Bloodring

by Faith Hunter

  Surprised, I opened the sight fully and stared at the stockroom. Before, the amethyst had bombarded me with power, as if trying to pound and pummel me with its strength. But now there was a beseeching quality to it, a kind of submission. Offering itself to me as if it had observed my reactions to it and evolved a new approach. Which would make it intelligent. Which was way weird. "No," I said, under my breath. "No way."

  Returning to my work, I tapped hammer to chisel, dislodging a fragment of rock and a shower of dust. The amethyst slid closer. A fine strand like a lock of hair touched the bloodstone. Weirder and weirder. I placed the chisel there and tapped the hammer. The amethyst energy brushed my finger. When I didn't freeze or fight it, the lavender light slid over my hand like a glove, warm and faintly tingly. I tapped again. The light flooded over the soon-to-be cat.

  The bloodstone in the vise suddenly glowed green and red, like sparklers on New Year's. The underlying crystal matrix of the stone pulsed with the ordered pattern of the minerals. I tapped with more certainty, watching the way the cat absorbed the blow, the way the crystal medium spread the jolt throughout.

  Tempering my taps to the strengths and weaknesses of the stone, I began shaping the cat with fast, sure strokes. The face and paws began to emerge from the rock. Time lingered, a languid construct. With the pick, I shaped the toes on one paw, rough work only, but much faster than any I could usually do.

  As I worked, I became aware of a soft voice at the limits of my hearing, a voice chanting, a drum beating, the soft, breathy sound of a flute. Lolo's voice, performing a working, singing in her Cajun patois. "Break dat call of siren's song. Ring dat bell and right dat wrong…"

  It felt odd to have another mage in my mind, so different from the brief time when my gift came upon me, and twelve hundred mage-minds fell into mine. Lolo's mind was soothing, as if the conjure was for me. Lavender light throbbed, and Lolo faded.

  "Cool. Is it a cat?"

  My vision broke. Dressed for kirk, Ciana stood at my side, looking at the cat. My mage-sight was still open. And I saw the mark of Darkness on her neck. I dropped the pick and hammer with a clatter, yanked off my eye protectors and mask, and gripped her shoulders. "Ciana. It licked you?" Her face shuttered closed, her mouth turning down in an annoyed pout. I shook her hard, smearing bloodstone dust onto her dress. "Ciana?"

  "He said you'd be mad." She looked up at me, a taut pout on her lips. "He came to my house this time."

  "Did you let it in?" Ciana's eyes shifted, just a flicker of movement, but I knew. "Did it lick you?"

  "He said I could tell you. I let him in." Her blue eyes lifted, defiant, rebellious. "But there was nothing wrong with it. Really."

  Her skin was pale, with purplish circles beneath her eyes. Her hands looked ethereal, blue veins prominent. A daywalker had licked her. Claiming her. Marking her. "Oh, Ciana. Baby," I breathed.

  "Get dressed," she said, still not meeting my eyes. "We'll be late."

  * * * * *

  While Ciana played with my dolls, I showered quickly and dressed. Maria had dropped Ciana off for me to take to kirk, knowing I seldom missed Sunday services. Maria was human. She could brave the elders' wrath, playing hooky on Sundays. While I seldom went to kirk for weekday meetings, I attended at least one of the Sunday services. To skip would result in attention from the elders.

  Wearing flowing taupe-gray robes suitable to the volatile temperatures and lowering clouds that obscured the tops of the mountain peaks, my leather cloak over my shoulders, two blades strapped to my wrists, and the walking stick in hand, I rushed with Ciana into the cold to kirk, following sleepyheads and latecomers for the eleven o'clock service. We made it inside just as the elder closed the doors.

  Ciana and I squeezed into the last row and sat on the smooth wood. The preaching had already started, Elder Culpepper reading from the New Testament, from the gospel of Mark, the fourth chapter. "And in the same way, the ones sown upon stony ground are those who, when they hear the Word, at once receive and accept and welcome it with joy…."

  I helped Ciana off with her coat, the unheated room almost warm with close-packed bodies. I brushed back her hair and, even with my mage-sight firmly off, I could see where the thing had licked her. I spent the hour of preaching deciding what I could do to protect her.

