Ruled by Tainted Blood

by Michael J Allen

  “Is there a restroom I can visit first?”

  I led Dylan to the bathroom, itching for him to hurry. I busied myself by opening the new phone. Dylan had already set the password to match my last one.

  A notification suggested I’d need to charge the phone or it would run out of battery in three hours and nineteen minutes.

  Might as well charge it while we play, but I don’t have one for this model.

  “Ani, do we have any phone chargers?”

  “I believe Shield Caelum keeps several in his chambers.”

  I smiled. “Thank you, Caelum.”

  I hurried to fetch a charger before Dylan finished.

  Caelum’s room was an eyesore—a modern, art deco island in Vitae’s turn of the previous century manor.

  Looks like he updated all his electronics recently in case Vitae forced him to relocate. Is that a satellite internet node?

  A brushed aluminum and glass desk offered a selection of tidy wires flanking a charging pad. I collapsed into Caelum’s extremely soft leather desk chair.

  I’m totally stealing this.

  One of his cables fit my phone perfectly. I started it charging and configured it to use his Wi-Fi with information taped to the bottom of Caelum’s router so the phone could download updates.

  “Dylan? Are you finished?”

  “Your paramour is cleansing his genitals.”

  I arched a brow.

  Is he now? Does that count as considerate or selfish?

  Notifications popped up one by one, enumerating a long list of missed messages and voice mail. I recognized most of the numbers as Judith or the flower shop.

  Yeah, I’ll bet she cares now that she’s doing all the work.

  The latest voicemail displayed a number I didn’t recognize. I was tempted to delete the call record as just another spam caller, but something made me tap it open instead.

  “Quayla, dear, this is Hadley Cox. I think your little helper from the flower shop just got abducted...”

  The hollow still lurking from purging so much essence out of my body swelled, sending my head into a whirlpool as the rest of the message played out. A lot of it didn’t make sense—not that people in my apartment abducting Judith made any more.

  I need to talk to Mrs. Cox.

  I dialed the unknown number.

  It rang.

  A thousand dark scenarios played through my imagination.

  It rang again and again.

  Images of poor, sweet Mrs. Cox trying to help Judith and falling afoul of whatever was going on knotted my gut. Lead lined my hollow core. I threw myself out of Caelum’s chair—completely forgetting to steal it—and rushed to my room.

  I snatched up both hilts.

  They’re in trouble. I need to help them. Dear, Creator, if something’s happened to them...

  “Dylan?”

  “Almost done,” he said.

  “I have to go.”

  Alarm filled his voice. “What? Why?”

  “Mrs. Cox and Judith are in trouble.”

  “You’re too weak to leave,” Anima said.

  “Are my door privileges restored?”

  “Not as of yet,” Anima said.

  I cursed. “Why not?”

  “Your body remains too weak for field duty.”

  I dropped next to my nest and shoved both hands into the essence. Replacing it later would hurt, but if that was what saving Mrs. Cox or even Judith cost, I’d pay it. Essence rushed into my body until only two rebirths worth remained. Restored essence filled me with vim and verve, even if my reflection resembled a zombie movie extra.

  “Now you can let me out,” I said.

  “I’m sorry, Quayla. I cannot. Perhaps if we contacted one of the others?”

  “And what? Tell them they have to take care of my friends for me? That I am too weak? Give Vitae an excuse to forbid me friends outside the Shield?”

  “Peace, Shield Quayla, your excitation is frightening me.”

  “Let me out, Anima.”

  “I am truly sorry.”

  “Me too.” I snatched up a bedside table and threw it through the closest window. A moment later, I dove headlong after my furniture. Wind rushed past me, lashing my hair like a thousand whips. I reached into my core, willing my essence to compact into a tight egg of energy.

  It built slowly.

  Floors sped by.

  I pushed harder.

  Have to transmog high enough to avoid being seen.

  The ground rushed toward me.

  The power of my gathered essence swelled. I willed the transmogrification. The ground threatened to cost me one of the two lives in my nest.

  I’m not going to make it in time—if at all.

  I cursed, concentrating with all my will.

