BlackWind Page 18

  “Where are you now, my protector?” Bronwyn asked under her breath and was not surprised that her unseen visitor did not answer.

  “Stop mumbling,” Sister Mauveen ordered. Her grip tightened and she smiled brutally when Bronwyn whimpered. “I will give you something to cry about!”

  When they reached Bronwyn's room and Sister Geraldine Marie made to enter, Sister Mauveen would not allow it. “Wait outside!”

  “I don't think...” Sister Geraldine Marie began, only to have the door slammed in her face.

  Bronwyn clenched her teeth as the ruler slammed into her opened palms. The stinging grew worse the longer Sister Mauveen gleefully applied her chosen instrument of torture. Avoiding looking at the glazed look of combined fury and pleasure stamped on the nun's wrinkled face, it was all Bronwyn could do not to cry out with the agony being inflicted on her.

  “Whore!” Sister Mauveen chanted as the heavy, metal-edged ruler descended. “Harlot!” The force of the strikes grew harder, the epithets louder. “Strumpet! Slut! Jezebel!”

  Bronwyn's lower lip trembled, her cheeks streaked with tears, but she made no sound as the ruler left vivid red impressions in her palms and on the tops of her upturned wrists.

  “Hussy! Floozy!” Sister Mauveen shrieked. She lifted the ruler as high over her shoulder as she could and brought it down with enough force to splinter the wood.

  Bronwyn screamed as the ruler's metal edge sliced open the flesh of her left hand. Stumbling away from the demented nun who shouted at her to stay still, Bronwyn crouched against the wall, her back to an enraged Sister Mauveen.

  “Turn around! Give me your hands!” the nun demanded, pulling at Bronwyn's arm.

  When Bronwyn refused to budge, Sister Mauveen grabbed a handful of Bronwyn's hair and would likely have pulled her around in that manner had not Sister Geraldine Marie stopped her.

  “That's enough!” the nun shouted and stepped between Sister Mauveen and the object of her fury. She caught the other nun's wrist and dug her short nails into the mottled flesh.

  Yelping, Sister Mauveen snatched back her hand and turned to glare at the smaller nun. “How dare you interfere with this whore's punishment!”

  Bronwyn slid down the wall, cradling her bleeding hand against her chest. She whimpered; her shoulders shook.

  “What's going on?” someone demanded from the doorway.

  Sister Mauveen spun around to find Mother Superior just inside the room. She pointed a crooked finger at Sister Geraldine Marie. “This woman had no right to stop me from punishing this girl. I am—”

  “Go to your room,” the Mother Superior ordered, and when Sister Mauveen started to argue, she stepped closer. “Do you dare to disobey me?”

  Sister Mauveen looked as though she smelled something rancid. Her upper lips arched toward her aquiline nose and her chin puckered. “No, Reverend Mother.".

  “Then do as you are told!” Mother Mary Joseph snapped.

  With a curt bow that was less than respectful, Sister Mauveen spun on her heel and stomped from the room.

  “See to the girl,” the Mother Superior told Sister Geraldine Marie.

  Hunkering down, Sister put an arm around Bronwyn's shoulder. “Let me see, Bronnie.”

  Eyes swollen, Bronwyn looked up and held out her injured hands. At the nun's sharp intake of breath, she began to cry again.

  Sister Geraldine Marie looked at Mother Mary Joseph. “She is going to need stitches.”

  The Mother Superior's jaw tightened and her eyes became flint hard. “See to it, please.”

  Helping Bronwyn to her feet, Sister Geraldine Marie ushered her from the room. As she passed the Reverend Mother, their eyes locked.

  “I'll see to it,” Mother Mary Joseph promised.

  * * * *

  In the infirmary later than evening, Bronwyn lay on a cot, her face turned to the dank wall. She had cried all the tears she had in her and now all that was left was terrible grief and lingering pain in her palms.

  “Bronwyn.”

  “Leave me alone,” she said, her voice as detached as an automaton's.

  “The nun will be punished. This I swear.”

  Bronwyn buried her face in the pillow and tried to drown out the insidious words coming to her from the night beyond the walls of Galrath.

