DeVante's Curse (2 page)

By the sixth summer, it occurred to DeVante
to wonder why the pool wasn't stagnate. The fresh water and darting
fish meant the pool had a source that could not be contained by
walls.

Finding the source became DeVante's
obsession, and he held his breath and dove to the bottom, exploring
with his hands, learning the ebb and flow of the water. It was
surprisingly deep, but after many tries, he found it; a narrow
underwater stream.

He told Felix about the stream, excited that
they were no longer trapped. Felix looked at DeVante with sad, sad
eyes. "I wish you luck, my friend. And warning: she will find you
and bring you back."

DeVante shrugged. "It is not about escape. I
would not leave you here. But the wall is my prison, even more than
Katarina. This place is not a lifetime sentence if I can leave at
will."

He swam underneath the wall. And swam back.
And after giving an absolute promise that they would return before
nightfall, he coaxed Felix under the wall, as well.

They explored the land beyond the walled
estate, and eventually found a village. It took three hours to walk
there and back. Later they would later purchase bread, cheese,
meat, and wine, bartering jewels and gold they stole from Katarina.
Not that she starved them, but often their food stores were moldy
and nearly spoiled.

Katarina never suggested that she knew they
were leaving the castle, but Felix was twitchy about their forays
into the village, insisting that Katarina knew many things, and
that she would eventually punish them for their insolence.

The nights became more and more of a
trial.

Sometimes Katarina fetched her food early in
the evening and brought the poor, doomed sods back to the castle,
where she toyed with them, like a cat with a mouse. Her first
choice always seemed to be adult males, young to middle-aged. She
would retire to her room with her new toy, leaving DeVante and
Felix to imagine the cause of the terrified shrieks that came from
her chambers.

DeVante had to shut every feeling part of
himself down to stand it. And as he grew taller and became
stronger, it became more and more difficult to keep his anger
locked away.

"We have to kill her," he said to Felix one
night, as whimpers and sobs leaked past Katarina's door. He was
shocked that the idea hadn't occurred to him sooner. They were
strapping young men. Surely it could be done.

Felix reacted with a violent show of emotion.
"Don't even think it!" he hissed. "She can read your mind, and I'll
be heaving you into the burn pit sooner than you could come up with
a plan. Get the idea out of your head. They don’t die. Don't you
get it? She's immortal. Nothing hurts her. Nothing kills her. I've
seen one man strangle her, and another disembowel her with a
dagger. And still she lives."

DeVante showed Felix wide eyes. "Sunlight and
fire. You told me either of them will destroy her."

"No. Don't even think about it," Felix
insisted. "I was mistaken. She is all-seeing and all-knowing.
Please."

DeVante promised to never think of it, ever
again.

And yet he thought of almost nothing
else.

The worst nights were the ones when she
badgered them, poked fun, and devised competitive games with full
intent to hurt and humiliate. That DeVante had never been
successful in learning her language made things worse. She would
issue a command, and DeVante would look to Felix to understand what
was expected. But she often set up even that, and DeVante's failure
was as inevitable as the beating she would administer later with
sparkling eyes and a satisfied smile. Time marched on, and the
games became more convoluted, more physical, as Katarina seemed to
acknowledge that DeVante was now more man than boy.

One such evening Katarina issued a command,
and Felix responded by approaching DeVante and striking him across
the face with the flat of his hand. Felix's eyes were haunted, but
he offered no apology. "Fight back. It's what she wants," he
murmured in a tight, charged voice.

DeVante did.

He had the grace of a large jungle cat and
the agility of a tree monkey, and once he realized Felix wasn't
holding back, he used these skills to defeat Felix, and pinned him
to the floor.

Katarina watched from her gilded throne with
interested eyes. Words came out of her mouth, directed at DeVante,
and she gestured him to come to her.

DeVante stood up slowly and shook his
clothing straight. He then offered a hand to Felix, pulling the man
to his feet. Katarina spoke again, her tone sharp and impatient.
"Go to her," Felix said in an urgent whisper.

