Blood Blade

Chapter 18

The bastard had gotten lucky.

That was the only explanation for it. Like any other monkey that had more persistence than brains, the fool from Philadelphia had gotten lucky. Misonyk had heard about a fool who’d attacked Nymar and even a shapeshifter or two while surviving to tell the tale. Very lucky, indeed.

Misonyk had no trouble finding the man from Philadelphia for himself. As it turned out, the fool was also a coward who’d brought others along to help fight his battles. The others might have talked loudly, but they had shaky hands and frightened eyes. They came with weapons from the Old World, and most of them died like cattle. At the end of an exhilarating night, lightning was caught in a bottle.

Misonyk was blindsided by a stake that pierced his back. When he’d turned to get a look at the one who would make such a cowardly attack, he felt another stake pierce his side. That was followed by another, but none of them were deep enough to bring him to his knees. All those blows did was prove that the monkeys had listened to too many stories around their cooking fires before planning their little ambush. At one point Misonyk even thought he smelled garlic in the air.

That made him laugh.

When a spear was driven through his entire body to stop him in his tracks, he stopped laughing. The man from Philadelphia was at one end of that spear. The Nymar within Misonyk’s chest was at the other.

Misonyk dropped. The spear was broken off so only an inch or so of wood protruded from his chest. After that he could only squirm and hiss as he was dragged to a filthy dungeon of a place that surrounded him with blasphemous markings, his ears stuffed with pompous words and his nose filled with the stench of feces.

For years he lay on that floor as men with smug faces came and went. At first they’d preached to him and asked why he did what he did, how he’d become what he was. All Misonyk gave them was profanities in every language he could remember. When he’d gathered up enough strength to spit at one of them, the putrid jailer actually collected the mess from his own face and saved it. It seemed the monkeys enjoyed wallowing in the filth of others just as much as they enjoyed wallowing in their own.

All the while, Misonyk could only think one thing: the bastard from Philadelphia had gotten lucky. It was the only thing that could explain how that fool had struck such a blow. While luck might have played a part in putting that spear through his chest, there was no word to describe what possessed those monkeys to lock him in a room and prod him for their own amusement rather than finish him then and there.

Every so often the pompous men would visit his cell wearing butchers’ coats and gloves so they could carve off pieces of him and then leave. Misonyk was impaled with steel spikes. He was drained of his essence one drop at a time. He was cut open. His hair was plucked from his scalp. Holes were bored into his head. But he took none of those things to heart. The monkeys, it seemed, even committed such atrocities to their own kind. Misonyk could hear the human prisoners scream, even though he wasn’t willing or able to make a sound of his own.

One day blended into another, and the only way he knew time was passing was because of the hole that had been cut into his ceiling. He’d heard the monkeys chattering about him burning away in the sunlight, but that never happened. While his skin might have crisped in the summers, his eyes eventually got used to the glare and his body became accustomed to the warmth it usually shunned.

As he lay there, growing numb to the endless violations inflicted upon him, Misonyk became skilled at playing the part of a dead man. He allowed his eyes to glaze over and his body to remain as still as he’d been when he was first dropped onto the floor. That way, the monkeys became more relaxed around him. Even as they stuck their hands and faces within biting range, they chattered about the other patients in nearby rooms. Apparently, the room directly across from his contained a very special case.

The voice coming from that room screamed much louder than the rest. It grew wilder as the days wore on. In time it became feral.

According to the idle chatter of the lazy monkeys who tormented Misonyk, the wild patient had also been dragged to his room by the fool from Philadelphia. He was a young man who screamed and bit and scratched at the orderlies that came to clean out his room. He choked on his food and gnawed on his own fingers. There was even talk that he wasn’t a man at all. And after a few patient years, Misonyk arranged for a very personal introduction to that troubled young soul.

It happened on a day that started like any other. Before his door was opened, Misonyk tested his muscles to see if they would move. The spore inside of him was still punctured, but it was slowly healing around the chunk of wood that remained in his chest. Perhaps in a few more months he would be able to stand.

This time, however, it was no orderly that came to torture and humiliate him. It was the man from Philadelphia himself. The fool was as tall and brutish as Misonyk had remembered. His graying hair was gathered behind his head in a thick ponytail by a short length of twine. Even the whiskers sprouting from his gaunt face reflected how time was having its way with him. Until he’d actually seen how the years had scratched that face, Misonyk wasn’t aware that he’d been laying on that floor for so very long.

