The Lebrus Stone (38 page)

"I shall wash them," he whispered again with a moan, unbuckling my belt and swearing at the stubborn buttons of my pants. Relief washed over me as I scratched and thumped at him, bombarding him with blows to the head. I couldn't give in and allow myself to taste his blood while he had his way with me. I had to make the urges and him go away.

He loosened his grip and slapped me hard across the face. The pressure shook my brain and caused my head to a throb.

Too weak to fight from all the mental strength used up to try and not bite him, I lay there as he smothered me with kisses and pulled at my clothes.

"I shall wash you cleaner than clean," he continued repeating, his saliva dripping onto my lips. My eyes stung as tears flowed. His eyes were wide and glistening with desire. My brewing hatred for him made me forget my thirst at the sight of how familiar this all was becoming.

I managed to free one hand and connect a fist with his square chin. It barely made him wince

He panted and groaned and his eyes rolled back. With a loud gasp he fell on top of me; his weight sunk me into the bed. While he remained still, I peered down to see someone standing in front of me. Gal. Sinclair was yanked off of me.

I got up to attack Sinclair even though he was unconscious. My hands were caught by Gal.

"Let me go!" I elbowed him. "I said let go!"

He didn't. I jerked away and stood at the foot of the bed. "You save me then defend him?" I hissed.

Gal's face was a fuming red, scarily close to breaking me in half. "She isn't here. You breathe not a word of what happened." His lips moved quickly over clenched teeth.

"Why should I care what she thinks?" I hissed louder.

"If you want to experience worse punishments, be my guest."

"If it means I get to punish him…"

Gal's broad shoulders straightened, "She can't know of Sinclair's…indiscretions."

Clever misuse for attempted rape.

"Why? What is he to Isobel?"

Flinging Sinclair over his shoulder, he headed for the door.

"Are they together? An item?"

"They're husband and wife," he hissed, striding out of the room.

~ * ~

I had been vulnerable and exposed. Before now it hadn't crossed my mind. Any other risk hadn't been registered as more than fatal. Since that was the worst I thought it could get. Being dead.

But now I experienced something worse again. Fear without control, a body without a soul, broken as a shell. It could still happen. It could take me away from my mind. Leave me thoughtless and prepared to give in. During all that I had been through, I refused to quit, to throw down my arms and sink like a rock.

Yet a single act of one's shame could have ended me all over again today, regardless of whether I lived. I found myself praying for a sign, a promise to keep me adrift and complete, just until I found my lifeline.

And what Gal said explained the wandering looks and close contact at every possible moment between Sinclair and the woman I'd known as Isobel. But I thought Clias was a love interest for the spineless murderer. Whatever. They were both well suited to the black widow.

Great Uncle Theodore, if he was real, had been taken for a good old spin. Gal and Zella were probably not even his. She could have been resurrected hussy with five or more partners in crime. Not that I cared. But it wasn't going to exactly favor me well if she found out about Sinclair and his sickening odor rubbing all over me.

He didn't rape me. But the fact that he almost did was turning me into a nervous wreck. I couldn't sit still in case he or anyone else appeared to try and mentally destroy me.

It took everything I had to leave my room and make my way to see Cray. I kept my mind on his wakeful smile and the yellow flickers of gold in his eyes that would help me to stay together. Urging my feet to move across the landing, I finally reached his door and turned the door knob. I stepped inside, careful not to disturb him if he was asleep.

Except I couldn't have been more wrong. Cray wasn't asleep. He was sitting up in bed, wearing a blue Lakers t-shirt with the price tag still hanging from the back.

He muttered something that sounded like, "Thanks, you remembered," before Kellice kissed him on the lips.

He didn't flinch or shy away. It seemed a natural act of affection, a closeness that had grown from years of being within each other's wanted company.

"You're feeling better, I take it?" I was careful not to sound too affronted, only slightly miffed.

"Yes, he is," Kellice said, flicking back her voluptuous red curls.

Cray hadn't turned to look at me.

"I'll be taking care of Cray now." When she finished her little all mighty speech, she stared at me. Her pencil thin eyebrows rose to insinuate I understood exactly what she was implying.

"Is that right?"

