Bad Blood

by Kristen Painter

  “It was my idea,” Fi said. “I made him go through the smoke.”

  Doc opened his eyes, wondering if the gratitude he felt showed on his face. Still, he wasn’t going to let Fi take the fall for his actions. “It was my decision.”

  Mal growled. “It was a stupid decision. You have no idea what kind of dark magic that old witch could have worked on you.”

  Doc shrugged like he didn’t care. Like he wasn’t already thinking Aliza had gotten ahold of him through his dreams. “What’s done is done. Can’t change it now.”

  “So… your curse?” Chrysabelle looked from him to Fi and back again. “Are you better? Can you shift?”

  “Sure can.” He rubbed a hand over his scalp, dreading the next part. “Been having nightmares, though. That’s how I ended up at Preacher’s last night. Had to see for myself that what I dreamed wasn’t real. But now I know it was.” He moved off the sofa arm onto the cushion, then raised his head to stare directly at Creek. “You said she was badly attacked, but it was more than that, wasn’t it? She was torn up, wasn’t she? Shredded.”

  “The comarré?” Creek nodded. “Yes. Like someone tried to strip the gold from her skin. Almost did it, too.”

  “Exactly the way I saw it.” Doc dropped his head into his hands. The nightmare replayed itself like news footage.

  “You didn’t do it, Doc.” Chrysabelle scooted forward. “You can’t hurt people in a dream.”

  Creek shifted. “He should come with us to the mayor’s. She’s going to want to hear this.”

  Doc narrowed his eyes. “What’s the mayor got to do with this?”

  Creek stared at him for a long second. “The dead comarré was her daughter.”

  “That’s just flippin’ great.” Doc muttered a curse that got him a raised brow from Chrysabelle. “You going to tell her about her grandchild?”

  Creek, Mal, and Chrysabelle looked at each other. Chrysabelle spoke first. “I don’t think we should. Not yet anyway. That’s a lot of information to process in one lump.”

  Mal nodded.

  “Agreed,” Creek said before turning back to Doc. “And just because that’s not enough to deal with, there’s an ancient one in town.”

  Doc leaned back. “An ancient one?”

  “A Castus.” Chrysabelle’s eyes held a dark light. “Like what we were up against at Tatiana’s in Corvinestri.”

  Doc swore again. “This day just gets better, doesn’t it? What else? Tatiana here yet? Ronan suddenly come back from the dead?”

  Mal shook his head. “Creek’s going to work on finding out about Tatiana, but Ronan’s not even worth talking about. No vampire could come back after what that gator must have done to him.”

  “Also…” Chrysabelle raised her hands. “Mal, Creek, Mortalis, and I are going to see Dominic tonight after we talk to the mayor. We plan on borrowing his plane because I have to go to New Orleans to see the fae elektos about getting the ring back.”

  Mal’s face darkened, his eyes glinting with silvery displeasure. “She’s getting her signum put back on so she can see the Aurelian one last time.”

  Doc wasn’t in any position to tell someone what was safe and what wasn’t, so he just nodded. Nor did he need to know how the elektos had come by the ring in the first place. “NOLA isn’t a very friendly place for vampires. Hasn’t been for years. They know you’re coming?” he asked Mal.

  “No, but we’ll work it out.” He downed the rest of the blood in his glass and set it on the side table.

  Chrysabelle nodded. “Mortalis will be with us, too. The thing is, I’d like you to stay here while we’re gone. You and Fi both. With the two new comarré on the property—”

  “What’s up with that?” Fi interjected.

  “Favor to Dominic,” Chrysabelle answered before continuing. “It would just be nice if you could be here, provide an extra set of eyes.” She exhaled slowly. “And I think, considering the circumstances, the visiting comarré should stay in the house, too. Regardless of the new security measure I’ve had installed, it’s too dangerous with a Castus on the loose. I may not want them here, but neither do I want them dead.”

