“This is strange,” Hadassah said with a quick glance at Yael.
The ice turned to a rush of liquid warmth, flooding her. Heat rose up her throat. Into her cheeks. She parted her lips to let her tongue dip out, pressing the lower one. She tasted salt. She was sweating.
Now, Yael thought. Now she will tell me she knows what I am and what I have done…
“I’m sorry,” Hadassah said. “I can’t see anything for you.”
*
Hadassah pushed her chair back, unease twisting in her chest. She stopped herself from making another pass over the bowl of blood. There was nothing more for her to discover in it and pushing for it would only end up making her sick or weak.
Unless she was actively using it to do a reading, Hadassah’s magic stayed spooled inside her like a ribbon—and like a ribbon, it could tangle. In the beginning, before she’d learned how to control it, Hadassah had been untidy with her talents. They’d spilled out of her in messy, fraying threads, and she’d had a helluva time smoothing them enough for them to be of any use. Hemomancy was supposed to be like weaving a tapestry or doing embroidery—a careful, creative method of sewing together the images into a bigger picture. It had taken Hadassah years to learn how to control it, much less interpret the fleeting, shifting images she drew forth from the blood.
Even now, there were times when she hadn’t rewound her spool as neatly as she should have, times when the magic she pulled from herself stretched too thin or snagged along the way, or she tried too hard to strain the limits of her talents, and instead knotted them into an untenable mess. It could take her days after that to work out all the kinks and bends before she could even think about doing another reading. If she was even more careless, she could do real, physical harm to her body.
“I’m sorry, but there’s nothing to see,” she said.
“Is something wrong?” Yael sounded alarmed, but at least now her voice was stronger, and she didn’t seem like she was going to pass out. She sat up straight in her seat.
Hadassah forced a smile. “No, nothing like that. I warned you there was a limit to what I’d be able to see for you. It looks like we reached it sooner than expected.”
There was more to it than that. Hadassah had never been cut short so fast during any reading, not even when she’d been apprenticing and hadn’t been able to pace how much information she pulled out. But that was the way of magic, she told herself as she set about tidying up the table. Even when you’d been practicing your craft for almost your entire life, you could still be surprised by what happened…or what didn’t.
“Was it something I did?” Yael asked.
“No. It happens sometimes, that’s all. Magic is an imprecise talent. It’s unusual not to get some sort of reading, but not impossible. You might be tired. Maybe a little anemic?”
That honestly shouldn’t matter, but it was the only explanation Hadassah could make. There’d been times when she hadn’t been able to do a reading because her own talents hadn’t been honed enough. This was the first time she’d ever been simply cut off.
Yael stood. She took the gauze off her hand and peered at the smooth skin, marred by only the faintest line. She gave Hadassah a look. “The cut is almost gone.”
Hadassah paused at that. It wasn’t totally unheard of for clients to heal quickly, but she’d never had one leave her office without at least some residual wound. Yael definitely had some super in her…but what? It would be rude to ask.
“You heal fast. You might feel some tenderness there for a few more hours, so don’t be surprised.” Hadassah held out her hand for the gauze, which was spotted with only a few drops of blood. She tossed it, along with her gloves, into the trash can.
Yael looked hesitant, studying her hand. “Now what happens?”
“Nothing happens. You can choose to take what I saw for you and follow it or ignore it.”
“What happens if I ignore it?”
Hadassah laughed ruefully. “I don’t know.”
“Because you didn’t see my future.”
Hadassah shook her head. “That’s part of it. But remember what I said—”
“Yes. My choices change what occurs. What’s the point, then, in trying to find out what your future holds? If it’s simple enough to change it?” Yael’s question was aggressive, but her tone remained neutral.
Hadassah went to the small fridge behind her desk and pulled out a bottle of sparkling water. She poured two glasses, added the sifting of restorative herbs to make the chilled tea, and handed one to Yael. “Some people believe that knowing what could happen tells them enough about what they wish could happen, or what they don’t want to happen. So, they can pursue a path, or avoid one.”
