White Blood

by Holder, Angela

  “Yes, your Grace,” Maryn whispered. She stepped tentatively forward and sank into the chair Carlich had vacated, perching nervously on the edge. Barilan squirmed. She pulled loose the tie of her shift and offered her breast. Luckily, he was willing to nurse. He might fall asleep if she could keep him still long enough.

  Vinhor waited until they were both settled. When Maryn looked up at him, he leaned forward, resting his elbows on his desk and interlacing his fingers. “Tell me child, how much do you know of sorcery?”

  “Very little, sir,” she mumbled. “Only what everyone is taught, how to release power from accidentally shed blood.”

  Vinhor pursed his lips, but kept his voice gentle. “Then you know the prayer of invocation to the Holy One?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “The spell I’m going to teach you begins the same way. Let me hear you say it.”

  Maryn recited the syllables of the ancient tongue. Vinhor winced once or twice. When she finished he went back over the words with her, correcting her pronunciation in several places.

  Satisfied at last, he sat back, frowning thoughtfully at her. “The rest of the spell could be accomplished by incantation also, but it would be very complicated, and it might take days for you to memorize the lengthy stanzas required. I take it you don’t read? No, of course not.” He sighed. “Let’s try something different. Here, can you get one hand free? Good. Do this.” He made a graceful gesture with his hand, touching his thumb and forefinger together in a circle and scooping the air with his other fingers spread wide. Maryn copied it as best she could.

  “Very good. Yes, this will be much easier. That’s the motion which begins all gestural spells. It captures the magic inherent in the blood you’ll be using and gathers it ready to be shaped by your will. Gestural magic isn’t as exacting as incantational magic. With incantations, the words of the sacred language control the form the power takes. If any words go awry, the only risk is that the spell won’t work at all. It’s almost impossible for the magic to escape control.

  “With gestural magic, it’s different. Your will controls the magic. Certain gestures are customarily used, but they’re much more fluid; someone with a strong enough will can use almost any motion to direct the spell. As long as you keep your purpose firmly in mind there’s little chance your spell will fail completely. But it can easily overwhelm your control, especially if your knowledge of the time;-;tested gestures is weak, or the amount of blood you’re attempting to control is great. Uncontrolled sorcery produces powerful and unpredictable effects, and frequently kills the wielder. That shouldn’t be a danger here, however. I’ll drill you in the gestures you must use, and the spell will only require a small amount of blood.”

  So that was what had happened to King Froethych. Maryn shuddered, remembering the eerie way his hands had moved involuntarily, gushing blood, sweeping into ever more extravagant gestures. The thought of falling victim to such wild magic terrified her. She would have much preferred to spend whatever time was necessary to learn the safer method. But the priest had decided, and Carlich’s parting order bound her to obey him.

  Vinhor proceeded to instruct her in a complex series of gestures. Maryn paid close attention, sweeping her hand through the fluid motions in imitation. As soon as Barilan fell asleep she detached him from her breast and eased him into her lap so she could have both hands free. Vinhor ran her through the series of gestures over and over again, first the sequence that would sever Barilan’s soul from his body, then the longer, more intricate sequence that would call Frilan’s soul to take its place. Maryn didn’t let herself think too deeply about what the motions meant, as her hands darted above Barilan’s slumbering form. She only focused on learning as quickly and well as she could.

  At last Vinhor sat back. “One more time through the whole set.” He watched closely, making no comment, only sitting in silent judgment until Maryn’s palms grew sweaty and her mouth dry. But she didn’t falter, moving her hands in the graceful dance of the spell.

  When she finished, Vinhor nodded slowly. “That should do. You’re a surprisingly apt pupil, for a servant and a woman.” He rose and came around his desk to stand beside her chair and look down at the sleeping baby in her lap. “Best to do it now, while your memory is fresh.”

  He drew the little gold knife from its sheath on his belt and laid it on the edge of the desk in front of her. “I shall step out. You may have as long as you need.”

