by Aja James
The Pure Healer shook her head to the last question.
“Wan’er is in NYC setting up a sister clinic in the Chinatown there, similar to the one she has here in Boston. She goes often these days to make sure it’s running smoothly.”
Ava quickly took in Tal’s clenched, naked form curled into a tight ball on a mechanical bed, covered only by a sheet at his waist, his blood slowly seeping from a hastily patched up tear in the throat area and several open gashes in the chest.
Good lord! It looked like he’d been attacked by a bear or a tiger.
Inanna and Gabriel were standing by the bed, their countenance grim and pale. No telling how long they’d been standing there. They seemed like statues they were so silent and still.
Sophia and Benji were asleep on two nearby cots, though fitfully, as Sophia’s face was scrunched in a worried frown.
Rain took Ava aside as she put on some scrubs and washed her hands, whispering so that the others couldn’t hear.
“There is nothing we can do for the pain,” she finally replied to Ava’s first question.
“Pure and Dark Ones’ bodies reject any and all foreign agents. The drugs that work on humans to numb the senses won’t work on our Kind.”
“What about a vampire’s venom?” Ava asked, thinking fast. “Depending on the chemistry between the vampire and the subject, it could create a relaxing or numbing effect.”
Rain jerked to alertness. “Why didn’t I think of this?”
“You’re not married to a vampire,” Ava returned briskly, cutting off Rain’s self-blame.
To Inanna she said in a louder voice, “Nana, have you tried injecting the venom from your fangs into Tal’s bloodstream? Didn’t you used to take away terminal patients’ pain as the Angel of Death among the Dark Ones?”
Inanna startled to wakefulness as if she’d truly been a statue frozen with terror and sorrow.
Slowly she blinked at Ava and Rain and furrowed her brow in concentration.
“It would not work on Papa,” she said after a lengthy pause, exhaling as if deflated. “His blood answers to none but his Mistress.”
“What does that mean?” Ava asked directly, while Rain also looked puzzled.
Carefully, Inanna pulled on the sheet that covered Tal, so that his lower abdomen right above his groin was revealed under the dimmed lights over the bed.
Her Mate clenched his jaw at the sight and turned away, his body vibrating with fury.
“What is it?” Ava asked, stepping closer to get a better look.
“What am I looking at?”
There were sooo many wounds on Tal’s body, old and new, that Ava didn’t know where to look. Everywhere where there was a patch of skin, except for his face, hands and feet, was covered with blue, purple, even blackish lines, some jagged, some curved, so fat, some narrow, as if he’d been drawn on by a thousand markers.
Except Ava doubted the marks washed off like those you drew with Crayola.
She’d met Tal a few times before during her regular trips to the Shield to get her checkups and do her research, and of course when they’d liberated him from the prison in Japan, but he’d always been covered up from head to toe, usually wearing a turtleneck if weather permitted, and always long sleeved shirts and long pants even during the humid Boston summers.
She had no idea…
Ava shook herself mentally and tried to refocus. She narrowed her gaze on the strip of skin bared by the lowered sheet. She could make out two thin, purplish lines that looked like tattoos over the internal iliac veins that pulsed in the lower abdomen on either side of the pubic bone.
No, not tattoos, Ava detected upon closer examination. Unhealed scars or wounds that no longer bled. The skin and tissue were barely knitted together over what looked to be two three-inch incisions into the veins.
“They are the marks of a Blood Slave,” Inanna replied, her voice raspy with barely contained emotion.
“They will not heal as long as his Mistress does not release him.”
Rain’s gasp was the only sound in the chamber.
Having treated Tal when he’d first been liberated from his prison in Japan, Rain had seen all of the warrior’s body. She’d noticed the markings on his lower stomach but didn’t know what they signified, having heard of, but never seen firsthand, the brand of a Blood Slave.
The Great War had liberated Pure Ones from enslavement. The idea of Blood Slaves had not been talked of in over four thousand years, becoming more myth than history.
To be a Blood Slave was the deepest shame and humiliation a Pure One could endure.
“What… What does that mean?” Ava stuttered, barely whispering, as if she dreaded the answer to her question.
“His physical self, every part of him, including his blood, will only respond to his Mistress’s commands,” Inanna said, her voice stony, her face a mask of anguish for her father.
“If he is to find any relief from this excruciating torture, she will have to provide it—if she intends to provide it.”
A vampire’s venom reflected its owner’s emotions. If Tal’s Mistress possessed selfish inclinations, or worse, ill will toward him, her venom would only make things worse.
“Can he—” Ava began to ask, but cut herself off.
No, Tal could not tell them who his Mistress was. His jaw was all but breaking from the way he clenched it against the debilitating pain.
Ava saw that he was entirely unconscious of everything around him, as if he were transported to, and encased within, his very own Hell. No one could reach him, and he couldn’t reach out.
“Even if he could obtain some relief,” Inanna plunged on despite her crumbling face, eyes overflowing with tears she could no longer hold back, “he will still succumb to the Decline. Only the female he loves, only if she loves him back truly and completely…only then might he live.”
She choked on a tearful breath, and then another, gulping for air. Gabriel came behind her and enclosed her in his embrace, holding her tight.
