Leoht (BloodRunes: Book 3) (12 page)

When it was clear, Marak unwound himself
slowly from her arm and then pulsated a bit around it, massaging
the blood back into her deprived limb. She smiled down at him
fondly. “What would I do without you?” He raised his tiny little
head and stuck out a forked tongue as her. “I wonder…” she thought
back to when she had been much younger. For a while, she had been
on a kick where she was afraid of monsters under her bed and in her
closet. She looked down at Marak with newfound appreciation.
“Didn’t I put an anti-monster charm on you when I was little?” she
asked. Marak looked at her smugly, slithering up her arm and
re-solidifying himself into the usual armband. “I did, didn’t I.”
She sat back on her heels in thought. She hadn’t ever known if the
charm had worked. It had been one that she had snuck into Karl’s
secret stash of books to discover, and she had spent hours trying
to perfect it before trying it out on Marak. She hadn’t been able
to tell at the time if it had done anything or not, seeing as how
the monsters she was afraid of were simply shadows in the dark, but
it had made her feel better none-the-less. But perhaps it had
actually been more than that. Perhaps he really was repelling
them.

She couldn’t remember the specifics of the
spell, having read it so long ago, but she thought it had been
something of a combination of making it difficult for a ‘monster’ -
looking back with adult perspective, it had probably been magical
beasts they were describing - to see where you were, and even more
so what you were, making you appear as though you are a bad tasting
food, a rival’s territory who is not to be messed with, or simply
part of the landscape.
Kind of like hiding under the covers in
your bed makes you ‘invisible’ to things that go bump in the
night
, Katya thought to herself with amusement.
But more
effective.

“Well, thank you,” she said to Marak who
acknowledged it with a squeeze. Katya had been neglecting poor
Marak during her travels with Layna and Gryffon, and she could tell
that he was relishing the fact that it was just the two of them
like it had always been once again.

When she had found the spell to make him
animate, she had thought he would be a simple tool, but that hadn’t
seemed to be the case. He certainly acted of his own will and had
an attitude that was uniquely his. Being free of Karl, Katya was
confronted with just how much information a select few were keeping
from the public. Good thing Karl hadn’t had enough talent of his
own to perform many of the spells and rites that his books spoke
of. Katya’s life could have been much worse. She shuddered. It was
also fortunate that he was selfish enough not to let anyone else
gain the knowledge, not even to perform it for Karl, lest they use
it again for themselves.

Though she had not run across many of the
monsters that roamed the plains, she had started coming across
strange anomalies in the magic around her. She guessed that this
had been what the dragons had meant by chaotic magic. Instead of
running in ordered ‘streams’ like it did back home, here it did not
seem to follow any discernable pattern nor direction. Several times
when she had been trying to harness the power for her water spell,
she had suddenly either completely lost the power or been hit by a
surge of it. One time, the surge had been so intense that she
thought she might lose control of it. By using the techniques that
the dragons had shown her when she camped for the night she went
through the arduous process of cleansing the area so that the magic
was more ordered around her. That way, the spells she set up to
shield herself while she slept would not randomly ebb with the flow
of the magic around it. The effect would not be permanent, but
hopefully one day there would be enough people willing and able to
perform the task of cleansing the world and there would be enough
of them to finally tame the wild magics here.

As Katya set out her bedroll, she pondered
the strange dreams that she had been having and what they meant
with the new information that Gryffon and Layna had just relayed to
her. Apparently, her fears about the King had been correct, he was
indeed the carrier of the Bloodstone, and worse yet, they had
determined that in order to get rid of the source, they also had to
get rid of the Bloodstone at the same time and would resort to
killing him if that was the only option. That meant they were
planning on kidnapping the King and bringing him to the source,
where they would have to use the sword to cleave the stone in two
and stab the dragon’s body. Whether or not the stone was still
embedded in the King’s chest seemed to have little relevance to
them, but it constricted Katya’s heart painfully to think of him
dying.

