Bloodstains and Bitemarks

by Kyra Quinn

  A crimson glow radiates from inside the cast iron, bathing the room in a light somewhere between ominous and romantic. Burnt flesh and copper assault my nostrils. Dagon and Kane exchange a look I can’t read, but Mother Miscreance only cackles. She lifts her gaze to me and crooks a finger.

  “Come, pretty. Let’s see what your mother can tell us, shall we?”

  My heart jumps. Kane snakes an arm around me and pulls me to my feet before I can resist. He nudges me towards the pot of bubbling magic with a smile too relaxed for the surrounding madness.

  “There’s a girl,” the witch coos. “What is it you’d like to ask your mother?”

  I swallow, my voice stuck in my throat. The smart decision would be to ask about the messages hidden within her art. But a bigger question still weighs on my mind. For two years, I’ve told myself I knew who killed my mother. If I was wrong, every step I’ve taken since was in the wrong direction. I don’t know what I’ll do if Kane is telling the truth.

  “She wants to know what happened the night of her mother’s death,” Kane answers when I don’t.

  Mother Miscreance grips the cauldron with both hands. She throws her head back and cries, “Shadow and light, flesh and decay, spirit of Sister Alana, here me and obey! I command thee to reveal yourself to us.”

  The lights flicker. Cold sweat drips down my neck. The liquid inside the cauldron stops bubbling, the surface still rippling with motion. When it stills, my mother’s ashen face stares back at us.

  “She can hear you,” the witch tells me, “but she can’t answer you in words. The voices of the dead can’t reach this realm unless we perform the spell under a blood moon.”

  Dagon scoffs. “Then what’s the point in any of this?”

  Mother Miscreance shoots him daggers with her eyes. “She cannot speak, but she will show us all we need to know. Should we begin with the night of her death?”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Kane

  I’ve spent time in the company of the Prince of Darkness himself, but even Lucifer doesn’t unsettle me the way Mother Miscreance does. Perched against the wall, I watch Nadia and question if she’s worth all the effort I’ve put in. Despite her hauntingly beautiful features, trouble follows her like a lost puppy. I have enough money to never want for anything, but none of it is enough to ease the headaches Nadia brings.

  The hag seems to have stolen the fire from her soul. She’s quieter than I thought possible for someone who talks shit like it pays bills. Her shoulders and head are drooped as she peeks out at Mother Miscreance from behind her hair. The robe Arachne found her hangs loosely from her tiny body. She hugs her arms around her slender waist, rocking back and forth on her heels.

  “How many questions can she ask?” I ask on her behalf.

  “Three. Any more will cost you an additional fee.”

  Not a lot, but enough. “Ask her about the night of her death. That’s the most pressing issue on the table.” And what I’m paying the hag a minor fortune in black market magical artifacts and texts to clear up.

  Nadia’s eyes narrow in my direction, but she nods. Pushing off the wall, I move to stand a few feet to her left. We lean forward in unison over the cauldron. The liquid ripples until Alana Gray’s face morphs into a bad piece of abstract art. The mixture bubbles and the image changes, this time to Nadia’s mother in her studio. Her face is bent over a small silver chalice. Thick globs of black makeup streak her cheeks.

  “Please, Kane, help me,” she whispers in the borrowed memory. “The spirits warned me the Dark Hunt put a target on my back. Michael is coming—”

  A deafening bang interrupts her sentence. She shrieks and backs away, but there’s nowhere to run inside the compact work shed. She holds her hands in front of her chest and sobs, “Please, don’t do this. I’m not a practicing witch anymore.”

  “Oh?” a familiar voice asks. “Because I’m no expert on the dark arts, but it appears I’ve interrupted a summoning spell.”

  Zeke steps into view, his thin lips curled into a bitter smile. A crossbow is strapped to his back, but it’s the curved dagger clutched in his hand that draws my attention. The same dagger I found buried in Alana Gray’s chest when I teleported into her studio.

