The Cassandra Palmer Collection

by Karen Chance

  “Another reason not t’let ye in,” he said complacently, tipping his stool back against the wall.

  I fished a ring out of my real purse, a pocket sewed inside my kirtle. It was set with a large square cut ruby of a deep blood red hue, a good stone. It should be enough for what I wanted.

  “Not a penny,” Sol mocked, as I handed it over.

  “Not in coin, no. I took that off a vampire.”

  “Best be careful, girl,” he told me, fishing a jeweler’s loupe off a string around his neck. “Stealing from their kind is a dicey business.”

  “That’s the only good thing about being locked up,” I said bitterly. “There’s not much more can be done to you.”

  Sol cackled delightedly. “Ye stole it off him while in jail?”

  “I needed traveling money.”

  “And what was a vampire doin’ in a mage’s prison? I thought they policed their own.”

  “He wasn’t a prisoner,” I said shortly, wanting to hurry this up. I could almost feel the Circle’s noose closing in. And considering how many people they’d lost in the escape, a noose is exactly what it would be as soon as they caught me.

  But Sol didn’t appear to feel the same. Usually terse to the point of rudeness, he must have had a pint or three before I arrived, because tonight he was almost chatty. “Then what was he doin’ there?” he asked again, taking his time examining the jewel.

  “I don’t know. Some damn fool story about working for the queen and wanting my help.”

  “Wanting ter help himself to dinner, more like.”

  I didn’t reply. I also didn’t touch the spot on my throat, under my shift, where he’d bitten me. The interlude had been a strange one, and I wasn’t sure what I felt about it. Not that it mattered; I’d never see him again.

  If I was lucky, I’d never see anyone in England again.

  The thought sent an unexpected pang through me, but I shoved it away. “You’ve seen it,” I said impatiently. “What’ll you give?”

  But Sol’s beady eye was no longer fixed on the ring. The legs on his stool hit the floor with a thump and he wheezed out a breath through his missing front teeth. “Where did ye get that?”

  He was staring in disbelief at the staff in my hand. The long piece of wood was ebony dark, cured by centuries of careful handling. It felt satiny smooth under my touch, with a faint tingle where my fingers rested. I couldn’t blame him for his surprise; it wasn’t every day that an ancient Druid weapon was spotted in the hand of a dirty thief.

  Of course, until a few days ago, it had been in worse ones. One of the mages serving as jailers had taken it from its rightful owner, a leader of one of the great covens. He had died soon thereafter, in the fighting that had led to my escape, and I’d somehow ended up with it. I was a thief, but this I would have returned, had there been anyone left with a right to it. But the Old Mother had died in jail, and the covens were scattered and broken, their leaders dead or in hiding.

  Like the staff, coven witches were becoming a rarity in England.

  “The Circle confiscated it from one of their prisoners,” I said tersely. “I confiscated it from them.”

  As usual, Sol didn’t ask for specifics. “What’re ye wanting for it?”

  “I’m here to trade for the ring.”

  “I c’n buy rings anywhere. I want the staff.”

  “You’ll take the ring or nothing.”

  “Nothing then.” He carelessly tossed the ring back at me.

  “I’ll go elsewhere,” I warned. “It’s a good quality stone, no visible flaws. Plenty of people—”

  “Will turn ye into the Circle and collect the reward, which is more than the ring is worth,” he finished for me. “Ye’re a wanted woman, Gillian. Not one ter be making threats.”

  And they called me the thief.

  The staff was a treasure of my people; it deserved a better fate than this. But I didn’t have a people anymore, nor a family, save one. And her safety was worth any price.

  “What’ll you give?” I asked harshly.

  “What’ll ye take?”

  I’d have preferred to discuss that somewhere other than the doorway, but the ribald party going on inside made that impossible. I waited while a couple of men came in. One was promptly allowed inside; the other, a curly-haired sailor type, paused just beyond the thresh hold, cursing and wiping the remains of someone’s dinner off his boot.

