Wicked Blood (Dark Fae Hollows)

by Margo Bond Collins

  But this man couldn’t be an innocent, could he? Not a human who would directly engage a shifter tonight of all nights. Not someone dressed like a mercenary, out past dark during a full moon.

  You’re out on the full-moon night. It was that odd little voice again, speaking to him as if it weren’t a part of his own mind.

  Oh hell, I’m really cracking up.

  But he didn’t have time to worry too much about it, not when some human bruiser was trying to drag him along the street, back toward the enclosure.

  First things first: get out of this guy’s grip.

  To take the guy off guard, Sorin went limp for a second, then threw all his weight backward onto his hind legs, digging his claws in as the man tugged at him. Then, just as suddenly, he quit resisting, so the man holding him stumbled back a few steps.

  At that point, the shifter swung his hind legs forward and dug them into the man’s thigh. His leather pants provided some protection, but Sorin’s claws were razor-sharp.

  The mercenary was well-trained—Sorin had to give him that. Even the surprise of a cat’s claws digging into his leg didn’t cause him to loosen his grip.

  But that was just what Sorin could do without the bloodlust over him. Letting it loose might make him no better than the vampires in their castle, but he couldn’t think of any other option.

  At least you’re only doing it to save yourself. The tiny voice echoed in the back of his mind. I guess that’s something, anyway.

  Sorin shoved it away, ignoring the fear that its clear disapproval might be justified.

  Then he closed his eyes and opened his mind to let the full moon in.

  It was like throwing open heavy curtains on a sunny day. Everything dark within him was illuminated.

  But not with bright, cleansing sunlight.

  The moon’s beams shone down upon him, and everywhere the moonlight touched flared with desire. It hit his fur with a hot, red sizzle that burned down to his skin, searing away all concerns about what was right or wrong. It started at his back, flashing up his spine and shooting out to the end of every nerve.

  Then it raced back to meet at the top of his head in one blinding flash of red. The crimson light dripped down over his vision, drenching everything with the need for blood.

  And it took away all caution.

  With a surge of power, he shoved his claws even deeper into the mercenary’s legs, then raked them down, ripping through leather wherever he could, cutting down to the skin and slicing into the thick, hard muscle beneath.

  The mercenary had withstood the initial surprise of Sorin’s attack, but the sensation of multiple razors slicing through his clothes and skin loosened his hand on Sorin’s neck for just an instant.

  Long enough for Sorin to wrest free of his grip.

  Once free of the man’s hold, Sorin turned on him, crouching down then leaping to bring his front claws to the man’s face. He climbed the man like a kitten on a post, running up him to slash at the vulnerable skin exposed by his armor-like clothing.

  The mercenary shouted in pain, bringing his hands up to try to protect his face. But his hands were also made up of exposed skin, the kind that could be ripped and shredded with just a few well-placed swipes.

  The cuts didn’t bleed immediately. The edges of sliced skin stayed stark white as Sorin leaped back to the ground, using the man’s head and shoulders as leverage for his back paws, digging his claws in before he went. Seconds later, the blood welled in thick, red drops, sliding down the mercenary’s face and hands, staining the arms of his shirt, and smearing across his pants as he moved.

  Every gash sent a wave of joy through the shapeshifter.

  The bloodlust wasn’t magic, Sorin knew—or if it was, it was a magic that infected all of Gypsy Hollow. He’d been told that even humans could feel it, even those least imbued with the magic that had infected the world when the barriers between the human and the Fae worlds disappeared—the magic that had turned dark and infected the Sleeping Daughter in Gypsy Hollow.

  No. The bloodlust wasn’t magic.

  But it brought dark magic with it.

  And blood made the magic stronger.

  It was a direct trade: use the magic coursing through the veins of the earth and pay a Blood Price. Or pay a Blood Price and reap the benefit of magic.

  As the mercenary finally scrabbled for the weapon he’d foolishly left sheathed at his side when he grabbed Sorin, the shifter moved in for the kill.