“But you can’t ever really know, then, how those changes make a difference, yes?” Yael sipped from the glass and then lifted it to look. “Anise.”
She had such an odd demeanor, but Hadassah found it thoroughly charming. If emotions could trigger alarms, a klaxon would be sounding inside her right now. Red Alert. Warning. You’re about to get way too invested in this stranger.
Hadassah’s first teacher, Regina, had told her working the blood magic didn’t affect everyone the same way. Some were drawn to gluttony of food and drink. Some to frantic exercise. Some to sex. Utilizing her skills always triggered arousal; Hadassah was used to that. But sex was not necessarily intimacy or affection—at least, it shouldn’t be. So why was that what she was feeling right now for Yael? An attraction, Hadassah told herself. Nothing deeper or more meaningful than that. And yet…
“I owe you compensation now.” Yael reached for her black leather crossbody bag.
“No. Don’t worry about it. It wasn’t a complete reading.” Hadassah waved a hand. She was not in the habit of giving free readings. Even if they ended up truncated for one reason or another, she always required full payment. “Are you going to be okay?”
It was kind of against the rules, unspoken as they were, to ask too many personal questions about what a reading revealed. Or what it didn’t. She told herself she was just being careful, making sure that Yael wasn’t going to keel over. It was more than that though. Hadassah wasn’t quite ready for Yael to walk out of her office, and maybe, out of her life. She really needed to get a hold of herself, Hadassah thought with a frown.
“Are you?” Yael asked.
“Readings make me a little tired.” And horny. “That’s all. If you’re feeling woozy or unsteady—”
Yael shook her head. “I’m steady.”
They stared at each other for a half a minute. Hadassah drew in a breath. The tingling heat that had begun an hour or so ago at the bar had never gone away, and it surged now.
“I need another drink,” she said. “Care to join me?”
Chapter Three
“I swore I’d never be like my mother, always commenting on how things had changed, or how much they were better when I was younger,” the woman called Hadassah said.
They’d moved from the bar to one of Sanctuary’s curving dinette tables. Hadassah had ordered a plate of what she’d called “appetizers,” but which seemed designed specifically to fulfill the appetite, thus making additional consumption unnecessary. Also, they were delicious. Yael was accustomed to hunger. Demons of her kind were made for starvation. This was the first time in her eternally long life she could recall being free of that gnawing ache. It had been replaced, however, with something else. A similar emptiness, a yearning, but not for food.
Hadassah dragged a long strip of fried potato through a pool of crimson syrup and popped it into her mouth. “Yet here I am, waxing philosophic about the fact they tore down a doughnut shop and replaced it with a kombucha bar.”
“It is allowable and understandable to mourn the loss of something you loved.” Yael did not completely comprehend the feelings of grief, nor of love, but she knew that one often accompanied the other.
Hadassah’s shapely eyebrows rose. “Very astute. You sound like you’ve been there.”
“I have not been to any kombucha bar. I…” Yael hesitated. “In fact, I am uncertain what, exactly, is a kombucha.”
Hadassah let out a trill of tinkling laughter. To Yael, who looked through the eyes of this human vessel but still saw with a demon’s vision, that laughter was a swirl of blues, greens, and hints of red. Not anger, but passion.
“Well, it’s a terrible replacement for homemade doughnuts, that’s all I can tell you.” Hadassah leaned toward Yael on the curving bench, close enough for Yael to feel her body’s warmth.
Yael wondered if she was meant to also lean in. She tried it. The warmth between them increased. It was different, being in this vessel than her own true form. More difficult to respond or react. She was sensing a sexual heat coming from Hadassah, but she could not be sure how she was expected to react in response. Yael struggled with behaving human, but she was well aware that people did not simply engage in copulation as demons did, without warning, sometimes without even communication. Her former mistress had used Yael in that way… Yael forced the memory of the witch from her mind. She’d done her best to fully sever their connection, but she could not be certain nothing residual remained. Best not to test the bindings the witch had placed upon her and which Yael had so far managed to slip.