"Yes." She grinned.

"I was talking to Cray."

He didn't answer me. After everything I did for him. The ungrateful bloodsucker needed to give me a good reason for her being here. He said there was nothing between them. I stupidly believed him.

"It's fine now. Kellice's here," he said finally, taking her hand as a way to hint how.

"Kellice's here, is she?" I mocked.

His head nodded for a long moment.

I was a nervous wreck again. I knew I was cracking my knuckles, but I couldn't stop it. It wasn't even a usual habit, another first. But then I wondered if this was another act and he was pretending to not to have feelings for me, if it was a way to convince the coven he was on their side. But why would it help him? Still, as usual, a small bud of hope uncurled in my chest.

With a quick glance at me, Cray let go of Kellice's hand. I didn't get a chance to read anything behind his expression, the colors of his eyes.

Kellice's mouth gaped. At least now she was the one on the verge of tears.

"You and me, it was…fun," Cray said to me. He didn't sound convincing. I cracked my knuckles.

"Fun!" I lashed, just in case he meant it.

"Interesting." He rubbed his face.

"What else?"

"Now it's over. Nothing really started. I only kept returning to you because I was desperate for something else. It was the only way to get it."

He didn't sound certain, the bud of hope flourished; there was nothing behind what he was saying to me. There couldn't be.

"Desperate for what? My blood?" I tried to sound enraged and follow through with any plans of pretending he had no feelings for me. That had to be the only explanation for the sudden change. Maybe they had threatened to torture me if he showed any interest.

When he looked at Kellice, I knew he wanted her to explain. Her smile took great enjoyment in it. "Yes, it was your blood and only your blood."

I felt sure even Cray rolled his eyes. Or maybe I just wanted them to.

"Why? Is yours too infected with scum?" I bitched.

She faintly laughed without retaliation. Her potential win was her payback. I should have just left and put myself out of my misery, forgotten all about him if this was all true. But being attracted to someone, cousin or not, made you inconveniently dim.

"You were chosen to be his feed until he could be cured of what you did to him," she said with a satisfied grin.

So, even she was feeding him that bull. Did she really want him or was she in on it all too? How could she want him dead if she really loved him? Had they lied to her?

Again, it felt like my responsibility to make sure he didn't fall for anyone who was secretly against him. Which reminded me, Cray and I needed to talk about what he knew and didn't. We needed to talk babies, and how he was going to make one appear if I wasn't pregnant, how he was going to help me escape, unscathed. Or had he changed his mind about that as well?

"Is that true?" I asked him, knowing that enlightening him would have been futile if this was all an act.

He nodded.

"Do you know it's me that brought you back when you were withering away? Does what I made you into also cause you to make promises you can't keep? Make you a heartless coward with no real intention to anyone but to please himself? You could die if you don't keep feeding from me, Cray? Have they mentioned that part?"

"Why do you care so much?" he asked. I thought about confessing how much I somehow cared for his life more than my own, how I would gladly have given it up to save him if I had the choice. Maybe it was the bond we shared from being supposed cousins. Maybe we weren't related and I had just fallen for him in a way I hadn't expected. He had made me feel alive again. No, really alive for the first time.

I even wanted to tell him what had happened with Sinclair. How the one thing I kept thinking about throughout my whole ordeal was the fear of never seeing Cray again. Not being the same person he'd left. I swallowed bitter tears.

"Crys." The soft way he uttered my name lifted my spirits. Hearing the way he called me Crys gave me the extra bit of hope that he was still the Cray he had shown me, not the monstrous jerk he became around these people.

"There's nothing more to say," he spoke hurriedly, turning to drink a glass of water from his bedside table.

"If I'm the one you need to feed from to cure you, why are you doing this?"

"Just because I need it, doesn't mean I want you in another way." I thought I caught him wince into his glass; other than that, he gave me no other sign he might be lying.

"But you have no choice about it." I snatched the glass from him and smashed it onto the floor. Drama would help if we were to make this convincing.

Their jaws dropped. Maybe I went too far.

"You still need me, Cray. You still need at least one more feed from me or you're toast. It's been confessed. I know everything you probably don't. They're lying to you. You're a Sha'lac. I'm part…Fallion. And you have to feed from me three times. If not, they've said you will suffer a slow and agonizing death."

