Beyond the Veil Read Free Page A

minutes, give or
take, Mihheer’s agonized screams drifted into the background noise of my head. I’d
started picturing porn and quoting rap lyrics to keep from going crazy while
Longinus put the squeeze on the alien. The porn helped, but the lyrics just
made me want to smoke dope and beat bitches. Probably not the best of
distractions, I admit.
    I curled up into a ball, my hands over my
head and my face on my knees. I would have gone fetal, but I’m not that
flexible. If I were, I could have found better ways to entertain myself. A
happy ending out of the question, I sat that way until I heard the creak of the
door opening. Against my better judgment—a mental reaction of mine more
prevalent than the training of Pavlov’s dog—I looked up as Longinus reclaimed
his sword from the floor where I’d dropped it, my gaze immediately drawn
through the crack of the doorway and into the room.
    What had been gray stone was now dripping
with crimson, not an inch of its natural color showing through. Stalactites of
blood and entrails coated the ceiling, hanging down like sausages at an
old-timey butcher shop. They swayed even in the still air. Wet drips sounded as
though a gentle passed over. My eyes followed the carnage downward. Visible
through the space between Longinus’ legs was a droopy puddle that had once been
something humanoid in shape. Like silly putty washed in red paint, the remnants
of Mihheer lay stretched and distorted, hammered thin into a sheet of boneless
meat. Vibrant greens and blacks stood out amidst the mass, colors swirling to
make intricate shapes, which spoke legions of the torment the alien had
endured.
    I swallowed hard and looked up at Longinus.
“So?” It wasn’t much of a question, but it was all I could squeeze out of my
throat right then.
    Longinus nodded. He didn’t even bother to
wipe at the blood that coated him as moistly as it did the room. “He gave up
his master’s location a half hour ago.”
    A cold chill danced the Macarena down my
spine as I spied the subtle flickers of a satisfied smile playing across his
lips. He’d gotten the information he needed and still spent an extra fifteen,
twenty minutes turning Mihheer into a puddle of goop. I kept my mouth shut, but
it damn sure gave me the willies. You just don’t question that kind of
conviction, which probably explains why so many people in history have happily swallowed
the Kool-Aid. Determination like that carries a weight that’s hard to oppose.
    A moist gurgle drew my gaze back to the
room. My heart thrummed at seeing the sludgy remnants of Mihheer twitch, a tiny
wave rippling down the length of his flattened body. He was still alive.
    I stood on numb legs and stumbled past
Longinus, amazed and sickened by the destruction that had been visited upon the
alien. To realize all he’d suffered and yet still clung to life was a testament
to the nature of Hell. Torment was a certainty here, but death wasn’t so easy
to come by.
    A half-pulped eye turned in the soupy mass.
Its foggy stare settled on me, memories washing in its wake. I’d seen such
butchery before…caused by my own hands.
    Arol’s shattered face stared out of the
past, and I recognized shadows of the agony I saw in Mihheer, the final moments
of misery before the end stole in and gratefully washed all the pain away. I’d
given Arol mercy, not because I felt he deserved it, but because it satisfied
something in me to finish it, to have closure for my mother. That bitterness
stung my tongue now that I knew how I’d been used, how Arol’s death had been
nothing more than a means to keep me under Lucifer’s thumb.
    I glared at Mihheer. His one eye trembled
in its soggy socket. It begged for release, whimpers squirming out from
somewhere within the carnage of flesh and oozing wounds. Death was coming for
him soon. He was too far gone now to stop it. My hand reached instinctively for
my gun, but all I could think of was Karra. Gorath had her and Mihheer had