Bloodstone (27 page)

Gwen’s laugh had an hysterical edge to it. “She sounds exactly like I did at that age—do you remember? If only I’d known then how good ‘little kids’ have it. I had to grow up way too fast, and I wasn’t ready for it. Thanks to your precious aunt Mab.”

“Gwen, what happened?”

“That’s why I never told you, you know,” she said, ignoring my question. “Christ, you were younger than Maria when it happened. I wanted to protect you, protect your innocence. And then later, you were so crazy about Mab and demon fighting and Wales that you wouldn’t have believed me.” She glared at me accusingly. “You won’t believe me now, either.”

“Try me. I promise I’ll listen, at least.”

Gwen didn’t sit down. She didn’t look at me as she spoke. She stood by the kitchen sink, staring at a spot on the far wall, seeing into the distant past.

“Thirteen. I was only thirteen years old. A child. That summer in Wales, I was so terrified of Mab I felt more like her prisoner than her apprentice. I used to imagine that I was Gretel and she was the witch, getting ready to eat me alive. I was so unhappy. I’d take long walks whenever I could escape from the house, and on one of those walks I met a boy from the village. Eric.” Her eyes softened. “I thought he was the handsomest boy I’d ever seen—black hair, dark eyes, and black eyelashes so long and thick I wished mine were like that.

“Eric was fifteen, and I knew Mab would never approve of him. So I’d sneak out at night and we’d meet. I thought I was being careful, but one night Mab must have followed me. I met Eric at our usual place, a stone wall where we’d sit and talk. It was all so harmless, so innocent. That night, he put his arm around me and said he wanted to kiss me.

“My heart was thumping like mad. I closed my eyes and waited for the feel of his lips against mine. Instead, something warm splashed onto my face. I opened my eyes. Eric clutched his neck, blood spurting from between his fingers. His throat had been slashed wide open. Mab stood behind him, holding a bloody dagger.”

Here eyes locked onto mine like laser beams. “She killed him in cold blood, Vicky. A fifteen-year-old boy. And all because he tried to kiss me.”

THERE HAD TO BE ANOTHER SIDE TO THE STORY. GWEN wasn’t interested in speculating about what it might be. As far as she was concerned, our aunt was a brutal killer who’d murdered a young girl’s first love. The set of Gwen’s jaw, the absolute certainty in her voice—her mind held zero doubt about that night.

No, I thought, sitting on the train back to Boston, there must be more to it. I knew my aunt. Gwen’s picture of her as a cruel butcher killing for spite simply wasn’t
her
. Mab had once reminded me that I didn’t know everything about her. But one thing I did know: She’d never do what Gwen accused her of. Mab was loved and respected by the villagers of Rhydgoch. She didn’t go around slaughtering them.

Yet Gwen’s words haunted me all the way home.

WHEN I WALKED IN MY FRONT DOOR, MAB LOOKED UP from the book she was reading. Kane came over and sniffed at my fingers, wagging his tail.

“You had a telephone message—” Mab began.

“I need to talk to you. Right now.” My voice sounded harsh as I gestured toward the bedroom.

“The caller did say it was important.”

“So is this.”

Mab didn’t argue. She stood slowly, her brow creased as she peered at me. She balanced her book on the arm of the chair and walked around the sofa to the bedroom.

Kane tilted his head, curious.

“I’m not trying to shut you out, but I need to talk to my aunt in private. It’s a family matter.”

He pressed against my leg, like he wanted to show his support, then went into the kitchen.

Mab sat straight-backed on the edge of my bed, hands folded in her lap. She kept her face blank, waiting.

I closed the door and leaned back against it. “Mab . . .” On the ride back from Needham, I’d imagined a dozen different scenarios of how I’d handle this conversation: a confrontation, a gentle question, a matter-of-fact request for her explanation. Now, it was hard just to get the words out. Gwen’s story, so vivid when she told it, dimmed, and suddenly I wanted to say
never mind, it was a mistake, forget the whole thing
. The idea of Mab as a murderer was preposterous. But I needed to know the truth. I blurted, “Gwen told me you killed someone in front of her. A village boy named Eric.”

