Intuition: The Premonition Series (38 page)

He wants me to respond like her. Ha! No way, pal! You’re not my type,
I think scathingly.

Looking around the table at the other Gancanagh, the passion is building rapidly. As their lust is increasing, something else that I had hoped wouldn’t happen does. Lust is giving way to bloodlust. Hearing a distinctive
click,
not unlike the sound that a retractable pen makes when you click it into place to engage the ink, my eyes fly back to Brennus. He is still watching me; his smile is seductive, allowing me to see the fangs that have shot forward in his mouth from a retracted position. Then, I watch with detestable fascination as he nuzzles the girl’s shoulder lovingly, before piercing her flesh with his teeth. Her gasp is one of pleasure as a small trickle of blood escapes the powerful jaws of the Gancanagh next to me, to slowly trickle down her shoulder.

Freaking vampire!
I think as a shudder of revulsion slides down my spine. My hands are trembling for real as the horror of what is happening is breaking through my denial.

Pulling my eyes away from the feast going on next to me, I glance down the table to the other end. Alfred sits alone, watching my reaction. He is enjoying my confusion immensely. Rage and fury shoot through me as something snaps inside of me.
I am sitting across the table from the one who killed my Uncle Jim.
And, as that thought registers, nothing else matters at all. Nothing. Killing scenarios pulse in my brain like well-conceived plots, but I’m immediately frustrated by the fact that they all involve the ability to at least walk.

Slowly, so that I won’t disturb any of the frolicking going on around me, I lean forward, climbing up on the table. My eyes zero in on Alfred, who watches me with curiosity. I begin to crawl down the center of the table on my hands and knees, stalking the prey ahead of me. Confusion flickers across Alfred’s face as he sees my slow progression toward him. Then, realizing that I’m stalking him, he looks around in a nervous panic, as if he wants to get the attention of the others at the table, but he is unsure of how to do that without angering them.

Slinking down the center of the wooden table, it feels endless in its length and breadth from my target. I manage to get halfway to Alfred. As I come abreast of Ninian, my hand brushes his booted foot he has placed upon the table while enjoying his dinner. I pause then, because I know his dinner—it’s Autumn. Autumn must have been in on their little plot tonight to sabotage me at the library. She had followed me around all evening, probably making sure that I didn’t leave before they got there. She is enthralled now with the attention she is getting from Ninian, content to be his meal—
cheers Ninian.

The glint of a knife sticking out of the top of Ninian’s boot catches my eye. Not slowing my progress, I pull the knife easily from his ankle strap as I continue slinking down the table.

Pushing his chair back from the table, Alfred prepares for the frontal attack I’m bringing him. His wings are vibrating loudly, making me want to tear them from his back. I want to stop the noise that makes me remember the 7-Eleven, where I had first heard it. Alfred’s eyes are wide with concern as they search the room wildly, attempting to find his best escape scenario. I train my eyes on his, seeing if they will tell me which way he is going to go.

Someone clears his throat loudly behind me. I ignore the noise, focusing on the fact that Alfred’s eyes are telling me he is preparing to leap up toward the ceiling and fly away from my assault. “Genevieve, whah are ye doin’?” Brennus asks behind me. I can tell by the distance of his voice that he is still seated at the head of the table.

Ignoring him, I inch closer to Alfred, who is riveted by my intensity, but he snaps out of it in the next instant. His muscles tense to make his leap into the air. My muscles tense, too, and I don’t feel an ounce of pain as I spring up on my severed heel to follow Alfred into the air. Arcing toward him, I extend my knife. Although I had planned on it embedding itself in Alfred’s chest, in the exact spot where he had plunged his knife into Russell’s, I miss the mark because I don’t have the force necessary due to my damaged foot. I am a little disappointed when my knife embeds itself in Alfred’s thigh and I slide down his leg, carving a long, severe slice out of his quadricep. Although, hearing his screams of pain makes my disappointment somewhat easier to handle.

Dropping on the floor, I roll and pivot, trying to catch a hold of his foot so that I can pull him down to me. Nothing is registering in my mind but killing Alfred. Seeing that I can’t reach him from my position on the floor, I leap back up on the table, pivoting again to jump to the chandelier above my head. Just before I can spring toward it, someone scoops me up off the table. Brennus is holding me in a bone-crushing hug that squeezes the air out of my lungs, making me see spots.

There are shouts of dissent from all around me. Someone says, “Gawd, why did he stop her? Dat is da sexiest ting I’ve ever seen in all me life.”

“Did ye see her movin’ down da table? I tought I would die from na touchin’ her,” says Ninian, who must have noticed me take his knife.

“Ye will na kill me guests, pet,” Brennus breathes in my ear. I would have screamed in frustration, if I could get enough air in my lungs to do it. Looking around wildly, I try to see where Alfred has gone, but he must have fled somewhere else. I guess he thinks that bleeding, while in the company of Gancanagh, is not a clever thing to do. It’s that, or he is truly afraid of me. He should be. He should quake when he sees me coming because I am his destiny—his end.

