we managed to isolate the tail. We had ascertained that there was only one. We cornered him here on the beach, against the water. I should have known before I took him down…” …that he was too small to be a grown man… “…but I took my shot anyway.”
“You shot him?!” Airel hissed in a whisper, then recovered. “Wait…you shot him? I didn’t hear any gunshots.”
“The freeway’s right there,” he pointed straight ahead. The racket of interstate traffic, mostly trucks at that hour, became very loud once attention had been drawn to it. “Besides,” he patted his ribs under his sweater, “Stanley trained me well. I know when to use a silencer.”
It came off rude, like sacrilege, and he did not intend that. But he couldn’t stop himself. “One shot. I took him down with one shot.”
He then collapsed into more heaving sobs.
“I knew him, you know…” His voice softened as he brushed a hand over the boy’s cheek. “This was James’ little bro. I used to help change his diapers…” He choked on a sob and swallowed hard.
Airel prodded softly, “What was his name?”
“This was Marc.” Michael was running out of tears to cry. He could feel anger beginning to set in.
“Did he…attack you?”
“Yeah, I chased him here. He was just beginning to change…I had to kill him. There was no time to think, really.
“I’m so sorry,” she said. She was silent for a while. “But you had to defend yourself. You had to defend me—us.”
“God, I killed him. I killed Marc. What else is there?” His voice was quiet. “When will it ever be enough?”
He stood, holding Marc dead and dangling. The boy was small in his arms. “I need some time alone. To take care of this, to think.”
“What are you going to do?”
He looked at her. “Take care of it.”
“Where should I go?” She sounded lost.
“Back to the room. Sleep. Ellie says her man will be here with a car at 8 a.m. sharp to pick us up and take us to the airstrip. That doesn’t give you much time.”
Airel looked very sad. “You want me to leave?” She stood off from him, hands in her back pockets.
He looked at her perhaps a little cruelly, he thought. “Yes,” he said, hoping she would understand all that he had been through for her. For them.
Eyes brimming with tears, she left him.
I couldn’t believe it. Michael had killed a boy; demon host or not, he was a boy. And James’s little bro, too. Yikes. And now he didn’t want me around. I felt like I didn’t even know him anymore. I didn’t know how much to attribute to the Bloodstone, how much to all the crazy circumstances of our situation, and how much was just me doing my over-thinking thing again.
I walked alone, back to the hotel room. Back to Kim, the zombie; and Ellie, the weirdo. A little slice of Hell.
CHAPTER VI
Arabia 1232 B.C.
“HE HAS FAVORED YOU with a glance, Uriel! I think you have found favor in his eyes,” Santura said. She smiled broadly at the young man, a little too much so for Uriel’s comfort. She turned away from the boy Santura had indicated. He was tall and strong enough, perhaps, but his piggishly small eyes were much too close together.
“Him!” she whispered with disdain, “He’s not what I should call handsome at all.” Still, she was of age and she wanted a man of her own, if even as a plaything. Less for romantic exploits than to irritate her father, truth be told. Her uncle Yamanu gave her the kind of free reign only uncles could, the kind of liberties a father, in her experience, could not and would not ever grant a daughter.
Santura giggled as she flirted with the young man for herself. “Uriel, stop it! He is handsome enough.” She gave him a little wave. “Besides, there’s more to a man’s eligibility than the construct of his face. There’s nobility, for instance.”
“Oh, Santura, you can rest assured. I know all about his line. Dear Yakob shall one day inherit vast riches not only from his father’s bloodline, but also from his mother—the union of his parents was most wise and judicious.” Uriel did not say that she found it deplorable for women to marry for dowries. For expedience. Was there not more to hope for under the sun?
“He is well liked by the elders,” Santura said, running a hand through her long blonde hair and fiddling with the pure white flower of