Chapter Sixteen Taranis
Chapter Sixteen
Taranis
She ran out on me. That little hussy. That was always one of my favorite words my white human host family taught me.
I’m angry and irritated as I rush through a shower and pull on clothes. But . . . I’m also pleased. And the rugged combination of emotions confuses me . . . and makes me irritable all over. Standing in front of the mirror does not improve my foul disposition.
I’m still the same monster I was last night, and I look even more ridiculous in the soft morning light.
For starters, I’m still blue. My horns and the claws on my hands and the talons on my feet are all white.
Like a children’s art project, they look like they were dunked first in Elmer’s glue and then into a vat of glitter.
I have fangs. Not a dainty set of fangs like the Wyvern has that affect only his back teeth, but a mouth full of them.
My front teeth are pointy. And the worst part of all, I’m almost as big as that hideous pink creature. And definitely more hideous.
My face is a different shape. Monika was right about that.
Was it the ugly composition of my features that drove her off?
My clawed hands come insecurely up to my cheeks.
My brow, cheek-and jawbones stick out too much, making the unusual glow of my eyes even more startling as they lie in shadowy hollows of my face.
They’re not purple anymore, but blue, with only the slightest purple tint as I stare into them now.
Frowning, I go to my closet only to find that it’s been ruffled.
One of my T-shirts is missing off the hangar, and the drawer where I keep my rarely worn sweatpants is ajar.
Hmph. At least she left in my clothing. That has to count for something, I think as I pull a T-shirt on over my head and proceed to shred the hell out of it on my horns. Not that it would have fit.
I huff out a sigh, abandoning any hope of wearing a shirt and moving on to pants. I can’t come close to slipping my talons through the leg of my jeans, so I go to my sweats. I can pull them on with minimal tearing, but they only come up to my shins. Like fucking capri pants.
Irritation blasts through me, and a huge ball of electricity swells from my chest. Fuck.
I stumble back, away from the full-length mirror, caught off guard by my surging powers.
But after the initial shock wears off, I grin.
I may be uglier than sin, but my powers are magnificent.
I can feel fresh energy storming through my body, waiting to be unleashed.
It makes it easier to recall the strange dreams that plagued me last night—an expansion of the visions that crippled me the moment I reverted—and remember exactly how to use my powers to their fullest extent.
Training on brutal battlefields made of black sand, the Elders watching over me as I attacked and was attacked again and again by monsters who could shift into wind, who had claws and hooves and horns, who could cause pain with nothing more than their will.
I shiver and frown, remembering so much about my childhood and finding it utterly unsatisfying.
Not because of the violence. No, that I rather liked.
But because on Tratharine, there was nothing that was mine.
A collective army, we fought, slept, and ate together as we worked to protect a violent population that had few redeeming qualities.
Babies were birthed in centers by magical machines that engineered us.
Badly injured and disabled Tratharine were killed the moment the Elders deemed them ineffective.
I was among the top soldiers. I was counted among the ten the Elders confided in and depended on most. I was number Six.
I stretch out my arms, admiring the way the symbols glitter over them in the light.
Symbols meant to bind me to my weapon and, more importantly, to the Elders whose magic created them.
I shudder. The Elders had—have—more power than the lot of us soldiers combined.
Though the Marduk still fights in their name and honor, I don’t want them here on this planet.
I don’t want to invite creatures so powerful that they not only lay waste to humanity but also have the ability to rule over me, even in this form with all my newly acquired power.
I want to be out from under the COE—that motivation has not changed. I don’t need a new master.
As I watch myself in the mirror, I realize that, like this, I’ll have no problem killing Mr. Singkham and Ms. Lemon, if needed, and taking over the COE.
I am also no longer sure I’ll have an issue with the Marduk.
I can take him now; I’m quite convinced of it.
And if my memories ring true, then he needs to die.
Without him, the Elders won’t make it to this side.
There is just one other thing I must do first: Find and punish Monika Neumann.