Between keening wails, she cried, “B-but he wouldn’t be li-like this if the female he loves loved him back. S-so there is no cure! There’s nothing I can do but w-watch him d-die!”
Ava felt the blood drain from her face upon hearing those heart-rending words. Rain, too, bowed her head in defeat and sorrow beside her.
Gabriel turned Inanna around and folded his body over hers, tucking her face into the hollow of his neck, so that his back was blocking her view of her father. As if he could somehow protect her from the ugly, devastating truth.
Ava stood frozen with despair for long moments. Only the sound of Inanna’s sobbing echoed through the eerily silent room.
And then, with furious efficiency, she gathered the necessary equipment and took a test tube’s worth of Tal’s blood from his jagged throat wound.
Sample in hand, she took off her scrubs and charged out of the chamber at a brisk walk.
Rain followed her and had to run a little to keep up.
“What is it, Ava, where are you going?”
“I’m going to the labs to analyze this blood.”
Rain stumbled in sudden realization, then walked just as fast and purposefully alongside Ava.
“You think you can isolate something of his Mistress’s DNA? Enough to help us search for her?”
Ava nodded. “I know Pure and Dark Ones don’t store records of DNA.”
She’d only been able to collect samples from the occupants of the Shield, including the part-timers Inanna, Gabriel, Tal and even Benji, and from herself and Ryu, in her efforts to trace the genetic material of a mysterious research sample she’d dubbed Evergreen.
A sample that was key to their nemesis, Medusa’s, genetic engineering programs involving humans, Dark and Pure Ones.
Ava hadn’t had time to conduct a thorough analysis, having focused primarily on her own blood and then her son’s, given that he was a mix between human and vampire, and she was a bit of a Frankenstein herself, to make sure
they were both stable. And then she’d turned her attention to finding a treatment or cure for her father’s Parkinson’s.
“But if I work extra fast, I might be able to determine some of her physical characteristics, assuming I can isolate any of her genetic material in Tal’s blood.”
Rain’s eyes widened with understanding. “Then we’d know what to look for, even if we had to narrow it down one vampire at a time.”
“Better than nothing,” Ava bit out, pushing through the double doors of the test clinic on the opposite end of the corridor.
“It’s definitely something,” Rain agreed, her focused, zen-like calmness returning.
“Tell me how I can help.”
*** *** *** ***
Third millennium BC. Outskirts of Akkad.
Ishtar snuck out again a fortnight hence to visit the blacksmith’s hut in the outer villages that branched from Akkad.
It was almost dawn, and the entire palace was asleep or preparing to. Ishtar knew that if she was caught, the Queen would likely put her under heavy guard at the very least to prevent any such venturing in the future. She’d already gotten in trouble once before, and Queen Ashlu never forgave a second offense.
Even so, the promise of seeing the blacksmith’s son—Tal—trumped by far any punishment Ishtar would suffer if her escapade were discovered. She just couldn’t seem to help herself.
She stopped short at the fork in the road where the dirt path that led to the hut met with the rambling stream that led through the mountain that abutted the sea.
Tal was coming toward her, head down, striding quickly on long, lean legs.
Unreasonably happy to see him, Ishtar started to run, meeting him half way. Face filled with joy, eyes bright with excitement.
And then her glowing countenance abruptly fell at the first words out of the boy-man’s mouth:
“You shouldn’t have come here.”
Tal said this in a low, solemn voice, his eyes cast somewhere behind her, not meeting hers, as if he didn’t want to say it, but had to.
Ishtar searched his face and considered what to do. The one thing she knew she didn’t want to do was to leave, now that she’d seen him again.
It was like the cold, lonely moon trying to leave the sun’s toasty orbit.
“Did you get in trouble for helping me?” she asked in a small voice, worried that he’d been punished or abused after what he did for her before.
“It’s not that,” he replied with a tinge of impatience, still not meeting her gaze, as if he were frustrated.
Whether with her or himself or someone else, she didn’t know.
“We—you and me and our Kinds in general—should not be…socializing,” he ground out, then more gently he said, “I’m glad I was able to help you, but…”
“You don’t want to see me again,” she stated what he couldn’t seem to finish.
Finally, he looked into her face, into her eyes.
Ishtar almost fell backwards from the indescribable impact of his turquoise gaze. It felt like she’d been struck by lightning, her very blood singed and sizzling in her veins, and she couldn’t look away even if her life depended upon it.
“It’s not safe for someone like you,” he said quietly, willing his message to sink in.
“Even though vampires rule the world, humans are your cattle and we…Pure Ones…are your slaves, it’s not safe outside the protected walls of your estates and the palace. There is much anger simmering among the people, especially after the vampire kills in recent years, the taking of human lives and souls against the laws, the taking of Pure slaves without compunction.”
Although Ishtar was only ten summers, she’d been educated from birth to understand the rule of Dark Ones and the order of things. She understood clearly what Tal was saying now. It was indeed foolishness for a vampire to try to befriend a human, much less a Pure One.
Pure Ones were at the very bottom of the totem pole of society. And she, a Dark Princess, was at its zenith.
