Blood Challenge

by Eileen Wilks

  Arjenie had sadly but successfully predicted a couple of divorces based on that kind of touching.

  The couples who worried her were the ones where one partner touched and the other didn’t. Sometimes that was a power thing—a man who wanted to keep his woman physically under his thumb, and reminded her constantly with little touches. Or maybe the woman exerted control with constant, vaguely sexual touches. And sometimes, sadly, one partner was simply indifferent.

  New couples touched more often than established ones, of course, and it meant less. Sex was a form of intimacy, but it said little about long-term prospects. And admittedly, a few established couples defied the touch rule. But most of the time, Arjenie’s touch-counting gave her a pretty good idea of how a couple was doing.

  Not that it was any of her business, of course. Which was another reason not to mention her touch-counting.

  Benedict leaned close enough that his arm brushed hers. Heat swept through her and she forgot about anyone else’s touches.

  “You’re staring,” he rumbled very softly. “And you look gooey. Do you have a crush on Rule? Or maybe on Lily?’

  “On . . . oh!” She flushed, ducked her head, and grinned inside the privacy of the curtain formed by her hair. “No. No, I’m just nosy, and they’re so sweet together. I’m about an eighty on the hetero scale. Maybe eighty-five. I gave it a try in college, because you can’t really know otherwise, can you? And there was this sweet lesbian girl who wanted to date me, but we never got past a kiss or two. I’m just not turned on by breasts, even real pretty ones.”

  Dead silence. She tilted her head to look at him. “You’re shocked. I didn’t think lupi got shocked.”

  “Surprised,” he said dryly. “I expected to fluster or annoy you.”

  “I’m Wiccan. I fluster about lots of things, but sex isn’t one of them. Why did you want me flustered or annoyed?”

  His mouth turned wry. “The same reason I would have pulled your hair a few decades ago. Or turned cartwheels, or lifted something impressively heavy.”

  “You want my attention.” Delighted, she propped her chin on one hand, elbow on the table, so she could look straight at him. “Okay. You’ve got it.”

  He hesitated. “I think I’m flustered.”

  That made her laugh.

  At the head of the table, Isen tapped the coffeepot on the table like a gavel. “There’s a couple cups left. Anyone want some before we give Lily the floor? Unless I’m mistaken, she’s ready to get us all lined up.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far,” Lily said wryly, “but I’ve got my own thinking lined up. I’ve got a couple of ideas to share and some questions.”

  For some reason that made everyone chuckle or grin. Everyone but Arjenie. There were much more important things going on than a bit of flirtation . . . but she’d wanted the flirtation.

  “Okay,” Lily said. “Three topics up for discussion: the Great Bitch, Friar, and Arjenie. First question.” She looked at Isen. “Are we speaking openly about her and related matters? Arjenie isn’t clan.”

  “We are.” Isen’s smile was placid. “With one exception.” His gaze flicked to Benedict so fast Arjenie wasn’t sure that’s who he’d indicated—until Lily looked at Benedict, too. She didn’t speak, just raised her eyebrows.

  “Not yet,” he said. His voice was level. Was she imagining it was also grim?

  Lily looked at Arjenie next. “Have they told you about her?”

  “I don’t know what her you mean.”

  “That means they haven’t. I’ll give you . . . let’s call it the cover blurb of the CliffsNotes version. You can ask questions later. When lupi refer to her—sometimes known as the Great Bitch, though that’s unfair to female dogs—they mean the Old One they were created to oppose. We don’t use her name, any of her names, because she’s reputed to be able to hear it. She is powerful beyond our understanding, so it’s a good thing she can’t reach into our realm directly. For something around three thousand years she’s been penned up, or weakened, or busy elsewhere. We don’t know, but she hasn’t been meddling here. Until last year. She was behind the hellgate the Azá tried to open. You’ll know about that. She also tried to send me to hell, and partly succeeded—”

  “What?” Arjenie exclaimed. “I didn’t—”

  “You didn’t hear or read anything about it, and you won’t. Ruben knows the story, but it’s not in the Bureau’s files. She suffered a setback there, but we have reason to think she may have made one of the lords of hell into her avatar.”