  “A license to travel, for me and Elinor,” I said quickly, referring to my daughter. “Money—enough to make a decent start elsewhere. And safe passage to the continent.”

  The wily old man contemplated this for a minute, while I watched the patterns the firelight painted on the floor and tried not to look as desperate as I felt. Despite what he seemed to think, this wasn’t the only place in town to make a sale. But I didn’t know how many of those establishments the Circle’s men might be watching.

  “The money’s no problem; safe passage neither,” he mused, lighting up a long pipe. “But the license, that’s another thing. We don’t need ‘em.”

  “But humans do. And that is what I must appear to be. I was almost recaptured twice on the way here.”

  I glanced over my shoulder, but all I saw was the sailor who’d stepped in the puddle of sick. It had somehow smeared onto his hose, too, which he’d stripped off a hairy leg. Now he was balancing precariously on one foot, hose in one hand and boot in the other, looking bemused. It looked like he’d started the night’s revelry a little early.

  “Aye. ‘Tis the way of the world, lass,” Sol said, with the air of someone imparting great wisdom. “Power shifts and we have to shift with it, if we want to keep our heads.”

  “Thank you for that,” I said, through gritted teeth. “Now can you get me a license or not?”

  “I can. But I’m thinking ye’ll not be needing it where ye’re going.”

  It took my tired brain a vital few seconds to catch up. Then I glanced at the counter, where Fulke should have been, and found it empty. Goddess teeth!

  I sprang for the door, cursing Solomon’s filthy hide, only to have it slam open and a group of mages rush in. Fulke’s traitorous hulk was visible just behind them and there was no question where he’d been—or why. The Circle’s men would have had me before I could turn around, but the sailor took that moment to pass out on the lintel, causing the mage in front to trip. And the others ran into him in their eagerness to get at me.

  The accident bought me a precious moment and I turned toward the main room, intending to run out the back. I might have made it, if Solomon hadn’t kicked my legs out from under me. I rolled and brought the staff up, only to have Fulke leap from the doorway and make a grab for it.

  “No!” Sol screeched. “Don’t touch it, ye idle-headed lout!”

  Fulke was not the swiftest thinker, but he’d spent years suffering under his father’s lash for the smallest infraction. He jerked his hand back as if burned and I whirled on Sol, who dove for the door in a move that belied his age. He scuttled behind one of the mages, a young sandy-haired blond, who surged back to his feet and grabbed the staff.

  I hadn’t uttered a spell, hadn’t even formed one in my mind, yet power pulsed under my fingertips before spilling down the wood like liquid. The mage froze as it flowed onto his hand, spread up his arm and covered his body. And then he started screaming.

  I jerked back, but he didn’t let go. Instead, his hand came away with the staff, in a stringy, gooey mess that in no way resembled flesh any longer. The small, pale finger bones melted through the slimy mess and rattled against the floor. I stared in horror from the shining arm bone hanging out the end of his flapping sleeve to his face, where round eyeballs lolled in fleshless sockets as the skin dripped down his bones.

  He stopped screaming about the time he collapsed into a heap of clothes and spreading ooze. But I could still hear it in my head, a high-pitched, half-hysterical sound that I vaguely realized was in my own voice, and then someone grabbed me. I looked up to
see the vomit-smeared sailor, who had apparently sobered up quickly.

  “Run!”

  Sage advice, had there been anywhere to go. But the appalled silence of a moment before had disintegrated into utter chaos, as the drunken patrons of the bar met the small contingent of mages in a tangle of thrashing limbs, shrieks and curses. One of the latter shot by my face, close enough to singe my hair, and caused the sailor to jerk back with an oath.

  Having been in more tavern brawls than I cared to recall, I hit the ground and started crawling. The Spaniard was built on a slant to match the bank of the Thames, with an extra story on the river side. The lower level was used for storing whatever illicit merchandise Sol was dealing in this month, and had a convenient ramp leading down to the water. If I could get to the staircase, there was a chance I could get out before the Circle noticed I was—

  A curse sizzled over my head before exploding against the wall in a shower of sparks. It looked like they’d noticed. I picked up the pace, only to catch sight of Fulke waving his arms and looking panicked.