First Monika, then Mr. Singkham’s cleverly engineered death—a simple internal electrical charge should do it. Everyone will think he had a stroke instead. Then the Marduk and any minions who may remain loyal to him. Then destroy all the weapons. Fuck, kill, kill, destroy. Easy peasy.
Feeling quite content with my plans, I strut in my fucking capri pants to my office.
First things first: I need to find her address.
As my dick swells at the memory of last night, I also decide that second on my list before killing Mr. Singkham is going to see the doctor to make sure I can continue fucking Monika with wild abandon with this new magnificent dick.
It makes me wonder if I should shower—yes.
Did she shower? I would have heard it. Which meant she really left my penthouse in the middle of the night without a bra or drawers on, my cum and her slick crusted all over her.
Did strange men and women see Monika’s pert nipples poking through the thin fabric of my T-shirt? Did they look at her bare toes curl, curl, curling as the pleasure crashes through her, and she’s fully restrained, incapable of escaping my hold as I slam into her over and over and . . .
Fuck.
I rub my hand roughly over my face as I enter my office and find her file.
It sits in a locked drawer underneath my built-in shelving unit, right beneath the shelf that holds my strange silver weapons.
I glance at them as I wrench the drawer open, and curiosity has me reaching out to touch one of them.
I brush my fingers over the metal, which isn’t like any metal I’ve ever felt before.
Almost rough, it carries a preternatural chill, like it’s trying to warn me away from it. Like it isn’t even mine.
I frown as I pick one up and pull it on. I did some research. In the human world, there exists only one other weapon like it: the katar. An ancient Indian weapon, it fits on my hands like gloves. There’s a trigger mechanism inside that I can squeeze and the single blade pops into three.
Now that I’ve reverted and have regained my memory, I remember the Elders bestowing this weapon onto me.
I could use it on Tratharine just fine without a key, but for whatever reason, here on Earth, the key is required both to find the weapons and activate them.
The Elders could not have designed this system to be more fucking complicated.
When activated, lightning would shoot out from the tips of each blade of my weapon, so powerful that one single strike to the chest could kill any incoming opponent.
I could simply stand at the top of a hill and eradicate an entire approaching army one by one.
That’s why the Wyvern is only number Sixty-Two in our hierarchy.
I grin at the revelation, then frown again as I remember that the Marduk is number Four.
I cannot allow him to revert, or I might struggle with phase three of my fuck, kill, kill, destroy mission.
Especially considering that the weapons remain dead in my hands on this planet, nothing more than useless scrap metal.
I frown. Is this weapon . . . even mine?
What if he offered me a poor man’s replica?
“Of course he fucking did,” I grunt, clearing my weapons from my desk and tossing them onto the shelf behind me before returning to Monika’s file to find her personal information. “One problem at a fucking time.” Fuck, kill, kill, destroy. I need to keep my priorities in check.
I pull my phone out of my pocket and, ignoring far, far too many notifications that I have no intention of dealing with now or later, I call her. It goes straight to voicemail. Concern mounting alongside suspicion, I try again. And then three times more.
“Stupid bitch,” I curse, my chest heating with embarrassment. She’s going to see those missed calls from me and what’s she gonna think? That Darius is some desperate fucking loser?
Lewd and lucid visions of how I’ll punish her for ignoring my calls flood my thoughts and make me harder than the goddamn paddle I’m gonna whoop that ass with. Oh, how I’m gonna punish her . . .
I glance down at the file, which is stamped with a black-and-white photo of her face that I tear out and shove into the pocket of my sweats like a psycho and come to the bit with her address. “No.” I blink at the paper. I blink again, and anger hits the nape of my neck. “That fucking . . . liar.”
I know I’m being irrational as I slam the paper down on my desk and move out of my office, kicking the door shut behind me.
I return to my living quarters, heading straight past the couch I fucked her roughly on last night and rip open the glass doors that lead to my balcony.
I take flight without bothering to shut the doors behind me, circle the building, find the four floors down from mine, and touch down onto the most bizarrely decorated balcony I’ve ever seen.
There are carpets out here, bright pink and orange, and so many plants I nearly trip over one in my haste to make my landing.