House of Blood and Bone

by Kimberley J. Ward

  “Bah, don’t be insulted. Simple ignorance can be easily remedied.”

  Eyebrows rising, Nessa muttered. “Great. I’m naive and ignorant. Anything else you’d like to add?”

  “Easily offended?”

  Nessa frowned, trying hard not to be, well, offended.

  “As I was saying,” Pharawynn continued. “The ignorance within our community, I’m forced to say, largely comes from your kind, the users of internal magic.”

  “Is that so?”

  “If you ask me, yes, that is so. They assume that just because they’re an internal magic user, then that’s all they can use.”

  “But that’s not so?”

  “You are an Old Blood,” Pharawynn said with wonderment. “You belong to a group of beings that have lived on these lands long before mortals reached these shores. You belong to a species that’s tied to everything in this world. Surely then, that would mean you also have access to the Atheals? Give it a bit of thought. If someone who relies on external powers can call upon the spirits, upon the Atheals, then why can’t someone who has internal magic, a magic that’s thought of as far more formidable, do the same?”

  Nessa swallowed nervously. “Are you saying that Old Bloods, users of internal magic, can also practice external magic?”

  Pharawynn grinned. “Want to learn about the arcane arts, my dear girl?”

  PART III

  Chapter 33

  The day had begun like any other of that week, with Orm and Hunter going down to the docks to help shift concealed contraband. They felt like they were sticking a big, fat middle finger up at the establishment by doing such things. Nessa felt like they were playing with fire and that they wanted to get burned. They liked the taste of danger, dabbling in a trade that could easily end with their necks in a noose. There was no fun to be had with clean, honest work, it seemed, and work it was. They weren’t paid much, but the need for them to gamble and cheat to fund their stay in Ellor was gone. Not to say that they had stopped. No, they still found an excuse to go out for a game or two, either for a friendly match between mates or to listen to the latest round of gossip. Most often, it was a mixture thereof. Nessa had discovered that dockworkers gossiped worse than old women.

  Hunter and Orm had been working with Heimaey and his, as Nessa liked to think of them, minions, Bo and Luca. The five of them got on like peas in a pod, mischievous and often up to no good even when they were on their best behaviour. Together, they would coordinate the unloading and reloading of ships that came from and went to Vasindor, the next largest port town on the shores of Lake Nyma, and ready the latest arrivals of contraband for redistribution. Some of it stayed in Ellor whilst a large portion made its way north.

  It appeared that Jerome and his mysterious partners, not to mention his nameless and faceless employer, operated on a kingdom-wide scale. They had contacts in almost every major city and town, ranging from lords and ladies, right down to the criminal underbelly of society, thieves and beggars. They had eyes and ears everywhere. Nessa saw the sense in employing from all walks of life. After all, who better to listen to the latest behind-the-scenes goings-on than the unassuming beggar who was sat beneath an open window? Who would know more about the latest court intrigues than a noble hoping to gain a foothold in the dark and seductive world of espionage and sedition?

  Nessa had joined Hunter and Orm for a while that day, seeing the inner workings of the smugglers’ operation and then swiftly distancing herself, allowing them to have their daytime activities while she had hers…

  She had been spending every available minute with Pharawynn, learning about the Atheals, spellcasting and summoning. Orm and Hunter didn’t know about this. She knew that they would disapprove. So, each morning, Nessa would wait until they had left for the docks and then slip out of the guest house with a gaggle of other guests, careful to make sure that neither Jerome nor anyone who worked for him noticed her escape. With her sly breakout completed and a cover story cleverly concocted should her absence be discovered, Nessa would make her way to Pharawynn’s for the day.

  It was easy for Nessa to keep Hunter and Orm in the dark about her daily exploits. She was always careful to return to the guest house before them. With Aoife, though, it was a little harder, although by no small means impossible. Whilst a part of Nessa liked to think that she had grown more skilled at controlling what she did or didn’t share through their bond, she couldn’t help but feel that luck played a significant role. Or was it fate? Whichever one it might be, Nessa was so profoundly grateful that Aoife was experiencing a sudden growth spurt. All Aoife had been doing for the past week was sleeping or hunting, the latter of which, apparently, needed full concentration and the former requiring, under no uncertain terms, no interruptions of any kind. When they did reach out to one another, it was during the quiet hours of early dawn and late evening, when all was still and calm around them. Nessa could easily keep the conversation away from any incriminating line of enquiry.

