"Okay," Frog said, "We've been over the basic procedure. Sara will handle the ritual space itself, and Ardeth will read the incantation."
The Elf nodded, removing his sword belt and resting it on a covered section of ground near the altar Frog had set up. Elves as a rule didn't bear arms in sacred space. "I am ready."
Sara moved up beside Ardeth at the altar and looked down at the black-covered tablecloth, taking a deep breath. Fairly standard ritual implements—the Elvish book, candles, charcoal and an impressive jar of frankincense, and a slab of oak carved with elaborate symbols from the text. Frog and Ardeth had created the carving, performing the appropriate incantations; luckily the ritual didn't depend on astrological timing or the lunar cycle, so they could do it tonight and not lose any more time.
She reached into her coat and removed a double-bladed dagger in a leather sheath, one of the few magical tools she had escaped from Dallas with, representative of her will as a Witch, and a channel for the energy she'd have to raise to protect the area. They were about to make Jason very, very vulnerable, and she wouldn't be satisfied until she knew there were sufficient shields up around the shelter.
Sara laid her blade on the altar, and Frog came over and added two more items: a test tube and a pocketknife. Sara swallowed when she saw the tube; it was filled with deep ruby liquid and labeled precisely.
Elven magic rarely used blood, but this was different. They were invoking something so old and elemental that it predated both mortal and immortal races alike. Blood was the only fitting catalyst.
"Do you have the bracelet?" Frog asked, turning to Jason.
The vampire held up his closed hand.
"All right, then. Sara?"
Sara drew the dagger from its sheath. "Ready."
Ardeth stepped forward to the altar and began to read from the text as Sara grounded herself, drawing energy up through the earth into the soles of her feet, letting it travel up through her body. She greeted the land, and it acknowledged her return with something like a smile.
Sara could cast a ritual circle in her sleep; she'd been doing it for years. She made her way around the shelter, moving power along her arm and out through the tip of the blade, creating a barrier of shimmering smoke-like energy that would keep unwanted influences out but allow them to do what they needed to do. Ardeth's low, gentle voice rose and fell like a Gregorian monk's, buoying her consciousness beyond ordinary thought. She was no longer aware of the rain, or the cold, or the mud; she knew only the magic and the eternity of the present.
She tested the border and found it true, then returned to the altar, sheathing her blade. Ardeth gave her a politely impressed look and bowed slightly, a gesture she returned. He favored her with a smile that normally would have warmed her all the way to her toes, but she was too intent on their work to think about it.
Beck and Frog had withdrawn to the back corners of the shelter where they could keep an eye on the proceedings without being in the way. Ardeth beckoned Jason closer, and she saw the vampire struggling, for a beat, with what felt like an instinctive fear of the spiritual overtones of all of this. She knew he was an atheist, or at least claimed to be—but he wanted answers, and if the sacred knowledge of the Elves was the only way to get it, so be it.
Ardeth added more incense to the smoking charcoal, sending a billowing cloud of heady scent through the circle that danced in and out of the candlelight. He continued with the reading, and Sara knew basically what he was saying—blood called to blood, and soul called to soul, and they had come to call, beyond the Veil, beyond life and death into the very heart of all that was, to find the one they'd lost.
He picked up the pocketknife with one hand and took Jason's wrist in the other, and with a quick, expert stroke, made a two-inch slash in the vampire's arm. Sara watched, morbidly fascinated, as berry-bright blood welled up and dripped onto the charcoal.
She'd never smelled burning blood before, and hoped to god she never would again after tonight.
The cut closed almost as soon as the blood had fallen; she wondered briefly if he had any control over the speed of his healing, or if it was luck that it had stayed open long enough.
Ardeth opened the vial of Rowan's blood and reverently let a few drops fall where Jason's had. He finished the last lines of the text and closed the book, then stepped back. Sara followed suit.
For a moment she was sure nothing was going to happen, but then something in the air changed, a subtle quality she knew the others—with the possible exception of Frog—could feel against their minds. Sara could feel it rising from the charcoal, carried on the incense smoke; she couldn't name it, or even describe it, except…it felt like…like…
She heard a gasp and spun around toward Jason just in time to see him sink to his knees, paler than she'd ever seen him, eyes wide with shock and fear. He made a noise as if someone had punched him in the stomach, and both his hands clenched against his chest, the glint of silver showing between his fingers. Sara felt the energy of the spell moving through the air, surrounding him, settling over him, and to her psychic senses his aura changed color and texture like they'd been violently shaken.
He groaned and pitched forward, catching himself with one hand, his entire body gripped in the vise of energy that forced its way into him, cracking through his shielding. Sara was hit with alternating waves of Jason's energy—chaotic with agony and near to screaming—and the spell's, and she fell backwards under the onslaught, missing the altar by inches. She would have hit the ground if Ardeth hadn't seized her shoulders and pulled her back against his chest, twisting halfway to protect her with his body.