  * * * * *

  Thadd bumped into me at the doors after the service. Literally. Without speaking, he moved on, shaking hands with the elder, talking about the uncertain weather, a blustery wind blowing. I started to speak when I realized something had been deposited in my pocket. Instantly, I knew what it was and shut my mouth. I fingered the small bag all the way home.

  Ciana had brought a satchel containing enough clothes to last a week, Maria having dropped her off for Rupert and me to baby-sit, while she took off with a new boyfriend. The unhappy woman probably thought she was being a pain, probably enjoyed the thought that she had put us out, sticking us with an onerous job, but Rupert and I were always delighted to have Ciana, and I was especially happy to have her near me now, where I could guard her from the daywalker—blood-demon? the same thing?—that had left a spot of Darkness on her throat.

  During kirk services I had come up with a plan. I intended to create for Ciana a prime amulet, a protection from the thing that stalked her. I hoped there was a conjure for human primes in the final third of the book, but I wasn't betting on it. Yet even without a recipe, I would attempt it. It would be easier to accomplish if I had a drop of her blood, but I could use a few strands of hair with roots, which contained genetic material to work into the mix.

  After Ciana changed clothes, I brushed out her hair and sent her across the small hallway, where she banged on Rupert's door and let herself in. The unmistakable smell of frying meat had attracted her. Ciana thought my being a vegetarian was way cool, but she liked meat and she really liked bacon and eggs.

  Alone for a few moments, I scraped the strands of hair from her brush, wrapped them around my finger, and stored them in an envelope in the armoire with the dolls. Then I fished the bag from my pocket and poured its contents on the kitchen table. Lavender stones glowed up at me, as if warm and contented to be with me. They positively blushed with happiness.

  I was anthropomorphizing a rock. I had to be losing my mind.

  Dry reddish brown residue coated the cracks and vugs of the amethyst. Lucas' blood. I knew that with his blood embedded in the lavender crystal, I could scry for him successfully. I picked up the phone and dialed Rupert. A few minutes later, Audric entered, carrying a sandwich and reeking of pork.

  "She's playing go fish with Rupert and beating the pants off—Spawn balls," he said, coming to a stop and gawking. I grinned up at him, tickled that I had thrown the big man. He forced his features into his habitual, Zen-like equanimity. "It's been a while since I saw one of those used."

  From the center of a partially formed circle of earth salt, I said, "I found a recipe for scrying. I tried it once for Lucas and it didn't work, but I used scripture in it." Audric winced. "Yeah. I figured out scripture was for warfare."

  "And for ultimate truth. You want me to watch your back?" he asked, understanding. I nodded and he closed the door, pulled my rocking chair close, and sat. "When you blow yourself up or set the town on fire, who do I call?"

  "The same person you called last time," I said, a wry tone to my words. He looked confused, and I said, "Lolo called about the prime amulet."

  "Ah." He didn't look remotely uncomfortable at being exposed. In fact he looked self-satisfied and sanctimonious, as only the second-unforeseen can.

  "I have this theory," I said. "I don't think you just stumbled upon Mineral City and Thorn's Gems. I think Lolo sent you here."

  "Interesting hypothesis," he said, voice grave, but lips tilted up. "I've got your six."

  Which meant he wasn't going to talk about it. I blew out an irritated breath and told him what I was going to do. When he lifted a thumb, I dropped the final handful of salt, closing the conjuring circ
le. The fire of creation burned along my nerves and bones, pulling at me, tempting me. But this time I batted the temptation away easily and slipped the amulets over my head, stabilizing the energies I needed for the conjure.

  There hadn't been time for Lolo's ancient warning, pounded into me by countless repetitions while I was in training. I was getting good at this. Maybe too good. Maybe practice made perfect. Or the stones in the storeroom did. I was feeling a little uneasy at the way they had insinuated themselves into my life, but I would worry about that later.

  My heart beat slowly; my blood pumped; breath moved through my lungs. All glamour fell from me. My body pulsated with radiance, a brighter glow to my old scars. I was my usual luminous coral and pearl, but now with a lavender underglow, as if I sat on a pillow of lavender light. That hadn't been there before.

  I opened my eyes, seeing Audric with mage-sight. The sight hadn't worked before. But now, for reasons I didn't want to look at too closely, I could see past the charm of his necklace. He was beautiful, ripe with energies and power. The lightning bolt at his throat glowed softly at me. I figured his father or mother had been a metal mage and the amulet had been crafted at his birth.

