Bloodstone

by Johannes, Helen C.

  “People blame all sorts of the world’s ills on that incident,” Tolbert said. “You’d think, after all these years, they’d realize what’s happened since has something more to do with their own actions.”

  The innkeeper merely nodded, his gaze focused on his hands, which cupped the table’s edge. “Everyone agrees it was Durren Drakkonwehr and Errek Eolan who trapped the mage Syryk at the Dragonkeep.”

  “And none of them were ever seen again.” Tolbert straightened in his chair as if that pronouncement ended the discussion.

  Ulerroth, however, stretched out a hand and fingered the bloodstones. “The Stone Dam that Kiros set in the high pass at Herrok-Eneth ages ago, to separate the good land from the evils of Beggeth, was destroyed that day, obliterated from the face of the mountain when it broke. The River Ar didn’t flow for days. And smoke covered the sun. It was dry and hot and dark, even this far down the mountain, and the ground trembled. Then the Krad came, those ancient scourges of Beggeth, through the crack in the mountain where Herrok-Eneth fell. They overwhelmed what was left of the Dragonkeep and poured into the Wehrland, rampaging like they had in Shadowtime before the warrior Kiros first drove them out and sealed the pass against them.”

  Mirianna shivered, but not from cold or fear. She knew the Deeds of Kiros, knew well Owender’s History of the People. What made bumps rise along the underside of her arms was the innkeeper’s voice, the way its quiet awe propelled her backward to childhood, to hours spent listening to the storyteller in Nolar and absorbing the ancient chants and tales of Shadowtime, Dawntime, Dragontime, Dragon’s End. She knew the tales, but she knew them as a child knows them—as tales to be fantasized about while testing the balance of a bejeweled weapon in her father’s workshop. The deeds were too distant to be real, the places mere names that tasted oddly sweet on the lips. Only the Wehrland was real. Only the Wehrland and the strange being who had stolen the head of her horse—and given it back again.

  The innkeeper’s sigh brought her attention back to his bulk. His expression distant, he rolled the largest stone back and forth with a fingertip. She watched the red aura shift with each movement.

  “In Shadowtime,” he mused, “we had great warriors like Kiros. In Dragontime, we had Koronolan and the Hero Mages. At Dragon’s End, Koronolan gave us his sons and their sons forever after them as Dragonkeepers. He gave them his own sword, the Sword of Drakkonwehr, to keep the beast sealed forever beneath Drakkonwehr fortress. Now that the last of the Drakkonwehrs is gone, and the Sword with him, what do we have?”

  “Black Mage spawn, shadows, and other such unnatural creatures,” another voice said before Ulerroth could answer his own question.

  Rees leaned against the wall at the foot of the stairs, his hair tousled and his tunic entirely unlaced. He scratched absently at golden chest hair exposed between the loose thongs. He looked, Mirianna thought, like a cat who’d just feasted on quail. Or, much more likely, a man who’d just risen from a shared bed.

  As if sensing the direction of her thoughts, Rees fixed her with a gaze that lingered too long on her breasts. “Now, I offered to tell you that story, remember?”

  Mirianna flushed.

  With an insolent grin, he pushed away from the wall and strolled to the table. Hooking a chair with one hand, he swung it into place beside her and straddled the seat. His thigh, thick and hard, pressed against the length of hers. She tried to pull away, but her father’s knee on the other side kept her hemmed in. Rees dropped her a look from half-lidded eyes, then turned his grin on the two men.

  “Now, what’s this talk about unnatural creatures and such?”

  “The Shadow Man.” Tolbert leaned forward. “He brings Ulerroth his bloodstone. He was here only yesterday, but he didn’t bring enough. We have to hurry after him and ask him to find a few more pieces because—”

  Rees held up a hand. “Did you say, the Shadow Man?” His brows lowered and, alongside her thigh, Mirianna felt his muscles tense. “Are you referring to that—that thing that drives men mad and steals women to couple with and kill?” His gaze slid to her. “Young women. Unmarried women. Women fond of going off alone.”

  Her face burned, as much from the gaze that flicked from her breasts to the V between her legs as from the implication in his words. Her fingers clenched in her skirt.