  “My family—”

  “Is better off without your corruption.” He twirls the dagger, a cat toying with the mouse before he sinks his teeth in. “What do you think your precious Nadia would say if you told her the truth, Alana? All those years you forced her to sit in those pews and listen to her father preach when you already knew the truth. There’s no room in Heaven for your kind. Her kind.”

  “Don’t hurt her!” Alana shrieks. “She’s a child!”

  “Relax. I will not harm a hair on her little head. She’ll find you dead and blame the demon she screwed around with. I’ll convince her to seek her vengeance and join the Dark Hunt, and the witch will become the witch-slayer.”

  Alana shakes her head. “She won’t. We raised her better than that. Smarter. No matter what you do to me, she won’t throw away her life on your pointless war.”

  Zeke shrugs, his expression unchanged. “We’ll see.”

  He lunges forward and shoves his blade through her chest. Her eyes and mouth widen until they both form perfect circles. She screams, but only a choked gasp escapes her. Dark crimson liquid pools around the blade and spreads across her chest. Zeke twists the handle for good measure, and Alana collapses onto the floor.

  Nadia watches in horrified silence, her expression not unlike her mother’s. My fingers curl into shaking fists. Heat radiates through my arms, and it’s difficult not to push the cauldron onto the floor just to spare Nadia any more pain. No one makes her cry but me. Not anymore.

  “Enough. Move onto the next scene.”

  “I want to know why she hid all of this from me,” Nadia says, her voice choked. “Why didn’t she tell me the truth?”

  The image ripples and shifts once more, this time to a memory of a much younger version of Alana. She stands in front of Nadia’s father with tears in her eyes, her hands resting over a belly round with the bloom of fresh life.

  “They’ll come for her,” she whispers. “The coven. She’s one of their sisters by blood.”

  “Like hell she is,” Adam grumbles. “That’s my blood, too, and you’re not raising her in a madhouse full of heretics.”

  “Those women—”

  “Witches,” he snarls. “Not women. Witches. Daughters of Lilith. Women are children of Eve.”

  Her hand flies out to strike him, but he grips her wrist inches before she reaches his face. “Where is your sister, Alana? And where do you imagine you’d have ended up if you stayed? Is that what you want for our child?”

  “What happened to Nadya isn’t the coven’s fault.”

  “Isn’t it? Do you think mortal women die the way she did? And they’ll burn our daughter the same way if they find out—”

  “Shut up.”

  “Alana, please.” He drops her wrist and rubs his forehead. “I’m doing everything in my power to protect you and our baby. You don’t have to like it, but this is the only way to keep her safe. Let her have a normal childhood. She’ll thank us when her powers manifest.”

  “One question left,” Mother Miscreance reminds us, snapping me back to the present. “What’ll it be?”

  Nadia shakes her head, her gaze unfocused. “There’s still so much I don’t understand.”

  “Pick your most burning inquiry,” the witch suggests. “We can’t sustain the spell much longer.”

  “I-I want her to tell me which side of this war is right. I thought Zeke and Michael were the good guys. How can I trust anyone anymore?”

  I snort. “That’s easy. Put your faith in only yourself.”

  The scene changes to a slightly older Alana with a chubby-cheeked baby girl balanced on one knee. Two fiery red pigtails hang over each of her shoulders. She swings her little legs and hums a melancholy tune under her breath while her mother pets her h
ead.

  “When is Daddy coming home?” little Nadia asks. Her legs go still, her gaze fixed on her hands folded in her lap.

  “As soon as he’s finished with his hunting trip,” Alana says. “A few days tops.”

  The little girl pouts. “How come we don’t get to go camping?”

  “It’s not as fun as it sounds,” Alana says with a weak smile. “Daddy and Uncle Dave have work to do out there. We’d only get in their way.”

  “There’s no work in the woods,” Nadia says, her little face scrunched with confusion.

  Alana purses her lips, contemplating the best way to deal with her daughter’s questions. After a long moment she asks, “Do you trust me, Naddie?”

  Nadia doesn’t hesitate. “Duh. You’re my mommy.”