I didn't mention why they wanted that for him. It would have been too much.

He didn't seem shocked. They might have filled him in. But why didn't he care?

"We still also need to talk," I muttered.

He closed his eyes.

I had no choice but to react as he might have wanted me to. I thumped his head and shoulders. Kellice yanked me back and threw me to the floor.

She pinned me down by my neck. She was super strong. I couldn't move an inch.

"Don't you get it?" she yelled. "You're not needed anymore. He has me. His fi-an-ce. He doesn't need to hear all your lies. Feeding from you is what could kill him."

She spat in my face.

"Have him!" I managed to push her away and wipe my face "Marry him tomorrow, for all I care."

Cray seemed struck by an invisible arrow. His eyes were a tarnished blue-gray, still expressing nothing. His acting skills were better than I thought if this was another one of his games with the coven.

"But you'll pay for this if you're playing me, Cray," I said, trying to match his believability. "You both will."

His caved expression looked like he already had paid for something, and would pay for the rest of his life. Yet maybe, so would I, maybe without a way to change it.

"I'll find a way out of here by myself," I said, just in case he really was choosing to forget all about me and purposely end his life.

I kept to my room for the next few days, hatching up no plan at all. It wasn't to be that simple, so I busied myself with writing pretend letters to Jared and Sal.

I tried to eat a piece of garlic bread that was almost green from being sat on its plate for so long. It didn't taste of anything. It didn't fill me with a need to eat any more than just a nibble. Just like my half eaten apple turning brown with rot, it stayed briefly touched by my lips. Water was my only need of comfort, drenching my scorching insides and my throat when the torrid cravings started.

I think a few days had passed and I had still barely eaten, changed my clothes or bothered to take my daily walks. Every meeting and ritual I was forced to attend and contribute to began and ended without my recollection. I had to get a hold of myself if I was to ever escape.

But I suppose I was trying to mentally shut out the people surrounding me with their perverse way of seeking revenge. No one mattered and no one cared for my well-being considering they thought I was pregnant; not even Zella, the youngest of their coven. Maybe the stone had ways of keeping me healthy regardless. I, in turn, wouldn't take the time to remember so much as their names.

I briefly recalled seeing Jess bowed and cloaked at the meetings, following orders and never once steering her attention away from the teachings of those who taught her nothing she really needed. Her hand clasped Gal's with a superiority as one and the same, as devout worshipers of some higher arch called the Dia'ac: a society of Sha'lacs that had taken residence somewhere on Earth.

The rest I didn't remember, either by choice or condition.

I was about to pen another fictitious letter when my door swung open. I threw my journal in the drawer until I could hide it better.

Judith carried in another tray of what would be more tasteless food and placed it on the floor beside my bare feet.

"Will you be declining your walk yet again tomorrow?" she asked, blatantly not caring what my answer would be.

"Yes."

She stepped back. "You have a visitor."

Jess walked confidently into the room. Her hair was curled and set. Her make-up defined her eyes and lips.

I almost didn't recognize her. Although she was always pretty, now she was radiant. And most of all, she seemed content. Envy gripped my chest until it felt pressed inwards.

Judith left the moment she made the announcement. So quietly you would never have known it.

As soon as we were alone, Jess's whole posture drooped and her fixed, elated grin turned upside down. She hurried to me.

"Jeez, What they gone done to you?" she asked, tears welling in her eyes.

"What have they done to
you
? I asked." Are you alright?"

She nodded and sat in a chair beside me. "Sorry, Crys. I've had to go keep my distance." She looked at the door. "You know. Play along," she whispered behind her hand.

"You sure that's not what you're doing now?" Frustration ate at my nerves. She wouldn't be the only one after Cray's little act. But what was Cray's gain? I still didn't understand. He wasn't much better off than me in all this.

"No," her voice was adamant.

"Are you playing along with Gal, too?"

Silence.

"I thought so."

"Okay, okay, aside from Gal. You must know by now how much I've always liked him."

"Enough to literally bleed you dry."

"He's explained," she shushed me. "And I'm gonnna do whatever it takes to help him."

