Bloodmoon (The Scarlet Star Trilogy Book 2) Page 6

  ‘I’ve known stranger,’ muttered Lilain.

  ‘Stranger than what, may I ask?’ a voice piped up, startling them. An elderly woman stepped out from beside the pulpit and walked forwards. Her hands were clasped behind her back, and she wore a long brown robe with a purple cord holding it together at the waist. Her hair was thin, finer than cobweb, and white as milk. It was tied back and fell in a ponytail down her back. Her face seemed kind enough, littered as it was with deep pox scars from years long forgotten.

  ‘Stranger places for churches,’ Lilain told her, and stuck out a hand. The woman raised an eyebrow and moved to clasp it. Merion watched on, confused.

  Whatever happened when they touched hands, it caused the old woman’s eyebrow to climb higher. ‘What colour is blood?’ she asked, quietly.

  Lilain smiled. ‘There are many shades.’

  Merion had removed his hat, and was busy scratching his head. ‘Would anybody like to tell me what exactly is going on, please?’

  The old woman beat his aunt to the answer. ‘Secret handshakes and riddles, my boy. It’s how bloodrushing stays alive,’ she said.

  Merion rolled his eyes. Yet another person in this godforsaken country that had a penchant for calling him ‘boy’.

  ‘I see. So you’re a letter as well?’

  The woman shook her head. ‘Oh my, no,’ she replied. ‘I’ve never had the stomach for it.’

  Lilain might have stood a little straighter, it was hard to tell. ‘A fixer then,’ she stated. The old woman nodded.

  ‘A fixer, and what is that?’ Merion asked. He heard boots behind him. It was Lurker, who stared at his surroundings with a wrinkle on his brow. He was not a fan of the Maker’s churches. Suffice to say, he was not a fan of the Maker at all.

  ‘A fixer. One that sells, instead of lets. Have any magpie blood, Ma’am?’ Lurker got straight to the point.

  The old woman smacked her gums, which Merion was not surprised to see were missing a few teeth. ‘Averine,’ she said, introducing herself. ‘Averine Vermillion. And I’ll have to take a look, Mister, if that’s what you’re after.’

  ‘Others as well,’ Merion butted in.

  Averine squinted at him. ‘For you, boy?’

  ‘For both of us,’ Merion replied, smiling politely.

  Averine hummed. ‘If you have the coins, I have the shades.’ She bent a finger towards them and led them down the aisle. She clicked her fingers, and a small boy, a few years younger than Merion and skinnier than a sapling, stepped out from a hidden alcove with a short rifle. His freckled face was pale and unsure. ‘It’s fine, Rump, they’re friends. Put it down, for Maker’s sake,’ Averine told him, and the boy did as he was told, wiping his nose with the back of his hand. His eyes flicked to Merion, and stuck there.

  Averine was already fiddling with something beneath the seat of the front bench. It sounded like a latch or a lock. With a little grunt, she lifted up the seat top and gestured for Lilain and Lurker to have a look.

  ‘Here we are, this is all I have in,’ she said, almost apologetic. She retreated, gesturing for Rump to come and stand by her side.

  Merion stared down into the hollow bench, where little bottles rubbed shoulders, the colours masked by a thin film of dust. Some sported labels whilst others had a word or two scratched into the glass. Merion’s heart was not sure whether it wanted to sink or soar. This was certainly no hidden room in a Fell Falls basement. Maybe a score and a half of shades at the most.

  ‘And nobody in your congregation suspects you’re hiding blood in the benches?’ he queried.

  ‘They might if’n I had one, young man,’ she said finally. ‘I get the occasional wanderer, comin’ in to relieve their guilt. Couple of words here and there, that’s all the religion this town needs.’

  ‘That’s all it should ever be,’ muttered Lurker, as he rifled through the bottles. Merion and Lilain stood a little further back, letting the prospector look first. His hands were shaking ever so slightly. There might have been more sweat on his brow than usual. His leather coat creaked as he moved back and forth.

  ‘What’s that say?’ he held up a bottle with a label written in a strange script.

  ‘Slow-worm,’ Lilain informed him.

  Averine picked at her nails. ‘Sanguine. Never been able to read it.’

  ‘Hmph,’ Lurker grunted.

