Chapter Seventeen

Idream for the first time in a century.

There's not much of a narrative to it, just flashes of images. I see Larimar's shimmering tail underwater. The dead soldier clawing through his grave. Larimar nailed on a windmill, like the ones from Don Quixote. The moon over the water, impossibly large. Abe dressed as a knight, riding a horse made of bones. Larimar reaching into my chest and pulling out my heart before throwing it over her shoulder because it was still beating.

When I wake, I feel rested and alert, though, judging from the moon coming in through the window, I couldn't have been asleep for more than a couple of hours.

That same moon is illuminating Larimar, no longer crucified to a windmill, no longer discarding my heart. She is here beside me, hair spilling around her like liquid silver and gold. Her eyes are closed, her face a slate wiped clean. An angel of innocence, even when I know otherwise.

My heart makes itself known, beating wildly in my chest, as if it wants to punch its way through my ribs. All of this from just looking at her.

But I know what's really making my soul come alive like the soldier in my dream, crawling out of a grave.

It's because I fell asleep after fucking her.

I dreamed.

And she is still here.

She is bound only by that rosary. She could have left at any time during the night, and she didn't.

She's here.

She chose to stay with me.

I keep staring at her, taking in every inch of her face, her body, and something inside me begins to make room, like there's space now for something to live within me.

But it cannot be love.

I close my eyes to the sight of her, trying to grapple with the truth.

It can't be love.

I cannot love this woman, my captive, my pet, my Syren, my little fish. I cannot love her because I lost my heart centuries ago, and I know what happens to the ones I love.

My love stories never get a happy ending.

A cold sweat breaks out on my brow, and I slowly sit up. For the first time, I contemplate running. Leaving. I'll throw myself into that ocean and make myself drown. But I'll never drown; I'll never die. I am in love with this woman, and she will haunt me until the end of time. She will make a nest in my heart and stay there, caught behind the prison bars of my ribs. She is bound to me whether either of us likes it, and I will never be free of her, never be free from this feeling that's slowly taking over my existence.

I rub my hands over my face, trying to gain composure and calm my ratcheting pulse. There's something happening deep inside me, some strange sensation that comes from a dark place, that endless grave recently unearthed. It's not my heart, which feels as if it's balancing on a precipice, but something vile spreading in the marrow of my bones.

No. No, God, please don't let this happen now.

I have tried for so long to keep this monster at bay; this can't be happening now.

Fear jettisons through me, and I press the back of my hand against my mouth, feeling as if I might be sick. I glance down at Larimar sleeping soundly, and I know I can't be around her, not until I know I have things under control.

I quickly get out of bed and slip on my trousers, and then I step out into the night. The clouds have come in, and rain falls, cold and heavy, but I barely feel it.

I only make it halfway to the church when I feel it clawing up through me. I drop to my knees and vomit blood into the grass.

No. I must keep it buried. I must stay in control.

I must.

I've managed to hide that old beast deep down, no matter what was thrown my way. I used the rigid teachings of the book to keep me in line. I always thought that if I deviated from God's word in some way, that's when I would slip, and the monster would take advantage. I thought if I didn't kill, I would be saved. I thought if I didn't give into my lustful, depraved urges, I would be saved.

But, it turns out, none of that matters.

I killed that soldier, with or without Larimar's help, and the beast stayed asleep.

I fucked Larimar and defiled her in every single way possible. I became a slave to my deepest and darkest sexual desires.

And though the beast woke up, it didn't escape from its cage.

But now that I feel like my heart has gotten involved, now that real emotions are coming to light, that is what is bringing this monster inside me to life.

I knew keeping her here would be dangerous, not only for her, but for me.

And now I know why.

I spit and get up, stumbling the rest of the way to the church, barging in through the doors like a madman. I stagger down the aisle, leaving a trail of water in my wake, before collapsing on my knees at the altar. I already feel immense pain in my back, like my shoulder blades are splintering, and I arch my head toward the ceiling.

"Please!" I yell, my voice echoing off the rafters. "Help me! Save me, Lord. Save me from myself!"

I press my palms together in prayer, but my hands won't stop shaking. The darkness inside me builds, filling in all my cracks and crevices.

Light, I need light. Only light can cast out the darkness.

I stagger to my feet and grab the matches from the altar, lighting every candle, torch, and oil lamp I can find. I want this room blazing, I want it so bright that there is no place inside me for evil to hide.

When I finally come to the last lamp, the ever-burning chancel lamp on the altar's wall, I add more oil, making the flames dance dangerously high.

And in those flames, I see Larimar dancing.

Then, I smell her, hear her footsteps from outside the door moments before she steps inside.

"Priest?" she calls out.

I turn around to see her barefoot and walking down the aisle, dressed in only her white shift. The rain has soaked her through in the short walk over, her hair wet, her dress soaked and sticking to her. I can see her nipples clearly, the dark shadows of her cunt. Hot, liquid need thrums through me, stealing all that is good and moral until I am just a wicked man and feral beast.

"Get away from me," I growl, but I've already pulled my cock out of my pants, making a tight fist. There is a deep itch inside me, painful and insidious, and I know she can make it go away.

