Текст книги "The Shifting Price of Prey"
Автор книги: Сьюзан Маклеод
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Текущая страница: 3 (всего у книги 33 страниц)
Chapter Five
I raised my hand in greeting. The bike rider dipped her head and removed her helmet in one smooth continuous movement. Lifting her gaze to mine, she hit me with a stunning smile and whisked her swathe of shining blonde hair round in a practised flip worthy of any hair product advert.
Katie: part-time Spellcrackers receptionist (and my occasional taxi service), soon to be full-time student dancer, and the nearest thing to a kid sister I have.
I grinned at her. ‘Ten out of ten for the hair whip, Katie. All you need now is to get someone to pay you to do it.’
‘Well, funny you should mention that . . .’ She did another expert flip and stretched out her arms, excitement glinting in her eyes. ‘Ta da! You are now looking at L’Oréal’s newest hair model!’
‘Really?’
‘Reallyreallyreally!’
‘Woot!’ I held my hand up for a high five, and she slapped my palm with her leather gauntlet. ‘Go you!’
‘Yeah! Go me!’ She beamed and punched her fist in the air. ‘Finally!’
‘That’s brilliant, Katie.’ I hugged her, breathing in the scent of leather, hot metal and the citrusy perfume she always wore as her arms tightened around me. She’d been hoping for this for so long. ‘So what’s the job?’ I said as we broke apart.
‘I’m to be in the background of an ad with about ten others, so there’s no face work. It’s only a couple of days. But it’s a start. And the pay’s good for a chunk of college fees, but then’ – she gave me a mischievous grin that made her look about nine years old – ‘I’m worth it!’
I groaned and rolled my eyes at her. ‘Plea -se. You’re killing me.’
She stuck her tongue out. ‘Wait till you hear my other news.’
By the way she was almost bouncing, I didn’t need to hear, I could guess. Marc, the boy – no, not boy, man, since he was my age: twenty-five – who’d been seriously flirting with her for the last few weeks (at her other part-time job in the Rosy Lea café), had finally asked her out. Marc was the first guy she’d been interested in after her last ‘date’ turned out to be a vamp’s human blood-slave. The vamp had kidnapped Katie to blackmail me into taking his blood-bond. Katie hadn’t been hurt, but I’d promised myself I’d never let anything bad happen to her again. I couldn’t change the fact that her confidence and trust in herself and others had taken a beating, though, so Marc asking her out was momentous.
Especially as he’d spent so long getting to this point, which had taken Katie from agonising over whether to say yes to wondering what was wrong. Katie’s mum, Paula, thought it showed he’d picked up on Katie’s nervousness. But for me, it smacked too much of manipulation and had me uneasy. Of course, anything to do with Katie pushes my Red Alert button. But still, just because I might be rabidly over-protective, and over-reacting, didn’t mean Marc wasn’t someone to watch. Damn it, I sowanted to wrap Katie up in the proverbial cotton wool, but I hate it when people try to do that to me.
I pasted a teasing smile on my face. ‘You won the lottery?’
This time she rolled her eyes at me. ‘Gen– ny!’
‘Kat– ie!’
She crossed her arms with a disgusted glare.
I laughed. ‘C’mon then. Out with the details.’
‘First night at the Royal Opera House for La Sylphide.’
Marc was good; I couldn’t have chosen better for Katie myself. I clamped my mouth shut before my paranoia made me say something I’d regret.
‘And no,’ she said, her glare turning determined, ‘I’m not bringing him into the office so you can give him the once-over.’
Then again, I didn’t really need to say anything. Katie knew me.
‘Look, I’ve got it under control,’ she carried on earnestly. ‘I’m meeting him there. I’ll book a Gold Goblin taxi home. I won’t go anywhere else with him, or get into any strange cars, go down any dark alleys, or drink or eat anything that’s been out of my sight.’ She leaned forwards and hooked her blue heart-shaped pendant out from under her jacket. It carried a mega Personal Protection Ward and Tracker spell that had cost me near enough six months’ wages, even with Tavish doing the castingfor free. She dangled it before me. ‘I’ll be wearing this as usual. I know what I’m doing. Marc’s a nice guy. Trust me? Please?’
