New Blood (2 page)

“I can only hope that Jax has surpassed his usual cork-brained efforts and found you quickly. There is much to learn and little time to learn it. Do not waste a single minute. Honor to you, blood sorceress.”

As Amanusa watched horror-stricken, the man's eyes faded from brown to blue and his face slowly filled back up with himself. Jax stared at her a moment, blood beginning to trickle from his nose. Then
his eyes rolled up in his head and he toppled over onto the comfrey.

 

I
T WAS DAYLIGHT
again, nearing noon. And still the man—Jax—lay motionless in her bed, scarce seeming to breathe. Amanusa checked one more time to be sure he did indeed breathe and propped hands on hips. What was she supposed to do with him?

When he had collapsed yesterday, she'd been sorely tempted to leave him where he fell. He'd frightened her, appearing out of nowhere like that. She could admit her fear to herself, even if she'd learned better than to let it show. But no matter the temptation, she couldn't have left him there. Not helpless as he was. It just wasn't in her to be so cold.

For one thing, he'd been bleeding. For another, there was that strange magic that had crawled out of some depth to possess his eyes and his voice. Amanusa shuddered. Poor man. For all his lean strength and height and handsome face, he had no power against the magic. Woman's magic, apparently.

A chill ran down Amanusa's back at the memory of that eerie voice. She made a warding sign in the air, then spit on the earth outside her door for extra protection. Women couldn't be magicians. Or sorceresses. Not here. Not in the Grand Principality of Transylvania, part of the Austrian Empire.

The Imperial Council of Magicians strictly enforced that rule, and Amanusa had no desire to bring them down upon her. She'd never seen their work, but she'd heard whispered tales of women left witless after the wizards' and conjurers' inquisition. As long as Amanusa stuck to small magics, the tiny spells allowed
women, and denied her thirst for more, she would be safe. If this man and the magic that bound him called the council's attention to her . . .

She had to get rid of him and the temptation that was the knowledge he carried.

But that nosebleed concerned her, coming on top of powerful magic as it did. She had sworn to tend the sick and helpless. When he was helpless no longer, she would send him on his way. After he explained a few things. Such as why he'd addressed her as “blood sorceress”.

A harsh caw brought Amanusa slowly around to see a crow walking through the open doorway of her cottage as though it were an invited guest. Amanusa tilted her head, watching it, and the crow cocked its head in seeming response, fixing her with one black beady eye. It cawed at her again, as if asking permission to be there. Amanusa wanted to laugh at herself for such fanciful notions, but couldn't quite.

She bowed, gesturing a welcome. “Do come in, Master Crow.”

And with a flurry of black wings, it flew to perch at the head of her bed. Above the blue-green gaze of the man, Jax. The crow hopped down onto the blanket covering him and absently, the man raised a hand to stroke the ebony feathers of its breast, never taking his eyes off Amanusa.

“So, it wasn't a dream,” he said in that same haunting language.

“You're speaking English.” That wasn't what she meant to say.

His lips twitched in a tiny, hesitant smile that vanished. “So are you.”

“Yes, but this is Transylvania. No one speaks English here.”

“Except, apparently, you and me.” He struggled to sit up, setting the crow to flapping until he stilled.

Amanusa quelled the urge to assist him. He was big. He was inside her home, in her bed, and she didn't know how ill he might yet be. He hadn't been armed, which eased some of her worries. At least he was still dressed, though now in shirt and trousers only, with all the buttons unfastened. After wrestling him into the house and the bed, she hadn't wanted to wrestle him out of his clothing.

He wasn't feverish. She'd found no open wounds or obvious injuries to cause his collapse. Nothing other than the magic. The bleeding had stopped soon after she got him inside.

“How did you get here?” she demanded. “What do you want? Where do you come from?”

Now that he was awake, the helplessness dropped away, transforming him into a dangerous creature, a man. Aggression was her best defense, she'd found, especially on her own ground. Fear made her angry, and she hid her trembling hands.

“England, apparently.” He moved the crow gently aside and reached beneath the blanket to button his trousers. “How is it that you speak English?”

