“I’m sure a lot of people would say the same thing; and that’s the problem isn’t it? Not even Renee can believe I want to be mated to her.”
“I’m sure you’ll find a way to convince her. You can be very charming when you set your mind to it,” Katerina assured me.
“I don’t think charm alone will do the trick, but I have some ideas that might help. How are things going for the tournament?”
“Everything is in place for the banquet tonight and almost everything is ready for the tournament itself. I did want you to take a look at the playing field for the marksmanship finale however,” she replied handing me a smooth rectangular stone the size of a domino with a hole in one end and runes etched on both sides.
I took the stone and turned it over carefully examining the runes. It was similar to the stones I had attached to a ring in my pocket and the hundreds like them that I kept locked up in my apartment. Sorcerers often used stones like this one to prepare spells ahead of time. A few whispered words could then trigger the spells. Depending on the strength and skill of the sorcerer creating the stones, the spells they contained could be cast multiple times, or in my case an infinite number of times.
My father practiced, and taught me how to wield, a mixture of human and Druid magic that he liked to call self-sustaining magic. Every spell I cast is designed to draw energy from the environment and channel it back into the spell to either keep it running or recharge it for the next time I need to use it. It’s a form of magic that very few people alive know is possible, and even fewer would be able to pull off.
Based on the runes covering its surface and the magical energy I felt emanating from the stone in my hand, I whispered the ancient words most likely to trigger its spell. All around us trees sprouted from the ground and the sandy floor of the fight arena was replaced with fallen leaves and twigs, but before the transformation was even complete, I knew exactly why Katerina wanted me to see this.
“Did your new sorcerer Grayson create this stone?” I asked Katerina.
“Yes. He really did do his best, but there seems to be something missing.”
I snorted, glancing around. “There’s actually a lot missing. This spell only contains the visual elements of a forest, and what’s here isn’t very creative at all. Is there any way you could get him out here so I can help him make some modifications to the spell?”
“Sure,” she replied pulling out her cell phone.
When she was finished making the call I conjured up a couple of chairs and invited her to have a seat.
“It must be nice to have comfortable recliners at your fingertips wherever you may go,” Katerina commented as she pressed the button to recline her chair.
“It doesn’t suck,” I replied, kicking back my own chair. “So how many other sorcerers are participating in the tournament this year?”
“We’re only letting the top five sorcerers compete in the tournament and the dance club transformations this year. The rest of the sorcerers can show off their skills and wow the crowds at the fair between tournament events if they like.”
“Who made the top five?”
“You of course, Merek the Irish wolf, Chen the Asian dragon, Hannibal the Alaskan bear and... Sergio the Italian scum.” The final name was spat as if she almost couldn’t bring herself to say it.
Sergio was Travali’s sorcerer; the one who cast the spell during The Great War that put our beasts to sleep for more than four hundred years. If the red flames glowing in Katerina’s eyes were any indication, she wouldn’t be forgiving the sorcerer for his past deeds anytime soon. Since almost everyone invited to the tournament would feel the same way, I had to wonder, “Why would Danarius bring him here?”
“I’ve wondered that myself, but then, I still don’t see why we’re letting any of those filthy bloodsuckers come here.”
We all had reasons to hate Travali’s vampires but perhaps Katerina had more than most.
“Katerina, Danarius is not Travali and though I still wouldn’t trust him to guard my back, I do think he sincerely wants peace between our people.”
“If it was only Danarius, that would be one thing, but nothing says the vampires under his control want peace. They followed Travali for centuries and many of the ones who attacked our homelands are still alive and kicking, living it up in New Orleans as we speak.”
I shrugged. “That’s true, but consider this: Travali never had any control over us, not even the unfortunate souls he sired himself, because somehow our beasts always protected our minds even in their sleep. None of the vampires in New Orleans were that lucky, not even Danarius. He was Travali’s unwilling puppet for centuries. He could have broken Travali’s psychic leash if he’d been willing to forgo fresh blood, but he chose not to sell his soul. Honestly, I can’t blame him for that, but I’m not sure I would have lasted as long as he did under Travali’s control.
Now think about all the other vampires in New Orleans and compare their psychic strength to that of Danarius. Most, if not all of them, have gone without fresh blood at one time or another, yet none of them can even compete with Danarius psychically. What if they were also unwilling participants in Travali’s plans?”
“Do you really believe none of them wanted to follow Travali?”
“No. I believe that’s true for some, but not all of them. That may be exactly why Danarius wants to bring his people to this tournament. When he’d finally had enough of Travali, he found a way to lead us right to his back door, which of course allowed Dragon to finish the bastard off once and for all. I’m sure some of Travali’s faithful servants would like to see Danarius pay for turning on their Master. Maybe he thinks we’ll take out some of those vampires before they can pose a real threat to his new position as Master of the New Orleans vampires. And who knows, maybe the sorcerer falls into that category as well.
I could be way off of course, but it seems like an easy way for Danarius to get rid of his enemies without getting his hands dirty. After all, there’s always a death or two at these tournaments, and that’s when we only invite our allies. Imagine what could happen this year with Danarius and his vampires in the mix.”