  “Then I need you to trust that everything I do is for your own good. All the times I tell you no, all the rules your father and I make, it’s all to protect you. Including this. I know how much you wanted to spend the weekend with your Daddy, and I promise he’ll make it up to you when he comes home. But it’s not safe where he went.”

  “What does this mean?” adult-Nadia demands, stepping back from the cauldron. “This doesn’t answer my question at all.”

  “Doesn’t it?” Mother Miscreance asks with a twisted smile. “Reflect on what your mother has shown you, child. The answers you seek are there.”

  “I need another question,” Nadia says. “Or a better vision. Something that helps me understand what that meant.”

  The hag shakes her head. “Your master paid for three questions. How you interpret the answers isn’t my concern.”

  Nadia whirls on me, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. “Please, I’ll do whatever you want. But I need more from my mother.”

  For a split second, I’m tempted to cave and pay the witch whatever additional fees she demands. Even after we stripped her, humiliated her, starved her, and beat her, Nadia didn’t break. But I worry she’s now dangerously close to splitting apart at the seams.

  “If I had to wager a guess,” Dagon says, still leaning against the wall across the room, “your old man didn’t leave to hunt bears or deer.”

  Nadia’s eyes widen. “No—”

  “It makes sense,” I say, unable to meet her gaze. “I always wondered why Alana stayed married to that prick for so long.”

  “To watch him.” Dagon whistles under his breath. “Say what you will about witches, but that cunning woman had brass balls. It’s probably what got her killed.”

  “I don’t understand,” Nadia says, shaking her head. “If my mother was a witch, why did she let my father beat on her for all those years? Why didn’t she do something to magic Zeke away when he came for her? And if my father was a hunter, why did he marry a witch?”

  She’s got more questions than I have answers to. I cup a hand over her shoulder. “Witches are born with an affinity towards certain types of magic. Druids specialize in Earth-based magic, while others may draw their powers from the ocean—”

  “And my mother’s ‘affinity?’” she spits the last word from her mouth like poison.

  “The dark arts,” Mother Miscreance answers for me. “Alana had an affinity for death magic, but she picked up a lot of other lethal talents from her former coven. Necromancy, blood curses, demon conjuration, shadow spells... quite the skilled witch, your mother. Our community mourned for weeks after she died.”

  “If she had so many talents, why didn’t she fight back against Zeke or my father? Why allow herself to become a victim?”

  “To protect you,” I say, my voice flat. “She accepted the pain to spare you from suffering it. I think she hoped if she surrendered without a fight, the Dark Hunt might spare you.”

  Nadia shakes her head, her nostrils flared. “Lot of good her martyrdom did me. Her killer turned me into his attack dog.”

  “From what we’ve observed over the years, Michael doesn’t care if his targets are mothers or children. We’re still puzzling out why he recruited you,” Dagon says. “Zeke had plenty of opportunity to kill you, too.”

  “What about her powers?” I ask the witch. “Can you figure out what they’ve done to block them?”

  Mother Miscreance’s eyes sweep over Nadia. She shakes her head, her expression grim. “I specialize in the dark arts, demon. Whatever magic the angels used on her is not infernal. It’s divine. I can’t tell you anything without more research.”

  Nadia’s face pales. “What the fuck am I supposed to do now?”

  A hollowness spreads through my chest. Something about the fear in her eyes doesn’t sit well with me. Under any other circumstances, there’s not much I wouldn’t do to replace that look on her face with a smile. There’s nothing I wouldn’t say if I thought it would bring her comfort.

  If only I knew what to tell her.

  * * *

  I wait until the hag is gone and Dagon is busy drowning his frustrations in a bottle of booze to visit Nadia again. She’s curled in a ball on the foot of the bed when I enter with a tray of human food Arachne threw together and a bottle of cognac from Dagon’s study. Her red, puffy eyes stare vacantly at a spot on the wall. Even broken, she’s so hauntingly beautiful it’s difficult not to stare.

  “What do you want?” she croaks. “Come to rub in my face how you told me so?”