  Pavement came into focus like some movie’s slow-motion action scene.

  Please, change. Now. It has to be now, for...

  I transmogrified, but neither far enough up to go unseen nor pull completely out of my fall. I flashed into my true form, wings snapping outward to stop most of my momentum. I shifted my body, restoring clothes and possessions while not shifting back my wings. I consumed my wings and shot all of that essence downward with as much force as I could muster. The counter force of the downward waterspout slowed me to a hard crash that luckily only shattered my legs.

  I shrieked, drawing onlookers.

  A man in business garb rushed up to me. “Are you all right, Miss? What happened?”

  I put a hand down in the puddle, soaking up the essence to repair my legs. Knitting bones back together hurt—particularly shifting bone fragments through muscle into place. I restrained the cry behind my lips even though I lost the fight against shedding tears.

  “I slipped and broke a heel,” I said.

  He smiled. “Unfortunate, but not worth making a pretty girl cry. May I help you up?”

  “That would be most gallant of you.”

  His brows rose. “Gallant?”

  “Sorry, been studying a lot of old books lately.” I held out my hands as the last of my bones reknit.

  He helped me to my feet, frowning at the ground. “You slipped because the sidewalk was wet, didn’t you?”

  “Uh, I thought so. Maybe my pants soaked up all the water.”

  “That’s so strange. You’d think the pavement would at least still be damp.”

  “Thank you so much for your help.” I kissed him full on the mouth.

  And thank you Primal Battle.

  He blinked at me, cheeks reddening and lifted a hand into view. “Um, thank you, Miss, but I’m married.”

  I gave him my best smile. “Just thanking you for your help.”

  A nervous chuckle escaped him. “Consider me thanked.”

  I aborted another round of thanks to flag down a passing taxi. He helped me into the back seat and disappeared on his way as I gave the cabbie my address.

  Quayla

  I pulled up to my apartment, tipped the cabbie and slammed the door in my headlong rush inside. Had the cab been something like a Prius, I’d have apologized, but the fossil-fuel guzzling sedan didn’t deserve that kind of consideration.

  I took the front steps two at a time. Despite drawing enough essence back into my body to fill it out, my knees buckled as I hit the landing. I grabbed the doors, barely keeping myself upright.

  I used too much to heal the breaks. I need to rebalance again and build up my leg muscles.

  Mrs. Cox appeared on the other side of the glass ovals. “Gracious, child, are you all—” Mrs. Cox opened the door. “Quayla, what on earth have you done to yourself?”

  “Later,” I said. “I got your message. What happened? Are you all right? Where’s Judith?”

  Mrs. Cox pursed her lips. “Come inside, child, let’s get you some tea.”

  “I don’t need tea!”

  Mrs. Cox folded her arms. “You need to settle your nerves. If you saw the bodies in this state you might collapse all together?”

&n
bsp; Bodies?

  I took Mrs. Cox’s arm. “Bodies?”

  Mrs. Cox led me into 1A and settled me into her rocking chair. I lurched back to my feet, but a dark look put my butt back in the seat. “There was some sort of hootenanny in your apartment. You know I don’t—”

  “It wasn’t me. I was under medical care.”

  Mrs. Cox scowled. “Not your Dylan?”

  “No. He’s not like that.”

  Mrs. Cox gave me a piece of pound cake and a tall glass of milk. “I thought as much, elsewise I wouldn’t have killed them.”

  I choked, spluttering milk all over the carpet. “You what?”

  Mrs. Cox gestured dismissively. “They weren’t regular people in any case, faeries of some kind.”

  The glass of milk clattered to the ground, spilling its contents every direction.

  “Oh, dear,” Mrs. Cox produced a towel and bent to clean up.

  I took the cloth from her even though I wasn’t much steadier than the old lady. I bent over the mess while Mrs. Cox clucked her tongue. “You need to be more careful, dear.”

  “T-tell me about the faeries.”

  Mrs. Cox folded her arms. “You don’t believe me. You youngsters all just know there’s no such thing as the faerie.”

  “I do believe you. I...I’ve seen the faerie.”