“How can you be so rational and even tempered about all this?” Katerina asked clenching her fists at her sides. She wouldn’t normally let her emotions show like that, but we were alone and she knew she could trust me not to see it as a loss of control or a weakness. “Just the thought of Travali, or anyone associated with him makes me see red. I can handle Danarius because he wasn’t alive during The Great War and he helped us get to Travali, but I can barely think straight when it comes to the rest of them. Yet here you sit, logically breaking down their behavior and possible motives.”
“My father taught me well.” I smiled sadly remembering the man who meant the world to me. “He always said I should get to know my enemies, then prepare for the worst and hope for the best. To do that, he taught me to be patient, to watch and listen and to suppress the urge to lash out when I’m angry.
He often told me that he loved shapeshifters, my mother and me in particular, but he believed that too many of them rushed into battle unprepared, driven by their emotions. He’d already lost my older brother Ezekiel to what he called senseless violence, so when I came along he packed up his family and moved far away from the clans and any other shapeshifters.
If it hadn’t been for The Great War, we never would have returned to the clans. My mother missed her people, the foxes have always been a tight knit group, but she understood why my father wanted to raise me away from the violence. Yet even he couldn’t deny the call for aid when it came. He told me once that he had no regrets, not even after we lost my mother in battle. That was why he stayed with the clans after the war and helped them rebuild while he taught me everything he knew about magic.”
“Sometimes I still miss your father even after all these years.” Katerina sighed wistfully, the tension and anger starting to drain out of her. “It’s a shame he wouldn’t let you sire him be
fore he died.”
“At that time, most of us still thought all vampires were evil.” I shrugged, going for a nonchalance I didn’t really feel. “There wasn’t any gray area like there is now. Besides, he passed fifty years after he lost my mother and he was looking forward to seeing her in the afterlife.”
“I don’t remember a lot about the war, I was simply too young, but I’ve been told your father refused to let you get anywhere near Sergio. Why was that; did he think you wouldn’t be able to defeat him?”
“He always gave me vague explanations when I asked why he wanted me to stay away from Sergio,” I replied drumming my fingers on the arms of the chair, old frustrations rising to the surface. “Then right before he died he finally confided in me, and he told me that Sergio was his apprentice a few decades before I was born.”
Katerina gasped, “No... That can’t be.”
I nodded. “That was my initial reaction as well, but it’s true. I think my father would’ve taken his secret to the grave but he didn’t want me to be caught unawares. The magic we practice is very rare, so I wouldn’t usually be prepared to defend against it. If I had faced Sergio without knowing my father trained him, it could have been disastrous. As it is, knowing the basis of my magic would give him an advantage against me that none of the other sorcerers would have.”
She sat forward obviously considering the implications of this information. “Would you be worried if you had to face him in magical combat?”
“Not worried per se, but cautious. Was he one of the sorcerers who tried to reopen the portal last night?”
Her lip curled with disgust. “No, he hasn’t arrived yet.”
Nodding, I said, “That’s what I thought. I’d be willing to bet if he couldn’t break the lock I had on the portal he would have at least known where to start unlike the other sorcerers.”
“He’s that good?”
“It’s not a matter of being good; it’s a matter of knowledge. The spell I used was a modified version of a spell my father taught me. Since my father trained Sergio, he would have recognized the basis for the spell. Could he have figured out what I added to the spell? That’s anyone’s guess. The other sorcerers simply had no clue where to start, so they had no hope of undoing what I’d done. Because of the years he spent training with my father, I would have to be very creative to best Sergio in magical combat.”
Katerina chuckled. “Well it’s never been said that you’re not creative. As a matter of fact, I could name quite a few women who would probably say you’re the most creative man they’ve ever met.”
Smiling, I said, “I’m sure you could, but all that’s over for me now. Renee is the only woman in my life.”
“She always has been Solomon,” Katerina told me seriously. “You may have shared your body with hundreds of women, but even they knew there was only one woman who has ever touched your heart.”
I sat up, pressing the footrest back into the front of the chair and turned to face Katerina with my forearms resting on my thighs. “If you could see that, and they could see that, then why couldn’t Renee see that?”
“Despite her feisty personality, deep down she’s very insecure - at least when it comes to men. When she looks at herself in a mirror, she sees a short, thin girl with small breasts and narrow hips. I know she was twenty-three when you changed her over, but her appearance is that of a sixteen-year-old girl. She can’t believe that grown men would be interested in her, especially in our world where the majority of women have long legs and more than ample curves.”
“But she’s beautiful,” I said running my hands through my hair with frustration. “I’ve told her that at least a hundred thousand times. Why can’t she believe it?”
“Maybe because you haven’t shown her that she’s beautiful. You can’t tell a woman she’s beautiful and then aggressively pursue every woman you meet except for her and expect her to believe you.”
“That was just sex; it didn’t mean anything beyond a few moments of pleasure. The relationship I have with her means so much more to me, and I thought she would see the difference.”