When I don’t relent, but struggle harder to get away, Brennus squeezes me so tight I think I might lose consciousness. I don’t, I just lose my grip on the knife I had stolen from Ninian. “Right lads—we have a very lethal Seraph. No one underestimate her. ‘Til she’s one of us, she’s na one of us—no matter how fetching she is,” Brennus says. He hoists me up in his arms and swings me toward one of the stairwells—the one that leads down. “Finn—ye go see if dere is news about da other. Someting went wrong.”

Dragging me down several flights of stone stairs, we reach the bottom, where there are several winding shaft-like hallways. Turning left, Brennus half-drags, half-carries me to what can only be described as cells that line the hallway. Thick steel doors held by thicker hinges gape open in some instances and are sealed shut in others. It seems to be a random choice of cell when Brennus turns and deposits me in one of the small rooms. There is nothing in this room. Nothing. Just a dirt floor and stone walls. He does not say a word when he backs out, slamming the door closed. I hear him sliding a bolt shut to secure the door.
I must have scared him,
I think as I look around at the cell that is probably no bigger than ten by ten square.

Adrenaline courses through me and I’m rational enough to know that I’m the strongest I will ever be at this moment in my captivity. I turn and push with all of my might against the steel door that traps me behind it. The door bows a little as it groans and protests the abuse. I step away from it when it refuses to give any more. Backing away to the wall, I run at the door, using my body as a battering ram to try to plow through it. The door rattles and a couple of cracks form on the wall surrounding the door, but it doesn’t open. I try again, but I’m really hurting myself. My shoulder is fractured for sure and I just can’t get enough speed to thrust against the door because of my severed tendon and the fact that there just isn’t enough room to gather the speed needed to do it.

Hobbling back from the door, I hold my right arm that is limp from being crushed against the door. Defeated, I collapse to the floor in a heap. I lie there for a while, my legs bent at an awkward angle beneath me. I need to rest—repair the damage that has been done to my body and plan my escape. While I’m at it, I’ll start my hit list:
Number one, Alfred
—
number two, Brennus
—
number three, Finn…

After my foot is mostly healed, I pace the cell. It has to be mid-afternoon by now and no one has come back to check on me for over twelve hours. I’m so thirsty. I have sores forming in my mouth from dryness. I think that my need for water has increased because of the healing I’ve had to do to recover from my injuries. I feel dehydrated and it occurs to me that I shouldn’t pace, I should sit down and conserve what little hydration I have left.

At around sixteen hours without water, I’m getting desperate, and my muscles are beginning to ache and cramp. I never imagined I would need water this much. But I do need it. I need it.

It occurs to me that this is just like the first dreams I began having right after I found out what Alfred had done to my uncle. I kept having vague dreams, like I was starving, but there had been no images to accompany the dreams. Maybe that is because I’m stuck down in a dark mine, in a cell with only vague shapes to let me know that I’m anywhere at all.

A while later, I begin to feel detached from all of this, like I don’t exist anymore.
They’re not coming back,
I think feebly and the sadness of being lost down here forever is stabbing at me like a knife.

I lose track of the time, but an eternity later, a small slat in the door opens and a voice comes through the door, “Do ye want some water, pet?” it asks. I immediately know it is Brennus.

“Yes,” I reply in a near whisper because I can hardly speak at this point and I’m desperate. Two small, 4-ounce bottles of water drop in. Brennus doesn’t speak again and the slat closes quickly without preamble. Pulling myself up off the floor, I retrieve the bottles of water. I drink the first bottle right away, trying not to spill a drop of it. The second bottle I try hard to ration. With my need for water fulfilled for now, I focus on the strategy Brennus is employing with me.
What does he want from me? Does he want my complete loathing? Well, mission accomplished. I hate him.

There are several things going on here. I have to break them out in little pieces in order to understand them fully, like Zephyr had been teaching me back in Crestwood. A pang of longing hits me when I think of my friend.
Where are you now, Zee?
I wonder, and I almost begin to cry before I clamp down on my emotions so I can focus on what is really important.

Okay, Brennus wants something from me. My blood? Possibly, he might like to snack on angels. We might be tasty to the Gancanagh. But, why not just take it then? There are a dozen of them and only one of me. He said he wants to make me one of them. He’s going to let Alfred take my soul so that I’ll die—or almost die, and then he’ll do what? Somehow make me one of them. How does that work? Maybe I have to be willing somehow—like Buns said, I have to willingly give my soul to Alfred. Do I have to willingly become a Gancanagh, too?

It seems to me that everything in this life of mine is about choice. I have some choice in what happens to my soul. Now that I know where my soul may be allowed to go, I’m less willing to give it up to a stinking demon. Having felt Paradise briefly, I want it. If I had acted differently than I had before, would Russell be enjoying Paradise right now? Instead, he’s trapped in the U.P. near a nest of Gancanagh and Alfred. They’re probably all out hunting for him. That is what Brennus had meant about “da other.” He was telling Finn to find out what has gone wrong with Russell.

Go, Russell!
I think, sending up a silent prayer that he is past Cleveland by now and on his way to anywhere. I know they don’t have Russell because Alfred would be down here right now bartering Russell’s life for my soul.

It is at least a full day before I hear the slat on my cell door slide open again. It had been at least twelve hours since the water that I had tried to ration had run out. I feel dazed, and not at all sure if I am imagining Brennus’ voice, when he asks me, “Do ye want some water, pet?”