Though after the dreams she woke without a
clue as to the details, there was always a face burned into the
backs of her eyelids every time she blinked away sleep. And it was
the face of the King. And the odd emotions that washed over her
every time she thought about him were…disquieting. She believed in
Layna and Gryffon’s conviction that he was in league with Nuko and
had no longer held onto any fantasies that he wasn’t somehow
involved with the use of the collars and bracers within the ranks
of the army. That by itself should cause her to hate him, but for
some unexplainable reason, she just couldn’t. There was an
undeniable draw to him which both frightened and excited her. What
would happen if she ever had to directly oppose him? She was
already feeling guilty for the part she was playing in a plan to
rid the world of a very dangerous and very powerful menace, and she
couldn’t quite rationalize the feeling to herself. Maybe Nathair
was simply being duped by Nuko? Maybe he really didn’t know about
all the horrible things that were being done in his name? The voice
in the back of Katya’s head scoffed at her, deep down she knew
Nathair was fully aware of the evil and he relished it.

But those eyes, they held her in their gaze
and she couldn’t seem to break free of it, she wanted him, needed
him…

She crawled inside the blankets and curled
them around her tightly, drifting into an uneasy sleep. Her
breathing slowed and evened and her eyes fluttered back and forth
under the lids of sleep.

She smiled, her dreaming mind content.

CHAPTER 8

Jezebel took a few deep breaths to clear her
head. Sucking power from Gryffon had been a bit of a head-rush, and
even hours later she felt a little light-headed. She had sent Devon
out to gather information about news at the palace as from her
contact with Gryffon she had determined that they had returned. It
was a tad less precise than she had hoped for, but extremely useful
none-the-less, in no time she would have that little whore right
where she wanted her. While she was at the palace, it would be
difficult to make another attempt, she was still a wanted lady.

She laughed to herself. Obviously the
authorities were not very effective here, she was staying at an inn
not more than a day’s ride away from the capital and still they had
been unable to locate her. She hadn’t even seen signs of pursuit
past the first day.

She scoffed out loud.
Incompetents
.

She was currently pouring over one of her
recent acquisitions and was determining exactly how she had put the
life-sucker on Gryffon without having been aware of doing so. She
furthermore wanted to know how to go about putting one on someone
else.

Because she had the perfect someone else in
mind.

She reread the passages explaining the
process one more time. Unfortunately, the books were not explicit
in all the details, she assumed because they had been originally
written for those who already had some knowledge of the spells
beforehand, which Jezebel sadly was lacking. She couldn’t believe
how much information had been allowed to have been lost because of
the ridiculous fears of the common folk. One of the books didn’t
even have blood-magic, and still it only survived because of being
hidden! It was filled with more mundane spells, many of which
involved healing. She had set this one aside, the other two were
far more interesting to her at the moment.

Understanding dawned on her and she hastily
scribbled a few notes to herself on the parchment she had waiting
under her ready hand. So it had been the shackles that had allowed
her to put the rune onto Gryffon despite the fact that he had
talent. That particular aspect had been eluding her since she had
read that only those with no talent could be forced to bear the
rune. But the magic shielding of the shackles must have blocked his
natural ability to resist her.

Satisfied by that mystery solved, she moved
onto the next: How to go about placing one on someone with no
talent. Did they have to be aware of it, or could it be placed
without their knowledge? Did it require the pain and torture like
Gryffon’s had, or could it be voluntary?

She contemplated these questions for some
time in front of her prize while she waited for Devon to return.
Normally she hated waiting, but with the books to entertain her, he
was back before she realized it.

“Jezebel,” he said knocking at the same time
as opening the door. His lack of subservience and respect was
wearing her nerves very thin, but she was about to change all
that.

“Ah, Devon,” she greeted him, closing and
locking the book before rising gracefully. “What news did you
discover?”

Devon took a seat in the chair next to the
fire and cleared his throat. “They were indeed at the palace like
your
instinct
told you,” he confirmed, his tone conveying
that he was skeptical about the true methods she had used to obtain
the information. She hadn’t enlightened him about the life-sucker
just yet, but he would find out soon enough.