‘I do trust you,’ I said. Just not him.
‘It’s a first date, Genny,’ she warned. ‘I don’t want to get all heavy about things and scare him off.’
If he likes you, then it won’t.But again I didn’t say it. If I didn’t trust her judgement, then how could she? And really, the vamp kidnap thing had been my fault, not hers. She’d done nothing wrong. She didn’t deserve to have her every date interrogated, magically or otherwise, because I felt guilty. What she deserved was to have an awesome night out with a guy she liked.
‘ La Sylphideis a’ – romantic, tragic tale of impossible love; not mychoice for a first date, but hey, Katie would adore it – ‘wonderful ballet,’ I said, happy for her, my smile only a tiny bit forced. ‘You’ll love it.’
She grinned and clapped her hands. ‘I know! So exciting.’
I grinned back then changed the subject. ‘So how’s things back at the office?’
Her expression turned businesslike. ‘All under control. Rotas are done and agreed for the Carnival. I’ve got a couple of interviews lined up for the vacancy, and we’re all caught up on the non-Carnival jobs.’
Katie wasn’t our summer receptionist/office manager because she’s my sort of kid sister. She’s also Ms Super Organised. I was going to miss her come the start of college.
‘So all I’ve got you down for tomorrow, so far, is Harrods,’ she finished.
I nodded. Harrods were having problems in their lingerie changing rooms. Their Magic Mirror spells kept mutating and instead of coming up with the appropriate recommendations, they were spouting subtle put-downs that meant customers were walking without buying. Obviously, store management were nothappy. It was Spellcrackers’ top contract and, once the Magic Mirror problem was sorted would be a good steady earner.
‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Anything else come in for tonight?’
‘You’re free as a—’ Katie’s eyes rounded with alarm as she pointed at the park. ‘Look, Genny!’
I looked. And saw nothing. ‘What?’
‘There! In those bushes!’ She waved frantically at a dark clump about fifty metres away. ‘He was naked. ’
I raced alongside the iron railings enclosing the park, through the entrance and ran towards the bushes, clenching my hand around my ring and releasing Ascalon. ‘Naked’ said the male was probably some lowlife pervert so he wouldn’t warrant a killing blow, but as a scare tactic the sword would make him think twice next time he got the urge to get his junk out. And if he was more than just a lowlife, like, say a peeping tom Autarch, then I was way happier being armed and dangerous.
I slowed as I neared the spot, sending my Spidey senses out. No one. Naked or otherwise. I’m fast, part due to my sidhe blood and part because I run daily, so I should’ve got some sort of ping back. So either he’d disappeared into thin air – possible, but I couldn’t sense any magic either – or he was fast enough to sprint out of range. Which could only mean a vamp. I scowled, ignoring the way my pulse was pounding harder than it should for a short run and debated whether it was worth poking about in the bushes. Katie shouted again.
‘There! Down by the trees.’
I spun towards the wooded area a couple of hundred metres away . . . No naked male, but a brief glimpse of a dark shape moving low and merging into the deeper gloom. My inner radar pinged: ‘human’ and ‘animal’. I started running then stopped as my senses zeroed in on the path coming from the far side of the wooded area. A man was walking his dog. His shoulders were stooped under his beige-coloured shirt and trousers, and the dog – a yellow Labrador – padded slowly on age-stiffened legs. Even without being close enough to see the man’s face clearly, it was obvious he was old. No way was he the flasher. Neither he nor his dog could move fast enough to get over there from the bushes.
I ran to the trees and did a swift check round. Had I seen something, or was my imagination on overdrive? Whatever, there was no hint of vamp, or of magic. Letting Ascalon slide back into the ring, I jogged over to the man and his dog, said a brief hello, and confirmed he was as old and human as he appeared and hadn’t seen a flasher making a fast exit. Then I sprinted back to the bushes, poked around and again found nothing. Rolling my shoulders to get rid of the tension, I jogged back to Katie.