  “I love you, Bronwyn,” he whispered. “I will always love you and one day we will be together.”

  “I don't want you,” she said fiercely. “I want Sean!”

  There was silence, then: “You will never have him.”

  Despite the pain in her hands, she covered her ears. “Go away!” she yelled.

  There was a soft pressure, a longing stroke along her left hip. She jerked, staring up into the darkened room, yet seeing nothing.

  “You are mine.”

  The pressure increased, then vanished.

  “Who are you?” Bronwyn sobbed, her lip trembling.

  “You will know soon enough...”

  CHAPTER 18

  Sean opened his eyes, feeling as though he were wrapped loosely in a thick blanket of cotton. He swallowed and tried to turn his head, but when he did, his world cantered off to the side. He had to squeeze his eyes shut to keep the nausea from rushing up his throat.

  “The feeling will pass,” Brian said. “Don't try to move for a few more minutes.”

  “W...what did they give me?” Sean asked, his voice husky, grating.

  “A drug called tenerse. Once you Transition, you won't be able to live without it.”

  Forcing his eyes open, Sean grabbed two fistfuls of the sheet beneath him and moved his vision to his father. “You get addicted to it?”

  Brian nodded. “In a manner of speaking. It's not a narcotic, though. Don't consider it in that light. Think of it as preventative medicine. Something like a drug to keep your blood pressure under control, or like insulin for a diabetic.”

  With effort, Sean lifted his hand and rubbed his forehead. “I hurt.”

  “I would imagine so. That was one hell of a seizure you had, lad.”

  At the word “seizure,” Sean's brow furrowed. “What caused it?”

  Brian glanced at Daniel Dunne, who stood by the door. Dunne shrugged. “Tell him what he needs to know.”

  “Why don't you tell me?” Sean asked.

  Dunne smiled crookedly. “All right,” he said, advancing on the bed. “Where do you want me to start?”

  “What happened to me?”

  “We believe it was your close proximity to the revenant queen,” Dunne replied. “She grew extremely agitated the moment you started up here. The parasite within you felt her and began to wake. You can liken it to a lost child hearing its mother's voice and trying to get to her.” He locked eyes with Brian. “It's never happened before, so we were unprepared for the severity of Sean's reaction or the intensity of the queen's.”

  “The drug you gave me knocked me out,” Sean accused.

  Dunne sighed. “If it hadn't, you might well have experienced an aneurysm or gone into convulsions. We thought it best.”

  “Is that what Transition is like?” Sean asked.

  “Since I've never experienced anything like you did,” Brian answered, “I can't say, but from the sheer force of the reaction you had, I'd say Transition will be a piece of cake for you.”

  “That's not to say Transition will be easy,” Dunne put in. “It's a painful process.”

  “Something to look forward to,” Sean muttered.

  “The tenerse controls the severity of the change,” Brian told him. “And it also keeps us from Transitioning out of cycle. Without it, we'd have no way of controlling when we Transition or for how long.”

  Sean stared at the ceiling. “How does it feel to be a puppet master, Dr. Dunne?” he asked sarcastically. “To turn men into monsters on a whim?”

  Brian gasped. “Sean! Don't talk to...”

  Dunne held up his hand to silence Brian. “Let him have his say. He is entitled.”

  A snort cam
e from Sean. His gaze slid to Dunne. “What good would it do to tell you how disgusting this whole thing is to me? How angry I am that, through no part of my own, I can look forward to a future of torment?” He turned away his head. “How much I ache because that future can't be shared with the only person I've ever cared about?”

  “Ah,” Dunne said, sitting astride a chair beside Sean's bed. He braced his forearms on the chair's back. “That's the crux of the matter, isn't it? The girl?”

  Sean's jaw tightened.

  “You love this girl,” Dunne stated. “We are aware of your feelings and we know those feelings will never change.”

  “Fat lot of good it does me that you know how I feel!”

  “You've a lot to learn about being a Reaper,” Dunne continued as though he had not been interrupted, “but the main thing you need to understand is that Reapers bear a close kinship to what legend calls ‘werewolves.’ When you Transition, that is basically the kind of shape you will have.”

