Faith Hunter - Seraphs

I opened my eyes slowly, feeling the gummy texture of sleep in the corners. Turquoise glared in my field of vision. Slowly, it resolved itself into my kitchen floor. I was facedown on the tile, arms stretched out, my cold hands in salt. Eyes. I had been drowning in eyes. The purple snake was gone. The water-mist-eyes were gone.

I eased upright, supporting my weight on one hand. The circle was broken, my hands having dislodged the salt when I passed out. But there had been no explosion of wild energies, no fire, death, and destruction. The loft was unchanged, bed stripped, clothes hanging from the armoire doors. In mage-sight, I spotted one difference. There was a purple hue to every stone in the apartment. I lifted my amulets, seeing the same glow. It wasn’t overpowering; it was, in fact, so faint a stranger might not notice.

I looked at my hand. “Seraph stones,” I cursed under my breath. Normally, mage flesh has a pearly peach sheen, even to human eyes. Mine was now slightly darker, vaguely purple. I wasn’t sure what had happened, but it couldn’t be good.

Skirt bells jingling, I stood and found my breath and my balance, and looked down at myself. I was dry and clean, and the salt was still in an almost perfect circle, broken in two narrow places where my hands had swept through it. But the salt was pale lavender. “Habbiel’s pearly, scabrous, decayed, putrid toes!” I said, fury rising with each word.

“Thorn?” A knock sounded at the door.

“In a minute,” I shouted. He didn’t rap again, but he didn’t go away, either. I could almost hear him breathing on the other side of the wood.

Movements jerky, I swept up the salt and put it in a fresh plastic bag, not wanting to contaminate the salt in the original container. I marked the bag with a big black X, and below it, in smaller letters, wrote, DANGER. PURPLE STUFF.

I looked at myself again, and realized that the purple didn’t emanate strictly from my mage-flesh, but more from my scars; a pale, pulsing color where once had been pure, bleached-out white. I cursed so foully that I’d have been branded on both cheeks and forehead had a kirk elder heard.

“Thorn?” The voice was tentative, and I realized I was still shouting. I breathed deeply, pulling in the calm that had always been part of my home. The peace was still there, untainted by the lavender electricity I expected. I breathed several times, each breath slower than the last. When I felt like myself again, I looked down. The purple in my scars had faded to a barely perceptible glow. Even as I watched, it continued to dim. Whatever it was, it wasn’t long-lasting. Maybe the remaining energy in the amethyst had now expended itself. With a final breath, I took my thick leather cloak and laid it over my arm, positioning it so I could pull a blade if needed.

The bells on my skirt jingled as I opened the door, to find Rupert standing there alone, black hair pulled back, dressed in unrelieved navy. Around his neck was a primitive necklace I had designed, tiny white pearls and silver beads interspersed between seven large, faceted blue tigereye stones and slivered white shells, like long teeth: like fangs. I stared at the shells and blue tigereye, remembering the serpent’s eyes and wide-open mouth.

“Saints’ balls,” he breathed. “You look…” He didn’t finish the sentence. Rupert had never seen me dressed as a mage, my neomage attributes radiating. Some of my fury abated at the pure wonder in his gaze.

I had been hiding in the human world because I knew—I believed—that no human would allow me to live. Until recently I hadn’t even trusted my friends with my secret. Maybe I should have. Following his eyes, I looked down at my scarred knuckles. The tissue was white again, light spilling from them. “You ready?” I asked.

“Yeah.” He lifted a finger and traced the crisscrossed scars on my cheek. “You’re beautiful.” I felt a flush rise. I would never be beautiful, but the compliment was nice. “Suggestion?” When I shrugged, Rupert took the cloak and draped it across my shoulders, securing it. “Keep all this hidden, even your skin, until the right moment.”

“When will that be?”

“You’ll know. Anyone who can wear this in public? You’ll know.” He waved his hands over mine and said, “Make that go away till then too. Okay? All at once, when the time’s right, throw off the cloak with a flourish, like a bullfighter. And let your skin do this glow thing. It’ll stop them in their tracks.”

“Too bad you can’t do it for me. You have a better sense of the dramatic than I do.”

“No straight woman will ever have the style of a gay man, honeybunch,” he said smugly. “And if you can get some mage-clothes my size, I’ll start a new style that will take the human world by storm.”

I rolled my eyes. “I’ll see what I can do.”

“If you two are finished with the mutual admiration society,” Audric’s voice came from the bottom of the stairs, “it’s time to go.”

Audric was not dressed for practice, but for war. A tight-fitting, black dobok was thickly padded against devil-spawn, his weapons secured in loops or fastened in place, his katana and wakizashi sheathed at his waist. Audric was a savage-chi and savage-blade master. A war ax was strapped across his back, the blade painted scarlet, feathers floating from the handle. Bombs dangled from a belt across his chest. Throwing blades were strapped in plain sight at wrists and calves. Smaller throwing weapons adorned his chest, hips, and upper thighs.

“Oh,” Rupert breathed. It sounded like ecstasy. “Even if I were straight, I’d turn gay at the sight of you.” I was pretty sure I moaned too. Nothing like a man in uniform.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” I asked. Audric had not revealed to the town that he was a half-breed. “There’s no reason to.”

“I am bound to Raziel, winged-warrior who fights with the ArchSeraph Michael. I have been charged with your protection.” He bowed deeply, the formal obeisance of his training and heritage. I caught the sadness underlying his tone. Audric had never wanted to be bound to a seraph. He wasn’t happy with his status, would never be happy serving another, not even a being of Light who would call him to battle. “It is my duty and my honor to protect the licensed mage my master has honored with his presence.” When he raised upright, his sigil of office rested on his chest, and his skin was warm with the soft tones of the second-unforeseen. Not as bright as my own, but clearly displaying his half-neomage genes.

“Nice touch,” I said, uncertain. “But don’t risk it if you don’t have to.”

Audric laughed, the deep rumble echoing in the cold stairwell, his dark eyes hot with scorching brightness. “If the day is auspicious, the humans will attack and we will fight. Battle and glory call to me today,” he said with all the formality of his kind. His hands rested on his swords. “The blood of humans is sweet when they trespass against the seraph’s chosen.”

“Hey. Human being standing here,” Rupert said. “Enough of the blood and glory.”

“If they attack, stay to Thorn’s right,” Audric commanded. He slung a scarred battle cloak over his shoulders and dobok. Tapping his lightning-bolt pendant, he damped his skin. I touched my prime amulet, blanking my neomage attributes, and checked my walking-stick blade. Eighteen inches of mage-tempered steel showed before I re-sheathed it.

“Okay,” I said. “If you’re sure.”

When we reached the bottom of the stairs, Audric stepped into the uncertain light of the shop. From a chair in the waiting area of Thorn’s Gems, he lifted a dark bundle and gave it a shake. Yards of velvet slinked down with a whisper of sound, taking the shape of a cloak. He held it to Rupert. “I bought it for your birthday, but it seems appropriate for today.”