  Ulerroth colored. He balled his huge hands into fists. “He does nothing of that while he’s here. Nothing except—”

  Rees’s head snapped up like a hound scenting rabbit. “Except what? Take a woman?”

  The innkeeper stared at his hands. “There’s some that would go,” he mumbled, “for gold.”

  Rees’s mouth curled into a sneer. “For gold, eh? Small compensation for coupling with a fiend.” He leaned toward Tolbert, his expression conspiratorial. “I hear he has to drug them.”

  Ulerroth slammed his hands on the table. His brows bristled like thunderclouds. “Nothing of the sort happens in this establishment! The Shadow Man does nothing wrong while he’s here.”

  “Nothing wrong! What about those three men? That happened right outside this very inn, didn’t it?”

  Ulerroth’s color deepened. He avoided Rees’s stare and tugged at his tunic collar. “Two,” he said, his voice gruff. “There were only two. And the fools tried to rob him.”

  “They died, didn’t they?”

  “What of it? Any man with gold would have killed thieves who came at him in the night.”

  Rees snorted. “Would any man with gold have killed them without touching them?” He lounged back in his chair. “Everyone knows they were found dead with looks of horror frozen on their faces. And not a mark on them.”

  “You’ve been listening to tales.” Ulerroth dashed an arm across his forehead. The dark arm hair came away wet. “That was years ago. You know how stories spread.”

  “I was listening to your serving maid, telling me about the fiend that was here only yesterday.” Rees rotated his head and fixed his gaze on Mirianna. “And in your room, too.” He leaned forward, a feral gleam in his eyes. The charm he wore swung free of the hair it had nested in and spun, glittering. “Tell me, how did you like sleeping in his bed?”

  Panic stirred in the pit of Mirianna’s stomach. She remembered all too vividly the weight of Rees’s body grinding hers into the earth, the pressure of his arms pinning hers beside her head, the taste of his hand clamped over her mouth, the sensation of helplessness, terror, loss. Her skin crawled. She wanted to bolt, to overturn the table and run. Rees’s eyes, and the pleasure evident in the widened pupils as they basked in the terror broadcast from hers, held her rooted to her chair.

  “You bastard spawn of a Krad!” Ulerroth lunged across the table, seizing Rees by the tunic and toppling both of their chairs. “The Shadow Man comes, he trades, and he harms no one! I’ll not have a dung beetle like you spreading lies about my establishment or any of my customers! Do you hear me?”

  Rees shrugged out of Ulerroth’s grip and made a show of straightening his tunic. “Lies, Ulerroth? How can they be lies when everyone in Ar-Deneth knows you do more business in one day the fiend’s here than you do in a month without him.”

  A muscle under Ulerroth’s moustache twitched. His fingers flexed at his sides, curling and uncurling. Color washed in waves across his face. “Get out!” He jabbed a finger at the stones scattered across the table. “Buy your gems and get out! All of you! Now!”

  Mirianna stood up slowly. Her father, beside her, fumbled with his gold pouch. “I—tell me your price.”

  “That’s right. Tell him your price, demon trader.”

  The innkeeper’s fists bunched. Mirianna feared—hoped—he would smash Rees’s face. Ulerroth had the bulk and sinew to give the cocksure Master of Nolar’s man the beating he deserved, but the innkeeper slowly straightened. “I’d wish for a Krad to cut out your heart and eat it, but I’d hate to disappoint the beast.” Seizing a handful of coins from Tolbert, he turned on his heel and stalked into the kitchen.

&n
bsp; Rees brushed at the sleeves of his tunic as if to remove clinging dirt. “Demon trader! Brothel for unnatural creatures!” He shuddered. “Pick up your stones and pack. Meet me in the stable.”

  Vibrating with the emotions that still charged the room, Mirianna could do no more than watch Rees mount the steps two at a time and disappear around the corner at the top. Part of her wanted to rage at him for his obnoxious accusations. Another part asked if it was wise to remain in a place frequented, if not by unnatural creatures, then by those with similar unsavory reputations. However much Ulerroth tried to minimize the charge, he had not, for all his anger, denied its truth. And Rees, despite his faults, was only looking out for their welfare, wasn’t he? Even the appearance of consorting with evil could brand a person, and she and Tolbert, with no other family to shield them, had little enough protection from that. Rees was right, of course, but—

  Beside her, a chair scraped. She turned and saw her father tie a thong around the opening of his gem pouch. Lifting the thong ends, he tried to fasten them behind his neck. With a sigh, she said, “Let me,” and tied a double knot.