“And did you come up with any ideas how we
can get to them?”
“Ah, well, it seems that while they were there this morning, no one
has seen them since. It’s thought that they have already moved
on.”

Jezebel turned her lips downwards.
How
annoying, but then again, away from the palace will certainly be
easier to stage the murder
. “Any ideas where they were headed?”
she asked, albeit somewhat pointlessly since she could find out for
herself anytime she wanted. The thought made her smug and she
couldn’t contain the tiniest of smiles and knew that her tone was a
bit sarcastic.

“Alright Jezebel, obviously you know
something that I don’t, are you going to tell me what it is or just
torture me with wondering?”

Torturing him did sound appealing after all
the betraying he had done, but she had ultimately decided to give
him a choice. “We’ll get to that,” she said, drawing out the
mystery a little longer, “Did you find out why they were at the
palace? Stopping in to let people know that the source of the river
didn’t do much for the poor little whore and they’re off dragging
the limp lifeless form to some other end of the earth to cure her?”
She cackled ruthlessly at the thought of them carrying the girl’s
shell of an existence around.

Devon’s mouth quirked now and his eyes
gleamed with mischief. “That is where it gets interesting,” he
began, but didn’t immediately explain, giving Jezebel a look that
she knew this was payback for her making him wait.

She glared at him and snapped, “What is
it?”

He waited a moment longer and Jezebel was
contemplating taking away the choice that the damn soft spot had
made her want to give him, when he continued, “Apparently the
source of the river did work wonders on her, Layna came back
walking and talking. They didn’t tell anyone while they were there
exactly what happened, and were gone before most knew they had been
back. Even more interesting than that even,” he paused a second
time, but must have seen the dangerous glint in her eyes because he
didn’t make her wait too long, “is that while they were leaving the
palace, someone launched a magical attack against them. And more
specifically against Layna.”

She growled at the sound of her name, she
hated it when he used it. “So I’m not the only one tying to kill
the
whore
,” she mused, exaggerating her use of the term to
remind Devon of her dislike of the name. “We’re going to have to
work faster, no one is going to take the pleasure of killing her
away from me.” She had a momentary twinge of displeasure that the
girl had been cured, but quickly reminder herself how much better
it would be to have her aware of what was happening.
And now I
don’t have to bother spending time and energy fixing her
myself.

Devon’s voice cut into her thoughts, “So are
you going to tell me how you knew where they were now?” he asked,
sounding rather annoyed. Let him, it wouldn’t be much longer before
he no longer dared to show her any sort of disrespect.

“Of course,” she smiled at him, “Remember
that lovely night that Gryffon was our special guest?” Devon nodded
his head. “Well apparently, while we were deep in ‘conversation’, I
accidentally put a rune on him.” She stuck her nose in the air.
“Without ever having been taught it, I graced him with a
life-sucker. Now, anytime I want I can drain power and life-energy
from him and he is helpless to stop me.” She moved closer to Devon,
letting her front brush up against him, and was rewarded by the
look of interest in his gaze as it swept over her. “I was
thinking,” she whispered seductively, “that it would be a rather
fitting show of your devotion if you were to be bonded to me in a
similar fashion.” His eyes snapped back to her face and she smiled
at him. “According to the book, it can be done one of two ways: You
can voluntarily agree to undergo this show of loyalty which will
require only the need for you to produce the barest amount of blood
for the ritual. Or, you can refuse me and I’ll be forced to torture
you until there’s not an ounce of strength left in you to withstand
me.” She backed up a pace, but her gaze never faltered. He met her
stare with one of his own, and his face hardened. She had never
before used her magic against him, but he had witnessed it enough
times to know that if she ever decided to, he would be in trouble.
Good, he needs to be put back into his place. I’ve been far too
lenient with him lately
. She said in a normal volume, putting
enough conviction behind the words so that he knew she was serious,
“Your choice.”