Mat shrugged. “He would have asked me to sell him some if that were the case.”
I gasped, but she just grinned at me. “I didn’t say it would be my blood. But there are always those willing to sell for a price. I don’t actually carry the stuff, but could put him in touch with someone.”
“Unbelievable,” I muttered.
“There’s ways to provide it that are anonymous, and apparently it carries a lot less consequence if not done directly, but it’s not something I normally negotiate. There’s actually a number of clients who would purchase witch’s blood, but I don’t want that kind of responsibility.”
“Unbelievable.”
“You said that already. What do you think? Will you come?”
I fidgeted. “I can’t fix what ails that vamp.”
“Me either. But I’m not sure that is what his request is about. He considers us friends.” She nodded hard at my stricken look. “Especially you. He wants to do everything he can even if it’s futile, and that happens to include us.”
“It doesn’t sound safe.”
“He’s a vamp. It can never be completely safe. Half my clients aren’t safe. What does that have to do with anything?”
She had succinctly stated all the reasons I did business through intermediaries. The less I dealt with the actual client, the better. But I had been dealing with Patrick for a while now whether I wanted to or not. “You’re asking me to go chat with Patrick as a show of support?”
“Unless you actually have a spell that would cure Joe?”
“That has got to be one of the most messed up pieces of logic I’ve ever heard.” I headed around the bar to the living room. “Let me sort through the lab. Maybe I’ll think of something. Patrick did let me rescind the invite into my house. Maybe he did it knowing he needed a favor. Maybe not. Why are we allowed to do this in broad daylight?”
“Gordon’s watching my shop for me,” Mat said. “He owes me, and I didn’t want to show up early, wake you and drag you to the hospital at all hours. Vamps are also weaker during daylight so if we must take chances, we may as well have the timing on our side.”
I invited her into my messy lab. About the only spell that came to mind was holy water. What good would any healing stones do? He was dead. He didn’t need to be healed, he needed the opposite.
I shook my head and was pretty sure something rattled. Obviously there was more than one screw loose up there. “If he’s dead and doesn’t want to cross over, does that mean he isn’t dead enough? Or is he too dead? If you don’t heal someone, you injure them.”
I ransacked my boxes again and selected a string of coral. “I don’t know if this stuff works against the evil eye after you’re dead. It will block witchcraft, and I would think that would work after death, but who knows? I have some arrowheads too.”
Arrowheads were a ward against evil and evil-minded witches. Because of the possibility of them being effective against witches, I didn’t normally house them in my lab, but because of the move, they were currently locked inside a metal jewelry box and secured behind another lock inside my cabinet.
“What about bloodstone? It’s a healing stone,” Mat suggested.
I shook my head, while I tried to decide which arrowhead was best. “Bloodstone isn’t likely to help because healing stones are gifts for the living, not for the dead and not gone. Mother Earth is very happy to take back what is hers, ashes to ashes, but don’t ask me how she feels about vamps. Plus if a normal healer would be of any use, he’d have hired Tara or someone like my mom.”
“Probably so. I thought the bloodstone might cure him if whatever he had was some sort of vamp blood disease.” She reached into her purse and extracted a dark green piece of bloodstone, aka heliotrope. “I ordered a bunch more heliotrope since I’m in short supply.”
“Thinking of enticing me to trade for Martin’s last stone?” I grinned. “No way. It’s a done deal.” I told her about the Martin sighting in the desert. Only Mat could be disappointed to have missed something like that.
“Next time you see him, ask where he parked his trailer and who inherits all the stuff he collected.”
My eyes widened. “I hadn’t even thought about it.”
“I asked Gordon to be on the lookout now that I know he’s a cop. I could use Martin’s stash, even if I have to purify it.”
“Hmm. You’re right, it would be nice to find.” And I could possibly, remotely possibly, find it using the heliotrope he had gifted Mat. It was twice removed from him now, but he had felt the stone and come back to talk to me. “I’m pretty sure we won’t be able to explain to a court that a ghost left us a bunch of stones.”
