Page 105 of Edge of Darkness (Night Prowler 4)
ght, as if viewed from the end of a very long tunnel.
Then Caesar slapped her hard across the face.
Her head rocked back; all the bones in her neck popped. Reeling, she cried out and jerked upright in shock.
“That’s better,” said Caesar as she straightened. He sounded satisfied. He leaned down, placed his hands on his thighs and smiled at her. Then he wagged a finger in her face, tutting like a mother scolding an errant child. “No passing out on me. I need you lucid. We haven’t even gotten to the good bit yet.”
He straightened and gestured to his men, and she was suddenly over the table again, her chest and cheek pressed flat against the wood. One hard, large hand held her head immobile when she struggled to free her arms, similarly pinned. Caesar picked up his knife from the corner of the desk, stroked a finger up its edge and said, “Stop struggling or stepmommy loses an ear.”
Panting in panic, Ember fell still. She cut her gaze to Marguerite, who seemed to be praying. Her eyes were squeezed shut tight and her lips were moving rapidly with silent words.
Caesar came and stood over Ember. He gently turned her left palm up, revealing the mangled mess of the inside of her forearm. He put the knife between his teeth, slowly rolled up the sleeve of his white shirt to reveal a tanned, muscular forearm, and held it out directly above Ember’s own arm. Then he took the knife from between his teeth and in one hard, slashing motion, cut deep into his own skin, straight across the vein.
Blood sprayed from the wound. Horror dried her tongue to jerky in her mouth.
No one else in the room seemed particularly surprised by this turn of events, however. Caesar’s men held her down while he calmly held his outstretched arm over hers and let the torrent of blood rain down over her wounds.
“Oh my,” he breathed, his voice trembling with excitement. “Look at all that blood.”
With her head on the desk, Ember was eye level with Caesar’s crotch. Beneath his blood-spattered pants, she saw him grow instantly hard. She squeezed her eyes shut in disgust.
But then…burning.
Itching, like a thousand biting fire ants nibbling on her skin. A wave of heat enveloped her body, and she was drenched in sudden sweat. It became very hard to breathe; the earlier nausea returned with a vengeance. She thought she would throw up.
“Olé!” cried Caesar, satisfied. “I had a feeling that would work!”
Ember looked at her arm, and knew her eyes weren’t working properly. She must be hallucinating from the pain.
Because, as she watched, the gaping, serrated cuts that sliced through the skin and muscle of her arm were swiftly, silently knitting together.
The man holding her head murmured an awed, “Whoa.”
Frozen in horrified astonishment, unable to think or move or breathe, Ember glanced at Caesar. He held up his arm, and there was nothing there except a smear of blood. The vicious cut he’d given himself had entirely healed in the space of a few seconds.
When she looked again at his face, he winked.
Then he reached out and gently stroked a finger up and down her arm, smearing his blood into all the healing wounds on her own skin, getting it into every nook and cranny, deep down into the muscle next to the bone where he’d dug out one of the thin metal plates. She watched his progress with disbelieving eyes, watched as the flesh smoothed itself out and grew together.
It hurt but it didn’t, still burning, still itching, and Ember couldn’t look away.
Caesar leaned down near her ear. “Are you religious, September? Myself, I used to think it all a bunch of mumbo-jumbo jabberwocky, but I have to admit my thoughts are now somewhat…in flux about the matter. I mean, immortality has really changed my perception about the state of life on this planet.”
She finally tore her gaze away from her arm to stare into his eyes. Black and wild, they burned with devout fire.
He said, “Imagine a world without suffering. A world without sickness, or poverty, or war. A world without death. It’s possible, you know. I am going to make it possible.”
“By murdering the innocent?” Her voice was hoarse, shaking with fury. “Like those people at the Vatican—”
“That was just to get your attention,” he scoffed, straightening to gaze imperiously down at her. “Unfortunately you humans don’t respond to anything but a show of power, so…I gave you one.” He smiled, a chilling, rabid smile that made her skin crawl. “I’m afraid more displays of power will be necessary before your species is brought to heel.”
He motioned to her arm. Ember followed the direction of his hand and gasped when she saw all her wounds were healed. The only thing left were streaks of blood, glistening red in the overhead fluorescents.
Her arm was whole. Unblemished. Perfect.
Tentatively, she flexed her hand open; there was no pain, not even the old stiffness. She stared down at it in total disbelief.
“You’re welcome,” said Caesar, and all his men laughed. He motioned for them to release her and she sagged back into the chair, stunned.
