“What’s the other place” I asked. I already knew about the bears. We all knew about a bear and her cubs.
Maggie broke from her reverie. “Oh, right. Don’t get between a master vampire and a new recruit. They’ll rend you from top to bottom if they think you’re stopping them from gaining power. The only thing blacker than that sludge they call blood is their hearts.”
“Oh, you’re right about that, Mags. What did the trapper say that bloodgift means? Is it a curse?” Gran asked.
Maggie chuckled, a wispy, bright sound. “You might say. Seems those vamps like to parcel out newly-minted undead as a sort of reward to their . . . I guess you might call them their lieutenants. You know how they are about structure. Well, the master will call all of his followers to feed once a year. They’ll handle clan business, and give gifts, and even socialize, if that’s what you call it.” Maggie shuddered. “I think that based on your questions and all of the activity we’re seeing in between worlds, the clan meeting is happening soon.”
“So the bloodgift is an actual gift of blood? Not to sound dubious, but I’ve rarely heard of vampires doing anything quite so bland.” Gran wrinkled her nose in distaste. The vampire tendency to make everything into some grand gesture was well known; I understood why she was suspicious. If there was one thing we did understand about vampires, it was their addiction to subjugating others with style. True, they would hole up in some obscure corner of the globe, but within the dank lands they controlled, they would live with all the trappings of some ancient king.
“I understand your doubts, Tess. I’m not sold on the idea either. There’s more to the concept of the bloodgift than glorified cattle being given out like candy.” Maggie’s disgust was palpable, even through the curtain of Everafter separating us. “I wish I’d listened to that trapper more closely, but he was a bit much for me to take. I was new to this, ah, neighborhood when we met. Hadn’t gotten my sea legs, so to speak.”
“How long had it been since you’d crossed?” Gran asked, her voice sympathetic.
Maggie heard the note of pity and dismissed it with a grin. “Two days. I was wandering around the lake, utterly lost and more than a little scared. I couldn’t tell if I was being punished, or just too dumb to know how to get where I was going. Probably scared the bejeezus out of a dozen families in the rental properties I’d sold over the years; I kept popping in and out in hopes of finding someone I recognized. You know, on this side, not yours. Before you ask, I didn’t. I did walk in on two cheating spouses, a teenager smoking pot, and a guy with sleep apnea so severe I thought he was a growling demon. I waved a hand through his body just to give him a start. Thought he was going to kick off right there in mid-snore, but he made it.” She giggled, a spectral laugh of such youth that it fit her apparition perfectly. “I ran into Rene’, the trapper, after about three days of getting to know the lay of the land. He hangs out up on Sylvan Point; seems he died there and finds the place comforting.”
“It is beautiful,” Gran admitted.
I nodded. Sylvan Point was at the north end of the lake—a little cove crowded with trees and a small crescent of rocky beach that was snug and perfect. Three large boulders poked up from the water; kids would bask on them in the summer like turtles. “Think he’s up there now?”
“If he isn’t, he will be tomorrow. He’s never gone for more than a day or so. He stops by to say hey now and then, but he’s rather attached to his own little area. Try him just before dawn, and Tess?” Maggie leaned forward to drift in the air on her magical seat.
“What is it, Mags?” Gran’s face was guarded.
“I know you’re going to ask him about the bloodgift, and I can’t stop you. I also know that you’re doing a good thing keeping your side of the curtain clear of darkness, but I’m telling you . . . this might be something you want to duck, you hear me? If you can, duck and cover. I mean it. I’ve seen some of the vamps that come through here on their way to wherever it is the masters go when they travel. It’s like a thundercloud of black oil that rolls through, sick and cold and hungry.” She flicked her eyes at me, then slid them back to Gran. “The kid is good. She’s strong. But the undead aren’t like other things that come howling out of the Everafter; they straddle both worlds, and they’re strong, Tess, and so angry. They might whisper, but it sounds like a scream to us on this side.” She sagged into herself at the conclusion of her warning. Sparks flew from her outline. She was tiring.