  He moved toward the door, then paused. “I want you to understand something very clearly. Once this work is done, you must forget all I’ve taught you. You must never again draw blood to use for magic, nor make use of any blood you might encounter for that purpose. I forbid it, in the name of the Holy One. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, your Grace,” Maryn whispered. Carlich’s spell gave Vinhor’s words the force of magical compulsion.

  “Very good. Be about your work. Perform the spells, just as I taught you. Restore your son to life. Once you’re done, open the door and call, and Prince Carlich and I will return.” Vinhor passed over the threshold, easing the heavy wooden door closed behind him.

  Maryn was alone with Barilan and the knife. The baby nestled in the valley where her thighs met, relaxed and vulnerable. One arm draped across her knees above his head, and his breath came in little sighs. The heat of his body soaked through her skirts into her legs.

  She must not think. If she stopped to think, she knew she wouldn’t be able to go through with it. Barilan trusted her, and she was about to betray him. No matter what sophistry Vinhor might weave to justify the act, a voice buried deep in Maryn’s heart whispered that it was profoundly wrong to send Barilan’s soul off to the Holy One’s courts long before its appointed time.

  She refused to listen, letting longing swell up to smother all reservations. She wanted to work the spell that would bring Frilan back to her. Wanted it so intensely her hands shook and her breath shuddered and she felt as if she would die if she didn’t immediately snatch up the knife and jab it into her flesh.

  Memories of Frilan overwhelmed her, filling all her senses. His soft dark fuzz tickling her stroking palm. His strident cry waking her from slumber. The milky, musky smell of the top of his head. His warm wet mouth questing for her breast, and the slow, rhythmic sucks when he found it and her milk answered his demands.

  She almost reached for the knife, but a splinter of doubt pricked her, and she hesitated. Was she longing for Frilan’s soul, or only his body? She wasn’t going to get those physical things back. The spell promised something else, something she couldn’t touch or taste or smell.

  Vinhor thought that no one would be able tell the difference when Frilan’s soul replaced Barilan’s. That since babies hadn’t yet developed the ability to speak or understand or remember, their souls could be freely interchanged without making any real difference. Maryn knew he had to be wrong, but for a moment she couldn’t quite articulate why. Would even she, who knew them both better than anyone else, be able recognize Frilan’s soul if it lived in Barilan’s body?

  Yes, she would. The more she thought about it, the more certain she became. Frilan had been so different from Barilan, in ways that had nothing to do with the way they looked or sounded or felt. Frilan had always been easy;-;going, while Barilan was needy and clingy. Frilan had been happy to go three or four hours between nursings, while Barilan grew restless after no more than two. Barilan had his little way of looking sideways at her, while Frilan had never met her eyes anything but straight on. Frilan had relaxed content in his bath water, even when she poured it over his head to rinse his hair, while Barilan began to scream as soon as wetness touched his skin. Frilan had kicked and protested when she changed his diaper, while Barilan usually lay passive. Barilan was reluctant to spend more than a few minutes in anyone else’s arms but hers, even his father’s or mother’s, while Frilan had scarcely noticed who held him unless he was hungry or sleepy. A thousand little differences, most too small or subtle for her to de
fine and catalogue, but instantly recognizable to her mother’s perceptions, that made each of them the unique individual she knew.

  Maybe no one else would recognize a change when Frilan’s soul came to inhabit Barilan’s body, but Maryn would. She was sure of it. She would know her own child’s soul, even if a thousand lifetimes separated them, not just the handful of months since Frilan had died.

  Her throat grew thick and choked, and her eyes blurred with tears. She could hold Frilan again. She could look into his eyes and see him looking back at her. She could laugh with him and sing to him and whisper to him of her love. Edrich might be lost to her forever, but Frilan wasn’t, not anymore. All she had to do was take up the offered knife, and prick her finger to draw forth a little blood, and wave her hands just so…

  She ached to reach for the knife, and she felt the pressure of the compulsion spell shoving her hand forward, but something in her still resisted. She interlaced her shaking fingers and stared at them, and past them to where Barilan peacefully sprawled in her lap.

