MayanCraving

Mayan Craving

A.S. Fenichel

Surviving the End of Days was only
the beginning of the journey for Nancy. After years of searching, she’s finally
found her missing sister, but when she attempts to rescue Robyn, she enters her
worst nightmare. Captured by demons and about to be sacrificed, she’s rescued
by Asher, whose kindness and bravery arouse her lust, and leave her wanting
much more than friendship.

Asher has been in love with Nancy
since he first laid eyes on her, but her infatuation with another man left him
unnoticed. Her sudden craving for him couldn’t turn him on more. Together they
find rapture, but the attraction can only be fleeting.

While danger and passion pull them
together, doubt may rip them apart. Asher and Nancy will need more than a
carnal connection if they hope to survive.

Mayan Craving

A.S. Fenichel

Chapter One

“Damn her,” Asher Dove muttered over the droning Cessna’s
engines.

“What was she thinking, going out here all alone?” He’d
asked himself the same question over and over since setting out to find Nancy.

The closer to the Yucatan peninsula Asher flew, the more the
sky blossomed with familiar dark-red clouds, just as it had five years earlier
after the End of Days. The sky had clouded over, leaving most of the Earth in
shadow. Some said that the heavens had burned. Once the Lord of the Dead,
Mictlantecuhtli, or Mictlan, as they called him, was defeated, those red,
ominous clouds had parted and slowly disappeared, allowing the land to live
again.

Mictlan had nearly conquered the Earth. If he had succeeded,
everyone who Asher loved would be a servant to Mictlan. However, humans had
banded together to defeat the Lord of the Dead all those years ago.
Unfortunately, it looked as if they had not done enough.

He prayed that Nancy hadn’t been picked up by any demon
patrols. Asher focused his attention on the single-lane highway below,
searching for any sign of her. The roads she’d have to have taken stretched
over eight hundred miles, a lot of ground to cover. A glint of metal caught his
attention and he circled back for another look. He spotted a Jeep parked on the
road about twenty miles west of Acayucan. His heart leaped. Nancy.

From the air it looked intact, but he could see no sign of
the young woman driver. Before he could land and investigate further, something
else caught his eye. Coming toward him from the south, a massive beast loomed
dark against the red clouds.

“Shit,” Asher swore. “Dragon.”

An attempt to veer off to the right failed as the dragon
moved too fast and slammed into the front of the plane. The impact rammed Asher
back against his seat, but by some miracle, he managed to keep his hands on the
yoke. The Cessna bucked against the added weight and plummeted toward the
Earth.

“Not good.” Pulling back to keep the plane’s front end up,
his heart leaped into his throat as the desert grew larger in the window.

The dragon’s blood-red eyes stared back at him while the
black, snakelike body clung to the nose of the plane. Twenty feet of leathery
wings beat against the wind shear, creating a tug of war between Asher and the
yoke. Even over the wind and engine noise, those tremendous wings battered the
air like thunder. Asher ignored the cacophony of noise pummeling his eardrums
and the strain on his muscles.

As the land grew closer, Asher pulled back, hoping to glide
in rather than collide with the ground. His shoulders and arms screamed with
pain as the dragon’s weight made controlling the descent nearly impossible.

“You are going to die now, little pilot. Join me and I
will spare your life.”

He knew that voice. The Lord of the Dead was the only one
who ever called him that. Somehow Mictlan spoke through the animal clinging to
Asher’s airplane. Any fear he felt became overshadowed by rage. He agreed with
only one thing the voice had said. He
was
about to die. The Cessna would
crash to the ground and explode because he couldn’t get the nose up.

“Join me. I will make you a prince,”
the voice
taunted.

Asher and his friends had defeated Mictlan in Teotihuacan
after the End of Days, but now it was obvious they had only delayed the Devil’s
plans.

He spoke out loud, though he knew Mictlan could hear his
thoughts. “Tempting, but being a prince with pieces of my flesh rotting off and
smelling like I died several months ago doesn’t sound like much of a prize to
me.”

Asher braced himself for impact. The idea of dying didn’t
trouble him, but his heart filled with regret because he would never know what
happened to Nancy. He pulled harder on the yoke in a vain attempt to live long
enough to find her.