“Take your rest, honey. And thanks. We’ll go carefully, and with our eyes open. Tell the others I’ll be using some heavy magic, and it’s best if they get lost for a few days, okay?” Gran said.
Maggie nodded once, smiling, then her body dissolved into bright points of magical chaff that spread upward before winking out, one at a time.
Gran turned to me as she stood in a smooth motion, leaving her translucent seat behind. I really needed to learn that spell. It was just cool. “Do you cook in the morning, dear?”
I looked to the east, where the delicacy of an oncoming day was diluting the depth of night. “This morning you mean, and yes. Sure do. Sylvan Point is a three hour walk, a twenty minute car ride, and we’re about two hours from dawn at most, if I’m any judge. I don’t think we can get there before it’ll be too light to see if the trapper’s at home, so to speak.”
“Oh, I agree,” Gran said cryptically. “We only need to get the water’s edge. Can you cast a glamour on us so that we’re relatively invisible?” She knew I could, even without much preparation.
“Yessss—are you going to tell me why?” I was brimming with curiosity. The night was full of revelatory moments. I sensed another was coming.
“When my toes are wet, dear, and not a moment sooner.” Gran’s serene’’ smile told me that it would be fruitless to hector her for details, so I took her arm and together we turned for the lake.
Chapter Eighteen: Tripping the Lake Fantastic
I’ll admit it. When we reached the lakeshore, I felt a hum of energy in the air around Gran that made my skin tingle. She was pulling enormous amounts of power to her in a silent series of waving gestures; it was like watching some kind of archaic Japanese theater. She plucked a water lily, then three leaves of bright green cress, and filled her hand with water. Pursing her lips, she blew across the surface of her palm’s tiny reservoir, then wove the flower and cress together with her free hand using a spell I’d never heard before. It wasn’t Gaelic, and it was old. I knew that from the liquid syllables that tumbled from her lips like a morning birdcall.
“The glamour, if you please,” Gran said. A smile played at her lips.
“It’s getting light. Will we make it?” I asked. She nodded, so I closed my eyes and reached inward as a charm flared into life against my wrist; the cold thrill of magic surged up my arm and I felt the nascent light of the morning curve around me. “We’re shielded from human sight.”
“Perfectly done, Carlie. And now, we fly.” She stepped out onto the water, trailing one hand behind her as an invitation.
I gulped audibly. I had no idea that Gran could do such things. In that moment, I felt rather small. It took several quieting breaths before I could muster the courage to follow her, taking those long fingers in my hand only because I believed in her.
I floated. It was different from the sensation I’d had earlier in the ghostly cradle near Maggie’s grave; this was a complete lack of weight and resistance to the surface of the lake. I laughed into the first fingers of dawn, abandon on my face at the wonder of Gran’s power and the knowledge that, someday, it could be mine. If I was strong enough.
“And now, we travel.” Gran gave a negligent wave, and as one we began to blur across the lake, fresh wind streaming at me like a cleansing potion of Everafter. We covered the miles of gray water in seconds, only slowing when the secluded rocks of Sylvan Point hove into view. I struggled to catch my breath, but Gran seemed unfazed by the entire journey. I looked at her with newfound respect; an event that seemed to be happ
ening about once an hour.
Before I could speak, Gran brought us to a hover, mere inches above the water. She pointed to one of the boulders that hunched near the shore. It was a gray mass of friendly stone, seven feet tall and scored by various waterline rings that told the history of the lake’s rise and retreat.
“Shhhh.” Rene’s ghost put a finger to his lips, shushing us into silence with a wry grin. He looked like Maggie—well, his color was similar. He was an outline of blue and silver, lighter in the center but beautifully detailed. Rene’ had been a hardened man of medium height and spare frame, carved by the harsh life of mountain trapping and seasonal starvation. His face was all angles bracketing a long nose and lips that were full when in repose. He wore leather breeches and a patchwork of furs covering a rough woolen shirt. On his feet were soft doeskin boots, beaded in a complex pattern of snaking curls that wove up his slender calf muscles. Rene’ looked like the marriage of man and wild, posed like a crane on the rock as he stared at something in the growing day.
