Free Kardinal by Thomas Emson

excited. He was erect beneath his cowl – erect for her, his dead queen.
    He took the knife, and the man on the scaffold squealed.
    Simeon gutted him.
    The man howled. His innards spooled out of his belly.
    Blood and slime gushed out.
    The gore splashed over Ereshkigal’s remains.
    The opened man bellowed and twitched.
    Simeon then sliced him from throat to sternum, sawing through bone, which splintered and cracked.
    The man jerked.
    Blood rained.
    The man died with a terrible noise coming from his throat.
    Simeon snapped open his ribcage.
    He clawed out the man’s heart and lungs, slopping them into the coffin.
    Ereshkigal’s remains hissed.
    Smoke rose from her cadaver.
    Simeon stepped back.
    The smell was terrible.
    Steam filled the cellar.
    Simeon retched.
    And then he froze.
    She reared up out of the smoke.
    More beautiful than she had ever been.
    She was naked and pale. Her black hair streamed over her shoulders. Her eyes burned red.
    She opened her mouth. Her fangs were sharp.
    Simeon fell to his knees, jabbering.
    He was shaking with awe.
    Ereshkigal floated up out of the coffin and slowly hovered down towards Simeon.
    She clutched the red rag around his throat, the mark of the Nebuchadnezzars, protection against vampires.
    Her voice was like a snake’s.
    “Do you think this protects you from me?”
    “I am your servant, Simeon,” he cried. “Do you remember me, my queen?”
    He stared at her naked body. He was shaking with desire.
    She tipped his chin back with her finger.
    “Oh my queen,” he gasped.
    She grinned at him, showing her deadly teeth.
    “Shall I kiss you, Simeon?”
    “Oh… kiss me, my queen.”
    “If I do, you shall die. Shall I kiss you? Or will you live and be the eunuch in my court?”
    He groaned.
    “Choose, or I shall kill you,” she said.
    He chose.
    And he shrieked when she gelded him.

CHAPTER 19. SHE IS THORNS.
     
    Tălmaciu – 12.15am (GMT + 2 hours), 18 May, 2011
     
    LAWTON reeled, his head spinning. Every drop of strength he had seemed to leach out of his body. He suddenly felt weak in the woman’s presence.
    “Five hundred years,” she said. Her eyes flashed. She hissed out a breath and it was putrid.
    “Who are you?” he asked.
    The woman didn’t answer. She was staring goggle eyed at the Spear of Abraham.
    “How did you come by this?” she asked.
    “I asked you who you were.”
    She looked him in the eye. “Ereshkigal. Mireasă de Nimrod .”
    Lawton furrowed his brow. “What?”
    She shook her head as if she’d forgotten herself by speaking Romanian instead of English. “Bride of Nimrod.”
    Lawton’s nerves fizzed.
    “Where did you come by the spear?” she said again.
    He didn’t answer. He was trying to regain control of his senses, trying to find his strength again. Slowly, it was returning.
    The woman’s hand shot out, and she laid it flat against Lawton’s chest.
    He stiffened. It felt as if pulses of electricity were passing from her palm into his body. He could have easily retreated, but he stayed put, not wanting to show any weakness. He had a feeling such a revelation would put him in danger.
    “I can feel your heart,” she said. She panted, her lips partly open. Her tongue slithered across her lips.
    Lawton’s defences were crumbling again. He had faced this temptation before. Three years ago, he had been forced to kill his ex-girlfriend Jenna McCall after she became a vampire. When she’d first appeared to him as an undead, Jenna had demanded he give her blood – or she would go out and kill. Lawton had given in, and she’d fed from him, taking enough blood to survive, but not too much so as to kill Jake. She had mocked him, and he’d felt weak after she’d fed. But days later, he’d killed her. And he’d not hesitated. He did not shirk either when it came to crafting the death of another woman he loved when she’d returned from the dead. Sassie Rae had died at the Religion nightclub when Lawton and his companions prevented the