Forsaken: The World of Nightwalkers (12 page)

“May I ask you something?” she asked.

“No way to stop you, really,” he said, his hands tightening once again on the steering wheel.

“You are willing to do this thing, this task that could be very dangerous, but you hold a great deal of distrust for the Bodywalker Pharaoh. I am curious as to what your motivation is. There are so many words evoked whenever you think of him, that I find it very confusing.”

“A very good reason why you should mind your own business,” he said caustically.

“Perhaps you are right. But since I have asked the question, perhaps you might answer.”

“I’m not particularly inclined to,” he said.

“Very well,” she said, settling back and contenting herself with the wild-looking scenery, all its varied browns and russets broken up by the odd green patch of cacti.

To her surprise he huffed a breath out his nose and said with obvious reluctance, “I don’t trust that
thing
inside of him. How do I know any of the Jackson I know has survived the possession of him? If he’s usurped the Jackson I know…I want to know. I want to know so I can do the right thing by my friend.”

“I don’t understand. The right thing?”

He paused for a long minute and she saw the fiercely bright scrawl of a word on his light.

“Because if that thing inside Jackson has destroyed the soul of my best friend, I’m going to do everything in my power to kill the fucker.”

Marissa and the Bodywalker inside her, Hatshepsut, were grieving. She touched Jackson’s face, squeezed his hand tightly within her own. Hatshepsut had loved Menes for lifetimes, since they had first met in Hatshepsut’s first host. By then Menes had been reborn twice already and was very familiar with the nature of the Ether and the way to live in harmony with a host after the Blending. It had been long before the Templars had separated from the Politic. Long before the Bodywalkers had even had enough cohesive numbers to organize a working government.

They had known from their first touch that there was something powerful between them. They had known they would be together from that moment until the day they experienced the actual death, if such a thing were ever possible.

But these last few incarnations had been so painfully short, the war robbing them of the time they craved to spend with one another. In her last incarnation Hatshepsut had only lived a week before Odjit had caught her exposed and slaughtered her. One week. And that had been a cruel and painful death, Odjit truly showing the color of her nature as she had tortured Hatshepsut and her innocent host. It had been a horrible way for that innocent to die and that was why, although she had craved Menes with all of her heart and soul, she had not wanted to be reborn. Reborn to what? To another painful death? To a time much too brief? For her ability to put physical hands on her beloved to be robbed from her far too quickly again? And what of the innocent soul she would share her body with? How could she willingly put that soul in the line of fire?

And then there was the grief. The grief the lover left behind would be blinded with. A grief so insurmountable that, in spite of how badly their people needed them, they could not see their way to living another hundred years before their mate could be returned to them. Last time she had been the first to go, but Menes’s grief had been so total that he and his host had preferred to take their own life rather than go on without her.

And now she was facing that same mourning, facing that same chasm of time without her soul mate. And as deeply well worn as Menes’s and Hatshepsut’s love was, the love between their hosts had been just as white hot and undeniable…but so new, so untried. And unlike their Bodywalker souls, Jackson’s and Marissa’s original souls would not be reborn in a hundred years. They might not be reborn at all…ever. As far as the Bodywalkers knew, they experienced the actual death.

This time…this time they hadn’t even had a week together. They were being wrenched apart, again, much too soon. The senselessness of it was more than they could bear. She could not stop the tears that ran from her, sometimes in great, painful sobs. She could not breathe…not without him.

She felt more than heard Docia enter the room. She wanted to scream at her to get out. Wanted to throw herself over his body and keep anyone from touching him. She had knelt there in that stupid garden and had simply watched while that savage thing had cut her lover down. And where had Ram and Docia been? The Templar soul inside of Docia, Tameri, had extraordinary power at her fingertips. Why had she done nothing to save him? How could they have simply watched?

Just as she had simply watched. Watched him put his life at risk in order to protect hers.

“Shh,” Docia said softly, reaching to rest comforting hands on Marissa’s shoulders. “We can’t give up hope.” But Marissa could hear the shaky doubt infecting the other woman’s voice. “We have to have faith in…well, Faith. You know as well as I do that the Night Angels are capable of extraordinary things.”

“I do understand that,” Marissa said quietly. “But I am afraid that nothing can fix this. What if…” She trailed off, unwilling to give her fears voice. Obviously she didn’t need to. Docia sighed shakily.

“I know.” It was all she could say. “I know.”

Apep frowned as he looked in the mirror, studying his new corporeal body for what had to be the thousandth time since he had been called into it. He always found being a female so much more complicated than being a male. The most confounding and superfluous parts of it being the breasts and the uterus. He had very nice breasts, he admitted as he ran his hands over then, hefting the weight of them in his hands. As far as that went, he amended. But other than their aesthetic loveliness, they served him no purpose. It wasn’t as though he would suckle a child. And yes, that led him to think of the other troublesome item on his body. A uterus. How complex it was, how inconvenient it could be, to engage in carnal activities when there was always the risk of being infected with a child. It was really a thorough annoyance. Perhaps he should be content to engage in lustful relations with only other females. That would eradicate the threat of infection. Yes, he thought with satisfaction. That was an ideal plan.

Of course…there was something to be said for the idea of procreation. He could perhaps section off a part of his godly energy and imbue an infant with it. Then that infant would grow into a beautiful scion of himself, an ally of equal power.

Yes. There was something to be said for
that
indeed! In fact, the more he thought about it, the more curiously appealing the idea became. But he would have to choose a physical sire and that was no small feat. It couldn’t be just anyone. It would best suit his purposes if it were another being of power.

He turned and looked at Chatha for a thoughtful moment. Chatha was such a beautiful creature. Not his physical form. That was most certainly sub par in his eyes and therefore took him completely out of the equation. His aberration was called Down syndrome. A limiting factor indeed. No. As beautifully wicked, as scrumptiously perverse as Chatha was, a child of his must be sired by an ideal physical specimen.