  My loft shone with power. Every window, doorway, even the floor surfaces, all were charged with pale energy, glowing with subtle shades, their purposes working together to form the harmony that was my home. All were slightly lavender now.

  The Book of Workings was beside me, opened to the final third, the section dedicated to warfare against Darkness. "Scrying for a Human" stared up at me from the page. I wasn't going up against the Powers; I was just going to look around their domain—trespass, not fight.

  I had procured a small sliver of the amethyst from the stockroom and filled the silver bowl with water. Into the bowl, I dropped stones recovered from the scene where Lucas had been attacked. They clanged softly as they hit bottom, touching tip to tip. A soft resonance of energy gathered as crystalline matrix touched matrix. A faint sheen of red emerged. Lucas' blood.

  Taking up the sliver of clean amethyst, holding it in my left palm, I stared into the water and quoted the words I had worked out while waiting for Audric.

  "Blood and bone, stone and dust, search and find in life and death, Lucas Stanhope, danger dire. Seek and find and show him now."

  It was a simple incantation, as conjuring went, and the lack of scripture made it less powerful, but it felt right. Simple seemed best, what with my pitiful level of training, less likely to attract the notice of the resident Darkness. On the third repetition of the verse, the water in the silver bowl began to darken. It didn't cloud or become opaque, but it was as if all the light began to vanish, as if the sun set fast. I kept up the words and rhythm of the incantation, the syllables soft and cadenced.

  The water began to shimmer, dark on dark. A human took shape in the unlit space, a man, lying on a thin mattress that rested on smooth limestone, in rock caverns deep in the earth. Lucas … There were bars over his cell door; they sparkled with Dark energy. They would be cold, I knew. The burning cold of death.

  A reddish mist churned over him. I smelled sulfur. An ache started in my old scars, my flesh remembering. Beneath that smell was a hint of gangrene and old blood. Lucas' chest rose and fell; he was alive, though wasted, thin, and limp with fatigue. He was sleeping, heavily bearded, unwashed, and scruffy. He was the only man I had ever known who could spend a week being bled and still be beautiful. No wonder they hadn't killed him yet. And that brought other possibilities to mind, ways they could be using him other than for food. Feathers and fire . . .

  To his side sat a container, a handle sticking out of it, and a plate. My attention was drawn to the plate and the crumbs left there. They appeared roseate, glowing in the dark, passed over by the cloud that enwrapped Lucas, but remaining untouched. I tightened my focus on them as the red mist parted. Bread crumbs, glowing blue, the hue of periwinkle, the tint of the sky just as the sun set, as the first star appeared. The blue of purity and heaven.

  "Who are you?" a voice called, reaching. "Is there a mage here? Mage?"

  Something moved in the dark beyond the cell. Realizing I was about to be discovered, I eased back from Lucas, finished the incantation, and placed my hand holding the amethyst from the storeroom into the water. It cleared and brightened, my vision of Lucas dissipating. I reached over and opened the charmed circle, the energies flowing back into me.

  "Thorn!" Tone of warning. Audric wasn't in his chair. I followed his voice to the doorway. In its arch were Audric and Thaddeus Bartholomew. Adrenaline surged through me. Fight or flight.

  The men stood chest to chest, Thadd with a pair of handcuffs in one hand, the other on his gun at his hip. Audric barred his way. They glowed, supernat bright. "Papers," Thadd said, all cop.

  I could fight. I could kill him and run. Instead, a strange calm engulfed me, soothing away the adrenaline rush, taking with it the spear of terror. It was like sitting in a warm bath, like resting in a hammock under a summer sun. How odd. "I'm unregistered," I said, tranquil and serene. "You can arrest me. I won't resist. But if you turn me in to Durbarge, you'll have to turn yourself in too." That brought him up short. "If you doubt me, take off your ring."

  Audric shot a look at me, his eyes shifting from Thadd to me and back. They both glanced down at the ring on the cop's hand. Audric's battle-ready stance changed instantly. The half-breed stepped back fast, paused, and bowed from the waist, one of the most formal gestures of his kind.

  Thadd froze, the cuffs dangling, lifting to me, sitting in a salt ring, the implements of a conjure all around me, the Book of Workings lying open. His gaze settled on the man who bowed before him. "What…?" The question trailed away.

