Blood Spells

Sometimes being an eagle warrior sucks, Woody had said to him a few months after they all moved to Skywatch, when he’d stopped being able to pretend things between him and Patience were okay.

The winikin had gone on to say, But for the next few years, we need warriors more than we need good husbands.

And right now, they needed a Triad mage.

He took his place beside Patience and nodded. “Ready.”

The torches filled the small space with the scent of ritual incense, and the flickering light outlined their reflected images in a haze of orange yellow that made them look like negatives projected onto the sacred black stone.

She glanced at him, and he had the sense that she was waiting for him to say something, only he didn’t know what.

Then the moment passed and she said, almost to herself, “I think we’re supposed to try the etznab spell here partly because it’s a power sink, and partly because it’s a place I associate with the twins.

And it’s tied to me too, I guess, because breaking in here was me hitting rock bottom. After that, I knew I had to change what I was doing, who I was becoming.”

Brandt’s throat was tight. “I’m sorry I didn’t help you more. I should have . . . I don’t know. Done something.” Even now, with guilt gut-punching him, he couldn’t reach out to her the way she needed him to. What the hell was wrong with him?

Dull agony pounded behind his eyes. Fucking headache.

“I had to figure things out on my own, I think.” She paused. “Before, someone else was always around to tell me who I was. Hannah taught me that I was a Nightkeeper, and the color of my belt told me how far I had gotten as a fighter. In school, depending on who you asked, I was a straight-A student, a princess, a tease, or all of those things. Then I met you, and I became a girlfriend, a fiancee, a wife, a mother . . . but at the same time, I was still a Nightkeeper, which made me unique, at least as far as I knew. Special.

“Then, when we came here, I got a whole new set of labels. I wasn’t the only Nightkeeper anymore, but I was part of the only mated mage pair, and the mother of full-blood twins. My talent manifested before most of the others’, and it was my job to teach everyone hand-to-hand combat skills. . . .” She trailed off. “But then Hannah left with Harry and Braden, and you and I drifted apart. Over time, my talent didn’t prove all that useful, and the fight training petered out. Suddenly I wasn’t special anymore. I was just me.”

He couldn’t argue the chronology, but she was mistaken about one thing. “If you don’t think you’re special, you’re dead wrong. Trust me. . . . You’re special. You’re—” But he couldn’t do any better than that. All the love words he’d once used freely with her stayed jammed in his throat.

She didn’t seem to notice that he’d locked up. Or more likely, she was way too used to it. “I’m starting to figure it all out,” she said. “The good news is that I don’t need your sympathy or your help.

I’m doing okay on my own.” She shook her head. “And I didn’t mean to get into any of this right now.

Sorry.”

“Don’t be.” He met her eyes in the mirror, and wished with all his heart that he could snap his fingers and make everything better between them. “I’m the one who’s sorry. For all of it.”

She nodded, but didn’t say anything more. Instead, she pulled her knife and bloodied her palm, then held out her hand for the uplink. Being sorry isn’t enough, the action said. Not if you can’t be what I need.

And it wasn’t like he could argue with that either. So he drew his knife, slashed his palm, and took her hand.

“Focus on the accident,” she said. “But keep your eyes open. Keep looking into the mirror.”

Werigo’s magic made the memory slippery and hard to pin down, but he made himself remember the sinking Beemer, the blaring horn, and the sound of his own voice screaming for help. His skin crawled with a sudden chill and the imagined press of frigid water. Swallowing hard, he nodded.

“Let’s do this.”

They chanted the spell together, as they had in the mirrored hotel room. But this time as the world spun around him and his consciousness lurched sideways, he was acutely aware that she wasn’t with him, not even as a tingle feeding through the jun tan bond.

He was entirely on his own, which wasn’t nearly the relief his warrior self thought it should be.

Then even that sadness disappeared.

The world went black and cold.

And he was dying.

He crowded up near the roof of the sinking car, tilting his head into the remaining air, which was leaking away by the second. He watched the bubbles rise up, silver in the darkness, and longed to follow them. On his next breath, he sucked water along with the air, and had to fight the gag reflex that threatened to double him over.

Don’t panic. Think! But all he could think about was Woody’s stories about the Nightkeepers, and the end-time war, and how important it was for him to work hard, train hard, and have faith. As the final string of silvery bubbles escaped, his mind locked on the last of Woody’s expectations. Faith, he thought. When all else failed, that was what it came down to, didn’t it?

Tasting his own blood in the water he’d inhaled along with the last half breath of air, he searched for a prayer in the old language. When nothing seemed right, and the grayness started to telescope inward from the edges of his consciousness, he went with his heart, and used the last of his oxygen to say: “Gods. If you can hear this, please help me.”

He spat blood into the water, though that seemed redundant given how much he’d already lost from his leg. Then he thought, deep down inside, I’ll do anything. I’ll give anything. I swear it on my soul.

Just get me out of here.

A soundless detonation ripped through him in a shock wave and the world exploded around him, lighting the blackness with a rainbow flash that coalesced to fiery white light.

A voice boomed in his head, somehow sounding like flutes, drumbeats, and a man’s voice all at once. “Son of eagles, your offer is accepted because the earth cannot lose a Triad mage in this era. But to keep the Triad intact, a triad must be sacrificed. Two will be taken as tradition holds, but one will come later. The last sacrifice will have both power and your love, because there is no sacrifice without pain.”

Brandt convulsed as his body fought for air. He was distantly aware of movement, a rush of water and bubbles, a hand grasping his wrist. Panic clawed at him. His terror that the voice might be real was equally balanced by the fear that it was nothing more than a delusion, the light at the end of the tunnel, a final salute by his dying brain.

Which was it, a god or biological death?

“Son of eagles, do you accept?”

Accept what? He couldn’t follow, couldn’t think, couldn’t do anything but crave oxygen. With his free hand, he clawed at his throat, his chest. Both of his legs were pinned now, by a heavy weight that yanked at him in return, pulling until he felt muscle and tendons tear. A jolt of adrenaline cleared his perceptions slightly and he realized that Joe and Dewey were in the car with him, trying to get him out.

Gods, yes! Pull! he shouted, but didn’t make any noise. Yank the fucking leg off. I don’t care what happens. Just get me out of here!

The voice came again, saying, “If you do not care what the cost, then take the oath mark and carry it willingly until the balance is restored.”

Out of nowhere, glyphs streamed through his head, symbolizing words in the language of his long-

ago ancestors. He didn’t know how to read the symbols, but somehow the syllables were right there in his head.

“Kabal ku bootik teach a suut!” he gasped, parroting the syllables that danced in his spinning brain.