  It took him several minutes to find it: a small fat-bottomed bottle with the word “MAGPIE” scratched into its dark green glass. Lurker uncorked it and sniffed it. ‘Smells fine.’

  Lilain took it from him and checked herself. ‘Fine enough.’

  Averine blinked owlishly. ‘I take pride in what I do,’ she stated.

  It was Merion’s turn. Lurker was digging coins out of his pockets and handing them over to Averine. Blood was not cheap, and Merion bit his lip as he pictured the few coins that lingered in his own pocket. He removed his hat and began to pick through the bench’s offerings. His aunt did the same beside him. Every now and again he would show her a bottle, and she would shake her head or nod. Once she even glared at him, as if he should know better.

  Three bottles, that was it: the fine line between what he could drink and what he could afford. Merion was not exactly thrilled with his glamorous options: chipmunk, mule, armadillo. He stared down at the three bottles sitting in his upturned hat, a brief spectrum of brown and red. ‘Well, then,’ he said, reaching into his pocket. He grabbed all he had save for one coin, a heavy gold florin, and handed them over. Averine bit each one, and once she was happy, she ferreted them away in her long robe.

  ‘Lot of blood for one boy,’ she commented, conversationally.

  Rump had been sidling forward, little rifle still hanging from his hands. His eyes were still locked on Merion. The boy piped up, his voice loud and his words slightly muddled at the edges. ‘Are you a leech, mister?’

  Merion glanced at his aunt, and she shrugged. Averine and the boy seemed harmless enough. ‘Yes, I am,’ he said.

  ‘ ’Fraid Rump here is deaf. Got caught on the wrong side of the railroad blasting one day. Can’t hear a thing,’ Averine told them. Merion nodded and smiled at the boy. Rump grinned in return. He could not help but swell with a touch of pride.

  ‘Lucky,’ Rump said.

  Merion nodded again and then bowed to the pair of them. ‘Thank you kindly, for your help. However I’m afraid we must be going.’

  ‘That we must,’ Lurker echoed, still nurturing his bottle.

  Averine curtseyed. ‘So formal, you Empire types. It’s my pleasure, young man. Where you headed?’

  Lilain helped her shut and lock the bench. ‘East, and back to the coast,’ she replied. There was something of a wistful tone in her voice, as if part of her wished to stay and chat blood with the old woman.

  ‘In that case I wish you all well, and Maker bless you with swift travels. The wilds ain’t no place to linger.’

  They filed out of the tumbledown church and into the sweltering heat of the afternoon, picking their way between the gravestones like ponderous fingers over chess-pieces. Averine and Rump hovered in the doorway. The little boy waved until they were but shivering shapes in the heat haze.

  As soon as Cheyenne was far enough behind them, away from even the most watchful of eyes, two corks were squeaked from their bottles. Lurker took a swig from his, whilst Merion only took a sip from the mule blood. He just wanted to feel the shiver of the magick in his veins.

  It came as quickly as he hoped, and fiercely too for such a small drop. He could feel it sliding down his throat and stirring in his stomach, then seeping into his veins to pulsate and throb. Merion shuddered as it rose to his skull. He felt the power in his legs, and all the sore spots and aches of marching through the desert began to fade away.

  Almighty, he had missed this.

  ‘Feeling good, Nephew?’

  Merion turned and found Lilain smiling lopsidedly at him.

  ‘I am indeed, Aunt,’ Merion gasped as the magick ricochet
ed once more through his body. He felt the tiredness dripping away, and the strength and endurance flowing into his legs and spine. ‘I feel like I could go for miles.’

  ‘Well, enjoy it while it lasts. You got maybe an hour or two before it wears off, I think. It’ll last a little longer as you haven’t done it in a while,’ Lilain told him.

  ‘Is that how it works? It gets stronger if you use it less?’

  ‘No, not really. It’s your perception of it that changes. You notice all the little things, feel it deeper, or so I’m told. Just like Lurker and his whiskey, or his tobacco. The more you miss it, the better it feels when you find some. The more you notice every last drop.’

  ‘That makes sense, I suppose,’ Merion replied, nodding. He let the magick flow for a while, guiltily savouring it. ‘So what is that handshake, then? When were you going to show me that, hm?’ he asked her, raising an eyebrow, a curious smile on his lips. The blood had shoved him into good spirits.

