by Faith Hunter
“Okay. So I’ve got, like, three months to learn what the rest of them will have studied for centuries.” I handed the short blade back to Leo. I figured one at a time was smart, and the unfamiliar one first was smarter. “What are the rules?”
“Other than proper etiquette, there are few rules,” Gee said, his blade slowing. “One may fight with one blade or two, though two is more common. And most formal challenges are to first blood, though some few are to true-death. Deception and duplicity are looked upon with approval, as La Destreza—as the Mithrans practice it—is as much a mental game as a physical one.”
“Sooo.” I thought as I watched him dance with the sword, knowing I’d never get a cut through the circling blade. “Cheating is acceptable.”
“Indeed. One may—”
Two-fingered, I pulled a throwing knife and flipped it at him. For once, I hit what I was aiming at. The steel blade embedded itself into Gee DiMercy’s chest, slightly left of where a human’s heart would be. If he had a heart.
Just like the last time I stabbed him, light sparkled out, downy blue mist, soft and bright. The mist had weight and texture. A blast of heat followed, stinking of cauterized blood and burned evergreen. Charred jasmine. Unlike the last time I stabbed him, when Gee had been asleep, no dark bloodred wings unfurled. I didn’t get a glimpse of a dark-sapphire-feathered beast with crimson breast and wings, claws like spear points, glinting at wing tips and feet. His blood, trapped by the cloth of his gi, didn’t splatter like liquid flowers, perfume like rainbows hitting the ground. No sparks shot up where the blossoms landed. There was none of that. But the air around his body flashed a faint shade of blue for a splintered moment. Had I not been watching so closely, I would have missed it.
The mist retreated, fast as a flinch, and the punch of power snapped at me, electric and solid. It hurt, even though I was farther away this time, and was expecting the reaction. I felt/heard a sharp, sizzling hiss. If he’d been human, I might have killed him. But he wasn’t. Gee was something else entirely. Whatever he was, the layers of glamour around him reacted negatively to steel. He had been expecting me this time. But he hadn’t expected exactly what he’d gotten.
“First blood. Cheating. With two blades,” I said. “Like that?”
“First blood to the Enforcer,” Leo said, his voice coming from the side, where the spectators sat, amusement in his voice. “Does our Enforcer’s methodology fit within the parameters of the rules of etiquette?”
Gee pulled the weapon from his flesh and his padded suit. With a flick of his wrist, he sent it back to me. Had Beast not been so close in my mind, I might have gotten stuck. Instead, I batted the flying claw out of the air and down to the ground. With the new blade. Gee chortled, delighted. “Excellent. You will learn quickly, my little goddess. Or not.”
Crap. I was gonna learn how to fight with swords. And I didn’t know whether Gee’s or not meant that I’d learn fast or not, or that I was his goddess or not. Either way, I was so in trouble.
Behind me I heard mocking laughter. Without turning, I said, “I’ll kick your butt for that one, Eli.”
“You can try,” my partner said, still taunting. “I’m just glad I’m not the part-time Enforcer. Somebody’s gonna be sore.”
• • •
I was taught the positions for my feet for the Spanish Circle and how to step into a lunge. I was not taught how to parry, which I guessed was a move for wusses. And once I halfway had the basic moves in my mind, if not in my muscle memory, I was slapped half to death with the flat, beat with the dulled edge, and stuck with the point of Gee’s sword. I was disarmed, tripped, elbowed, tapped numerous times—over a kidney from the back or into my gut from the front—light blows and shallow cuts that would have killed me had they been delivered with any intent. Gee made me pay for first blood with a host of bruises and a little blood when I turned wrong and his short sword caught my arm. Skinwalker blood added to the vamp stench of the room. Once upon a time that had bothered me. A lot. Now I had no reaction at all to the smell of my blood in a room full of vamps.
As soon as I was warmed up—his words, warmed up, more like sweating like a horse—we sparred. The next six hours were a blur. Okay, maybe not really six hours, but it felt like it. I was dripping with sweat when the sparring-practice session was over, and yes. I was sore.
Beast was elated. Beast likes long claw, she murmured to me. More.
“No more,” I gasped, wiping the sweat from my eyes. “I’m done.”