  In the wild, a lynx would normally deliver a single bite to the back of its prey’s neck, severing its spinal cord. Death would be instant.

  But Sorin was not pure animal, even in the grip of bloodlust. He’d played with his prey, and now it was wary. The man had his sword out, and the two circled each other, even as blood dripped from the mercenary’s wounds, advertising his vulnerability to every magic user and blood taker around.

  Sorin let out a yowling growl, a reminder to the human that he faced a wild animal, a warning to other shifters to stay away from his fight, and a claim that this kill was his.

  For just an instant he saw unease flicker through the man’s eyes.

  That second was all he needed.

  In one mighty leap, he bounded out of sight. The mercenary spun, trying to follow his trajectory, but faster than the man could turn, Sorin doubled back and jumped up onto his broad back and shoulders. He screamed as Sorin’s claws dug in and held on, his arms flailing as he tried to reach behind him with his sword. Finally he lifted it up over his head, preparing to drop it back, crashing it into the cat who rode him. Sorin took that moment to focus on shifting partially back to his human shape, just enough to allow him to wrap an arm around the mercenary’s neck, hook a claw into his throat, and slice from one side to the other, even as he bit down hard on the back of his neck.

  The crunch of bones between his teeth, the rush of blood into his mouth, the sudden collapse of the form beneath him—all of that rolled through Sorin, fulfilling the lust that had consumed him.

  The mercenary sword completed its stroke through sheer inertia, but Sorin was long gone, having pushed free as soon as he made the killing bite.

  The mercenary gurgled and dropped to his knees, the blood spilling from his neck and throat onto the cobblestones, soaking into the cracks between.

  As it slipped into the ground, the blood rushing to feed the Sleeping Daughter, magic flashed up in return, wrapping Sorin in a crackling flow, slamming into every cell, sliding up his back and filling him.

  As pleasant as it was, the magic draw was ultimately weak.

  The man must have been a Wicked Blood, Sorin realized.

  He’d have to find somebody less steeped in the bloodlust, less inured to killing. If Sorin wanted real power, he needed to find another victim. Someone without blood on his own hands.

  That’s the bloodlust talking.

  Sorin shook his head, dropping back into his full lynx shape as he tried to push that tiny voice out of his consciousness. It didn’t work.

  You don’t want to be a killer.

  Ignoring the thought, Sorin trotted away from the dying man, having taken all the benefit he could from the mercenary’s death.

  You have a job to do.

  The voice was stronger this time.

  He stopped in the middle of the road, planting all four paws hard on the ground, remembering the feel of the Daughter’s magic sliding up and into him.

  Yes, he had a job.

  A new one.

  He needed to find someone else to kill so he could offer more to the Daughter, the power source of Gypsy Hollow. He needed to send more blood to her to hasten her rising.

  For a moment, the red haze of the bloodlust covered his eyes again.

  No. You do not want the Sleeping Daughter to rise.

  The voice was so loud now that it seemed to echo between his ears, bouncing around inside his skull in agonizing ricochets.

  Let. Me. IN.

  The last word shattered Sorin’s conscio
usness, sending shards of himself rolling, tumbling and twisting inside his own mind until all that was him huddled in pain in a small dark corner of his psyche, his spectral arms wrapped around himself as he whimpered.

  When he finally brought himself to look up and out through his eyes, his lynx form was trotting down the road, back across the city, without his ever having given it any orders to do so.

  What is this?

  Whatever it was spoke to him.

  I am going home. Once I’m there, I will let you go. But you have to take what you know back to your leader. If the Council is in league with the vampires, someone needs to know.

  Dazed, Sorin could do little but agree, though he still didn’t understand what was happening.

  Yes. I need to report back to Ciprian.

  As the bloodlust cleared entirely, he watched from inside while his body raced through Bucharest, skirting the vampires’ section of town and slipping into the Romani area on his way back to Titan Park.