  Arjenie’s heart beat too fast. Her mouth was dry. In a small voice she said, “Old Ones are real? And this one . . .” She looked at Isen. “This is who you think is behind the attacks on Ruben and Lily?”

  He smiled gently. “Oh, yes.”

  Lily looked at her again. “You’ll have questions. I’m asking you to hold them for later. You said Friar can’t Listen here at Clanhome.”

  Baffled, Arjenie nodded.

  Lily looked at Isen. “That’s why you’re convinced she’s involved, isn’t it?”

  He spread his hands. “I can think of no other reason Friar’s Gift would be blocked here. Can you?”

  “Son of a bitch,” Rule said suddenly. One of his hands rested on the table. It fisted. “Of course.”

  Benedict leaned closer to Arjenie and spoke softly. “She isn’t omniscient, but she’s clairaudient and clairvoyant even across realms. She can hear or see what happens on Earth, but not around lupi. Our nature blocks her. If Friar’s Gift came from her, it would explain why he can’t Listen here.”

  “This is not established fact,” Lily warned them. “Maybe she has recruited Friar. It fits what we know, but we don’t know much. We haven’t confirmed that Friar is a Listener or that he can’t eavesdrop here.”

  Arjenie squirmed. She so wanted to tell them. “That’s—it’s just—” Too much. She shoved to her feet. “Excuse me. I need a minute.”

  FEAR comes in many flavors. Tonight’s flavor was bitter with a twist of misery. She left the table, not caring where she went—just away, someplace where she could be terrified in private.

  Someplace turned out to be the kitchen. But it didn’t work. She stood at the kitchen counter with her arms wrapped around herself and somehow, even without looking, she knew Benedict had followed her. Her heart fluttered with fear and other things.

  They could all die. Benedict, too. She couldn’t stand it. “You’re talking about an Old One,” she whispered, not turning to face him. “That’s like a little g god. An Old One who’s out to get all of you.”

  He stopped close enough for her to feel the warmth from his body along her back. Two big hands came to rest on her shoulders. They were even warmer. “We don’t have to stop her. She can’t come here or act directly. We only have to stop her agents.”

  “Only? It’s scary. Why is everyone so calm? Isen keeps smiling. Why would he smile like that?” Her breath huffed out. “I hate being scared. I hate being a coward.”

  Benedict chuckled. She wrenched around to face him. “You’re laughing.” She wanted to hit him.

  He kept on smiling. “A coward who invades Friar’s land in spite of armed militia goons. One who invades lupus territory the next night—and I can promise you, most people are more afraid of us than they are of any human, with or without guns. A coward who doesn’t want me to make a big deal about the chance that evil elves might try to kidnap her so they can bleed and breed her.” He wound one of her curls around one finger. “Such a coward.”

  “I’m used to the possibility of being grabbed,” she said, “and it’s never happened, so I’m careful, not terrified. But I was scared the whole time I was sneaking around. More scared at Friar’s because I was pretty sure you lupi wouldn’t kill me, but I was scared here, too, even though I knew no one could see me. Though it turned out you could, and I don’t understand that, but I didn’t know that and I was scared anyway. And I know that courage is supposed to be acting in the face of fear, not t
he lack of fear, but no one at that table just now was quivering with terror. Lily’s been shot and she wasn’t shaking. I am.” She held up one hand and showed him.

  He took her hand in both of his. Wordlessly he began rubbing it, as if fear were a cramp he could dispel.

  It worked. She stared at him in astonishment. “How did you do that?”

  “I dislike fear, too,” he murmured. “I dislike the way it feels. I dislike the way it tries to control me. But a large part of fear is physical. It’s possible to learn how to control some of the physical aspects.”

  “But I haven’t learned how to do that. How can you—”

  “Later.” He brushed her shoulder with his fingertips—just her shoulder, and she barely felt it through her clothes. Yet that simple touch brushed heat through her. “I owe you a full explanation, but later. Lily wants to ask you some questions.”

