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Cursed Page 39
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“I know it’s dangerous.” Mei-Li reached across the narrow isle to squeeze his hand. “But if it was me, I’d want to go after you, no matter what.” She looked up at Charlie. “He’s more than just a co-worker and partner to you, isn’t he?”
“I don’t know what he is!” Charlie had begun crying by now—she couldn’t help it. “All I know is that we just let him go to his death and I can’t let that happen—I can’t let him die!”
“All right.” Six started manipulating the controls and suddenly the Dark Kindred cruiser, which had shrunk to a speck in their viewscreen, began to grow larger.
“Will we make it? Can we catch them?” Charlie asked doubtfully, swiping at her eyes.
“We will try,” Six said grimly. “I can make no other promise than that. We will try.”
The three of them leaned forward, all eyes on the viewscreen and the Dark Kindred ship ahead.
None of them saw the fourth set of eyes, small and red, concealed under the last passenger chair.
* * * * *
“I will have him now. I want a new host—one which I can control fully.”
“I have told you, Ur, the Collective wishes to interview him first. They cannot get accurate information if you are already infesting him like a swarm of tzzgs in a rotten log.”
Stavros sat back in his chair—which he was manacled to with plasti-steel chains that made the Kindred handcuffs Charlotte had put on him when she first captured him look like child’s play—and watched his captor (or was it captors?) fight about his eventual fate. Their fighting didn’t bother him, though. He didn’t really care what they did to him as long as he got to complete his mission first.
Beneath the heavy black uniform shirt he had borrowed from Six, he could feel his mark glowing. It didn’t hurt but it didn’t feel exactly comfortable either. It was like having pure starlight trapped under his skin, trying to get out. He was glad the shirt was of such thick material that the light didn’t show through.
Despite his discomfort, he felt calm. He had always known he would die young and at least this way, he would be dying for a good cause—to save the planet of the woman he loved.
Oh, Charlotte…falinda…
He could not repress a sigh when he thought of her. He wondered where she was right now—hopefully on her way back to the Mother Ship and safety. He just prayed he was in time to stop the Dark Kindred from making another attack on her home planet. She had looked so devastated when Mei-Li told her how some of its major cities had already been destroyed. He wanted to keep that from happening again.
Charlotte was his only regret in all this, he had to admit to himself. But even if he hadn’t been destined to die in order to destroy the Dark Kindred, he never could have claimed her as a bride. Even if she would have had him—and he knew she wouldn’t, not with her past pain in the way—he couldn’t have allowed himself to bond with her. It would be wrong to tie her to him knowing he was Cursed…wrong to form a permanent soul bond knowing he was destined to die young and possibly drag her down with him…
“I tell you, I will have him—I must!”
“I don’t think so, my demonic friend. Just try to get lose and go to him. Go on—try.”
Stav looked up to see a very strange sight. Two, the Dark Kindred Commander, was pacing jerkily in front of him up and down the long isle between the seats filled with Dark Kindred warriors. They all stared stoically ahead, obviously not interested in what was happening to their commander. But Stavros couldn’t take his eyes from the scene.
The Dark Kindred Commander was jerking this way and that, twitching as though he was having spasms or seizures. When Ur spoke from his mouth, the left side of his face and body jerked wildly but when Two spoke, the right side was clearly dominant.
Two seemed to be winning this internal war. At least, Stav didn’t feel any demonic presence trying to invade him. He wondered what would happen if it did. Could a purely evil being like Ur stand to be in contact with all the positive emotions of love and understanding and kindness which his Mark had soaked up like a sponge? He seemed destined never to find out because clearly Two was keeping the errant demon hostage inside his body.
“Let…me…go!” Ur bellowed. “How dare you hold me against my will?”
“Maybe because I like you.” Two seemed to be smirking. “You’re such good company.”
“I have never had a host hold me against my will—never!” the demon seethed.
“Maybe because you’ve never had a willing host before,” Two mused. “But I would be very sorry to lose you—I was so lonely before you came. No…I don’t think you’d better leave to inhabit our new friend after all. I like having you in me.”
“Sooner or later you will have to let me go or lose your free will completely,” Ur snarled. “I already have control of the left side of your body—how long do you think it will be until I also gain control of the right side?”
“Oh, I would say…probably forever,” Two remarked. “You see, my enhancements and all my neural links are on the right side—they form an impassible barrier you will never be able to penetrate.”
His only answer was an inarticulate howl of rage—clearly the demon was venting his wrath about being trapped within his host.
“Now, now,” Two said, when he had complete control of his mouth again. “I think you should be glad that I still want you, after all the trouble you’ve caused. You haven’t exactly been the easiest guest, you know—tipping our hand too early to get the Heart of Love or to find out why the Kindred want it. Unsettling the Hossans so that they would only release one of the prisoners to us.” He nodded at Stavros who stared blandly back.
“Not to mention destroying all those lovely cities on Earth before I got a chance to properly play with the inhabitants first.” Two made a tsking sound with his long, thin tongue against his metal teeth. “Really, if you weren’t so much fun to have around, I would have taken you back to the Black Planet by now. You’re lucky I like you, Ur.”
Stavros frowned as he watched the bizarre exchange. It occurred to him that Two was not in the strictest sense of the word sane. For why would any sane person want a demon living inside them? And why would he wish to keep Ur from leaving? Not that Stav was complaining—he preferred not to be possessed. If he was going to die doing his duty, he wanted to be in his right mind when he did it.
“Now do try to relax,” Two said, still apparently talking to his demonic passenger. “We’re about to go through the fold in space and I don’t want you getting all excited when we do. It’s…unsettling.”
“I will show you ‘unsettling’,” Ur growled. “I will be free of you, Two. And with the next host I take I will wreak such vengeance on you as will make you fucking beg for mercy and pray for death.”
Two tsked again. “Now, now—such language! Do you kiss your mother with that mouth? Oh wait, you don’t because it is my mouth and I never had a mother!” He broke into peals of strange, jagged laugher that set the short hairs at the back of Stav’s neck standing on end.
Insane—he’s definitely gone insane. Holding the demon within him for so long has broken his mind.
As though he could feel Stavros thinking about him, Two turned to stare at him with an amused expression on his face.
“And you, my dear Kindred—still nothing to say?”
Stav just stared at him.
“I suppose you’re thinking of your little paramour—the one the Joined One refused to release to us,” Two mused. “I expect you’re sitting there, consoling yourself that at least she got away, hmmm?”
Still Stav said nothing.
“Well, it might interest you to know that she didn’t get away.” Two smirked at him. “In fact, she and my old colleague, Six and his lovely little bride are hot on our tail right this minute.”
Stav surged forward to the limit of his manacles.
“You lie,” he growled.
“Oh but it’s true.” Two’s one visible eye glittered with glee. �