Soul Enslaved (Sons of Wrath Book 3) (11 page)

Sabelle knit her brows. “How so?”

“Instead of sinking into what surrounds you, what’s normal for your species, the expectations and social pressures placed on you, you seem undeterred. You emerge above it all. You want a better life. I admire that.”

She rested her forearm on the console, flashing a tattoo on her wrist of a lotus in deep purple, almost black, sitting in dark water. Two stark white butterflies hovered above it, with the letters
T
and
J
set inside each of the wings. Beneath the entire piece, the words
ad meliora
had been tattooed in cursive.

“A lotus. Very appropriate for you. Fitting for what I just said.”

“It’s a reminder for me. I had it done a couple years back.” A quick glimpse of him incited a smile, and she slid her arm back into her lap, her fingers fidgeting at the compliment. “Thank you. Though, I imagine the women who hang off you most of the time are the most elegant flowers in creation.”

“Elegant, perhaps.” Gavin’s fingers curled around the steering wheel. “Some happen to be the most poisonous.”

Through the windshield, Sabelle caught sight of something white, almost glowing, down in the roadside ditch. “What the hell is that?” She stole a quick glance, noticing the tightness of Gavin’s jaw.

“Sang.”

The car came to a stop on the lip of the road, about a half-mile from where the crouching beast tore at meat from some poor species.

“Say what?” Sabelle’s fingers curled around the leather seat and she straightened her back, focusing on the white creature ahead of them. “Why did we stop?” Christ, whatever it had looked dead from where she sat.

The manic shift of her eyes, to him and forward again, did little to affect Gavin’s focus. “They’re an ancient creature of Orcosia. I’m surprised to see it out in the open like this. They’re usually quite reclusive.” He nodded toward her. “Glove box. Hand me the glock from inside.”

“Glock? Do bullets kill them?”

“We’ll find out.”

***

Gavin quietly slipped out of the car, eyes locked on the white figure ahead. Though, it seemed to still carry some human traits, the further the Sang disease progressed, the more they tended to look like creatures.

Long stretches of muscle fibers hung from its mouth as it consumed the body spread out before it like a buffet. Lifting his hand, Gavin leveled the gun, aimed and fired.

A splat of red hit the beast’s forehead. In a flash of light, it disappeared.

Muffled screams rang from behind, and Gavin swung around to see Sabelle scrambling inside the SUV. He bolted toward the passenger door and threw it open, allowing Sabelle to tumble from the seat. Within, lain across the driver’s seat and console, the Sang oozed a clear, bloody pool that’d trickled across her thighs.

“H-h-how d-d-did it do th-th-that?” Shaking and covered in clear, almost plasma-like ichor, she flinched as Gavin wrapped a coat over her shoulders. Her body trembled against his, before she sucked in a breath and backed out of his embrace.

“They can transport, or
flash
, as it’s referred. Glad to know he was affected by bullets at least.” Gavin stepped away from her and walked toward the lifeless and discarded body still lying on the ground.

“Where are you going?” She trailed after him like a puppy.

“Making sure the poor bastard he was feeding on is dead.”

As Gavin approached, his pace faltered. The chest of the victim rose and fell—slow and irregular. Its skin blackened with a shine around it’s eyes glowing orange.

“How the hell?” Gavin murmured.

He watched with a frown, as it morphed from human to its Saevious form, writhing with impending death. Its chest and stomach cavities had been torn open and ripped to shit, and entrails hung over the jagged edges of its wounds. Blood trickled down its cheek, and its eyes looked almost robotic, too big for their sockets, as they spun around in what must’ve been delirium.

“What is it?”

“A Saevious demon. Incredibly dangerous. Much stronger than the Sang I’ve encountered so far.”

“So … it was feeding on that?”

“Yes. It must’ve been wounded already. They’re very hardy demons. Savage.” White smoke from inside the demon’s chest cavity caught Gavin’s eye, and he knelt beside the body. Using a stick from the ground beside him, he pushed aside the spilling viscera and shook his head.

Some of the organs inside had crystallized, carrying a white frost on the surface. A few beads of liquid clinging to the outer surface evaporated into the organs.

Gavin blew out a breath and tossed the stick. “Liquid nitrogen. Must’ve consumed it. They have an aversion to cold.” Gavin rubbed his hand through his hair. “Fuck.”

