Reaper Kissed

33. Reaper King

Chloe and Ryder came upon another body. Chloe rolled the man over, allowing them to see his face.

"I know him, he was a vampire." Chloe exclaimed, startled. Ryder crouched down beside her. He examined the vampire's face, seeing how the skin had suctioned toward the mouth and felt the deep gashes were Lauren's fangs had latched onto the victim's cheeks. "Why is Lauren doing this?" Chloe questioned.

"She's feeding on souls." Ryder straightened up and sighed heavily. Chloe turned to him sharply.

"What?"

"It happened before, when Harriet died...Harriet was a friend of mine," he explained. "Lauren became suddenly consumed by... a sort of hunger. She went wild, loosing all control - in the end she begged me to stop her."

"I still don't understand."

"I think Lauren came back from the dead with a hunger. A hunger for souls. And now that she's gotten a taste, that hungers only getting worse."

Chloe thought about this.

"But if she consumes a person's soul, what happens to them? You know, in death?"

"Nothing, that's it. No afterlife." Ryder's expression became distant as his thoughts took a dark turn. Chloe shuddered.

"But what is she?"

Ryder urged Chloe to her feet. They carried on down the road, keeping to the shadows - both tense and listening out for any approaching sounds.

"A beast of silence, also called..." he hesitated.

"Yes?"

"A mournslag."

Chloe shivered, she'd hoped to never encounter a mournslag again. But to Ryder, 'mournslag' had deeper implications. Wabyt had used a mournslag to guard the Bastille prison. A mournslag could be killed, and Ryder knew how it might be done. But... this was Lauren. How could he slay Lauren, the girl who'd captured his heart so utterly? Ryder's shoulders hunched inward. He'd sworn to be her slave but now she'd turned into something terrible. Would he hunt her down? Or keep her fed so that he might keep her close, as Wabyt had done for her own pet mournslag? Could he feed her souls, just to keep her alive?

Ryder gasped suddenly, his hand covering his chest – a sudden pain having gripped him.

"Ryder?" Chloe questioned. Ryder brushed her aside, breathing deeply around the pain. Tears shone in his grey eyes. It felt like his battered heart was crumbling to dust. Chloe watched him, her brow furrowed in concern.

"What," he groaned, "what fuels you, Chloe? What keeps you going?"

Chloe paused, considering this.

"Madness." She shrugged, offering him a smile.

"You're not mad," he disagreed.

"Not visibly, not anymore." They both thought back to how she'd once been – flinching and cowering at every loud noise. "But the cracks are still there."

Ryder took her hands in his, giving her fingers a squeeze.

"I'm sorry, I sent you away because you weren't Lauren. I failed to appreciate all that you are though."