Blood Challenge

TWENTY-ONE

THE night air had that silken feel Arjenie associated with late spring evenings back home. No fireflies, though. Did they have fireflies in this part of California? She asked Isen, who said no, then told her about some of the bugs they did have.

Isen Turner was an excellent host now that he wasn’t threatening her. He listened as well as he spoke—and he was an entertaining speaker, whether he was talking about wine or bugs—and he had a sly sense of humor. Clearly he wanted his guest to feel special.

Special, and relaxed enough to tell him things. That was okay. It wasn’t as if she’d accidentally start blurting out stuff about Dya.

She was having a wonderful time. She was very conscious of Benedict sitting beside her, though he didn’t say much. Cullen Seabourne did. He’d gotten over his surliness. When Isen took a phone call and left the table to speak with someone privately, Seabourne amused both of them by flirting with her. He was a bit outrageous, but clearly just playing, so she relaxed and enjoyed herself. How often did a woman have an absurdly sexy man say her scent was as fresh and mysterious as a summer night, or that her hair reminded him of calling fire to dance on his fingers?

When Isen returned he still wore his earbud and he placed his phone nearby. Benedict looked at him with raised brows, which made her think this wasn’t Isen’s usual behavior. She hoped not. Aunt Robin didn’t allow phones at the dinner table, and Arjenie agreed with her.

“A developing situation,” Isen said vaguely. “My apologies. I need to stay on top of things, but it’s nothing for you to be concerned about.”

That made her curious, of course, but it wasn’t any of her business, unless they were about to be attacked by another clan or something. But surely he’d be doing more than keeping his earbud in place if that were the case.

By the time the silent Carl took away their empty plates, it was fully dark. Carl replaced the lasagna with cheesecake, and the wine with coffee. “That was excellent,” Arjenie said after she swallowed the last bite of her cheesecake.

“Would you like another piece?” Benedict asked.

She eyed him. His expression didn’t give much away, but she suspected he was amused. “No, thank you.”

“Are you sure?” Cullen Seabourne said. “You only had a pound or so of lasagna, along with a few slices of garlic bread—no more than four or five, surely. Plus the cheesecake, of course.”

No doubt about the expression on that gorgeous face. He was laughing at her. “I suppose you’re wondering where a skinny thing like me puts it all. I have a high metabolism, especially when I’ve been using my Gift. That sucks the calories right out of my body.”

“That’s not how Gifts usually work.”

“No.” The meal was over. It was time for the question-and-answer portion of the evening. “I believe it’s normal for those of the Blood, though admittedly my sample is small—me, a few brownies, a half-blood sidhe, a couple others. Do you need to eat after you’ve been through a Change?”

Seabourne’s eyebrows lifted. “We do, as a matter of fact. You consider yourself of the Blood, then?”

“Genetically, I’m about three-fourths human. Magically, I’m of the Blood, but I may or may not be sidhe in that respect.”

“Ah.” He glanced at Isen, who gave a small nod. “Maybe you could explain.”

“I can. I’m not used to it, but I can do it. Do you want to ask questions, or should I give you a … well, not a summary. I don’t abbreviate well. But I could tell you about my heritage.”

Isen answered this time. “Please do.”

“Okay. I’m asking you to be really careful about what you repeat to anyone else. I’ll explain why in a minute.” She put a hand on her chest. Funny. Her heartbeat had picked up and her mouth was dry. “This is harder than I thought it would be. It’s been such a big secret my whole life. I’ve never spoken of it to anyone outside of family. Well. The short version is that my mother was human. My father is sidhe. Low sidhe,” she added.

“The distinction doesn’t mean anything to me,” Isen said. “Low sidhe?”

“Sidhe divide themselves into three groups or classes: High, Middle, and low. High Sidhe are the immortals. There aren’t many of them. I’m told that most people in the sidhe realms go their whole lives without seeing a High Sidhe. Middle sidhe are the elfin nobility—and the way they determine who’s noble is confusing, but never mind that for now. Low sidhe are everyone else. Well, not humans—”

“There are humans in the sidhe realms?” Isen asked.

