by Faith Hunter
Beast on thongs: Writer came home from Con. Was tired, like after big hunt. Had small bag of “thongs” from “prank.” But there is no deer or cow or bison strapped to her big truck. Writer is not good hunter.
(Later.) Writer explained “thongs.” Writer should grow pelt, not silly thongs. Thongs would get stuck in places and Beast would have to scoot. Writer would not like Beast to scoot on her rug.
Beast on cover art of books: Writer saw first cover idea of BLOOD TRADE. Writer likes it. Cover made Writer dance. But Beast was not on it. Beast was going to eat artist. Then artist sent cover art of BLACK ARTS. Beast is on BLACK ARTS. BLACK ARTS is best cover.
Beast on being thankful: Writer says to list Stuff I’m thankful for, five each day: People, Food, Natural, Memory, and Personal. I can count to five.
MONDAY—
People: Writer.
Food: Turkey feathers stuck in mouth after hunt.
Natural: Moon reflected in water.
Memory: Teeth sinking into throat of human who destroyed forests.
Personal: Big killing teeth. (Chuffs with laughter.)
TUESDAY—
People: Jane Yellowrock. And Yardboy.
Food: Deer. Standing over water. Under tree with tall branch.
Natural: Herds of deer, running in rut.
Memory: Kits, sleeping in curve of Beast-body and legs, smelling of milk.
Personal: Bitsa.
WEDNESDAY—
People: Ricky-Bo. He smells of big-cat and hot, steamy jungle. Bruiser. Want Bruiser.
Food: Want to hunt bison. (Looks at Writer. Flicks ears. Writer says no.)
Natural: Sound of world at dawn. Silent, waiting.
Memory: Sight of Wesa eating kill. Little cat, who changed life of Beast.
Personal: Claws (Cleans claw sheath on tall tree, bark scraping away, leaving Beast-sign.)
THURSDAY—
People: Molly and Angie Baby. Miss them – Molly and Angie Baby. . . .
Food: Rabbit!
Natural: Sound of wild turkey goggling. Easy to hunt stupid noisy bird.
Memory: Wind in nose when Jane rides Bitsa, full of good food smells.
Personal: Visit with angel Hayyel. Was short but was good.
FRIDAY—
People: Big Evan.
Food: Once caught fish jumping through water. Was good.
Natural: Water running fast down river.
Memory: World before white man stole the trees.
Personal: Leo. (Chuffs with laughter.)
Beast on Christmas Songs
Six Geese A-Laying
Jane Yellowrock is listening to Christmas Carols about good food. A feast. Beast wants feast like song Writer talks about! (Licks muzzle. Thinks. Flicks ear tabs, listening to song.) Jane sings along. Jane cannot sing. Sounds like bison stuck in ditch. Or hawk calling for mate. Jane cannot sing, but Beast likes Jane’s song food! (Listens. Thinks.)
Most of song is about more-than-five foods. Beast cannot count that high but knows that more-than-five is many! Beast is hungry. (Thinks about food and hunting and eating fresh kills.)
Beast does not want seven swans a-swimming. Swans are good fighters. Swim fast. Peck hard with beaks. Swans leave mushy stuff on ground that gets in Beast’s paw pads. Tastes bad to clean pads with tongue. (Looks over at writer.) Writer is making gagging sounds. Beast does not know why writer is sick.
Beast wants Six Geese A-Laying! That is more-than-five! Maybe more-than-seven! Geese sitting on nests will not be able to fly fast! (Thinking.) Geese are fat and mean, but when on nests will be slow. Goose meet is good! (Song goes on.)
Five golden rings . . . (Thinks hard.) Beast does not want gold. Does not taste good. Should not be part of feast song.
Four calling birds are tasty! But loud birds would tell other prey Beast was near. No. Do not want Calling Birds. Want geese! More-than-five geese! (Looks at writer.) WANT GEESE!
Three French hens are full of fat and slow to fly. Easy to catch! But only three. Want more-than-five geese!
Two turtledoves are small mouthful. Crunch and gone. Good, but six geese are better! Beast thinks more-than-five! Like geese!
And a partridge in a pear tree. (Thinking hard.) Do not want bird in tree. Would fly away before Beast could get there. Beast likes six geese a-laying. Thinks this is more-than-five geese. Could get eggs too. Eggs are tasty. Chomp through shell and lick insides from ground. Good winter food. (Sits up and stares at writer.)
