Faith Hunter - Host

However, I smelled blood and knew his back was still a problem. He ought to sit down, but I wouldn’t spoil his fifteen minutes of fame by pulling him to a chair. Instead, I used the opportunity to slip upstairs to my loft. There were humans in the stairwell, preteens using the relative privacy to huddle and giggle, and still more in Rupert’s loft, adults dividing up space and laying out bedrolls. I nodded weakly to them, slid into the privacy of my own loft, and closed the door, sinking against it. This sucked Habbiel’s pearly toes.

It wasn’t quiet. The building was old and the walls were thin, and the muted roar of many voices, punctuated by the occasional high-pitched scream, made their way through. Even here it was chaos, Rupert’s and Audric’s things piled in front of the couch, weapons and clothes and what looked like Pre-Ap board games, Scrabble, Yahtzee, a pack of playing cards. “Blow it out Gabriel’s horn,” I said. “I’m in hell.”

Feeling trapped in my own space, I draped the amulet necklace over a chair back, changed into jeans and a fuzzy sweater, opened the Book of Workings, and looked up Trapping Darkness in Stone. The Book of Workings was constructed of blackberry ink on handmade paper. The book itself wasn’t a thing of power, not a book of spells or incantations, nothing so mundane, only a guide, a map of sorts, showing mages the path to our gifts. It was divided into thirds and the directions for the incantation were in the final third of the book, the section dedicated to warfare. I seemed to be studying that part of the book often these days.

I had always believed that incantations seldom used blood for conjures, but had discovered that really difficult workings required either several mages or blood, though never on the full moon, which made it black magic. It was only the easy conjures, the daily incantations for cooking or heating bathwater or illumination that could be done with just the mind. If I had studied the book like Lolo had wanted for the ten years I was banished, I would have known that. There was so much I didn’t know, so many misconceptions. I needed a teacher.

Cheran Jones came to mind, and I flipped through the sheaf of papers he had left. Nothing I could use. Mostly cryptic notes that hinted at solutions to several neat incantations, but nothing with a big arrow that said, “Do it this way!”

I could ask him, beg him, to teach me how to use the visa to call for seraphic help, but he hadn’t done so himself last night, when his own life was in danger. Maybe there was some prohibition against calling for help, like the proscription from calling mage in dire unless a human innocent was near death, or a mage’s life was threatened by humans or Darkness. Or maybe he was telling the truth. Maybe he was here to watch, judge, and teach me, but that didn’t include saving humans in danger. There wasn’t time now, but I would go to him in the morning and ask for his help. A small part of me insisted I didn’t have to like him to let him teach me.

But for now, I had nothing, absolutely nothing, and a Dragon, a Prince of the underworld, was coming. Threads of true fear coiled under my skin, burning with cold. I stared at the incantation suggested by the new priestess.

Trapping Darkness in Stone was an incantation for seven mages. Big help there. It needed a lot of power. A lot. Power I didn’t have. Unless I drew on the Trine again. Or on the wheels. Or commanded seraphs to help me. I closed the book.

If I drew on the Trine again—all that stored, polluted power, left there by the Darkness—it might warp me. Or it might bring the Darkness closer. I didn’t know how often a mage could use Dark might before becoming Dark herself. If I drew on the wheels for a working this big, Amethyst would know. My guess is that she would kill me without a second thought. The only other way I could think of to perform the conjure was to command seraphs to help.

Cheran had drawn the conclusion in the battle in the street. I remembered his whispered word, omega. Something I didn’t think about too much. I was an omega mage, among the most rare and dangerous of neomage traits, one that was poorly documented and scary as death and plagues and all the powers of Darkness combined. I could command seraphs in battle against Darkness. And I could command them in other ways too, if I didn’t mind dying. Most omega mages died young when they overstepped the bounds of their gift and commanded seraphs in other things. And when mages died at the hands of seraphs, it was a bloody mess. Literally.

I wandered my loft, stopping at each window to stare out over the nighttime street. There were bonfires at each corner, the forms of men and women backlit by the flames. Snow-elmobiles whizzed past, moving shadows. It occurred to me that I should remain dressed in the dobok so I could race to trouble, but I couldn’t stay battle-ready twenty-four/seven. Standing by, waiting, I hung my weapons, boots, and clothing on hangers on the open door of an armoire, within easy reach.

A knock sounded at the door at my back and without looking around, I called, “Come in.” It opened and I saw Ciana, reflected in the armoire mirror, framed in the black space. She was wearing a pink shift and leggings, the seraph wings pin on her chest glistening with energies.

“Miss Polly thinks they’re all here,” she said. “You can set the ward.”

I sighed and went to the bedside table, picked up the marble sphere that held the trigger. With a touch and a thought, the ward activated. Mage-sight blazed on and I felt, more than saw, the energies flow from the energy sink at my spring, through the ground and into the foundation. They rose over the first floor and up the walls to the roof. It was a powerful conjure, perhaps the most powerful I had ever tried. Ciana, who stood in the doorway, watching, glowed in mage-sight like a bright star. Not human. Not human at all anymore. My throat grew tight at the sight of her. She said, “Can I stay downstairs with the girls from school? I have a bedroll and extra blankets. And Uncle Rupert has a cot I can borrow.”

“What did your uncle say? What did your father say?” Rote words. Important words. Lucas had divorced me. I was no longer her stepmother. My heart wrenched at the thought, as if it was squeezed in a huge hand. But if she heard what was in my mind, she didn’t say so.

“Uncle Rupert said it was up to you. Daddy is out patrolling with the other men.”

“Fine, then. But if you get cold, come back upstairs and get in bed with me.”

“I’ll be okay. Cissy can sleep with me. And they’re going to roast marshmallows after supper.” She cocked her head, a little-girl mannerism marred by world-weary eyes. “Will you be okay?”

I dredged up a smile for her. “I’ll be fine.” Liar, liar, pants on fire. I shielded my thoughts from her. She smiled so sweetly, the child of my heart. The tightness in my chest eased as she closed the door, leaving me alone. On its faint echo I thought, I could use you. I could make you help me trap the Darkness in stone, you and that pin. I crushed the thought, ground it to nothingness, and opened the fridge.

I had fresh green beans, rare and costly, and potatoes to add to the stew downstairs. I could pick the meat out of my bowl. I took the bag of beans from the crisper and with the other hand lifted the bag of potatoes from the countertop.

A sudden tightness gripped my belly, twisted up through my spine. A cloying heat touched my breasts and warmth flooded out into my limbs. Waves and waves of heat slammed into me, rolling over me. Mage-heat. My spine arched, throwing my head back. The bag of beans and potatoes fell to the tile and rolled as if drunken, ungainly wobbles that made me nauseous. My knees buckled and I hit the floor. I caught myself on my palms, the bright light of the fridge bathing me, throwing sharp shadows.