  Tolbert responded with a wan smile and tucked the pouch inside his tunic where the precious stones would lie next to his skin. “Come on, lamb.” He touched her hand. “We’d best pack.” With a sigh, he left the common room in which they should have been spending days, not hours, and mounted the stairs.

  Mirianna followed him to the landing and turned to her room. Inside, she drew up short, instantly aware of darkness shrouding the ceiling beams. Gloom draped over them in folds, insinuating itself like the heavy canopy of a bed into the lighter space below. Shadows lurked in the room’s corners and stretched dark fingers around the legs of the chair, the table, even the bed.

  She swallowed, but no saliva dampened her dry throat. The gloom, the shadows had been there before, hadn’t they? Or did they seem thicker, denser, more substantial now she knew who—or what—had inhabited this room?

  She wished she’d opened the shutter. She could open it now, but the window lay farther across the room than her belongings. With every instinct screaming at her to avoid contact with even the smallest shadow, she inched her way across the chamber toward her pack. As she did, her attention riveted on stains spotting the floorboards. She’d seen the stains before, hadn’t she? Or did she only now notice them because—because—

  Because they might be blood?

  Dizzy, Mirianna put out a hand to steady herself, touched the bedpost, and jerked back as though snake-bitten. He had lain here. Here! In the very mattress hollows Mirianna’s body had settled so comfortably, under the very blankets her body had snuggled, the possessor of the voice whose reverberant tones still struck echoes within her body had spread his limbs. He, the dark, faceless being who prevented her horse from bolting, had intimately occupied this very space.

  Sensation shuddered through her, a strange shivery…flush that penetrated deep into her woman’s core and left it damp and throbbing. Her knees weakened, and she swayed forward, drawn by an inexplicable desire to lower herself inch by inch to the bed and lie upon it. That same strange desire directed her to raise her arms above her head and open her legs so that she lay, spread-eagled and quivering, while the velvet shadows of late afternoon descended like drapery and enveloped her. Powerless to do otherwise, she closed her eyes and completed the seal.

  At once, her lover materialized. He leaned over her, his dark shape haloed by golden haze filtering between shutter slats. The mattress sank under his weight as he stretched full length beside her. The scent of sun-warmed wool and leather filled her nostrils, trailed faintly by something...sweet, she thought, like crushed white clover.

  He sighed, and the warmth of his breath caressed her face. Mirianna closed her eyes with pleasure at the contact. They flew open again when his knee crossed hers and the corded thickness of his thigh slid upwards, bunching her skirt above it. His hip leaned into the curve of her bone, and she felt, even as the breath shuttled in and out of her lungs, the pressure of the hard, hot ridge of his manhood against her abdomen. Her body thrummed with sensation. Her nerve endings quivered, jarred by a movement more intimate—and erotic—than any he’d made before.

  Let me see your face, she pleaded, searching the shadow that formed his head. Let me know who you are.

  His movements stilled as if her unspoken words had reached him. For heartbeats, she sensed the scrutiny of his gaze as he lay unmoving, his weight securing her hips beneath his, his knee holding the secrets of her body unlocked and vulnerable. Finally, his hand rose to the fine bones at the base of her throat and lingered there a moment. Then his fingers, feather light, unlaced her bodice and laid it open.

  Mirianna sucked in breath while blood pounded in her ears. Her nipples puckered under the gentle breath he blew over each one. Shifting slightly, he grazed a fingertip over each hardened nub.

  Mirianna’s world pitched and rocked. Her body arched upward, leaning, straining toward the touch. Her arms rose of their own accord and reached for his shoulders. She yearned to pull him down to her, to beg him to ease the sweet pain coursing through her body with more than a whisper of contact. But as soon as her arms entered the plane of his shape, he vanished.