  “Sure,” Doc said. “Be happy to.” And in truth he was. Time away from the freighter and the nightmares he’d been having there would be a good thing. Maybe sleeping in a new bed would give him the first peaceful sleep he’d had since walking through Aliza’s smoke. And maybe it wouldn’t. But Mephisto Island was a long ways from the abandoned shipyard and rusted-out freighter he’d called home for the last few years.

  Change could be a good thing.

  “You go through weapons like a child goes through sweets,” Argent said, dropping the new halm and crossbow Creek had requested on the workbench he used as a kitchen table. The halm rolled to a stop beside Creek’s motorcycle helmet.

  Not exactly that fast, Creek thought, but held his tongue. You didn’t argue with the sector chief. Not a sector chief who was also a dragon varcolai. He picked up the weapons, tested their weight. They seemed identical to the ones he’d lost. “It’s all in the line of duty.” He turned as Argent did, unwilling to let the dragon-shifter get out of his peripheral range.

  “Try not to lose this, too.” Argent tossed something his way.

  Creek dropped the halm and caught the sleek black rectangle just in time. It was no bigger than his palm, but weighty enough to be more than just the slab of glass it seemed to be. “What is it?”

  “Tap the front.”

  Creek did. It lit up. “I thought phones were a security issue?” Not to mention crazy expensive since the supplies of rare earth were so tightly controlled.

  “This one is completely secure. And for KM use only.” The sector chief stopped and blinked the inner membrane over his unnerving green eyes. “All the numbers you need are programmed in.”

  “How very full service.” Creek tucked the device into his front pocket. Now the KM could find him wherever he was. Hell. Nothing like being monitored 24-7. He’d had enough of that in prison.

  Argent rested against one of the steel support poles holding up the sleeping loft. “This thing that attacked you. You’re sure the creature was one of the ancient ones?”

  “Positive.” He picked the weapons back up and slid them into place on his chest holster, comforted by their presence against his body. “What else would light up like that from biting me?”

  Argent lifted a brow. “Any vampire. The brands you wear ensure that level of protection.”

  Creek stilled the urge to comment on a level of protection that required being bitten to kick in. But then considering those brands had been burned into his skin in the first place… He took a few steps back to lean against the sink. He’d kill for a beer, but he needed a clear head for tonight. “This wasn’t a vampire. I’ve been bitten before; there was never this much fire or this much pain. Trust me.” Not that the KM really trusted its grunts. Not from what he’d seen so far. He was just a tiny cog in what he suspected was a very large machine.

  Argent eyed Creek’s V-Rod just like he always did. The lure of chrome was too much for him. Dragons might have a high heat tolerance, but they had a serious weakness for shine, which was why Creek kept the thing polished as best he could. Any distraction with Argent was a welcome one. The varcolai took a few steps toward the bike. “Where are you with getting the ring back?”

  Lying by omission was still lying, but it didn’t exactly feel like oath-breaking either. “I’m progressing. I know it’s not in the comarré’s possession, but I’m working on finding out who has it.” A little truth, a little half-truth. And now a change of subject. “Something new has come up. One of Seven’s manufactured comarré was murdered. Turned out to be the mayor’s daughter. Mayor thinks I know something since I’m the one who found the body, but I’ve offered to educate her a little on what’s happening in exchange for removing me from the investigation’s focus.”

  Argent’s gaze stayed fixed on the machine. “The KM supersedes the mayor’s po
wer. You don’t need to do anything for her.”

  “If I’m to live and work in this city, I do.” He checked his watch. He had to do it soon, too. He’d promised to be back at Chrysabelle’s by dusk. That gave him thirty minutes to get out of here and to her house. “Getting on her bad side will only make my job harder. If she feels indebted to me, I can use that down the road.”

  Argent shrugged as he strolled slowly around the motorcycle. He trailed a finger over the handlebars. “Suit yourself. But we need that ring back. Samhain is tomorrow night.”

  “What do you think could happen?”

  Argent stilled and looked at him. “That ring has the power to raise and command an army of undead souls. With the covenant broken, the wrong person gets hold of that ring and even the KM may not be able to save the world from the hell that’s unleashed.”