Stomping over to Misonyk as two of the regular orderlies filed into the room, the fool dropped to one knee and grabbed his face in one hand. Misonyk tried to struggle, but the lucky bastard responded by grabbing and twisting the stake in his chest as if working a lever. When Misonyk was almost unconscious from pain, the fool from Philadelphia stuck his fingers into the swollen sack under the left side of Misonyk’s tongue and pulled the delicate Nymar seedlings out from where they naturally collected. The seeds of his species might have gathered in a different spot than they did for humans, but that spot was just as sensitive for a Nymar as it was for any man. Misonyk tried to clamp down on the fool’s hand, but his jaw was already held in place by a rusted metal wedge.

No one, human or Nymar, had ever wounded Misonyk that way. The pain spiked from that protected sac under his tongue, all the way down to the spore attached to his heart. Even through all of that, he was able to hear the fool’s voice.

“I imagine this hurts you,” the fool from Philadelphia said. “But I have also gathered that you quite enjoyed raping the women of the nearby towns until they’d lost too much blood to provide you with a meal.”

That one made Misonyk smile. Such fond memories would sustain him for several more weeks in that room.

“I would imagine their spirits are enjoying this show very much indeed,” the fool said as he pinched the nerves that attached the seedling gland to Misonyk’s jaw. The man then tore the sac loose and held it out far enough for Misonyk to see it before he finally cut the last remaining nerve with a quick swipe of a short dagger. “You’ll roast in hell for the sins you committed against all those good people, but not until I’m through with you. At least you’ll do some bit of good before you rot away.” Looking over to the other men who had filed into the room, he held the sac out until one of them stepped forward holding a glass jar that was half full of a cloudy liquid.

Once the sac was dropped into the liquid, the other man asked, “What should I do with this, Mr. Lancroft?”

The fool from Philadelphia made sure to lock eyes with Misonyk as he replied, “Take it to the lab inside the mansion. And be careful. It’ll take a long time to collect another batch like that. Personally, I’d rather kill this piece of manure rather than keep him alive that long.”

The rest of the men nodded and backed out of the room.

The fool from Philadelphia knelt down so he could look into Misonyk’s eyes. He pushed the lids open and even pulled the Nymar’s lips up so he could get a look at the fangs extending from the gum line as he removed the wedge. Misonyk snapped, but the fool’s hand was pulled back with reflexes that were marginally impressive for a human.

“Lancroft,” Misonyk hissed.

The fool nodded and stood up. As he stepped out of the room, he turned to face the men in the hall. “Keep an eye on the vampire and see what’s bothering Henry. Work up a new schedule so both of them can be observed for any changes.”

“Yes, sir.”

Misonyk reached his decision as one of his keepers was about to lock the door to his cell. Before the men could get too far away, he pushed out a loud breath and used most of his strength to scrape his leg against the floor. Thankfully, that was enough.

“See if he needs to be tied down,” he heard Lancroft say. “I’ve got to look in on a few of the others.”

“Yes, sir.”

One of the remaining orderlies came back to Misonyk and stared down at him from a safe distance. Misonyk could practically taste the fear dripping out of him. Forcing himself to groan and turn his face to one side was enough to draw the curious monkey closer. When the orderly was close enough, Misonyk faced him again and spat venom into his face. After all the time he’d been laying there, he had collected more than enough in his throat to get the job done. Like a good, frightened little animal, the orderly rubbed at his face and eyes to make sure plenty of the cloudy fluid got where it needed to be. Mere seconds after wiping himself off, the monkey responded to the intense glare in Misonyk’s eyes.

Come…closer, Misonyk thought. Each syllable grated against his agonized mind, but proved to be worth the effort as the orderly leaned forward.

Misonyk could have sunk his fangs in then and there, but he resisted. He could have ordered the man to remove the remnants of the spear in his chest and help him up, but Misonyk was too weak to put up the fight that would be necessary to get him outside of Lancroft’s walls. Since it would take a long while to produce more venom, he used the chance he’d been given.

Get those spores. When Misonyk saw the confusion on the monkey’s face, he added, The things in that jar. Take them and give them to the wild man across the hall. You will tell Lancroft the jar was dropped. Do you understand?

The orderly glanced toward the door and nodded.

Come back…every day, Misonyk ordered, putting as much power into his thoughts that his weakened body could manage. Blood you take from me…will be shared with him.

