Blood & Honey

by Shelby Mahurin

  The confession struck me with unexpected force. I frowned, blinking rapidly against the stinging in my eyes, and looked away to compose myself. “Is she?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t had the nerve to ask about her since.”

  “Shit, Coco.” Eager to distract her, to distract myself, I shook my head, casting about for a change of subject. Anything would be preferable to this distressing conversation. I’d thought Morgane to be cruel. Perspective was a curious thing. “What was the book in your aunt’s tent?”

  She turned her head to face me, frowning. “Her grimoire.”

  “Do you know what’s in it?”

  “Spells, mostly. A record of her experiments. Our family tree.”

  I repressed a shudder. “What sort of spells? It seemed . . . alive.”

  She snorted. “That’s because it’s creepy as hell. I’ve only flipped through it once in secret, but some of the spells in there are evil—curses, possession, sickness, and the like. Only a fool would cross my aunt.”

  Now I couldn’t repress my shudder, no matter how hard I tried. Mercifully, Claud chose that moment to approach. “Mes chéries, though I am loath to interrupt, the hour has grown late. Might I suggest you both retire to the amber wagon? You are undoubtedly exhausted from your travels, and it is unwise to linger alone here at night.”

  I climbed to my feet. “Where is Reid?”

  Claud cleared his throat delicately. “Alas, Monsieur Diggory finds himself otherwise occupied at the moment.” At my arched brow, he sighed. “After a poorly timed jest from His Royal Highness, the young master Ansel has succumbed to tears. Reid is comforting him.”

  Coco sprang to her feet, hissing like an incredulous, angry cat. When she at last found her words, she snarled, “I’m going to kill him.” Then she stormed back toward camp with a violent stream of curses. Beau—who spotted her coming across the way—changed directions abruptly, fleeing into a wagon.

  “Do it slowly!” I called after her, adding a curse or two of my own. Poor Ansel. Though he’d be mortified if he saw Coco sweeping in to save him, someone needed to kick Beau’s ass.

  Claud chuckled as a shout rent the air behind us. I turned, startled—and perhaps a bit pleased, expecting to see Beau wetting down his leg—and froze.

  It wasn’t Beau at all.

  A half dozen men spilled into the clearing, swords and knives drawn.

  An Unexpected Reunion

  Lou

  “Get down,” Claud ordered, his voice abruptly deeper, more assertive. He pushed me flat to the ground behind him, angling his body to shield mine. But I still peeked beneath his arm, frantically searching for the blue coats of Chasseurs. There were none. Dressed in tattered rags and fraying coats, these men reeked instead of bandits. Literally reeked. I could smell them from where we lay, thirty paces away.

  Claud had warned us about the danger of the road, but I hadn’t taken him seriously. The thought of mere men accosting us had been laughable in light of witches and huntsmen. But that realization wasn’t what made me gape. It wasn’t what made me struggle to rise, to race toward the thieves instead of away from them.

  No. It was something else. Someone else.

  At their back—wielding a blade as black as the dirt on his face—stood Bas.

  “Shit.” Horrified, I elbowed Claud in the side as Bas’s and Reid’s eyes met. He didn’t budge. “Let me up! Let me up now!”

  “Do not draw attention to yourself, Louise.” He held me down with a single arm, implausibly strong. “Remain still and quiet, or I’ll throw you in the creek—a most unpleasant experience, I assure you.”

  “What the hell are you talking about? That’s Bas. He’s an old friend. He won’t harm me, but he and Reid look like they’re about to tear each other to pieces—”

  “Let them,” he said simply.

  Helpless, I watched as Reid drew his Balisarda from his bandolier. The last of his knives. The rest remained embedded in his turning board from our performance. Bas’s face twisted into a sneer. “You,” he spat.

  His companions continued herding the others into the center of the campsite. We were woefully outnumbered. Though Ansel brandished his knife, they disarmed him within seconds. Four more men erupted from the wagon, dragging Coco and Beau out with them. Already, they’d tied their wrists and ankles with rope, and both struggled in vain to free themselves. Madame Labelle, however, didn’t fight her captor. She acquiesced calmly, making casual eye contact with Toulouse and Thierry.

  A short man with bone-white skin strolled toward Reid and Bas, picking his teeth with a dagger.

  “And just who might this be, eh, Bas?”