“Accepted,” Gee said, dropping his practice blades. “Tomorrow we will practice the same moves, study three more, and then spar for thirty minutes.”
“Yeah?” I brightened. “I can do thirty.”
“Excellent. Today you managed only twelve,” Gee said, swatting me one last time across my butt. Hard.
“Owww. What was that for?” I asked, rubbing my backside.
“For being so very out of shape.”
“Me! Bleeding and bruised all over, but not out of shape.” I pulled on my Beast and skinwalker magics, a small tug of gray energies, to help me get out the door. I am not out of shape.
Eli laughed. Evil man. But he took my weapons, which now weighed about forty pounds each, and carried them, along with my discarded leathers, toward the door. Out of shape? It had been a while since I lifted weights with the Youngers, but out of shape?
Just as we reached the hallway door, a prickle of danger danced along my skin, burning through the drying sweat on the damp, elastic fabric of my clothing. I stepped in front of Eli and grabbed the long sword from his lax grip. “Gun,” I whispered.
He didn’t argue or ask questions. He slapped a nine-mil into my hand and pulled his own weapons as I whipped my eyes across the gym. People were everywhere, three pairs on the sparring mats, Leo and Gee together, Grégoire and Bruiser together, Del and a young vamp named Liam, all with blades, sparring. What I was feeling wasn’t coming from them.
“What?” Eli asked, his voice dropping low, his body tightening all over, the way an animal pulls inward just before the pounce.
Heat and light danced into the room, tingling on my skin. My body flooded with adrenaline, my eyes darting everywhere at once. Something was coming. Coming fast. “Magic!” I shouted. “Leo! Gee! Bruiser! Beware!”
There was a glint across the room, a glistening brilliance, yet no one looked up. At the back door, the light-being flowed through and into the room, snaking along the ceiling, a sparkling hint of rainbows and shadow. I pointed. “Lillilend,” I said.
Eli grunted, not disagreeing, but not able to see it in the gray place of the change where energy and matter might be the same thing. Moving as one, we dashed back toward the center of the room. Eli holstered his gun and pulled blades. I realized he was right. You can’t shoot something made of light. Or you could, the same way you could aim and pull the trigger at the sun. But you weren’t gonna do it any damage.
I wasn’t sure what good blades would do either, but between one step and the next, I shoved the useless gun into my waistband and accepted a vamp-killer from my always-armed second, fourteen inches of silver-plated, razor-edged steel to back up the practice weapon’s blunted steel. Most magical beings had an aversion to some sort of metal, and I thought the lillilend’s metal allergy was to steel.
The lillilend sped around the room, fast as an eyeblink, its body tight against the ceiling, hissing with anger. Eli released the useless bundle of my leathers and leaped over the pile it made without breaking stride.
Just ahead, the sparring partners raised weapons and bladed their bodies as if we were the danger. “Above!” I shouted, pointing.
Overhead, the light-being whipped around the vents and fixtures, wings spread, like something Disney might have envisioned if he’d taken a dose of LSD, backed up with a serving of psilocybin mushrooms, and a quart of tequila. It flashed into the visible range, a rippling of light and shadow, with human-shaped head, rows of shark teeth that glinted like pearls, transparent wi
ngs in all the colors of the rainbow, and a frill around its head in copper, brown, and pale white. Its body was vaguely snakelike, with iridescent scales the color of tinted glass and thick smoke and hints of copper. It smelled like green herbs burning over hot coals and the tang of fish and water plants. The thought came out of nowhere—Dragon of Light . . .
It dove. Snapped at Leo. He raised his weapons, executing one of the whirling moves Gee had used, his sword whipping and stabbing. Beside him, Gee stood still, his eyes and mouth open wide, his blades lowered, pointing at the floor. The lillilend dodged Leo’s whirling blades as if they were stuck in park and bared its fangs. It struck. Biting down on Gee, fangs entering front and back across his left shoulder. Bruiser raced in, ramming the stunned Mercy Blade to the floor. The light-dragon released him and the small man landed on one knee, dropping his swords, still staring up. I caught a glimpse of his face in something like reverence or awe, his eyes a luminous blue with a funky, oily shimmer that moved, like heat rising. And blood on his chest that appeared iridescent, not red. Almost faster than I could follow, the magic light-thing reared back and dodged in again, this time extending a black tongue and flicking it at Gee. Tasting his blood.