It took all of Misonyk’s strength to project so many words, but he got them out. The monkey left and pulled the door shut behind him. Even after he’d been locked into his room, Misonyk could watch from his new puppet’s eyes as the jar was retrieved and then brought to the room across from his. Henry fought and screamed, but the puppet carried out his task. A few of the monkeys came to help and might have been killed by the wild man, but Misonyk knew that would only leave Henry with some much-needed sustenance. Eventually, the fighting stopped and Henry’s shouts were silenced.

Before long Misonyk’s eyes snapped open and he fought the urge to scream. It wasn’t normally possible for a Provider to pass along more than one seedling at a time, so that added a few more voices to the hellish symphony already filling poor Henry’s thoughts. The connection was made. The spores had been fed to Henry, but now Misonyk found himself in the mind of a madman. It didn’t take long for him to learn that Henry was no man. He was a creature struggling to find his new shape. A creature with a head full of demons preventing him from taking his true form.

Misonyk closed his eyes and tried to block Henry’s screams from his mind. The spore required time to nest.

Time crawled along.

The wild man grew wilder. Although he wasn’t progressing as Misonyk had expected, Henry was indeed able to hear the thoughts that he sent him.

Lancroft and his helpers continued to check in on him to see about harvesting spores to replace the ones that had gone missing, only to find that some parts of Nymar physiology were slower to heal than others.

The link between Henry and Misonyk was strong, thanks to the multitude of spores forced into Henry’s body, but it wasn’t a normal transition from man into Nymar. Instead, the process was slowed by something else. The wildness inside of Henry kept any of the Nymar spores from embracing his heart as they so desperately wanted to do. The spores continued to grow, however, and were consistently fed as Henry got his hands on more and more of Lancroft’s men. Soon, Henry was strong enough to start digging.

Poor Henry. He loved his room, but Misonyk pressed him to find a way out. When the monkeys couldn’t get close enough to touch Henry without losing a piece of themselves, they started firing their weapons into Henry’s beloved room. They even tried to starve him and beat him into submission. It was even rumored that somewhere along the way one of the workers had snapped poor Henry’s neck.

Throughout this time, Misonyk comforted Henry as any good Lord should. When the explosions came and the floors above Misonyk’s cell collapsed, the only thing he or Henry could do was listen.

Years later, as Henry kept screaming and scraping at his walls with torn and bloody fingers, Misonyk urged him on. The wolf inside of Henry kept him alive. It also forced the spores inside of him to squirm in his belly, wriggle between his organs, and occasionally fight one another like eels trapped within a suffocating prison. That struggle turned out to be a blessing, since it kept Henry awake day and night for years on end so he could continue digging.

By the time Misonyk heard the crumbling of shattered stone and the splintering of reinforced wood, the spear in his chest had almost rotted away. Since there was nothing on which to feed, it was all Misonyk could do to keep himself alert and ready to move in the event that Henry finally fulfilled his Lord’s command.

That day came after over one hundred years of imprisonment.

Misonyk could smell Henry’s fetid hide and hear his nonsensical ravings as he’d scraped at the door that had been shut so long ago. As soon as that door gave way, Misonyk wanted to pounce upon the man who’d opened it and drink until he could feel the spore swell once more within him. Instead, all he could do was lay beneath the dust that had formed a filthy cocoon around him and wait to see Henry with his own eyes. When he did, Misonyk almost felt sorry for the poor wretch.

Almost, but not quite.

Henry’s body swelled and shrank, unable to stop as long as the Nymar spore fought the beast inside of him for sole ownership of the man’s soul. Somehow, Henry managed to stand before Misonyk as his head dangled at the end of a broken neck.

“God?” the wretch whispered.

Misonyk turned his head, but just enough to crack the thick layers of filth encrusted upon his neck. You must heal me, Misonyk thought. And then we can walk together.

For a moment Henry simply gawked down at Misonyk. After he moved closer, Henry’s eyes finally settled upon the remains of the spear lodged in Misonyk’s chest. The pain Misonyk felt as the remains of Lancroft’s weapon was pulled free was the best thing the Nymar had felt in all of his years. Pressing his hand against the phantom splinters marking the spot where the spear had resided for all that time, he stood up and smiled at Henry.

The sounds of a changed world drifted from above the ruins of Lancroft. Machines rumbled and humanity bleated their nonsense without so much as a thought as to who might be listening. Misonyk was hungrier than he’d ever thought possible. Stay here until I come back for you.

“Then can I walk?” Henry grunted.

You’ll be able to run.