  Sean flinched; his grip on the sheet tightened.

  “If you know anything about wolves,” Dunne went on, “you know they mate for life. The male wolf will never mount another female after he has chosen his mate. Neither will you.”

  “Not only a freakish monster, but a celibate freakish monster,” Sean hissed.

  Dunne sighed. “Please don't consider yourself a monster. You are...”

  Sean turned a hard glower to the doctor. “What am I if not a monster?”

  “I'll tell you, if you'd let me,” Dunne snapped.

  “By all means,” Sean grated. “Tell me just how bad it really is!”

  Dunne let out an exasperated breath and clenched his teeth for a moment. “For centuries there have been legends in Ireland of the dearg duls. Do you know what they are?”

  “No.”

  “Celtic vampires. Every culture has its own version of the creature. The most written about are the ones from the Balkans region, from Transylvania, but Greece, China, Spain, even the Native Americans, have beasts that resemble the traditional vampire. Dearg duls are ours. Reapers are dearg duls, they—”

  “Not only a werewolf, but a vampire.” Sean guffawed. “There's no end to my talent, is there? Next thing you'll tell me is that I'm part brain-eating zombie, too.”

  “That's enough!” Brian shouted. “There is no reason to be disrespectful!”

  “Did he respect you when he implanted that evil thing in you?” Sean countered, his voice equally strong.

  Dunne put a calming hand on Brian's arm. “Let me handle this. Take a walk. Calm down. I'll send for you when we're through here.”

  “But...” Brian began, but Dunne tightened his grip on his arm.

  “Go,” Dunne insisted, then released his hold.

  Brian cast Sean an angry look, then threw up his hands and left.

  Dunne sighed heavily. “Brian accepted what I did long ago.”

  “How? By having one of your goons program him into accepting it?” Sean scoffed.

  “I've never had any Reaper programmed, and I won't start with you, if that's what concerns you.”

  “What concerns me is the beast I'm going to turn into when the damned moon turns full!”

  “Would it make you feel any better if I told you I am sorry I ever implanted the first revenant in a human?”

  “No!”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I wouldn't believe it! I think you enjoyed the hell out of it. You knew precisely what you were doing. You might not have known what would happen to the men, but you knew it would be to your advantage!”

  “How could it possibly be an advantage to me?” Dunne barked.

  “I've yet to figure that out, but I will!”

  “Well, whether you believe it or not, I do regret it. I've created beings that are hard to control and some that have gone rogue on me. I have three rogues locked up in the deep containment cells who would gladly tear me apart piece by bloody piece if they could. They are marked for execution at the end of this week.”

  Sean stared at him. “Just like that?” he asked, snapping his finger. “You just say the word and a man's life is terminated in the blink of an eye because he opposes what you did to him?”

  “Do you have any notion of what evil those three would do if they were let loose on civilization?” Dunne ground out. “They'd make your horror movie serial killers look like choir boys. We're talking mass slaughter here, and the violent impregnation of three innocent women whom those Reapers would keep filling with their contaminated sperm. There would be wholesale bloodshed until they could be stopped. Is that what you would unleash on society? Is that the kind of plague you would like to see replicating itself?”

  Sean seethed. “You know it isn't.”

  “Destroying the rogues is the only way to make sure that scenario doesn't happen.”

  “Stop making Reapers and you won't have to worry about it.”

  “We haven't ‘made’ a Reaper in eighteen years. You and nine others are the only second generation Reapers we have.” Dunne looked down at his hands. “When the three rogues are terminated, that will leave seven of you.”

  “And how many first generation monsters?” Sean queried.

  “Five, your father included. There were ten, but three died trying to escape Fuilghaoth and two were terminated when they turned rogue. I suspect a third will be eventually going to the deep containment cells. He is the bloodfather of one of the rogues and is showing signs of turning.”

  “So no more Reapers, then?” Sean challenged.

  Dunne shook his head. “No more Reapers.”

  Sean narrowed his eyes. “You're a lying piece of shit, Dunne.”

