Jaz Parks 5 - One More Bite

Round Four: I zinged another one. At the same time Raoul landed a punch that should’ve shattered Brude’s jaw. But the crack I heard was his hand breaking. To give him credit he didn’t cry out. Didn’t even delay his next move. Just switched back to his sword, which clanged against Brude’s staff at the same time that he threw a front kick into the king’s diaphragm.

“Raoul, this is pointless,” I said. “Back off, dude. Maybe I can talk some sense into this guy.”

Raoul’s response was a kick that caught Brude in the ribs. Unfortunately he didn’t pull his leg back fast enough. Brude grasped his calf with both hands and twisted. I heard Raoul’s knee pop just before he screamed.

Brude tossed Raoul aside like a bag of laundry, sending him flying at least ten feet into the heather. Then he came for me.

Because he expected it, I scurried out of his reach. Ran to Raoul’s side. Nope. Forget pulling him to his feet, much less making for less-populated spots. “Are we done for?” I asked.

Raoul shook his head. Not an answer. Just an attempt to clear the woozies. “He’s pulling strength from somewhere beyond himself. Look at him.”

I had been, but only casually. I opened my third eye as wide as I could manage. Brude’s lips curled upward as he strode toward me, his arms swinging confidently at his sides. He moved like a true warrior, comfortable in his skin, capable of instant lethality from any position. But his eyesEn. ar added a disturbing dimension. They said he’d be happy to stab, hack, or impale given any lame excuse and the weaponry to pull it off. Beautiful, whispered the part of my brain that recognized how closely that trait must link him to evil here, where the prettier you were, the higher up the nasty ladder you got to climb.

As I watched his tattoos detach from one another, become just another set of funky body squiggles, I caught another movement. Like a longer length of hair flowing off his shoulders, down his back. A nearly invisible cape that fluttered behind him as he walked. It wasn’t like one you’d see on, say, Superman. Where a couple of guys on the ground might look up and say, “Yo! Mr. Hero! Your sheet’s stuck between your legs!” right before he plummeted to the earth and put a big hole in some poor woman’s kitchen island. This item seemed muscular. Almost like a pterodactyl wing, it wrapped around him as he approached us. A shield, or maybe a supernatural steroid pump, it was definitely the item that gave him that extra edge. And I had no idea how to cut it from him.

I leaned into Raoul’s ear, whispered the secret to Brude’s advantage just as he reached me. He grabbed my arm and yanked me to my feet. “You will be mine.”

“I don’t see how I can do that,” I told him, working hard to force calm into my voice. Could I really get stuck here? No. Don’t even allow the possibility. You’re not staying. Because if you do, you’ll probably die. Plus Vayl would be so pissed. I thought of him standing guard over that damned Scidairan when I needed him here. Now!

“You will do as I say,” Brude said, his hand tightening painfully on my skin. And that’s when I knew what I had to do.

“You like getting your way, don’t you?”

“Of course.”

“Well, you know what?” I stepped up to him, put my free arm around his waist, and shoved my body against his. “So do I.” I nuzzled my mouth against his neck. As he moaned I felt the cape slide out from between us. And wrap around me. I was in. With one chance to get this right.

I pictured Vayl. Pretended it was his body pressing against mine. His skin under my canines. And bit. So hard that my teeth nearly met each other inside the bloody tissue of his carotid. Though I tried not to swallow, I felt Brude’s blood spurt down my throat.

It’s okay, this isn’t real, I told myself.

It’s not a dream, insisted the librarian in my head, who was already shelving this experience into the vast, unending Horror area of my biography section.

But the blood  .  .  .  it’s not like I’m really stomaching the stuff that powers him.

Lies. All little fibs to keep my mind off the disaster I was making of his throat. The gurgling screams in my ear. The pounding on my back as he tried to release himself from the clench I’d taken on him.

He tasted of thick, sweet metal. Behind it the heavier flavor of stolen vigor, coming straight from that ghost- cape enveloping us both. As his blood gushed down the sides of my mouth, I had less and less of a problem resisting his onslaught.

Finally he appealed to Raoul. “Get her off of me!”

“And what?”

“I will allow you to cross my lands freely for the next fortnight.”

That was good enough for me. I released him, spitting until my mouth cleared, backing until my shoulder blades hit Raoul’s chest.

Wait a second. My Spirit Guide couldn’t stand. I whipped around.

“Vayl, how did you get here?”

He motioned to Cirilai. “You needed me. You called. I came.” When his eyes met mine they were blacker than I’d ever seen them. Angry fountains of red rose and fell from his pupils as he stared at Brude’s throat. His words cut into me like a garrote as he said, “Jasmine, what have you done?”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

The accusation in Vayl’s tone brought the blood rushing beneath my cheeks. Which was when I realized I probably had quite a bit on top of my skin as well. I pulled out the neck of my shirt and wiped my face with it. Wondered if, when I woke up, I’d still have this taste in my mouth, still want to brush my teeth as badly as I did at this moment.

Neither Vayl nor I felt like looking at each other, so we spent some time watching Brude make a poultice out of dirt, spit, and his own blood. Once he’d packed the entire mess onto his neck, he pointed at me. Kind of satisfying