The Bonds of Blood (47 page)

“Joya,” Angelica said as her sister
stirred to wake. “Are you okay?”

“Hmm, what?” Joya groaned as she
rose.

“You do not look the greatest.”
Angelica said placing a hand to Joya’s head.

“I am tired,” Joya snapped, but
Angelica took it in stride. Joya was normally not the most pleasant
person upon waking.

“You have looked troubled for
days.”

“I’m fine,” Joya said harshly as she
stood abruptly. In the process, Angelica was knocked back slightly,
and if it hadn’t been for her quick maneuvering she might have
fallen back into the fire.

“Great Goddess Joya, what the
Otherworld is the matter with you?” she hissed as she stood and
brushed off the back of her trousers.

“I am sorry, Angelica. I
have just not been feeling well is all. I didn’t mean any offense;
you must believe that. I think the change is taking me, and I am
not sure exactly how to handle it.”
You
mustn’t tell her any more, Joya Neferis,
she heard the voice of Wisdom interject itself in her train of
thought so effectively that the line of reasoning vanished. Joya
shook her head unsure of what she had been about to say next, and
instead rubbed the bridge of her nose feigning weariness. A yawn
helped the act and she breathed, “I will be better in the morning I
am sure, rest well.”

Joya left Angelica then to find her
bedroll and dreams.

CHAPTER
THIRTY-SEVEN

_T
he attack came late the
next
evening, at least that was the time
Maeven would have reasoned it was. The day had dawned dark and
colorless with the first heavy storm they had to endure since the
Summer Storms that trapped them for some time in the way station
some weeks back. They traveled slow but steady all day, only now
and then coming to sections of Voyagers Pass where the white stones
had been washed out from the heavy rain.

Around the time they normally made camp
the thunder and lightning came. Maeven cast a scowl to the storm
above and started looking for possible shelter from the harsh
weather. This close to the Ivory City there was little in the way
of man-made shelter to be had, and since he joined the group he
took charge of finding appropriate places to make camp when none
was readily at hand.

Tonight it looked like they might have
to rely on the canvas he brought to keep them somewhat dry; even
then there was no telling what they would use to bind it up in a
makeshift tent as there were no trees for miles.

Then, as the lightning flashed again,
three sodden people could be seen emerging from the shadows off to
their left, like wythes from beyond the Black Gates. For all Maeven
knew, as he tried to keep his white stallion Ernet from rearing,
they could very well have been from the Otherworld; their very
presence made his skin crawl.

But there was something strange about
one of them—a young girl who stumbled forward as if goaded by a
force that could not be seen. She stumbled through a puddle
splashing water up onto her yellow dress and, shivering, her arms
wrapped around her for warmth, she came into view. The other two,
Maeven realized, did not move to join or help her forward, but
instead held back as if watching what would happen.

A gasp from Joya alerted Maeven to the
fact that this was someone the Neferis brood knew, so he took a
closer look and realized with startling clarity that he had seen
this woman before, though when he last saw her she had been much
better kempt, clean, and sane looking.

The strangest thing about Amber Neferis
now was not the ragged peasant dress she wore, or the matted dirty
tangles her once golden hair hung in. It was the gaunt look about
her, as if she had not eaten in weeks and the hungry, wild look in
her amber eyes. They had turned recently, he could tell; someone
that had long been crazy had a look in their eyes that suggested
there was no return from the brink they had crossed. Amber’s eyes
still retained some of her old spirit there, but it was obvious
that not much remained to salvage.

“Amber,” Joya said, hesitantly urging
her horse near her sister. It seemed the wild look in the eldest
daughter’s eyes startled more than just Maeven.

As he was not related to Amber, and
therefore was not as invested in her return, Maeven paid closer
attention to the two that held back in the shadows. There was
something about the taller one, a man Maeven gauged with the keen
eyesight built from years of tracking and being alerted to attacks.
The stance of the boy suggested submission. Not just complacency
but submission built of fear and abuse. It was too dark for him to
see any more of the man, and the figure that stood beside him was a
mystery that boggled Maeven’s senses, so checking his sword in its
sheath he turned his attention to the meeting of the Neferis
clan.

Joya now sat still on her horse,
looking at Amber with fear and worry written in her watering eyes.
Joya’s fingers touched her lips as if she was holding herself back
from saying something to upset the uneasy calm that
existed.

“Amber, we have come to save you,”
Jovian said dismounting and nearing his rugged-looking sister.
Truly told, Amber looked like she hadn’t slept the entire time she
had been gone from home. “We have come to take you home.” He held
out a hand to her, as if to coax her to him like Amber was a
frightened child and he was a stranger trying to help her from
imminent danger.

“Save her, Jovian
Neferis
?” a female said
from behind Amber, and Maeven looked up to see the strangely
cloaked figure stepping delicately around puddles of water, lifting
the folds of her slate blue cloak out of the way. There was wyrd
about her creating an orb of energy that encased her, causing the
rain to sheet around the woman so that she remained dry and no
doubt warm. She nearly spit his last name as if it were foul, or
lies.

“How do you—?” Jovian began, but the
woman interjected.

“I know all about your family, Jovian.
I have made it my job to know all about you,” she said, her
encroaching footsteps stopping beside Amber.

“That voice,” Grace said as thunder
rippled across the land again.

“No doubt you recognize it, Grace,” the
woman said, casting down her hood to reveal a strangely fey face
that writhed with lines of blue energy etched into her skin. “Or
should I say ‘old friend,’” she said as her silver hair fell like a
river of quicksilver nearly to the ground and she turned slanted
eyes toward Grace.

“Porillon,” Grace hissed so vehemently
that her horse nickered and shied away.