DeVante approached her, dread filling his
limbs, wishing he had contrived to lose the battle.

When he stood before her, she spoke again,
looking up at him from her seated position. He, of course, did not
understand her words. She made a violent noise and smacked the side
of his head, and used her small, dainty foot to sweep his legs out
from under him. He went to his knees, and she smiled.

She reached out to him, and he flinched away
without thinking, which made her scowl. Then she stroked his brow
let her fingers slide into his hair. Before he realized what she
was going to do, she curled her fingers into claws, gripping his
hair and jerking his head up. And then… and then… she was nuzzling
his neck with her lips, licking him. He tried to push her away,
tried to fight, but she wrapped both her arms around him, and held
him so tightly he couldn't move at all.

The sting of her fangs piercing the flesh of
his throat was nothing compared to the feeling of pure revulsion
that twisted his guts.

When she finally let go, he sank to the
floor, light-headed and weak. The thought of standing or running
was unfathomable. He finally understood why Felix believed there
was no hope.

A moment later she gripped his chin between
the thumb and forefinger of one hand and let her fangs tear open
the wrist of her free hand.

Blood flowed. DeVante struggled to get away,
but there was no escape. Her fingers were like a vice. And while
his brain went through several stages of panic, she pressed her
bleeding flesh against his mouth hard enough to mash his lips apart
and smear blood on his teeth.

His physiological reaction was immediate. The
juice of the pomegranate was nothing. The dark tree plums ripened
beyond their prime, that made even the monkeys punch drunk, were
flavorless and dull compared to the blood of his captor.

His mind fought it desperately, but his
senses were submerged. An unfathomable feeling of peace flowed into
him.

DeVante understood so much more about Felix,
and about accepting his position here, and about… everything. It
was as if his brain had been sleeping, and was now suddenly awake.
As if he had been going about each day with eyes half-closed, and
now they were wide open, accepting every glean of light from each
star that shone through each crystalline pane of glass.

And his ears, and his fingers… every sense he
possessed was heightened, ready to experience and devour the room,
the night, the world. He would go back to the rainforest and
explain everything to the villagers, would find a healer, would
become the first male apprentice, and then the first male witch,
filling his mother's abandoned post… but first, first he would get
Felix away from here, and they would travel together, like
brothers, and spread warnings about Katarina, and figure out how to
--

Sharp laughter cut his thoughts short. It
warbled through the room, loud enough to be painful, and she
touched his head again, smoothed his hair. "Silly boy, you look
enraptured, like you've just seen God Himself." She dissolved into
laughter again.

DeVante did not know how to respond. He
looked over his shoulder to see Felix sitting on the floor,
watching everything.

"It wears off," Felix said softly. "And
leaves a craving."

DeVante could have cried, except he had sworn
to lock all emotion away, to feel nothing, because there was no
other way to survive in the witch's castle.

Katarina scowled at Felix. "Shut up, Felix.
I'm done with you for the night. Unless you want a beating."

DeVante realized that he suddenly understood
every word Katarina said. Was there something about her blood that
--

She interrupted his thought yet again.
"DeVante, you will come to my bed."

Felix gasped, and DeVante looked at his
friend, whose eyes had grown huge.

"No," Felix protested. "I'll come, Kat. I'll
take care of you. Leave him alone." Felix strode forward, grabbed
DeVante by the arm, and pulled him across the room, away from
Katarina.

Katarina fixed her glittery eyes on Felix.
"Jealous?" she asked. "That I would give him the blood?"

Felix shook his head. "No, no. Don't hurt
him. Haven't you done enough, stealing him from his life, his home?
Must you completely destroy him?"

Katarina threw back her head and laughed.
"You
are
jealous. How beautiful. Oh, you hide it well
enough, little boy Felix, but the truth is you don't want to share.
DeVante is special, has he told you? Something astounding is going
to happen when he dies. Something triumphant. Of course I will
destroy him. It's his destiny."

DeVante understood. She had brought him here
to kill him. Eventually. "Perhaps the triumph of my death will be
the end of your perverted existence," he said, keeping his tone low
and respectful.