She shook her head. “My questions first. What do you want?”

Jax gave her a wary look as he brought his bare, bony feet out from under the blanket and set them on the plank floor. “What did I say?”

“A great deal of nonsense. How do you feel? Any dizziness? Nausea?” His caution made her brave and
she dared to step closer and lift his eyelids, searching his eyes for any sign of head injury.

Things swam past in their depths. Brown flecks appeared in the cool blue and faded again.

Amanusa held her hand steady, refusing to flinch at the strangeness. She knew enough about magic that it didn't frighten her. She looked until she was satisfied she had seen all there was to see. Magic haunted this man, held him tight in its eerie grip. She took her hand from his face and stepped away.

“I didn't—” He swallowed. “Greet you as ‘blood sorceress'?”

“Like I said, utter nonsense.” Amanusa turned away to set the kettle on the hearth, kept her hands busy so they wouldn't shake. Kept her mind busy so it didn't shatter. She was no blood sorceress. Blood magic killed. It lived on blood and pain and death, and it ate the soul of its user. She would never be a sorceress. Ever. “If you know what you said, why did you ask?”

He rubbed a hand over his eyes and thrust it into his too-long hair, shoving it back out of his face. “I don't always—sometimes I remember things that didn't happen, and most times I don't remember things that did.” He met her eyes when she looked back at him, his eyes haunted by ghosts of things un-recalled. “The magic . . . mixes things up.”

“Are you a magician? A sorcerer or wizard?”

His bitter chuckle didn't escape, but Amanusa could sense it there, in his throat, and she wondered at his bitterness.

“No,” he said. “No magician. Only a servant. Blood servant. Your servant now, lady.”

He didn't stand. He slid from the bed straight to one knee, his head bowed. “I am yours. Command me.”

“Oh for—” A tiny thrill of power sparked through her veins and Amanusa crushed it. She would not become what she hated simply because he would let her. She pushed aside the quiet whisper that said he might understand her fears, that he'd been where she was, that he might be there still. “Get up off the floor. That's my command. Sit. Answer my questions.”

“As you will it.” Jax returned to his seat on the edge of her bed. The crow hopped close and he stroked its feathers again, as if the action comforted him.

“Why did you call me ‘blood sorceress'?” Amanusa measured tea into the pot.

“That is what you are.”

“No.” She shook her head emphatically. “I am not.”

Jax only ducked his head without speaking. As if he didn't agree, but wouldn't contradict her.

“Why would you say such a thing?” Amanusa poured hot water over the tea leaves and hung the kettle back on its hook, moving it near the fire but not over it. She pretended the title didn't tempt her as much as horrify her. Think of the things she would know. The things she could do.

No. She wanted justice, not bloody vengeance. She wanted to set things right, stop the evil from ever happening again. But if in the process, those who'd done the evil paid for . . . No. She wouldn't let the wicked things done to her carry the same evil into her own heart.

“It's the truth.” Now Jax met her eyes. “At the very least, you have the talent necessary to become a blood sorceress.”

That was no comfort. Amanusa knew she isolated herself here in the forest, away from people. More so since her mentor, old Ilinca, had died. But that didn't mean her heart was cold and callous enough to work blood magic. Did it? It had been battered and broken, but surely it wasn't past mending.

“How did you get here? How did you find me?” She repeated the questions he hadn't answered as she smacked a pair of mugs down on the table, grateful for their sturdy construction. She shouldn't take her temper out on the crockery, even if the man and his words did upset her on so many levels. She peeked at the tea. Almost done.

“I walked from the station.” The man fidgeted, as if he couldn't bear sitting still. “I should be serving you.”

Amanusa waved away his protest. “The train station is fifty miles from here, in Nagy Szeben.”

“I know.”

“You walked.”

“Yes.” Jax took the mug of tea she handed him, wrapping his hands around it.

“Why? Why come here?” The things he'd said didn't make sense, didn't fit her understanding of the way the world worked, and she needed to understand, to know. Her thirst for knowledge had often caused her problems, but she couldn't stop it, not at this late date. Amanusa sweetened her tea with a dollop of honey and offered some to the man who'd invaded her home. “Where were you coming from?”