Gran pointed. A loon swam with her young, perfect in their serenity. There were five of them in all; the four chicks rode on their mother’s broad back like she was a winged ferry. It was one of those things that I’ll never tire of; the lonely cry of a loon is the sound of my home, as far as I’m concerned. I smiled broadly at Rene’, thinking that this man had a kind eye and a heart to match. I was right.
“Maggie told me you were coming to visit. I’ve grown fond of her occasional presence, you know. She is a remarkable light.” He squinted into the east, then gave a Gallic shrug of such nonchalance that it was a whisper under his ghostly clothing. “I have only a moment or two at most. You have questions about the . . . the uncertainty among our undead?” His accent was light, but present.
“How long have you been here, Rene’?” I asked. I couldn’t resist.
“Another time, perhaps, but suffice it to say that the only years I care about are those I have endured without Claire. She moved on some time ago, to the next place. I am French, but that does not mean that I have forgotten the past.” He smiled, and I surmised that Claire had been his wife and, for whatever reason, she was no longer a ghost. That too was new for me. I’d always assumed that there was our world and the next, but it seemed that there were more layers to the Everafter than I previously suspected. I wondered if this hole in my knowledge was by design and made a mental note to ask Gran about it later, but for the moment I turned to Rene’ and spread my hands.
“The bloodgift. Do you know of it?” In those words I heard Gran pouring through me, and I felt a mix of honor and fear at my tersely-worded question.
The trapper nodded appreciatively as a beam of sun crested the trees at the eastern edge of the lake, pouring brilliance across the water in a spangled kaleidoscope. He didn’t waste time, but began speaking immediately, even as his edges began to fade. The day would take him in seconds.
“I only know what is has done. I’ve met spirits in great pain who spoke of this bloodgift. They never stayed in place, and made little sense even to me. There was a veil between us that their pain made impenetrable.” His voice sagged with recollected sadness. “The bloodgift is not a thing. My suspicion? A person who owns a thing that can be . . . bestowed. Or taken away. The regents of the traveling undead will hold agency through this act. It will be ancient—older than anything ever made by man, and you will know its existence by the trail of souls that straddle the world between yours and mine. Their agony is . . . it costs you something to feel it, even through the buffer of our different planes,” Rene’ explained. “We live three lives, you know. The one we are born to, the one we wish for, and that which we are left with when our dreams fade as shadows at dawn. The regents who visit are bypassing all three of those lives, and their lust subverts the free will of men and women alike. It’s a kind of theft that makes me wish for my body once more. Then, perhaps I could fight with more vigor than what this husk will allow. I’m sorry I cannot tell you more, but know that whoever makes these half-torn spirits will not hesitate to send you to my side.” He glanced at the sun and nodded his goodbye, but not before a final admonition. “Once the undead have their taste of dominion, they will kill an entire bloodline to keep it. If you have family, no distance will keep them safe from a being that can move through the Everafter. You understand?”
I did. That meant that my parents were at risk, despite being in New Mexico, now that I knew anything of the bloodgift. As the trapper faded, Gran whispered a blessing to him, and his image disappeared like the Cheshire cat, the smile fading last into the blooming day.
Chapter Nineteen: The Prodigal Hunk
I was nearly swaying with exhaustion when I left the diner. Between a lack of sleep and constant proximity to magic, I was drained. Intensely so, and there was nothing but a bath, cuddling Gus, and sleep in my future. As I stepped in my foyer I tried to make straight for the bathtub, but Gus was having none of it. His series of yowling cries started immediately as he argued with me like an old man trying to use an expired coupon. I finally gave in with a muffled curse, mixing his food while a miasma of cat food and anger closed in around my head.
“Hey.” Wulfric’s voice was warm in my ear.
I started lightly and turned to him in one smooth motion. His dark eyes regarded me with unbridled joy and I saw he’d tied his long blonde hair into a rough plait. The kiss of sun was on his golden-colored skin, and his glowing face told me of the days ranging far across his lands.