  “This is the man who killed the Archbishop.” Bas’s voice was unrecognizable, hard as the steel in his hands. His hair had grown long and matted in the months since I’d last seen him, and a wicked scar forked down his left cheek. He looked . . . sharp. Hungry. The opposite of the soft, cosseted boy I’d known. “This is the man who killed the Archbishop. Fifty thousand couronnes for his capture.”

  Bone White’s eyes lit up in recognition. “Reid Diggory. How ’bout that?” He laughed—a jarring, ugly sound—before slapping one of the wagons in delight. “Dame Fortune’s right, innit? Here we was thinking we’d pinch a few coins, maybe cop a touch wit’ a pretty actress, and friggin’ Reid Diggory falls in our lap!”

  Another bandit—this one tall and balding—stepped forward, tugging Coco along with him. His knife remained at her throat. “Innit there another one travelin’ wit’ him, boss? A girl wit’ a nasty scar at her throat? Posters say she’s a witch.”

  Shit, shit, shit.

  “Keep quiet,” Claud breathed. “Do not move.”

  But that was stupid. We were in plain sight. All the idiots had to do was glance down the stream, and they’d spot us—

  “Yer right.” Bone White scanned the rest of the troupe eagerly. “Hundred thousand couronnes for the head o’ that one.”

  Reid’s hand tensed on his Balisarda, and Bone White smiled, revealing brown teeth. “I’d hand that over if I was you, sonny. Don’t be gettin’ no delusions of grandeur.” He gestured to Coco, and Baldy tightened his hold. “’Less you wanna see this pretty little thing without her head too.”

  To my shock, Bas laughed. “Take her head. I’d like to see everything else, though.”

  “What did you just say?” Coco spluttered, indignant. “Did you just—Bas. It’s me. It’s Coco.”

  Grin slipping, he tilted his head to study her. He gripped her chin between his thumb and finger. “How do you know my name, belle fille?”

  “Unhand her,” Beau commanded in a valiant attempt at gallantry. “By order of your crown prince.”

  Bone White’s eyes lit up. “What’s this, then? The crown prince?” He crowed with delight. “I didn’t recognize yeh, Yer Highness. Yer an awful long way from home.”

  Beau glared down at him. “My father will hear about this, I assure you. You will be punished.”

  “Will I, now?” Bone White circled him with a leer. “By my reckonin’, I’d wager yer the one who’ll be punished, Yer Highness. Been gone weeks now, haven’ yeh? The city’s all in an uproar. Yer dad is tryin’ to keep it quiet-like, but rumors spread. His precious boy has taken up with witches. Can yeh imagine? No, I don’ think I’ll be punished for returnin’ yeh home to him. I think I’ll be rewarded.” To Reid, he added, “The knife. Hand it over. Now.”

  Reid didn’t move.

  Baldy’s blade left a thin line of blood at Coco’s throat. “Bas—” she said sharply.

  “How do you know my name?” he repeated.

  “Because I know you.” Coco struggled harder, and the blade bit deeper. Bas’s frown deepened inexplicably, as did my own. What was he doing? Why was he pretending not to know her? “We’re friends. Now let me go.”

  “D’yeh smell that, then?” Distracted, Bone White stepped toward her, staring at her blood with a peculiar, hungry expression. “Smells like somethin’s burnin’.
” He nodded to himself. A pleased smile stretched across his face. “Y’know I’ve heard rumors o’ a witch o’ the blood. They don’ cast wit’ their hands like the others. Swore I saw one meself once. Smelled it, more like. Nearly singed my nostrils off.”

  Bas’s voice hardened with conviction. “I’ve never heard of such a thing, and I’ve never seen this woman before in my life.”

  Coco’s eyes widened. “You asshole. We practically lived together for a year—”

  Baldy clubbed her in the head. Seizing his opportunity, Reid lunged—at the exact same second Coco twisted, trying to coat Baldy’s wrist with her blood. Skin sizzling, the man shrieked, and all three collided in a mass of tangled limbs. More men sprang forward amidst the tussle, wrenching away Reid’s Balisarda and pinning them both to the ground. Coco’s blood hissed where it touched the snow. Smoke curled around her face.

  Madame Labelle looked on with an anxious expression, but still she didn’t move.

