blood 03 - blood chosen (28 page)

“There you are, Rare One,” Queen Darcel purred. “Look who's arrived to celebrate your coronation.”

Oh my God
, Julia thought, facing the insanity that was Queen Darcel.

Darcel swept her palm at Jacqueline and Tony, the scars from the burns giving him an almost comic look of raw meat everywhere but his eyes. Those had been spared by whatever had been done to him and Julia couldn't help but flinch at the sight of his partially healed and melted flesh.

“Coronation?” Jason asked, puzzled, wrapping his arm tighter around Julia's shoulders and pressing her into the crook of his body.

Cormack came to flank Darcel. “Yes, our Queen is convinced that she,” his nostrils flared in apparent dislike of Julia, “and she alone, possess the purity of blood to revive the Unseelie.”

Marcus held up his hand and Darcel responded, “What say you, pure blood?” No one asked how she knew Marcus was a pure blood Singer.

Marcus did not falter. “I am Marcus, ruler of Region One of the Blood Singers.”

Queen Darcel inclined her head. “And I am Queen Darcel of the Unseelie Sidhe.”

She narrowed her gaze at him, her silver hair, streaked with white glinted in the low light of the torches piercing the stone walls. “How is it that you broke through the briar?”

“Jacqueline.” Marcus moved his eyes to rest on her then back to the level gaze of Darcel. “She is part fey. Jacqueline found the mound, breeched the briar and those who are descended from her moved past them as well.” He marveled at the healing of the fey warriors who stood by her side. The damage from the altercation earlier was tossed away as they spoke.

“Ah,” Darcel said slowly, knotting slim hands behind her back. She dipped her head and Marcus swore he saw the wheels of her mind turning with her scheming. Darcel looked back at him. “Who are these who accompany you?”

Marcus hesitated, then decided the longer they could keep the lines of communication open, then peace could be possible. Or so he dared to hope. He listed William and Delilah, the undead were obvious to the fey, who gave them eyes that held healthy respect. The vampire were the kryptonite of the fey. They, and they alone, could steal fey immortality with a bite. That was what legend told them. Further, it had been confirmed from the mouth of Celesta. It made Marcus feel better knowing it. However, it was not certain how loyal either William or Delilah would be to the Singers.

He listed his son and Cynthia, and the Were whom the Reader had insisted be present: Adrianna, Slash, Jason, Emmanuel, Reagan, and the former police detective, Karl Truman; the Packmaster had been left behind. Jacqueline and Tony were already known to Queen Darcel.

When the introductions were finished, Queen Darcel, in turn, introduced Kiel, Celesta, Cormack, and Tharell, who they'd made acquaintance with, in the most violent of circumstances. A fey with deep blue hair and a green body jogged into the entry hall, the rocks rising so high that the ceiling appeared black, though this portion of the mound before entering the court was well lit. He casually tossed out his name as Domi, and seemed to be close to Tharell, who did not look exactly like the other royal Sidhes.

An awkward silence followed Domi's appearance and Marcus filled it, “Your guard, Tharell, entered our territory, poisoned us with a magical sleep, after first deceiving us that he was a member of our own region.” He paused for effect. “Then, we were fortunate enough to have one amongst us that possessed enough blood of the fey to use it as a homing device of sorts, and find the nest of fey. When we arrived, your briar nearly had us bleeding to death.” Marcus hated including Jacqueline in any way that was positive or tied to the Singers. Her treason was of the highest order against Julia. Yet, her royal standing had spared her miserable life and Jacqueline's deceit of her true lineage had aided in finding the Rare One. He focused on that rare turn of fortune.

Darcel listened impassively while Marcus gave the history of the last day's events, then said something that was unexpected, “We are not birds.” She chose to reference how Marcus had referred to the fey as a nest and Jacqueline's homing. The greater message appeared lost. Not a good sign.

Jacqueline spoke for the first time, “He understands, Queen Darcel.” Julia knew that Jacqueline was placating the Queen, not defending Marcus.

Darcel looked at her for a protracted moment. “Then why does he speak like he does not?”

“They want the Rare One back,” she answered. Julia's eyes narrowed. Jacqueline would never help her.