I forgot such details at our first touch.
He swept me up in his arms and kissed me, long and deep, his lips cool at first, but warming to the task. I wrapped myself around him like ivy, inhaling the woodsy scent of his clothes and that indefinable spice of his skin. He felt like home, and for the first time I started thinking that I didn’t really like him living in a cabin. In the woods. Far away. Yeah, the more I thought about it, the less I liked it.
“Missed you,” I said into his chest. I had, but it melted away like a bad dream. I rode a wave of need and leaped onto him, wrapping my legs around his narrow hips.
“You look tired, lover.” He held me upright with one powerful arm, the other hand stroking hair from my eyes. I knew I looked like roadkill, but his gaze flipped a switch in me from which there was no going back.
“Take me upstairs.” My voice was low with need.
He nodded, kissed me again, and began walking with me clinging to him so tightly I couldn’t tell where his mouth began and mine ended. I was tired, dizzy with lust, and hollow from using so much power. I didn’t need him, I craved him.
He lowered me to my bed with a delicacy I wouldn’t think such a big man could manage, his eyes simmering with a desire so visceral I felt the hair rise on my arms. A smile crossed my lips as my eyes roamed over him, then I pulled him to me so I could get lost in our frenzied reunion. We fell on each other in a tangle of caresses and sighs and I knew that his arms were my harbor. I let go and gave in to his touch with all of the love I had saved for his return.
He was wrong. I wasn’t tired. At least, not until he was.
Chapter Twenty: Carlie McEwan’s Day Off
We slept. Oh did we sleep, in that gloriously together-but-apart way that gave me hours of blissful, dreamless rest where only our feet or hands touched occasionally, but I could still savor Wulfric’s masculine warmth under the covers. It was magnificent. I woke in the pre-dawn gray because I have a thimble for a bladder, then dove back under the sheets to snuggle up to Wulfric and begin stealing his toastiness as ordained by the First Law of Girlfriends: Thou shalt not be more comfortable than me while in bed.
He opened one dark eye to regard me patiently, while I went through my admittedly tedious routine of getting comfortable again, all while bouncing around next to him without care or worry for his well-being.
After the fifth time I adjusted my legs, and my arms, and then my feet, Wulfric spoke in a tone of warning. “Carlie.” One word, but his tone was grim.
&n
bsp; “Yes?” I asked, not opening my eyes. If I just get my knee wedged under his ribs, it would be perfect—ahh, there. I chivvied under him like a burrowing owl.
“I am only warning you once. If you do not stop wiggling that little bum against me, you’re going to be boarded and looted. Is that clear?” His big hands cupped my rear and I realized that at least part of him was fully awake.
I lay still, considering my options. After taking stock of my general condition—hair, disastrous, breath, questionable, but fully rested—I began to deliberately wiggle against him while laughing, knowing that I was entering the dragon’s den while naked.
“Challenge accepted, sport.” I rolled over on him as his teeth flashed white in the growing dawn, marveling at how good it was to be small during moments like this. Our lips met as he began to quake with laughter, sending delicious shockwaves through my skin at the mere touch of his lean body. I nuzzled into him as his arms closed over my back, thinking that there was no bed in the world big enough to keep me from this man.
I was right.
We spent the morning in each other’s arms, venturing out like pioneers to gather supplies as our hunger pangs and thirst forced us to leave the shelter of my bed. With great detail, I explained the developments in Halfway since Wulfric had gone to pay respects to his territory.
“Clowns?” he asked suspiciously, proving that even Vikings knew evil when they heard the term. “You mean like a jester?”
“Exactly, but these guys are tumblers, acrobats. They do magic tricks, sure, but they’re mostly out of the spotlight at the circus while the ringmaster does whatever it is he does.” I shrugged, dislodging a small plate with cookie crumbs that rested against my shoulder. The bed looked like a small festival had passed through, leaving the detritus of what appeared to be one hell of a good time. “I sense that the ringmaster is the key to whatever’s happening. Gran thinks so too, but we haven’t proved anything yet.”
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