  “Well,” Bone White said pleasantly, still grinning, “that solves that, then, dinnit? She’ll fetch a right nice price wit’ the Chasseurs. We passed some o’ them just up the road. Smarmy bastards. They’ve been scourin’ the forest for weeks, makin’ a right mess for us, haven’t they? O’course, I might just keep ’er blood for meself. Near priceless it is, to the right buyer.” Bone White scratched his chin thoughtfully before gesturing to Reid. “And this one? How abouts do you be knowin’ Reid Diggory, son?”

  Bas’s grip on his knife tightened. “He arrested me in Cesarine.” Trembling with rage, he knelt beside Reid, sticking his knife in his face. “It’s because of you that my cousin disinherited me. It’s because of you that he left me for dead in the streets.”

  Reid stared at him impassively. “I didn’t murder those guards.”

  “It was an accident. I only did it because—” Bas spasmed abruptly. Blinking rapidly, he shook his head to clear it. “Because—” He glanced at Coco in confusion. She frowned back at him. “I—why—?”

  “Stop yer blatherin’, boy, and get to the point!”

  “I—I don’t . . . remember,” Bas finished, brow furrowed. He shook his head once more. “I don’t remember.”

  Baldy regarded Coco warily. “Witchcraft, it is. Eerie stuff.”

  Bone White snorted in disgust. “I don’t give a damn about witchcraft. All I care about is my couronnes. Now, Bas, tell me—is the other one here? The one they’re all after?” He rubbed his hands together greedily. “Just think what we can do wit’ a hundred thousand couronnes.”

  “There are stilts in the wagon, if you’re thinking prosthetics.” Coco bared her teeth in a smile, jerking her chin toward his diminutive legs. The men tried and failed to force her face into the ground. “I’m sure with the right pants, no one would ever know.”

  “Shut yer face,” Bone White snarled, his cheeks flushing crimson. “A’fore I shut it for you.”

  Coco’s grin vanished. “Please do.”

  But it seemed Bone White—despite claiming he didn’t care about witches—had a healthy respect for them. Or perhaps fear. He merely grunted and turned back to Bas. “Well? Is she here?”

  I held my breath.

  “I don’t—” Bas’s eyes flicked over the troupe members. “I don’t know.”

  “What d’ya mean, you don’t know? She’s supposed to be travelin’ wit this one, innit she?” He pointed his knife at Reid.

  Bas shrugged weakly. “I’ve never seen her before.”

  Relief surged through me, and I closed my eyes, expelling a sigh. Beneath his rather unfortunate new exterior, perhaps Bas was still in there. My old friend. My confidant. I had saved his skin in the Tower, after all. It would’ve been poor repayment for him to watch as his friends chopped off my head. This—this thing with Coco—it was merely an act. He was trying to help us, to save us.

  Bone White growled in frustration. “Search the area.”

  At the command, my eyes snapped open—just in time to see Reid glance in my direction. When Bone White followed his gaze, I suppressed a groan. “Is she hidin’ behind that tree, then?” he asked eagerly, pointing his knife straight at us. “Over there, boys! She’s over there! Find her!”

  “Quiet.” Claud’s whisper sent a tingle down my spine. The air around us felt heavy, thick with spring rains and storm clouds, pine sap and lichen. “Do not move.”

  I obeyed his command—hardly daring to breathe—as Bas and one other bandit stalked toward us. The rest remained poised in a circle around the troupe, watching as Baldy began to tie Coco’s hands and feet. She eyed his knife as if contemplating whether to impale herself on it. With a bit more blood, these idiots would rue the day they’d been born.

  “I don’t see nothin’,” Bas’s companion muttered, circling us with a frown.

  Bas peered into the holly branches, his eyes skipping past us as if we weren’t there at all. “Me either.”

  Claud’s hand tightened on my shoulder, silently warning me not to move.

  “Anythin’?” Bone White called.

  “Nothin’!”

  “Well, go on and check down the creek then, Knotty! We’ll find her.”

  Bas’s companion grunted and hobbled away. Without a backward glance in our direction, Bas rejoined Bone White.

  “What was that?” I whispered, confusion heightening to panic. None of this made sense. Even Bas wasn’t this good of an actor. He’d stared at me—through me—without giving a single indication he saw me. Not a wink or brush of his hand. Not even eye contact, for shit’s sake. And why hadn’t Madame Labelle yet trounced these idiots? “What just happened?”

