Seduced by Crimson (39 page)

Patrick must have felt the same way, because moments later she saw him withdraw from the crowd. He sat down to meditate in the opposite corner, a silent statue that exuded power and peace. The part of Xiao Fei that remained a woman longed to sit next to him, to share his quiet and merge with him, but she could not. That was not her function anymore. Not during this war when she was a vessel for power and not a human being at all.

She turned away from Patrick, and ignored the twitters of the others. Everyone was gathering in Peter's front office, because the druid leader had not bothered to tell them to stay away. Which meant, if sensed, they presented a big target to the demons. But Xiao Fei was dampening her power right now, masking her energy signature as best as she could. Hopefully the demons wouldn't pick up on her until it was too late.

In the meantime she sat apart, speaking to no one, watching all but thinking nothing. That was her wartime rhythm: silence, and the slow stripping away of everything that was not duty, responsibility, and sacrifice. That was what she'd learned back in Cambodia, and now she returned to it in America. There was no escape. She was the blood sacrifice. She allowed her mind and body to be consumed by the power in her blood, and in this way she became a Phoenix Tear.

She took off her shirt. A Phoenix needed no clothing. In the background the room went absolutely silent. She ignored it. A Phoenix did not worry about human embarrassments. She pulled her hair away from her face as best she could. It was too short for a ponytail, but she fashioned a headband out of someone's red scarf. That could serve as a tourniquet if things went better than expected.

Next she pulled out a pocketknife to gently, meticulously scrape away the scar tissue at every tattooed tear or curving feather, except one. She started at her wrist, and bit by bit moved up her arm to the beak and eye, neck, spine, even the stretched wing along and between her breasts. When she was finished, the skin was thin but not broken. But the smallest pressure of a fingernail would begin the bloodletting.

In truth, she went too deep on more than one occasion, and then there was the lengthy process of chanting and sealing the wound—but that too served its purpose. It brought awareness of her power to her conscious mind, and settled it into the manipulation of her flesh and blood.

When she finally finished, she started to slide the knife into her jeans pocket, only to remember that she would need to be in a robe or tunic. So she straightened instead, and pulled open her pants.

Someone coughed nervously, but she barely noticed. In Cambodia this process was done by the monks. It was a worshipful moment, meant to reinforce her existence as a vessel for power and not as a woman at all. This act was witnessed and praised. It was only fitting that these druids watch.

She shimmed out of her jeans until she stood naked and proud, a Phoenix Tear in all her splendor. With a steady hand, she held her legs and cut lightly at the skin on the tattooed tears right above her femoral arteries. There were only two tears there—a single large one high on each leg—and no scar tissue at all. A cut at either spot would be deadly, but would also ensure the fastest blood flow.

Now her preparations were complete. There would be more ritual at the sacred grove. She would consume more fruit. She would chant and pray to first clear her thoughts before accentuating her power. But for now, there was little else to do.

For the first time in the last two hours, she allowed her attention to focus outward. She lifted her gaze to see the druids all staring at her, each with a varying degree of shock or horror etched upon his face. But then the crowd parted. Without a sound or apparent signal, people stepped back and away to allow the Draig-Uisge passage. She wanted to smile at Patrick, but the rhythm of the room was too serious, and she was not a woman now who could smile or think or feel.

Patrick held something in his hands—a white druid robe—which he offered her with bowed head. She reached to take it, but he immediately straightened, lifting the fabric high. He meant to dress her, so she extended her arms upward and he settled it reverently upon her.

It was a simple thing: white cotton with a hood, the cut too large for her, the hem trailing all the way to her ankles. It was too ponderous for a Phoenix Tear, and there would be no way for her to easily access her bleeding points. So, when he stepped back, she reopened her pocketknife. She cut away the arms at the shoulders, slit a long vertical line at the neck, and another long slice up each leg. The result looked like a child's first costuming attempt, but at least she would be able to perform her function. Then she handed the knife to the Draig-Uisge. He took it, but with a troubled expression.

"I will manage the bloodletting in all places save one," she said in a quiet voice. But it was so silent in the room that her voice seemed to reverberate in the air.

"Xiao Fei," Patrick said, but she shook her head.

"I am the Phoenix Tear," she replied, then was momentarily shocked by the power invested in her title. As a child, she'd thought it nothing, of no more importance than saying she was a third grader or one of the Ron family. But as an adult, there was a resonance in her words, a meaning and a stateliness in her existence. For the first time in her life, she felt pride in that title, honor in her unique ability.

She straightened her shoulders and tilted her head to expose the long tattooed feather that extended up her neck. "The feather outlines where you can cut—"

"The jugular," he said.

She nodded. He understood.

"I'm not cutting you there." He said it so firmly,
so
clearly that she knew he believed what he said. He had no intention of letting her bleed to death. But they both knew when it came time to choose, he would do the right thing. She was so surprised that her vision blurred with tears.

She swallowed her self-pity. She was not a woman or a person, she reminded herself. She was a vessel for power, and as such there would be no remorse, only honor for her sacrifice. "Do not fear to do what is necessary, Draig-Uisge. I am prepared. I am a Phoenix Tear." Then she turned to look at all the others in the room, one by one, as their horrified expressions fixated on her neck. "For Earth," she said loudly.

As one, they echoed the words back to her:

"For Earth."

She glanced outside. It was nearing sunset. In truth, they waited for moonrise, not sunset, but either way, it was time to go. "Gather your weapons; sharpen your wits. The time for sacrifice has come," she said.

Patrick grabbed her arm. "There will be no sacrifice."

She slanted him an arch look. "Of course there will be. My blood. Your will." She glanced significantly at the druids around them. "Their witness and
defense
?"

