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I smiled wryly. Over the past few years I’d done what passed as dating for someone like me. Each time I tried, I ended up feeling more alone, not less. Fascination isn’t love and pedestals are hard, uncomfortable, and only big enough for one. Some people get a home with family and friends, some people get a pedestal. Perversely, those on the pedest
al hunger for the normalcy of a home and family, while those with the home and family hunger for the glamour and excitement of a pedestal. Further compounding things, the magic of the Song enhanced my sidhe-seer gifts. I’m physically stronger and have to hold back all the time. Careful, restrained sex is an oxymoron in my book. I get more release from exploding a few of Ryodan’s punching bags.
“Will you return her, then? All of them,” I added. Precision was a must with my moody beast.
“Yes, Yi-yi,” he said with a gusty sigh. After a moment, he lifted his head from the dresser. His violet eyes narrowed and shot a meaningful glance at my left hand, which was still cold and black. “It’s happening again.”
“I know.”
“Bigger now. It doesn’t hurt?” he fretted.
“No. I’m fine.”
He assessed me intently, as if seeking reassurance of that, then his body disappeared and only his head remained, his large, expressive eyes gleaming with love.
I smiled. “I see you, too, Shazam.”
His disembodied head nodded regally. “I will return after I’ve hunted, Yi-yi.” Then all of him was gone.
I dropped to the floor, peered beneath my bed, and watched with relief as the Pallas cats popped out of existence, one by one.
* * *
p
I stood beneath the spray of a long hot shower while he was gone, washing my hair, shaving my legs, and considering my left hand. The stain had retreated to beneath the crook of my elbow. Although my hand was still black, even the nails, my fingers were no longer quite so cold.
I had no idea why it happened or what caused it, if anything. It was possible it was simply random. Sometimes when my hand turned black, I was in the midst of a dangerous situation. Other times, I could tie it to nothing threatening in my vicinity. Each time it happened, I felt oddly shaky afterward and had found eating helped allay the strange enervation.
I flexed my hand beneath the warm spray. It didn’t hurt. Well, aside from the brief stabbing pain I’d felt earlier when it shot up beneath my nails. The wraiths in the cemetery had been repelled by it.
What had the Hunter done to me that night so long ago?
I hadn’t seen any of the enormous winged beasts in our skies for years and I’d been watching, waiting. I had questions.
I’d found no reference to the Hunters in the abbey’s vast libraries. But then, I still had the lion’s share of the collections to wade through. It was slow going, sorting through the bits and pieces of my sidhe-seer heritage. I read for hours a day, sitting with those at the abbey who were scanning the ancient fragile scrolls and books to create an electronic library with cross-referencing tags that will never decompose. It should have been done long ago, but the prior headmistress of our order had been more inclined to let our secrets rot than share them.
I turned off the water, wrapped a towel around my body, and used a second one on my hair. As I toweled it dry and sorted through the damp tangle of long red curls, I turned my thoughts back to the problem of Shazam.
He’d been different lately, with fewer moments of lucid brilliance and more of emotional angst. I was worried about him. When he got back, we were going to have a long talk, and I wasn’t going anywhere until I figured out what to do to snap him out of his funk. If an emergency came up, he was going with me to take care of it. I should never have let him stay at home while I’d gone out patrolling the past few months. After nearly seven years together I knew being alone and unseen, as he’d been on Olean, was the worst thing for him.
I smoothed a light oil into my hair to keep it from going completely wild, grabbed my clothes off the counter, tugged on a pair of faded, ripped jeans and one of Dancer’s old, faded tee-shirts, a white one with HOLY SHIFT, LOOK AT THE ASYMPTOTE ON THAT MOTHERFUNCTION! emblazoned on the front. Wearing his clothes made me feel like a part of him was here with me, although I wasn’t sure he’d be particularly impressed with my life. Lately it positively brimmed with…routine. Epic adventures were a thing of the past, Fae battles forbidden.
Sighing, I retrieved the sword that I wasn’t allowed to use for its universe-given purpose from its perch within reach of the shower.
I love my sword. I pet it; it soothes me. Cold, hard, frequently bloody, we’re two of a kind. Made for war, but with a bit of work we shine right back up again. Double-edged, the straight blade swells in thickness and width as it nears the guard. The blade, apart from the hilt, is 34.5 inches long—most of the time. In battle, I’ve seen that length increase and decrease. Dancer was never able to identify what it’s made from but it’s oddly light yet weighty at the same time, razor-sharp, and has proved unbreakable.
Although the blade shimmers alabaster, the grip is fashioned from engraved lengths of ebony and ivory metals woven together. The guard is dark as midnight and resembles narrow wings that arc back toward my hand. The heavily engraved pommel is formed from the same obsidian metal as the guard and is always cold. Ornate dark symbols—a cipher that has never ceased to stump me despite the considerable time I’ve wasted over the years with pen and paper trying to work it out—flow the length of the blade on both sides. The symbols often move, swirling too rapidly for me to transcribe. When I fight, my sword burns incandescent, and I often find those undecipherable symbols seared into the flesh of our victims.
Most of all, it feels good in my hand. As if it was made just for me. And one day, I just know deep in my bones, I’ll get to use it again.
I padded out into the bedroom.
My fingers tightened on the hilt.
There was a man sitting on my bed.
Not Fae.