  Mrs. Cox patted my head. “Knew you were a smart girl. Have you experienced second sight too?”

  “No.”

  She frowned. “I think Nana did. That’s how she knew.”

  “So, you’ve seen faeries.”

  “Didn’t I just tell you I killed some, dear?” Mrs. Cox took the glass into the kitchen and ran it under water. “You think I go around impaling random peoples’ heads with garden tools?”

  “What happened to the bodies?”

  Mrs. Cox pushed a refilled glass into my hand.

  “Mrs. Cox, you have to tell me what happened to Judith. You have to tell me what you did with the bodies. You could be in real danger.”

  Mrs. Cox gestured to the windows. “Elderberry sprigs wrapped in silver and salt on the sills. No mischievous Faerie Folk are going to invade my home.”

  “Some of the Folk come back from the dead.”

  Mrs. Cox blinked. “Really? Nana never said anything about that. Just as well I dragged them into your apartment and gave stabbed them in the head with my sheers for good measure then.”

  I downed the milk, earning brain freeze in my rush. Rubbing my tongue against the roof of my mouth to warm my palette garbled my question. “What happened to Judith?”

  “I heard screaming and a commotion. Well, I run a quiet building, so I went up to have a word with the culprit. As I got there, she was snatched back into your apartment by a horde of goblins. A naked hobgoblin answered your door when I knocked. He not only slammed my door in my face, but he spat on me. Well, I wasn’t going to put up with that kind of nonsense as you can understand.”

  “How do you know what a hobgoblin looks like?” I asked.

  “Pictures—of course the pictures had clothes on them, not like this cheeky little bugger. Didn’t really have that much to show off if you—” Mrs. Cox blushed. “I’m sorry, child, I shouldn’t be saying such things in front of an unmarried girl.

  “Anyway, dear, when I couldn’t reach you, I checked my book then went out to the greenhouse to see about luring them with some elderberries—you know how Faerie Folk are obsessed with those.”

  My mind swam. “Book?”

  “Don’t interrupt, dear, I’ll lose my place. One of the reasons I grow elderberries is in case of Faerie Folk, though you have to be very careful to wash them thoroughly—the berries, not the faeries.” She smirked. “That rhymed. Anyway, there are all sorts of bad things that can happen to you if you eat or drink elderberries that have faerie saliva on or in them.”

  My mind refused to stop circling. Little Mrs. Cox, calm quiet landlady was a damned walking faerie wiki.

  “So, while I was getting the berries, I thought to myself, Hadley girl, might not hurt to take the sickle with you, just in case they can’t all be lured away by the berries. On the way back up I remembered Nana told a story about getting rid of hobgoblins by presenting them clothes—probably where that Rowling girl got her house elf thing. Anyway, armed for faerie, I went up to your apartment to save—Judith you said?” Mrs. Cox scowled. “I do hope the others weren’t your friends, particularly since I killed a few of them.”

  “They weren’t my friends, Mrs. Cox.”

  “Oh, good, I’d hate to do something like that to you.”

  “I appreciate it.”

  “The clothes thing didn’t work and the berries only let me shove a few of those little buggers down the stairs. So, I gave the foul-mouthed naked fiend what for and the remaining goblins tore out of here with your Judith.”

  “Where’d they go?” I asked.

  “I don’t know, but that Detective Foxner had been on the corner staking out your apartment when they left. She pursued their van. I hope she caught them—she seems very competent even if a bit rude—in which case your Judith should be safe and sound.”

  Okay, the detective from the humane society is staking out my apartment, which odd as it might seem to me ended up being a good thing. Even if she lost them, she might have a line on where they took Judith. Wait...

  I turned to Mrs. Cox. “The goblins had a van? Why?”

  Mrs. Cox looked suddenly offended. “How should I know? Do I look like the kind of person to break into people’s houses and indulge in strange practices?”

  I laughed, I couldn’t help myself. “No, Mrs. Cox. I’m sorry you thought that was what I was suggesting.”

  “Eat your pound cake, dear. You look a death.”

