Page 78 of Sinful Crimes for the Artistically Inclined
Percy paid no heed to either of them. With one hand, he shoved a fresh cigarette in his mouth and lit it. With the other, he moved the blade back and forth, back and forth, concentrating on the cruel incision. “That’s a lot of blood, don’t you think?”
Joe came to his side. “Yeah. It’s a lot.” He meant only to appease and calm Percy, but then it did strike him as odd. The blood gushed out wherever Percy cut, and Joe, in a short time, was struck with a grotesque notion. “What happens if we take off a finger?”
Percy pulled the cigarette out of his mouth and offered the bloody butt to Joe.
“No,” said Joe, with an unrestrainable scrunch of his nose.
“Oh,” Percy remembered. He offered the cigarette case toJoe, and Joe took and lit a clean cigarette. “Althea?” Percy called, throwing the case in her general direction.
“You can’t offer her cigarettes!” Joe near-shouted through a cloud of much-needed smoke. “She’s a kid.”
“I’m not a kid!” She picked up the case, about to prove a point, then chucking it back to Percy, declared, “I quit. About the time I was kidnapped.”
“Good girl,” Percy said again. “Now which finger? Althea, do you want to choose?”
Joe tsked at him, but Althea approached nonetheless, placing a tentative hand on Percy’s back as she peeped over his shoulder. “Index.”
“I like it,” said Percy. “Straight to the point.”
Joe stifled a laugh, and Althea grinned, adding, “Plus, the little one’s broken.” Then, as if shaken awake, “Wait, why are we doing this again?”
“It’s probably regenerative,” Joe explained. “If it can keep making blood like that, it might be able to heal itself too.”
Percy formed his lips into a kiss, which he smacked in Joe’s direction. “Watch.”
Althea crouched down beside Percy as he pulled a switchblade from his shirt pocket. He brought the blade down just above the first knuckle on the index finger.
“No, no.” Joe placed his hand over Percy’s and repositioned the knife. “Take more. Give it a better chance.”
“A better chance at what?”
“He’s right,” Althea chimed in. “It needs the joint for extra movement. So it can wiggle back to the hand.”
Percy sent her an approving smile, then sliced through the finger below the second knuckle as directed. It trembled in his hold, the way a complete human might if they were experiencing the agonising pain of an impromptu amputation, and again, that strange wheeze escaped from the wrist. Blood spilled out abundantly, soaking into the sand, but the finger justsat there, twitching in its ever-increasing pool of blood. The hand flexed a few times, and that was all.
“Not what I was expecting,” murmured Joe.
“Nor me.” They studied the appendage a little longer, then, “Maybe it needs a helping hand.” Percy, his cigarette held delicately between his thumb and middle finger, brought the lit end closer and closer to the tip of the severed finger.
Joe passed a swift tongue across his lips. “Is that necessary?”
“It almost killed you.”
“Yeah, but… burning with cigarettes seems like a step too far.”
“Do you think it wouldn’t burn you?”
A whistle and a singe came off the blackened flesh, and in a second, the thing had wormed its way back to the hand, reattaching itself.
Percy took a long drag before exhaling the smoke contemplatively into the night air. “Well, we’re in trouble now. Let’s get going.” He flipped the dagger up with the hand still writhing and offered his other hand to pull Althea up to standing.
She accepted the help, asking, “What trouble exactly? What is that thing?”
Percy turned to Joe for the answer. “It’s not a soul eater, is it?”
Joe shook his head. “And it’s not regular undead. It’s too smart for that.”
“Then what is it?”
