Eternal Kiss of Darkness

Chapter 35

The Bank of America building towered imperially over the rest of the skyscrapers in the Atlanta cityscape. Lights reflected off the gold-plated steel girders that crisscrossed in an open lattice design to form, of all things, a gleaming pyramid at the top. Mencheres stood on the roof of the nearby Symphony Tower, staring up at the thousand-foot skyscraper. How fitting that Radje chose this place. Their enmity had started on the sands of the Giza Plateau; but it would end here, inside the gleaming pyramid built not by ancient Pharaohs, but human industry.

He flew the other few hundred feet and landed on the exterior of the spire, sliding between the girders into its domed interior. Lights from the buildings below him paled against the dramatic golden glow that infused this metal cobweb of space. From this height, wind snatched at his clothes and hair as Mencheres spotted his old enemy standing on a beam forty feet above him, his back to Mencheres, looking out over the city spread below him.

“Do you remember when the tallest building was Khufu’s pyramid?” Radje said, not turning around. “It took thousands of men and dozens of vampires to construct it. I used to sit at the top and look out over the people, marveling at how much smaller they appeared from that great height. Now look. The mortals make structures that dwarf Khufu’s most magnificent accomplishment, and they erect them in under a year. How the world has changed.”

Mencheres looked not at the dozens of impressive buildings Radje gestured to but at the man who’d been in his life since his birth. When Tenoch killed himself, Radjedef became the last person who’d known Mencheres since before he was a vampire. He and Radje were the last of the Fourth Dynasty Pharaohs still living. Pity Radje’s insatiable jealousy and lust for power had brought them to this.

“The world has changed, true, and the past is buried under more than the sands of time,” Mencheres replied. “I am content to let it rest there.”

And he was. The weight he’d carried while focusing on his former sins had accomplished nothing except to burden him and endanger his people. That weight had even broken his power, shattering his visions and ultimately his will to live.

No more. He’d made mistakes—yes, many—but those he could not change. His future was yet unwritten, however. As Kira had proven, there was more to it than just oblivion, no matter how his despair had tricked him into believing nothing but darkness lay ahead.

“Menkaure,” Radjedef said, turning around to face him. “It is time to finish this.”

“Yes,” he replied steadily, thinking back on the thousands of years of bitterness, blood, and strife between them. “More than time.”

Mencheres jumped onto a beam across from Radje. The next gust of wind carried a hint of decay and magic mixed with the Law Guardian’s scent instead of just the normal odors from the city. Mencheres inhaled even as Radje’s mouth curled into an arch smile.

“You came alone as agreed, but I take no chances that you’ve surrendered so easily.”

Mencheres let out a short laugh. Radje had coated himself with a spell of grave essence, the one thing that would negate Mencheres’s telekinesis against him. Radje was cautious to the end, but it wouldn’t be enough.

“Your concern flatters me, uncle,” he said lightly.

Radje’s gaze raked over him, calculating and expectant. “You’re not the only one Tenoch taught the dark arts to. Now, take off your clothes. Then throw them over the side of the building.”

Mencheres made a derisive sound as he began to strip off his shoes, trousers, and shirt. When he was naked, he threw everything over the side after a glance ensured no one was below. The clothes wouldn’t injure any humans; the shoes would, from this height.

“You thought I would wear a wire? That is a human trick, Radje.”

“Turn around,” Radjedef said shortly.

Mencheres did, showing his back and stifling his scorn as he felt Radjedef roughly handle his hair, looking for any electronic devices.

“You know that vampires cannot hide wires beneath their skin. Are you content that I have no means to record anything spoken between us?”

Radjedef considered him, the wind whipping the tight braids of his hair as he inhaled to pick up Mencheres’s scent. “You smell impatient, Menkaure. Are you really this eager to die?”

He met his gaze. “Give me my proof that Kira lives, and let us be done with this business between us.”