Want six geese a-laying. Want them now!
Writer raises eyebrows. Looks amused.
Beast growls low.
“Hey. I put you in the books,” Writer says, “I can take you out of the books. Be nice.”
Beast chuffs with displeasure, but will not growl again. Sits and looks away, stares into distance, tail twitching, not looking at writer. Mad at writer. Want geese!
Writer sighs.
Beast Haiku
Writer says to write haiku. Beast cannot count to more-than-five, so writer will help on line two.
Beast is good hunter.
Beast hunts bisons in Beast dreams.
Beast eats bison heart.
(Beast is great poet! More hunting number poems later! Beast is napping now on warm rock in sun.)
Leo predator
is fierce, strong, bloodthirsty vamp.
Want Leo as mate.
Writer is mad. (Chuffs with laughter.) Beast likes making Writer mad. Beast is good poet-with-numbers called haiku.
Writer is home now.
Home from big city New York.
Did not bring home cow.
Politician’s words
fighting hunting debate words
Beast would rather sleep.
(Writer is laughing. I do not understand.)
Beast naps on warm rock.
Sun heats Beast pelt and Beast purrs.
Too warm to hunt now.
(Beast is sleepy poet-of-numbers.)
Sun is warm on Beast.
Rolls over, sun on belly
Beast stretch out in sun
(Thinks.) Did Beast count right?
JY Companion Guide Major Character List
Aggie One Feather: An elder of the People, mid-fifties, black hair without any gray; her parents are both Wolf Clan; serves as counselor for Jane; first appears in Skinwalker.
Angelina Everhart Trueblood: Daughter of Molly Everhart and Evan Trueblood, six years old with strawberry blond hair; has the witch gene from both parents, which means many people and organizations would want her; given her parents, the extent of Angie’s powers are not yet known; first appears in the story “Kits,” first book, Skinwalker.
Antoine: Male witch; first appears in Skinwalker; dies in Skinwalker when attempting to kill the liver-eater/rogue skinwalker masquerading as Leo’s son.
Bethany: Mithran Outclan healer/shaman, black-skinned, former slave, mentally and emotionally unbalanced; first appears in Blood Cross.
Bobby Bates: Jane’s friend from the Christian children’s home, childlike mentality but later discovered to have a unique magical ability; has bright red hair and freckles; first appears in the story “The Early Years,” but plays a significant role in the plot of Blood Trade.
Brandon and Brian: Grégoire’s twin primos. First appear as Big-Gun Red Shirt and Big-Gun Navy Shirt in Skinwalker. They are onorios.
Bruiser: see George Dumas.
Derek Lee: African-American former marine that Jane meets while tracking a rogue vamp; does work for Leo; first appears in Skinwalker.
Eli Younger: Former Army Ranger hired by Jane, along with his younger brother, Alex, as her private team; first appears in Death’s Rival.
Esmee: Elderly but very feisty woman with bright red hair whose home in Natchez Jane and her team rent out briefly in Death’s Rival, but she returns for a larger role in Blood Trade.
Evan Trueblood: Male witch, six foot four and burly, red hair and beard, brown eyes; married to Molly Everhart Trueblood, Jane�
�s best friend; first appears in the story “Kits,” first book, Skinwalker.
Evangelina Everhart Stone: Molly’s oldest sister and coven leader who develops a demon addiction; first appears in the story “Signatures of the Dead,” first book, Skinwalker; dies in Raven Cursed at Jane’s hand.
George Dumas/Bruiser: Leo’s primo blood-servant, six feet four inches tall, muscular, lithe, brown eyes and hair, over one hundred years old; first appears in Skinwalker. Came to the Americas in the early nineteen hundreds.
Girrard DiMercy (Gee): A Mercy Blade, a creature who performs the task of killing scions unable to emerge from devoveo; his blood aids the parents to overcome dolore; uses glamours to hide his true face, as he comes from another dimension; first appears in Mercy Blade.
Grégoire: Blood Master of Clan Arceneau; looks as though he was turned as a teen, though it happened in the time of Charlemagne, blond; first appears in Skinwalker, when he is held captive by the liver-eater. He is the premier soldier and warrior of the United States Mithrans. He also has three primos, two of whom later turn out to be onorios.