  ‘I was wonderin’ how long it would take you to ask.’

  ‘As if you can blame the boy,’ Lurker interjected. ‘He’s thirteen years old. There’s a secret handshake for bloodrushers. Of course he wants to know it,’ he chuckled.

  ‘That’s enough out of you, Lurker. I was going to show him, fear not!’ Lilain chided him.

  Merion grinned. ‘You were?’

  ‘Well, it makes sense to,’ she replied, ‘to be able to tell your friends from your enemies. To know your letters from your Averines, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘Good point.’ Lilain reached forwards and clasped his hand, and as she did so, she folded her smallest finger in to her palm and tapped, once. Merion instinctively did the same, clumsily at first, but he got there in the end.

  ‘That’s it, and again, fold before you shake,’ Lilain said.

  A few more tries, and Merion had it. He practised a few times on Lurker’s raspy gloves for good measure and then nodded to himself, obviously pleased. ‘Anything else I should know about, while we’re at it?’ he asked.

  ‘Just the bloodrushing tax. Payable to your local letter on the first of the month. One florin,’ Lilain answered with a shrug. ‘I’ll make sure it gets to the right people.’

  ‘Or your local prospector can do the same job, but slightly cheaper,’ Lurker smirked.

  Merion shook his head. ‘Cheats and liars, the both of you. Come on, before we end up as puddles of sweat in the desert.’

  *

  Sand and rock watched them pass by, lazy and still in the afternoon scorching of the summer sun. June in the desert had a cruel taste to it. If the heat did not make you sweat and burn, then the light blinded you, or the terrain tricked you, fouling your tired steps.

  Even when the sand faded into prairie here and there, where the sagebrush and hardy grasses swayed in the hot breeze, they got no relief. The ground undulated and swayed, as if designed to weary even the hardiest traveller. It was as though the desert resented wanderers across its dusty skin, the way a dog might nibble at fleas. The constant ups and downs and rocky tors made their lungs burn. Even Merion was tired. The mule shade had died away after an hour or two, as his aunt had said, and he had succumbed to the sweltering drudgery.

  By early evening, their feet were sore and hot and their mouths were parched like roof-slats. They longed for a place to rest their limbs. Lilain was lagging behind and Lurker had dropped back to help her. Merion was striding ahead, leading them towards a distant smudge of green and brown, where a handful of hardy trees had banded together to form a copse. As they drew nearer, something sparkled in the orange glow of the setting sun, something that looked like water between a huddled copse of trees. Merion’s tongue rasped between his cracked lips.

  Rhin, who had met them a mile past the church, strode beside him, silent and yet keeping pace with the purposeful boy. His own withered tongue had another longing. It wanted to speak, to break the constant thudding of boots and crunching sand and say something. Anything.

  To his utter surprise, it was Merion who broke the silence.

  ‘Looks like water,’ muttered the boy.

  Rhin squinted, and saw the glittering between the trees. ‘That it does. By the Roots, that’s lucky.’

  ‘I can’t tell whether we’re on a winning streak, or sore out of it,’ Merion whispered with cracked lips.

  The faerie ran a hand through his hair and thought about that. ‘We found the church. And we got lucky with Doggard. Feels like a winning streak to me,’ Rhin said assuredly.

  ‘Hmmm,’ came the reply, and then there was silence again. Rhin did not mind one bit. That was a step in the right direction. Lucky indeed, he thought.

  There was a strong smell of fresh water in the air, one that sparked a memory in Rhin’s mind, one he had not dug out in many a year. It smelled like the fires of Carn’Erfjan, the fortress where he had spent his earliest years. Standing fast between the raging sea and the ice that inched down the black mountains, it was one of the oldest faerie forts in all of Undering. It had been built before the Fae marched south with the Barbarians and the Kelts, to fight the First Empire from their shores. Before they had been driven back to Eyra, or Éire as the humans called it.

  Ancient Fae law demanded the second-born of every family be trained as a fighter, to make war for Queen Sift. Rhin had been such an offering, left on the steps to be raised as—or more accurately, beaten into—a soldier, like the Spartans of the olden days.