  The pressure at my back relented slightly, though Claud still didn’t release me. “Illusion.”

  “What? They—they think we’re part of the tree?”

  “Yes.”

  “How?”

  He fixed me with his gaze, uncharacteristically serious. “Shall I explain now, or shall we wait until the imminent danger has passed?”

  I scowled at him, returning my attention to the others. Bas had started helping Baldy with the ropes. When Baldy moved to bind Reid, Bas stopped him with a nasty smile. “I’ll take that one.”

  Reid returned the smile. In the next second, he thrust his head backward—breaking his first captor’s nose—and rolled to his back, kicking the second in the knees. I almost cheered. With uncanny speed, he snatched his Balisarda from the howling man and exploded to his feet. Bas reacted with equal swiftness—as if he’d expected the attack—and used Reid’s momentum against him.

  Though I cried out a warning—though Reid tried to correct—it was too late.

  Bas plunged his knife into Reid’s belly.

  “No,” I breathed.

  Stunned, Reid staggered sideways, his blood spattering the snow. Bas grinned triumphantly, twisting the knife deeper, slicing upward through skin and muscle and sinew until white glinted through crimson. Bone. Bas had gutted him to the bone.

  I moved without thinking.

  “Louise!” Claud hissed, but I ignored him, throwing off his arm and scrambling to my feet, racing to where Reid fell to his knees. “Louise, no!”

  The thieves gawked as I sprinted toward them—probably stupefied at seeing a tree transform into a human—but I couldn’t think past the blood roaring in my ears.

  If Reid didn’t—if Coco couldn’t heal—

  I would kill Bas. I would kill him.

  Throwing my dagger at Coco’s feet—praying she could reach it—I dropped to my knees in front of Reid. Mayhem erupted around us. Finally, finally, Madame Labelle burst free of her ropes. With each flick of her hand, bodies flew. A small part of my brain realized Toulouse and Thierry had joined her, but I couldn’t focus, couldn’t hear anything but the thieves’ panicked cries, couldn’t see anything but Reid. Reid.

  Even injured, he still tried to push me behind him. The movement was weak, however. Too much of his blood had been lost. Decidedly too many of his innards were on display. “Don’t be stup
id,” I said, trying to hold pieces of his flesh together. Bile rose in my throat as more blood spilled from his mouth. “Keep still. Just—just—”

  But the words wouldn’t come. I glanced to Coco helplessly, trying to summon a pattern. Any pattern. But this wound was mortal. Only another’s death would heal it, and I couldn’t—I couldn’t trade Coco. It’d be like ripping out my own heart. And Ansel—

  Ansel. Could I—?

  Lou is different when she uses magic. Her emotions, her judgment—she’s been erratic.

  No. I shook my head vehemently against the thought, but it lodged there like a growth, a tumor, poisoning my mind. Reid’s blood soaked my front, and he slumped forward in my arms, pressing his Balisarda into my hand. His eyes closed.

  No no no—

  “Well, looky ’ere.” Bone White’s snarl sounded behind me. Too close. His hand fisted in my hair, ripping my head back, and his other tugged aside the ribbon at my throat. He traced my scar. “My little witch has finally come out o’ hidin’. Yeh might’ve changed yer hair, but yeh can’ change yer scar. Yer comin’ wit’ me.”

  “I don’t think so.” Coco descended on him like a bat out of Hell, my knife flashing, slashing his wrist.

  “You stupid bitch.” With a howl, he released my hair and swiped furiously at her. His fingers caught her shirt, and he pulled her to him, forcing her back against his chest. “I’ll drain yeh like I drained yer kin, sell all this pretty blood to the highest bidder at the Skull Masquerade—”

  Coco’s eyes widened, and her face contorted with rage. Bringing her own dagger up sharply, she plunged it deep into his eye. He crumpled instantly, screaming and clutching his face. Blood poured between his fingers. She kicked him once for good measure before dropping to her knees beside Reid. “Can you heal him?” I asked desperately.

  “I can try.”

  Blood and Honey

  Reid

  I slammed back into my body with excruciating pain. Gasping for breath, I clung to the first thing I touched—brown hands, scarred. Distantly, the sounds of men shouting and swords clashing met my ears.