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The holograph hovered over Mike, then slid down across his lap, and Cindy
moaned.
“Why the hell do you want that damned Indian,” he
whispered, “When you could have me?”
Cindy straightened, and the hood snapped up, the holograph
fading as she scowled through the tears on her face. The TV slid back in the
wall.
Mike sighed. He
crawled out of the bed and went to shower away the thin burn of a hangover with
ice cold water that did nothing to alleviate other needs.
Coming out with a heavy towel wrapped around his waist, he
heard a light peck on the door. The screen came on, and he saw Creel shuddering
in those thin pajamas, his hair already plastered to his head with a thickening
coating of snow. For a moment, Mike was tempted to leave him there.
He sighed and muttered, “Open.”
The door squeaked, and Creel toppled to the floor scattering
cold air and snow across the carpet.
Mike shook his head and dragged the man into the shower and
turned the water heater to fifty degrees, Celsius, and left him there with steam
billowing out of the room.
As he lay back, Mike frowned.
“Hey, Creel,” he shouted. “What’s the address of the
sex goddess? The one you call Sue.”
All through the day Benny lay on the floor next to Sue’s
bed. Her breathing was normal, but that was because of the drugs Maggie and Ama
fed her. A baby . . . His mouth tightened. Under the old law, one that came down
through thousands of years of trial and error from the first Longhouses, a man
that hit a pregnant woman was denied the rights of the longhouse. An outcast, it
was rare that he lived for long. A person that murdered a kid, that one was
turned over to his mother, and the murderer’s own grandmother would appoint an
executioner.
Sue wasn’t a part of a longhouse. He didn’t get the
feeling of community from her. She was alone and lonely.
One hand crept up to find and hold Sue’s.
The winter sun was down, the scorching pain it brought, gone
for now. Another memory of suffering. Shuddering with the memory of Hell, Carl
dragged himself from the wet leaves and brush the imps hid him under through the
day. Remembering the flesh of the man he fed on, Carl doubled over and heaved. A
thin stream of acid dribbled onto the leaves. Around him, soft, mocking laughter
of the imps and darkened suns whispered.
“Screw you,” he muttered, spitting in the leaves.
He started to crawl up when something rammed his stomach, and
laughter roared as he was thrown against the bole of an oak.
Carl struggled this time to move. His back was a blaze of
fire, and acid from his stomach ate at his throat as he tried to breathe again.
Unseen hands ripped him from the ground to toss him into a
thicket of laurel brush. He crashed down into the brittle branches, shattering
them and driving splinters deep into raw, burned flesh.
Carl whispered a moan of pain. He tried to escape, but the
spirit was coming, thrusting aside small trees and crushing bushes as it moved.
“Who the hell are you?” he cried, and jammed into a dry
spot that smelled of deer.
Eighteen inches long, invisible feet crushed the snow and
leaves to stop before him.
Hands took him by the arms, raising him ten feet in the air.
Thy woman’s people
call me the asgina:gili, the demon
dog.
A loud snort came from below, in the laurels. A deer, maybe
the one that bedded down in the brush below, stomped a forehoof and snorted a
second challenge.
The demon let Carl see the contempt and laughed at the man.
I am your owner.
Thrashing and screaming, Carl kicked out. His foot slid
through the body.
Slave.
“No.”
You will give us the
body of the Grey-Wolf’s brat.
“Benny? I won’t.”
Then you will again die
and fall into the pits of Shambala.
Staring into the cold yellow eyes, Carl went limp.
“No,” he whispered. “I love the kid. I love him and
Anna.”
The demon hissed, and the trees around them froze, cracking as
the sap in them swelled and the trunks split with strain.
Obey, for I am your
master.
The demon laughed, dropping Carl to the deer’s hiding
place. The pain of fire swept through Carl, and he cried out, then bit into his
tongue to stop the sound. Huddled in a ball he whimpered.
The deer snorted again, and the demon turned to it, but the
antlers ripped through it.
The demon snarled, reaching down to kill the doe. She tossed
her head, and the demon was throw away. She turned to finish the job, racing
after it in the gloom of the evening, and Carl was alone.
The demon slipped from the ground and stole into the body, and
Carl was jerked up to stand. He tried to stop and couldn’t. His bare feet
shambled south towards Philadelphia and Benny.
“I'm sorry, kid,” he whispered. “I don’t want to, but I
can’t take it any more.”
Tears rolled down his face. Falling, they froze in the bitter
cold of the demon’s presence. The deer charged from the night only to plow to
a stop before hitting Carl. She snorted, shaking the antlers, then dashed away.
The demon laughed, and with Carl’s voice said,
“Thee protect me well, human. Thy Sacred Mother would not harm thee.”
©2004 StoriesByEmail.com
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