Page 14 of Besieger
I love you, he repeated in his mind, kissing her hand again.
She saw the struggle in his eyes when he looked up. He did not want to go back to the table and resume entertaining that vile man, that creature wearing his clothes and rings. Gustave could tolerate and forgive these petty crimes, he could replace material things. But Dulior, he could not.
“Madame,” her husband began to say, his voice faltered. His breath was heavy with wine, the mirth from earlier gone. “Will you wait for me?”
Dulior nodded and let the servant with the candle lead her back to the bedchamber. Gustave lingered in the doorway, watching the candlelight, and her, fade down the corridor before he stepped back, back into the darkness of Rorgon’s company.
It was a crude little knife. The dagger fitted nicely in the palm of her hand. She had taken it from the table when Gustaveescorted her out, hiding it in the folds of her skirts. All night it rested under her pillow as she pretended to sleep next to her husband, his drunken snores distracting her from the task looming ahead—until it was time.
She listened to the servants move about the house, and glimpsed through their eyes. Rorgon had left the dinner shortly after her, and made his way out into the night. He returned shortly before dawn, hissing at the maid who tried to take his coat. Whatever foul mood had followed him out had not dissipated, it had deepened. Through the maid’s eyes Dulior noticed how pale and drained her master looked, the opposite of when he had fed. Dulior could not tell if the poor woman’s fright was playing tricks on her mind or if Rorgon had forgone to hunt.
Dulior waited, listening to the drone of her master’s heavy footfall as he walked to his quarters, and began to pace the room. The song of birds alluded her to the rise of the sun, the heavy curtains of her room banishing the light. Continuing to lie motionless and cold, she felt the hours ooze until she was sure the sun was high in the sky, and there would be no dark sanctum for a daemon to crawl under.
Casting one last glance at her husband, she stood up and made her away to the floor above. The knife burned against her skin, her fingernails dug into the soft flesh of her palm. If she failed—if the daemon punished her for the disobedience—it would be the first time she left a husband a widower. The thought amused her.
As if a mortal would ever mourn my passing…
With her mind she unlocked the chamber door and waited, just a beat, before stepping inside. She had been in this room before—first to have it furnished to her master’s comfort and then a number of times to report the Count’s activities to Rorgon: where he stored his riches, had he any living family, the usual matters they used to discuss and dissected when it came to her husbands.
The clothes which Rorgon had worn were thrown on the ground, scattered near the bed. She saw splashes of blood around the tunic’s collar and sleeves.
So perhaps you fed, she mused, praying that the human blood within him was weak. The room reeked of him; the contents of a trunk were spilled across the floor, coins and pieces of cloth thrown on a table. There was the seal he had searched for among her husband’s belongings. A ring. A scarf Dulior recognized as one of her own. It disgusted her to know a part of her was kept in this room. A piece of silk she had wound around her hair and neck, now sat among the other filthy little things, Rorgon’s fingers running over it whenever he pleased.
And there he was—her beast of a father, her everlasting groom—his body prostrated on the bed, like a puppet made of straw. No white sheet or warm blanket to cover him, he had kicked them all to the side, spilling off the bed. He wore a kind of simple tunic, the laces undone to reveal his throat and chest, his legs uncovered and ghostly pale. Like Christ, laid down dead and bare in His tomb, in the early stages of putrefaction.
Gently, she sat on the edge of the bed, and reached out to caress his hair. The silver glistened beautifully against the rich brown of her skin. It reminded her of the first time she saw snow, how it had melted through her fingers. How good it felt to reach down and grab more, form it into a ball, the cold running up her arm.
Her fingers tightened in Rorgon’s hair and she jerked his head back, baring his neck. With her other hand she brought down the knife, down into the undying soft flesh, and stabbed. Then tore.
Rorgon’s eyes opened and fixed on her instantly. His hands shot out to grab her and he struggled like a crab to reach her, his fingers scratched at her arms and face. His fanged mouth opened to scream, the blood gushing out of it in a fountain, drowning the sound of his voice. How sweetly he gurgled and trashed under her.
“Ssshh, husband,” Dulior cooed, the knife cutting through flesh and larynx.
I will lay fresh flowers on your grave. Red as the blood you have given me.
She pulled his head by the hair, forcing the wound on his neck to widen, and continued to try and break the spine with the blade. She wanted to split him open from ear to ear.
Black as the blood that unmade me.
She pulled and pulled, her breath ragged, her vision blurred as the blood pooled around her. It ran down her legs like birthing waters. She wanted to scream and curse him, have her shrieks follow him into the underworld. But she could not. If she let out a sound now, she would never stop. Like a mourner, she would spend her days wailing and tearing at her hair, unable to undo what was done to her.
She blindly slammed the knife into his arm, forcing it to still. With both hands Dulior grabbed at the little that was holding his head and body together, and began clawing. Her fingers closed around bone. She pressed. She twisted at the mess under her and gave one final tug, falling back against the bedpost. The head cradled to her breast, moist and warm like a newborn baby. The mouth opened and closed, the eyes looked up at her, bloodshot and blind.
She did not have a maid to help and carry the head on a platter, so she stood alone in the room, the smell of blood making her gag. The sheets were drenched in it, it dripped on the floor and dampened her skirts. The whole of her face and gown were covered with the stuff. Quickly, under the frantic gaze of the severed head, she stumbled to the fireplace and tried to start a flame. All the while the decapitated body continued to trash against the bed, one of its hands still pinned to the mattress by the knife.
After what felt like an eternity, Dulior watched the flames dance. She flung the head in the fireplace, and braced herself to hear it scream again. The daemonic mouth opened, the fangssnapped at her but no regurgitating shrieks came from her maker’s head.
Behind her, the body was still twitching and twisting.
Light—Daemons cannot live in the light, she thought, recalling how the light of the sun had scorched and blinded her each time she had tried to escape her maker.It is not enough,the whole of him must burn.
In one final, desperate bid to end this horror, Dulior reached for the curtains and tore them loose. The bright sunlight flooded the room, spilling over the gore on the bed, instantly causing the thing upon it to erupt into flames. The skin on Dulior’s arms began to bubble and peel where the rays caressed her. She barely stumbled out of the room, suffocating from the stench of burning flesh, singed hair, and searing sunlight.
She slammed the door shut behind her, locked it, and forced one foot to move in front of the other. Her soles were slick with blood, but she kept dragging her feet, bracing the nearby wall for support. She hated being awake during the day, it drained her, made her feel itchy and smothered.
By the time she reached the stairs, the smoke had started to spill through. She expected to come upon a servant—the whole house was becoming alive from all the noise and the fire—but instead, it was her husband who waited at the bottom of the stairs.
“Madame!” Gustave’s eyes examined her, searching for the source of the blood. There were strands of white hair sticking to her fingers. The scratches her maker left on her face and arms had healed long ago, and her once white gown was now crimson, a trail of slaughter, following her like a bridal veil.