“Sure. We seem to be everywhere. What I meant was that low sidhe includes a lot of elves, plus a lot of mixed bloods, plus races other than elves who share in the sidhe magical heritage.”

“What does that mean?”

“It’s complicated, but they determine who’s sidhe and who isn’t based on bloodlines and on common magical descent. It’s possible for magic to be passed on in ways that have nothing to do with the physical DNA. Pixies are a good example. They can’t interbreed with elves, so there’s no shared DNA, but their magic is descended from sidhe magic—don’t ask me how—so they’re considered sidhe.”

“Interesting,” Isen murmured. “I suppose that’s why you consider yourself of the Blood? Your magic isn’t human, and I suppose your blood would interfere with lab tests. Yet, if I understand correctly, you aren’t sure if it’s sidhe magic or not.”

“It’s more that I don’t know if the sidhe would consider me sidhe. That’s sort of important. My father is just under half sidhe by bloodlines—fifteen thirty-seconds, to be precise. His mother was a one-woman melting pot. If he were exactly half-sidhe, he’d automatically be considered low sidhe. Since he isn’t, he had to be tested. His magic tests as sidhe, so he’s sidhe.”

Isen nodded thoughtfully. “You haven’t been tested?”

“No.” She sighed. “Like I said, it’s complicated. My father did register my birth, which means I’m entitled to be tested, and he thinks I would test as sidhe. Not because I’m powerful, but my Gift is a sidhe ability. Kind of a rare one, too,” she added. “Or so he said the last time I saw him, but that was years and years ago. He isn’t exactly attentive. But I’d have to go to one of the sidhe realms to be tested, and that isn’t possible, which means I’m sort of at risk.”

Benedict spoke for the first time in quite awhile. “What risk?”

“There are, um, some people in some of the realms who might want to breed me or use my blood.”

He growled.

She blinked. “Wow. That sounds exactly like a wolf. I didn’t know you could do that when you were being a man.”

He took a slow breath and looked at the lovely man sitting across from her. “Seabourne, do you know what she’s talking about?”

Cullen Seabourne took his time answering, his expression abstracted, as if he were thinking hard. Or maybe seeing hard. He was watching Arjenie the way a mongoose watches a cobra. “Some blood is more magically potent than others. I assume that’s what she refers to.”

Arjenie nodded. “Yes, and there are some spells you can only do with sidhe blood. I’ve made some guesses about what they might be, but Eledan wouldn’t tell me, and I suppose that isn’t important right now. I’m considered Sha’almuireli kin now, but if I tested as sidhe I’d be Sha’ almuireli—or possibly Divina’hueli, since my father does have some of that in his bloodline, but he’s Sha’almuireli, so I probably would be, too. If I turned out to be sidhe at all, that is. But being Sha’almuireli, however lowly a member, would probably keep me from being grabbed.”

“I’m guessing that Sha’ almuireli is one of the Hundred?” Seabourne said. When she nodded he added to the others, “There are a fixed number of sidhe surnames, which designate kinship groups similar to clans—though it’s a great deal more complicated than the way we think of clans.”

“It certainly is,” she said with feeling. “I don’t understand it all, but—” But she was trying to be brief. Not succeeding, but trying, so she wouldn’t go into that. “Unfortunately, there isn’t any way for me to be tested.”

“You’ve never been to the sidhe realms, then?” Isen asked.

“Oh, no. Eledan can cross realms whenever he wants—and that’s usually a middle sidhe ability, not low sidhe, but that’s the thing about mixed bloods. Sometimes we’re just a diluted version of a sidhe. Other times we don’t have any sidhe skills at all, but the other parent’s innate magic gets passed on, only stronger than usual. And sometimes we only get one or two of the sidhe abilities, but we get that full-strength. That’s how it worked with Eledan, and with me, too.”

“But he can cross, and he wants you to be tested, yet he’s never taken you there for this testing.”

