J. Geissinger: Edge of Oblivion

And just above that, painted in bold strokes of black and gold, was the all-seeing Eye of Horus.

Xander dropped to his knees and pressed his shaking hands flat against the cold marble.

Beneath. Below. Underground . But—how?

The scream came again, and the how no longer mattered. All that mattered was Morgan, and she was somewhere down there, beneath his feet.

Just as a group of armed Swiss Guards burst through a side door near the entrance to the basilica, Xander closed his eyes, concentrated, and was swallowed like a stone dropped into water by the ancient marble floor of the church.

Someone far beyond the brimstone sea was controlling her muscles. Someone beyond the sea chanted a refrain of burn, burn, burn , and because of him she was smoking, she was blistering, her flesh had all melted away.

“Xander,” Morgan moaned, voice raw from screaming.

“Oh, yes,” said the demon controlling her body, stoking the fire that crisped her bones, “I imagine he’ll be along anytime now. Perhaps I should revive you a bit for your reunion.” He chuckled, a sound like red-hot pokers stabbing through her ears. “We wouldn’t want you to miss the unhappy ending, now would we?”

Suddenly the fire dimmed and she was ripped panting and coughing from the scalding brimstone lake to find herself chained naked—unharmed, all in one piece—to a rounded stone wall.

“Welcome back, Morgan,” Dominus said, smiling serenely. “And how are we feeling?”

The room spun. Dark and circular, it sported black walls so high the ceiling was lost in shadow.

It felt very much like being at the bottom of a well. A blood-spattered well, because all along the walls from eye level down were smeared dark trails of crimson, some old and flaking, some bright and hideously fresh.

The room was devoid of ornament save for a huge rusted metal rack drilled into the stone from which dangled a sadist’s collection of playthings. Steel and leather and wire whips, chains and pokers and saws, masks and knives and metal things she couldn’t name but recognized as implements of unspeakable atrocities nonetheless.

Morgan stared at the tools and the splatters of gore on the walls. Her mind began to clear. The enormity of the situation edged in.

“That was really a rhetorical question,” Dominus mused, stepping closer. “I won’t make you answer it.” He lifted his hand and very gently, as Morgan shrank back against the rough, frigid rock, caressed her bare breast.

Her wrists were shackled overhead with what felt like steel or iron; her ankles sported the same. But she was still able to move her body. And as he stroked her and watched her writhe, intently watched the disgust and fear and anger play over her face, Morgan realized he could have simply held her frozen in place with his mind. But the lust burning bright in his eyes told her that he found the physical display of her fear so much more arousing.

She stilled, closed her eyes, and swallowed back the vomit rising in her throat.

Fuck him. Fuck. Him. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of watching her squirm.

“Oh, Morgan,” he sighed, and she heard the exasperation in his voice. “Honestly, this is beginning to become tiresome.”

And he slapped her across the face with so much force she tasted blood.

“Touch her again,” shouted a furious voice from behind him, “and I’ll eat out your fucking heart!”

Morgan sobbed, Dominus spun around, and Xander leapt, snarling, from the shadows of the opposite wall.

Then everything happened at once.

With the force of runaway trains colliding from opposite directions, they smashed into each other and fell in a bellowing tangle to the floor, trading vicious punches, howling like rabid wolves, an unholy noise that reverberated through the room. They rolled over and over until they hit the rack of whips and knives and chains. With a terrible squealing shriek of buckling metal, the whole thing wrenched from the wall and came crashing down on top of them.

Three huge males appeared in the doorway to her right. They skidded to a stop as they saw Dominus and Xander grappling beneath the pile of instruments and the ruins of the rack. A fourth male—bald, pierced, and tattooed—appeared in the arched doorway on the opposite side of the room.

He took in the scene in one swift glance and froze. His hard face blanched; his expression turned incredulous, then, strangely, elated.

Dominus leapt clear of the debris and landed a dozen feet away, crouched and snarling, his attention still focused on Xander, who had thrown off the crumpled rack and struggled to his feet in the middle of the debris. When Dominus spied the bald male on the opposite side of the room, a look —savage, bloodthirsty—passed between them.

“You didn’t tell me he was immune to mind control!” Dominus screamed, teeth bared.

The male stared back at him, hatred darkening his face. “I didn’t tell you a lot of things.”

Dominus stared at him for one fleeting, suspended moment. Then, horrified, he whispered, “Eliana.”

With the suddenness of a switch being thrown, the temperature in the room dropped thirty degrees. Ice formed on the walls, rose in long, crackling white fingers up the black stone. Morgan’s breath frosted out in pale clouds in front of her face. The air itself began to shiver and hum.

Then something happened.

It was like a detonation. All the air sucked into a tight core and then exploded, lightless and silent, in a blast that ripped through the room. It flung the tattooed male back against the wall with devastating force. He was suspended there for a moment, spread-eagle, gulping ragged breaths, his huge body twitching. Dominus pulled a small dagger from his belt and flung it across the room.

With a sickening pop , it sank deep into the male’s chest. He slid down the wall and crumpled to the ground.

As one, the three males at the door let out a deafening roar of fury. The bare-chested one and the long-haired one launched themselves across the room and landed, sliding into a jolting stop, against the stone wall beside the wounded male. Their companion, a beautiful male with classically perfect features, stood rigid in the doorway, staring in horror at the scene. He looked toward Dominus and Xander—who was now well clear of the debris and crouched to pounce on Dominus—and reached into the waistband of his pants and pulled out a handgun.

“Xander!” Morgan screamed.

And just as Xander spun to heed her warning, Dominus snatched a wicked-looking blade from the mess of weapons on the floor and plunged it into his back.

Impossible! her heart screamed. Then her voice rose to echo it, ripping its way out of her like a thing with claws, gutting her as it went. She screamed and screamed and watched in helpless horror as Xander sank to his knees, lips parted in surprise, wide eyes focused on her face.

“I told you, Morgan,” snarled Dominus, teeth bared as he glared at her. A fine spray of Xander’s blood was misted across the pristine white linen of his shirt. “I told you I win!”

“That’s what you think,” said a hard voice from her right.

Then there was a thunderous crack of noise near her head, a flash of light, a wave of hot, pressurized air and the smell of gunpowder. Dominus staggered back several steps and a small, perfect hole appeared in the center of his forehead. For a moment he looked confused. From the hole trickled a tiny rivulet of blood. He touched a finger to it.

Looked at his hand in incomprehension.

Frowned.

Then slowly pitched backward and fell unmoving to the floor.

A few feet away, Xander wavered on his knees, fell forward onto his hands. Blood from the wound in his back had rained an inkblot pattern over the backs of his legs and the stone on which he knelt. His face was white, white as the frost on the walls.