It was useless. The added weight on the front of the craft
made gliding in impossible. The dragon’s gaze darted toward the ground. The
terror Asher saw in the dragon’s eyes made him smile. It recognized the
ground’s fast approach. To Asher’s surprise, the beast pushed away from the
plane in an attempt to save itself. The absence of the dragon’s weight on the
nose allowed Asher to pull up just enough so that the wheels hit first. The
impact snapped them like twigs and the belly of the Cessna skidded across the
ground violently.

Asher took a moment to assess his situation.
Not dead
.
Inside the cockpit, alarms screamed from the cracked instruments. Smoke filled
the plane. Asher’s heart raced with a mixture of terror and joy. He choked and
pulled at the harness holding him against the pilot’s seat.
I can still find
her.
As soon as the forward motion ceased, he jumped up. He had no more
time for gratitude or amazement over being alive. The first flicker of flame
began in the electrical instruments and spread to the wires that had dislodged
and were hanging everywhere. Heat quickly filled the small airplane.

“Dammit.” Asher thought of how many times the Cessna had
saved their lives. He grabbed an automatic weapon that had fallen from its
place behind the rear seat and slung his duffle over his shoulder. The crossbow
he always kept hooked to the pack hit him square in the back. Jumping to the
ground stung his cramped leg muscles, but he ran as far from the wreck as he
could before flames engulfed the craft.

Turning back, he searched the sky for the dragon. His heart
pounded from both fear and exhilaration. No giant beast marred the blue sky.

The impact of the first explosion knocked Asher off his
feet. He covered his head while shrapnel rained down, and two more blasts
followed, filling the air with black smoke. The dragon’s cry pierced the air.
In spite of the ear-splitting pain caused by its banshee-cry, Asher turned
toward the noise. He lifted his gun in the direction of the Cessna and watched
as the dragon rose up from behind the smoke like a phoenix.

The dragon struggled to fly and Asher could see its torn
left wing. Still, it climbed higher. Asher fired, expecting the dragon to come
for him. The thing turned to the southeast and moved away, much to his
surprise.

Asher collapsed on the dry earth, the hot metal of his AK-47
still clutched in his hand. The adrenaline that had helped him flee the burning
plane and run from the explosions fled as quickly as it had come. He felt that
energy rush away. Exhaustion enveloped him like a blanket and even lifting his
duffle and rifle might not have been possible. He watched the Cessna burn for a
few minutes.

A change in the wind caused the smoke to burn his eyes. They
watered to the point where he could no longer see his precious Cessna. His
lungs stung in protest of the black smoke and his hacking cough forced him from
the area.

“Damn.” He looked one last time at the little Cessna he
loved so much.
That plane once saved the world.
He’d met Ian Scott and
Aileen Grant in western New York and the Cessna had gotten them to Mexico in
one piece. In spite of attacking crows, dragons and Mictlan himself, the little
plane had held up and made it all the way.

He wanted to rest. Needed to. He could already feel bruises
and bumps forming all over his body. He thought of Nancy and what trouble she
might have gotten herself into.
Rest will have to wait.
He walked toward
the road, where Nancy’s car had been abandoned.

The Jeep hadn’t crashed or met with any demon, as far as he
could tell. He turned the key and the engine came to life for a second, then
died again. “Out of gas.” The extra gas cans she’d taken along were also empty.
He shook his head.

Faint footprints in the sandy dirt headed south. He hiked up
his duffle and followed.

The trail disappeared a mile further down the road, but he
continued on what had once been the two-lane highway toward San Lorenzo. The
passage of time, plus the lack of repair, had left the roadway cracked and
broken. Flash floods had washed out part of the pavement and he had to climb
down into a hole that could easily swallow a full-grown human. He began to
worry about the things that Nancy might have encountered. Could she have broken
a leg in one of the washouts? Or been dragged away by the giant wolves that had
emerged in the world after the End of Days?

“Why couldn’t she just wait?” he muttered. He would have
helped her find her sister. As soon as Nancy heard testimony that Robyn might
be alive, she’d left the safety of the settlement by herself to mount a rescue.
Nancy would stop at nothing to get to Robyn. He cursed himself for having been
gone so long trying to find fuel, but she should have waited for him. She never
should have tried this on her own.

He watched for signs of blood or struggle as he walked, but
found only empty road and a few prints that were not human.

