Chapter 18
I t was the night of the Bloodmoon Ritual.
“Stay in the house,” Rhyder reminded me, his hand a caress on my chin. “And lock the door.”
“I will,” I said.
I had no desire whatsoever to get tangled up in whatever they were planning.
“Oh, I found something for you,” Rhyder said. “Before I go.”
And he reached out for his motorcycle bag.
I watched his motions as he did. For a big man his movements were so smooth and efficient, a crease appearing between his brows as he dug in his bag. The dark tattoos ran up his arm, and by now I could pick them out, and I knew if I ran my fingers down the raised marks that were my name, I’d feel a shiver down my spine. The words of Holy Writ mixed with my name or the symbols that represented me, his religious devotion shot through with his carnal obsession until I wondered which one was the stronger.
Then he was in front of me, and he turned over what was in his hands.
I couldn’t repress an unguarded squeak.
It was a copy of the Wind in the Willows , the book he had burned up in a jealous rage. This copy was much older than mine, half of the cover missing, some of the pages water-damaged.
But oh Allfather .
My fingers traced the title, lips curving up at the pieces of bright illustration I could see on the front.
“T-thank you,” I stammered. “It’s—beautiful.”
“I will give you everything you want,” Rhyder said. “You can even read it to me if you like. Now be a good girl and keep this door locked.”
And with a kiss he was gone with the other Congregants headed to Bloodmoon Ritual.
I wondered where on earth my brother had gotten it, but I found it didn’t matter who or what shop he had stolen it from.
Settling into the living room to read, I pulled aside the curtain.
The clearing in the center of the settlement was empty, eerily so, a few dried leaves the only thing rustling across the empty, dry clearing.
It was a spooky sight and I quickly dropped the curtains and settled into the couch.
I had only gotten a few chapters in when suddenly there was a tremendous pounding on the door, and a loud, urgent voice calling for me.
Shit
What had happened?
Had something happened to Rhyder?
I hurried to the door, but hovered at the knob.
My brother had told me to stay inside.
“Open up, Temperance!” a man called.
I recognized Abel’s voice.
“I thought—I thought we were supposed to stay inside,” I called.
“You are needed for something,” he ordered. “Open this door now!”
When I still hesitated, he pounded even louder on the door.
“I’ll break this door down,” he threatened. “Open it, bitch!”
When I heard the scraping sound of something in the door frame, my stomach tightened with panic and I cursed to myself.
My fingers still hovered indecisively on the doorknob, wondering if screaming would reach Rhyder wherever he was doing the Bloodmoon Ritual, when the door broke open and Abel was there, stinking of something and looking at me with those little rat eyes.
“You are needed to go pick herbs for a sick Helpmeet,” he said.
“But—but it’s the Bloodmoon Ritual,” I said, stupidly.
Of course he would know.
“Rhyder said to stay here,” I began, backing up and trying to shut the door, but Abel stuck his foot in it and grabbed me by the hair.
“Don’t talk back, whore. Go get the herbs and run back or I’ll slit your throat right here.”
He flicked a knife out and never had I wished more fervently that my brother was here.
But I didn’t have a choice
My legs trembled as I hurried across the clearing and into the forest, clutching my headscarf as the wind picked up.
Distant lightning lit up the sky, flashing a sickly green. A storm was coming.
The silence in the trees was eerie and I felt hairs rise on the back of my neck.
What was the Bloodmoon Ritual?
Fat drops of water began to hit my face as I hurried into the scrubby woods to find the coarse purple roots and healing herbs.
Was it the strange greenish sky that had chased off the animals?
My fingers felt cold as I hurried to the spot where I knew the plant would be. I should have put on Rhyder’s sweatshirt.
But then I wasn’t supposed to be outside at all.
There it was!
My chilled fingers scrabbled at the dirt, hastily jerking at the tough roots, ripping them out of the soil. I hadn’t thought to bring my herb bag either, so I just gathered them up in my plain gray skirt and headed back.
The wind had picked up, spitting water at me now as another flash, even closer this time, lit up the dank bare woods.
I saw a flash of the settlement between trees, and I ran faster.
Almost there
Then dark shapes passed across the tree line and I stopped, throwing myself behind a nearby elm tree.
And I saw why I had been told to stay inside.
The men of the Congregation were gathered in a circle and all I could see was blood. Their bodies, all naked from the waist up, were slick with it.
In front of them were crumpled, savaged bodies.
I could see by the bloodied jacket patches now hung around the deadly circle that these men were what was left of the Congregation that had attacked us at the Reaping, sent wild animals to savage us.
Rhyder was instantly recognizable.
And when he turned around I barely managed to stifle a horrified, despairing gasp.
Bloodmoon madness
Holy Bloodwrath
His eyes were red, a fiery scarlet color covering the whole of his eye, the white and the blue, until it was nothing but blood with only a tiny pinprick of dark pupil there.
The Congregants weren’t talking or praying.
Just grunting, in low guttural tones
Blood, blood, blood, blood
And I looked in his eyes across the woods and I knew he couldn’t see me.
He could only see bloodlust and bloodwrath.
I pressed myself further into the scratchy bark of the elm.
