Writing and Reading

It’s been a long time…. Some of the bruises have healed. Some have not. But it’s all good. I’m ready for another fight. You know the rules. You’ve played the game. You’ve seen the blood stains on the floor. You’ve tasted it. You’ve felt it. You’ve loved it.

We continue on with another scene from my book, THE CAIN LETTERS. Let’s roll, people.

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   They stormed off toward them. Every single one of them. Like a plague, they looked to ravage anything in sight. At that moment, Alexandra knew she and Kyan stood in their line of sight. The thrells would tear them apart into shreds of wispy flesh and skin seared by the heat of their claws and fangs and the burning dust of Egypt. The thrells longed for nothing more than that. Nothing more than to kill, to feast.
   Several dozen leaped into the air, their claws stretched open—
   They sailed long, the look in their eyes so maddening and heinous.
   Others continued the stampede, bending further down, their speed intensifying.
   Kyan set his eyes on the thrells on ground. Alexandra kept her eyes on those sailing in the air like poisonous arrows toward her.
   In less than a breath, Kyan and Alexandra pulled out firearms from underneath their coats—
   Kyan pulled out carbines and blazed away at the storming thrells, the gunfire rattling hard and loud, endless, merciless. Threll after threll vaporized into ashes scattering in the wind, blackening the air, the smoke from his carbines saturating it even more. He stepped aside a little, still locked on tight to his targets—
   Alexandra had pulled out semiautomatics, blistering the raining thrells with her hellfire, each one exploding in a haze of ashes, like onyx fireworks in the Egypt sky—
   Their howls of death echoed in the air, beneath her skin, bleeding in her ears, fading into the ground where their ashes drifted down, cindered skeletal remains catching on fire.
   Kyan shortly ran out of ammunition, dropping his carbines, and then quickly pulled out two more weapons from inside his coat—two single-handed, double-barrel shotguns.
   He re-gripped quickly to grasp the barrels and cock them one-handed—
   He then gripped the handles, grasping the triggers and aimed—
   Fired.
   Two thrells exploded into ashes.
   The thrells came upon him, only inches from swallowing him up in their rot and stench—
   Somehow, though, Kyan seemed to blend into the air in his white coat, dodging them left and right, cocking his shotguns so quick that he matched every heartbeat, every breath. His body aligned itself, somehow, with every move, every blow—as if the guns extended from his body like extra parts, knowing when to fire. Trusting. Every threll came inches away before tasting a round, the searing heat spreading through their frames and blasting them into dust—
   Kyan swerved, knelt down, cocked his guns—
   He fired again and two more went down.
   The thrells ravaged the air, spitting saliva. Kyan remained untouched.
   Alexandra tossed her semiautomatics to the floor and then pulled out two automatic handguns. Her rapid fire flooded the air with ultraviolet rounds, shattering threll after threll. They each vaporized into a bright blaze, yellow ashes raining down on her shoulders.
   The thrells seemed to come from both sides—
   She aimed both guns in opposite directions and strafed the air. Her gunfire spread like a plague. More thrells crashed into a hellish darkness. She walked forward still firing her guns. Not one distraction made her hesitate. Ashes fell like Armageddon around her.
   Kyan ran out of bullets.
   His senses screamed—
   A gang of thrells charged him from both sides. He acted quick, dropping the shotguns and pulling out two magnums from inside his coat. He fell back and aimed toward Heaven as the thrells dove for him—
   He let loose. Just above him, they burned and raged, screaming, dying—
   Kyan closed his eyes. He rolled over and then gained his footing to see a dozen more thrells charging after him, their eyes burning with golden hunger.
   He tossed his guns like daggers, one gun smashing into a threll’s eye and the other denting another threll’s skull—
   Just as they came, claws out, ready to rend his flesh—
   He pulled out from behind his cloak the staff, bladed on both ends.
   He swung it fierce and fast over his head—the sheer speed and power dropped a line of thrells down, beheaded. The others stopped short, howling and hissing. Kyan crouched, holding onto the staff to his side with one arm, other arm out, open palm. His eyes burned with determination. The thrells he cut down had stained his face with slashes of blood. His white coat had been painted in spots already.
   He kept his eyes focused right on the group of thrells moving forward—
   His staff dripped with vampire blood.
   Alexandra dropped her handguns just as ten thrells leaped into the air, their claws and feet open like spiders, as if they saw a fly caught on their web. She would not be the fly—
   From inside her coat, she unsheathed her two serrated blades—
   The ringing sound of her blades fed her fury. The steel glimmered for a second before she cut down each threll, their blood masking her face—
   She kept her mouth closed. The air sang with every stroke. The thrells’ flesh ripped. She clenched her teeth. She decapitated one and then ducked over another, regripping one of her blades and thrusting behind her to meet the threll with a jab into its back. She twisted the blade—
   Its innards poured out.
   She took the other blade and ran it through a charging threll. It thrashed and bit the air, trying to reach her face, to tear her face off—
   She also twisted that blade—
   She pulled the other blade out of the other threll and swung that blade across while she had the threll in front of her pinned—
   She nearly cut the threll in two. It crumbled in a lifeless mass as she pulled out her blade.
   She glanced quick at Kyan to see the bloodstained white blur swing his staff with incomprehensible fury, cutting down countless thrells one after another—
   She caught her breath as she heard a fierce growl—
   Synapses fired. Adrenaline rushed—
   It warned her.
   Breed ferociously swung at her repeatedly, diving for her.
   She threw herself back, crossing her blades in front to protect herself. Breed flew over her and fell over, rolling out.
   Alexandra exhaled. She closed her eyes.
   She flipped over in time, landing on her feet, swinging around, swinging her stained swords around, the blood flying—
   Breed charged at her, howling harder than several thrells combined. Breed’s eyes glowed like supernovas. Its neck burst with veins and sinewy tendons—
   Alexandra smiled. She now had her chance to bring her message to Breed—
   The message of Death.