51. Chapter Fifty-One
Chapter Fifty-One
Empusa The Devourer
A Pre-Commissioned Joyride
The machines beside Elowen’s bed beep in slow, steady intervals that grate against the edges of my patience.
She looks so small beneath the hospital blankets, pale from blood loss and exhaustion, eyelashes resting against her cheek like she’s only sleeping.
She looks so breakable in this form. Just like her sweet Grandma Lise.
Little human playthings pretending they have a destiny.
A shame they don’t have her intubated anymore.
Can’t I just kill her right here? I thought enchanting that guy to swerve in front of her last night would be a clean-cut plan.
I knew she would flee when I made my sudden entrance into the loft.
I thought ahead and my plan still failed.
What use is being able to tell the future if I can’t guarantee anything anymore?
Yet, here she is. Still. Fucking. Breathing. Why won’t you die already? UGH.
The stupid host of this body screams in torture for hours on end now. She thinks it’s enough to make me tap. She figured out my weakness, but knows she would have to somehow con someone to insult me on the outside. Instead, she just wails and screams from within in hopes it’ll click.
I stand at Elowen’s bedside and tilt my head, studying the stillness of her chest. It rises and falls.
Such a fragile rhythm. She shouldn’t have survived.
Last night’s experiment should’ve taken her out completely, but somehow she clung to life like a disgusting parasite.
The lights above hum faintly, buzzing enough to irritate my heightened hearing.
I fold my arms and watch her, wondering how many more times the universe plans to inconvenience me with her survival.
Nearing footsteps sound in the hall. Waiting to see who is bound to enter, I freeze, waiting.
The nurse pushes the door open with her hip, holding a small swab and a syringe.
She stops halfway into the room when she sees me, eyes widening like prey sensing the wrong kind of predator.
“That isn’t necessary,” I say.
Her breath stutters. “I need to give her this. She’s scheduled for it at—”
“Come here.” Her body obeys before her mind even understands the command.
Her eyes glaze, the will draining from her like water through a cracked pot.
She steps to the side of the bed, inches from me, close enough that I can feel the quickening of her pulse.
“Stay calm. Don’t alert anyone. You won’t be giving her anything. ”
I allow her to turn around before changing my mind, “On second thought. On your way home, wrap your car around a tree. Like this one should’ve, had she done her job properly. Consider it your contribution to correcting a failure.”
The nurse doesn’t blink. “Anything you say, Empusa.” She keeps the tray, turns, and walks out with steady, unscarred, obedient steps.
Silence returns. I turn my attention back to Elowen, glancing around the room, debating my next move.
When I turn back around, I reach out and touch her cheek with one long nail, dragging it slowly along the soft skin.
A tiny line of red rises in its wake. Her face twitches under the cannula in her nose, the smallest subconscious reaction, nothing more. Pathetic thing.
My phone vibrates in my pocket. The sound veers too close to the heart monitor’s rhythm, clashing unpleasantly.
I snatch it up and glance at the screen.
Of course, I forgot. I have a disaster to tend to.
I cast one final look at Elowen before slipping out of the room.
The scent of her blood trails after me, faint, but stubborn, and it follows me all the way to the door as I disappear down the hall.
It won’t be long until I’ll be able to parade around in my true form, but before that, I’ll need to remind Beau that I’m the reason he’s even still here in the first place.