‘Did you see him?’ she asked, expression worried.
Crap. Katie really didn’t need to hear I thought her flasher might be a vamp stalking me; it would knock her confidence way down. ‘Sorry, no. Probably scared him off with the sword.’
She frowned at me. ‘He was weird.’
I snorted. ‘I think sick is the word you want.’
‘No. He was naked, but he wasn’t trying to, y’know, flash. It was more as if he was spying and he sort of fell over.’
I pursed my lips. ‘He fell over?’
‘Maybe not fell over exactly, but sort of crumpled downwards.’
‘Okay, that is weird. But he’s gone now,’ I said, aiming for reassuring. ‘So he can’t have been hurt.’
She hugged her helmet, still anxious. ‘Maybe. Did you see the animal under the trees? It was weird too. Dog-like, but not. And big.’
I gave her a considering look. Maybe my imagination wasn’t on overdrive. A big dog might account for the dark shape I thought I’d seen. ‘I didn’t get a clear look, Katie. Sorry.’
She gave an almost imperceptible shudder. ‘Do you think the animal was something to do with the Carnival? They’ve got some odd exhibits. Maybe one of them escaped? The man could’ve been looking for it?’
I hadn’t thought of that, but then my paranoia was stuck on vampire. Whereas Katie’s was stuck on finding an explanation that wasn’t scary. ‘Could be,’ I said, and dug out my phone and called Carnival security, more to reassure Katie than anything.
The duty manager hadn’t had any escapees reported, so he took my rather sparse details, asked if I was sure they were animals and not some sort of fae, then thanked me and said he’d check it out. He also suggested I phone the zoo. I did. And got almost the same response, albeit with the guarantee that they took security very seriously, and would have known if any animal had escaped. They would, of course, look into it.
‘Nothing, but they’ll let me know,’ I told Katie as I came off the phone. ‘I think we should tell the police about the flasher.’ Which the naked male was, whatever else he might be, and as such needed to be reported. ‘Can you describe him?’
She twisted the strap of her helmet, chewed her lip, frowning at the bushes. ‘Dark, wavy hair. Pale-skinned. Tall-ish . . . I think.’
‘And definitely naked,’ I prompted.
‘Yes, but I didn’t see anything, y’know, important, just enough that I could tell he didn’t have clothes on.’
I gave her a comforting hug, and phoned the police.
An hour later, we waved them goodbye. They’d taken our statements and I’d managed to let them know, without Katie hearing, my suspicion the flasher might be a vamp. They’d said it wasn’t unusual to get flasher reports from the park and they’d do a more thorough check during daylight. Then they wrapped the bushes up in enough blue and white tape that it looked like the vegetation had been a victim of an over-excited troupe of maypole dancers. The coppers’ parting shot had been to ask if we wanted a police liaison officer to contact us to arrange some counselling.
‘Counselling,’ Katie muttered miserably once we were on our own again. ‘We don’t have to, do we? It wasn’t like I even saw anything.’
I hugged her again. ‘It’s only if you think you need it, hon.’
‘Yeah, well I don’t. I had enough counselling last year.’
When the vamp kidnapped her. She didn’t say it, but she didn’t have to. That counselling hadn’t been fun, but it had helped, which was what mattered. ‘Hey.’ I gave her shoulders another consoling squeeze. ‘Wanna hit the Rosy Lea for coffee and a fry-up?’
She eyed me dubiously from under her lashes. ‘You don’t do coffee and I don’t do fry-ups.’
I grinned. ‘Semantics.’
She huffed and handed me her spare helmet. ‘You gonna tell Mum about tonight?’
‘Do you want me to?’
She heaved a sigh. ‘No. I’ll tell her. She’s gonna freak out, though.’
Yep, Paula would. But in a good way, Then again, what mother wouldn’t? She was as protective as I was about Katie, apart from when it came to Katie’s new boyfriend, Marc. But before I could say anything, a bird-like warbling sounded. Katie started, grabbed for her phone. She frowned then shot me a bemused look. ‘You’re never gonna believe this, Genny! Someone’s pulled a “Harry Potter” in Leicester Square!’