  To start with, Nessa had felt the weight of her covert liaisons with Pharawynn bearing down on her shoulders, an oppressive burden of guilt and dishonesty. It had quickly faded, though, as the secrets of the arcane arts started to be revealed to her. Pharawynn had shown Nessa a glimpse into a world beyond her imagining. Before Nessa knew it, it was swallowing her whole.

  A few days into her tutelage, Nessa was allowed to summon a spirit for the very first time, calling upon it to carry out her will, to infuse a drop of magic into a dainty gemstone ring. Afterwards, Nessa had brimmed with pride, happy beyond belief. She had done it. She had used magic! On her way back to the guest house, the light around her rapidly giving way to night, Nessa had done little else but twiddle the ring around her finger, admiring the twinkle of the gem in the street lamps, marvelling at the gleam of magic that shone from within, the magic that she had put in it.

  Aoife had contacted her, sleepy and mildly irritated by having to relay Orm’s message, and informed her that he and the others were on their way to the den. They were in need of a drink after a long day of “tactical work”. Instead of wondering what that could mean, Nessa decided to join them, such was her good mood. So, she met up with the gang a short distance from the den, their paths fortuitously crossing.

  Together, they had made their way along the riverside, a merry group filled with chatter and laugher. Nessa spent most of their journey talking to Heimaey, getting to know him. His humour and narrative skills, regaling her with tales of the gang’s antics over the last week, were highly entertaining. Nessa saw why Hunter got along with him, Bo and Luca so well: they were spiritual clones.

  As they turned down an unfamiliar street, heading away from the river, Hunter, with much glee, informed Nessa that they were now permitted to use the front door to the den. They had proven themselves over the last week, and that was their reward. Nessa wondered why she was allowed to go with them, considering she had done nothing to aid the organisation in any way.

  Her wonderings fell on deaf ears as her companions, her friends, came to a stop. Have we reached it already? Why are they so quiet? She peered at them, her eyes going from face to face. A shiver of warning crawled up Nessa’s spine as she saw the blood drain from their cheeks, as their merry smiles faded away.

  With trepidation, Nessa followed their fearful stares.

  A stone’s throw away was a small T-junction, a street from the left intersecting with the one they were on. On each corner stood a lamppost, tall and ornate, the ethereal mushrooms encased behind glass panes, throwing out rings of ghostly light in the gloom of night.

  Light which caught in the fine tendrils of mist that crept along the ground.

  Nessa bit her lip. Those eerie tendrils of mist reached across the cobbled street like spectral vines, searching and seeking.

  There was a muttered curse when a hand wrapped around Nessa’s wrist, tugging her up against a side. Nessa looked, finding that it was Hunter who held her to him, with one arm wrapped tightly, protectively, aroun
d her shoulders.

  “This is how it happened before,” he whispered. “With the ship.”

  Nessa had needed no explanation. She knew what the mist concealed, for the same night that Hunter had witnessed a ship being swallowed, she too had found herself engulfed by its shadowed depths. Just like that night, a strange charge grew around them. It was like the air was coming alive.

  Hunter’s grip tightened and he tensed. Nessa held her breath. They weren’t alone. Her blood sang with the need to run, to flee.

  “I don’t know about you lot,” one of the twins muttered. “But I’m getting a bad feeling about this.”

  “Not just you,” the other twin breathed. “I’m having the exact same feeling.”

  “Glad to hear it. Not.”

  The unearthly mist flowed further into the street, growing denser and higher, rolling forwards in a churning wave. Tendrils snaked out, wrapping around the lamps, pulling the body of mist up, up and over the lanterns, engulfing them, smothering them. The light dimmed.