  She bolted upright and blinked like an owl while the room swam around her. Through the lingering sensual fog, she heard, somewhere, the scrape of boots and the sound of men’s voices. Her father? Pumble? That’s right, we’re leaving, aren’t we?

  Her hands rushed to straighten her dress and leaped away when they contacted only skin. Mortified, she looked down and saw her bodice gaping open. A delicate flush colored her breasts and the nipples stood out firm and pointed. She cast a frantic glance around the room. Two long shadows stretched out from the farthest corner and, fingerlike, gripped the side of the bed. Over the mattress, the tips curled like claws, extending narrow bands of blackness across the depression in which her body had only moments earlier rested.

  Fine hairs on the back of Mirianna’s neck stood straight up. The down on her arms and body rose in waves that began at her shoulders and rocked to an end at the base of her spine. One thought took on crystalline certainty in her mind. One horrible, terrifying thought: He touched me! By the Dragon, that—that creature was here and he touched me!

  With a groan, she sprang from the bed. Her fingers fumbled with her clothing, jerking the lacings tight over breasts that seemed twice their normal size and prickled with every shift of fabric over sensitized nipples. Shaking like an aspen leaf, she snatched up her belongings, hurled them into her pack, and broke from the room.

  In the corridor, she ran headlong into Rees. He absorbed the brunt of the collision with a grunt and a backward step. She ricocheted off his chest, bounced against the wall, and would have fallen if he hadn’t dropped his pack and caught her arm.

  His slowly blooming smile told her terror still radiated from her expression. “Can’t wait to get out of this place, can you?” He stepped into the space between their bodies. “I don’t blame you. A sweet thing like you has to be careful where she sleeps.” His free hand skated up her arm, slowing enough next to her breast for the outside of his thumb to graze its swell.

  She flinched at the contact, but he only tightened his grip on her arm. “Don’t worry. I’ll protect you from anything that tries to crawl under your blankets.”

  Revulsion—sharp, acidic, and wholly unmistakable—squirted through Mirianna’s veins. Her body reacted, propelling her hands into his chest with a force only muscles still charged with panic could deliver.

  Rees staggered back two steps, a startled look on his face.

  “By the Dragon, don’t you—don’t you ever touch me again!” With a wild look, she seized her pack and bolted for the stairs.

  Halfway to the stable, her legs turned to mush. She stumbled to a trough and sank down on the edge, breathing hard while dots of color exploded on the fringe of her vision. Her ears roared, but even within that roar, she discerned another sound. Her finger
s dug into the damp wood, curling like claws as her body recognized the voice before her mind could distinguish the words.

  —Remember, not all of the beasts—

  For a score of heartbeats, Mirianna did not breathe. When nothing further echoed in her mind, she gulped in a lungful of air. Beasts! She shoved a shaky hand through her hair. There was no shortage of beasts in the vicinity—Rees, the Krad, Pumble, Ulerroth. Even her father fit the description for wanting to buy stones collected by something monstrous.

  And then there was the Shadow Man himself.

  Mirianna gulped more air. Her body still quivered with the aftershocks of his touch. His touch. Somehow, in that room, his...essence...had invaded her dreams and he had become—

  “No!” She sprang to her feet and backed away from the trough, shaking her head. It was too horrible to comprehend. She would not even consider the possibility that he had become—that he might have always been—that he was—

  It had to be the room. Nothing more. Now she was out of it, she was free. Wasn’t she?

  Mirianna spun, raking the inn yard with a desperate glance. In the late afternoon sunshine, shadows lurked everywhere, long, dark shadows that seemed to slink toward her with the patience—and purpose—of a Wehrland lion stalking prey. Sinking her teeth into her lower lip, she turned and ran toward the stable.

  ****

  By all the sons of Koronolan, she’s breathtaking.

  The first glimpse of the woman who came to him like quicksilver through the planes of his dream always left the man breathless. It didn’t matter if she appeared after an absence of days or merely hours, her beauty stole the very air of life, withholding it from him just long enough to fill it with her own lush scent. Lilacs, he thought, breathing deeply. Blue ones, not the cloying purple. And—he breathed again—musk. Just a hint of her own unique woman’s scent.