A ghost blew through Melissa’s bones as she stepped into Archbishop Pager’s suite. She didn’t know why he’d called or what he wanted, but it had to be about the missing marrow seeds—if Pager knew who stole them, she was dead. It was easy. That reality had crept up as the sentinels allowed her entrance. One of the meatheads actually gave her an impatient shove.
Sandeus Pager had taken the liberty of decorating, as was his way. The hotel suite, though expansive, was crowded with antique furniture and the gilded excess of a man with too many resources and too much time to ponder creative uses for them. Strawberry incense burned; she couldn’t see the smoke, but the choking sweetness powered through the air.
Standing in this room, in the presence of the Archbishop, put her in danger just to save Cole’s ego, and made her silently hate him. It couldn’t be helped. Melissa began to wonder if she’d ever loved him as much as she once thought.
“Come into the bedroom, sweetie,” Sandeus called. He laughed and said to somebody else, “No not you, Archbishop Kennen. Of course, if you have a bedroom handy, by all means.” Another chortle.
Melissa edged by a bronze replica of Medusa into the spacious bedroom. Melissa’s shoes shifted through coils of black and orange potpourri layering the carpet like a forest bed. The Archbishop stretched out under the canopy bed next to someone. Somebody naked and female. Somebody naked and female and with a cavernous red mouth of gore smiling in her throat. Wires connected to the organic circuitry led to a phonograph that had been placed on the bloody pillow beside her. Sandeus lay on his side in an evening dress almost identical to the orange get-up the Priestess of Morning had worn at conclave.
“You’re not lying to me, are you Sandeus?” the voice on the phonograph implored. “The Priestess hasn’t lost sight of the Nomads, has she?”
“I don’t know what else to say, Kennen, other than we have them.”
“But the Hearts?”
Sandeus looked at Melissa and winked, then patted the side of the bed. She treaded over. The body of the dead woman came into full view. The corpse was arranged as though she were doing snow-angels. Melissa recognized the woman. She worked janitorial. Such a pretty thing. Lupita, she remembered the name plaque had read. Before Melissa left for the restaurant that day, she’d given this dead woman a ten dollar gratuity. A shy smile in return. Now Lupita’s body served as an audio conduit to another world. Sandeus had festively adorned her breasts and pubic hair with black and orange glitter.
“Don’t worry so much, Kennen. The Heralding has begun.”
Lupita’s lips frothed with words from the other side. “I sacrificed my wife to smelt visions of the Nomads’ future. I had to choose the time. I changed reality so that the Priestess could find them. So why are we learning information about the Hearts in fragments—this diminishes everything my church has suffered for. This was to be the year, Sandeus.”
Sandeus shared a smile with Melissa. “They haven’t gone to retrieve the Hearts yet,” he lied and tapped Lupita’s cold purple lips. “But I look forward to giving you the good news.” He lightly lifted the needle off the phonograph plate. His eyes moved over Melissa’s clothes for a while, beaming under his peach eye shadow. “Why we keep our women in those hideous suits, I’ll never understand.”
Melissa felt her cheeks warm. “Yeah.”
Sandeus reached forward. “I like your glasses. So cute.” He pulled them off with a coil of his finger and her world turned into a blurry wasteland of black, orange, and red. She could tell the man had put on the glasses, but really couldn’t see.
“They hurt my eyes,” he told her, handing them back. “Can’t you wear contact lenses, honey?”
“They hurt my eyes when they dry out.” She put the glasses back on and found Sandeus’s smile had vanished. He sat cross-legged now in his evening gown, his hands folded in his lap.
“I asked you up to talk about Bishop Szerszen,” he stated. “Point is, I value Cole. Hell, he’s a better politician than a face like his would usually permit. But the sad thing is, lately I don’t think he values me in return. Actually, truly, honestly, I don’t think he cares whether I live or die.”
“That’s not true.”
“Cole’s no dummy. He sees things are changing and wants to be able to change with them. Plans have a funny way of flipping and only the smart roll with them. You’re in on his insurrection, aren’t you, Melissa sweetie?”
“He wants what’s best for the Church. What would cause you to believe anything besides that?”
Sandeus leaned forward. His spicy perfume made her eyes water. “I don’t mean to scare you, even though I know I am.”
“Not scared,” she mumbled.
“Yes, yes you are. But you don’t have to be. I need Cole on my side. You two are lovers, and that makes you a perfect go-between. If he’s planning something, I want you to try and convince him otherwise.”
“He would never—”
“Let me be clear. This is between you and I. Okay?”
She nodded.
This didn’t satisfy him. “Say, ‘Yes I understand.’”
“Yes, I understand.”
“Every October 31st I take a vigorous dose of marrow seeds. I experiment with the new power they bring to my garden while our worlds have connection. And Melissa, this process brings me more power than Cole could abide. I tell you this, not as your Archbishop, but as your and Cole’s friend. If he tried something this Halloween, he wouldn’t survive.”
