Soul Song ~ Book One

Chapter Eleven

In the deep of the night, Klellen took his wife's body down into the deepest part of the cave where the Healers had lost their power and lives. Rigor mortis had set in as she lay on their bed, but he carried her as gently as he could. Each step he took to the altar ahead of him sapped a little bit of energy out of him until he collapsed, after having laid her body across the altar. Even after his earlier glee with his new condition, his heart was pained at the sight of his wife's pale face. Not even a hint of color graced her skin. Having seen plenty of dead bodies before, he knew it was lack of blood that caused her pallor. Guilt washed over him, cinching his throat. The gaping gash in her neck was the only thing that marred her beauty as she looked as though she only slumbered.

Normally steely blue eyes filled with tears that spilled over his own pale cheeks. In the torchlight, she almost looked as though she might wake. He could almost imagine her sitting up and smiling at him, asking what he was doing and telling him how foolish he was to think she was dead. Almost. The fluttering torchlight seemed to make her eyelashes flutter along with it.

"Why?" Lightly at first, then more intently, Klellen took his wife's cold hand and pleaded over her prone body, rubbing the hand, willing the heat to leave him and enter into her. After a few furious moments, he slowed to a defeated stop; a pitiful sigh escaping him. He had no heat to give. He was as cold as she.

"Why? Why, my wife? Why were you taken from me? My strength, my bond, my love," he moaned. "You did no wrong. Why were you the one taken?" Bowing his head to her midsection, his body wracked with sobs.

"To give me new life, Husband, so that you may fully understand the sacrifice you have made."

The sobs froze in Klellen's throat. The gravelly voice that came from his dead wife's lips was nothing like hers. The cold hand tightened onto his own before he jerked it back.

"No," he breathed. Scrambling away from her, he never took his eyes off his wife's body. Lyla arched her back, stretching as though she were waking from a nap, before raising to a sitting position. Endless black eyes stared at Klellen as he cowered on the floor. Each oiled turn of her head opened the flaps of the wound in her neck until she raised a bloodless hand to her throat, and grinning a wicked smile, she placed her forefinger and thumb together at one edge and pulled, as if closing a zipper. Klellen watched in disbelief and horror as the tear magically closed and all traces of it disappeared.

Never taking his eyes from Lyla, Klellen maneuvered into a kneeling position, his hands palm up to entreat her. "Lyla...how? What...?"

"My husband, you made an arrangement." As she spoke, Lyla oozed from the altar and stepped toward Klellen, every movement smooth and unnatural. The same hand that had repaired the ghastly wound on her neck reached out to caress Klellen's cheek. The shocking cold of her skin sent a shudder through him. He closed his eyes in a failed attempt to block out the sensation.

"The arrangement to take the plague away from the village was a noble one," Lyla continued, in a voice that sounded as though thousands spoke at once. "My dear, ignorant husband. You did not understand with whom you were dealing. For everything, there is payment." The gentle voice was almost lazy as it poured from Lyla's lips. Klellen didn't mistake the delivery of the words for kindness. One glance was all it took to remind him that something was very wrong.

"What...what is this...payment?" He asked, barely above a whisper as Lyla circled behind him, placing her chilling hands on his shoulders. She paused a moment, holding his shoulders, before whispering in his ear, "You, Husband....you." She breathed out a sigh, icy breath the stink of death blew past his cheek. Klellen slumped as his will left him, his chin resting on his chest.