Blood Magic

by Jayne Hawke

  I rolled it around in my arteries for a moment and realized I could bend and dry it the way they did. I wasn’t going to be able to summon blood monsters anytime soon, but if I mixed it just right with war magic that would bond with my skin, I could create some sort of unspeakable magical bandages.

  Letting my magic flow on autopilot, I pressed war magic into my veins and wrapped it around the new blood, forcing the mixture into my wounds and hardening it into a silvery-red skin replacement. Every wound hurt like a thousand needles had pierced every edge and corkscrewed its way in, but I moved experimentally and found that I was as good as new apart from that.

  I shuddered at the thought, but there was no time to think about what I must look like. I pulled the pain down and made it into rage. They had done this, had made me into this, and they were going to die a death that made their transformations feel like a dream spa day.

  I turned to where Ethan was standing, his sword and dagger fending off two witches while a third lay on her back. Cade was down, pinned by a woman coated in blood like a power suit. I wanted to save Ethan first, but Cade needed me. I rushed the lady in red, my weapons forgotten, and lay my hands on her outer shell. Before she had a chance to even notice me, I folded the whole thing inward, her attention entirely on killing my packmate until it was too late. She screamed in agony as her own weapons pierced her skin and crushed her bones, and as she did the pack howled and snarled while Sin laughed maniacally over the din. I looked around to see the tide turning as the pack fought with renewed strength.

  Turning, I caught the weapons of the women fighting Ethan and bent them to my will, the weight of my magic enough to still them for more than long enough for Ethan to dispatch the pair. He looked at me, a nod of gratitude faltering as he saw what I’d made of myself. I couldn’t help but imagine what he could see, a mess of shining red blood very obviously not mine criss-crossing my skin a millimetre below the surface. He recovered quickly and we moved into what was left of the fray.

  Not long now.

  I summoned my sword again, knowing I couldn’t afford to rely on pure power if I wanted to keep my strength up. I rushed an unattended witch who was slowly advancing on me and swept my blade down towards her. She caught it on her kite shield, and the shield cracked in two. As my sword passed through, she folded it around and engulfed the blade, holding it away from her and covering the blade in blunt blood. The weapon was completely dulled, all but useless.

  All but.

  I summoned up my war gauntlet on my off hand and gripped her sword as it thrust towards my abdomen. I didn’t know whether a blood magic sword would cut through a war magic gauntlet or vice versa, but I knew it wasn’t going to happen soon. I brought down my sword again from above, and this time there was no shield to block it. My blow landed on the crown of her forehead, bashing into the little black widow’s peak that was left in her otherwise grey hair, little chips of red dropping into her hair as I was struck with the sensation of driving an axe into soft wood. She flinched but continued to struggle with her sword, so I did it again. And again. And again. Five strikes in, I heard a loud crack and she fell dead, her sword and shield turning to dust along with the maddening sheath on my own weapon.

  I turned to find Sin, Ethan, and Cade with one witch furiously blocking between them, a thousand tiny shields in a whirlwind. She had no chance of fighting back, but her defensive skills were impressive. Equally impressive was the struggle behind her, Kerry still cracking open the semi-transparent blood egg holding our very last enemy.

  “Look around you, witch,” Ethan said. “Nothing is left of your coven except you and a weeping bubble. My cat is going to eat your bubble friend very soon, which means that you need a plan to kill an entire pack of death workers. Surrender now, and I can at least promise you’ll get to meet some interesting people before you die.”

  The girl was clearly exhausted, her magic drained and her clothes soaked with sweat. She knew there was no way she could win. A snarl of triumph marked Kerry’s entry into the egg, and a wet gurgle marked the end of its occupant. The last witch winced at the sound and raised her hands in surrender, the blood all around her soaking back into her resealable wounds before she shut them once more.

  Ethan reached to reopen them, to let her power drain out of her before she stabbed us in the back with it, but she looked up at him with something that wasn’t quite pleading and said, “I’ll die without blood. We all would.”

  He satisfied himself by dumping some sort of sealing potion over it that immediately hardened. It wasn’t going to be useful again anytime soon. We walked together back to the cars shoulder to shoulder, Ethan and I at the centre and Sin on the wing looking pleased as punch. We’d just defeated the vampires.

  FORTY-EIGHT

  A tall olive-skinned elf was leaning against a beautiful pitch-black car with his hands tucked into the pockets of his exquisitely tailored black suit. The fabric had the depth of the night sky woven into it making it the purest of blacks, which made the elf eye-catching, no doubt the point.

  Ethan tensed next to me.

  “Ryn,” he simply said as he stopped some eight feet in front of the elf.

  We all stopped along with Ethan. My god magic was within reach if this went sideways. The exhaustion was sinking into my bones and beginning to turn the edges of my vision dark, but I wouldn’t let that stop me from taking the leader of the Fae Isles down if he started something.

  The elf looked at the broken blood witch and smirked.

  “You brought me a gift; how kind.”

  He pushed off from the car with the grace of a ballet dancer. His movements put Sin to shame. There was no predator that could match Ryn, and he knew it.

  I lifted my chin and looked into his green eyes the colour of spring leaves, not sure if I was daring him to mention the patch job that was still all over my skin or politely asking him to ignore it.

  “Ethan contacted you to remove the bounty from my head,” I said.

  Ryn smiled, a cold predatory expression that sent a shiver down my spine.

  “He did. And I’ve thought about it.” He gestured at the blood witch to walk to him. “This little gift has had no impact on my decision.”

  The witch shuffled towards him, eyes down. Everyone here knew her fate. Perhaps it would have been kinder to kill her ourselves, but there was a political game afoot. We needed to consider the bigger picture.

  “No. I will not remove the bounty. You’re proving to be quite hard to kill, which is useful to me. You are sorting the wheat from the chaff. The weak assassins and hunters do not return from their mission. I do recommend that you complete the bond with Ethan, though, for your brother’s sake. Your being the joint alpha of the pack will give Matt far more protection.”

  He opened the door and pushed the witch into the car.

  “If there comes a time when you prove yourself superior to all of the assassins and hunters, then we will talk again.”

  He turned and got into the car.

  Ethan’s anger rolled off him in thick syrupy waves. Sin turned to us and grinned.

  “So, I’m officially a member of the pack now, correct?”

  I had to laugh. His response was so ridiculous and out of place there was nothing else to do but laugh. Everyone joined in after a long heavy moment. There we stood, covered in blood, exhausted, and laughing at the elf that had originally been sent to kill us.

  “I suppose you have some uses,” Ethan said grudgingly.

  “I do like pancakes,” Cade said with a shrug.

  And just like that, everything was back to normal. We continued our walk back to the cars. The blood dried against our skin and my muscles began to stiffen with over exertion. There was a weird happiness to it all. I should have been pissed at Ryn’s decision, but all I could really think about was the wonderful pack around me.

  “We’ll move into the pack house tomorrow,” I said softly to Ethan.

  He looked at me with happiness shining in his eyes. N
o more words were needed. We were one.

  Continue Kit’s adventure with Death Magic. Grab your copy now!

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  OTHER BOOKS BY JAYNE HAWKE

  Urban Fantasy in the Wolf Ridge world.

  Wolf Ridge – Baker turned werewolf.

  Chaos Witch – They never saw her coming.

  Paranormal romance in the God Touched world.

  Dragon Knight – She’s the only one that can break his curse.