Hieronymus: Master of the City of Natchez and surrounding area; first appears in Blood Trade, though mentioned in Death’s Rival; tall. He was turned with a condition called Alopecia totalis, and the vampirism has not fully healed him, leaving him mostly hairless.
Jane Yellowrock: Cherokee skinwalker, six feet tall with long dark hair that she braids and wears in a queue when fighting, golden eyes that glow; in addition to her skinwalker ability, Jane has the soul of a mountain lion that she captured within herself at the age of five in an accidental act of black magic; Jane walked out of the woods at the approximate age of twelve, scared, scarred, with no memory of anything at all; spent the next six years in the Bethel Nondenominational Christian Children’s Home (also referred to as the children’s home).
Katie: Katherine Louisa Dupre—true legal name; also Katie of Katie’s Ladies; has also been known to the world as Katherine Fonteneau, Katherine Pearl Duplantis, Katherine Vuillemont, among others; a registered Republican, votes religiously, pardon the term; sits on the local Vampiric Council; eyes are a sort of grayish hazel. She is Leo’s heir, blond, owns the house Jane lives in while working in New Orleans; is small, slender, and ash-blond; first appears in the short story “Cat Tats,” and next in the first book, Skinwalker.
Kemnebi: first appears in Mercy Blade as an emissary from the International Party of Weres to the U.S.; African black wereleopard whose mate, Safia, is killed by the grindylow in Mercy Blade for attempting to turn Rick LaFleur; Jane claims alpha status over Kemnebi in “Blood, Fangs, and Going Furry,” forcing him to be Rick’s mentor to learn about life as a were, despite Kemnebi’s hatred of Rick.
Kid (Alex) Younger: Eighteen-year-old computer genius and MIT graduate on probation for hacking into the Pentagon’s system; first appears in Death’s Rival when he and his brother, Eli, are hired by Jane to be her private team.
Leo Pellissier: Master of the City of New Orleans and a large portion of the Southeastern United States, shoulder-length black hair, black eyes; binds Jane to him through blood in Death’s Rival, for his own purposes. Later, by accident, he binds Beast while trying to save Jane’s life when she is shot and dying; first appears in the story “Cat Tats,” first book, Skinwalker.
Lincoln Shaddock: Asheville Blood Master vampire who petitions for Master of the City status in Raven Cursed; some of his scions have come out of devoveo much earlier than the usual time, the most recent taking just two years; is spelled and used by Evangelina Everhart throughout Raven Cursed.
Misha: a woman, now a reporter, who was in the children’s home with Jane; first appears in Blood Trade, when she was captured because of her magical abilities.
Molly Trueblood: Jane’s best friend; earth-witch, curly red hair; first appears in the story “Kits,” first book, Skinwalker.
Reach: computer expert and hacker who can find just about anything; first appears in Mercy Blade, though we never see him physically.
Rick LaFleur: Black hair, Cajun, six feet tall; in a relationship with Jane at the end of Skinwalker; at the beginning of Mercy Blade, this relationship is cut short because of his undercover work that leads to his being bitten by Safia, a wereleopard; first appears in the story “Cat Tats,” first book, Skinwalker.
Jodi Richoux: New Orleans Police Department detective, in charge of the supernatural crime unit, blond; her mother is a witch; her aunt was a witch and a cop; first appears in Skinwalker.
Sabina: Mithran Outclan priestess, wears a nun’s habit, pale skin with dark eyebrows and eyes; first appears in Skinwalker. Sabina is the keeper of a sliver of the item that made the Mithrans.
Safia: wereleopard mate to Kemnebi; first appears in Mercy Blade; killed by the grindylow in Mercy Blade for biting and infecting Rick LaFleur in an attempt to turn him.
Soul: Rick’s mentor and supervisor in PsyLED; looks human but isn’t, though no one (other than her supervisor) seems to know what she is, exotic-looking; first appears in the story “Golden Delicious,” but plays a significant role in Blood Trade.
Sylvia Turpin: Adams County sheriff (Natchez area), brilliant blue eyes, fair skin, and dark red hair; starts a relationship with Eli Younger; first appears in Blood Trade.
Tom/Troll: Rick’s “uncle”, Katie’s blood-servant who runs her household at Katie’s Ladies and has been with her for seventy-nine years, bald and muscular; first appears in Skinwalker; distant relative of Rick LaFleur.
