Vicious Circle

Chapter 30

When I thought that you had betrayed me,” Menessos said, “my anger bested me. But now, now that I know it was the whelp—I mean, now that I know it was Johnny who betrayed us both, I am determined to prove to you that I am infinitely more worthy of your trust than he.” He added softly, “And I sincerely hope that you will find yourself liking me.”

Focusing on the blaze before me because I didn’t want to see his expression, I asked, “You never really answered me about Johnny.”

Fabric rustled, and easy footsteps brought him beside me, where he sat, imitating my position before the fire. A glance told me the flames lent color to his skin, color that suited him well. I could almost have thought him human.

“I hope you can acknowledge his mistake and understand that a punishment is in order. Consider it a lesson in how unreliable and capricious wæres can be. Placing trust, or responsibility, in them is an incautious decision with an often disastrous result.”

I thought of Nana’s predilection, “Witches and wæres weren’t meant to mingle.” The last few days had chiseled the sharp edge off that belief for her. I wondered what it would take to change the vampire’s mind. “Trusting you was an incautious decision.”

Menessos seemed offended. “Have I not done everything I said I would?”

I snorted. “That and more! You made the wærewolves change, all of them, during the spell. Not just Theo.”

He held up a finger. “Ah, I said they would not be harmed, and they were not. I never said they would not transform. Perhaps you told them they would not, but I made no such assurances.”

I glared at him. “If there hadn’t been enough power to change them fully—”

“Persephone, I owned that book a long, long time and I know it well. And I know that if I had let the wærewolf transform without her alpha also in wolf form to guide her and communicate with her, she would have been disoriented and lashed out. I do not make oaths lightly, or without thinking them through to the end.”

I faced the fire again. Part of me wanted to demand how he had known her alpha was among them, but another part of me was aware that I was simply arguing because that kept the vampire comfortably at arm’s length. Peripherally, I was aware that Menessos had arched his neck to glance down at his chest. “Admittedly, I had not considered this possibility.”

“What?”

He shifted his torso and opened his shirt. There, inches above his heart, was a deep gash, coated with drying blood, dark and thick. A sickening flap of wasted skin with a piece of muscle still attached lay on his chest, exposing the depth of the cruel stroke that had made it.

“Samson endeavored to use the stake to strike me down. He had learned of this weapon through rumors, so his information was questionable and lacking. For instance, he was unaware that if he carried the true stake on his person, he would not be able to tread within a hundred yards of me or any of my people without us knowing it. Unaware of this limitation, he boldly brought the fake to our meeting place under his coat. He was able to enter with it because we felt nothing of the pain that heralded the true weapon.” He stared at the burning logs, words coming faster, posture rigid and hands fisted. “In order to deliver the details of how he had destroyed it privately, I required him to be in close proximity to me…and he used the short distance to his gain. He distracted me and struck. I raged and slew him. Too quickly. But it was done. My temper has never been mild.” He paused, unclenching his hands and relaxing his position. “I reasoned that you had deceived me. I came here immediately.” He paused. “This is why the wærewolf has not yet been punished enough.”

I looked away. What could I do? Nothing. Nothing to stop him, nothing to change his mind. And where was Johnny? Were beholders beating him up while I warmed myself by the fire?

“Do something for me, Persephone, and perhaps I will feel more kindly toward your Johnny.”

“Let me guess—you want to put a second mark on me?”

“I could be devious and say yes, because I think you just might take it to save the wære. But as I said, I want your trust.” He paused. “No, Persephone. It does not involve a second mark.”

“What do you want me to do for you, then?”

“Tend my wound.”

The thought of tending something as awful and deep as that gash on his chest was not one that sat well with me, but for Johnny’s sake, I agreed. “Fine. This way.” In the kitchen, I retrieved my first aid kit and stared down into the plastic box of supplies. “I don’t even know what’s appropriate to use on a vampire.”

“Proceed with whatever you would use on your own wound.” He stripped out of the shirt. The ugly wound marred the beauty of him: swells of masculine strength in his chest and shoulders proportioned perfectly under pale, smooth skin.

“But you’re a vampire. It’s dead flesh. It seems ridiculous to apply healing cream to the wound of a dead man. Won’t that just fester during the daylight hours and make everything worse? It’ll stink and—” I realized that Menessos didn’t smell like the bottom of a leaf pile. “Why don’t you smell?”

“What?”

“Most vampires smell rotten. You don’t.”

“I am not like other vampires.”

“That’s pretty much what I just said. Why?”

He caressed my hand. “Perhaps, someday, I will tell you.” He paused. “Please tend my wound.”

I laid out the gauze, tape, and antibiotic cream atop the kitchen counter and focused my attention on the horrible gash. Taking clean dishcloths from the drawer, I dampened one under the sink faucet and gave him the other. “To wipe with,” I said. After adding a disinfectant from the kit to the wet cloth, I squeezed the solution over the gash. Menessos sucked air through his teeth as pink water ran down his chest. “It hurts?”

He wiped the rivulets from his abdomen. “Of course it hurts. Do you think I don’t feel?”

“I guess I did.” I made certain to not make a disgusted face as I dabbed at the flecks of dirt and mud clinging to the torn skin. If he could bear the physical pain of this, then I could bear looking at it. “There’s dirt in there, and some splinters that’ll have to come out.” Now I understood how the true stake could have destroyed him, leaving pieces like these behind.