“What brought you into Sanctuary today?” Hadassah asked suddenly.
Yael allowed herself to consume another fried potato strip before replying. “It is a safe space. Shielded, yes?”
She’d been passing by in the street and seen the unassuming front doors. She’d sensed the safety within them. Too, she’d been craving something she couldn’t put a name to. Companionship. Comfort. Sustenance. A respite from looking over her shoulder, certain her maker-witch would be there, even though Yael had left her miles and miles away.
Hadassah nodded. “Yes. Of course. But if you’re new to the city, how did you happen to stumble on it?”
She could not admit she’d been wandering, aimless. “Good fortune?”
“It’s certainly mine, I think. Or…for both of us?”
Another slow, rolling wave of sensual heat rose up between them. This body responded. Yael’s stomach was full; now there was another sort of hunger to feed.
“Oh, yes. The ones like us,” she said in a low voice. “Ones who want.”
Hadassah made a small noise from deep in her throat. She drew in a breath. Then another. Her eyes gleamed, catching and holding Yael’s gaze.
“Do you believe in fate, Yael?”
Yael could not be sure how to answer Hadassah’s question. She knew the meaning of the word, but fate seemed inextricably linked to ownership of a soul—which of course did not apply to Yael.
“I do not,” she said.
“What do you believe in?”
Hadassah leaned a little closer. She had ceased consuming the wine some time ago, and the fruity scent remained prevalent on her breath. Yael had been around drunk humans before, though, and Hadassah seemed only mildly intoxicated.
Although she had thought being in this human vessel would make a difference, Yael herself was not at all affected by the alcohol. Her belly, however, felt aching and empty. Her eyes, a little heavy lidded. Warmth had gathered low inside her, centered between her thighs.
“I believe in appetite,” she said. “I believe in desire.”
Hadassah made a low purring noise that somehow sent slow, swirling ripples of heat rising inside Yael’s body. “What are you hungry for?”
Yael’s fingers twitched. In her own form, her claws would be extending, ready to rip and rend, but this body had soft nails. Pointed, but blunt compared to her talons, even if they were painted black. At any rate, she did not wish to kill Hadassah. So, what, then?
“I would like to fuck,” Yael said.
“Oh, wow.” Hadassah leaned back, and for a moment, Yael thought she had misjudged. Social interactions were…difficult. But then Hadassah moved in close once more. Her mouth found Yael’s, the kiss greedy but somehow soft too. Requesting, not demanding. Their tongues twisted. Hadassah tasted of sweetness, of arousal. Of something else, too, a flavor Yael could not name. The witch’s kisses had been bitter and bilious… Yael drew away abruptly. Demons did not fear, but this vessel could.
“Sorry?” Hadassah’s word tipped upward at the end, not quite a question, but clearly questioning. “I thought…?”
Yael slid closer on the curving bench. Her hand slipped beneath Hadassah’s thick dark curls to cup the base of her skull. Her fingertips dented the flesh there. She slanted her mouth over Hadassah’s, but this kiss was not soft.
Hadassah’s mouth opened, and a soft moan slipped out of her. She arched her body toward Yael’s. More sexual heat flowed from her, but this time, she was the one who broke the kiss.
“Do you want to go somewhere else?” Hadassah’s breathy voice tickled Yael’s ears.
Yael answered with another kiss. “Yes.”
Chapter Four
Hadassah did not take people back to her apartment. Non-Talented folk would be likely to cringe at the sight of her altars, her vials and bottles and decanters of blood, her Velvet Elvis lined with twinkle lights. Even the supernaturals she took to bed might look at her differently—it was one thing for them to know she was a hemomancer, and quite another for them to see the blatant evidence of how she worked. For many, blood was a trigger, even when it had been collected in a bottle.