“That’s right, Grace. Back away; back
away from the Great Betrayer.” Porillon smiled wickedly and looked
at the three Neferis’s considering. “They have grown up fine,
Grace, and I trust completely oblivious?” She looked back to the
old lady as if waiting for her to confirm the truth of her
assessment, but Grace was not forthcoming with answers. Porillon
shrugged and looked back to them.

“Ah, and with his mother’s
sword I see,” Porillon said stepping closer to Jovian who drew his
sword in anticipation of a battle. “Do be a good boy and sheath
that toy. You would be no match for me in arms or wyrd,” she stated
lightly as if she were talking of the weather. “Of course, if Grace
controlled—I mean raised you as I anticipate she did, you would
also be oblivious to the fact that you even
have
wyrd, much less know how to use
it. Of course, she could not hide it from the two eldest daughters;
the lemniscate was present on their necks, so there was no way to
cover that up. I do suspect the old bitch kept them in the dark as
long as she could about this as well, but she couldn’t keep it from
them forever. The Wyrding Way is strong in your family; someday you
might encourage her to tell you the whole story, I mean to say
the
true
story of
your family; it is rather interesting. Then you might even come to
know who I am, and how I have affected the past to create this most
ripe future, ripe with possibilities for Dalua and Alarists
alike.”

By now all eyes but Jovian’s—whose were
still focused on the pacing lady before him—fixed on Grace. The
stares revealed the questions running through the minds of her
observers, wondering what it had been that she was keeping from
them for so long. Jovian was almost certain that what this lady
said were lies, though he could not be sure; there was indeed a lot
about his mother and her past that he did not know. He knew that
she was a mercenary, hence the sword he now held, and that she had
many grand adventures, but aside from that he knew blessed
little.

“You speak lies lady; give my sister
back,” Jovian growled.

“Don’t think that will be
happening anytime soon, dear. You see, she possesses something that
I seem to be unable to touch … directly. I believe your family
thinks the medallion is an heirloom; well, that is to say that
you—except Amber who now knows the truth, hence her deranged
look—know it only as a precious family treasure. Grace, Dauin, and
I all know differently though, another thing you might ask her
about when you get the chance …
if
you get the chance.”

“I don’t believe you,” he said shaking
his head as if to clear it of fog.

“Come now, Jovian,” Porillon said
scowling at him as she stopped mere paces away. “You mean to tell
me that you are carrying one of the legendary Shin-Buto blades and
do not realize it? You don’t find it odd that you could feel the
wyrd in the blade the moment you touched it, or had a sensation
that you could not describe when it came loose of its sheath? She
really has made you ignorant.” She rolled her hand as if in
dismissal. “That makes no difference, however; it doesn’t matter if
you understand the significance of your blood, that sword, or the
medallion that is wrapped even now around your dear sister’s neck.
Grace does, however, know the power they all hold, and she now
knows that I have control of the most powerful artifact in all the
realms, and the blooded person who can wield it.”

“One of the blooded people that can
wield it, Porillon,” Grace spat back from behind all of them.
Though her voice was quiet, the other woman flinched as if struck.
“You forget that I have three other bloods here that can also use
it.”

“That very well may be, dear, but I
think after they find out about all the lies you have been telling
them they will be less obliging to help.” A sliver of a smile split
across Porillon’s face.

“You are making no sense at all,”
Angelica said coming out of her near trance.

Porillon started laughing loudly, a
kind of cackle that seemed to come from her very toes and shook her
entire being.

“Or maybe I am making perfect sense!
You see, none of the things you carry, any of you, are normal
trinkets. Nor are Amber and Joya only your sisters, Jovian,
Angelica. They are not normal, you are not normal. None of you are
normal boys and girls. That is no ordinary necklace,” Porillon said
near shrieking, throwing a hand back to Amber indicating the
medallion. As her finger pointed at Amber, the eldest Neferis
daughter reached for her neck as if she were being bereaved of air.
“That is no ordinary blade.” She cast her index finger in the
direction of Jovian, and the hilt began to redden with heat nearly
unbearable.

Porillon dropped her hands then, and
instantly the hilt cooled, and Amber could once more breathe.
“BEHOLD!” Porillon screamed throwing her hands to the heavens like
claws that would scrape the very moon from the sky. Lightning
danced in the clouds and the thunder that sounded instantly
afterward shuddered through their bodies, shaking their bones. The
same lightning arched out of the sky to fill her palms with
sizzling energy. “YOU ARE NO ORDINARY FAMILY!”

With that Porillon threw her hands out
toward the three Neferis’s before her. Amber made a motion behind
the sorceress; her wyrd frightened her sisters’ horses enough to
get them out of the way. Jovian, on the other hand, was not on
horseback and therefore had nothing but his blade to try and thwart
the lightning attack that came hurtling at him from across the
space between himself and Porillon.

He tried to fight it off, but the
lightning slithered around the blade and lanced down into his
body.

Jovian tried to scream but couldn’t as
smoke began to rise out of his body, and he tried to open his hand
to let the blade fall free, but it was pinned there by the sheer
magnitude of the energy coursing through it into him. His back
arched, and he convulsed as Porillon raised her hands higher, and
his body, loathe to refuse obedience, rose with the lightning until
he was shivering, convulsing, dying in midair. Jovian felt the
lightning continue to lance through his sword like a conduit to his
body, but once there the wyrded lightning had no place to go and it
began to swell quickly under the surface of his skin. He felt the
hair on his head begin to shrivel, and his skin blacken as smoke
rose higher into the air despite the rain, evoking with it the
smell of burning hair and flesh. He felt his toes and fingers swell
painfully until they could not hold together any longer and finally
burst in a gory display of flesh, blood, and bone. At last he felt
a great pressure building under his eyes until he was chased into a
darkness so complete it could only be called oblivion.