Radje took out his mobile phone, dialing. Mencheres waited, thinking how he’d hated to wash all traces of Kira’s scent away before he met Radjedef, but it had been necessary. Any hint of her, Veritas, Radje’s guards, or the ferryman would alert the Law Guardian to his defeat, and Mencheres didn’t want him to know of it. Not yet.

Kira. Yes, he smelled impatient. He’d been too long without her. Even before that fateful morning at the warehouse, a part of him hungered for her. The same part that recognized her when they met, then later tormented Mencheres when he’d tried to forget about her.

“Shade, bring the phone to the prisoner. Force her to speak into it,” Radje said curtly when his guard answered.

After several seconds, Mencheres could hear Shade tell Kira to speak, then Radje held the phone out, and her lovely voice flowed over the line to him even with the whirling winds. “Mencheres?”

“I am here,” he said, meeting Radjedef’s callously expectant gaze.

“I love you. Now, put Radje back on the phone.”

Radje’s brows rose, but he held the phone closer to his ear. “What?”

“Veritas is here,” Kira said clearly. Radjedef’s eyes widened. “There’s an open position for an Enforcer since you killed Josephus,” she went on. “Veritas said the training takes centuries, but I’m going for it. The vampire world can always use another good cop—”

Radje dropped the phone and leapt off the side of the building. Mencheres followed, his telekinesis unable to stop Radje, but his speed unhindered by the grave essence coating his enemy like an invisible shield. He caught him right before the Law Guardian slammed through the wall of the next building. Mencheres whipped them both upward, but even as he did, Radje twisted in his grip to face him. Fire erupted in Mencheres’s belly in the next instant. That fire spread in a brutal arc upward, but he didn’t loosen his grasp, even as he felt Radje rip his silver knife higher. He was almost there. Almost . . .

Mencheres flung Radje at the golden steel beams of the faux pyramid. Metal tore as the Law Guardian’s body hurtled through it, ripping a hole inside the glowingly intricate structure. Mencheres flew through it, yanking the knife out of his stomach, to blast into Radje just as his uncle was about to leap out the side again. The two of them rolled in midair inside the spire, breaking more steel around them with their struggle.

Radje landed a ruthless knee in Mencheres’s still-healing stomach, doubling him over, but again, he didn’t let go. He drove Radje backward toward the object his uncle couldn’t see—a bent steel beam sticking jaggedly out from the hole Radje’s body had torn through the structure.

Radje screamed as that beam impaled him through the sternum. He tried to fling himself off, but Mencheres held him in a merciless grip. His eyes met the Law Guardian’s for a second that seemed frozen in time before Mencheres ripped off several more gold-plated beams with his power, sending those hurtling into Radje’s body.

The bespelled grave essence only worked on the wearer to negate his telekinesis. Radje had neglected to coat this structure in addition to his body.

More howls came from Radje as those ragged steel spears slammed home, pinning his arms, legs, chest, and stomach. Mencheres twisted them with another thought, curling the metal around Radje and through him, holding him in an unbreakable meld of steel and his strength. The glowing lights from the building shone on the Law Guardian’s face as his blood turned the gold-leafed beams red around him, more blood dripping onto the floor almost fifty feet below.

Even with Radje’s shouts, the wind whipping from different directions, and the noise from the city around them, Mencheres heard Kira’s voice below them. She was screaming his name out from the cell phone Radje had dropped in his attempt to flee.

He sent a strand of his power downward, curling it around the phone to float it up to his hand. At the same time, he ripped off another steel beam, sending this one straight into Radje’s throat. Gurgles replaced the Law Guardian’s hate-filled screams, his voice barely audible over the keening of the wind.

“I am here,” Mencheres said into the phone, interrupting Kira’s frantic shouting.

“Thank God!” she gasped. “I could hear screams, but I couldn’t tell if they were yours or his . . .”

“They were his,” he replied, regretting the pain that would have caused her. “All is well. Radjedef cannot harm us any longer.”

