Inheritance

Chapter 42: Disgust

I can't take much more of this pain... Pollyanna thought to herself as yet another round of arrows pierced her body and sent several jolts of pain coursing through her body.

And yet, she knew that she could, indeed, take more of it, and would. If she didn't, Eory would die--and by extension, she would, too. She looked over at the dog who had died and felt a loathing in her heart for Laurence that she had felt for no other creature on Yharos. Pollyanna had killed so many people, but killing something as harmless as a dog was disgusting and ruined the cleanliness of an honest kill. He did not even have the excuse of instability like Eory's brother had.

She wanted to be the one to kill Laurence, and she hoped Eory would give her the order to.

The fairy had gone still beneath her, and she couldn't even imagine how he was feeling.

He was buried under her body, stained in her blood with his head craned forcibly to the right so he couldn't look away from his dog's corpse. It probably stank, and she was sure he was overheated, exhausted, and traumatized. She knew he was alive, at least, because if he wasn't, she would be dead.

Pollyanna wished the potion would prevent her from feeling pain as well as keep her from dying, but she supposed that would be too good to be true.

Everytime an arrow pierced her, she wept with pain and gritted her teeth. When she was pierced too many times by the arrows, her body would push some of them out and would quickly close and heal the punctures where the arrows had been.

Regardless of being healed, her pain was indescribable and was she was glad to be unable to see the many arrows sticking out of her back which probably made her look like a porcupine.

From the other side of the room, she could hear the waif screaming at the top of her lungs and weeping—begging for the king to cease fire—but he would have none of it.

Stupid bitch. She should have known. Pollyanna thought to herself with hatred burning in her heart.

Time passed, and Pollyanna was disgusted by the smell that clung to her nose from her the mingling of her sweat and blood and hated the feeling of being swathed in it.

I can't take this! She thought to herself as she cried all the harder.

But she had to, for Eory. It was strange to think, but she didn't just want him to live so that she could, too. She wanted him to live because he had picked her over his hard-fought freedom.

And so she endured for what felt like an hour, until silence again reigned in the hall.

It seemed as if they had finally run out of arrows.

Pollyanna was lying motionlessly with tears in her eyes from the pain—her long, silvery hair was sprawled out in a spiral on the tile floor and patches of her blood stained the ground.

She held her breath once she realized the arrows had, indeed, stopped.

She heard Laurence take a deep breath. "They're dead... They're finally dead. Yharos will be such a fine place without them in it... Quickly—all soldiers, make sure they're dead!"

Pollyanna listened to the archers' footsteps on the balcony recede.

She knew she and Eory had a few minutes to escape. She knew the layout of the castle so well; she recalled that the soldiers would have to file out of the door on the left side of the balcony, go down a long hall, take a staircase down to the first floor, and then take a right down another long hallway until they came to the ballroom doors.

Pollyanna jumped to her feet and hauled Eory to his—still shielding him with her body.

She heard the footsteps of the guards who were already in the corners of the room approaching them.

The fairy was dead-weighting, however, and it seemed as if all strength and consciousness had left him.

"Damn you!" Pollyanna grumbled. "Get up! We can get out of here together!"

The king's voice echoed in dismay as he cursed in fury. "Damn! What does it take to kill her!"

With great effort from her waning strength, she managed to haul the fairy to his feet and began walking him to the doors.

He stared listlessly forward while she did.

In a moment, he glanced over to Gershom.

You want to know the word now, don't you? The word it takes to activate that vile magic festering inside of us? The woman enticed him.

Eory gained his feet and had only one thought on his mind.

He yanked his arm away from Pollyanna as the guards who stood in the corners of the room came closer and closer by the second.

Pollyanna spat his name and chased after him as he sprinted to the dog's side and collapsed on his knees next to its corpse.

His mouth wobbled and he swallowed a lump in his throat as he took the bloody remains of his best friend and hauled it onto his lap where he petted it mechanically. He sobbed wretched and bitter tears which stung his eyes so much that blinking caused him pain.

And he thought the word he needed to think repeatedly until it became the only thought in his head.

Disgust.

Disgust.

Disgust.

Disgust.

"Disgust." He said aloud.

And as he said it, black tendrils boiled out of the dog's body and his in all different directions. They started as small tendrils—about the height of a person--and slowly grew until the whole room was covered in them. It looked as if the room was swathed in the shadows of gigantic, chittering worms. They rustled about on the floors and walls like reeds beings rustled by the wind on a shoreside.

Pollyanna could barely see through the blackness enshrouding the room, but she spotted one of the guards about to kill Eory with his sword high in the air.

She tackled him with a yell and strangled him until he breathed no longer--she was happy that Eory had also given the order for her to protect him from anyone who might try to kill him at the ball.--including taking their life if need be. She took the soldier's sword and then tried to haul Eory to his feet, but a black tendril burst through her skin as she grabbed his shoulder and she gasped in horror.

In a panic, she brushed it off and it wriggled on the ground until it evaporated.

The black tendrils began rotating and formed a humongous circle which touched the floor, ceiling, and walls of the room, and then shrunk so fast that Pollyanna could barely comprehend it.

It shrunk until it only encircled Eory and the dog.

And then, with a crunchy sound, the circle was filled in with blackness. Neither Eory nor the dog were visible any longer. The tendrils, which had been translucent and soft, were now hard like volcanic rock.

Pollyanna panicked—her heart beating wildly—and she dug her fingers between two of the rocky plates encircling Eory just to have the rock break apart in a shower of light and blow her backwards.

She sat up to see Eory staring forward with such a hateful look on his face that even Pollyanna was terrified.

And standing behind him was something resembling a dog, but something that was not a dog at all. It was so giant that it was nearly as tall as the balcony hanging above them. It still walked on all-fours and had a similar anatomy to a dog, but it was made of smoky shadows and the only thing that was bright upon the creature's body were its piercing yellow eyes and its gleaming white teeth when it growled. Pollyanna's eyes focused in on the smoky, twisted horns atop its giant, pit-bull like head.

It snarled in such a hideous way that Pollyanna was frozen in fear and she could do nothing but stare forward at the hideous beast who could likely devour anything in the room.