Page 119 of Lunar Desires
Rhianna screamed again, terror in her face.
Marcus pressed down harder, three witches surging forward to hold her down.
“The vessel will be still!” a woman cried, holding her by the head.
Rhianna spat in her face. “I’ll fucking kill you!”
Marcus tilted his head back, his eyes closed. “Hush your mouth, daughter. Unless you don’t want to keep your eyes.”
Wow. I didn’t care what happened to her peepers, but what a thing to say to your child.
Rhianna settled down, sobbing quietly.
Oh, God. What sort of hope was this kid going to be for the Kingwoods? Some version of the Anti-Christ for shadow witches to worship?
What power would Marcus’s grandchild possess? He seemed more enthusiastic over this child coming into the world than its mother. I guess being held down while in labor wasn’t the most pleasant method of giving birth.
Rhianna’s bump pulsated, those magical flowers puffing into sprays of petals, swallowed by the white light.
“Come to me,” Marcus said. “Come to me with your hope.”
“Be born,” the witches chanted. “Be born for our lord. Be born for our lord.”
“Come to me! Come to me!” Marcus removed his hands, a witch handing him his athame.
A witch tore open Rhianna’s gown, revealing the swollen, rippling flesh.
Oh. My God. What the hell was going on?
Marcus drew the blade across his palm as he spoke again. “It is time. It is time.” Blood ran down his arm. “Come to me!”
The candle blew out, a warm wind blowing through the room.
Marcus touched his daughter’s belly again with his bloody hand. She convulsed, the witches holding her down as she thrashed and screamed for mercy.
He held onto her, the white light expanding, pouring over the sides of the bed like milk.
“Come to me!” he roared, lifting the athame. “Come to me!”
Rhianna screamed as a beam of light exploded from her belly, tearing a hole through the ceiling. Debris rained down on the room, dust and stone smothering the bed and everyone around it.
People coughed on the cloying dust cloud, cold air flooding the room. The beam remained intact, sending rings of energy to the sky. Static electricity lifted the hair on my arms.
By Hecate, my brains were spaghetti, splattered against the wall.
What the hell was going on?
Something appeared in the light. A figure descending as slowly as a feather. An alien abductee in reverse.
“Daddy…” I heard Rhianna rasp. “Did it…did it work?”
He beckoned to the figure. “Yes! Come to me! Come to me!”
That wasn’t a baby, it was more like a grown man.
“Come to me!”
The figure broke out of the beam, drifting to the ground, wrapped in a glittering robe of woven starlight.