  “No! No fire spells. No fire spells!” he bellowed, loudly enough to be heard over the din. No one else paid him any attention, but then, they didn’t know what Sol had downstairs. I didn’t, either, but when Fulke picked up the monkey and ran for the entrance, leaving the till behind, I decided I didn’t want to find out.

  I reversed course, hoping to slip out the front door in the chaos. But my hair had come loose from its fastenings and someone stepped on it, slamming my head down onto the roughhewn boards and making my ears ring. And then someone else’s boot made contact with my ribs, hard enough to knock the wind out of me. Worse, it jolted the staff out of my fingers. I scrambled after it, through a forest of legs and spilled ale, and managed to get my hand on it—

  And looked up to see a mage leveling a flintlock at my head.

  I stared at it stupidly, still stunned and breathless. I had the staff, but didn’t have the energy left to use it. And this man was either better versed in Druid magic than the other, or he’d seen what had happened to him. Because he carefully kept out of reach as he prepared to blow my head off.

  But then his face paled and the weapon dropped from his fingers, his eyes going dead before he hit the floor. I stared past him at the sailor, whose hand was outstretched but didn’t hold a weapon. And then he grabbed me around the waist and hurled us at one of the windows.

  “No,” I gasped, “there’s no—”

  I cut off as we crashed through the old wooden shutters and out into thin air. A few dizzying seconds later, we landed hard on the ramp Sol used to roll barrels up from the water. Only we rolled down it, straight into the slimy waves lapping at the bottom.

  That turned out to be fortunate. The side of the tavern blew out a moment later, in a rush of heat and noise that sent blazing boards scattering far into the night. The sailor cursed and ducked under water, although most of the pieces went flying over our heads to flame out against the Thames.

  “—land down there,” I finished. I gazed numbly at the merrily burning building—for a brief moment, until a heavy hand grabbed the back of my neck and I was jerked to within an inch of the sailor’s face.

  But it wasn’t his any longer. It suddenly smeared, like someone had taken a cloth to a dirty window. Parts of it became streaked and blurry, while others went missing entirely. In their place were bits and pieces of another picture: the jaw line became stronger, the cheekbones became more pronounced, and the unkempt beard was replaced by a neatly trimmed goatee. But the cap of dark curls and the outraged expression remained the same.

  “You,” the vampire told me viciously. “Had best be worth this kind of trouble.”

  Chapter Two

  A n hour later, I was in hot water again, but this time, I was enjoying it. The vampire had a small ship, the Bonny Lass, which had been anchored not far from the tavern. We’d swum out to it in order to avoid any of the Circle’s men who had survived the explosion, and were now in the process of washing off the river stench.

  At least, I was. I doubted that even someone as wealthy as the vampire appeared to be had another luxury like this aboard. I leaned over to refill my wine glass, then settled back against the soft sheets cushioning the side of a large, wooden tub. And sighed.

  The sigh soon turned into a yawn, the hot water lulling me into sleep I couldn’t afford. I had somehow kept hold of the staff in the confusion, but I’d lost the ring. I needed to find some other source of funds and do it quickly. Elinor was safe with friends, but she wouldn’t stay that way for long. Neither of us would, as long as we remained within the Circle’s reach.

  The question was: where to go?

  Being a witch in her majesty’s most Protestant England had once been considerably easier than life on the Continent, where the Inquisition had been joined in its efforts to wipe out magic users by a group of dark mages known as the Black Circle. Having been excluded from the magical community for years, they lusted after its demise and their own subsequent rise to power. And their magic combined with the Inquisition’s numbers had insured that the number of real witches meeting a fiery end had recently shown a dramatic increase.

  As a result, a flood of magical refugees had started arriving in England, determined to rebuild their power and retake the continent. Anyone who resisted the new order imposed by this “Silver Circle” was suspect. But members of the once powerful, independent covens or—worse—outlaws who refused to abide by anyone’s rules but their own, were anathema.