  Damn. “Thanks for the info.” Creek studied the varcolai, thankful Argent couldn’t read his mind. If he, Mal, and Chrysabelle couldn’t get things taken care of in New Orleans and be back before tomorrow night, the KM wasn’t going to be happy. Hell, they weren’t happy with him now. Wait until they found out he’d voluntarily let Chrysabelle have the ring and that she planned on melting it down and embedding it into her skin.

  Could the ring’s power transfer into her? Did she even know what the ring’s power was? Not that it mattered. Chrysabelle wasn’t exactly the world-domination type. Which reminded him of a woman who was. “I could use a little intel.”

  “On?” The sector chief’s nostrils flared like he was trying to smell the chrome.

  “Tatiana. I know we had a source in Corvinestri. Did we get a replacement after Algernon’s death? Because I need to know Tatiana’s status from them.” He moved away from the sink and grabbed his jacket from the hook by the stairs, hoping Argent would take the hint.

  Argent’s head whipped back around. “KM deep-ops are above your pay grade.”

  Creek held his hands up, his leather jacket swinging from his fingers. “I’m not asking who the source is. I don’t want to know. I just want to use them to make my job a little easier. That is what they’re there for, isn’t it?”

  “Yes.” If Argent had feathers, they would have smoothed. “You suspect she’s here, then.”

  “Don’t know.” He slid the coat on, then scooped his helmet off the workbench. “Since the Castus is, that could mean she is, too. Or the Castus has found another way of getting the ring. Maybe she’s screwed up one too many times. Maybe they’re no longer using her.”

  Argent half shifted, a sure sign that this conversation was near its end. Wing tips jutted from behind his back, his forked tongue flicking out to lick his lips. “I’ll see what I can find out. Regardless, you follow your leads, get that ring back. If it’s used tomorrow night, the world will never be the same place again.”

  Creek snorted before he could catch himself. “It’s not now. And it certainly won’t be after tomorrow night.”

  Argent shifted completely, his eyes hooding with a darkness that seemed both threatening and worried. “What it is and what it could be are as different as heaven and hell, because hell is exactly what this world will turn into if that ring gets slipped onto the right finger.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Ma?” Evie called as she entered the house. She let the screen door slam behind her to announce her presence further. “Ma, you here?” Not that Evie expected an answer. The airboat normally parked beneath the house was gone, and she’d been phoning the house for hours without an answer. Evie’s left eye fluttered involuntarily for a second, then calmed. Damn spasms were getting worse. “Ma, where the heck are you?” Wasn’t like the old woman to go into town without asking if Evie needed anything. Or even to be gone without anyone knowing where she was. She was the coven leader. She had to be available.

  “Anyone home?” she asked the empty space. A coffee cup and breakfast dishes sat in the sink. She passed the kitchen and went into the living room. TV was off. The demon was at rest in his aquarium, which meant only a boiling mass of black-red smoke was visible. Her mother’s bag, usually on the side table next to her recliner, was gone. What could be keeping her in town this long? It would be dark in an hour.

  Evie flicked one long, clear-polished nail against the aquarium to wake the demon up. Since being unfrozen from her stone prison, the twitching made it impossible to give herself a decent manicure with colored polish.

  The smoke shifted and the demon roused enough to form a face within the smoke, nothing else. Daylight wasn’t its best time. “What do you want, human?”

  “Find the ring yet?”

  He sneered. “No.”

  “Where’s my mother?”

  A flicker of a smile. “Gone.”

  “I know that. Where?”

  “Not my problem.” He closed his eyes.

  She picked up the spray bottle of holy water and gave him a spritz. Flames shot up from the aquarium as if she’d just doused hot charcoal with butane. She squinted at the heat.

  The demon burst up through the fire. “Human, you try me.”

  “Where is my mother?”

  “I told you I do not know.”

  “Use your power. You’re connected to her. To both of us. I know you are—our blood is mixed with the vampire’s we used to draw you. Find her.”

  Nostrils flaring, he lowered his head. His eyes went almost completely black for a few seconds before returning to their usual red. “She’s not on this plane.”

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” She planted her hands on her hips. “Speak English.”