Oh please, don’t let them see me
What were they given to induce bloodmoon madness? How long would it last? How long would Rhyder be trapped by the drug into animalistic savage madness?
I had to get away
Forcing my trembling legs to move, I crouched cautiously down, then slipped as quietly as I could to the shelter of the next tree. One by one. That’s how I’d get back to the safety of our house. I’d go inside and push all the furniture up against the door until the effects of the drug wore off.
But as I crept, a body in the circle turned around slowly, first the massive arm, slick with sweat and blood, then the shoulders, and finally the face, flecked with blood.
Rhyder
I was caught, trapped in his inhuman gaze, and as I froze in fear my belly twisted and my monthly flow burst, the blood beginning to flow down my legs.
He made a low guttural noise.
Blood
I turned and fled.
Crashing through the trees, I ran with sheer terror in my veins and they followed, baying and howling like wolves.
The branches whipped and tore at my body and still I ran, my flow slick on my thighs, the scent drawing them like hunting bloodhounds.
I could hear the men fighting behind me, loud snarls and heavy, thick thuds, the occasional whimper of pain.
But not from my brother.
Never from my brother.
There was nothing in front of me except the hill , the big peak Congregants would climb to claim a woman.
It was steep and rocky, deadly in the daylight, and even worse in the night with rain beginning to pelt down on us.
There was a rope to help during non-ceremonial climbs, and I pulled it up with me as I scrambled up the side, wrapping it around my wrist as I climbed, panting with the exertion, the rain flattening my head scarf to my soaked hair.
My knees were shredded in my haste, my hands trembling uncontrollably as I held on desperately to the rope.
It was a long way down and one mistake meant I’d fall on those sharp rocks at the bottom.
Rhyder was behind me, climbing fast, his eyes demon-bright, his big boots kicking down on the other Congregants, sending them tumbling to the ground with maddened roars of rage.
In a panic, I tore at a rock beside me, clawing it from the dirt with desperate, shaking fingers, then let it tumble down the hillside behind me.
It was a big, solid rock, and miraculously it managed to hit him squarely in the shoulder.
But he didn’t even flinch
Even in his madness he was impossible to beat.
What could I do?
I scrambled up to the top, my breath a sob in my chest.
There was nothing up here. Nothing except the raised grassy platform where Congregants took the Helpmeets they won in bloody battle in front of the whole Congregation and the heavy wooden post where they burned those who didn’t pass the test.
I was trapped.
Should I throw myself off the side? Try to get a weapon?
My skin prickled with terror as a bloody hand appeared over the side of the cliff, strong fingers digging into the soil, then another hand, rough and split knuckles, dragging up a big body after them, and Rhyder stepped onto the top of the hill.
As I watched him stalk toward me, all brutal heat, I felt something deep-down in my gut.
Rhyder wasn’t going to hurt me.
Couldn’t hurt me, no matter what they did to him.
“Brother, it’s me,” I said, although there was still a tremble in my voice.
My skin buzzed as he came up right in front of me, that unmistakable sign that I was a filthy, depraved sister who wanted her brother.
And he picked me up by the throat, lifting me in the air and shoving me against the heavy wooden burning stake.
I forced my body to stay calm even as his strong fingers tightened around my neck.
He bent to my throat, his nose under my ear, taking a long, deep breath.
“It’s me,” I said again. “It’s Temperance.”
He made a low noise I couldn’t interpret, his mouth opening over my throat to bite down on the sensitive skin. It was a quick pop of pain, my blood trickling out of my cunt and seeping down my bare legs.
Then he dragged his beard across my cheeks and forehead.
Was there a glint of something in his pupils? Did he recognize me yet?
My vision swam with how tightly he held me, spots and flares of light exploding in the corners of my eyes.
If I was going to die, it would be here trusting my brother.
“Rhyder, you can fight this,” I rasped, barely able to talk.
His lips seemed to almost part over my forehead, almost a kiss, but not quite.
Then with a low animalistic growl, he let me down and shoved me face-first into the raised grassy platform. Before I could even pull my skirts up, he sunk his cock painfully into my pussy.
He pulled out to slam in again and he must have spotted the blood.
The low raw noise from his chest sounded like nothing I’d ever heard in my life, so base and animalistic it was monstrous, prehistoric.
I was raised up on my elbows, and I looked down my body to see his cock covered in my fresh, bright blood, gleaming wetly in the moonlight as the rain streamed over us.
“It’s OK,” I gasped. “It’s just my period. . .it’s my flow.”
But his hands had moved back and he suddenly jerked my ass cheeks painfully apart, stretching my hole into the air.
Fuck and godsdamn
His dick slick with my blood, he began to press it into my asshole, growling in a low, menacing tone when my tight little asshole resisted.
With one big hand, he slapped viciously at my cheeks, massaging them with big, rough hands, trying to get me to open for him.
I sucked in a deep breath, tried to let it out carefully, relax every part of my body as he jerked me back, shoving my face into the mud.
He was rocking back and forth in my asshole, angry and unable to progress further.
And I felt my pussy tighten and I knew one thing.
I was going to come for my brutal, bloody brother.
