Page 6 of Bloody Bargain
I nodded, sniffing out at the heathland. “Right. I’m not sure you understand me,” I started, feeling as foolish as if I was talking to a lamp, “but I’m going to bring you down. It’s gonna hurt, so, you know. Brace yourself.”
I stood back up and pressed my weight against the few boards that still stood in my way. I watched the ceiling with a knot in my throat. Something waswrongwith this shed. The walls swayed but the block of stone above the creature remained steadfast, floating of its own accord rather than connected to anything at all.
I stomped on the remaining nubs of wood and the door frame, no longer worried about the roof collapsing as I demolished the walls to make room for the mattress. It was a heavy lump that I had to massage into position, working up a sweat as I pushed it up against the creature’s feet. When it butted up against his shin’s, I stepped back up onto my cracked bucket, panting for air.
A moment later, the creature crumpled to the mattress with a soft thump, wrists tied, shoulders bulging at an unnatural angle. He gasped awake, tendons and ligaments all across his body tight with pain. I was impressed he had so much energy left as he guppied for air like a fish out of water. He couldn’t catch his breath beyond a gurgle.
“Don’t,” I said loud enough to grab his attention. He rolled onto his side, looking up at me as I stepped down from the bucket. “Your lungs are probably filling with fluid. I want to ask you some yes-no questions before you die. Blink once for yes, twice for no. Okay?”
Surely he didn’t understand. He hadn’t spoken English before. This was going to be a bust, I was certain of it. But his oddly long eyes caught mine with recognition. He blinked once slowly, then watched me with that infected gaze.
My heart raced, exhilarated. I rubbed my injured hand over my face in shock.
“Wow, okay,” I breathed. “Are you a fiend?”
He didn’t blink.
“Like the one in the cottage,” I explained.
He blinked twice.
“Are you their enemy?”
Once.
What are you?
I bit my cheek. I couldn’t ask complicated questions to a dying creature, but I wanted to so badly. He could fade at any moment.
“Does iron hurt them?”
Once.
I blew out a breath. “I knew it,” I said in wonder. When I first started, I’d used my shitty knives from college. They were rusty and worked well. When I decided to take hunting fiends more seriously and distanced myself from life, I invested in high quality steel. My first hunt after that nearly killed me. The fiend hadn’t gone down in shock like Matthew. It had fought back.
I licked my lips. “Can they smell human blood?”
Once.
The creature’s eyes focused on my injured knuckles and forearms, where the nails had left their angry scrapes, and I stilled.
“Canyousmell human blood?”
He looked up at me, then away. The streak of my blood on his face was bright against the infected yellow pallor of his skin.
“Yes,” he hissed in a whispered breath.
The weight of my knife sat heavily against the small of my back. My heart pounded in my ears. He’d gurgled moments ago. He shouldn’t have been able to breathe let alone speak.
He should be dying.
So why thefuckwasn’t he dying?
“Do you hunt humans?”
The creature looked at me again.“Non…No.”
“Can you breathe?”