“People live here?” Yael paused outside the nondescript silver elevator doors tucked down a discreet hallway beyond Sanctuary’s steakhouse.
Hadassah swiped a keycard to access the elevator. The doors opened with a genteel ping. “No. But there are rooms here.”
She did not add that they were available to members only, and that she paid a decently hefty fee for the privilege of being able to use them. Inside the elevator, she swiped her keycard again and pushed the button for the thirteenth floor. The mirrored interior walls reflected the two of them into a myriad of clones, duplicated into infinity.
When the doors opened into a small, sparsely furnished lobby, she crossed the small space to the large board adorned with hooks, upon which ornately carved keys hung in rows. She tapped her keycard against the release mechanism to register which key she was taking and plucked one at random. She’d used all the rooms on this floor at one time or another and had no preference as they were all identical. Today, she picked the one at the end of the hall.
“What was that?” Yael pointed at the register box.
“It records who takes which key, in case someone damages a room, or does not return the key.” Hadassah held up the key she’d chosen. “You’re supposed to leave it on the table in the room when you leave, but it can be easy to slip it in a pocket or something and forget it.”
“There is no attendant?”
Hadassah shook her head as she led Yael down the hallway. The silver-and-gray carpet muffled their footsteps, and she kept her voice hushed too. “No. These rooms are meant to be kept very…private.”
“What if there is a problem?”
“You mean with the room?” Hadassah asked. “I suppose you could pick another key, try another room. But I’ve never had any trouble.”
“I mean, what if someone does not merely damage a room, but another person?”
Hadassah paused. Her stomach dropped a little. “What do you mean?”
“What if someone in whom you placed your trust betrays it?” Yael’s dark gaze captured Hadassah’s own. “That is the risk of engaging in sexual intimacies with someone you do not know.”
Hadassah’s heart thumped. “Are you planning to hurt me, Yael?”
“Only in ways you would like,” Yael said in a low, husky voice. Her eyes gleamed.
Hadassah’s clit throbbed. “How do you know I want to be hurt in any way at all?”
“How do you know you can trust me with your body?”
They’d reached the end of the hall and the door to the room Hadassah had chosen. For a flash of a mome
nt, Hadassah considered turning around. Leaving. She’d regretted some choices in the past, but mostly because the women had turned out to be clingy, or selfish lovers, or entitled bitches. She’d never actually been afraid of someone she’d taken upstairs at Sanctuary.
But was she afraid, now? It had been Yael’s oddness, that hint of the unknown that had appealed to her from the start. Hadassah forced herself to ask, did she truly feel like Yael was dangerous and might hurt her?
“Your heart is beating very fast,” Yael said. “I can see it pulsing in your throat.”
“Are you a vampire?” Hadassah blurted the words, aware she’d spoken too loud, going against the unspoken rules for using this floor. Stay quiet. Don’t draw attention to yourself, or to anyone else. She softened her tone. “I don’t have anything against vampires. I just want to know.”
Yael blinked and tilted her head, her gaze clearly scanning Hadassah’s face. “I’ve frightened you. I didn’t mean to. No. I’m not a vampire.”
“What—” Hadassah began, but the sound of a door opening stopped her. That was another of those rules—no lingering in the hall. It was inevitable that you might sometimes pass other guests coming to or fro, but it was forbidden to purposefully remain in the public space. “Come on.”
She slipped the key into the lock and opened the door. When they were both inside, she shut the door behind them. She put the key on the small table inside the door. She turned to Yael. Before she could speak, Yael had moved in close to take Hadassah in her arms.
The kiss was gentle. Hesitant. Yael pulled away without removing her hands from Hadassah’s hips.
“I do not always understand societal norms,” Yael said. “I am trying. I did not mean to make you afraid. I have no intentions of causing you harm. My question was meant from curiosity, not intent.”
“Are you human?” Hadassah tensed, expecting the answer to be “no.”
Love, Blood, and Sanctuary Page 12