The Hunter's Song II: Lost Blood

Ch 28: Reaper (Mourning Crow)

Brrrrr...

Why's it so cold?

I clenched my jaw to stop my teeth from chattering.

I was lying on my back, staring up at the giant red hole in the sky.

Bold Step's red tongue was detached and wrapped around my naked body with its pointed tip, secreting clear slime and slowly invading my mouth.

"Get off of me!" I yanked the long red serpent-thing away and shimmied free.

"No! Stop moving!" Bold Step stood over me, snarling from behind a little circlet of lightning. "How are you awake?! It shouldn't be possible. You were attuned to the memory! I saw it, you gave in!"

"What the fuck?!" I scrambled up, confused to be sitting on a large stone altar that hadn't been present while Bold Step and I were fighting.

There was a red stream of light tethered from my chest to the little circlet. The crackling crescent sparks were steadily shifting from white to red.

"The channel is open!" Bold Step growled with his ears folded flat and sharp. He was standing next to me, holding up the lightning circlet, but he couldn't move to stop me. "That's your lifeforce you're about to sever! Stop moving before you kill us both!"

"Really...?" My lips curled at the edges.

"Fuck!" Bold Step struggled to summon his tentacles from his shadow to bind me. Something about that little circlet was sapping all of his stamina as he strained to wield it.

I reached out for the little circle, but Bold Step yanked it away.

"It doesn't belong to you!" The Slayer tried to step backward but he was stuck under the overwhelming weight of the little circlet and the glowing red line linked to me draining my immortality.

"Stealing second-hand is still stealing," I swung my feet over the edge of the altar.

Wuh-ooh... my vision went blurry.

That link sucking the life out of me didn't hurt, but my extremities felt numb and I had the overwhelming urge to curl up and nap.

"Just lay down and close your eyes," Bold Step mellowed his tone. "The ritual is nearly completed."

"Like fuck, I'm gonna just lay here!" I jostled my head in an attempt to wake up my nerve endings.

The slimy red tongue thing slithered over my bare leg. My skin became cold in the places where it made contact.

"The least you could do!" I seized the red tongue thing in my fist. "Is get me a proper blanket!"

SPLACK

I started hammering the long red disembodied tongue-thing into the stone altar over and over.

"Don't touch it!" Bold Step's eyes went wide with desperation. He couldn't let go of the red circlet, and he lacked the strength to manifest any large tentacles.

I continued smashing the nasty red thing and smiled when the red link coming out of my chest suddenly flickered.

"NO!" Bold Step quivered in exasperation. "You consented! You wanted to save me, I felt it! The link was voluntary, the binding can't be disrupted!"

"Not my fault your shitty movie got all mopey and I had to insert my own kickass soundtrack," I kept on mashing his red life-stealing serpent. My hands and feet were beginning to warm up.

"How..." Bold Step frowned in confusion, and then his ears zeroed in on my most notable piece of jewelry and its innocuous percussion.

I scooted off the altar and took one haggard step forward.