“There’s a mass limit to what he can carry when he crosses. I’m too big now. When I was little enough for him to take me, my mother wouldn’t permit it. She thought he wouldn’t watch out for me properly, or maybe he’d forget to bring me back. He might have. He’s not very reliable.”

Benedict spoke again. “I take it Eledan is your father’s name.”

She flushed. “Yes. I don’t call him Father because, you know, he isn’t. He’s my genetic parent, and he’s got some sense of duty toward me, but it isn’t very highly developed.”

Benedict’s eyes were flat. So was his voice. “What did you mean about them breeding you?”

He looked scary again. He sounded scary, too. Why did all that grimness make her want to touch him? Right there, along that hard jaw … Behave, she told herself. “The sidhe realms are not uniform, no more than our realm is. Some governments in our world suck at civil rights. Some governments in the sidhe worlds do, too. There’s one place that’s rancid with slavery and other ugliness. According to Eledan, if I ended up there, I’d be used as breeding stock.”

“And how would someone in this slavery realm know about you?”

“Like I said, my father registered my birth, so it wouldn’t be all that hard to find out I exist and that this is my home realm. Especially because of Eledan’s profession.”

This time it was Isen who spoke. “Which is?”

“Um. We don’t have an analog for it. He’s unusually fertile for a sidhe, so basically he gets paid for impregnating women. Um—not my mother. She was a busman’s holiday. He was in our realm and she drew his attention, and he does have a touch of the sidhe glamour, though even without it he’s almost as beautiful as Mr. Seabourne.”

“Cullen,” Seabourne murmured. “Lovely ladies should always call me Cullen, not mister.”

She awarded him a quick grin before continuing. “What I’m getting at is that Mom wasn’t a paid job for Eledan, but he did come back to see if he’d impregnated her. That was partly duty, like I said, but also, the more offspring he registers, the better. Especially sidhe offspring, so we can’t assume he’s right about me testing as sidhe. I suspect he confuses what he wants with what is.”

Benedict shoved back his chair and stood. “Excuse me.” He strode away.

She started to rise, too. “What’s wrong?”

Isen put a hand on her arm. “Give him a moment. “

“But—”

“He’s angry. He doesn’t like the way your father treated you.”

She watched as, in three strides, Benedict reached the retaining wall and leaped almost straight up onto the upper deck. There he began pacing.

Arjenie frowned. Benedict was truly upset. His father seemed to think he should be left alone, but… “Do you always interpret him for people?” she asked Isen, then patted the hand he’d used to stop her. “Never mind. I think I’ll go to the original text.” She stood.

Seabourne spoke quickly. “That may not be a good idea.”

“Resides,” Isen murmured, but to Seabourne, not her. In this context that meant calm down or subside. “Benedict is not you.”

Arjenie limped over to the stairs. Benedict stopped pacing and looked down at her, his expression not at all welcoming, so she was surprised when he jumped down to land beside her. “You’re supposed to stay off your ankle.”

“It’s much better than it was.” She tipped her head up, studying him. “What’s wrong?”

“My father’s interpretation is accurate.”

“Oh. Well, Eledan may a bit of a prick by our standards—”

The muffled snort came from Seabourne back at the table. “—and even for a sidhe I think he’s careless. Of course, that’s based on a sample of one and a half, so I could be wrong.”

“Half? You sampled half a sidhe?”

She waved that aside. “I don’t understand why you’re so upset.”

“Your father put you in danger of being enslaved and bled or bred in order to further his career as a professional stud.”

“I like that.” She smiled, pleased. “A professional stud. That’s a good way to put it. But I may have made things sound too black-and-white. Registering my birth was partly self-interest, but not entirely. To Eledan, being sidhe is terribly important. In his eyes, he would have failed me in a fundamental way if he hadn’t registered my birth. It wouldn’t occur to him I might not want to be registered.”

“Maybe because the danger isn’t to him.”

“Nooo … at least, I don’t think so. I don’t think he’s cowardly. Self-interested and a bit lazy, but not cowardly. Anyway, I doubt the danger is very great. This is a big world. Someone who wanted to grab me would have to find me first, so I don’t draw attention to myself.” She shrugged. “Maybe no one’s even looking. I’m just careful, that’s all.”

