The Relic (Cradle of Darkness 2)

Which was endlessly amusing, considering her past.

But the religious babble, those maddening prayers—they were not good for my beloved one. So I offered honest truth, rubbing my chin atop her head, careful not to inadvertently crush her skull. “I met your Jesus. A decent enough fellow, I suppose.”

Adjusting my arms to aid in Pearl’s comfort, trying to hold a fragile body as cautiously as I might, I added, “Completely wasted the gift of immortality, if you ask me. He spoke and spoke and spoke, and who listened? Who remembered any of it correctly? Not a soul… except maybe myself. Our time in the desert was interesting, though thoroughly misquoted.”

Tiny, her reply was. Tiny and meant only for her ears, her lips pressed to my chest as she sobbed. “Blasphemy.”

She was so utterly cute that I could not resist running the back of a razor-sharp claw over her cheek. Success achieved, not a single drop of blood spilled. “Oh, sweet one, how I adore you. You’re just… delicious.”

All fangs and cracked black skin, all flames and searing heat, wings, and bulging muscle… every last molecule of me was completely enamored with my soul’s new face. All of her was delicious, down to her toes.

I wanted to eat them. Not really. Well, really. But I wouldn’t unless she gave me permission.

What had I done to deserve this? This elation!

The loving sigh that billowed, brought tendrils of steam from my lips, was both lengthy and the right amount of dramatic.

In time, she’d look back upon our reunion fondly. And we had time, a universe’s endless expansion and contraction of time.

With care, with feeding, with love and attention, my soul would find that it indeed recognized me. That it sang its song so I might be drawn closer.

That deep down she always knew I’d find her and bring her home.

Oh so carefully, I set the shaky thing on her bare, mostly reconstituted feet to spare her skin from further unintentional searing. Perhaps a little too exuberant in the way I slid her down my body as if she might ice the flames. And I was left with a shiver like an untried boy. “Shall we use this moment”—what was the best way to phrase it?—“to outline expectations?”

Blood drunk, healing at a rapid rate, yet still bearing gnarled corpse’s fingertips and reforming organs. Driven utterly mad, for reasons that spread my wingspan and left her cowering, Pearl hid behind her tangled, dark hair.

An improvement. She wasn’t trying to run… potentially because I held her slender wrist in my very large, very dangerous fist. And her pretty, filthy skin only smoked a little.

Beating the air with one relaxing flex of my wings, I gave myself the luxury of a deep breath. And contemplated.

She started screaming again.

The bridge of my nose between forefinger and thumb—a habit from my mortal years I’d never quite set free—I even groaned in mirror to her terror, somewhat tempted to let her wrist go. Yet concerned that chasing her through the maze of the Cathedral would only heighten her confusion.

Instead, I tried to explain. “You died in childbirth. Our seventh son.” Bitterness welled from a place I had forgotten, lacing a demonic growl into my litany. “Not in some great war, not from a rival’s poison… in duty and fealty to your husband.” My free hand, tipped with razor-sharp claws, knocked against my breastbone, a loud bang fitting the mood. “The universe dared take you from me, and I have squeezed payment from its bones. As you are my soul, there is a chance you spent our time apart in some version of hell you keep referring to.” I rolled my eyes toward the heavens, aware of the pun. “If there even is such a realm.”

At the widening of her bloodshot, tear-stained, and beautiful eyes, I amended, “Though I greatly doubt you’d have been condemned. My bride is a creature of light. Even in immortality.”

Which was, in many ways, hilarious.

More importantly, the creature who suffered through hell had been I. “And now you are reborn and delivered. You are home. With me.” Adding, so it could not be said, that despite the form I might bear, I still possessed charm, “And I will love you until time itself ceases to be.”

An already fragile mind unraveling before me, my naked, filthy bride screamed, “Satan, has your demon not shown me suffering enough?”

Never having enjoyed that title, I corrected, calm as the precious dead of night, “Call me Vladislov. Or Steven. Do you like the name Steven?”

If Satan got her hackles up, the name she’d known me by in her past life would cause this hissing kitten further distress. Come to think of it, any of the monikers I’d borne over the centuries would. Therefore, Vladislov it would be. Just as she would remain Pearl.