Mab closed her eyes as if in pain. But then she nodded, once, and I had the feeling she’d expected my words. “Yes, I thought she might bring that up now. To enlist your help in keeping me away from Maria, I’d wager.” She opened her eyes and regarded me calmly. No hint of guilt troubled her gaze. “Frankly, I’m surprised she’s waited this long. She never told you before?”

“Don’t you think I’d have asked you about it if she had? I’m asking now. I need to hear your side of the story.”

“Well, your sister told you the truth. During the brief period of her apprenticeship, I became aware she was sneaking out of the house at night. I followed her, I saw her meet a boy. And I slashed his throat.”

She looked at me fiercely, almost defiantly, challenging me to judge her acts. I put my hands behind me to hide their shaking, but I waited. There had to be more coming, and I was keeping my judgment—and my emotions—in check until I knew the whole story.

“There was no village boy, Victory. It was Pryce.”

“Pryce?”
The demi-demon who’d loosed the Morfran on Boston and tried to kill me had once upon a time courted my sister?

She nodded. “He somehow learned my niece had come to Wales to train with me, and his first thought was of the prophecy. He wanted to find out whether this young American niece was the Victory foretold in
The Book of Utter Darkness
.”

The Book of Utter Darkness
was an ancient text, written in the language of Hell, that outlined the origin of demons and was full of slippery prophecies about the struggle between the Cerddorion and demonkind. Pryce had attempted to use the book as his personal road map to power, believing that “Victory,” mentioned in the book, was destined to be his mate and demon queen. In the end, though, his arrogance had caused him to misinterpret the prophecies and end up as he was now, “the sleeper.”

Mab continued: “Pryce altered his human appearance to that of a teenage boy.” Demi-demons can’t shift into animals, but they can take on whatever human shape they choose. “In that guise, he courted Gwen. It didn’t take him long to learn that she had a sister named Victory and to decide that you, not she, were the one foretold. Gwen was of no interest to him; he could have simply walked away. It would have broken the child’s heart—she was a silly, romantic girl—but Pryce saw an opportunity to injure me through her. He intended to kill her.”

I knew Pryce. I could believe it. But still I felt my jaw drop as I stared at my aunt.

“It’s fortunate I chose that night to follow her. At first, he looked like a human boy to me, as well. I almost went home, thinking I’d simply keep the girl too busy to sneak out. But when Gwen closed her eyes and leaned forward for her first kiss, Pryce pulled a dagger. Moonlight glinted off the blade. His shadow demon loomed behind him, and I realized who he was. I drew my own dagger and ran over to them; I swear I never moved so fast in this lifetime. I grabbed Pryce’s hair, yanked his head back, and slit his throat.” Her face showed grim satisfaction. “My only regret is that the blade wasn’t bronze. I could have destroyed that infernal demi-demon once and for all.”

Her fists were clenched. She opened her fingers and smoothed out her skirt.

“Poor Gwen,” she said. “All she saw was a mortally wounded boy. The look of utter horror in her eyes . . . I knew I’d lost her then. She ran back to Maenllyd and locked herself in her room. The moment she fled, Pryce disappeared into the demon plane to heal. Gwen didn’t see that, of course. He returned moments later in his demon form—at a safe distance, I might add—and announced he’d be waiting for you.”

No wonder Mab had kept such a tight leash on me for all those years of my apprenticeship. I never once went into the village alone, and my training left little time for walks through the woods and fields. Village boys? I never knew they existed.

Would I have been susceptible to Pryce’s charms at that age? I was glad I’d never had the chance to find out.

“Gwen wouldn’t open her door or listen to me. Over and over, she demanded to return home. That’s all she would say. And so I sent her home.”

