Women Scorned (31 page)

Too risky to pass through the walls. Something passed by it with a scream of rage and pain. The other spirit, the one possessing the High Priest of the Order, was gone. So it wasn’t over. But Rory knew it could continue on if only it could find a way out.

It didn’t know how long it would be stuck in the mountain but knew a way out would come soon. It would endure. It would continue its quest to avenge all the angry spirits of men wronged.

Soon a time would come when it roamed outside again. And soon, it knew, maybe too soon, it would have to face Satan again.

*  *  *

Libitina yanked on the lever. Stuck for good. Deep inside she knew death had come for her at last. She stopped trying to pull the lever and ran to the bars, thinking it would be nice to watch Camilla walk away, to see her accomplishment one last time.

“What are you still doing here?” she asked when she saw Camilla still standing at the doorway, staring in.

“I just…”

“Run! Get the fuck out of here!” Her voice hit Camilla like a slap.

Camilla turned, still too slow, but at least she was moving, and descending the steps leading away from the manor, toward the forest, to safety. She had no idea what was going to happen, but she knew the further away Camilla was from the manor, the more likely she would successfully escape.

Libitina let go of the bars, her arms relaxed at her sides, a grin on her face.

“I did good,” she said to herself. “For once, I did good. Hell, I think I saved the whole damn world.” A booming rumble shook the manor and the mountain with it. Plaster and dust fell. The force of the explosion hit her back, slamming her into the bars, breaking her nose. She hardly had time to feel this, to register that her nose was broken. A disjointed thought,
this will make me look so pretty,
crossed her mind and then flames sank their teeth into her flesh. The manor fell apart around her.

*  *  *

In a great wave of heat, Camilla flew through the air. She felt her skin grow taught around her muscles, felt a hint of pain. She hit the ground and slid, her skin peeling back like an overcooked turkey’s. Her right cheekbone and shoulder bone ripped free of the skin. She stood, shook herself, straightened her neck in a slow pop. The tattered flesh on her face was stiff, black in places. It crackled as she grimaced. One small clump of hair remained at the front of her singed scalp, hanging over her forehead, but the rest of her head was bald.

She turned back to the manor and watched it burn. In the distance, high in the sky, she thought she saw the shape of one bright spirit hovering, also watching, but then it, too, was gone. She headed back to the forest, sensing Rory’s other half trapped in the mountainside, glad there wasn’t a way for her to get at him because she knew she would go to him if she could, would destroy herself in his kiss.

No. She needed to be strong. Rory couldn’t continue after her. Of this she was sure. The male half was weak in the decaying body it now inhabited. If it didn’t find another body soon, she knew Rory would be trapped in that flesh.

Camilla grinned, the skin on her upper lip breaking open, sending a rivulet of goo down her chin, dripping on her charred breasts. It would be sweet taking the breaths, but when Rory was done with her body, she would find a way to hold on.

It ended with her. She would never pass the spirit to another. Would never give up this life. In the end, she would rather bury herself in the earth and live eternity with Rory raging inside her while she rotted in the ground than be responsible for another woman suffering this violation, this possession.

Camilla faced the forest, faced her destiny and lurched onward, into her new future and the eternity of horrors that awaited her.