Sara heard Beck shout something, and Frog tell her to stay back, but Sara couldn't look away from Jason as the spell sucked power from him, fueling its quest, shooting up through the shelter's ceiling and…wherever. The hairs on her arms stood up and there was a roaring in her ears, thunder and magic hitting simultaneously, shaking the entire universe, and someone was screaming, but she didn't know who, and it was killing him, she knew it, draining him dry, reaching, reaching—
--silence fell.
Distantly she heard something heavy hitting the ground. Sara craned her neck around Ardeth's shoulder and saw Jason lying on his face in the mud…he was so still…
"Fuck!" Frog exclaimed, diving to the vampire's side. "Beck, get the map!"
"Are you fucking crazy?" she snapped. "I'm going to get a medic—"
"Go, I'll help with this," Ardeth replied calmly, stepping away from Sara and fetching the maps that Frog had insisted on bringing. Beck sprinted away.
Sara stood frozen, unable to move or speak. She felt like she was watching from a hundred miles above. Frog and Ardeth carefully turned Jason onto his back, and the vampire's face was ashen, eyes half open, dazed but alive.
Frog called his name several times before Jason heard him. "Show us," Frog said urgently.
Jason lifted one hand and touched the map with a single finger, tracing a route through the forest without even looking. The smell of burning paper reached Sara, who realized that as he drew his finger along the map, he left behind a line scorched into the chart, finally stopping nearly two hundred miles away to the west.
He was trembling so hard it looked like a seizure, and Sara found her paralysis broken. She pulled off her coat and knelt beside him, covering him in its folds.
His arm fell back to the ground, and Frog's attempts to get his attention failed; he was fading, drifting somewhere far away. Whatever he had felt or seen, it had been too much. Between the violence of the spell and the wrenching grief, his body and mind both were collapsing.
Just before he lost consciousness, he lifted his eyes to Sara. She started to cry at the pain in his eyes, but she held onto his hand, feeling the hard metal of both his and Rowan's bracelets pressing into her skin.
"Stay with us, Jason. Come on. We need you for this."
"Sara…promise me…" He was barely whispering, and she leaned in to hear him over the pouring ra
in that she was suddenly aware of again. The circle had fallen as Jason had. She could also hear pounding footsteps—Beck and the medic.
"What is it?" she asked.
His eyes rolled back, but he forced the words out. "Promise me you'll bring him home."
Sara squeezed his hand even harder, and whispered, "I promise."
Part Ten
Sethen stepped in front of Kir, placing himself firmly between the Healer and the five Guardians who now filled their living room, guns raised and aimed at them both.
“What is the meaning of this?” he demanded.
Rethka said, “Stand aside, Sethen. The Guardians of the Way have come for Kir.”
“On what grounds?”
She ignored him and addressed Kir, who looked neither surprised nor upset that they were there. “Kir, you are charged with a third level violation of the Way. You will be taken in for questioning by the High Inquisitor and your fate will be decided then. May the Goddess have mercy upon you if you are innocent, and may She strike you down swiftly in guilt.”
Sethen didn’t move. “You’re not taking him anywhere until you tell me what he’s supposed to have done.”
“We’re not obligated to discuss this with you, Sethen. As far as we know you’re next—you live together, you could be in collusion. If the Council sees fit to tell you—“
Kir sighed. “I broke into the Temple and stole the crystals. You know that.”
Sethen glared at him. “You’re not helping!”
A shrug. More than anything, Kir looked tired, weighed down by the knowledge he’d gained but resigned to his fate, and Sethen felt a surge of protectiveness for his lover, one that Elves with guns couldn't surmount.
He decided then and there that they weren't going to lay a hand on Kir.
Of course, five against one in a room with only one exit weren't terribly good odds.
"All right," Sethen said. "We'll both go. I'll talk to the Inquisitor myself."
Rethka and the others exchanged looks, suddenly uncertain. "Sethen…you're acting like a crazy person."
"I'm turning myself in. I am, as you said, in collusion with Kir, and you really should take us both in now and save yourselves a trip."
Her brows knitted together, but finally she nodded. "Fine."
Sethen leaned over to Kir. "Stay behind me. Don't do anything until I tell you to."
The Healer looked at him curiously but said nothing, and fell into step behind him as the Guardians escorted them out of their house.
A crowd had gathered. No doubt the news that the fearsome Guardian Sethen's young love had been accused of a third level violation had traveled fast, and everyone wanted to see if it was true. Sethen ignored them all, his attention divided between their surroundings, looking for an escape, and Kir's exhausted presence at his back. Two Guardians walked in front of them, two in the rear, with Rethka leading the group toward the Temple. Their best chance would be the woods, and the path led closest to the village's perimeter on its outside loop, about halfway to their destination.