The smell of rotting flesh filled the air as he neared the
town. The humans and animals who followed The Lord of the Dead were not meant
to live on Earth, so their bodies festered. Asher gagged from the stench and
pulled his shirt over his nose and mouth while pressing forward.

Asher’s air patrols to look for survivors and locate
supplies had never turned up a town that reeked so unbearably. He moved off the
road and waited for dark. The village’s small size would make it difficult to
safely sneak out any prisoners, but the rabble who populated these places
didn’t care much for community beautification. Abandoned cars and piles of garbage
lined the streets of demon settlements. Conveniently, the mounds of trash would
create cover on the way in. The escape might be more difficult.

A large outcropping of rocks gave him a relatively safe
place to wait for nightfall and allowed him to doze in the late afternoon sun.
He pressed his canteen to his lips, but permitted himself only a small sip. “I
hope this dump has water,” he said. More importantly, he prayed he’d find Nancy
alive and well.

The cool night air revived him and he started across the
desert toward the village. Staying off the road, he ran from rock to shrub,
hiding and watching as he went. As expected, he found the town strewn with
debris. A semi overturned in the middle of the square had burned long ago.
Cars, tables, chairs and beds were all thrown in a pile near what looked to be
a government building of some kind. A sculpture of a head stood taller than a
man in the entryway.

The town appeared empty, but strange noises emanated from
one building. Asher couldn’t identify what the sound could be. It sounded a bit
like monks chanting. He took the long way around so that he could cross the
square closer to the piles of debris. The sign at the building’s entrance read
The Olmec Museum.

The noise grew louder, and though he could not understand
the words, he realized it wasn’t monks, but a group of demons. Their garbled
voices rose to a fevered pitch and the chanting gained speed as their
excitement seemed to be building. Under the growing hum, Asher also heard a
woman’s screaming rants. The combined noises created such disharmony, he
couldn’t decipher any of the words.

No demons guarded the museum and Asher wondered if they were
all inside. Could they be that confident in their invulnerability? Built using
modern technology, the museum looked like an old adobe, but with larger windows
that no longer held glass. White fabric hung across the gaping holes and the
light breeze caused them to flutter.

Asher rounded the building and pushed the fabric aside to
peer through the window. Another Olmec head stood in the middle of the room.
Twenty demons of various sizes and states of decay knelt around the head. They
appeared to be in a trance, all swaying and chanting. Fires burned in large
cauldrons at the four corners of the gathering and smoke filled the air. He
could make out the hand of a human strapped to the face, and he moved to the
next window to get a better look.

His heart jumped to his throat.

Nancy’s wrists and ankles were tied spread-eagle to the face
of the sculpture by heavy ropes. Dried blood coated the side of her head and
face. Her matted hair stuck out wildly. Struggling against her bonds, she
screamed and cursed at her captors.

Asher had to restrain his urge to rush the room, screaming
and shooting those malignant abominations who were hurting Nancy. He clenched
his jaw in his effort to tamp down his anger and slowly climbed through the
window, careful not to be noticed.

The demons’ focus remained on Nancy and the large demon in
front of her. Less decayed than the others, the central demon’s black skin was
smooth and muscles bulged on his bare chest and arms.

Asher knew he’d get only one shot at this. Hiding behind a
totem, he fished out a small stick of dynamite from his pack. He set his AK-47
on the ground next to him, then strapped the explosive to one of his arrows and
nocked it into his crossbow. The bow clicking into place sounded like a gunshot
while he was attempting silence. He looked around to make sure no one had
heard. Luckily the demons were focused on the sacrifice.

Asher took a deep breath, aimed for the burning pot on the
far side of the head and fired.

The pot exploded, and he let his breath out. Several demons
blew up in the blast, spewing body parts in every direction. Asher trained his
gun on the large demon standing only inches from Nancy. Consciously telling his
heart to slow its rapid thumping, he pulled the trigger just as mayhem broke
out. Asher’s bullet hit the leader in the chest and he followed with a shot to
the head. The demon crumpled to the floor. If it had been anyone else strapped
to that statue, Asher could have stuffed his emotions deep in his gut and let
his instincts push him into automatic pilot. Nancy’s precarious position
changed the game. He had to still his shaking hands every time he lifted his
weapon and his pulse beat so fast it created an ache in his chest.