Wrassler: Security guard at the clan council house; first appears in Blood Cross under the Jane-given moniker WWF.
First Sight
By Faith Hunter
Faith’s note: I love seeing Jane from the point of view of other characters. It is refreshing and often eye-opening. Bruiser is a huge fan favorite, and about half of the romance readers want Jane to end up with him and about half want her to end up with Ricky Bo. While I’ve written stories from Rick’s POV before, I’ve never written one from Bruiser’s, and decided to try my hand at it in a scene stolen and reworked from Skinwalker. I discovered a lot about Bruiser. And I like him a lot better than I expected. I hope you enjoy.
I wasn’t fond of doors without peepholes, which was surely quite telling about my age. I also found it difficult to remember security cameras were everywhere, even over the door to Katie’s Ladies. I resisted the urge to look up and wink at the camera, as Katie herself was unlikely to be watching the security display screens and I had no desire to flirt with Tom, her muscle.
The door opened and . . . everything changed. A woman—an Amazon—stood there, needle-thin, muscled, balanced, and ready, dressed in jeans and leather, black braids to her bum, a gun held low at her side, and a glowing cross in her other hand. I was inhaling when the door opened and I caught her scent. All I could think was predator. Without thought, training and muscle memory pulling me forward into the moves, I drew a knife and attacked.
She sidestepped fast—faster than human—and stuck out a foot. I tripped over it. Felt myself falling forward, prey to the oldest trick in the book. I cursed under my breath as she landed on me, riding me down. We hit and I could hear her heart pounding. She growled. We bounced, me on bottom, her knee landing against my spine just as Leo’s weight fell onto us.
We had practiced this move hundreds of times and I knew his hands would already be at her throat, but her braids tangled around them. Leo sucked in a breath, his fangs extending with a soft snap. They brushed the side of her neck, his killing bite coming down.
But she rammed back her head and connected, her skull hitting something softer. I heard his oof of expelled breath, followed by a faint sound of movement as of cloth on cloth. And I smelled the scent of burning flesh, remembering only then the cross in her hand. Silver. Glowing.
Leo howled and his weight fell away. The woman rolled, pulling me with her in a move that was both balletic and vicious, until we lay on the floor, her gun at my neck, my body on top of, and protecting, her. The
reek of my sweat and hers and vamp pheromones bathed the air. She smelled of blood and exhaust and sex and—
“I’ll shoot your blood-servant if you move again,” she said to Leo, her voice low and cold. My master paused and went quiet, that undead shift from combat to utter stillness that had once been so startling and was now so telling. He believed her, and after centuries of human and nonhuman responses, he would know if she was speaking the truth. “If you listen, I’ll let him live,” she bargained.
Leo’s stillness went deeper. Without giving myself away, I tried to gather myself, but her clawed hand dug into my windpipe. The woman shoved the muzzle hard under my ear, and I realized that if she had wanted us dead, we’d already be dead.
I should have beaten her, no matter the surprise, and I swore hard, under my breath. I’d gotten lazy sparring with humans and other blood-servants. I needed to fight for real, and fight Mithrans, not slower beings.
“If you resist,” she said to me, “I’ll rip out your throat, then behead your master. Pick and choose.” A shocked silence filled the foyer. Slowly, I went limp. “Wise move,” she said.
“Leonard Pellissier, I’m Katie’s out-of-town talent,” she said, in an indefinable Southern accent, “I’m the tracker and hired gun the council contracted to take out the rogue. I don’t want to kill either of you, but I will if I have to. The blood you smell was not spilled by me. I am not your enemy. Back. Off.”
Leo backed, making a deliberate boot-scuff so I would know. She tightened her grip on my throat and I was having trouble getting a breath. “You gonna play nice?” she asked me.
I tried to swallow under the pressure of her hand, and when I spoke, the sound came out in a whistle from the pressure on my windpipe. “Yes.” She sniffed at my ear, which was quite suddenly, unexpectedly erotic. Her scent filled my nose, smelling of sex and need and desire. I felt her breasts against my body and I hardened. She released her hold. Damn woman. Laughter, a reaction neither of lust nor of combat, rolled up in my chest, and I forced it back. The woman I now knew was Jane Yellowrock had terrible timing.