  I ate the heavenly cake, asking for more milk and cake as I considered things. Mrs. Cox knew things she shouldn’t but apparently, she’d been taught by her grandmother which either freed me from any need to call for a rewrite or made for one hell of a time edit. I gobbled the third piece of cake, much to Mrs. Cox’s beaming approval.

  “Wait, you never told me where you saw hobgoblin pictures.”

  Mrs. Cox crossed to an old trunk shaped much like a fantasy treasure chest. She pulled an old afghan from atop it and unlocked it from a key on her crowded ring. She pushed aside two more blankets—smaller and much softer looking—and brought out a leather-bound book almost a foot thick.

  My brows shot up.

  Mrs. Cox’s gentle care placing the book on the coffee table still resulted in a resounding thunk. She opened the ancient tome, easing pages over one by one until she found one filled with hand-drawn sketches of what were undoubtedly hobgoblins.

  Writing accompanied the pictures, but I couldn’t make heads or tails of it. “What is that? I can’t read it.”

  “I should think not. Took me two years to learn,” Mrs. Cox said. “Nana wasn’t a patient woman either. She expected me to know it from the first glance, though I can’t say why. I can tell you, I got a switching for each week I got some word wrong until I was blistered and bitterly determined to learn the damned thing.”

  “What language is it?”

  Mrs. Cox glanced around, her hands flitting through some sort of peasant ward. “The Romani Cant.”

  “Romani Cant? As in a Gypsy thiev—”

  Mrs. Cox scowled.

  “Um, never mind. Can I see the bodies now?”

  Caelum

  Caelum froze in front of his apartment. A cloying stench wafted from beneath his door typical of Unseelie mixed with a lesser but fresher stench of Wyldfae. He unlocked the door, chambered a round into each pistol and eased the door open.

  Outrushing taint nearly bowled him over.

  He fought its affect, sliding into the spacious living room decorated in a wide spectrum of black, white and greys. His eyes swept the immaculate room. A tent of white beckoned from the grey marble breakfast bar.

  He took the long way around the couch, eyeballing his undisturbe
d bedroom through the doorway before closing to the tent. A neat handwritten note informed him he was out of milk.

  That’s not right.

  Caelum’s skin prickled.

  The apartment wasn’t that bad. I should’ve had enough credit for at least two more normal cleanings.

  He slid around the bar into the kitchen proper. A quick check showed his own milk reserves exhausted. Cream cheese, sour cream, ice cream and even coffee creamer were all absent too.

  What the hell?

  Caelum crept toward his bedroom. The Unseelie taint grew stronger the closer he got.

  How did Unseelie enter directly into my bedroom? I’d have sensed an Arch.

  He glanced at his walls, verifying the vibrant, airbrushed canvasses remained. His weapon wall—depleted by recent action—possessed no new gaps to wring his guts. He inhaled, trying to determine if trap or ambush waited a step across his bedroom’s threshold.

  Another white tent rested on his far bureau. Something about the room troubled him. Something felt missing, but he couldn’t place it.

  Sound, there’s no wind blowing.

  Caelum charged into his room, jerking weapons toward the privacy screen. He edged forward. He froze, squeezing his essence. A wind jerked the screen toward him. It fell in slow motion, exposing the corner in which a whirlwind of balloons should’ve swirled.

  The corner gaped empty.

  He leapt the screen in a rush.

  The Unseelie hadn’t emptied his nest. They’d taken it.

  What the hell did they want with my nest? Unless Vitae...

  Hair along Caelum’s limbs stood as pressure built behind his eyes. He tightened his grip on the guns in equal measure to the clench of his jaw.

  He crossed to the second note. It gave him a phone number. Inside it read: These guys can fix the ceiling. They come highly recommended.

  Caelum’s gaze shot upward to the underside of someone else’s bed, easily visible through the missing ceiling and floor between the two apartments.

  9: Bloodlust

  Vitae

  A waterspout of dark blood swirled up out of my nest. It fanned outward like spreading wings forming a new body. Blood drew long bones, painted them with sinew, ligaments and shrouded the whole in muscle. Lean fat layered next as cushion to lustrous, bronze skin.