She raised coy eyebrows and smiled. “Who else will want them? He didn’t have any relatives.”
“Maybe.” Tracy didn’t act as though he had any relatives. But being a loner and hoboing around the states didn’t necessarily mean you didn’t have relatives.
“Just a few more things and I’ll be ready.” I collected several extra loops of silver, a turquoise and silver ring, and four silver bangle bracelets with crosses dangling from each one. I handed her a crucifix, but she shoved her shirt sideways, revealing the one she was already wearing.
“Looks like we’re set.”
We jingled worse than wind chimes all the way to the car.
On the way to the hospital I said, “I take it that you didn’t tell Gordon about this mission of mercy?”
“Need to know basis,” she replied tightly.
I sighed and dialed.
She nearly jumped a curb, protesting. “You hate telling people what you’re up to.”
“I’m finding it’s easier to do before rather than after. And if something goes wrong, he’d know and then...it’s just easier.” I wasn’t about to confess that if Patrick came after either one of us, White Feather would know almost as soon as it happened. It wouldn’t be a pleasant way for him to find out about this endeavor. Slightly better was the phone call ahead of time.
After a single string of curse words, and several questions, I heard Gordon say in the background, “They’re going where?”
White Feather was almost more mature about it. “I’ll head over and meet you since it’s on the way home.”
“On the way” wasn’t even a stretch because it was so far out of the way. “You can’t go everywhere with me,” I said. “Not all the time. You married a witch. It’s my job.” I wondered just how much he was regretting marrying me.
“You aren’t the problem,” he bit out. “Neither is your job.”
He hung up, leaving me unsure exactly what he meant by that.
Chapter 28
The hospital where Patrick was employed as a nighttime nurse was on the opposite side of the road from the Santa Fe Indian Hospital. Its location made it natural to associate it with Indian Hospital, but lately I’d begun to suspect it was not funded by the same sources.
The only sign on the building read, “Specialty Center.” There was a trauma entrance and a regular entrance in addition to the back one, which was the only entrance I’d ever used. My latest impression was that the hospital was privately run by an organization that didn’t answer to a typical hospital board. Maybe a check with Mom and her buddies was in order. If her network didn’t know for certain who funded and ran it, they’d have some scintillating rumors.
Of all things, Patrick had given Mat a key to the back door. The key might not unlock his direct haven, but the outside door swung open to reveal the concrete steps that led down to a long, dark corridor and his special room in the hospital basement. There were no visible windows in the underground cavern. The doors along the corridor were ancient metal ones with sturdy locks. It screamed “dungeon” rather than “hospital.”
Quiet as a tomb, it was a perfect daytime lair for a vamp.
“I can’t believe you talked me into this,” I muttered.
Vamps had acute hearing. Patrick whispered into existence outside one of the cinder block walls. I d
istinctly remembered there being a visible door when I last left the lair, but it wasn’t evident now. I studied the bricks behind him. I’d never have found the door if he hadn’t been standing right in front of the outline.
His guidance might be a necessary evil, but chills still traveled down my spine.
“Welcome.”
My nod was cursory. There was no point in chit-chat. Patrick looked as he always did to me, mostly handsome and debonair, but with a blurriness that upon close inspection, revealed hints of something else. “How’s Joe?”
“Another day or two in this state, and it will be merciful to put an end to it.”
Maybe we should have brought a stake. Maybe that’s what Patrick had meant when he asked Mat for a spell. If she was thinking the same thing, she gave no indication of it, staring around with avid curiosity mixed with a healthy dose of wariness.
Searching for silver to sneak a peek in the room before entering was a waste of time. There would be no silver in the vamp cave. Besides, I wore so much silver on my person, the weight of it might very well block out anything less than a silver mine with the mother lode of finds.
I sighed and followed the two of them into the room. The door made no sound as the false lines in the bricks sealed behind us.