  Wisps of smoke curled from his forehead. “I cannot sense her.”

  Evie threw her hands up. “Just like you can’t sense the ring. I’m not sure what good you are, demon.” She leaned toward him, her right shoulder suddenly hitching up. She hugged her arm to her body, trying to hold it still. “I can’t wait to destroy you.”

  He smiled, reminding Evie of the body they’d found floating in one of the marshes. Time in the sun had tightened the skin into a very similar look. “I eagerly await your attempt.”

  “You think I can’t do it? You have no idea, demon.” The years she’d spent in her stone prison had not been wasted. She’d cast and recast spells in her head until she dreamed them better than she’d done them in real life. What else was there?

  It was how she had a feeling where her mother might be. Or at least how she’d gotten there. She gave the demon an exaggerated grin as she walked away. “You just sit tight. I’ve got some work to do.”

  Her mother had a secret room, one Evie had never known about until her stone statue had been positioned in front of the glass windows overlooking the glades. Amazing how those windows worked as mirrors at night. How the angle of the mirror on the living room wall reflected her mother’s room and the door into her closet. Made no sense why her mother would spend hours in that closet. Not at first anyway.

  Evie opened the closet door. The scent of smoke lingered, the last reassurance of what she already knew. It wasn’t uncommon for a witch to have a private altar. Evie’d had one in her old bedroom, just a simple wooden box she kept tucked under the bed. Nothing like the one she had now in the new house the demon had built for her.

  She felt behind the clothes, along the wall, her movements releasing the fragrance of patchouli clinging to her mother’s things. Evie’s hand sank into a strange dimple on the wall. She pressed it and the click of a latch being released caused her to nod. A shiver ran down her spine.

  She pushed the clothes back, gripped the protruding edge, and opened the door. The smell of burned eggs and earth greeted her. She felt for a switch, found it, and flipped it.

  Atop a small altar were the trimmings of the spell her mother had worked to fix the ghost girl’s troubles. The one she’d inlaid with a trap for the varcolai she’d known would pass through the smoke as well. More than that, Evie could tell by the arrangement of things and the freshly burned wick on the oil lamp that her mother ha
d opened the trap and used it. Her disappearance meant the trap had worked. She was out hunting down whatever she’d discovered through the varcolai’s eyes. If she was gone this long, she’d found something good.

  Evie kneeled on the pillow before the altar and set about opening the trap again. She threaded a new wick through the oil lamp and lit it, then picked up the mortar and pestle, giving it a good sniff. It seemed her mother had been so sure about her secret room that she’d left all the ingredients sitting out. There was no need to sift through her mother’s supplies for the hawthorn, sulfur powder, and ground bones of a money cat Evie smelled in the mortar, because they all still sat on the altar. Another nearby container held silver filings, but those wouldn’t be necessary to open the portal, since it was tied into the original spell. Although… she picked up the vial of silver filings. Her mother had them laid out but, based on the leftovers in the bowl, hadn’t used them. Silver would strengthen the spell, make it possible to control the subject’s movement and actions, but it would also make the spell heavy-handed. The subject would feel the control.

  She weighed the vial in her hand, her fingers twitching. Screw whether or not the varcolai knew what was happening. She needed to find her mother.

  A heavy pinch of silver went into the bowl, then she tipped a little of each of the first three in as well. That done, she pricked her finger with the blade beside the pestle and squeezed in a few drops of her own blood. Last went in the pinch of earth necessary to ground the magic. She crushed the contents together with the pestle, then tipped them into a flame-blackened silver bowl and placed it on the burner.

  The flame licked the metal, heating the mess until a curl of dirty smoke spiraled out of the dish. She smiled. “Like mother like daughter.” Didn’t hurt that this was the last spell her mother had taught her before the fateful night.

  She bent closer, watching the smoke spread out like a curtain. “Show me what the one joined to this spell sees.” Hopefully she’d find out where her mother had gone. The demon’s words that her mother was no longer on this plane rang in Evie’s ears as shapes and movement wavered on the surface of the smoke. Pushing the meaning of those words away, she smoothed the smoke until the images became clearer.