  But before he moved through this section and toward home, he found himself back in the courtyard where he’d left the young Romani girl. He padded across the cobblestones to the broken-down cart he’d rolled her under. He watched as his body leaned in, sticking his head under the cart and checking on her.

  Still alive.

  She’s safe.

  The two thoughts—his own and the Other—overlapped, and he wasn’t certain if the sense of relief washing over him was his own or if it belonged to…it. Whatever it was.

  My inner cat, maybe?

  The girl was still there, still safely hidden out of sight—and still unconscious. The full-moon night was waning, and she was as safe here as almost anywhere else he could hide her.

  He could go home, report to Ciprian.

  He had a job to do.

  If only he could figure out how to retake control of his lynx form.

  Yes, go, the voice whispered.

  He sat down on the cobblestones.

  Watching his body act without his volition left him lightheaded, and for the space of three heartbeats, that dizziness increased, spinning harder and faster until it slung him back out into all parts of himself, putting him back in control of his actions.

  Again, he shook his head.

  With a huff of satisfaction, the lynx-shifter Sorin Rascu trotted away.

  Chapter 5

  I woke up gagging from the remembered smell and taste of blood, glad that I was still me.

  Losing myself entirely in a Vision was the greatest danger of the Sight, something Maicǎ had taught me to fear even more than the Blood Price.

  And what would have happened if he had ripped my body to shreds, consumed my flesh? If I’d had no self to return to, what use would it have been to keep my mind separate from his?

  I had no answer for that. If Maicǎ knew what happened to the Sighted when their bodies died as their minds traveled, she had never told me. And I had never asked.

  Too late now. Besides, I was back.

  I came out of the Vision more slowly than I would have preferred, though, blinking away the afterimage of claws and fur. It took several seconds for the boards above my head to come into focus.

  That was right, I was under Gavril’s wagon outside my family’s enclosure.

  Outside, alone, on a full-moon night. And unlike the lynx-shifter I’d been inhabiting, I didn’t have claws and teeth to use against any assailants.

  But I did have important information about the vampires, some of the shifters, and Councilman Petri.

  I needed to get inside to tell my grandmother what I had seen. Maicǎ would know what to do next.

  This wasn’t the first time I’d had a Vision of corruption or expanding violence in the Hollow—all the Romani who carried magic had seen it at one point or another. All the Visions, the tea leaves, the card readings, everything suggested that the worst was coming, that the Sleeping Daughter was preparing to rise.

  Maicǎ said Gypsy Hollow was never truly peaceful. It should have been. The Fae and human councils here worked long and hard to come to an accord after the sacrifice of the daughters had split the Earth into the Hollows—and they eventually formed the single Council that rules us all.

  But that didn’t bring any lasting peace. As the essence of violence and anger infected the Hollow and darkened the little energy that remained, it drew upon the oldest legends of the region—vampires, shapeshifters, and powerful witches—and twisted them to its own devices.

  Over the years, those of us who watched the signs had seen the portents: something terrible was coming, and no one would be able to escape it.

  But I have to try to do something.

  Scrabbling around in the dirt under the wagon, I crept to the edge of my cover to peer out from underneath.

  The courtyard area that led into the walled city area where I lived was completely deserted, from what I could see. I didn’t hear anything moving, didn’t see anything. In the distance, a dog barked. That was usually a good sign that the shifters weren’t around. Pets were kept inside during the full moon, and strays who survived this long tended to know to keep quiet.

  Tentatively, I crawled out from the illusory safety of the wagon. With a quick glance around, I gathered up the fruit I’d bought hours ago for Maicǎ. It had scattered through the alley, but most of it still looked fine.

  My fingernail caught on one of the cobblestones and I whimpered, clenching my teeth against the sound in case there were any other monsters nearby.

  Other than shifters.

  At least one of whom might not be a complete monster.

  I could still taste blood on my tongue, still feel the surge of magical power rush through me from the fight with the mercenary—and that wasn’t me at all. It was the lynx, someone I had never met before tonight.