  THIRTY-ONE

  WHILE they waited for Benedict and Arjenie to rejoin them, Lily took another cup of that coffee Isen had been waving around. And argued with Cullen.

  “In learning mindspeech,” Cullen insisted, “you must have learned how to turn off the main function of your Gift.”

  “No.” Lily looked over her shoulder. Benedict and Arjenie came in, holding hands again. Well, she knew how comforting that could be, and it looked like Arjenie needed the comfort. She was still pale. “You okay?”

  “No,” Arjenie said, circling the table to return to her chair. “I mean yes, I’m okay in the not-falling-apart sense, but I might fall apart again.” She sighed. “There’s a reason I never tried to be a field agent. Even if I could have made it through the training with my . . .” She shot Benedict a glance. He was holding her chair for her. “With my physical limitations, I wouldn’t have been a good agent. I scare too easily.”

  “It would have been a waste,” Cynna announced. “You’re a top-notch researcher. You love research. Why would you want to be an agent?”

  Arjenie smiled ruefully and sat. “Why did you?”

  “I didn’t. I wanted to help people. To Find people who were missing. The rest just sort of happened.”

  Lily waited until Benedict sat, too, then said, “Arjenie, I want to try to do the mindspeech thing again. Or kinspeech. Whatever we call it, it’s pretty intrusive. Are you willing?”

  “Do you think it’s safe?”

  “We were just talking about that.” She glanced at Cullen. “There’s a problem with both the theories I’ve heard. They don’t explain how something magical could affect me in the first place.”

  Surprise lightened Arjenie’s expression. “Of course. You’re a sensitive. Magic shouldn’t hurt you, should it? But somehow it did.”

  Cullen shook his head. “Because she’s doing things with it she couldn’t do before. Lily, it seems obvious that when you use your Gift differently, it leaves you less than completely impermeable to magic. Most Gifts aren’t stuck in the ‘on’ position, after all. Cynna doesn’t Find things unless she looks for them. I don’t spray fire around all the time. Arjenie isn’t using her Gift now, so we all see her. You must be—”

  “No,” Lily said again. “There’s a lot I don’t know about my Gift, but I’m clear on one thing. I can’t turn it off. It isn’t like those shields of yours—and that’s what Sam says, not my own, uninformed opinion.”

  Cullen scowled at her. “Explain your headache, then.”

  “The only way I can see for magic to hurt me is if it’s my magic.”

  Cullen’s scowl slid into a frown—a thinking sort of frown, not the angry sort. That was one of his saving graces. Cullen might argue at the drop of a vowel, but he didn’t take offense if you disagreed. He just kept arguing . . . unless he decided you had a point. He was capable of turning around and agreeing with you, because getting it right was more important to him than being right.

  “I don’t see it,” Cynna said. “I don’t see how your magic could be doing a number on you. It sure looks like it was Arjenie’s magic that did it.” She shrugged. “But then, I don’t get mindspeech.”

  Cullen spoke slowly. “What you did to the Chimei last month . . .”

  “Yes?” Lily wished she could use mindspeech right then so she could think “shut up” at him. She didn’t want him to mention her ability to soak up someone else’s magic.

  Either he got the warning, or he was tactful, for once. “In a way, that’s a logical extension of your Gift. You soak up magic. Normally you absorb such a tiny mote of power that the loss isn’t noticeable. Your Gift translates that mote into your own form of magic—and in the process, gives you information about what you touched. You experience that information as a tactile sensation.”

  “Yeah,” she said, not seeing where he was going.

  “Mindspeech doesn’t fit with that model—”

  “I noticed that.”

  “—unless we stipulate that receiving thoughts is simply another way of experiencing information. Thought and magic are closely linked.”

  Lily’s brows drew down. “I almost understood that.”

  “I think I get it,” Arjenie burst out. She looked at Cullen. “It’s the ‘thought given form’ dictum you’re thinking of, right?”

  His eyebrows lifted. “That’s right.”

