Bloodring (29 page)

Taking up the sliver of clean amethyst, holding it in my left palm, I stared into the water and quoted the words I had worked out while waiting for Audric.

“Blood and bone, stone and dust, search and find in life and death, Lucas Stanhope, danger dire. Seek and find and show him now.”

It was a simple incantation, as conjuring went, and the lack of scripture made it less powerful, but it felt right. Simple seemed best, what with my pitiful level of training, less likely to attract the notice of the resident Darkness. On the third repetition of the verse, the water in the silver bowl began to darken. It didn't cloud or become opaque, but it was as if all the light began to vanish, as if the sun set fast. I kept up the words and rhythm of the incantation, the syllables soft and cadenced.

The water began to shimmer, dark on dark. A human took shape in the unlit space, a man, lying on a thin mattress that rested on smooth limestone, in rock caverns deep in the earth.
Lucas ...
There were bars over his cell door; they sparkled with Dark energy. They would be cold, I knew. The burning cold of death.

A reddish mist churned over him. I smelled sulfur. An ache started in my old scars, my flesh remembering. Beneath that smell was a hint of gangrene and old blood. Lucas' chest rose and fell; he was alive, though wasted, thin, and limp with fatigue. He was sleeping, heavily bearded, unwashed, and scruffy. He was the only man I had ever known who could spend a week being bled and still be beautiful. No wonder they hadn't killed him yet. And that brought other possibilities to mind, ways they could be using him other than for food.
Feathers and fire . . .

To his side sat a container, a handle sticking out of it, and a plate. My attention was drawn to the plate and the crumbs left there. They appeared roseate, glowing in the dark, passed over by the cloud that enwrapped Lucas, but remaining untouched. I tightened my focus on them as the red mist parted. Bread crumbs, glowing blue, the hue of periwinkle, the tint of the sky just as the sun set, as the first star appeared. The blue of purity and heaven.

“Who are you?”
a voice called, reaching.
“Is there a mage here? Mage?”

Something moved in the dark beyond the cell. Realizing I was about to be discovered, I eased back from Lucas, finished the incantation, and placed my hand holding the amethyst from the storeroom into the water. It cleared and brightened, my vision of Lucas dissipating. I reached over and opened the charmed circle, the energies flowing back into me.

“Thorn!” Tone of warning. Audric wasn't in his chair. I followed his voice to the doorway. In its arch were Audric and Thaddeus Bartholomew. Adrenaline surged through me. Fight or flight.

The men stood chest to chest, Thadd with a pair of handcuffs in one hand, the other on his gun at his hip. Audric barred his way. They glowed, supernat bright. “Papers,” Thadd said, all cop.

I could fight. I could kill him and run. Instead, a strange calm engulfed me, soothing away the adrenaline rush, taking with it the spear of terror. It was like sitting in a warm bath, like resting in a hammock under a summer sun.
How odd.
“I'm unregistered,” I said, tranquil and serene. “You can arrest me. I won't resist. But if you turn me in to Durbarge, you'll have to turn yourself in too.” That brought him up short. “If you doubt me, take off your ring.”

Audric shot a look at me, his eyes shifting from Thadd to me and back. They both glanced down at the ring on the cop's hand. Audric's battle-ready stance changed instantly. The half-breed stepped back fast, paused, and bowed from the waist, one of the most formal gestures of his kind.

Thadd froze, the cuffs dangling, lifting to me, sitting in a salt ring, the implements of a conjure all around me, the
Book of Workings
lying open. His gaze settled on the man who bowed before him. “What . . . ?” The question trailed away.

“Take off the turquoise ring with the angel-wing setting,” I said. “Watch what happens.”

His face went crimson, blood flowing up from his neck to his crown. A long moment passed as he darted frenzied eyes from his hand to me. “I can't.” The words broke from his mouth all by themselves, and his eyes snapped open, then slit into anger. “What have you done to me, mage?”

Stupid humans. Anything goes wrong, they jump to place blame on the first neomage they spot. The mage did it, whatever it was. “I didn't do anything to you. The ring is an amulet. I recognized it yesterday when I touched it on horseback and immediately went to sleep. I think it's a seraph ring.”

