Page 78 of Grotesque
“And you, my sorry friend,” I said, looking up at him as I lifted him higher into the air. The red light of my eyes cast his face in an eerie glow. “Are a dead man.”
I thrust my hand into his chest, through the breastbone until my fingers wrapped around the pumping muscle. He was still screaming when I pulled his heart from his chest.
The defiant light dimmed from his eyes with the final exhale from his lungs. I released him and watched with satisfaction as he crumpled to the floor. I took in the blood drenched organ in my hand. “Pathetic,” I muttered, crushing it with a flex of my claws before I dropped that too.
I cocked my head, listening for any indication of where Sorcha might be. I cursed silently that I had not sensed the commotion sooner. I’d been consumed by the mirror, by my plan to bring her with me. Too intoxicated by Under’s pull that I hadn’t felt a damn thing. Gods, what would have happened had I let it take me completely? There was no guarantee I would be allowed back into the mortal world once I crossed over.
I stepped into the kitchen, retracing the steps of the dead man. Glass littered the floor, and the French doors, their windowpanes completely shattered, were thrown wide open.
I tasted the air. Sorcha’s scent was everywhere, laden with fear and anger. I could tell she’d been through here only minutes before.
“Guys! Where the fuck are you? Get methe fuckout of here!” A voice trickled in from outside. I loped down the back steps, pausing at the latticed western entrance to the Belladonna Garden, from where the panicked voice rose again from behind the hedges.
“Guys! Jeremy! I’m not fucking around!” Even through the tightly woven hedges I could taste his terror.
A slow smile spread across my face, ripping the seams of my human mask as my scales revealed themselves once more. I could hear my prey pacing, hear the frantic beating of his heart. Beneath his sweat I could smell Sorcha's desperation. She was, or had been, in there with him.
I ran my tongue over my sharpened teeth as I strode into the garden. The hedges shifted, poisonous plants bowing as they parted, opening a direct path to the sweat-slicked man. He had his back to me as he stared helplessly at the impenetrable vegetation before him, his torn t-shirt damp and muddied. I could see the rashes blooming on his pale, bloody skin from the thorns and barbs that had already started their vicious work. I was tempted to pounce immediately, to drive my talons through his skull, but the predator’s sensibility pulsing through my veins urged patience. I had not hunted like this in a long while, and the game of it thrilled me.
“Lost, are we?” I did not bother to contain the lethal rage and hunger that laced my voice.
The man whirled, his hands clenching into fists. I heard the air leave his lungs as he looked me over, the assessment made allthe more delicious by just how quickly the blood drained from his cheeks as his gaze locked onto my face. A face that I knew was crooked and wrong, the costume of my human flesh tearing ever further as my true form pressed outward. I allowed my eyes to shift, the blood-red light of my irises casting my prey in an unholy glow. I let the length of my spine uncoil as my tail swept behind me. Part man, part monster, a patchwork of beauty and horror.
Pure, delectable fear flooded the space between us. My mouth started watering.
“Where is she?” I let power drip into my voice, its echo filling the space between the hedges, which seemed to lean in in anticipation.
The man stumbled back against the hedge, his arms spreading wide in an attempt to hold himself upright. His mouth gaped, opening and closing dumbly. I advanced until I was right in front of him, until I could see the tears gathering in the corners of his blue eyes.
I took his chin between my claws. “Where is Sorcha?”
“H-house,” he gasped. “S-she’sss in the house. –got out,” he stammered. “I-i can’t get out. She d-did.”
Annoyance flickered through me. “How many of you are here?”
“F-five. P-please.” One tear, and then another fell down his dirt-scuffed cheeks. I followed them down, making an assessment of my own. He was filthy, it was clear he’d fallen and been lost to the maze, whereas I knew Sorcha would have been welcomed through without hesitation.
Five. So, there was only one left...one I suspected was with Sorcha unless she had evaded him too.
The bastard would beg for death when I got my talons on him.
But first…
“Shh,” I crooned, cupping my hand over the man’s mouth. I pulled at the magik in my blood, at the traces of it that lay buried deep within the mortal realm’s soil. The hedge shivered behind the man, parting and then wrapping around him like a lover’s embrace. His eyes were impossibly wide. It sounded like he screamed the word “please” into my palm.
“You should never have come here.”
Roots snaked out of the earth to trap his wrists and ankles. They threaded around his thighs, his chest, tightening in a lethal embrace. He lurched, his back arching violently. Another muffled scream graced the underside of my palm.
I smiled, flashing my fangs. “Hurts, doesn’t it? People don’t give plants nearly enough credit these days, but they can be quite vicious. Quite effective in the ways they usher in death.”
I lifted my hand from his face as he started to shudder, in order to best hear the cough that rattled his lungs as he fought for breath. I leaned forward and pressed my mouth against his, slipping my forked tongue down his throat to taste the terror, the poison that now burned through his veins. The man’s body convulsed. The hedges crushed him further, and I heard the sweet sound of ribs cracking. I withdrew slowly, savoring death’s flavor as blood bubbled over his lips and down his chin. His lips parted as if to make some final, useless plea.
In place of words, elegant stems dotted with white flowers sprouted from the bloody hole of his mouth, reaching for my kiss. I brushed my thumb over them, grazing the fresh blooms of foxglove.
The man stopped shaking. His empty eyes looked almost as red as my own, such were the veins that had burst around their irises. The flowers danced in the last shuddered exhale of his breath.
Smiling to myself, I turned back to the house as the hedge continued to pull him back. In, in, in it dragged him, until allwas once more still and silent, and no trace of the blue-eyed man remained.