‘A what?’
‘A “Harry Potter”. At least that’s what they’re calling it on Twitter. Tavish’s bots picked it up. Look!’ She held her phone out.
The display showed a video clip of the Empire’s façade. The huge poster over the cinema’s entrance advertised Conan the Barbarian. On the poster, a half-naked, muscled-up Conan was looming high above the battling hordes, actually swinging his sword at his legion of attackers. As the video clip played, Conan’s adversaries stopped attacking and traipsed off into the wings as if taking a tea break. Conan looked around in satisfaction, hoisted his sword over his shoulder and followed, leaving the poster advertising nothing more than an out-of-focus vista of an empty, rocky plain.
I looked at Katie. ‘That is a poster, isn’t it? Not some new vid-screen the cinema’s using?’
‘Definitely a poster.’ She tapped her screen. ‘And it’s definitely a prank of some kind; there’re already apologies and reassurances on twitter that it’ll be fixed soon.’ She gave me an expectant glance.
‘You’re right,’ I said, answering her unspoken question. ‘It sounds like an ideal job for Spellcrackers, if we can—’
Katie’s phone gave another bird-like warble at the same time my phone beeped with a text – from Leandra, the witch who monitored our night phones.
Big problems in Leicester Square! Six jobs already and more coming in. You available?
Leandra had sent the text to every witch on Spellcrackers’ books. I raised my brows at Katie. ‘Jobs, plural?’
‘Yep. The rest of the posters are the same. Well, according to Twitter, anyway. Going by the ton of tweets, it looks like it might even be trending soon.’
‘Going by the tweets,’ I corrected, ‘it looks like we’re in for a busy night.’
Chapter Six
Conan the Barbarian twirled his sword like a cheerleader’s baton, pointed it out at the cheering crowds forty feet below in Leicester Square, then did a slow bump and grind as he shot me a salacious wink.
‘Bet you don’t do that in the film,’ I muttered, ignoring the whoops, whistles and calls for ‘more’.
I used the controls on the hydraulic lift basket I was standing in to nudge myself closer to the top of the film poster, then focusedon the splatter of muddy-coloured oil paint that was the ‘Harry Potter’ spell. How the hell the magical vandal had got it this high was a mystery – one the police were responsible for unravelling – all I had to unravel was the spell.
Which was proving easier said than done.
‘Okay, let’s try this again,’ I murmured, crunching three liquorice torpedoes to boost my magic, and touching the cleaned mascara brush I held to the paint. Carefully, I teased out a fat orange stripe from the muddy mess, then another of indigo, followed by pink, green, and five shades of yellow, until I had all the stripes separated out into a seemingly random colour wheel. Mentally crossing my fingers, I checked the poster. Conan scowled, hefted his sword like he meant business and froze. I compared it to the A4 copy the cinema manager had given me, and blew out a relieved sigh. They matched. Finally, I’d hit on the right combination. After two long hours.
The time was within the budget, but I’d hoped to nail it in less. Of course, crackingthe ‘Harry Potter’ spell would’ve taken a couple of seconds, but crackinga spell also cracks whatever it’s attached to, and shredded posters and damaged buildings were a definite no.
I’d tried absorbingthe spell, but all that had done was turn the poster white. Luckily I’d managed to spit the spell back out unchanged before the magic had mutated, though I was still suffering the nasty side-effects: mouth dry with the bitter taste of juniper berries, and six, so far, desperate trips to the cinema’s facilities. Even that hadn’t killed my constant urge to pee. The idea of setting a Privacy spell and making use of the spell-dumping bucket as a handy potty was my newest fantasy. Absorbingmagic can sometimes bring out its ‘mischievous’ side.
Mischievous magic aside, now I’d managed to reverse-tweak the spell to get the poster back to normal, all I needed to do was suck it up and dump it in the potty – sorry, bucket – with our new Spellcrackers spell remover, a.k.a. the common turkey baster: the kitchen implement with a hundred and one uses, according to Leandra when she’d suggested it. (Unnerved by the slightly manic glint in her eye at the time, I’d refrained from asking what the other ninety-eight were.)