Joe rested limply in a hospital bed. He was still paunchy and had the high sheen of someone who tended to sweat too much. His eyes were nothing but hollowed shells, with lids that fluttered half open and then shut again. A light sheet covered all but his arms and face.
Before, his face had been a cross between that of a teen with acne and a boozer. Now it was shrunken with vague red spots. One arm was hooked to an IV dripping blood, of course. His shoulder was completely covered with a harsh red rash that extended partway down his chest. The rash reminded me of drops of blood oozing...
A roaring in my ears shut out everything else. Mat shook me twice before I stopped holding my breath.
“For crying out loud,” Patrick burst out. “He’s not a threat to you in this state. He has had plenty of blood and yet he withers!”
“How did he die?” I squeaked out.
“What?”
I waved at the vamp. “Die. How did he die?”
“Here in the hospital. Sepsis. Infection in the blood.”
“Aha. Wouldn’t blood infections be detrimental to a vamp?” Mat asked.
“Not much is detrimental after death. Only this. Whatever it is.” Patrick watched me watch Joe. “You shouldn’t have come if you weren’t prepared to deal with death.”
“Death doesn’t bother me,” I muttered. “Unless we’re talking about my own.” I set my backpack down and peered closer at the rash. Backing off, I let my focus slide away from it, seeing it peripherally. “What was it?”
“What was what?”
I pointed. “His tat. And where did he get it?”
Mat sucked in a breath.
Patrick frowned. “He did have a tattoo, but when you change, they don’t last. No impurities like that make it across, generally. Why?”
“Can you wake him up?”
“He is awake. He hardly sleeps. That is part of the problem. His cycles are mixed up. That’s one of the reasons I’m here during daylight instead of in my own home. He’d walk out into sunlight without me watching him. He has no sense of night and day. It’s as though he’s only half changed.”
“Joe?” I said.
His eyes blinked frantically. After a moment or two, they remained opened, but he squinted.
“He’s better when the lights are off.”
There were no windows. No lights with two vamps was too scary to contemplate.
Mat conveyed my thoughts on the matter. “Only if you leave the door to the hallway open. Wide open.”
Patrick not only complied, he raised the light level in the hallway with a dial that was outside the room. The switch was higher up than a person would normally expect.
“Where did you get the tat? And how soon was it done before you died?”
With a question to focus on, Joe revived a bit. Done setting the lights, Patrick adjusted the bed up so that Joe was half sitting. He was little more than a puddle of death.
“It’s a secret,” Joe said, the ghost of a smile lighting his decaying features. “I always wanted a tattoo of a vampire. I planned to become one after I died. I researched it. I knew I had to find one, and I did. Think about it. You can live forever!”
The actual shape of the tat was hard for me to identify, especially since it was only a rash. His chest did sport a longish humanoid shape, but it was more bat-like with long wings, one of which stretched across his shoulder. “Is that where the infection started?”
Joe frowned. “I don’t know. Who cares? I didn’t die and that is all that matters.”
My heart beat double-time. Patrick stepped away, staring at my chest, and it wasn’t because he was interested in my boobs. I couldn’t control my heartbeat. “Sorry,” I said. “Who did the tat? When and where?”
“I got it at church.” He chuckled weakly.
“You’re a priest?” Matilda screeched too close to my ear.
“Nah. Records and historical collections.” He straightened his shoulders. “Worked at the Library of Congress for two years, and that got me a job at the church to run their archives. Sorting old documents may sound like a measly job, but not just anyone can piece together and organize important stuff. Some of those old papers explained all about vampires, so when the time came, my decision was made.”
“Who did the tat?”
“A friend. I couldn’t visit any of the pro studios, because the bishop is always harping against all that stuff; drinking, earrings, tattoos. Bogus rules. The job didn’t pay shit either, and I wanted the best.” He rubbed two puffy fingers together, except he missed and ended up looking like he was flicking off something nasty. “My friend set me up. We met at the church. I didn’t even have to leave my late shift.”