“What does this mean?”

“The Sang are an ever-evolving creature. Imagine a strand of genetic material with open pockets, just waiting for mutations it can suck up like a sponge. I’m surprised we were able to kill it at all. Bullets don’t affect Saevious demons, and the Sang would’ve taken up traits of its victim.”

The demon lying on the ground finally stilled.

“Let’s go. I want to double-check its corpse.”

“What happens when they take on victims traits?” Sabelle asked.

The thought of such a thing made his stomach churn, and Gavin couldn’t hide the grimness in his expression as he glanced back. “If they’re able to overpower the demons, nothing will be able to stop them from annihilating every species on this planet. We’re the final barrier. In our history, they wiped themselves out of existence.”

“And humans?”

“They’re a self-limiting entity. Unless humans can create a viable means of sustaining them, without a voracious need to consume everything in its path, humans are just as much at risk.”

“Where did these creatures come from? If they wiped themselves out?”

“I don’t know. Someone with a penchant for fucking up the world.” Gavin stared off, recalling a visit from Penwell and his son just a few months prior. “I happen to know of one pharmaceutical company that seems to have an unnatural interest in the species.”

Gavin’s heart caught in his throat as he came to a stop beside the passenger door of the vehicle. “What the f—”

Ichor still coated the leather, but the Sang was nowhere in sight.

“He was dead when he flashed, right?” he asked. “No sign of life?”

“I … I didn’t see him move or … he didn’t seem to be alive, no.”

Gavin rested his head on the frame of the car door. “Fuck. Somewhere there’s a Sang with the power of a Saevious.” He pulled his cell phone from his pocket and speed-dialed Ceferina. “I need a meeting with Aeguza. As quickly as it can be arranged. At the casino.”

“Is everything all right, dear?”

“I’m not sure. It seems the Sang have moved one rung up the food chain. You’re welcome to join us.”

“I’ll have him meet you at first light.”

“Thank you. My apologies for calling so late.”

“Not at all. Is all going well with …?”

“Yes, I’m fine.” Gavin caught sight of Sabelle, biting her lip, eyes vacant as though deep in thought. “Thank you, Ceferina.”

“Talk soon, Love.”

Gavin hung up the phone. “Wish I knew where these bastards flashed to.”

Shivering, Sabelle pulled his jacket tighter around her body. “That’s gotta be one frightening place.”

***

Calix stepped through the ash and rubble where Ryke’s fighting lair once stood. The old abandoned factory had been burned to the ground by his brother, Ferno, who possessed the gift of hellsfire. Nothing survived hellsfire, including a single clue as to where Calix might find Ava.

Huffing, he ran his hands through his hair and crouched in the ruins that lay around him. Calix had been banned from seeing Ava, thanks to Ryke, but at least there’d always been the sense—her presence a constant warmth that surrounded him. The knowing where to find her and how to reach her thoughts, on nights when he felt particularly lonely without her.

He reached for a skull as he came to a stand and hurled it across the debris. It slid through a hole in a half-burnt brick wall, and he started at an echoing crack he hadn’t expected to hear.

Calix crossed over charred body parts, seared weapons, and around the cage remnants that scarcely managed to stand. On the other side of the wall, he found a hallway, hidden behind the wreckage. While half had been burned away, the final three doors remained surprisingly intact.

What the hell?

On the wall, a circle had been drawn in chalk and Calix placed his hand in the center of it, his breath catching when it passed through. A door had been left open. Alterrealm, as the supes called them. Perhaps in his haste, Ryke had forgotten to close a passage to Orcosia, though where it led to remained a mystery. At least Calix knew why the wall hadn’t burned, though.

With a careful step, he climbed inside, a wall of cold air hitting his face as his foot touched down on the gray concrete, in what appeared to be another hallway. A single light swung back and forth from the ceiling. The scent of blood and rot clung to the air. Water dripped a constant beat from behind.

Calix swung around to find that the hallway went on until it faded to darkness.

An outcry brought him spinning back in the other direction.

“Oh, God, stop! Please!” Hard to tell if the high-pitched squeal belonged to male or female, but Calix hastened his steps toward it. “Help me!”