A sudden gust of warm wind hit and I grabbed the metal hopper’s handrail as it gave a stomach-dropping shudder. Heights don’t usually bother me, but something about being forty-odd feet up, in a three-foot-wide metal basket, suspended on a seemingly fragile-looking arm cantilevered up and out from the back of a small lorry, brought on an unexpected attack of vertigo.
Dizzy, I slumped down and tried not to think about water, potties or how far away the ground was. I took a few deep breaths, willing the dizziness to pass, then switched my phone on (leaving it on when dealing with unknown magic is a sure-fire way of crackingthe Buffer spell) and texted the rest of the team with the ‘reverse tweak’. Now I’d figured out the colour combo, removing the ‘Harry Potter’ spell from the other fifty-odd posters (who knew there were somany posters in Leicester Square?) would be as easy as, well, sucking up gravy.
I checked my messages– and found one from Malik, his clipped, ice-cold tone almost willing me not to phone back.
I took a breath and brought his number up, the nerves in my stomach not made any better by my constant need to relieve myself. And the minefield of thoughts I’d sidestepped earlier, when I’d decided Malik was the obvious choice for info, opened up in front of me. If I was honest, things weren’t just complicated and confusing between us, they were downright awkward. And it was all my fault.
I should never have blackmailed him.
Oh, it had seemed a great idea at the time. He’d started ordering me around, right in the middle of the ToLA case, and as he’d had my freely offered blood, I had no choice but to do as he said. His orders were all meant to protect me, and the one chance I had of recovering the stolen fae’s fertility. Later, when I’d discovered that, I’d forgiven him. But at the time I’d felt betrayed, mad as hell, and had been determined to stop him from ever abusing his power over me again. Plus, I had a plan to rescue the victims with his help, and knew the only way to get it was to force him.
So I’d come up with the clichéd ‘in the event of my death’ letter, left with the police, except I didn’t actually have to die for the letter to do its stuff; I only had to give the nod to Hugh – (acting) Detective Inspector Hugh Munro – and the full force of English justice would fall on Malik like the bricks of the High Court collapsing atop him.
Not that I thought Malik cared so much for himself. It was more that if what he’d done became public knowledge, it would break the ancient Live and Let Live Tenets between the vamps and the witches, and set them at each other’s throats. If the witches and the vamps went to war, then no one was going to come out a winner. Least of all the vamps. That, Malik did care about, hence the awkwardness.
And the reason I’d only seen the beautiful vamp once since the end of the ToLA case three months ago.
Not that I’d realised anything was different at first. In fact, I’d sort of fantasised that after he’d helped me, and healed me after the – literal – dust from the ToLA case had settled, things between us would . . . move on . . . and that the heart-thudding attraction I’d always felt (and had a wishful idea wasn’t just on my side) might develop into more. Though quite how ‘more’ would work out, his being a vamp and my running Spellcrackers, a witch company – and with a certain satyr I’d promised myself not to think about in the picture – was a problem my fantasies didn’t have an answer for. I wasn’t too proud of myself for wanting to have my relationship cake and eat it when it came to the satyr – I – wasn’t – thinking – about and Malik.
So despite my fantasies, or rather because of them, I’d reluctantly told myself it was better to stick to being ‘just good friends’ with Malik.
Then I’d called him to thank him. Malik had been distant and formal as if there’d never been anything between us, and my ‘just good friends’ idea was slapped back in my face. Though after my shock dissipated it hit me that, as far as he knew, I was still prepared to carry out my blackmail threat, so in order to protect the vamp/witch status quo, he was doing exactly what I’d demanded: leaving me alone.
Hoping to ease into sorting things out, I’d come up with a minor problem with Darius, my ex-fang-pet, and asked to meet. The meeting hadn’t gone quite as planned – an understatement if ever there was one – and I’d been left with the impression that the last thing Malik wanted was any sort of relationship with me.
Now, if nothing else, this Emperor/Autarch stuff counted as a good opener to clear the air.
I chewed my lip, worked out a polite greeting in my head and called.