I rinsed the wound again. After pouring disinfectant over the tweezers, I used them to pick out the dirt and wood. Blood welled up anew, and I rinsed a third and fourth time to be sure I’d gotten all of the pieces out. “The skin where the splinters were is all gray now.”

“It will rejuvenate.”

I blotted it dry, as much as I could, and picked up the antibiotic cream. “Yes or no?”

“Yes.”

“You’re certain?”

“If I feel pain, then I cannot be entirely dead, can I?”

I squirted the cream into the gash, way more than I thought was necessary, and held the flap in place, securing the parted flesh with three bandage-sutures and then covering it with gauze and tape.

When I finished, Menessos gently lifted my chin until I met his dangerous gaze. He said:

“Only when the sun’s light has fled

is my life lived and my hungers fed,

but I will live on and on, forever

if you will but swear to leave me never.”

He leaned in and put his lips to mine.

The mouth of a vampire is a dangerous, deadly weapon. But when used for pleasure…that weapon transforms into a sensual tool. Deep within me, my core shivered and sighed, yet an undercurrent of exquisite pain razored the edges of my tattered soul. I clung to him, as if we could become one and make this bliss last forever.

The smell of cedar and sage drifted to my nostrils and I woke as if from a dream.

“Johnny.” He stood in the doorway from the garage, stake in hand.

His posture was a rictus of pain; his expression was agonized. It was more than the blood drying on his face or his blackened eye, which was now nearly swollen shut. He was hurt. Emotionally. It was killing him to see me in Menessos’s arms and enjoying it. I thrust myself away from Menessos, but as soon as our contact broke, all the ease and comfort evaporated.

Pain overwhelmed my every nerve, contracting every muscle. My body rebelled against living. Anguish swallowed me. I crumbled to the floor, writhing, unable to speak.

“Destroy it now!” Menessos commanded, pointing to the living room. “The hearth is already aflame.”

Johnny tossed the stake up in the air and caught it repeatedly. My pain continued, but the pinpoint of it rolled back and forth with the stake’s movement. “I’ve been thinking,” he said.

“It is a dangerous time for you to try to change this situation. There is but one outcome here: the destruction of the stake.”

“See, that’s what I’ve been thinking about. Maybe I shouldn’t destroy it after all,” Johnny said.

“Look at her! She will die if you do not act quickly!”

“Oh, I doubt that. Though if she did, it would spare her from the horrors of the…affection you’ll force on her.”

“You care for her so little? Her death would mean nothing to you? Not hers, or her grandmother’s and the child’s?”

Johnny paused to consider that. “To rid the world of you, it might be worth it.” He stepped forward. Menessos retreated. I screamed in wordless agony.

“You’re killing her!” Menessos shouted.

Johnny took another step, and another. “I’m killing her? I am?” With each step, my torture increased threefold. I was burning. I was freezing. My skin was being torn off. My brain was buzzing as every nerve in my body sent contradicting messages of the kinds of torment I could experience. Death would be a welcome release. I started praying to the Goddess, begging her to grant me that outcome.

“Why, I wonder, are you not the one writhing on the floor?” Johnny asked Menessos as he stopped beside me.

I managed to roll my head enough to see Menessos where he had retreated. “She is mortal yet,” he said. “That is why her pain is greater.”

“Really?” Johnny knelt beside me. He laid the stake on the floor only inches from me. I screamed and choked, and my eyes welled up and tears blurred everything.

“You are killing her!” Menessos shouted, each word emphasized.

“No,” Johnny shouted back. “You are!” Softer, to me, he said, “He’s using you, Red. And only you can stop it.”

Menessos stomped a trio of steps closer, but Johnny grabbed the stake and held it before him. “C’mon!” he shouted. “C’mon! Let’s see what happens. Let’s see which of us wins.”

I blinked away the tears. Johnny was on his knees, rigid and trembling, but not backing down from the vampire.

“He’s using you, Red. Using the mark. He’s transferring his pain onto you, to keep himself able to act. This pussy is putting twice the pain onto the mortal woman and taking but a small, unavoidable dose of it himself.” He cracked the stake on the floor beside me again. “You have the power now. Right now. Not him. You do. Use it, Red. Use it. Take the stake in your hand—”

“No! It will kill her!” Menessos insisted.

“No, Red. It will set you free. It will burn away the mark he put upon you.”

“That’s a lie! The whelp is lying, Persephone! He is willing to sacrifice you and those you care about! He said it already. And if you touch that stake, you will die.”

“He just doesn’t want to feel the pain, Red. He knows he’ll be overcome like you are overcome now. He knows he’ll be weak. He knows I’ll stake him through.”

“Do not listen to this nonsense, Persephone. He cares nothing for you! He has proven himself a devious plotter and a backstabber. Do not listen to him!”

“Take it,” Johnny whispered. “Take it.”

I moved my hand, only a little. It was like reaching blistered fingers into boiling water. A whine left my lips. “Hhhhhurts. I can’t!”

“Do it, Red. Just do it. It’ll all go away.”

Menessos shouted, “No! It is your life that will go away!”

I turned my back on Menessos and rolled to my side, coming inches closer to the stake. “Persephone, no!” the vampire wailed behind me. “No!”

I looked into those Wedjat eyes.

All I could think was that I had asked for a release and the Goddess had provided one. I sucked in all the air my lungs could hold and summoned all my strength, all my resolve. I seized the stake and, clutching it to my chest, I screamed my last breath.