AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“You wanker.” I poked his ribs through the open front of the vile floral shirt he wore. “You told him to tell me you died? What the?”
From the corner of my eyes, I flicked away a few embarrassing tears with a finger.
He shrugged and kissed me again, and his breathing quieted slowly as he searched my eyes. “You have no idea how worried I was. Even the doc worried. We had to give you this extra dose to bring you back.”
“Oh.” The reason I’d stabbed myself avalanched into my head—the CNC party and the shock of being ambushed at the house, the ritual, oh yes, the ritual. That there was the reason Jacob wanted me alive and why he’d murdered Estelle.
A moment ago, I’d somehow been floating in a place where the memories existed but were not connecting and registering in my consciousness.
“I hadn’t…” I shook my head. “I’m sorry, I…”
“I know. It took me a while too.” He looked over my head at the doctor, who had simply held my waist while Cassius and I babbled at each other.
“I saved Cassius first. You came within seconds of dying, Charity. The guard’s life was dwindling and not enough to heal you completely.”
“So…” I bit my lip. “You killed someone else?”
I was struggling to understand. I’d thought I knew what the ritual was, that night, but I had not been certain. I’d gambled on the doctor being able to come out on top, with my distraction happening.
“No. We haven’t killed anyone else. I’ve developed a way to save some of the lifeforce, for emergencies. I used a stored sample. It’s not the best way, so we waited to be sure we had no alternative.” He exhaled, and I could feel and hear the shake in it. “I’m sorry to have drawn you into this. It can make you feel dirty and evil.”
I stepped away from them, but held one of their hands in mine, as if we were children about to do a dance. It made me think of that old children’s game,Ring Around the Rosie, that some thought harked back to the plague. I was being terribly morbid, but I had reasons.
“I don’t think my head is functioning normally, yet. Do you mean you’ve drawn me into using killers to help us to…” Us—it was funny to be saying that, and what words were used for this ritual that extracted life? “To regenerate.”
“I do. To do that and to simply live longer than anyone else on this planet. To outlive friends and family, to watch the history of mankind as we die and live and fuck up everything. I don’t expect you to see all the ramifications at once, Charity.”
He sounded bitter. Hewasbitter.
“This needs no forgiveness, but if you need it, I forgive you, sir.” I cupped his face with my hands, then I did a hop to reach up and kiss him, which made him laugh. He leaned in, and we shared a long, soul-healing kiss. “I needed that.” Cassius came in and hugged me from behind, his arms below my breasts. “Can we go back to the shade and sit on that bed that’s surreally out here, where no bed should be? I’m still a bit woozy.”
“Sure,” the doctor said. He stayed to one side of me, Cassius to the other.
I guess they thought to rescue me if I fell. It felt odd to be so weak in the legs. My limp was obvious as we walked.
Cassius spoke across me to the doctor. “Is her leg going to improve?”
“I’m unsure. We might have to seek out another source.”
Andsourcemust mean find someone to kill who sucked enough at living to make killing them seem justifiable,
How did one justify taking a life to heal an injured leg?
The doctor was right. This was giving me a slimy feeling. On the other hand, I’d sacrifice a Dahmer for free, anytime. Or a Hitler, or even a Putin. This was going to take time to wrap my head around. Could I ever see murderers as simply an energy source?
We reached the bed, and I leaned on it then hopped back on board, leaving sand on the quilt. I pulled myself to the middle, where a bank of pillows waited. I sighed and slumped into one, face first.
“Let’s have brunch here, doc? Inigo is waving.”
The doctor dropped onto the bed to my left, and I rolled onto my side and found his hairy knee next to me. I ran my hand over his muscular calf, as he bellowed out an order. We were all of us, killers now. Even I, for I’d stabbed myself to help the doctor kill. Self-defense, I could have argued, but still, it bothered my morals.
Mainly it bothered them because I remembered the hole in Estelle’s chest.
I knew why that was there. That ritual in the book had required a heart, a newly harvested heart.
“Brunch, Inigo!”
“Okay!”