“What makes you—?”
“Melissa,” he said. “Just stop. Okay? Now if you love him, encourage Cole away from the idea. I saw how the envoys were clinging onto him and giving me the stink eye. I didn’t get to this position by being foolish. You just have to know that I will re-cultivate my garden again and Cole doesn’t want to swim in these waters, believe me.”
She shuttered. He still didn’t know the seeds were gone! He hadn’t checked? But for how long? Taking the seeds might actually work out for the best in the end—
“He hasn’t mentioned any plan, Archbishop. It’s silly to think of him in that way, but I will ask him and honestly report anything out of the ordinary.”
“Fabulous. I’m just a paranoid person, I guess.” Sandeus petted Lupita’s brown tresses and gave her cheek a few reassuring smacks.
~ * ~
Paul watched the rain while he waited for the elevator. The light gradually went down the floor buttons, taking its time. He leaned against the wall and tried to collect himself for another night with the Priestess. Everything was slow. The atmosphere of the Doubletree felt like a big vat of syrup. The Heralding had left his body charged but his mind tarred and feathered.
The elevator opened and he nearly collapsed inside. The marrow blossoms clenched and unclenched. Paul should have felt better now that the children’s voices had left his mind. He despaired though. He wanted to understand their absence. It was easy to feel betrayed by the loss. He’d mentioned this to Cole in the lobby just before parting ways. The Bishop’s cracked face had looked grave. “Don’t worry Quintana. They’re never gone forever.”
Wonderful.
Eggert waited outside the Priestess’s room, as he was obliged to do. Paul sidled up and stuck out his hand. Some human contact would be good for a mood change, even if the human was Eggert.
The bushy beard lifted with a dry smile. “Having a pleasant evening? I thought you looked sad after all that ice I filled you with. What? Did a twenty horse carriage run over your balls?”
Paul’s hand fell. “But I feel stupendous.”
A prickly moment passed. The barbarian eyes were all business. Eggert’s usual smell of Aqua Velva had soured from many trips out into the rain, probably at the Priestess’s whims.
“Are you going to call her, or should I?” asked Paul.
Eggert stepped closer to insist upon the fundamental size difference between them. “I think she could do better than you by randomly picking a warm body out of a crowd.”
“Good thing nobody cares what you think.”
“You’re an imbecile, Quintana. You and the Priestess, you both want two very different things out of this.”
“What does that matter?”
Eggert backed away. “Because this won’t end well.”
Paul was too exhausted to toy with the man, although the prospect of making him squirm did have a lingering appeal. At first he had been revolted by the Priestess’s suggestion of Eggert watching them. Friends in the bed were one thing to Paul, but Eggert was no friend. Now however, he found the idea had potential. It might knock the big oaf down a notch or two.
Eggert rapped on the door with a brace of gnarled knuckles. “Bishop Quintana to see you, Priestess.”
After a few seconds, he nodded, as though the Priestess could actually see this. She could. The door popped open and Eggert lethargically gestured inside. Paul slipped by the man’s stench and it brought to mind that Paul, himself, hadn’t showered since the Heralding. Eggert reached to shut the door and he turned. “Maybe I’ll see you later, Egg.” He winked.
The door slammed.
Paul explored the massive suite for a moment, happy to be through with the Heralding. He already contemplated extended bathtub debauchery. Hot and cold water. And lips. And ass. And tits. He thickened at the fantasy.
The Priestess of Morning stood at the balcony window. She wore only panties, something from her world that looked like the briefest of skirts made of black scales. The hanging material hardly covered her ass. Her nipples had stiffened in the cold room and her areolas lightly bubbled. As devastating as she was, the worry cut into her face spoiled Paul’s glee.
“It’s letting up a bit,” he told her, taking off his coat and tossing it over the end of the divan as he had the night before.
She bit her lip and came away from the window. When he embraced her, he felt her body tremble. “I saw the Nomads again, only for a second,” she told him. “The woman wasn’t well.”
He stroked her hair. “That’s good.”
“The Heralding?” A smile flickered to her apricot lips. “Did it hurt much?”
“I don’t want to talk about it, if it’s all the same.”
She tapped his nose gently, her mood lightening. “You’re so thin-skinned, Bishop.”
Paul shrugged. Her hand slid between his legs, found his penis and clenched it through his slacks. “You want me then?”
“Actually,” he voice squeaked. “I wanted to unwind first. Everything’s still crazy inside my body.”
“You don’t make the rules.” She gripped him harder and her serpentine eyes threaded into his. “You’ll have me, hard, and you’re not allowed to release. If you release any seed—you’re on the balcony again.”
He pushed her away. “No fucking chance.”