  Nessa shifted uneasily, a movement that was mirrored by the others.

  “I don’t think we should linger,” she murmured, the words hard to say, fear making them stick in her throat.

  Hunter nodded; his gaze fixed upon the swelling wall of what was now mist as it rolled into the junction. “I like your line of thought.”

  Heimaey swivelled on his heel, and one of the twins had followed suit. They both stopped dead.

  “Ah, guys,” Heimaey said with a curse, “leaving might be a bit harder than first thought.”

  Nessa looked over her shoulder. Her heart skipped a beat.

  The street behind them was blocked. Another wall of mist stood there, solid and foreboding. The mist had surrounded them on both sides, spilling from unsuspecting alleys, trapping them. It rolled towards them like waves whipped up in a storm, violent and angry, ready and willing to destroy everything in its path. Right then, standing in its path, were Nessa and her companions.

  It was coming for them.

  There was something about the mist that was different to what Nessa had walked through before. She could sense a hunger about it, a feral need that was a driving force behind it. Darkness, one that Nessa had experienced when the world around her had been falling to ruin by dragon fire, lurked within.

  The mist swirled around them, circling them, a shifting cyclone of chaos. Nessa stood in the eye of a hurricane. It swallowed the walls of the elegant townhouses, engulfing the uniform gardens that sat in front of them. It drowned the light which seeped through the gaps between closed shutters, and it devoured the moon and stars.

  The street was plunged into darkness.

  Hunter’s hand tightened painfully around Nessa’s wrist, and she pressed herself closer against his side, wrapping an arm around his waist, hiding as much as she could.

  There was no echo of footsteps, the sensation of being watched. Things had changed this time.

  With a chorus of muttered swearwords and the whisper of daggers leaving sheaths, the guys in the group crowded together. Nessa somehow found herself pushed into the centre of their circle, their backs boxing her in. Nessa decided that this was probably the best place to be, and the safest. There was nothing better than an armed ring of protection around you when under attack by forces unseen.

  Orm clapped his hands, the sound sharp and more than a little unexpected. Green sparks flew from his fingertips, whizzing around wildly before settling on the ground. They hissed and flared, spreading out in a ring, looping around the group, burning tall and bright, the tips of the green flames coming to stand near shoulder height. The fierce fire crackled with energy, with power, and filtered through the mist, forming a sphere of illumination that almost reached the townhouses that stood on either side of them. Nessa hoped that the fire would scare away whatever lurked in the gathering dark.

  It was a fleeting hope.

  The mist swelled and pushed against the ring of fire, devouring the outreaching light and leaving them standing in a tight bubble of illumination that was growing ever smaller and subdued.

  Nessa’s gaze went to Orm’s face, and she was alarmed to see that rivulets of sweat ran down the side of it. His eyes were squeezed shut in concentration, with strain, and his out-thrown arm trembled. Nessa knew that Orm wouldn’t be able to hold the ring of fire for much longer. The force of the mist was too strong, too unrelenting.

  “We have to do something,” Nessa whispered, clutching at Hunter. “Orm can’t hold it back anymore.”

  “I’m open to any suggestions?”

  “Ah.”

  “Heimaey?” Hunter’s eyes darted to the man beside him. “Any ideas you want to throw into our already overwhelming mix?”

  “Other than wishing Orm could magic us out of here?” Heimaey muttererd. “Then, unfortunately, no. I am all out of ideas.”

  “Unhelpful.”

  “Yeah.”

  “As much as I’m loving the chitchat,” one of the twins muttered from behind Nessa. “There’s something out there. I saw something move.”

  Hunter tensed, almost going to turn around. Somehow, he managed to resist the urge. He couldn’t risk giving his back to anything that might be lurking outside their bubble of light and protection. They needed to keep a tight formation.

  “What can you see, Nessie?” Hunter breathed. “What’s out there?”

  Nessa slowly pivoted, being his eyes and ears.