  “Not unless you’re into that now.” I cross the room and set the tray next to her on the bed. “I had Arachne research so-called ‘comfort foods’ and collect some for you. There’s a bowl of chicken noodle soup, a slice of apple pie, a jar of peanut butter, French fries, and something she referred to as grits.”

  Nadia blinks at me in stunned silence.

  “Did we miss something?”

  “Why?” she whispers. “Why are you suddenly pretending to care about me? You trying to play me like Zeke did? You think I’m some weak, stupid girl you can break apart and manipulate into becoming your weapon?”

  The more she speaks, the higher her voice goes. I press my hand over her mouth and shush her with a stern look. “I’ll remember your thanks next time I consider feeding—”

  She bites down on my hand before the last word crosses my lips. I jerk my hand away to find a bite mark oozing with black blood in the center of my palm. Pain pulses through my hand and into my arm. This crazy fucking bitch.

  Nadia shrinks back and throws her arms in front of herself, assuming a posture of self-defense as she waits for me to strike. Her chest heaves with short, ragged breaths. She forms a cross in front of herself with her index fingers, but the tremble of her hands renders more of an X. I’ve never been more tempted to throw her over my knee and beat her until my hand goes numb. But it’s more fun when she can’t predict my next move.

  I bring my palm and lick away the inky blood, my eyes locked on hers. “That was a mistake.”

  Her eyes flicker between me and the locked door. “Fuck off. I may hate Zeke now, but that doesn’t mean I like you. You’re still a sadistic bastard, and you still have me caged in here like an animal.”

  I bark a bitter laugh. “This is what you call caged like an animal? You slept in empty warehouses and abandoned buildings before we took you. Fuck, we saved you from a life of homelessness and servitude to your mother’s murderer. How about a little gratitude?”

  She kicks her leg out in front of her, shoving the tray of food to the floor with a crash. “You’re no hero, Kane. Even if you didn’t kill my mother, you’re still a demon.”

  Red clouds my vision. It takes everything in my power not to kill her now and wash my hands in her blood. She’s caused me so much more trouble than she’s worth. I didn’t expect her to kiss my feet with gratitude or anything, but her increase in hostility is enough to make me want to slit her throat and walk away from the complete mess.

  My blood heats. I should leave the room before things escalate. Send someone else in to clean up the spilled soup and soaked food. I know the evil side of my rage better than anyone. If I let her push me too far, she won
’t live to tell anyone about it.

  But I can’t seem to pull myself away. My brain screams at me to walk out the door before it’s too late, but I lurch forward and grab her by the neck before she can run. I bring my face inches from hers and growl, “I will leave this room and pack a bowl before I snap your scrawny little neck. When I come back, you will clean every bit of this mess up before I deliver your punishment. Am I clear?”

  Her face reddens. Her hands claw at my arms and face, but her nails aren’t strong enough to break the surface of my skin. She gasps and wheezes, her eyelids fluttering.

  “It’s easy, pet. Tell me you understand.”

  “I-I understand,” she gasps.

  “What’s that?” I flex my grip. “You forgot something.”

  “I understand, s-sir,” she says, hissing the last word as if spitting poison from her mouth.

  A smirk tugs at the corners of my lips. I release her, throwing her back on the mattress. “Wonderful. Try to work up an appetite while I’m away. You’ll clean this mess up with that filthy mouth of yours.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Nadia

  My mother, the necromancer. No matter how many times I turn the recent information over in my mind, it’s hard to imagine the same mother who forced me into church three times a week working with demons and performing spells with dead bodies. She lied to me about so much, and I never questioned her. She was the only person in my life I ever fully trusted.

  And Zeke. I had my suspicions about a few other hunters, Michael included. But not Zeke. Never him. He found me wandering the streets covered in my mother’s blood and took me in. He taught me to protect myself, to track monsters, and how to kill the ones I found. Until today, I thought Zeke saved me from a life behind bars or worse. He promised me revenge for my mother’s murder if I helped protect Miami from the monsters.