She stops in the middle of the aisle and stares at me with her big violet eyes, which look nearly pink in this feverish light. With the flames blazing around her, casting flickering gold on her wet skin, she looks like angel escaping hell.

She needs to escape the hell I'm about to bring her.

"Larimar, please," I say, but my words do not match my actions.

My cock juts out from my hips, pulsing slightly with each wild beat of my heart.

"Why did you leave?" she asks, slowly coming toward me. "I woke up, and you were gone." She eyes the way I'm fisting my cock, pumping it. "Did I not give you enough pleasure?"

I let out a hoarse cry, wishing she wouldn't say such a thing.

"I need you to…go," I whisper.

"Why?" she asks, stopping at the foot of the steps. I'm up on the altar, looming over her like a deity, and I can't stop myself as I reach out with my free hand and place it on top of her head. I shove her down to her knees.

"Worship me," I tell her. "Suck me."

She blinks in surprise, probably because earlier, I had made her take my thumb in her mouth, telling her to stay clear of my dick. But I don't feel in control of my words anymore.

"I said do it," I snarl.

Apprehension falls on her face, but she reaches for me, wrapping her hands around my length. I want to hate myself for losing control, for letting the monster speak, but the sight of her on her knees, praying at the altar of my cock, is deliciously sinful.

I push inside her plush lips, and she starts sucking me, working me over with hot passes of her tongue, becoming more ravenous as she goes. There's a part of me that worries she might get too carried away, that the Syren part of her might come out, and I fear the beast will like that.

But then, when I feel my balls pull tight, my hands yanking roughly at her hair, enough to cause her to cry out in pain, I know I need my seed inside her.

I yank her head up by the roots, her teeth grazing my ridge as she goes, and then throw her backward onto the aisle.

She lands with a thump, a wheezing breath knocked out of her, and tries to get to her feet, but I move fast. I push her back down, and she yelps, pinning her hands back over her head. I notice she removed the rosary, and that does something to me, like the last bastion of grace and control I had was removed along with it. It's no longer there to remind me of salvation. The absence of it is a marker of my downfall.

"Priest," she says, her eyes a mix of fear and desire, but I care less about how she feels, and that's how I know the beast is winning.

"You should have listened to me," I rasp.

Then, I reach down and take a rough hold of her thighs, spreading them before I mount her, no hesitation except for the voice inside me that screams for her to run, to leave, to escape.

But that voice won't come out. Is this punishment for taking away hers, for making her words always be a whisper, for keeping that chain in her mouth for longer than I should have?

Is God smiting me right now for my past wrongs?

Or am I only doing it to myself?

I am doing it, a voice rattles from deep inside, one that sounds like Kaleid. That sounds like blood. That sounds like the Devil himself.

This is all for me. Fuck her, feast on her.

"No!" I cry out, and Larimar stares up at me with wide eyes a second before I spear my cock inside her. I watch as her mouth opens in a silent cry, and I grunt, slamming my hips harder.

I bring my mouth to her throat, and I bite, timing it with a punishing thrust of my cock, drinking as much of her as I can. The monster wants me to fuck and wants me to feast, and if I give it that and just that, perhaps it will leave both of us alone.

But I know the wish is fruitless, like an unheard prayer.

I saw my dick in and out of her, viciously, violently, pinning her down so hard, I fear she might become one with the church floor.

"Priest," she says through a breathless gasp, running her hands down my back. I pull my head back, wanting her to soothe me, needing her to rein me in.

That was a mistake.

One look at her beautiful eyes, a stained-glass window to her exquisite soul, and I realize how in love with her I am.

"Larimar," I breathe, trying to hold my hips back, but it's like trying to bring in a runaway horse. "I have to tell you something while I still have a chance."

Her brows come together as she stares at me.

I cup her face with one hand, overcome with the urge to bare my soul. "I have lived so long, too long, without you. I don't know how I've survived any minute of it."

Her lips move, but no sound comes out, a softness washing over her features, like she's melting beneath me.

"That's why I am sorry it has to end this way," I say and drive my cock back inside her, rough movements that jostle her breasts beneath the shift. My skin feels like it's on fire, stretching and thickening, my cock lengthening.

"What?" she asks, but the monster won't let me explain.

It makes me reach down and flick and pinch at her clit until she's crying. The monster makes her come with pleasure and pain until she's a wet, quivering mess below me.

I bare my fangs at her, hissing.

She's still moaning, fighting through her climax, trying to stay sharp, knowing there's something terribly wrong, knowing there is danger.

Good night, Armand Alcaraz, the voice whispers to me, sinister and all-encompassing.

"Armand Alcaraz!" I manage to cry out to Larimar. "My name was Armand Alcaraz!"

I feel my bones breaking and stretching and shifting, some awful transformation taking hold, like hot swords are breaking through my back.

The pain envelops me from head to toe as I scream, and yet I still come, shooting my seed into her cunt, pumping and emptying until my mind is fully gone and only my smudge of a soul remains.

The last thing I see with my own eyes is the look of terror on Larimar's face as she stares up at me and two long shadows falling over her.

Wings sprouting from my back.

"Let us prey," the monster snarls at her.