  Another memory, one buried in an even deeper grave, came back to him then: one of trolls and cracking stone, of screams in the dust-choked darkness of the tunnels, screams that sliced through the constant roaring and gnashing of jaws and little bones. Rhin shuddered involuntarily, and pushed those memories away for another day.

  There were no two ways about it: a brutal upbringing it may have been, but it made Rhin the Fae he was today, and it helped to take some of the blame for his life’s crimes. His upbringing lightened the load. It was as Merion’s father had once said to him: a man is the product of his boyhood. How a boy is shaped echoes in the man he becomes. Rhin shook his head and rubbed the memories out of his eyes.

  Under the trees the evening air was cool, the sand dappled in the last shadows of the day. Rhin went straight to the small pool, his buzzing wings powering him forward, saving his feet the trouble. He kneeled at the water’s edge, cupped a hand, and sipped. The water was cool and fresh, with the tiniest hint of desert salt.

  ‘It’s pure enough,’ he told the others, who were shuffling into the copse. They too bent to their knees and lapped at the water, slaking their powerful thirsts. Merion wasted no time in whipping off his hat and plunging his head into the cool water, blowing bubbles with a long sigh. When he came up for air and got to his feet, he let the water drip down his neck and chest, washing away at least some of the day’s dust and sweat.

  It was not long before Lurker had a campfire crackling. They had bought some sun-cured, though rather unidentifiable, meat to go around. The rest of the supplies in Cheyenne had all been snapped up. Was it hound, cat, or tortoise? Who cared? Their hunger ignored the fact of it.

  Lurker tended the pan, as always. Lilain was already half asleep. Merion was getting there. Only Rhin sat bolt upright, listening to the noises of the desert. Above them, the trees rustled gently in the evening breeze. Their pale leaves gleamed in the firelight.

  Rhin could not get comfortable. It could have been the memories tugging at him, or something else entirely. He felt uneasy, and it irked him.

  ‘It’s ready,’ Lurker grunted, jolting him.

  The others sat up, rubbing bleary eyes. The sun had sucked the life out of them. It was no surprise that they ate in silence, staring like zombies into their bowls. Rhin was still the only one who kept his head up, his lavender eyes narrowed at the gloom as he chewed quietly.

  The faerie paused. He had heard something, and not just a crunch and squeal of some unfortunate creature, or the tittering of the insects. A rock tumbling.

 
For what seemed an age, all he could hear was the noisy mastication of the others around him. To his keen ears they sounded like cows grazing, and he strained to listen to the desert beyond.

  There: another clatter of rock. Rhin put down his thimble of a bowl and drew his sword. The others seemed startled. A bit of life appeared in their dull eyes. Lurker made to get up, already swinging the Mistress from her holster. He cocked the pistol quietly.

  ‘What is it?’ Lilain whispered. ‘What do you see?’

  ‘Hush, listen,’ Rhin hissed. His skin was already fading into nothing, just the dim outline of his features remaining. He tried to penetrate the darkness, but the light from the fire blurred the night’s edges. He began to tread sideways. There came another rattle of stones in the darkness. They all heard that one.

  Merion was reaching for his coat, where the three bottles of blood were hidden in his pockets.

  The faerie pulled out his knife as well. ‘I see people! About five, comi—’

  The thundercrack of a gun cut him off, chased by the whistling of a bullet as it glanced off a tree a worrying distance above Lilain’s head.

  ‘Down!’ Lurker shouted, squeezing off three rounds into the darkness. There was a yell and a round of roars and curses.

  ‘The Sand Rabbits have got you now!’ came a cry.

  ‘Quiver in fear!’

  ‘Hand over your coins!’

  Lurker growled. ‘Bandits! Merion, what have you got?’

  As more guns opened fire, they threw themselves behind the nearest trees and hunkered down.

  The young Hark scrabbled for a bottle. ‘Chipmunk?’

  ‘Fast reactions!’ Lilain yelled above the deafening gunshots.

  ‘Get a rock, and go round the back,’ Lurker ordered him, making a fist and driving it into his palm. Merion understood completely.

  With nervous hands, he reached for the nearest, biggest, and lumpiest rock he could find. He wondered whether he was afraid or simply startled. He did not like the idea of the former. Merion held the rock with one hand and flicked the cork off the bottle with the other. A bullet struck the sand two inches from his foot, and sprayed dust at him, and he yelped.