At vamp speed, Bruiser and Leo went back-to-back, standing over Gee, as if they’d fought this way before, many times. Their blades sang and cut in perfect synchrony, holding the creature away.
“Jane,” Bruiser shouted. “Do it! Change!”
For a span of heartbeats I had no idea what he meant; then I remembered. Bruiser had fought the light-dragon, or one similar to it, once before. In the gray place of the change, as I—as Beast—ran away. It was one of many things we hadn’t talked about.
I pulled on Beast and she shoved me aside, sliding down my arms and legs in a move that was painful beyond anything I could remember, my flesh feeling as if it had turned inside out and spat my bones to the floor. So fast. A burning-cutting-boiling pain arced into the air, stole my breath, and shredded my skin. Eli yelped and leaped away. I screamed, the half-human, half-cat scream splitting the air. Everything around me slowed to a crawl as the gray of my skinwalker magics erupted from inside me. This was the battle timing that many soldiers report, where their senses go into overdrive and everything happens with an intensity and speed that isn’t part of the normal human experience.
My arms sprouted tawny pelt; my fingers flashed with pain as they altered shape and claws pierced through the tips. Beast claws. My head whipped back, my face exploding outward, bones cracking.
A gray haze of energies whipped around me like a burning wind, a storm of power, just like the phase of unreality that the dragon operated in; blue and green and black motes of power swirled hotly in the place of the change. And I realized that I didn’t enter the gray place—it originated from inside me. Had I noticed that before? The thought and the questions melted in the face of my agony. And then it was gone. But the light-dragon was looking at me, meeting my eyes, as if it saw me fully for the first time.
I stepped toward Bruiser, time still slightly out of sync. But moving through it all, the light-creature dodged me, dodged Bruiser, whipping so fast it was a rush of light and shadow, all teeth and snakelike tongue and spattered rainbows.
Time slammed back onto me, though I was still close to the gray energies, cold on my skin. Leo stabbed the creature, a single hard thrust, up through its belly, angled toward its head, his feet following as the thing rippled and tried to lash away.
Gee, still bleeding, fell to his backside, legs sprawled. In the same instant, Leo stabbed directly overhead with his short sword, into the creature’s side, both blades buried in it. Something like liquid glass flooded down over Leo, and he murmured words that sounded like, “Lepree lumyear. Larcencel. Larcencel.”
Faster than my eyes could follow, even in the gray place of the change, the creature curled back on itself, descended onto Leo, mouth open, teeth flashing. Striking. Biting. I could smell Leo’s blood and something bitter as ashes and horehound ground together.
Leo went limp. I darted forward, Bruiser stepping into my magics, a shocking wash of electricity that burned my skin and prickled across my scalp, hot as flaming cactus. Together, we stabbed up at the thing. It released Leo, snapping jaws and clacking teeth. The creature shot up to the roof. Around us, everyone, everything, flowed into a blur, speeding up, or perhaps we sped up, our time matching with the time and the speed of the thing overhead.
As if we were suddenly the only things visible to it, the light-being focused on us, its eyes flashing like light through a stained-glass window. It curled tightly, its tail lashing into a coil, its wings snapping into a half furl. I slammed my back to Bruiser’s, standing as he and Leo had stood only moments before. The thing dove at us.
Around us, everything vanished and we stood in the gray place of energy, Bruiser, the creature, and me. I screamed again, the sound more cat now than human. My toes dug into a mat beneath us, nails piercing the rubber.
Bruiser slid into the movements of La Destreza. My shoulders were against his, my backside just below his. My sword shadowed his; my feet mirrored his, following his lead. The swordplay was easy now, as Beast shared her power, her strength, and Bruiser led the way into the Spanish Circle of flashing, stabbing swords. A dance. I had always loved dancing with Bruiser.
