As all I have left to do is wait. This nurse, I’m not ashamed to admit, is kind of my type. He has a handsome, compassionate look about him, a well trimmed beard, and I’ve always had a thing about scrubs. The fact that he’s loaded me with morphine is also an attractive quality, and in my current state, I’m feeling no pain. The guy looks over at me from his chair. I feel a tingle of excitement move down from my belly. This is a ridiculous place to be thinking this kind of crap.

“You’re starting to soak through,” says the nurse.

“Oh yeah? That can’t be good.” I say in an embarrassingly coy tone.

He laughs and shakes his head.

“I’m thinking I need to change your bandages. Let me take a closer look.”

He moves in close, the crisp white uniform brushing against my hand, the bell of his stethoscope lightly bouncing off my chest. My heart rate spikes and schoolboy dreams cause a significant volume of blood to thunder south.

“Would you look at that.”

“What is it?” I ask, hoping he isn’t staring at the tent forming around the thighs of my minimal hospital pants.

He bends in closer to check my shoulder, and his beard caresses my cheek. I hold my breath as more blood exits stage south—the pants taking on circus tent proportions.

“What is it?” I try again.

“That’s a pretty big bandage for boxcutter wound,” he mumbles inches from my face, an earthy scent kissing my nose. I’m trying to place what it is. Sandalwood? Cedar? Whatever it is, I’m allured.

“Yeah, it went in deep, I guess.”

“And the awl must’ve come close to killing you. A good thing it was old and blunt.”

Hang on. What the fuck is all this about? The Barnum and Bailey main tent deflates and blood resumes its usual circuit. I cock my head and meet this nurse’s eyes. He smirks. Something’s wrong. Didn’t they say ‘she’ was with another patient when I asked for my nurse? I spin to try and get out of the bed, but the drugs make the entire room swirl like someone pulled the plug out of a drain in the bottom. I’m steadied by the nurse’s hand as he yanks me back to the center of the bed, pinning me. Then another hand grips my waist, holding me still. I try to fight, but the morphine has got me. And this man is so strong. His hands are rough, his scent surges into my nostrils, and I find myself staring into changing eyes.

I watch in horror as the blood vessels of his eyes dilate, then burst, flooding the whites with a murderous deep red. His mouth yawns open, his jaw popping down from the rest of his skull like he’s ready to swallow my head. His teeth extend to needle-like points. I’m trying to scream, but his crushing weight and the seductive morphine means I’m barely able to breathe.

“What do you want?” I gurgle.

“That very much depends on you.”

The creature releases the pressure a notch, and I heave in air. I’m squirming against this shitty bed, wriggling to escape the grip of this demon. Its old human form is now writhing into crooks and roots, which twist around my body, binding me to the bed.

“You know not what you’re up against,” it hisses. “You released the Trinity onto the earthly plane. You must undo the damage. You must return to your lineage. To the forests of your birth.”

“What would I go there for?”

The creature leans in, its breath hot against my face.

“For your life.”

“What if I don’t?”

It smiles, the needle teeth glimmering in the fluorescent hospital light.

“Then I need not travel far for a meal, it seems.” It clinks its teeth together and runs a deep green tongue along the tips. I think to scream, to draw attention, but this thing seems a step ahead. A rough branch-like limb crawls up over my cheek and clamps my jaw closed.

“Do you accept your task?”

All I can do is nod my head. The demon smiles and loosens its grip.

“Then you’ll be needing this,” it says, reaching a tendril up into its mouth, wrapping it around one of its teeth. It jerks hard, and the cracking  echoes through the room. The beast unfurls its fist, revealing an awl dripping with a viscous black ooze.

I reach for the awl but it lifts the tool out of my reach and growls with menacing delight.

“You can’t take this. I must give it to you,” it says.

“Then give it to me already,” I wheeze.

The needle smile moves across its wooden face. The blood-red eyes gleam and shine.

It moves in close, and this time I smell not sandalwood, but the rotting detritus of an ancient forest floor.

“Spare the heart, spoil the child,” the demon sings as it plunges the awl through the center of my chest.

Next Chapter: Ten