“But you do not want that. It is your heart's desire that Julia Caldwell remain here within the bosom of my tender mercy, and that you... return to rule their Region One in her stead.”

Jacqueline had been a busy bee, squealing like a pig and bending the sadist Queen's ear with all their Singer secrets. Julia's heart began to pound in a fierce rhythm inside her chest.
She could not stay here
. Darcel was a proven torturer. She knew, deep in her heart, that Darcel had only told her the things she wished for Julia to know. And like an iceberg, there was a ton of crap under the surface that she couldn't see. But Julia would see it all if she stayed.

Marcus tensed, insisting, “We must come to an understanding, Queen Darcel.”

“Why?” Queen Darcel asked, her brow cocked.

Marcus seemed to pause there, unsure. “We are a peaceable people.”

Queen Darcel threw her head back and laughed. It sounded like tinkling crystal being shattered, everyone flinched at the horrible music that laugh made. “That is a bald-faced lie. Our intelligence says that you routinely decimate any kiss of vampires that crosses your boundaries.”

It was interesting that they had intelligence on the Singers yet the Singers had thought the fey to be legend only. Marcus had the regret of ignorance heavy on his psyche this day. When they survived this, he could beat himself to death over not knowing that the legend was real. A terrible reality of surprise and strength. Right now, it was a matter of seeing his people through this event alive. His eyes fell to Julia, the Rare One. Without her, all their efforts were for naught. “Yes,” Marcus answered. “We will defend what we must but will not draw first blood.”

“Interesting... you have two vampire in your charge this day.”

Marcus nodded.

“To what end?” she asked like a verbal trap.

Marcus explained, in an extremely succinct way, the drawing of the three, the need for a marriage to unite the groups. Julia cringed at his wording. Finally, he mentioned the soul meld and Darcel laughed again. The grinding against Julia's ears felt like it could draw blood and Jason's fingers curled around her shoulders.

“None of what I have relayed is humorous,” Marcus commented quietly.

“Oh but it is, Singer...
it is.
” The Queen narrowed her gaze on him and he felt the first stirrings of foreboding. “Firstly, our magick breaks all other magicks which are not of faerie. Such as soul melds,” she began, her distaste for soulmates evident in her tone of voice. “It will not hold against the natural talents within the blood of your group. It cannot cause a shifter to
not
change if they will it. However, the Sidhe are dominant within faerie and Singers, though they be of pure blood, are not Sidhe. We of the Unseelie are separate from supernaturals who live amongst humankind. We are fey. We are other.”

“Permanently?” Scott asked, his eyes on Julia.

“Soulmates no more,” Queen Darcel replied, intuiting his question.

Julia and Scott stared at each other.

“Wow,” Cyn said. “Just... wow.”

Darcel continued to look at Scott. “I feel your energy, the nature of your relationship with the Rare One is to protect her. And that could continue,” she paused, “here in fairy.”

That wasn't really a choice of returning
, Julia thought, knowing things were going to end badly. There was no other way to look at it.

All eyes went to Scott. His gaze switched from the Sidhe warriors to the Queen, then to the small Were pack, Cyn, his father, and finally, the vampire. And always, his eyes glanced at Julia. Because she was under his protection. The soul meld might have been broken, but his role as Combatant had been there since birth, merely waiting for Julia to awaken the circle. Faerie couldn't take that away. He met William's eyes and knew what he saw there. They had both lived too long to not know it when it stared them in the face.

War.

But Scott had to be sure before he owned the bloodshed that was sure to follow. He couldn't kill unless he knew it was for a purpose.

“Julia,” he called out, his voice ringing for her ears alone.

Julia gulped, tears burning the back of her eyelids to hear him say her name without the warmth of the meld, but with the caution of the Combatant. “Yes.” came her trembling reply.

“Do you know this Queen?”

Julia rolled her bottom lip into her mouth, nibbling nervously as she thought about his question carefully. Scott was asking far more than just that one question.

Julia met his eyes. She knew what he asked. “I know that the Queen wants to use me to save her people.”

“How?”

Julia looked at Queen Darcel and saw her fate in those depthless seawater eyes.

“By blood,” Julia replied softly, but her voice carried to all those who were gathered. Scott's decision was made.