“Not possible.”

“So take it off.”

Thadd, still frozen, slowly lowered his head, the motion jerky, as if his muscles fought him. He was dressed in a standard Hand of the Law suit, dark gray and single breasted, white shirt, knotted tie, and a wool overcoat, shiny leather shoes. Slowly, he brought up his hand, extended his fingers, and stared at his ring in horror. The ring seemed bigger, more imposing. It glowed richly to my amethyst-enhanced mage-sight. “I . . . can't.”

“Why not?” I asked, my tone mild.

“I've never taken it off.” That was a stupid reason, and even he seemed to know that. Behind him, Audric closed the door to the hallway, locked it, and took Thadd's handcuffs, hanging them over one arm of the coat rack, where they swung.

“You've worn that ring for as long as you can remember? Even when you were a child?” Audric asked, watching his face. Something like compassion crossed his features when he asked, “How many times have you had it sized?”

His throat working, voice a whisper, Thadd swore foully. It was clear he'd never had the ring sized. He'd worn it all his life and it had grown along with him. And he'd never once thought that peculiar. “I've been spelled by a magic ring.”

Audric and I snorted, and I stood up from the circle. I swept up the salt and dumped it in the waiting bag. Moving with economy, I replaced all the other implements and pulled the kitchen table over the circle site before I plopped down on the couch and curled my legs under me. The couch wasn't an idle choice. The walking stick was in a large basket beside it.

“What have they done to me?” Thadd asked.

“Take off the ring,” I said again.

Movements jerky, as if in reaction to electrical shocks or to pain, Thadd took the ring in his fingers and pulled. It resisted for an instant before sliding smoothly off his hand. The skin beneath it was white and slightly wrinkled. He looked at the hand as if he'd never seen it, then at the ring, which he turned over and over, studying the angel wings on the setting. His face relaxed, settling into lines of perplexity. He opened his mouth to speak.

His body jerked, a vicious jolt, as though he had been hit with a cattle prod or a Taser. Thadd's eyes and mouth opened wide. With a silent scream, he tore off his suit coat and flung it across the room. I reached for the walking stick beside the couch, but my hand stopped halfway as Thadd wrenched off his holster and threw it, the gun banging hard and spinning. He ripped at his shirt, panting. Frantic. A soft, high-pitched moan came from his lips. “Help.”

I stood, but Audric was closer. He seized the shirt in two fists. With a powerful tug, he shredded the shirt, sending buttons flying, seams giving way at the shoulders and arms. The cloth fell to the sides, still held in place with his tie. Thadd pulled it free, dropping shirt and tie to the floor together. With one hand he reached over his shoulder and scratched a weal. I smelled blood. And flesh. And kylen. Mage-heat swept over me.

I
slithered across the floor, panther grace in my limbs.
Kylen
. His scent flooded me, sweeping into my nostrils, my lungs, converging on the beat of my heart, swimming out through my vessels, weakening my muscles, warming my flesh. His voice a strangled sound, Thadd clawed at his back, his arms up and bent backward, his chest broad, ribs and abs pulling, stomach flat and taut. Scents flooded me, arching my back.

He pivoted and I saw what he was clawing. From the tips of his shoulders, at the top of his humeri, and angled down his back were two wide slashes of swollen, inflamed tissue. Something was trying to emerge from his body.

I raced across the room to his jacket and shook it hard. The ring dropped to the rug. It was huge, maybe a size twelve, maybe bigger. I'd never seen one so large. When I picked it up, a tingle slithered up my arm, inviting me to put it on.

Ignoring its siren call, fighting the demand to mate, I launched myself across the room to Thadd, mage-fast, and slammed into him. His hands came forward as if to stop me, and I slid the ring onto his finger. He wrenched and dropped to the floor, pulling me with him. He landed hard, me on top, my hands going for his belt buckle. Audric pulled me away.

We were all breathless. The smell of kylen was so strong in the loft, it was like a bakery, and I wanted a taste of everything offered. Instead, Audric found my prime amulet and hooked it onto the necklace of amulets around my neck. The mage-heat rippled and faded, leaving me drained and empty. I dropped my head onto Audric's chest and sighed. The remnants of heat pulsed once, falling to a bearable itch I could ignore. If Thadd would put his clothes back on. Maybe.