Whether he took me savagely or gently.
I was his.
My nipples pebbled as he slapped my ass fucking raw, only a few inches inside me, with a lot of his fucking massive dick to go.
“I trust you, brother,” I said, even as his feral grunts made the hairs on the back of my neck rise up with the awareness of his power and size.
And Rhyder snapped his hips forward and bottomed out in my tight virginal asshole.
It was blinding raw agony, and I dug my hands into the ground so I could take it without screaming.
Green light flared all around us as the storm raged.
I tried to force my breathing to slow down, relax my asshole so I could take him easier, but it was very difficult to with Rhyder’s grunts of frustration, his balls slapping against my ass as he rutted back and forth in me.
The rain pounded down on my back, soaking me through, and I clutched the raised ground, willing my asshole to stop clenching so tightly as the blood ran down my legs.
Suddenly I heard a low noise, my ears picking up on something different.
“ Tem-perance ”
Was the drug finally wearing off?
My asshole was on fucking fire, and suddenly I felt rough fingers between my legs, my brother even in his bloodwrath snaking a hand up to rub my soaked, bloody clit.
I could have sobbed with relief and joy, his fingers stiff but sure, rubbing my slippery clit, then delving into my cunt.
It felt so dirty to have his fingers this deep inside me even as I pumped blood around him.
The pain from how roughly he was taking my asshole battled with the insistent liquid pleasure of his fingers, and I did come for him, came for him even as he was half-mad, drugged to be a murderer and nothing more, and I didn’t care whose blood he had on his hands, only that they were on me.
My thighs trembled uncontrollably as I finally let myself cry out in the intense aching raw release, shuddering pleasure and pain mixed together, and I must have blacked out, because the next thing I knew was Rhyder’s voice, his regular normal voice, rough with concern, saying, “Temperance! Temperance! Are you all right?”
“I’m fine, I’m fine,” I said, my eyes feeling crusted shut by my tears, waking up groggily, the dark trees spinning around me.
The storm has passed
My brother drew me further into the moonlight and now his fingers roamed over me, low noises of pain wrenched from his throat as he saw the wet splashes of blood on his fingers and smeared all over me.
“No. . . no, ” he cried, his voice raw with pain. “Did I do this?”
Rhyder sucked in his breath with a sharp inhale as wiping the blood away only revealed dark marks and bruises on my throat.
“No, no!” he groaned again, his voice almost frantic now. “I couldn’t have done this. Oh, Temperance, I couldn’t have! Not to you!”
His eyes were dark and shadowed with pain, but free of the terrible red of the bloodwrath.
“Rhyder! Rhyder! You didn’t!” I cried in alarm as he tore his hair, sinking to the ground with his head between my knees. “You barely scratched my neck. I bruise easily, brother. You know that. I am not hurt.”
His hands ran over my face again.
“It was the drug,” I said. “The bloodwrath drug. But when I talked to you, you stopped. You fought it, Rhyder. You didn’t hurt me.”
He pulled me into his lap, his eyes and fingers still anxiously tracing my face.
“Why did you come out, sister?” he groaned. “What if it hadn’t worked? What if the drug had taken me?”
I was still shivering uncontrollably but my body gradually began to warm with the contact with his.
“You would never have killed me, Rhyder,” I said confidently. “And I didn’t want to. But Abel came and told me to go pick some mountain roots and sassafras, that it was needed for medicinal salves.”
Rhyder’s face darkened, looking white with rage, the skin stretched like death across his handsome face, terrible in the moonlight.
“Come, angel,” he said. “You need a warm shower and warm clothes.”
I tried not to limp over as he moved to the hill and unfurled the rope, but it was hard not to.
“Climb on,” he said, and I couldn’t help flinching as I spread my legs to climb on his back.
“You flinched!” he said, his voice sounding like he had been in the grave for a week. “You will fear me now.”
But I shook my head, grabbed his bloody chin so he couldn’t look away in shame.
“I’m not afraid of you, Rhyder,” I said, holding his eyes. “You were in the Bloodmoon rage and still didn’t hurt me. I am not afraid of you.”
They were all gathered together in the center of the settlement by the time we got back, the bloodwrath gone from their eyes.
“Abel!” Rhyder shouted.
The other man turned around, his eyes sliding past me.
There was a sound like a low, dangerous slide of metal, sharp-edged and harsh.
And my brother stalked toward him, knives out in both hands.
He didn’t wait around for explanations or begging for mercy.
“You tried to fuck with what’s mine.”
I saw Abel’s dart eyes back and forth as the clouds scudded across the sky, unveiling the blood-red moon.
There it was. An omen of danger. An omen of death.
And no help was coming for Abel.
By the time he realized the Prophet and Enforcer weren’t going to save him, and tried to get his own dagger out, Rhyder had plunged two knives deep into his chest, cutting through his ribs with a boneshattering squeal of knife on bone.
This hadn’t all been Abel’s doing. But I had no way of proving that. Only the appraising eyes the Prophet darted between us as my brother yanked his knives out of Abel’s chest, kicking out with his big boots, the dead body making a hollow sound as Rhyder knocked the corpse halfway across the clearing.