Then all hell broke loose.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

War

Julia watched Cormack swing first, a knife in each hand. Though, from Julia's perspective, it was a curved dagger and a long sword. If its tip met the ground, it would be waist high.

He wielded it as if it was light as a feather. The metal bit into flesh effectively, like a stroke of a heated blade through soft butter. He knew who his real enemies were as the court of the Sidhe poured out behind the warriors like flies to an accident scene.

However, this was no accident... he strode toward William, swinging as he moved and Julia had just enough time to yell in warning, “William!” but William anticipated the danger and was already changing shape into a melting pot of black. Feathers sprouted, lifting him towards the twenty foot ceiling. His blood-red eyes took in the Sidhe warrior as he switched direction, going for Delilah next. His gaze refocused from the escaped vampire turned raven, to the female.

She hissed, “Your aura is as blood, Sidhe.”

“And you soon will be covered in it, death bringer,” he responded as he planted his feet wide and swept the arced blade upward, going for a true evisceration and Julia gasped when Delilah disappeared into thin air.

“What in the blue hell?” Jason whispered in shock, pressing Julia against the wall as his facial bones made the wet snapping of breaking apart to reform. Julia felt the downy coat of his hair fill the gap between his skin and her fingertips, her hands gripping his forearms. When those grew too large to grasp, she let go. Julia pressed her palms flat against the coolness of the stone wall and could only watch as a shimmering wave of light and movement appeared before she struck. Then Delilah came into being like a falling star captured before them in the murky stillness of the cave, the sound of fighting the only noise. She lunged even as she appeared, latching onto Queen Darcel by the exposed throat. The Queen's shriek of, “Kill the death bringer!” was summarily dispatched into a choked gurgle.

Fangs like delicate tips of white icicles had appeared in Delilah's mouth as her eyes met Julia's when she moved out from behind Jason's body. Delilah was vampire, but she was also part of Julia's people. She was Singer enough to advise, Were enough for the sharpest of senses, and Vampire enough to kill without remorse when the need was strongest.

As she did now.

Julia did what she could, casting her telekinesis like a clumsy net, her skills not fine-honed but enough to cause the Sidhe warriors, Celeste and Domi, to stumble.

But it was enough, the Were advancing from the opposite side in their wolfen form; to keep the Sidhe at bay while Delilah sucked the immortality out of the veins of their ruler.

Julia could feel something old, pressed against her, making her bones ache. “Magic,” she breathed, knowing that the Sidhe of the court were trying to use their magic to kill the Singers, the Were... and the precious vampire who gave them a fighting chance against the Queen's agenda. Julia hadn't known the feel of actual magic, because it was a different flavor from the inborn talents of the Singers. Different than the shifting of the Were and having nothing to do with the undead. It was a fey ability but she could feel it working all around her like the air she breathed.

Delilah's face came away from the neck of Queen Darcel, her lips a bloody circle like a clown's mouth.

The magic intensified into a narrow spear, hurting so badly, in a way- it bordered pleasure for Julia. It burst out like a bubble popped and the air was shattered by it.

But the supernaturals didn't fall.

The queen had been struck down in a pool of blood. Julia looked at the hilt that had landed the killing blow, while Delilah drank at her throat.

It was Rex, the Sidhe who had dared to speak against the Queen, the remnants of his torture by Cormack all over his body in bloody half-healed welts, punctures, and slashes. His long white robe, belted in a braided gilded tie, was now splattered with royal blood that mingled with his own. His eyes met Julia's. “She will meet true death this day, Rare One.”

The magic had gone along with the Queen's life. Julia stood stunned, her troubles over.

Or just beginning.

Jason, Manny, Truman, and Slash, who'd held the other Sidhe, dropped their hands and the warriors, Domi and Celesta, came to Julia, beaten but not defeated. Jason remained slightly in front of her, his features having bled back to his human face. He'd deferred to the rest of the Were pack to keep the Sidhe from hurting her. Jason had sacrificed the part of the battle that would have necessitated him leaving her side.

They knelt before her and the first hot flush of embarrassment washed over Julia in a slick glide of heat. She swallowed it back with an effort, and the green hand of Domi latched onto hers, pulling it down to his mouth, where he kissed it gently. “Thank you, Rare One.”