As he walked Sethen felt the crystal in his pocket burning through the fabric, and his hand itched to reach in and touch it, but instinct told him not to, not yet. If what Kir was saying was true, the last thing he needed to do was touch the thing before they were somewhere safe.
They had just rounded the bend leading away from the section of the village where he and Kir lived when Sethen reached forward, grabbed one of the Guardians by the neck, and slung her around into the other, stripping her of her gun and spinning it around to crack the second guard across the head.
The rear guards both cried out, but Sethen spun around, shoved Kir out of the way, and punched one in the face. The last Guardian tried to raise her gun but Sethen kicked him hard in the chest, sending him into the third guard as he fell.
"Run!" Sethen commanded. "Into the forest! Go!"
Kir blinked at him a split-second longer and then bolted. Sethen took off after him, taking advantage of Rethka's momentary shock when she realized what was happening. Stupid, stupid—her reflexes were too slow, and she never should have tried to take another Guardian into custody without at least twice as many armed enforcers.
The high-pitched whistle and ping of a bullet striking a nearby tree sent them both running even faster, and Sethen heard a volley of shots fired, several narrowly missing his head. It was hard to hit a moving target; he was counting on the tree cover making it impossible.
"This way," he panted, taking Kir's arm and dragging him deeper into the woods, even as more shots followed them. He heard Kir make a pained noise and the Healer stumbled on an exposed root, but Sethen hauled him upright and urged him to keep going, not looking back once until neither of them could run another step.
Breath coming hard and heavy, Sethen staggered to a halt and caught Kir as he fell forward.
"Rest just a minute," he said. "We can't stay here long."
Kir's knees buckled, and Sethen eased him to the ground. Kir was clutching his stomach, moaning softly with each breath.
"It's all right," Sethen told him. "I'm going to take care of you. Don't be…afraid…"
That was when he saw the blood.
"Kir—"
He pried Kir's hands away from the wound, and the bottom dropped out of his heart. The Healer had been shot in the back, and the bullet had passed all the way through his body, leaving just beneath his sternum. It was bleeding profusely, and his eyes were glazed with agony.
Sethen tore a section out of Kir's robe and pressed it into the wound, but even as he tried to staunch the flow, one of Kir's bloody hands covered his.
"Stop," Kir said, hoarsely but firmly. "There's nothing you can do."
"Don't talk like that," Sethen said through gritted teeth, ripping another piece of cloth to add to the first. "You're going to be all right."
A faint smile. "No, I'm not…you don't think I know a mortal wound when I see one?"
Something in the Healer's tone had changed, even ignoring the pain he was in—the rhythms of his speech were different, almost accented.
As if he were from another Clan.
"It's all right," Kir said. "I'm ready."
"No. No, damn it. You're not going to die on me. You can't…you can't leave me alone here like this…Kir, please…"
He smiled again, and Sethen knew what was happening—the blood loss was stealing away the pain, leaving him euphoric, and in a minute or less he'd lose enough clotting factors that it would be too late, and his life would be spent here on the forest floor, no one but Sethen even knowing who he really was.
"You're not alone," Kir murmured. "Trust me." He lay back in Sethen's arms, the grip of his hand slowly loosening. "Just…promise you'll remember me. I had a lover, and I had a son…they're dead now, and there's no one left to remember…please remember me."
"I will." Sethen couldn't stop the tears from falling any more than he could stop the bleeding, so he leaned down and kissed Kir—Kellan—on the lips, holding him close. "I love you. I don't care who I am or who you are. That was real."
"I know. I l…"
A shudder ran through the Healer's body, and he was still, eyes fluttering closed with a sigh.
Sethen held onto him for a long time after that, weeping softly into his hair, no longer caring if the Guardians caught up with him and dragged him back to the Temple. Let them arrest him, torture him—let them wipe his memory blank again. He wanted it. More than anything, he wanted to forget feeling Kir’s life leave his slender body, and the clawing guilt knowing this was his fault.
Sethen had failed to protect him. He couldn’t save him. He’d failed everyone. He knew, beyond doubt, that he was supposed to protect people, not haul them in for interrogation and torture. Somehow he’d been taught to follow orders without question even knowing it was wrong, and his blindness had cost him everything.
And now…where would he go? He had no idea how to survive out here. No idea where to go or what to do and no purpose, no
one to take care of, to remind him that he had a beating heart.
Of course, once the Guardians found him, it wouldn’t be beating for long anyway.
Sethen curled up against Kir’s body and closed his eyes. Let them come.
It was a cool, peaceful morning, a breeze rustling overhead, the occasional pale ray of sunlight poking through the trees. Perhaps it was only a few minutes or perhaps it was an hour, but he waited for the sound of boots tromping through the underbrush and the click of a gun cocking.
When the footsteps came, they were surprisingly quiet, not boots but bare feet. A twig snapped near him, but he wasn’t startled; he had lost the ability to react strongly to anything.
The Agency, Volume II Page 29