He answered on the second ring. ‘Genevieve.’
My heart did a stupid excited leap at hearing his not-quite-English accent, even if his tone was the same clipped, ice-cold one as his message. Then, as the metal bucket shuddered in another gust of wind, my carefully prepared words disappeared and I blurted, ‘Do you know a vamp called the Emperor?’
‘Why?’
The part of me that didn’t need to pee relaxed at his sharp question. If he’d given me an unequivocal ‘no’, I’d have hit a dead end on all fronts. But his question was almost an acknowledgement.
Keeping it business-like and brief, I told him about Tavish wanting my help, the Emperor tarot card with the Rod of Asclepius, the peeping tom and the faint ping I’d got off a nearby vamp. I finished with the million-pound question that had been bugging me: ‘Can the Autarch go outside in daylight, if he was in the shade of nearby trees or something? Is he the Emperor?’
There was a brief silence. ‘Where are you now, Genevieve?’
He hadn’t denied it was possible. My heart leaped again, with fear this time, and thanks to my magically irritated bladder I nearly wet myself. Crap. I swallowed, clenched my inner muscles tighter and said, ‘Leicester Square, I’m dealing with the problems here.’
‘What problems?’
‘A prank spell on the movie posters. It’s been all over the news. They’re calling it a “Harry Potter”,’ I finished wryly.
There was a brief burst of noise as if a TV had been switched on, then it was gone. ‘Ah, I see.’ Malik’s voice held a thin thread of amusement. ‘Do you plan to be there for some time?’
‘Probably another hour.’
‘I would prefer to discuss this situation in person. I would like to meet you there, if you agree?’
He wanted to talk face to face– relief, and not a little hope, filled me despite his formal tone. ‘Of course I agree, Malik. I wouldn’t have called you if I didn’t want your help.’
‘You require my help?’ The words seemed to whisper out of the phone and slide like ice down my spine. Goosebumps pricked my skin with uneasy anticipation, and I shivered.
‘Yes.’
‘Good. I will see you shortly.’ The phone went dead.
I stared at it. Had I heard a note of eagerness beneath his coldness, or was it just my imagination? And if so, what did it mean? I shook my head. No use biting off trouble before the gorgeous vamp arrived. Time enough for all sorts of things then, including biting. If the Autarch was about, I wanted Malik on my side. Whatever it took. And if the Autarch wasn’t, I still needed his help to find and do a deal with the Emperor.
I looked up at the scowling Conan, decided it would only take minutes to finish up and dug the turkey baster out of my backpack. I crunched another liquorice torpedo, and activated the glyphs (drawn on the plastic with Leandra’s silver sharpie) with a quick touch of my will. Time to suck up the ‘Harry Potter’ spell and then I really, reallyneeded to pee.
Fifty minutes later, feet thankfully back on solid ground, I was dealing with the ‘Harry Potter’ spell tagged to a poster for Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.Val Kilmer and Robert Downey Jr were playing Russian roulette and hamming it up whenever they bought it. After another desperate visit to the cinema’s facilities, along with the drastic measure of drinking a pint of salt water followed by the expected stomach-emptying results, I’d knocked my magical bladder problems on the head. I didn’t do the salt emetic often, but it was either that or a full cleansing ritual followed by a salt bath, something I didn’t have time for. Not with Malik due to appear shortly.
‘Miss?’
I carefully sucked up the spell’s last daub of paint then plunged my turkey baster into the bucket of salt water at my feet before turning to the owner of the soft, hesitant voice.
A Gatherer goblin, small at about two foot six, was waiting a deferential distance away, entertaining himself by hopping from one foot to the other to make the lights in his trainers flash red and green (much to the delight of a group of snap-happy Japanese tourists who’d previously been pointing their cameras my way). The goblin wore the standard issue navy boilersuit of a worker goblin, with the goblin queen’s logo embroidered in gold on its right chest pocket. On the left chest pocket was a large enamel badge, its design enhanced by tiny silver sequins. A similar badge was pinned to the front of the goblin’s peaked cap, which was doing a good job of flattening the tinsel-silver curls of the goblin’s massive Afro.