Katarina smiled at him, and it was almost
friendly. "Ah, a little blood and now you can speak. I should have
fed you long ago, young one. Come here."

DeVante moved to obey, but Felix grabbed his
arm again and beseeched her. "Kat. Please."

She went completely still. "Do you defy me,
Felix? Am I not the Mistress here?"

"Yes, yes, you are," Felix quickly
agreed.

"Shall I punish you? A few days in the box,
perhaps?"

The fight went completely out of Felix. He
let go of DeVante's arm and dropped to his knees on the floor. "No,
Mistress. Have mercy. Please."

DeVante wanted to ask about the box, but
Felix was a shuddering mess, and distracting Katarina seemed the
best course.

He went to her and knelt at her feet. "How
may I serve you?" he asked, as humbly as he could manage. He kept
his eyes on the floor, not daring to look at her because surely
she'd see through the ruse to his true intention.

"Very nice," she said, and he felt her hand
stroking his hair.

Perhaps she knew exactly his plan to distract
her.

It did not matter. Her fingers in his hair
suddenly gave a sharp upward pull that exposed his neck.

DeVante's heart raced as she lowered her face
toward his flesh, and her hands held him tighter, because he was
fighting to pull away.

"You want to run, but you can't because I've
got you," she said. And her words were true, though it wasn't a
conscious fight; it was a surge of adrenaline, every nerve tight
with fear.

And then he felt her fangs graze his skin,
and a choked cry came out of somewhere, out of him, and he realized
that he had somehow become the capybara, frozen with fear, aware of
the inevitability of his own death. She was the jaguar, and when
her fangs tore through his flesh, he submitted… like prey.

When he was too weak to stay upright, she
carried him to her bed. He was dizzy from blood loss, swooning in
and out of consciousness. He forgot about Felix and forgot about
fear. Random thoughts came into his head. If she means to kill me,
should I even resist? It would be a relief to die.

Who would you have replace you, DeVante?

His whole body jerked because her voice came
right into his head.

The baker's daughter, what is she, about
sixteen summers? Wasn't she in the shop last week when you and
Felix bartered my silver bracelet for bread? She looked strong, for
a girl. Fierce. She could probably handle the stench of the
burnings
.

DeVante came wide awake with a cold shock.
Katarina knew they had been going into the village. She knew the
specific people they dealt with. And if DeVante chose death,
someone else would be forced to know the despair of being a
vampire's keeper.

The baker's daughter was indeed a strong
girl. And although DeVante did not think anyone in the village was
particularly wealthy, she wore her hair in rich ringlets, and her
smock was well-pressed and as white as the flour they used for
their baked goods. Her brown eyes had glinted with curiosity the
last time they bought bread, and she'd twirled a curl around her
finger and batted her lashes at Felix. She had given them each a
doughnut covered with fine white powder, and it melted so in their
mouths that Felix swore on the spot he would marry her one day.

DeVante had thrown back his head and laughed.
"Your love for a sugar doughnut," and Felix had laughed, as well,
but was quiet for most of the long walk home. When the castle came
into view, Felix had said, "Laugh if you want, but if I could
escape, I would marry a girl like that."

The chill grew as DeVante remembered Felix's
words. Katarina knew exactly what they had been up to, and would
certainly punish them. Why, the corpse tomorrow could be the baker.
Or the daughter.

!Mierde!

Katarina's chuckle in his ear was cruel, and
DeVante turned his head to see her cutting into her own wrist with
a small dagger. "Better than a sugar doughnut," she whispered, and
pressed her bleeding arm to his mouth.

He wanted to resist, refuse. Slap the smirk
off her face and shove her away. But the blood touched his tongue
and he remembered the ecstatic clarity of thought and vision that
accompanied the taste, and he was that quickly lost.

She was tender with him then, her fingers
whisper-soft silk against his overly sensitive skin, her voice a
purr both inside his head and out. She stripped him of his
clothing, and traced his body with her fingertips, pressing against
the muscular definition of his abdomen and arms.