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“Yeah. Just thought you could use some company while they were out. Maybe tell me what I was so dense about over the years.”
I grinned. I wanted to tease him that maybe he was still too dense to get it, but I didn’t want to cut everyone out of my life. Maybe meeting Cord and becoming a father made Blithe grow up enough to see what had been happening for years. I’d give him one more chance. Hell, I’d probably give him lots of chances over the years, but one more chance for this and then I’d give up on discussing magic with him forever.
My wolf sighed as I was forced to get my lazy butt up off the sofa and answer the door. Blithe had little bags under his eyes and he yawned as he said hello.
“Should you even be out of the house?” I teased, stepping back for him to come inside.
“Probably not,” he laughed, stifling another yawn. “The kittens decided to mew back and forth all night, because Delilah discovered she had a tail.”
“Big news for them!” I laughed. “Do you want me to put some coffee on?”
“Would you mind?”
“Come on,” I said, motioning for him to follow me into the kitchen.
I put the coffee on and poured us some orange juice while we waited.
“Unless you’d prefer a bloodshake?” I asked.
“No, just had one, but thanks,” he shook his head as I slid the glass of juice in front of him and rounded the table to sit down on the other side.
“I think a dead man told me to wait for you here,” Blithe said.
I blinked. We all heard about the sticky notes that Duke and Blithe received from Liam on the day Blithe met Cord. Still, I wasn’t sure what Syre’s dead, but still sort of around sire, had to do with me, but since I always accused everyone else of not listening, I leaned in to hear what he had to say.
“I left not just to bring Rex and Del here,” he said.
“I know. Dakota and I had been waiting a while for you to go off to the coven south of here,” I nodded.
“I was going to, but then I met Cord and priorities changed,” he said.
“Understandably so. I haven’t really baked since I met Terrick. We’ve been a bit busy.”
“He said the one I was waiting on would come here and I was looking for someone who knew more about vampyric magic than I did.”
“Oh,” I laughed. “So a ghost told you off.”
“Not in so many words,” Blithe grinned and shook his head, “and apparently the correct term for him would be spirit.”
“Gotcha,” I nodded. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Blithe watched me as I sank back into my chair. I wasn’t sure I knew some big secret he didn’t know. He used his blood in his magic just as much as I did, if not more. Probably more because he worked on smaller projects while I put more energy into large baking projects that covered more ground with less blood.
“I think you might be disappointed in what I have to say about it all,” I shrugged. “It’s nothing groundbreaking. We are the magic, Blithe. Whatever makes us vampires and makes us need blood also makes us magic. Well, sort of. It makes us alchemists in a way. We take in blood that wasn’t ours to begin with and then we can turn that energy or literal blood into anything we want. We’ve used it for hearth magic and for battle and everything else over the years depending on which group we descend from. Where or who the blood comes from can have an effect on the magic. The bloodshakes work but live blood will make stronger magic. Some groups believed taking blood against the will of the donor made it stronger, but I don’t think so. Not for the sort of magic we do anyway.
“Traditionally the omegas have done the magic. Back in the day, I think the traditional system was to feed from the Alpha of the pair or maybe just an Alpha in general, an Alpha vampire would be best. Anyway, I’m going in circles. We’d feed from the Alpha – whichever one – and then do our magic. I’m not saying my magic is stronger than yours, that’s just the way it was done before. I think it was probably most likely done that way by true-mates. In that way their magics were combined. You’ve done it all along. I use it in my baking. That’s why I can’t make vegan recipes. My blood may be freely given to the recipe but it still comes from an animal.”
Blithe blinked at me as if he lost the plot somewhere. I opened my mouth to start over, to try to explain it in a different way, but he finally nodded.
“And the baking?” he asked.
“I just use the blood, intention, follow some astrological movements, and use herbology too. I think we were meant to use our blood. Those of us with magic anyway. I call it the blood cycle in my notes. We take in the blood of others in whatever form, and we transmute it into something useful – usually for someone else. It’s our place in the magical ecosystem. For a long time, the shifter community said we just took and took, but I think that was a lot of political stuff or they didn’t understand what we can actually do. Hell, maybe some of us lost track of what we could actually do. We’re here to make things better and no one can tell me differently. Sure, blood magic like all magics can be used for negative results, but that’s a personal choice. What we do – your runes, my baking and other hearth-y things, that’s what we were meant to do. In a society that works because it’s equitable we play a vital role. With enough time and the right supplies and intentions I don’t think there are very many limits on what we can do. Then when you add in the fact we have genetics going back to Frost and Juda, I think we have even more magic than the average vampire. It all plays together.”
“Dude, you should write a book,” Blithe laughed.
“Dakota says that too, but I’m not sure anyone would want to read it. Who would even publish it?” I shook my head.
“Irwin. He’s a wolf here. He writes and publishes mostly stories that have been forgotten. He fictionalizes dead folks to try to bring their stories to life. He has a printing press and everything. I’m sure he’d print it if you’d write it.”