‘Hi,’ I said.
The goblin looked up and I noticed another badge under his chin; it said his name was Obadiah. Obadiah ran his knobbly finger down his long ski-slope nose in the respectful goblin greeting and gave me a tight-lipped smile. He closed the distance between us, careful to make his trainers flash (goblins always attack in the dark; showing the shiny is a flag of truce), the silver-lamé satchel slung across his body reflecting the bright lights in Leicester Square. He took something that glinted from the satchel and offered it to me.
‘For you, miss. From Mr al-Khan.’
‘Thank you, Obadiah.’ I returned his greeting and the tight-lipped smile, and took the glinting thing. It was a silver-coloured electronic hotel keycard. The logo on it was the same as the one on Obadiah’s badges (minus the silver sequins) and on the hotel occupying one corner of Leicester Square.
Obadiah tapped the plastic keycard with a silver-painted claw. ‘Penthouse. Miss take lift.’
I dropped the keycard into my pocket and glanced at the hotel’s seven floors thinking I was hardly likely to take the stairs. And more importantly why was Malik using a goblin to play messenger? But as my paranoia twitched, Obadiah held out his hand again and said, ‘For our blood, now lost.’
Dangling from his knobbly fingers was a long-stemmed rose, leaves stripped, thorns blood-red and sharp, petals a rich dark crimson.
The meaning of the flower bled into my mind. A rose for Rosa – the only vamp Malik had ever offered the Gift to. The only vamp to survive the curse of his blood and not turn into a mindless, shambling revenant maddened by bloodlust.
Though Rosa not turning into a revenant was pretty much irrelevant, as she’d been off-her-head nuts before becoming a vamp, and sadly the lifestyle change only added to her issues. Something I knew only too well, since I’d unwittingly borrowed Rosa’s body (until she died the true death during the demon attack last Hallowe’en) after buying what I thought was a Vamp Disguise spell. The ‘spell’ had blipped a couple of times, merging my consciousness with Rosa’s and leaving me with fragments of her memories. Those memories were enough to tell me that Malik had given Rosa the Gift out of guilt, but not why he felt guilty. They also told me he’d loved her, and she him . . . as much as she could love anyone, damaged as she was. The crimson rose was a secret tryst signal between them.
Rage and jealously ignited like wildfire that he would use oursecret sign with another. I snarled at the goblin, baring my teeth. He threw the rose at me, backing off quickly, stamping his feet hard as he disappeared into the crowd.
Then the emotions were gone, leaving me with nausea roiling in my gut. I pressed my lips together and slowly unclenched my fists, remorse at frightening the goblin warring with fear that Rosa’s memories, and the emotions they aroused, had . . . What? Influenced me? Possessed me?
Crap. No way did I need this. I had enough of my own bad memories without hers surfacing. And no way did I need Malik to help them resurface, whether intentionally or not.
I grabbed the rose, squeezing the stem until the thorns punctured my palm. The brief pain twisted magic low inside me, and the honey smell of my blood mixed with the dark spice scent of Malik’s as the spell the flower carried activated. The rose shed its petals into the ether leaving me holding a platinum ring set with a black crescent-shaped gemstone: Malik’s ring.
Except his ring was attached to my bracelet. Wasn’t it?
With a thought I revealed the bracelet hidden beneath the rose-shaped bruises encircling my left wrist – Malik’s mark; signifying that I was his blood-property and giving me protection from other vamps. The bracelet popped out of my body, its various spells glowing red and gold, with a clattering of charms: the plain gold cross to protect me from the demon (the one that had attacked last Hallowe’en); the cracked gold egg that had trapped the sorcerer’s soul I’d eaten during the attack and which had stopped the sorcerer from turning the tables and possessing me (The Mother goddess had later hooked the soul out of me and sent it on its way, thankfully); the inch-long obsidian scimitar to cut my connection to Rosa (a precaution in case she wasn’t quite as dead as Malik believed); and the tiny platinum ring that, apart from its current size, was a twin to the one I held.