  The doctor blinked. For a few ticks of the clock, he said nothing, then got up from the chair. He crossed his arms over his chest and stared down at Sean. “You are going to be trouble, Cullen,” he said, his gaze flint-hard, “but you can be controlled.”

  “The rogues are like me, aren't they? They rebelled against what you did to them!”

  “You want the truth? Okay, I'll take the gloves off. No more lies. No more Mr. Nice Guy. I'll give you the truth, boy.” He leaned over Sean's bed, bracing his hand on the headboard. His voice was hard as he spoke.

  “His name was Viraidan Cree and he came from a place far beyond our own galaxy, from a planet we have learned is called ‘Rysalia.’ What we've learned of him has come from the revenant queen when she is psychically linked to the men we've implanted with her progeny.

  “The Reaper's craft crashed somewhere near Clifden. You can imagine what the ancient Celts and Druids must have thought of this man falling from the sky in his chariot.

  “Though hurt badly, burned hideously, he survived, his parasite working to heal him. He was dead, then alive, perfectly healed as though nothing had ever scarred him. That must have stunned the natives. They fell to their knees and began to worship him as a god. They brought him women to ease his needs, and from one of them, he chose a mate, a woman named Chandra.

  “The natives feared him, were terrified of his ability to shapeshift. Though he sexually took no other women save Chandra, there were females whose blood he drank, draining them almost to the point of death. These women would walk dazed through the village, eyes glazed, pale as ghosts, and it was said they became undead creatures who feasted on the blood of small animals and babies to satisfy the alien urges Cree had instilled within them.

  “We know now there is a venom in the bite of a Reaper, a venom that causes the victim to become psychically attached to the Reaper. Inject enough venom into the victim and it will become immune to illness, to injury, even to death. No doubt this is the basis of the legend of the dearg duls—creatures who feast on the blood of others and turn them into undead beings like themselves.”

  Dunne leaned lower over Sean. “In time, Chandra bore Viraidan a son on whom he doted. He loved the boy dearly and began to teach him how to be a Reaper. When the boy Transitioned for the first time at puberty, the natives
were horrified. They realized a whole race of savage beasts like Viraidan and his son could wipe them out. Their Druid priests began plotting a way to rid themselves of Cree and his bloodson. Chandra overheard what was planned and warned her menfolk to flee. The revenant queen does not know what happened to Chandra, but I suspect she was slain. The Druids could not risk her bearing another Reaper offspring.”

  “Which one did you find in the bog?” Sean asked.

  “Viraidan. His son had been set upon by a dozen warriors and hacked to pieces with stone axes. As they struck his back, splitting it open, his parasite was revealed. It tried to slither away, but they picked it up with a stick and threw it into the fire. What was left of the boy was also thrown into the fire. Another group of warriors, however, chased Viraidan into the bog where he drowned.”

  “He drowned, but the parasite lived,” Sean mumbled.

  “It went into extended hibernation.” Dunne straightened up. “Until I drew its host from the bog and allowed it to live again.”

  Sean shuddered. “And began putting portions of it into humans.”

  “To make them stronger, quicker, more powerful.” Dunne grinned sardonically. “And deadlier.”

  A cold finger of fear scraped its talon down Sean's spine. His face crinkled with loathing. “But why would you do that? What purpose could you possibly see for turning men into monsters?”

  Dunne cocked his head to one side. “Reapers are supreme warriors, Sean Cullen. Unlike anything this world had ever known. Their ability to shapeshift, to read minds, to hypnotize with a look, to kill without thought, makes them the perfect tool. They are worth their weight in gold bullion.”

  “Tool?” Sean repeated. “Tool for what? For whom?”

  “For governments in need of invincible soldiers. Governments desiring the ultimate warrior without conscience, without pity, without remorse. A relentless, nearly indestructible operative who will do his assigned job, do it well, then never ponder on what was done.” He grinned. “In other words, the perfect killing machine for governments and businesses with deep pockets and the willingness to pay for what they want.”

  Sean stared at the man hovering over him. “You're talking about assassins. Terrorists.”