“Who did the tattoo?” Mat repeated quietly.
“Zandy, my bud, set everything up for me. No girly shops where church members might see. Had to be secret. So Zandy and his friend met me at the church.”
And I had feared Zandy would run short of volunteers. My shock was such that I might never have moved except Patrick swore a string of curse words that started with the name “Zandy” and blistered my ears. Joe actually perked up, leaning forward as if to catch the stream of violent energy.
Hoping to settle my churning stomach, I paced away from Joe. “Was the church too holy to allow black magic?” That was possible. Magic in a church could go badly wrong. I had definite proof of that because I’d tried an innocent spell in a church once. “But why would it affect a vamp? Wouldn’t black magic be erased after death like most magic?” Blessings had affected the rogue vamp, but he was already changed. If a blessing worked against the rogue vamp, what would a construct of black magic do in a church?
I hovered over my backpack for a moment and then unwrapped the arrowhead from the silk. “What does an arrowhead normally do to your kind?”
Patrick shrugged. “Unless it’s blessed for some reason, nothing.”
“Here. Hold it.”
He stared at me, but I ignored the intensity and held out the silk with the arrowhead. Finally, he reached out and picked it up.
Nothing happened, at least nothing obvious. Malachite was a light protection against the evil eye and arrowheads were a defense against evil witchcraft, also known as black magic. My eyes weren’t evil and I wasn’t cursing him, but I was a witch. The blur around Patrick lightened. His glamour was suddenly stronger, as though blocking my eyes. If I tried, I could probably still see around it, but who wanted to see what was underneath anyway?
My attention slid to Mat, but I wasn’t certain how much she could detect beneath his glamour under ordinary circumstances. Now wasn’t the time to ask.
“Okay, let Joe hold it.” If it pushed away a curse, or evil eye, what would that mean? In and of itself
, it was more likely to push me away as it had done with Patrick.
Joe accepted the arrowhead.
My stomach hit my toes, flipped and left town. Mat choked and almost turned it into a cough to hide her reaction.
Instead of blocking my witch sight, the arrowhead revealed a gaunt skeleton peering from underneath his odd and ugly glamour. He was hairless and nearly skinless. The view was blurry, but the guy was a walking corpse. It shouldn’t have been unexpected, but even Patrick’s true self wasn’t a corpse. It was more like a beast. A strong beast, not a half-dead human.
I swallowed and pretended nonchalance, completely ignoring Patrick’s burning stare. Had to hide the fear. Fear made me more attractive to a predator.
“Okay.” My voice was steady. Good. “What about holy water. Burns, right?” I accepted the arrowhead back onto the silk and dug out my holy water.
“It burns?” Joe parroted.
Patrick rolled his eyes. Not a pretty sight since the whites of his eyes were already whiter than human eyes. “Yes.”
“Oh well, that was before I died anyway,” Joe said.
The room was already silent. I swear even the IV stopped dripping at that point.
“You used holy water?” Mat finally managed in a near whisper.
I had read up on tattoos way more than she had. “The ink!”
Joe nodded. “It was too thick. Had to be thinned and the holy water was sitting right there.”
I squeaked. “He mixed holy water with black magic in a tattoo. On church grounds.”
Patrick lost patience. “Do you plan to explain what you are talking about sometime today or should I order in dinner?” His tone lacked the sense of humor I would have preferred to hear when a vamp mentions dinner, but at least his fangs weren’t out.
“Not funny,” I complained. But I told him about the robberies and the victims. “Zandy’s new customer appears to be a black magic user harvesting Zandy’s blood to create constructs. The victim ends up at the robbery site and by the time all is said and done, the victim and constructs are completely used up or dead.”
“And Joe was meant to be such a victim,” Patrick growled.
Under Witch Curse (Moon Shadow Series) Page 17