  “Nothing…”

  Nessa squinted into the gloom, peering over a twin’s shoulder, wishing that Orm’s fire penetrated further into the darkness and mist, illuminating more than just a few yards at most. Nessa also wished that it didn’t burn with tinges of green, for it made what were already deeply disturbing circumstances all the more alarming, catching eerily on waves and wisps of mist as it danced around them.

  “No…wait…there’s something…”

  A shape moved in the shadows, keeping just out of reach of the flame’s light, staying at a distance where it was near impossible to tell what it was exactly. Nessa couldn’t see any details, but she knew that it wasn’t human. Its hulking mass was too large, too hunched over. She was pretty sure that it was walking on all fours like a dog. She hoped that it was a dog. Just a big, feral dog. The guys would be able to handle a dog.

  “It’s an animal of some kind,” Nessa murmured.

  Hunter raised his brows. “A friendly one?”

  “Umm…”

  A low growl sounded out, deep and ominous. Nessa could feel its vibrations deep in her bones. A threat rippled through the air.

  “I’m going to take that as a no.”

  The creature began to circle them slowly, prowling in the gloom, its steps silent, its movements holding an almost liquid fluidity. It was unnatural. The notion of it being an animal made of mortal flesh and bone was abandoned.

  “Orm?” Nessa said, her tone bordering on hysterical. “What might that thing be?”

  “Off the top of my head,” Orm groaned, a little breathless, exhausted. The act of keeping his flames burning high was taking its toll. “I would have to say that it’s nothing good.”

  “How informative.”

  “I aim to help.”

  Nessa’s next question was replaced by a strangled scream.

  The creature…monster…whatever it was charged at them, taking leaping bounds out of the shadows, out of the cover of mist. It was a huge being of darkness and maliciousness.

  Orm sensed what came at them, and whilst the others could do nothing more than blink in shock, or give a started yelp, he flung up both of his arms. With a mighty roar, the ring of fire rose in mimicry, bellowing and crackling to well above their heads, strong and proud.

  The creature hit the flames, rebounding off them as if they were a solid barrier, an actual wall. A shockwave reverberated through the air, strong enough to make all of them flinch as they felt the echoes of it in their bones. The creature hissed and growled, angered at being denied its prey, and stalk
ed around the edge of the fire, searching for any sign of weakness, slinking low to the ground. The mist, heavy and thick, swirled around it, tendrils wrapping around long limbs and a growling snout like loving hands, caressing this being of darkness and nightmares.

  “I can’t keep this up for much longer,” Orm warned, his voice hoarse from the strain he was under, the flames as heavy as bricks.

  “Don’t tell that thing that,” Hunter barked, panicked. “It might give up if it doesn’t know.”

  Urgh, what’s all this ruckus? A groggy, irritated voice groaned at the back of Nessa’s mind. I told you and the boys that I wanted no interruptions while I sleep. Yet here you are, practically pouring a rainbow of emotions down the bloody bond.

  Well, if you’d bothered to check the rainbow of emotions, Nessa snapped. Then you’d realise that the boys and I are about to become monster food.

  Oh, don’t be so pedantic.

  Nessa shared an image of the scene with Aoife: the alarmed, fearful faces of her companions, the wild ring of green fire, the stalking shadow that lurked just beyond it. Nessa was not in the mood to argue with an overtired dragon. There was no time even if she had been.

  Oh…Aoife sprang into alertness, her mind connecting with Nessa’s in such haste that it was almost overwhelming. Oh dear… Oh my…

  Thus the cause of the emotional rainbow…

  Aoife’s irritation was swallowed by a chilling sense of doom. That sense of doom became Nessa’s as it flowed through their bond. Her knees went weak and she slid down to the ground, Hunter’s grip on her wrist loosening. The creature came to a stop in front of them. The wall of fire was the only thing standing between them. A low growl sounded out, one filled with threat and cruel intent. It spoke of ripped flesh and snapped bone. It was a promise solely for Nessa.

  Her eyes snapped up.

  Through the gap between Hunter and Orm’s legs, through the dancing flames, Nessa’s gaze locked with that of the creature. From the depths of darkness and shadow, eyes began to glow like smouldering coals, a deep and terrible red.