A thick iron door brought him to a halt and Calix peeked inside. Through the darkness, he spotted a dozen bodies hanging from chains that reached up into the ceiling. Most of the bodies had been torn apart, cavities opened and mutilated. As the putrid smell of decay burned his nose, Calix covered his face with his sleeve.

In the back corner, two white figures clung to one of the bodies. The Sang.

“Oh … fuck!” He’d first seen one of those creatures the night Ferno had burned Ryke’s underground club to the ground.

Splayed fingers and a quivering jaw told Calix the person being eaten was still alive.

Calix raised his dagger and skirted around the hanging bodies, keeping to the shadows. With a hand on the second dagger at his hip, he threw the first, nailing the Sang in the back of its skull.

It slid to the floor, revealing the gore of the victim, whose genitals had been eaten away and thighs chewed to shreds.

The second Sang hissed, and its blood-red eyes locked on Calix—before it vanished into thin air.

Hands gripped Calix’s throat and a sharp sting pierced his neck. He reached back and grappled with the nape of his attacker, grimacing at the soft, squishy texture of its skin, as he yanked it over his shoulder.

Fangs protruded, and its eyes, so red they almost appeared black, narrowed in rage.

Calix sliced his blade across its throat and drew back as clear, glistening fluids sprayed upward into his face. Another slice decapitated the beast.

The first Sang had crawled toward him and it reached out a clawed hand.

Calix stabbed it, palm down, into the concrete, before removing the dagger from its skull and performing the same decapitation. He watched in awe as gold-speckled blood pooled across the floor.

Soft whimpers drifted across the room, hardly discernible over the rattling chains, as what appeared to be a male, judging by his facial hair, shook.

Calix stood from the gore and, careful not to hit the gaping wounds, he lifted the frail, human body from the hook lodged into his back. The male toppled forward, his hands bound behind him in chains, and with a slice of his dagger, Calix set them free before lying the male down onto the concrete.

“Who are you?” Calix asked.

“Na … name’s P-P-Paul. I’m … Alexi.” His eyes rolled back in his head, and Calix tapped his cheek.

“Hey! Paul!”

The guy roused, his face pale with a hint of blue that must’ve been hypothermia setting in.

“I’m going to get you out of here, okay?”

Instead of answering, he released a long sigh and his face morphed into pain. His body jerked. “I … want … to die.”

“No can do, my friend. You’ll be fixed up in no time.”

The male seized, his eyes rolling to white, and his body shook in Calix’s arms. When his eyes slid back down, the large brown irises doubled in size. “They’re coming!”

“Are there others in this place? I’m looking for a girl.”

The male’s lip quivered, like he couldn’t decide whether he wanted to laugh or cry. “The girls … are the first to go … the …” His lip curled in repulsion. “What they do to them …” Tears formed in his eyes before they fluttered shut.

Calix shook him. “Hey.” He placed his head on his chest, relieved at the
thump, thump, thump
still steadily beating within. “What do they do? Where are they taken?”

The male didn’t rouse.

Invisible trails of ice slid down Calix’s spine and chilled his bones. If Ava happened to be one of those taken, the expression on the male’s face promised a fate worse than death.

***

The humming sound penetrated Ava’s ears, rattling her skull. It seemed to be growing louder, more monotonous.

A pungent scent invaded her nose, one she instantly identified as the stench of blood and rotted flesh.

The loud buzz of a chainsaw finally broke her from a sleepy state and jerked her awake, to the clanging of chains near her ear.

One lone fluorescent light swung from above, flickering. A quick sweep of the room revealed steel counters and dirty white countertops, sprayed with graffiti.

On the door leading in, black writing said:
Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.

A loud thud interrupted the sound of the saw, and Ava craned her neck, bringing a tall, beastly thing into view. Its skin was mottled and brown, and its spine popped through its back as if it’d been ripped out and re-secured on the outside. She’d never seen anything like it before, yet her senses told her its malevolence was demonic in nature.

Though his facing away hindered Ava’s view, he seemed to be struggling, his arms jerking violently. Craning her head to the other side brought a stomach-lurching pile of bodies on the floor beside him into view. Some of the bodies were naked. Some dressed. Military. Some teenage kids, it looked like. All dead. Slaughtered and likely about to be cut up into parts.