"He's using you, Jess. You're fast food. That's it."

"Hey, I'm not fast food. I'm his chosen."

I tried not to lash out from hearing that demeaning word.

"Chosen to be his personal blood bank, Jess. It's not something to be proud of."

"I'm proud to be his, no matter how he has me." She paced.

"Anyway, you've perked up a lot at last considering you were in a frail state when I found you. Don't you care who murdered your grandmother anymore? Has that bitch brainwashed you too?"

"Maybe. But Gal's gone and told me he had nothing to do with Nanny's death. It was just Gundulla." She leaned forward and whispered in my ear. "He says she's insane. He just be playing along, see. All of 'em are. Until they figure out a way to get out of the pact. Gal plans to take me with him. After that, we can have some good ol' revenge."

I laughed. "Jess, are you seriously that gullible?"

She leaned back and took a moment to reply. "All I be knowin' is he loves me and I love him. Besides, Gundulla ain't his mama, you probably know it's Marsi."

"No, I didn't know." Though it wasn't surprising. "What about Zella?"

"Oh, she's Gundulla's. Theodore
was
your great uncle, but she'd gone married him to inherit the manor. A few years after that, when Zella was born, she went and killed him. If anybody grew suspicious and asked why she and her coven didn't age, she casted one of her spells to make 'em forget and not question it."

"Why did she have Zella with Theodore if she didn't want to be with him?"

"She didn't. Her father's Sinclair."

Hearing his name made me skin itch. I pushed his face from my mind.

"I don't get it." I frowned. "Why would they suddenly have a child after being alive so long? Why did she wait so long to finish Theodore?"

She shrugged. "Maybe Zella was a totally random mistake. Maybe they wanted her to be young enough to be kept youthful forever, too. You know, for when they overruled Shimmarian. And she probably had to make it look like a real marriage with Thoedore for a while. Anyway, Gal and Cray are half-brothers. Gal always knew, but Cray didn't, not until now."

"Why has Gal lived with Gundulla rather than his own mother?"

"He doesn't get along with Marsi."

I shook my head. "Why am I even asking all this? I don't care. I want to be left alone." I brought out my journal again. The paper had shred from my scraping.

"About the…feedin'," she said. "It's somethin' I want, you know. I…like it."

I winced as my own craving returned from the mere mention. I had become afraid of the urge to bite down on my own arms, or someone close by like Jess, to lessen the veracious heat rising in my throat, mounting by the seconds that passed like days. It took all my concentration to exclude myself from the auto-pilot increase to my temperature. But eventually I would succeed with a relief both disappointing and grateful.

I hated what had become of me. Although I wasn't entirely sure what it could lead to, it had to be minimally effective in bringing me any closure. I was left with nothing but a constant reminder of Cray's contamination.

"You'll be infected, Jess," I said, silently heaving.

She sighed. "It's no infection, Crys. It's just a thirst, is all, a thirst for knowledge."

"On what basis? Taking memories, thoughts, emotions?" I don't know why I asked, since I had no intention of having a debate. Nothing could rationalize this. Not even obsession.

"I don't give Gal what he needs, he could kill someone to get it. This way it be a part of our…intimacy. A way to bring us closer n all."

I winced, the fire in my throat provoked. "Why would killing someone affect someone as heartless as him?"

"Because he cares, Crys. I know he does. The only reason he never showed me any interest was to keep me from getting involved. It's a complex situation we be dealing with here. It had to be treated with care and respect."

"It's not a mission to Mars, Jess, it's a blood bath. It's too unnatural. Even for him."

"Look here, he could either kill someone to get it or come to me. I know which one I prefer."

"Whatever, can we just end this conversation before I have a cardiac arrest?"

Thoughts of Cray killing an innocent old woman or child had invaded my mind. Thoughts of what I could become capable of. The craving I had right now had to stop.

"Sorry. It was…insensitive of me to bring that up now that you need to feed." She sat on the end of my bed. "They've all been showin' me how to control it."

I was about to ask her how, but knew she would have been forced not to tell me. Instead, I chewed on the lid of my pen to help calm me. Yet all I thought about was a massacre for blood. Feed upon feed of unauthorized drainage.

