Before he could stop himself, he asked, “It kept Jonah Lancroft alive for a couple hundred years, but it won’t help me? Why?” He’d already bared himself, he thought, so the least he could get was an answer to his question.
“Lancroft was a monster,” Tristan said. “Do you even know what’s involved in making Memory Water?”
“No, but it can’t be too bad or you’d never make it at all. Right?”
“We can collect it,” Tristan said. “I won’t get into the particulars, but it’s a process that has become a sacred ritual among my sisterhood. To speed up the ritual involves torturing my kind and wringing the very essence of our soul from the fabric of our bodies. If Memory Water could help you, I would have gladly given you what little I can spare. It restores the physical body to a point in the past when it was more vital. Youth can be granted. Mortal lives, as you already know, can be extended for centuries.” Focusing on Cole, she added, “You may think of it as bringing your body to its default setting.”
There was something undeniably sweet about hearing Tristan put things into geek terms for him.
“But,” she continued, “it only affects you, and that thing inside you isn’t actually a part of you. Memory Water could revitalize your body to a point before that spore was injected, but that doesn’t mean the tendrils would be erased. You’d be revitalized and the tendrils would remain, just like clothes or jewelry or any other foreign thing attached or wrapped around you.”
“Couldn’t we give it a shot?” Paige asked.
“If we had any Memory Water on hand, perhaps,” Tristan replied. “But most of our reserves were plundered by Jonah Lancroft, and the rest have been stolen from us by his followers.”
Cole sat bolt upright. “The Vigilant have attacked you?”
“Not me, personally, and I haven’t heard of any of my sisters that were taken. Lancroft must have passed on the location of our hidden stores, because those were looted within months after the Nymar rose to—” She blinked and looked around at the two Skinners. “Well . . . you know what happened.”
“No need to worry about manners,” Paige said. “A little salt in that wound really doesn’t matter anymore. As far as Cole goes, do you think there might be anything at all the Memory Water could do for him if you could make some changes?”
She shook her head. “It’s not a formula we can tweak. It is what it is. My sisters and I have been hunted by Nymar since they decided to dwell within human bodies. Obviously, we don’t have much cause to find ways to help ease their pain. Not that we wouldn’t if there was a way, but . . .”
“But you’d be dead the moment you got close enough to try,” Cole said. “I get it.”
“We could help your arm, though,” Tristan said to Paige. “Why didn’t you drink the Memory Water I gave you when you were hunting Lancroft before?”
“I needed it for other things,” Paige told her. “Besides, Skinners need to learn from their mistakes, and there’s not a lot to learn by just erasing them and starting clean.” Looking to Cole, she added, “We can deal with our wounds. Just because we’re hurt doesn’t mean we’re . . .” Suddenly, her eyes widened. “ . . . broken. Can Memory Water cure a Half Breed?”
Tristan’s expression clouded over, leaving no doubt in Cole’s mind that she’d witnessed a Breaking firsthand when she said, “No. Something about that change is deeper than anything I’ve ever seen. A human is no longer human after they become a Half Breed, and drinking the Water only brings them back to the earliest point in their life as a Half Breed. The only thing worse than seeing them broken once is watching a human live through it a second time. I will never subject another living thing to that kind of torture.”
“What about a Full Blood?” Cole asked. “They can go back and forth. Randolph and Liam talk as if they’ve been around forever and were never anything but Full Bloods.”
“Right,” Paige said. “Which means bringing them back to square one won’t make a lot of difference.”
Cole shrugged. “Could it bring them back to how they were before the Breaking Moon?”
For the first time since the conversation began, Tristan didn’t hold herself as if every part of her ached. There was a glimmer in her eyes again. Though it wasn’t quite the same as the nights when she’d been twirling on stage, that it was there at all brightened the atmosphere in the room. “I . . . don’t know. We’ve never had a reason to try anything like that.”