“No Facebook page, or Myspace, or Twitter. No Internet presence at all.”

“You checked?”

“I can Google. I wonder if an out-realm kidnapper could.”

“Who knows? My feeling is that if someone took the trouble to come here at all—and that’s a big if—they wouldn’t mind staying long enough to learn stuff like that. They couldn’t just use a Find spell. My Gift protects me from that.”

He looked so tight. Unhappy. Maybe that’s why she did something unwise. She touched his cheek.

He went still. She skimmed the line of his jaw with her fingertips before reluctantly dropping her hand. “I get the feeling … are you a father?”

He nodded slowly, his eyes as wary as if he were the wolf instead of the man, uncertain about this human who’d dared touch him.

“So’s my uncle Clay. He’s a father to the children he had with Aunt Robin, and to me, too. I didn’t grow up fatherless. I’m not hurting because my genetic parent isn’t my dad.”

His face softened. It wasn’t quite a smile, but it came close. “I’m not to feel sorry for you.”

“Absolutely not. And anger—well, I won’t say that it’s never useful, but in this case it’s pointless. It won’t change anything.”

He didn’t speak. His eyes were so intent, so focused on her … He’s going to kiss me.

Arjenie’s heartbeat picked up. Longing rose in her, sweet and warm as summer rain. She forgot about the people sitting at the table a few feet away. Her lips parted.

He put one hand on her shoulder … and slowly drew that hand down her arm to reach her hand, which he clasped.

“Do you keep up with the news?” he asked.

“Oh. Um. Well.” Was her radar that badly off, or had he changed his mind? She pulled her thoughts together. “I’m a bit of a news junkie, but real news, not the TV pundits who just talk and talk. Though I’m out of touch right now, what with traveling and, um, stuff. I haven’t even checked the Times online lately.”

He nodded. “Then maybe you haven’t heard about Ruben Brooks or Lily.”

“What?” Alarm pinged through her. “Ruben? Lily? What haven’t I heard?”

“Yesterday Brooks had a heart attack. Last night Lily was shot.”

“Shot!” She grabbed his arm. “Is she—no, you wouldn’t be sitting around holding dinner parties if she … but she’s all right? And Ruben? What about Ruben?”

“Lily’s arm was damaged. We don’t know yet how fully it will heal. Brooks lived through the heart attack and is considered stable. There is some question about whether it occurred naturally or was magically induced.”

“Induced,” she whispered. “Oh, no.”

“You know something about this.”

“Not about Lily getting shot.” But about Ruben’s heart attack … maybe she was wrong. Maybe there were other ways to magically induce a coronary infarction. Vodun? It could be a vodun spell. Maybe. “I need my laptop. And my phone. I’ve got to check in.” And log in, do some research, and talk to someone, find out just how closely Ruben’s symptoms mimicked those of a heart attack.

If it wasn’t mimicry—if he’d actually had a heart attack—it wasn’t vodun.

Isen came up behind his son. “Not just yet. You need to tell us what you know or suspect.”

“I can’t.”

He shook his head. “I know we agreed you could withhold information on one subject, but there are lives at risk.”

“No,” Cullen said abruptly. “I think she’s right.” He shoved back from the table, strode up to her, and gripped her chin in one hand.

She tried to jerk away. Couldn’t. “I don’t like being grabbed.”

“Hush.” His fingers dug in enough to hold her head still.

“I don’t like being told to hush, either.”

“I’ll remember that.” But he didn’t let go as he murmured something, his other hand shifting rapidly through the air. The first symbol he sketched was the Raetic ka, which was common to lots of spells, being a rune of seeking. The rest … his hand moved too fast. She couldn’t see what they were.

And then she stopped breathing. Entirely.

It was only for a moment, but the terror was huge. She dragged in a deep breath as soon as her body would let her. “You—you—”

“I’m sorry. It was necessary.” He looked at Isen, then Benedict. “When she says she can’t talk about some things, she means it literally. There’s a binding on her.”