  She loved Barilan, too. Not with the intense, overwhelming passion she felt for Frilan, but with a gentle, stubborn affection that had grown almost unnoticed over the months she’d cared for him. He wasn’t her blood, but he mattered to her.

  Fate had sent Frilan’s soul from the world; surely it wasn’t right that her action should banish Barilan’s. King Froethych’s magic obviously considered the spell to be harm to Barilan; Prince Carlich had been restrained by its effects from even talking about it. What other evidence did she need as to how the act would be judged by the Holy One? If they’d told her that in order to get Frilan back she’d have to cut out Barilan’s heart, would she do it?

  Maryn recoiled from the thought, but at the same time she knew she wouldn’t reject the idea completely. So deep was her desire for her lost child, even that prospect would tempt her, however briefly. What they asked of her was so much less, so much easier. Barilan would suffer no discomfort. He would wake to the infinite pleasures of the Holy One’s courts, like the blessed souls depicted in the most beautiful of the church’s stained glass windows. Their faces shone with radiant joy as they feasted in the midst of ever;-;blooming flowers.

  And Frilan would be in her arms again.

  She watched as her fingers loosened and slid apart. Carlich’s spell gave Vinhor’s words inexorable power, animating her limbs without any volition of her own. Perform the spells, just as I taught you. It wasn’t her fault she was too weak to resist his magic. It must still be strong enough to force her to comply.

  Her left hand turned palm up, ready to receive the edge of the blade. Her right hand hovered, clenching and unclenching. Beyond it, Barilan slumbered, cheeks flushed a soft pink, chest lifting and falling. Maryn closed her eyes so she wouldn’t have to see him.

  Instead, she pictured Frilan lying in Edrich’s arms. Images that had lurked in the back of her mind ever since that day, horrible pictures she’d never dared fully consider, surged to vivid life in her imagination. She saw flames creeping in around the sleeping baby, licking up from the straw of the mattress to engulf him. Smoke invaded delicate nostrils and slid between bow;-;shaped lips. Heat shimmered, oven;-;bright. Tender flesh roasted. Skin blackened and split and peeled away from bones that gleamed white for an instant before they, too, burned. Maryn tasted vomit, burning in the back of her throat. Lidless eyes stared at her, lipless mouth gaping in a piercing scream that echoed, redoubled, from every deepest crevice of her heart.

  Restore your son to life.

  She had the power to stop the screams. She could quench the fire, as if it had never burned. She could give Frilan a new body, whole and unblemished and free from pain.

  Maryn opened her eyes and stared at the knife where it lay on the edge of the desk.

  Frilan. Alive. Nothing else mattered.

  Maryn grabbed the knife and slashed her palm with a strangled gasp. She raced through the incantation to the Holy One, spitting out the syllables. Dropping the knife, she raised her bloody palm, touched her thumb to her forefinger, and made the scooping gesture Vinhor had taught her.

  The blood in her hand crackled into life, blue sparks spitting and fizzing. Her bones reverberated with the buzzing, much sharper and more intense than cleansing had ever evoked. She forced herself to face, unflinching, the full truth of what she wanted. She willed the magic to sever Barilan’s soul from his body, leaving an empty vessel ready for Frilan’s soul to fill.

  Her hands shaped the necessary gestures. With the final motion, lightning burst from her palm and plunged toward the child in her lap.

  An invisible shield blocked the sorcery. Fire splattered harmlessly in all directions and faded. Barilan slept on, undisturbed.

  Maryn gaped, uncomprehending. Only slowly did she grasp what had happened. She let her hands drop. The sparks gradually subsided. Not all her shed blood had been consumed by the spell; a drop fell from her hand to the floor.

  She’d failed. The spell hadn’t worked. Barilan’s soul still stubbornly occupied his body. Frilan remained lost. His screams still echoed in her heart, just as they had ever since he died.

  She groped for the fallen knife. She must have erred somehow in her gestures. She’d perform the spell again, correctly this time. It would work. It had to.

  Her motion disturbed Barilan, and his face screwed up, mouth opening in a wail. The sound was thin and petulant, far different from the agonized screams of her imagination. But she caught her breath, staring at him. Her breasts responded to his cries with a familiar tingling rush. Dizziness swept over her, and confusion, thoughts and feelings tumbling chaotically as Barilan’s cries beat on her ears.