Katerina smiled a little sadly. “It’s the human in her Solomon. We see what she means to you because we try to keep emotion out of sex. To us, it was obvious why you never pushed her very hard for a physical relationship, but she’s still human deep down and to many of them, sex has meaning beyond the pleasure. By giving your body to so many women without really going after her, you negated every word you ever said to her about beauty or romantic feelings.”
I sighed knowing she was right. Why hadn’t I ever looked at our relationship from Renee’s point of view? “This would be so much easier to fix if that damn spell wasn’t interfering with the bond. If she could just feel what she means to me she’d understand that she’s always been the only woman for me.”
Katerina raised an eyebrow. “Wouldn’t that be too easy? Maybe this is karma coming back to haunt you for being so oblivious to her feelings. Now you’ll have to make amends and in the process hopefully show her how beautiful she is inside and out.”
Grinning I said, “Now who’s being rational and even tempered?”
“I have my moments,” Katerina replied, smiling brightly.
A few moments later Grayson arrived and I was surprised because at six-four with darkly tanned skin and long black hair he had to be a time demon. I’d never heard of a time demon with magical abilities, but then, anything was possible. Once the introductions were out of the way, Katerina left us to get better acquainted. We sat down in the recliners and I asked him to tell me a little about himself. I wanted to get a feel for what kind of man he was before I offered to teach him anything about magic.
Grayson told me that his family moved around a lot but for the most part, they lived in rural towns and avoided other supernaturals. He was only about a hundred years old, making him barely an adult by supernatural standards. His mother was a sorceress but a group of vampires in Eastern Europe killed her several decades ago. After her death, he traveled with his father, a time demon, until his death a few years ago. His father was an unfortunate victim of the corrupt time demon Elders that Rook recently removed from office. He went on to tell me a little about his magical training and what he’d been doing since his father’s death.
Grayson’s story turned out to be so much like my own, that by the time he was finished telling it I offered to take him on as my apprentice. I’d never had an apprentice before, but I knew what he was going through having lost my parents around the same age as him. Unlike him though, I’d had the clans to take me in. He’d had no one since time demons for the most part avoided other time demons. Their powers had a tendency to compete with those of other time demons whenever they were nearby. His mother’s people were human and died out centuries ago just like my father’s. He’d been dodging some of the more predatory supernatural groups for a few years and viewed the sanctuary Supernova provided as his last hope for a peaceful existence.
“How can you offer to take me on as your apprentice after one short conversation? Aren’t you afraid I might take what I learn from you and use it for evil?” Grayson asked, his brows drawn together.
“Will you?” I asked him seriously.
“No, never,” was his instant reply.
I nodded. “My instincts tell me to trust you, but I can’t rely on them alone. You’ll have to swear a blood oath if you choose to be my apprentice. You won’t be able to share anything I teach you without suffering dire consequences.”
“What if I have children someday and want to pass on my knowledge?”
“I can’t make any promises, but if you prove yourself and your loyalty, perhaps one day I’ll release you from your oaths. Until then, magic is simply too dangerous for me to take any chances.”
“I understand, and I would be honored to be your apprentice. My mother spoke very highly of your father and often said he’d be proud of the man you’ve become.”
“How did your mother know my fath
er?” I asked, surprised to hear his mother had known my father.
Grayson shrugged. “She said they grew up in the same village, but she hadn’t seen him since they were both very young.”
I stood up and fished my ring of runic stones out of my pocket. After carefully removing the correct stone, I held out my hand. I had to confirm my suspicions before I let myself get too excited. “Take this and hold it in your hand.”
He hesitated for a moment then stood and stretched his arm out towards me. I dropped the runic stone in his open palm and asked him to repeat a spell. He did as I asked and we were immediately transported to an ancient altar.
“Where are we?” he asked glancing around at the overgrown trees and vines surrounding us. Nearby, there was a stone slab resting atop three narrow rocks that were jutting out of the ground like pillars.
“Our ancestors used this altar to cast protection spells over the entire village. Only someone with our blood and our magic can come here.”
“What are you saying Solomon?”
“I’m saying we share the same blood. We may not be brothers, but somewhere in our family histories, our bloodlines intersect. If they didn’t you wouldn’t have been able to bring us here.”
“I didn’t think I had any family left.”
“I didn’t either,” I said grinning at his bemused expression. “At least not on my father’s side. Will you swear your blood oath to me here, at this altar built by our ancestors?”
His black eyes met mine then he nodded. I produced a small dagger, which I used to cut a deep gash in my hand and then another one across Grayson’s palm. We clasped our hands together and I whispered the ancient words that would bind his soul to my will. If he did anything to betray me, I could literally will him to die. His fate was sealed when he repeated the spell and vowed his loyalty to me.
“The spell should prevent you from divulging anything you learn from me or from using it against me or my people, but if you somehow find a way to get around the spell, I’ll know and you won’t have time to regret it,” I promised, releasing his hand. The virus in my blood had already healed the wounds on both our hands.
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