She saw his eyes widen, and he looked about him in renewed understanding. Clearly he had been focused on the two of them. That was his function and his duty, but he had forgotten the danger to the ones around them. These brave men and women might die tonight, simply to buy him and her time to complete their task. There
would
be sacrifice. The only question was how much.

Patrick's eyes grew tragic and he opened his mouth to speak, but whatever he would have said was lost as Peter appeared in full regalia. The head druid's entrance was all that it should be for a great hierophant, then was ruined as the man began to pontificate. In the end, neither Patrick nor Xiao Fei stayed to hear it all. After a glance at Hank and Slick, the four slipped out, mounted their motorcycles, and left.

Xiao Fei looked about the sacred grove and tried not to laugh. Trust Americans to choose a holy grove not more than a hundred feet from a park picnic area complete with garbage cans and wasps' nests. And yet, standing here, she could feel the ancient power pulsing through the ground, whispering through the trees, even singing with the birds and insects that buzzed in the air. This was indeed a holy place, and yet wholly American.

"I love it here," she murmured, walking a slow circle in the clearing. The space was not dominated by one tree, as was the Cambodian site, but was circled by trees both ancient and young, leaving a rough center of peace.

No one had come early to clean the place, so the first thing they all did was walk about and pick up trash, the druids chanting softly with every step.

Xiao Fei turned to Patrick, a question in her eyes. He answered in a hushed whisper. "We bless our site every time we visit, and then we ask for a blessing back."

She watched Hank place a large hand on the bark of a stately oak, his eyes closed in reverence. "How often do you come here?" she whispered.

"Someone comes every night. It is one way we do service to the Earth and the spirits here."

She understood. She also took a moment to perform her own ritual. Kneeling in the center of the space, she performed three kowtows and chanted a prayer of reverence and thanks. When the last kowtow was complete, she stayed on the ground, her face pressed into the grass, and she mentally expanded her awareness.

She connected first with the birds in the trees. Perching on a maple branch with a wren, she felt her heart beat in the small, rapid flutter of one of Earth's tiniest creatures. She grew outward from there. She touched and synchronized with the pulse of the maple, from the highest branch to the tiny roots that burrowed deep into the ground. She knew the insects that crawled in the bark, and greeted the wind and sky that whispered through the branches. And deep down, she expanded into the slowest pulse of the dark stones and the hot tempest of the world's molten core.

She had done this ritual before. Most especially in Cambodia before closing the gate there, but other times as well. It was her deepest meditation, for when she most needed to remember where she came from. She came from the Earth, and from the blessing of the Great One that was in all things.

Slowly, she rose from her prone position until she sat on her knees in the dirt. In Cambodia, the ritual of joining had ended there, and perhaps that was the mistake of the monks. Thanks to Patrick's teaching, she was able to expand her awareness one step further. She knew what she had to do. Not only was she one with nature, but she was joined with the people of Earth—the human and humanlike. Werewolf, vampire, even ghost and nature spirit, all were accepted as part of that which was of Earth—that which strengthened and exploited Earth's gifts, which gave and received from her bounty.

As she rose to her feet in the clearing, she felt herself as one with all. She was Earth: powerful, all enduring, a source of strength and energy to bless aeons of children. And she was dying. Xiao Fei felt the corruption, the pollution, the wounds that ate away at her strength. And she felt the hole that was the demon gate, the sudden and crippling drain of a power trying to sustain not one planet, but two.

It wasn't possible. She was struggling to support her own children. There was not enough of her to pour into another world as well.

Then came another soul into her awareness. Xiao Fei saw him as a man and yet more than a man. She recognized the water dragon—the Draig-Uisge—that shaped spirit and power. He was solid where she was liquid. He was sinuous strength where she was molten fire. And he was the force that would seal her wound.

"It's time, Xiao Fei. The moon's up, and the grove has welcomed us. The druids protect us." He pressed something into her hand: a phoenix persimmon.

Closing her eyes, she allowed the Earth to direct her actions. She raised the fruit and pressed it to Patrick's lips.

"But…" he began. Then, accepting the change, he bowed his head. He allowed her to push the fruit through his lips. She waited in silence as he ate. The blue light that was Patrick chewed and swallowed. Moments later, he seemed to understand. He mimicked her actions, lifting another of the fruits and pressing it to her lips.

She too ate.

"I'm sorry about doing this out in the open," he said. "They've turned their backs. They're watching for demons…"

She pressed her fingers to his lips, silencing his words. Some distant part of Xiao Fei knew she stood in the center of a circle with people all around. She even knew that demons were already massing to strike. They already felt the locus of power that was her—that was the Earth—centering here. But the greater part of her was already merged with the planet. Nothing mattered but she who supported them all. The ones who did or did not watch this lovemaking were merely the tiniest fraction of that bigger reality.

Then Xiao Fei felt it: the phoenix persimmon flowing into her blood and energy. She felt it in her body and in Patrick's. For the Draig-Uisge, there was a surge and a focusing. His energy became brighter, tighter, more like a laser beam than an incandescent light.

"Begin," she whispered.

He flushed, and she felt his hands touch her arm—tentative, trembling, with anxiety in every caress.

"I understand now," she whispered. "I know what you do and why." She was the Earth, powerful and alive even though bleeding energy through a great wound. Patrick was the doctor, the surgeon who sealed and closed and cured. But he was also a man with a man's mind.

What he did required a symbol, a focus to his thoughts. If that symbol for him was in sex, then so be it. It could as easily be in slicing an ax through a demon amulet. In truth, Xiao Fei preferred a man who favored a sexual union to one who needed violence to shape his thoughts.