“What am I?” he asked, his voice still tortured, but stronger.

“From the look of your spine, I would speculate that you are a third-generation kylen,” Audric said. “And I am yours to command.”

“Not possible,” Thadd said. For a Hand of the Law he was pretty unwilling to consider possibilities, even with wings trying to grow out his back. “My mother's human. And my father was killed in Arizona, mopping up a nest of spawn. He was a cop.”

“Of course he was,” Audric said, sarcasm increasing with every word. “Certainly. You've seen pictures? Seen your parents' wedding certificate?” The big man pushed me aside and I caught my balance on the couch arm. “You've watched home movies of your father? Met your paternal grandparents? Been to their house for a
barbecue
?” He stalked closer to Thadd with every question, and Thadd's face paled. “You've met your cousins on that side of the family? Maybe danced at a wedding or two? Been to a funeral?”

“My father was an orphan. He had no family.”

“Your mother lied,” I said. “You are kylen. Call her.” I licked my lips, eyes on his body.

Audric handed him a throw from the foot of the bed. “Put this on or our little mage will try to have you for breakfast. Mage,” he said, drawing my attention. “I knew he was more than human, though not what precisely he was. More important, how could the asseys have been in his presence and not seen him for what he was?”

“Part of the purpose of the ring, I think. It's spelled to be forgotten immediately, like a fragment of a dream. It kept you from identifying him. It made me sleep. Kept the mage-heat from being so strong, until now.”

“And now?” Audric asked.

“Not so good now. I can smell his blood.” And I liked it.

“This isn't possible,” Thadd said again, settling the throw across his shoulders for a moment before tossing it aside with a hiss of pain. The fabric seemed to irritate the raised flesh. “She's a mage. What are you? You're too big to be neo.”

“I am a second-unforeseen,” Audric said, bowing again, “and yours to command.”

Thadd looked him over from head to toe, as if measuring the big man. “Command. Crap.” He walked to my dressing area and turned his back to the long mirror, looking at himself over his shoulder. I could see him from two viewpoints.
Verrry
nice. “What . . .?” The words died as confusion warred with duty and honor.

“You have options now, kylen. And you need information to make wise decisions. Do what Thorn suggested. Call your mother.” Audric handed my phone to the cop.

Thadd grimaced and set the phone down, pulling a small device from his pocket. It had a little door on front and he flipped it open, punching in numbers. His satellite phone. I stared at his back where ridges had lifted his skin into bumps and irregular crests, some pointed and sharp, ready to cut through the skin. His fingernails had brought blood to the surface in long weals. He smelled heavenly. I wanted to touch him, to run my hands over his raised flesh.

“Mom? Yeah. Okay.” He sounded curt, a hint of outrage in the foundation of the words and a strong trace of disbelief. “I'm . . . fine.” He took a breath, preparing himself. “Tell me about the ring. Tell me about my father. No lies, Mama. Tell me the truth.” He paused a moment. “Yeah. I took it off.” The silence after that was longer. A lot longer.

Audric pulled me into the kitchen to give the cop some privacy, which was fine by me. The ring had pretty much kept me from smelling kylen, but now my whole loft smelled like vanilla and caramel and ginger. I could sit anywhere and enjoy the scent, the view, and the lovely vision of us together that kept flashing into my awareness in full-color, three-dimensional images.

“Little mage,” Audric said. “As I said, I had an indication he was more than human. Did you know he was kylen?”

“Oh, yeah. I knew.”

“Would you have known had you not damaged your prime amulet?”

I shrugged, watching the cop. “He's been deprived of his birthright. He's like me, an untrained mage.”

“Not quite. Because he received no instruction at all as he grew, he is in far worse shape than you. He is half human, the other half a strange mixture of seraph and neomage. Because he was denied his gift at the onset of adolescence, he may never be a powerful spell caster. His gift may be damaged, though that will not matter to the archseraph. He'll be sent to a Realm of Light, for training.” Audric slowly shook his head, the bald dome reflecting light from the windows.