“May I never see you again?” she asked simply, stubbornly stuck in her own selfish desires.
She’d never been shy about going after what she wanted. Very few things were ever denied her. And right now, with everything she was, she wanted simply to spend time with this male.
But given their situation, perhaps it was a lot more complicated than she realized.
He sighed as if weary, mayhap defeated. And she thought he would turn her away.
Instead, he grasped her hand and started leading her toward the mountain path, away from the village, toward the cliffs of the bordering sea.
After a rigorous, lengthy climb, the sun was beginning to crest over the horizon, and Ishtar naturally shifted into her leopard form to minimize the sun’s inducement for Dark Ones to sleep.
Being with Tal gave her extra energy from eagerness and joy, so she bounded playfully around his legs as he climbed, making him laugh at her antics.
Especially the one where she’d leap ahead to a higher rock and when he came by, she’d lick him from chin to forehead with her sandpaper tongue.
Finally, they reached the top of the cliffs that overlooked the sea below, calm and peaceful in the early dawn, as if waiting for the sun to ignite its waves into motion.
Tal chose a smooth, flat rock to sit upon and spread his long legs in front of him, leaning back on his elbows.
Ishtar circled around him a couple of times, teasing his nose with her fluffy tail, making him sneeze and chuckle at the same time. Finally, she kneaded his thighs with her two front paws before settling there in his lap, curling around herself and closing her eyes.
Just as she wished, one of his hands started stroking her thick, spotted fur, from the top of her head to the end of her tail.
Oh, she was in kitten heaven. A loud, vibrating purr emanated from her throat, making him laugh again.
“Like that, do you?” he murmured, his long fingers working their magic.
Meowrr, she replied, tilting her head up so he could scratch the soft, thick tuft under the chin.
He obliged her readily and she butted her head under his chin, rubbing the scent glands around her face all along his throat and collarbone, nuzzling affectionately while marking her territory.
“I’ve always wanted a cat,” he confided shyly. “But papa said that even the tamest of cats are wild predators at heart. They aren’t meant to be kept. They will always be the masters of themselves and everything around them.”
Purrrrr, she rumbled, apparently in agreement, then pushed up on her front paws against his chest and bathed his face with her tongue.
He laughed again, and all Ishtar wanted was for him to keep doing it.
It was the most beautiful sound she’d ever heard.
“I guess you like me enough to tolerate having me around, mistress kitten,” he said, still chuckling. “And I guess I like you enough to be your willing slave.”
Still pushed up on her paws against his chest, she pulled slightly back to look into his turquoise eyes, brilliant with good humor.
But the longer those mesmerizing orbs stared into her, the more solemn he became.
She wondered what he saw. His serious, contemplative expression was starting to alarm her.
So she gently licked his nose again, and then his mouth too, trying to tickle him back into laughter.
He exhaled roughly and patted her into a reclining position in his lap, and looked out into the horizon.
“Maybe I can’t keep a cat,” he murmured softly, “but you could keep me, hmm? Would you like that, ana Ishtar?”
Basking under the rays of the golden sun, surrounded by the comforting heat Tal’s body radiated, Ishtar put her chin on her paws and closed her eyes with bliss, curling her tail over them.
Her last thought before a marvelous catnap took her was:
Yes, she’d like that above all things.
While she slept contentedly, Tal was troubled by his thoughts.
No one knew save himsel
f, but his Gift had started to come upon him in the past couple of years.
At first it was disorienting and disconcerting, being able to see events that hadn’t yet occurred while the present was actually occurring. He didn’t understand what the visions meant when he gazed into another’s eyes, until he started to answer questions that hadn’t been asked, prevent accidents that hadn’t happened, create iron and wood works that hadn’t been ordered.
Everything came to be just as his visions showed him, for each individual he could see into.
But he couldn’t see his father’s future, he couldn’t see his own (for which he was thankful), and now, he couldn’t see Ishtar’s either.
He was familiar enough with his Gift by now to understand how to wield it and what each vision meant.
What he saw was not the definite future, but a possible one, and he could change it with his actions before it came to pass. There was no boundary for the timeframe of his sight—it could be in the next moment or far into a distant horizon. Only the context, the background, clothing, artifacts, in the visions told him whether they were the near or distant future.
And when he couldn’t see anything but his own reflection staring back at him, looking into a person’s eyes, it meant that their fate was too intimately entwined with his.
He couldn’t see his mother’s abduction and her death. Couldn’t see his father wasting away in mourning.
It made him seethe with a helpless rage inside, an inwardly directed fury, for not being able to prevent tragedies involving those he loved most.
And now he couldn’t see the events that surrounded the little girl-cat nestled in his lap.
It made him cold with fear and apprehension.
When the villagers had chased her to his hut that night, he’d easily said the right things to diffuse the tension, because he could see what saying the wrong things would lead to.
But when he’d looked into those amethyst eyes for the very first time, he was overwhelmed by a blinding, blazing light. Spearing through his body and searing his soul.
Then, just as quickly, it was gone. And when he stared some more, it wasn’t even his reflection that stared back at him, but a voracious, interminable darkness.