“I’m getting on a plane right now,” she said, her voice still edged with anxiety even though relief shone through as well. “The one you flew in on is refueled and waiting. I’ll be there in the next few hours. I love you.”

Mencheres stared into Radjedef’s eyes as he replied. “And I love you, my adored. I’ll be waiting for you.”

A shuffling sound later, and the female Law Guardian’s voice flowed over the line. “Is he alive?” Veritas asked.

“No,” Mencheres replied, the steel beam preventing Radje from making any sound Veritas could hear above the wind. “He tried to escape. I had to kill him.”

“It matters not. This phone was on speaker before, so all of the Guardians heard Radje’s complicity in kidnapping Kira and using her as blackmail against you. They also heard further testimony from the guards as to Radje’s complicity in Josephus’s death and in airing video footage that exposed our race to humans. You have been cleared of all charges, Mencheres.”

“Thank you,” he replied shortly, hammering another beam into Radje’s throat when it had healed enough for him to begin to curse audibly. “I must go now, before humans stumble across this scene.”

Veritas would know the real reason for his haste. The ferryman’s boat never returned empty, and Mencheres had no intention of being the one to fill it.

He hung up on Veritas, then yanked the beam out of Radje’s throat but kept the others where they were. After a few seconds, the gaping hole in the Law Guardian’s neck healed until only blood remained to show for it.

Radje’s gaze was green with seething hatred. “Was it all a trick? Did you never lose your visions? Never intend to seek your death? Did you plan all of this? ”

Mencheres couldn’t help his ironic laugh. “None of it was a trick, except tonight. You almost won, uncle, but somehow fate gave me back everything I’d lost—and even more.”

“What now?” Radje hissed. “You intend to take my head?”

Mencheres cast his power from the torn-up lattice around them down to the roof of the Symphony Tower, where he’d stood earlier, waiting for the time to tick down to midnight. He curled it around the silver knife he’d left there, the same one from the ritual he’d performed earlier, and floated it up toward him.

He caught that knife with one hand, noting the fear in Radje’s gaze when he saw it.

“I take nothing from you,” Mencheres said, slicing that knife across Radje’s chest and coating it on both sides with the Law Guardian’s blood. At once, the brightly lit dome around them disappeared into the endless black of Duat, a lone boat floating toward them on an obsidian river. “He does,” Mencheres finished, nodding at the ferryman.

Radjedef screamed as the horned figure of Aken appeared. Mencheres let go of Radje to back away, pulling out the steel beams from the Law Guardian and piling them in a heap below. Aken grabbed Radjedef with one long hand when he attempted to flee, that wide mouth open in a terrifying, toothless grin.

No one can outrun the ruler of the underworld, Mencheres thought grimly. Not even him. One day, he would be the one ferried to stand before Anubis, his sins measured on the scales against the Ma’at to see if the Devourer awaited him, or the peace of his eternal rest in Aaru.

But not today.

Radjedef was still screaming when Aken placed him in the boat. The horned head of the ferryman nodded at Mencheres.

“An acceptable surrogate, Menkaure. Tell me, did you find your darkness?”

A chill ran through Mencheres. “My darkness?”

“Kira,” the ferryman said, pronouncing her name as the ancient Celts would.

Mencheres began to laugh. He’d had the symbolism all wrong. His visions showed darkness surging ever closer, destined to consume him. He’d thought it was death because his despair could anticipate nothing else, but it wasn’t death. It was her.

Kira. Celtic for “dark.”

“Yes, I found her,” he said to Aken. His memory of that endless stretch of darkness in his vision, filling every aspect of his future, was suddenly the most beautiful image Mencheres had ever beheld.

He turned away from the ferryman. The black void disappeared, replaced with the glow from the damaged pyramid around him and the lights of the cityscape beyond. Radjedef’s slowly shriveling body lay now on the bottom of the structure, lifeless, his soul in the boat of the ferryman on their journey back to Duat.

Mencheres had his own journey as well, but his was with Kira, into their future.