"What you writin?" she asked.

I threw the over-used journal into my desk drawer. Truthfully, it had become my only companion, so it stayed with me when no one else, well, other than Jess, was around.

"Love notes to Cray, huh?"

"Something like that." I forced myself to bite into a muffin. If only to keep myself from blabbing.

She stood beside me, fingers combing the knots in my hair. "I didn't know Cray and Kellice were engaged before you got here, Crys. I sure am sorry."

Again I had to stop myself from filling her in on all the gory details and tell her it was all probably a farce, and that he might be pretending to still want to marry her. But I didn't know that for sure. Every time I thought about being wrong and that he had tricked me as well as her, I found it hard to breathe.

I chomped on another mouthful of my muffin, swallowing tears.

"I know about…you know. The baby, too."

A tear trickled down my cheek.

"I'll do what I can to help you take care of it. I'll find a way to save you both." she whispered close to my ear, then kissed me on my cheek. There was no conviction behind anything she said. How could there be? She had no power over them, no matter how much she thought she could with Gal by her side. I sank into her arms.

~ * ~

I had another dream. It was the reason I was cradling myself in a corner, imagining dark shadows zipping back and forth.

It began with the day Sal told me she had a miscarriage. The scene jumped to the conversation I had with her fiancé, Danny, over a glass of wine at a New Year's party. The majority of it was chopped into jumbled pieces that made no sense. His words, "She's not what I expected," kept being repeated.

After that I was at the manor, in my room, reading a book on pregnancy that graphically displayed photographs of births and stillborn children. Cray walked through the wall and headed toward me, as a shadow with no face, legs or arms. Just eyes that singed right through me as I screamed for help.

That was the only way I knew it was him, his eyes. It was the only way I ever would. And instead of running to him, I ran away, throwing the book through his blackened form.

Next I was consoling Sal. She leaned back, her eyes becoming completely black as they bulged like the eyes of a lizard. A long, pointy tongue shot out of her mouth and wrapped around my neck; her hands clawed at my stomach, digging as she bit down on to my wrist and fed from my splitting veins. My screams became begging whimpers as she pulled out a tiny fetus from my stomach: headless, blue, and dead.

The moment I woke up, I scrambled out of bed and crawled to the corner of the room, shivering and panting as if trapped in a snowstorm. Only I wasn't cold or hot. I felt nothing. Only fear and its re-occurring face.

~ * ~

I slept a lot better the next day.

Jess hadn't visited me, and I wondered how she was; if I'd brought her punishment for wanting to come and see me, and if Gal had kept to his word to obey her as she had to obey them.

When my bedroom door crashed open, I stumbled on a shoe, turning to see who was entering in a careless rage.

"You," Judith said, stomping across the room. "Downstairs."

She pulled me by the arms. My feet scraped along the floor as I struggled in her arms, wanting to pound into her.
How dare she drag me.
She yanked me into the hallway, all the while I swore and kicked.

She led me downstairs and shoved me into the drawing room. It was full of people, uncloaked and deeply unhappy to see me. I stopped complaining.

"Bring her to me," echoed a calm, yet callous voice. I recognized it as soon as it hit me. My blood boiled as well as pound in my ears.

I was dragged to the middle of the room by Judith. This time I didn't struggle. I kept my head held high.

Gundulla stood before me, dressed lavishly, though she made me feel sick to the stomach. I had to fight the urge to spit at her feet much like Vander did.

A ruby pendant hung from the center of her forehead. Her ears jingled with gold that interloped with the defined shoulders of her blue velvet dress; lace hung from the ends of her long sleeves.

Her skin was extra ghostly white, unrepaired by the flash of colors brimming from her fine cut jewels that also decorated her waist.

I glanced behind her and noticed Cray beside Kellice. His hand lifted to her waist the moment our eyes met. I swallowed hard. I couldn't let any of this make me break, not visually. I had to keep it together.

I let my gaze drift to Jess. She smiled anxiously at me and held onto Gal's hand. He, for once, was fully immersed by her need for support. The sight of them both coupled up, doubled over me with a penetrating sadness. I realized how much I had no one.  I kept up the pretense of being unaffected.