“The Full Bloods aren’t after you, are they?” Paige asked.
“Not as such, but they don’t hold us in high regard. Things were just never the same between our kind after I sent the Full Blood elder Gorren from a forest in Romania to our temple in Antarctica.” Seeing the expression on the Skinners’ faces, she waved it off and said, “Long story. If you want to try Memory Water on a Full Blood, you’ll have to capture one yourselves.”
“That may not be as tough as you think,” Cole said. “But what if there was a way to get that stuff to all of them at once?”
“You mean through the Torva’ox?” Tristan asked.
“Could Chuna help us with that?”
“I don’t know that either. These aren’t exactly the sort of things anyone has ever considered doing before.”
“But can they be done?” Cole asked as he scooted to the edge of his seat so he could use his hands while speaking. “We’ve got a Jekhibar, which can hold the Torva’ox. From what Taylor said back in Louisville, this Chuna guy or woman or whatever can help us do even more with it. What was she talking about?”
“Everything within the earth passes through Chuna,” Tristan said.
Paige winced. “That sounds kind of gross.”
“Chuna is a Mist Born,” she continued. “Their existence is real, but most of them don’t choose to interact with other beings. Some say they are the only true sentient forces of nature.” Since Cole looked like he was ready to start jumping in anticipation, she held him back with a single outstretched hand. “That doesn’t mean Chuna is the answer. The Amriany are thought to have more knowledge of Chuna, just like your Dr. Lancroft had knowledge of Kawosa. According to legend, the Torva’ox flows from Chuna’s veins. Like all legends, this may be exaggerated. But every legend connects Chuna to the Torva’ox. If any of the Mist Born would know about that power, be able to manipulate it or anything else along those lines, it is Chuna.”
“So,” Cole sighed, “we just need to find him . . . or her.”
“Finding Chuna may be next to impossible,” Tristan told him. “And you cannot just speak to a Mist Born. They are powerful creatures, dangerous beyond your comprehension. I believe they grew tired of dealing with humans simply because your minds were too flimsy to bear the weight of the meeting.”
“I met Clint Eastwood once at a press event back when I was with Digital Dreamers,” Cole said fondly. “It was kind of like that.”
Knowing when it was better to just ignore him, Paige said, “We’re meeting up with some Amriany friends of ours. They’ve worked with the Jekhibar and they’re on good terms with the rest of their clan, so we’ll see what they can tell us about Chuna. In the meantime, though, the Full Bloods are able to turn humans into Half Breeds with nothing more than a howl at some special frequency or . . . I don’t even know how they’re doing it.”
“They are reaching through the Torva’ox,” Tristan said. “Although humans only draw a small bit of that life force, it’s enough of a connection for the Full Bloods to reach through and break them.”
“This wasn’t the first Breaking Moon to rise,” Cole said. “Why didn’t this all happen before?”
“Because the Full Bloods didn’t have the help of a Mist Born. Kawosa created the first Half Breeds and now he strives to perfect the recipe. Perhaps it’s his way of making sure he has more soldiers on the field than anyone else. Heaven help us all if one of the Full Bloods is truly able to steer the wretches.”
“Memory Water is the only thing I know of that has a chance of taking that power away from the Full Bloods,” Paige said. “Maybe then Kawosa will be willing to go back to the way things were.”
“Or he could just back off and watch the fighting,” Cole said. “He seems to enjoy dealing with humans and shapeshifters, so at least we can take our chances with him. Either way, it’s dealing with one threat instead of . . . however many Full Bloods there are.”
Tristan sighed. “Even one Mist Born may be more than enough to make these days even darker, but at least it’s a course of action with some promise. Since you’re talking about a plan that requires Memory Water, I’ll be busy enough just collecting more than what it would take to fill a thimble. When I have more than that, I’ll let you know.”
“All right, then,” Paige said. “What about getting us to Hungary? Think you’ve got enough juice stored up in this place to pull that off?”