  Arjenie turned to Lily, her thin face alight with enthusiasm. “It’s a Wiccan teaching. Spells are ‘thought given form.’ By that we mean the caster’s intent is translated into an external statement using spell components, but the spell can’t function unless the caster’s thoughts are aligned with the statement of the spell. Which means, basically, that you can’t cast a spell that doesn’t make sense to you. But some take the expression farther. They believe that thoughts are part of the statement, just as much an external component as a sprig of rue.”

  “I’m sorry,” Lily said, “but if that was supposed to explain something, I’m missing it.”

  “It’s the difference between thoughts happening strictly inside our heads or being somehow ‘out there’ as well, like radio waves. Though I don’t think radio waves are a good model because that’s a space-time phenomena and I’m not sure—”

  Benedict laid a hand over Arjenie’s. “Later, perhaps, for that.”

  “Oh. I suppose so.” She looked at Lily earnestly. “If this model is accurate, thoughts are always external as well as internal, and mindspeech would be a sort of magical translator. Like your touch sensitivity, it soaks up a bit of something that’s out there and puts it in a form your brain understands. Only instead of tactile sensations, you get words. So it would be your magic giving you the information, not mine.”

  “Okay,” Lily said slowly. “But that doesn’t explain two things. Sam sends as well as receives thoughts. If mindspeech just translates external stuff, how could he do that? And I still don’t see why really loud kinspeech would give me the mother of all headaches.”

  Cullen shrugged. “I can’t answer your first question. I could speculate, but not helpfully. But as for your headache . . . we don’t really understand what happens in the brain when we think, but we know it involves electrical impulses and the way neurons fire together. I’d guess the ‘really loud kinspeech’ used your own magic to create new neural pathways in a really loud way.”

  That didn’t sound good. But Nettie had said she was fine. She felt fine.

  “The point is, if that’s the correct model for what happens when you touch Arjenie, it won’t be dangerous for you to try again. You might not be able to repeat what you did earlier, but there wouldn’t be any danger in trying.”

  “Glad to hear that,” she said, “because clearly I have to try.” She looked at Rule. “If it hurts, I’ll stop. Promise.” Their eyes met. For a second her mind went light and dizzy in an echo of that free-fall moment when the mate bond had first clicked in place. It was like having your skull vanish. It came back, but for a second, it wasn’t there.

  Rule smiled, his eyes swimming in mystery as if he’d felt it, too. “Nadia.” He touched her c
heek. “I accept your promise.”

  Lily nodded, swallowed, and held out her hand to Arjenie.

  Slowly Arjenie reached across the table and clasped it.

  . . . wish I could tell them! The . . .

  She had it. Then she didn’t. This time, though, Lily didn’t try harder. She didn’t try at all. Instead she breathed slowly and thought about candle flame and skin, about the cool, complex feel of Arjenie’s magic. “I’m not getting much, but I got something,” she murmured. “I’m going to ask questions. Answer out loud when you’re able to. And, ah, think softly. Don’t put any power into it, okay?”

  Arjenie’s smile sketched uncertain agreement. She added a nod to that.

  “Why do you believe Robert Friar is a Listener?”

  “Someone told me.” Dya warned me when she called. Wish I knew how she could do that, if it was magic or... snuck into his house? but she . . . Friar can Listen across the country, she said. Be careful. There wasn’t time to . . . worried about her. If he . . .

  “I know you can’t talk about Dya. Think about her—who she is, how you know her.”

  She’s my sister. That arrived as clearly as spoken words, but trailed a confusing mélange of thoughts and memories. Something to do with Dya staying with Arjenie when Arjenie was young. Staying up talking and talking all night. Love you, little fox. Their father didn’t want Arjenie talking about Dya . . . didn’t want Dya put to the tears so young . . .

  “Your father brought Dya to you.”

  Yes, he wanted them to wait a few years before they gave her the tears. Her elders didn’t agree and the contract ... she’s a professional daughter, not like me, but the contract doesn’t . . . it’s the best thing I know of him, that he wanted to . . . the tears. I hate them. Addict their daughters on purpose so . . . her duty, but she’s so different but I . . .