  Maryn pressed her hand to her mouth, shutting in an answering cry. Dear Holy One, what had she done? She’d nearly killed him. If her spell had succeeded, there would be two voices screaming in her heart now, not one.

  She snatched Barilan up and pressed him to her chest, burying her face in his hair. She shook as waves of emotion washed over her, tossing her back and forth. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry…” She was, and yet…It wasn’t fair. She was supposed to be holding Frilan now. A part of her hated the baby in her arms for not being her son.

  But as Barilan squirmed, complaining stridently about the tightness of her grip, horror at what she’d almost done rushed back. She loosened her grip and eased him down to sit in her lap. She reached out to stroke his hair, tears blurring her eyes. “I wouldn’t have—” She couldn’t complete the lie. “I shouldn’t have—”

  His face cleared, and he grabbed her hand, pulling it to his mouth. He gummed her finger vigorously, cheerful again, momentary displeasure forgotten. His bright eyes sought Maryn’s.

  She met them, swallowing, her stomach cold and hollow. If the spell had worked, how would it have felt to look into those eyes and know Barilan’s soul was no longer behind them? Could even the joy of meeting Frilan’s gaze have countered the horror of knowing that she had put out the light of Barilan’s eyes forever?

  She stared at Barilan until he looked away. The sickening truth crept over her until she could deny it no longer. It wouldn’t have. The spell’s failure had saved her from doing something terrible, something she would have regretted for the rest of her life. No matter how much she longed for Frilan, it had been wrong, horribly wrong, to try to sacrifice Barilan in order to bring him back.

  Again she wrapped her arms around Barilan and buried her face in his hair. For a while all she could do was shake.

  At length she took a deep, shuddering breath and resettled Barilan in her lap. She tried to think what she must do next. Carlich and Vinhor would wonder why it was taking her so long if she didn’t call them soon. She’d have to admit she’d proven incompetent after all and failed to work the spell correctly.

  Maryn frowned. She was nearly certain she’d made all the gestures just as Vinhor had taught her. And the magic had responded. Though she could hardly bear to think of that moment, she clearly remembered the blue lightning
plunging toward Barilan. Something had blocked it, the same way Carlich and Voerell’s magic had been blocked when they attacked each other.

  Could King Froethych’s spell have protected Barilan from her attempt to harm him, just as it had shielded him from Carlich? But why would it? The spell shouldn’t apply to her; she wasn’t Barilan’s blood kin.

  Maybe they’d all been mistaken about the sorcery the dying king had worked. Perhaps he had simply protected his own kin against all harm. But no, she’d heard his words, and that wasn’t what he’d said. Carlich had not been protected against the specters. And Vinhor had told Carlich that in Ralo, and presumably throughout Milecha, the action of the spell had been evident, shielding even serfs and commoners against harm by their own family members.

  No, somehow the spell must consider her Barilan’s kin. As she was, of course, though not by blood. Hadn’t Coewyn made a huge effort to ensure that no other living person had tasted her milk? If they had, they would be legally kin to Barilan. Magic, too, must consider milk;-;ties valid. She was Barilan’s milk;-;mother, bound by kinship ties as strong as those forged by blood.

  What had Siwell said? White blood. Some people called milk white blood.

  Barilan grabbed at her face, and his fingers found a purchase on her lip. They didn’t pinch, though. Of course. He couldn’t hurt her, either. That’s why his nursing had never once caused her pain since the light of King Froethych’s spell washed over them both, no matter how careless she’d been getting him latched. She should have realized that long since.

  Maryn noticed blood from her cut palm smeared on the shoulder of Barilan’s gown and splattered on the floor. She muttered the spell of cleansing. She didn’t have to rush past the Holy One’s name this time as she had before. She’d known in her heart it was sacrilege to ask his blessing on a sinful act. When the cleansing was done, she kept her eyes closed a moment longer in prayer. “Thank you,” she whispered. “Forgive me…”