  I was the Circle’s worst nightmare, for I was both.

  No, neither the continent nor England was safe for a coven witch these days. I’d heard the Circle had few allies to the East, where the Asian covens paid them little respect and no heed. Of course, they might have no more for a couple of penniless refugees, but I could try.

  It was a sound plan, I decided, even as the thought of leaving for good caused another pang. It wasn’t sadness, wasn’t even anger, although both of those were present. It was more of a soul deep feeling of wrongness. England was home; England was ours.

  I pushed the thought angrily away. I couldn’t fight these kinds of odds; no one could. But I could live. I could see to it that my daughter lived. Against the Circle, that was the only kind of victory anyone could expect.

  “You’re supposed to be relaxing, yet you look as though you’re planning another battle.”

  My eyes flew open to see the vampire standing beside the tub, watching me with faint amusement. He caught the hand I raised to slap him, which I belatedly noticed was holding my wine glass. He refilled it as I stared at it, wondering how it had ended up empty again.

  No wonder I was tired.

  “A gentleman would have announced himself!” I told him, pressing against the side of the tub.

  “And a scoundrel would have joined you.”

  I started to make the kind of reply that deserved when I caught sight of his right hand. The ruby gleamed black in the low light, but with glints of red fire. It seemed I wasn’t the only one who had rescued something from the evening.

  “Then what does that make you?” I asked instead, moderating my tone.

  “As with most of us, it depends on the circumstance.”

  I stood up, running a soapy hand up his chest as I did so. There was muscle, firm and warm, under the loose shirt. “And which way are you leaning?”

  I didn’t get an answer that time, at least not in words.

  He had amazing hands, I discovered, slightly coarse in texture, but warm and skilled. Later, I’d be able to remember each movement, each individual touch, but at the moment it all washed over me in a jolt of sensation. Warm: hand at the nape of my neck, chest hard against my own, palm smoothing down my back; hot: mouth against mine, tongue stroking in; sharp: teeth nipping at my lower lip. Rough here, smooth there, hard and solid everywhere.

  It had been seven years since my husband died; almost two since I’d lost my last lover in a robbery gone wrong. And there had b
een no one since, the never-ending struggle to survive precluding everything else. I’d forgotten how good it felt, another’s hands on my body, another’s breath in my mouth—

  He suddenly pulled me hard against him, and that answered one question about vampires, at least. He was still in his disguise as a sailor, wearing the usual loose-fitting breeches. It was easy to slip a hand below the slack waste band, to smooth down over soft skin and hard muscle, to find the source of his desire.

  I wrapped my free hand around him and heard him draw in his breath sharply. His own hand moved abruptly lower, clenching well below my waist, causing me to moan softly. For a moment, I almost forgot what I had been doing.

  Hot, moist breath stirred my hair. “Mistress Urswick—”

  “Gillian.” Formality seemed somewhat superfluous now.

  “Gillian, then,” he said, sounding a bit strained. “I believe I need to make something clear.”

  “And what is that?”

  He caught my other hand and brought it up to his lips, before forcing the palm open. “I am not a fool,” he said, and retrieved his ring for the second time.

  Devil take him!

  I broke away and he let me go, casually stripping off his soaked shirt and going to a chest to fetch a dry one. I glared at the long line of his back for a moment, then climbed out of the tub and wrapped myself in one of the spare sheets. I turned, a suitable comment on my lips—and stopped dead.

  He hadn’t been going to fetch a shirt, after all, and the view was undeniably attractive. But that wasn’t what had my breath catching in my throat. That was reserved for the small chest in his hands.

  “If you are so fond of jewelry,” he said wryly, “perhaps you can tell me what you think of these.”

  I tucked in the top of the sheet and quickly took him up on his offer. He sat the little chest down on the table with the wine and I started pawing through it. There was gold in abundance—chains, rings, bracelets and trinkets. But the majority of the chest held more precious contents still: jewels in every color and cut gleamed, sparkled and glimmered in the lantern’s soft glow.