Jax frowned, not seeming to see her. “I was searching. I didn't know what I searched for until I found you, but . . . something drew me this way. The magic.” He looked at her helplessly. “I think that before I came this way, I was in Russia. Or perhaps . . .” His forehead creased as he struggled to remember. “Bulgaria?”

“Do you want honey?”

He blinked, as if startled by the question. “Yes, please.” He held his mug out and watched as she dripped the honey in. “Thank you.”

She would not feel sorry for him. She had nothing to do with the magic that addled his mind, therefore his problems were not hers. She would feed him—he hadn't eaten since he collapsed yesterday afternoon, and who knew how long before that—and she would send him away. And she would feel safe again. “Do you feel well enough to eat?”

“I am fine.” He took a bigger swallow of the tea. “The dizziness always passes off quickly once I wake.”

“This has happened before?” Amanusa got out the bread she'd baked on Saturday and the cheese Danica had brought in payment for treating her boil and for the charm. The little charms Amanusa made were magic, yes, but not blood magic. Small things. Harmless. Helpful. Love charms, or charms against toothache or unwanted pregnancy. Magic too petty for the Inquisition to bother with. Women's magic.

“Aye.” He frowned again as he puzzled things out. “I was Yvaine's blood servant. I remember she often used me in her magic.” His frown cleared and he almost smiled. “I remember.”

“I do not use people.” Not even men. She wasn't like that. Not like them. She cut cheese and bread and set them on the table, adding a jar of berry jam. Her own work. “Come. Eat.” She indicated a chair.

Jax hurried to set his mug on the table, his crow flapping its way out the door in protest against the disturbance. Jax held Amanusa's chair, seating her like some grand lady in some great house. It made her feel odd and she didn't like it. She was a hedge-witch with a lurid past. A scandal, not a lady.

“Sit down.” She gestured at the chair again, irritated by the man's hesitation. “Stop hovering.”

“My place—” He waved a vague hand toward the hearth. “I'm not—I should—”

“Sit,” Amanusa ordered him. He was a guest in her house and she would treat him like one whether he wanted it or not. Whether she was comfortable with it—him—or not.

She didn't want to think about why her discomfort with Jax differed from the way she felt around all the other men who'd passed through her life. She wasn't afraid of him. Not anymore. Not exactly. More like afraid of what he brought with him, what he might mean. And she didn't want to think about it.

He sat, dropping into the chair as if his knees gave way. “Yes, my lady.”

“Eat.” She pointed imperiously at the food before taking some onto her plate and making a sandwich. Bread and cheese with blackberry jam might sound strange, but she liked it.

The meal passed in silence until most of the loaf was gone and half the cheese. She'd forgotten how
much a big man could eat. She felt strangely pleased to be able to fill him up.

Jax swallowed his last bite and cleared his throat. “If I might ask, my lady—”

“Don't call me that. I'm no one's lady.” She was who she was. Nothing more.

“Yes, my l—” He made an effort and swallowed the name.

“Ask.” She was being rude and knew it. But she hadn't asked him to come, hadn't asked for the magic he'd brought. She wanted him to take himself and the temptation of magic—more, better magic—away again. Maybe if she was rude, he would.

He didn't fit into the pattern of her life with his manners and his offers to serve. She didn't know what to think about him or how she ought to feel, and she didn't like the confusion. She didn't like wanting things she couldn't have. She didn't like not being able to hold onto her fear around him. He was a man. She should be afraid, and she kept forgetting to be, and she didn't like it.

“How did you wind up here in this godforsaken part of the world?” he asked.

“God has not forsaken this place.” Amanusa poured the last of the tea into her mug. “He has only forsaken me.”

She found herself telling the story she hadn't told in so many years. “My parents were servants, my father the English valet to one of the under ministers at the British embassy in Vienna. My mother was Romanian, from the village down by the road, come to the capital to find work in a grand household. She found Papa too, or they found each other. So Papa remained
in Vienna when the minister was recalled. We were happy until the great revolt.”