Her head cocked to the side and she pointed to the door. “You’ll do as I say, Paul, because if you don’t, I’ll send for Eggert.”
“The bastard’s not touching me again.”
“We’ll see about that.”
He grabbed his coat. “I’m too tired for this tonight, dear.”
Exhaustion and terror cinched in a perfect knot at the base of his throat. He locked onto her breasts and the smooth slopes of her abdomen. This was going to be impossible. She slipped the otherworldly undergarment down to the floor and kicked it aside. Then strode toward him, smile growing.
“He’s not touching me and I’m not sleeping out there again.” A whimper crawled up Paul’s throat. “Not again. I’ve been through too much tonight—I won’t do it. You can’t make me.”
“I can.”
“No—you don’t want me to show you what I’ve learned tonight.”
“That’s where you’re wrong, Paul,” she said softly. “I want you to give me everything inside you. Give it to me.”
“I’ll give you what I want to give.”
Her fingers brought down his zipper. “Stop my agony.”
Paul had an answer for that.
~ * ~
The Priestess had never found coupling as powerful as this. Now the insanity began. And the cramping muscles. With the clenching, gnashing teeth, and the nails disinterring curls of hot flesh, tears creased her face from all the disappointment. Losing the Nomads. Paul took her away from the failure that towered over every moment. She could sense power from the spiritual chambers deep inside him. It was a vast, new power, chilling in its scope. Billions of tentacles suckered onto her perception and then—then—
She saw him.
The night sky must have cleared outside. She saw the man at once. She saw the Nomad named Martin. He was in a brightly lit room, playing with his necklace made of seashells. She tried to have a look around the room, to see something that would give away the location. Just a name...
But she couldn’t concentrate with Paul drilling into her.
“Stop!” she yelled. “Stop now!”
Paul’s hands clamped around her shoulders and pinned her down. His hips swung fiercely and a mania of hateful delight rained down. She loved him for it. Hated him also.
“Stop!”
But Paul wouldn’t. Beyond the flags of damp blonde hair his eyes burned with the challenge she’d put there.
“You don’t understand!” The Priestess kicked through the foggy images. She was losing sight again. “Please!”
His hips came at her faster, and his hold numbed her and pushed consciousness elsewhere, forcing her to become some kind of ghost flushed from one world into another. Wait! He was sending her somewhere—yet, her body remained beneath him. She could feel the movement of ideas, the slipping sanity. Moving. Again, not her brain; her being. She screamed one horrified name at the top of her lungs before her soul left this world for the Old Domain.
Eggert!
~ * ~
Paul hovered over the Priestess, swatting at her face, trying to loosen those fixed, lifeless eyes. He felt her neck for a pulse. There was a strong thumping there. Snapping his fingers in front of her eyes got him no response. He began mumbling prayers to a nothing-god of his own determination.
“Wake up Priestess—wake up! What happened? What happened?” But Paul knew. He had felt the newly awakened creature inside him, working under the influence of the intoxicating blossoms raining more seeds from under their petals, and he knew that the Priestess’s soul had been stripped from this world, this flesh, and transported on the ethereal winds that blew through the valleys of the Old Domain. He should have never fought the power during the Heralding. Paul should have let it draw from his life, not rob it in the way he had. He’d cheated and now the Priestess had paid for it.
Paul bent forward, hoping he could draw her soul back—but it didn’t work that way. He wasn’t like the Nomads. They were powerful enough to pull things from the Old Domain into this world, but as Cole told him, they could never do the same. That meant that Paul had to find them and force them to bring her back. If that was easy, the idea might be reassuring. If you do find them, they’ll just fuckin’ kill you, he thought.
Getting up from the floor, Paul staggered deliriously, trying to remember where his slacks had ended up. He nearly ripped them open to retrieve the phone. His fingers dialed Vince’s number and he pressed the send button. Before an answer came, red darkness sliced through his vision. Paul’s head bumped a wall and he fell, naked body crumpling. Hot copper dripped over his lip. Everything went in and out. How had Eggert snuck in? A gallows laugh struck through his core: The man was built like a bear and moved like a tiger? How did I not hear him?
Eggert tied Paul’s hands behind his back with what felt like a zip tie. Paul tried to flex his fingers and get a hold on the big man, but Eggert kept a safe distance. Paul’s cell phone pulsed with green light. A boot crushed the sound out of it. Its cry faded.
Paul started blacking out from the throbbing head wound. He heard Eggert begging the Priestess to wake, over and over. Each time the man’s voice became more panicked and more sickened with loathing. Consciousness washed away at that point, but somewhere, maybe somewhere not that far away, a man was being beaten. Pummeled. Paul realized he was that beaten man but could do nothing about this. He knew he’d awaken to suffering or perhaps wouldn’t awaken at all. Reaching out for the Priestess did no good here. There was only dark.