Any one of the Nightwalkers would do, he decided. There were twelve breeds, each with their own strengths and limitations. Some more so than others. Their weaknesses could very well be inherited by their offspring.

Well, except for the Bodywalkers. Neither their power nor their weaknesses would convey. Like the one rattling around inside of him, the one called Odjit and the even more obscure human soul that had originated with this body, they were merely visitors to these bodies. The power was conveyed by the soul and if that soul were ripped away the power would go with it. There was no genetic alteration, they could not portion off their power and their souls like he could and put it into what would be a very human, mortal child.

But with part of his soul and power within him, Apep’s child would grow beyond its mortal shell, would be a demigod in his own right.

“But the inconvenience of pregnancy,” he whined aloud. “All that bulk and awkwardness. But I suppose it is a sacrifice that must be made in order to bring about a desired end. And yes, there is none more benevolently self-sacrificing than I.” Yes, this was turning out to be an excellent idea. But again…who to father such a child?

“A Djynn, perhaps?”

“Smoke, smoke. Weak, weak,” Chatha said with a shake of his head.

“Well, it’s better than a paralysis in the sunlight,” Apep argued. The Djynn breed had a weakness in the face of the sun just like any other did. They dissolved into smoke at the touch of sunlight.

“Wraiths,” Chatha offered with a giggle.

“Oh dear.” Apep shuddered. “No, that won’t do at all. Lycanthropes?”

Chatha turned to him with a face full of curiosity.

“What’s that?”

“You know,
Lycanthropes.
Come to think of it…my son no better than a lowly beast?” Apep scoffed. “Disgusting. And Shadowdwellers are out of the question. One touch of any light and poof!” He made a clouding gesture with his hands, then was distracted by the polish on his nails. Such a pretty lavender color. Yes. He rather liked these modern embellishments.

“Lycanthropes?” Chatha asked again, truly perplexed.

“Oh yes. I had quite forgotten about the curse,” Apep said with no little impatience.

He had toyed with the idea of dispelling the curse, shocking the nations into awareness and entertaining himself with the fallout, but then thought better of it. He would save that for a later amusement, if indeed he could dispel such powerful magic. He would certainly have to try at some point. If for no reason other than to prove his own power.

Or maybe he would imbue his son with the potential for that power! Yes! An exciting idea!

Oh, but then to wait so long for him to come of age.

“So many complications,” he tsked aloud. “Demon?” he suggested to himself, perking up at the idea, but then he immediately wilted again. No. Growing increasingly weaker with every moment left in the sun? Comatose and helpless? No. Certainly not. Although, the power to be had when accessing the elements, a Demon’s source of power, could be vast. It was without a doubt a worthy candidate, but not without its flaws.

Night Angel.

Again, Apep perked up. Yes. A Night Angel. Like that wicked little bitch who had set him back, seared him with his own power.

“I didn’t like that at all,” he muttered aloud.

All the more reason to have a son and ally, he reinforced the idea to himself. Together they could have destroyed that impudent thing! “My mind is quite made up,” he said with a nod. Then he leaned in to inspect the arch of a perfectly groomed brow. “We’re comely enough. We have very nice breasts. I could seduce a male to my side quite easily, I think. And now that I’m thinking on it, their weaknesses are really quite minimal. I hardly consider changing color in sunlight to be a weakness. Paired with the genetics of this body, and my own manipulations, the possibility is quite promising.”

“Yup,” Chatha agreed, and then he went back to his autopsy of a small white rabbit.

“Honestly, your obsession with the innards of things is almost worrisome,” Apep tsked as he took down his hair from its coif and arranged it softly around his graceful shoulders. “Yes. This should do quite well. Chatha, I’ll be back. I’m off to get impregnated. Do keep an eye on things, won’t you? There’s a dear boy.”

Faith sat upright suddenly. She had been dozing off, the alteration in her form a very taxing thing and the quiet of the company she was keeping a very boring one. Not that she expected him to entertain her. It was probably for the best all around, she had decided. The less contact she or any Nightwalker had with mortals, the better off things would be.

Her eyes had drifted closed not too shortly after that.

But suddenly the energy of power radiated into her body, setting her hands alight with a bright tingling sensation; the hands that were wrapped up snuggly into the scarf. The Djynn’s nik was becoming excited by the nearness of its master.

“Slow down!” she cried out, unthinkingly reaching out and placing a hand on strong, warm biceps. His arm flexed beneath her touch and she could feel the rejection that went along with it without even looking at his scroll or his face. She lifted her hand away as he slowed the vehicle down and pulled over to the side of the road. There was nothing. There was nothing to be seen except the vast scrub of the wilderness and the backdrop of the distant mountains.

“I can feel her nearness,” she said when he looked at her quizzically. “We’re practically on top of her.”

“Maybe that’s because you are.”

The voice came out of nowhere and was punctuated with a tremendous clap of thunder. Storm clouds raced across the sky, blotting out the sun so thoroughly that it was ominous and dark.

Leo and Faith both jolted in surprise when a head full of blond corkscrew curls popped up between them from the rear window. The Djynn waved, her hand on the other side of the solid glass, her neck bisected by it as though the glass had chopped her neck clean through.

“Jesus Christ!” Leo exploded in shock. He reached for the door, throwing himself outside of the truck, his boots scuffing on the sand and gravel that had accumulated on the road. Faith followed him outside, watching as the Djynn pulled her head back through the glass, then stood upright in the bed of the truck and waved at them again.

“Hey there! It’s nice to meet me, I know. Now give me my nik.” She held out her hand, then thought better of it, jumped out of the truck bed and held out her hand again. “There, much easier to reach me this way.”