Page 91 of Ashen Torment

The nape of his neck warming, that flush rising just beyond his black hair.

My groin responds without my wanting it to. The fabric of my trousers tightens against my leg in a way that has nothing dignified about it.

I part my lips, clicking my tongue, irritated by my own weakness.

“Sir?”

“Get out, Laurence.”

He slips out almost at a run.

I rest the book on the desk and bring one hand to my eyes, pressing my fingers against my eyelids until I feel them throb, while the other hand slides between my legs.

“Damn it.”

13

Contamination

Evander

Istruggle to breathe. The air is thick, sickly sweet, it clings to my throat and lungs, entering in hitches and burning.

Victor appears without a sound.

He does not walk, he drags himself weightlessly.

The fabric of his clothes makes no sound, yet I feel him on my chest, on my shoulders, everywhere.

His vacant eyes slide inside me without permission. They penetrate, they hollow out, they gnaw.

“Enduring her to have you.”

His voice is wet and viscous.

“Only to have you.”

“You are like a fever,” he reaches out his hands, “you burn even without my touch.”

The sneer pulls the corners of his mouth.

Filthy, rotten and the smell of cigars nests inside my nostrils, under my tongue.

It makes me want to tear out my own throat.

I back away, but the floor clings to my feet; a warm, greasy sludge sucks me down.

“You deny me... yet you always return here,” he continues, and I know it.

There is no elsewhere.

Behind him, a shadow blacker than darkness itself writhes, crawls upon the walls.

Liquid, formless, a poison lapping at my feet.

“You are made of me,” he adds, and a thread of glistening saliva falls from his lip.

Slow drops fall from the ceiling, warm and oily, seeping into my hair, onto my forehead.