Mab stood. “Your sister did see what she believes she saw: She saw the boy’s slashed throat, felt his blood on her arms and face. Yet she’ll never believe the rest. She wouldn’t listen to me. She didn’t believe the village constable, who said there was no such boy in Rhydgoch. She didn’t believe your father, who tried to tell her about demi-demons.” Mab sighed. “And should you try to explain, she won’t believe you, either. I concluded twenty years ago that Gwen was lost to me. Her recent actions confirm that. I’m afraid there’s nothing anyone can do about it.”

And that was that. Mab moved toward me. I stepped aside to let her pass. She opened the door and went into the living room, saying over her shoulder, “You need to return that phone call. It was from a Detective Costello, and he said it was urgent.” She picked up her book and resumed reading.

Kane’s face appeared in the kitchen doorway. “We’re good,” I told him. “Everything’s fine.” But nothing felt fine. My heart ached for Gwen, who for twenty years had been forced to carry a ghastly secret because no one would believe her. And for Mab, branded a murderer by the niece whose life she’d saved, shut out of Gwen’s life, her family. There ought to be something I could do to bridge the chasm between them. But they’d lived on their opposite sides of that chasm for twenty years. The tragedy of the situation was fresh to me; it had long ago been woven into the fabric of their lives.

I set the problem aside for now and went into the kitchen. I’d call Daniel and see if he’d learned anything that might help Juliet.

He picked up on the first ring. When he heard it was me, he dropped his voice.

“I can’t talk now. I need to get to a secure location. You’re at home?”

“Yes.”

“Don’t go anywhere. I’ll call back within five minutes.” He hung up abruptly.

Daniel’s voice sounded strange, I reflected as I waited, phone in hand, for his call. Tense, but also with a coldness I’d never heard from him before. When the phone rang, I answered immediately.

“Where did you get that sample you gave me?” Daniel demanded.

“Why, what—”

“No,
I’m
asking the questions. Where did you get it?”

I considered how much I should tell him. Juliet was still wanted by the police, and I wouldn’t bring her into this unless I had to. “From a fight. The sample was from the blade of a sword I took from my opponent.”

“Did it cut you?”

“No, but what—”

“Where, Vicky? Whose was it? Why did you swab the blade? That’s a pretty unusual thing to do, wouldn’t you say? I need details.”

My head spun from his rapid-fire questions. I picked the one that seemed safest to answer. “The sword belonged to one of the Old Ones, those creatures who stole Pryce’s body after the Paranormal Appreciation Day concert. Remember I told you about Myrddin? They’re working with him.”

“Who’s working with the Reaper. Shit.”

“Daniel, what’s wrong?”

“When you brought me that cotton ball, did you have any idea what was on that blade?”

“Some kind of poison, I thought.”

“It’s worse than poison. It’s a virus—a variant of the virus that caused the zombie plague.”

The phone fell from my hand. It hit my boot and skated across the kitchen floor. I chased it and snatched it up.

“Daniel? Daniel? Are you there?”

“The whole lab is under quarantine. I’m lucky they didn’t stick me in quarantine with them. I managed to convince them I didn’t come into direct contact with the specimen. But you can bet I got a grilling about where it came from.”

“What did you say?”

“I told them it was left anonymously in my mailbox, and I thought I’d better check it out.” I let out my breath in a rush of relief. He hadn’t linked the sample to me. I started to thank him, but he cut me off. “No more off-the-record stuff, Vicky. I can’t do you any more favors. This is way too serious for amateur detectives.”

I bristled a little at his suggestion that I was playing Miss Marple, but I let it go. He had a right to be angry. “Did anyone get sick?”

“Not yet.” That was good news. The original plague had killed its victims within minutes of exposure. “Don’t tell anyone. We’re trying to keep this out of the news to prevent widespread panic.” I bet his girlfriend the TV reporter wasn’t happy about that. “Each hour that goes by without symptoms is encouraging. This virus is a variant, so it may not be contagious to humans.”