  "Take off the turquoise ring with the angel-wing setting," I said. "Watch what happens."

  His face went crimson, blood flowing up from his neck to his crown. A long moment passed as he darted frenzied eyes from his hand to me. "I can't." The words broke from his mouth all by themselves, and his eyes snapped open, then slit into anger. "What have you done to me, mage?"

  Stupid humans. Anything goes wrong, they jump to place blame on the first neomage they spot. The mage did it, whatever it was. "I didn't do anything to you. The ring is an amulet. I recognized it yesterday when I touched it on horseback and immediately went to sleep. I think it's a seraph ring."

  "Not possible."

  "So take it off."

  Thadd, still frozen, slowly lowered his head, the motion jerky, as if his muscles fought him. He was dressed in a standard Hand of the Law suit, dark gray and single breasted, white shirt, knotted tie, and a wool overcoat, shiny leather shoes. Slowly, he brought up his hand, extended his fingers, and stared at his ring in horror. The ring seemed bigger, more imposing. It glowed richly to my amethyst-enhanced mage-sight. "I … can't."

  "Why not?" I asked, my tone mild.

  "I've never taken it off." That was a stupid reason, and even he seemed to know that. Behind him, Audric closed the door to the hallway, locked it, and took Thadd's handcuffs, hanging them over one arm of the coat rack, where they swung.

  "You've worn that ring for as long as you can remember? Even when you were a child?" Audric asked, watching his face. Something like compassion crossed his features when he asked, "How many times have you had it sized?"

  His throat working, voice a whisper, Thadd swore foully. It was clear he'd never had the ring sized. He'd worn it all his life and it had grown along with him. And he'd never once thought that peculiar. "I've been spelled by a magic ring."

  Audric and I snorted, and I stood up from the circle. I swept up the salt and dumped it in the waiting bag. Moving with economy, I replaced all the other implements and pulled the kitchen table over the circle site before I plopped down on the couch and curled my legs under me. The couch wasn't an idle choice. The walking stick was in a large basket beside it.

  "What have they done to me?" Thadd asked.

  "Take off the ring," I said again.

 
; Movements jerky, as if in reaction to electrical shocks or to pain, Thadd took the ring in his fingers and pulled. It resisted for an instant before sliding smoothly off his hand. The skin beneath it was white and slightly wrinkled. He looked at the hand as if he'd never seen it, then at the ring, which he turned over and over, studying the angel wings on the setting. His face relaxed, settling into lines of perplexity. He opened his mouth to speak.

  His body jerked, a vicious jolt, as though he had been hit with a cattle prod or a Taser. Thadd's eyes and mouth opened wide. With a silent scream, he tore off his suit coat and flung it across the room. I reached for the walking stick beside the couch, but my hand stopped halfway as Thadd wrenched off his holster and threw it, the gun banging hard and spinning. He ripped at his shirt, panting. Frantic. A soft, high-pitched moan came from his lips. "Help."

  I stood, but Audric was closer. He seized the shirt in two fists. With a powerful tug, he shredded the shirt, sending buttons flying, seams giving way at the shoulders and arms. The cloth fell to the sides, still held in place with his tie. Thadd pulled it free, dropping shirt and tie to the floor together. With one hand he reached over his shoulder and scratched a weal. I smelled blood. And flesh. And kylen. Mage-heat swept over me.

  Chapter 17

  I slithered across the floor, panther grace in my limbs. Kylen. His scent flooded me, sweeping into my nostrils, my lungs, converging on the beat of my heart, swimming out through my vessels, weakening my muscles, warming my flesh. His voice a strangled sound, Thadd clawed at his back, his arms up and bent backward, his chest broad, ribs and abs pulling, stomach flat and taut. Scents flooded me, arching my back.

  He pivoted and I saw what he was clawing. From the tips of his shoulders, at the top of his humeri, and angled down his back were two wide slashes of swollen, inflamed tissue. Something was trying to emerge from his body.

  Wings.

  I raced across the room to his jacket and shook it hard. The ring dropped to the rug. It was huge, maybe a size twelve, maybe bigger, I'd never seen one so large. When I picked it up, a tingle slithered up my arm, inviting me to put it on.