Our blades connected with the creature. Bruiser’s sword, sharp, not the blunted sword I had been given, sliced it, slashing up through its scaled hide, along its side, lifting as he rose to his toes. Light blasted out of the wound. More of the liquid glass spurted toward us, but the gray energies of the change repelled it, and it slid away, to puddle on the floor.
Pulling on Beast’s strength, I rammed my blunt sword point up, beside Bruiser’s, into the glare of light, through the scales of the light-dragon.
The creature screamed. It arched high and thrashed its tail. From the corner of my eye, I saw a wash of light and darkness. Heard a pop of displaced air, the sound a vamp makes when it rushes from one place to another. It was Bethany, red dress swirling around her legs, vamped out. She was scary in human guise; terrifying vamped out. She screamed words from a language I had never heard and leaped into the air. Her magics shot out and surrounded the creature like a net of power. She wrapped her arms around the light-dragon and latched on, as if to ride it.
The dragon-creature pulled itself free of our weapons. It knotted into a coil again, bucked to remove Bethany, who held on tighter. It flapped its wings once, and dove away, crashing through the closed door at the back of the practice room, breaking it into splinters as if the dragon was more than light.
And suddenly it was gone. Bethany landed on the floor and bounded back up. She raced to Bruiser’s side and ran her hands up and down his body. Then she disappeared again with that little pop of air. I growled, the vibration filling the air in the gray place of the change with warning.
For a moment, Bruiser and I leaned against each other, our backs supporting our weight. Moving slowly, he stood and stepped away, pulling himself out of the gray energies that surrounded me, stepping with a shudder that looked like he’d been tased. Bruiser was breathing hard, dripping with sweat.
I/we sniffed him to check his health, nostrils spreading and puffing. Bruiser dropped to his knees near me, his image flickering and smudged on the other side of my magics. I/we watched him, waiting, not knowing what to do. He breathed, his motions smoother. He looked up at me and his mouth moved. “Jane. Come back.”
I/we stared at him, brow furrowed, not understanding. He pointed at my hands. “Come back.”
I/we looked down and saw my hands, still holding the weapons. My wrists, hands, and fingers were pelted and tawny, my knuckles large and rounded, stronger than anything human, nails curled and sharp. Looked lower and saw pelted and clawed feet, paw-like, except that they were far larger than Beast’s—six inches across, claws extended and gripping the wood floor. Splinters came up around my Beast toes. Rubber gobbets from the practice mat littered the floo
r around me. I pulled into myself with an electric snap that tingled through me, and felt myself separate from Beast at some mental, almost spiritual level.
I dropped the practice sword and the vamp-killer and touched my face. The lower half of my face was outthrust. I had fangs, like small tusks at both my upper and lower jaw. My forehead and nose were human, or humanish. The pads of my fingers were thick and it was hard to feel, but I was pelted all over my face and down my neck. I pulled out my shirt and looked down. The pelt paled to cream and ended just above my breasts and my slim waist of solid muscle. The pelt ran down under my arms and across my shoulders, all the way to my fingers. I bent to my pants and pulled the ankles up. Pelt as far as I could pull the spandex. Bulky cat feet with huge knees and thighs. No way was I looking into my waistband. Crap. I was half-formed. Half Beast and half me. Without a mass change, my weight had been redistributed, my body cast in horror-movie mode.
But at least I was starting to think again, starting to think like a human, not the half-and-half I’d become. The first fully coherent thought was, I’m a monster. I managed a sound that might have been chuffing laughter. Even in the Party City of the South, I couldn’t go outside without a mask or a deep hood to hide behind. I’d scare the locals.
Close to the front of my mind I heard Beast rumble, Jane and big-cat are more than Jane and big-cat. I/we are Beast.
She sounded contented and determined and satisfied. As if she wanted to stay this way. And I had no idea what to do about that.
CHAPTER 8
You Want Me to . . . Wash Your Back?
What strength and energy I had left drained out in a rush and I landed on my knees on the ruined floor. Houston, I thought. We have a problem.
What is Houston? Beast thought at me.
Never mind. Are we stuck like this? Last time it went away naturally. And fast. But it’s worse this time. It feels . . . I don’t know. Permanent?
Jane likes half-Beast form. Jane hurt light-predator-snake-that-flies.