  The Sight had caused that. Somehow what I experienced in a Vision had left an aftertaste in my mouth.

  No. More than that, I had traveled with Sorin. He’d heard me speak in his mind. I had controlled his body. And somehow that terrified me most of all—more than anything ever had before.

  I only thought I had feared the night before now.

  Flattening myself against the wall, I slid toward the mouth of the alley, staring across the courtyard at the back entrance to my family’s enclosure.

  Yeah, I definitely needed to talk to Maicǎ, find out what I should do with the information I had learned.

  But first, I still had to cross the open space of the courtyard. My heart pounded as I stood, ready to make the dash to safety.

  The lynx was gone—but I still felt him as part of me, remembered his thoughts and feelings in a way I had never experienced with any other Vision.

  And in that moment, it was almost as if part of his speed and strength had traveled to me, even though I knew that was impossible. Still, I took a deep breath before checking to make sure that everything was as clear as it could possibly be, and then I ran as hard as I could, fetching up at the gate gasping.

  I fumbled for the key I kept hidden in a secret pocket inside my dress. My hands trembled, and they were slick with sweat, but I managed to open the lock and slip inside the wall. I shut the gate behind me and threw the bolt. I collapsed against the heavy barrier, leaning back and catching my breath.

  Inside the enclosure, there was more activity than I was used to this late, even on a full-moon night.

  I figured out why when my cousin Dimitru rushed up to me out of the darkness. I flinched away from him, but he threw his arms around me, anyway.

  “Mirela,” he cried. “Everyone is looking for you. Come on, we have to let them know you’re back—they were getting ready to send a search party out.”

  I gasped. “A search party for me? On a full-moon night? Are they insane?”

  Dimitru’s face lit up as he laughed—he was always better suited for joy than sadness. “That is exactly what everyone has been saying about you all night. That you must be crazy. Or dead.”

  I nodded and moved fo
rward with him. I knew Maicǎ would be beside herself with worry.

  “Some of the elders did readings to see where you were, but I heard someone say they were all wild and mixed up,” Dimitru said.

  “Mixed up how?”

  “You weren’t out spending time with vampires or shapeshifters or evil humans, were you?” Dimitru laughed.

  Oh hell, no wonder they were getting ready to send out searchers.

  “Not exactly,” I muttered. “Thanks, Dimitru. I appreciate you letting me know what’s been going on.”

  Leaving him gaping at my back, I hurried toward Maicǎ’s tea shop, prepared to tell her everything.

  Maicǎ leaned against the door frame of the entrance to the ceainărie, her arms wrapped around her middle as she hugged herself, her thin figure looking even more fragile than usual. Worry lines creased her face and her long skirt swayed with the agitated tapping of her foot, usually the only outwardly visible sign of any anxiety she might feel.

  When she saw me coming toward the tea shop, she cried out and ran to meet me, throwing her arms around me with a single sob. After she’d hugged me for a solid minute, her strong hands gripped my shoulders tightly as she leaned back and stared into my face, giving me a little shake.

  “Where have you been? Are you hurt? Did something happen?” She shot off questions too quickly for me to answer any of them, turning me from side to side as if to visually inspect every inch of my body.

  “I’m okay. I’m fine, Maicǎ. Really, I’m not hurt.”

  “Then why were you gone so long? You know better than to go out on a full-moon night.”

  I started to defend myself, to explain that when I left it was still daylight. But I stopped—none of that mattered. There were much more dire issues to discuss.

  “Maicǎ, listen to me. I had a Vision. Gather the Elders—it’s important. I know when the Sleeping Daughter is going to rise. And I think we can stop it.”

  My grandmother narrowed her eyes, peering into my face. With one brisk nod she let go of me, smoothing down the front of her skirts.

  “We can meet in the enclosure square in half an hour. I will send the message.”

  That was part of why I loved her so much. She never doubted me—and there was a deep comfort in knowing she trusted me completely, took my word that we needed to act, without even asking questions.