She opened her eyes, and he projected a thought into her mind. There was something important outside. She must get up and find it. Perhaps she was dreaming? But in the dream she still needed to see what waited.
Rising, she hurried to the window and looked out. Upon seeing nothing, she leaned the upper half of her body over the edge.
Ratboy grabbed her shoulders protruding through the window and pulled her outside. She did not scream, but blinked at him in mild surprise.
He did not want to frighten her, so he kept projecting the idea that she was lost in a dream. She didn't struggle in his arms, but rather examined him curiously through slightly slanted, brown eyes. An alien sense of excitement passed through him. He took his time, experiencing the scent of lavender soap in the crook of her neck mingling with the barest hint of dried fish on her hands. His fingers brushed the softness of her hair and the smoothness of her arms.
Then he pushed her slowly to the ground and used his teeth to puncture the wellspring in the base of her throat, all the while continuing to calm her with the power of his mind.
Her slender hands instinctively pushed once against his shoulders, but the moment passed, and he felt her gripping his shirt.
Power and unbelievable strength flowed into him. Domination through blind fear was one thing, but this was something else, something he and Parko had never talked about.
He drank until her heart stopped beating.
She was only a shell now, and he left her body where it lay, feeling some regret that the moment was over. Somehow, he knew Hashed didn't care about secrecy anymore.
Thoughts of the half-elf and the dog moved to the front of his awareness. Weapons? Shouldn't he find some weapons? No, his burned flesh was healing rapidly, and he had never felt stronger. No mortal trappings were necessary. He slipped down the near-deserted Miiska streets toward The Sea Lion.
Upon reaching it, he jerked one of the common room's shutters off. The dog lay alone in the large room, resting by the hearth.
"Here, puppy, puppy," he sang. What had that half-elf called him-Chap? "Here, Chap."
Chap's great, wolflike head snapped up in what Ratboy swore was disbelief. Then, as Ratboy anticipated, the dog's lips curled up in a hate-filled snarl, and he launched himself toward the window. Loud high-pitched wails burst from his long mouth.
Ratboy smiled. He bolted for the outskirts of town and the tree line.
Magiere ran down the near-black streets toward Brenden's shop until her lungs threatened to burst. Her long dress kept catching at her legs, but she pulled it up with her free hand and kept running.
What if Welstiel were right?
Truth hurt more than the exerted ache in her chest. How could she simply assume all danger had passed because Leesil and Brenden believed the burning warehouse had caved in the tunnels? She ignored the pain in her legs and ran on, falchion in hand.
As the smith's shop came into sight, she called out, "Leesil!" not caring whom she woke up.
The front door was closed. She pounded on it.
"Leesil! Brenden?"
No one answered, and she tried to open it. The door was unlocked.
Magiere shoved it open and stepped inside, but there was no one at home in the small one-room cottage. Maybe Leesil and Brenden hadn't gone directly to the blacksmith's house. What if Leesil had tried to cheer his friend by hunting up a late game of cards somewhere else?
Yes, she comforted herself. Leesil had taken Brenden somewhere else, and they were probably both sitting in some decrepit little inn playing faro. But her hopes were hysterical attempts to create personal security, and she knew it. Aunt Bieja always said, "We mustn't worry until we have something to be worried about."
No, Leesil had said he wouldn't be long.
When she walked past the back window, a flash of white caught her eye. She turned and saw Brenden's shirt. He was lying near the woodpile, not far from the fading stains of Eliza's blood.
"No!"
She rushed out the back door and into the yard, dropping to the ground at the blacksmith's side. His flesh was alabaster, contrasting with the dark red of his torn throat. She crouched down in front of him. His expression was not horrible, but more peaceful than any she'd ever seen on his face. Bright red hair stood out starkly against wan skin.
There was little blood on the ground, as whatever had ripped his throat open had carefully consumed every drop. She tried to let the sight sink in, to allow it inside where she could properly absorb and deal with it. But she couldn't.
Brenden was the only truly brave member of this town, the only one to help her and Leesil. And what had his bravery purchased? What did standing by them bring him? It had brought him death.
She reached out with her free hand and touched his beard. Her hand moved down to his throat, where her fingertips pressed against the side as if to feel the blood pumping. Nothing. She already knew he was dead, and her actions futile, but now she was one of the desperate, and she was paying a price.
Magiere remembered him standing in front of the tavern door that morning, blocking Ellinwood's entrance, protecting her home.
"I'm sorry," she whispered to him. "I'm so sorry for everything."
Welstiel was right. She should have made sure. She should have searched for the bodies and never stopped until she made sure those vampires were truly dead. She had let Leesil and Brenden just walk out into the night air. This was her fault.
She dropped her falchion and gripped her own knees, rocking back and forth. It was too much.
Too much.
In the distance, an eerie keening wail broke through her inaction.
Magiere grabbed her falchion off the ground and ran out into the street near the front of Brenden's stables and forge.
Chap's cry sounded out again. Chap was hunting.
"Leesil."
Chapter Seventeen
After Leesil left Brenden, he started for The Sea Lion, then changed his mind. Sounds of the sea called him, and he wanted a bit more time to himself before going home, so he walked toward Miiska's waterfront instead of taking the streets back to the tavern.
Pity for Brenden occupied his thoughts, but he was also troubled by the realization that he wanted to tell his friend the truth-well, maybe not the entire truth, just the part about how he and Magiere had earned a living for several years. How would Brenden react when he realized he'd risked his life hunting undeads with two people who probably knew less about it than he did?
Then again, they had been successful and everyone in their group survived. Perhaps the truth didn't matter.
Before him, gravelly sand and water stretched up along the forested shore and to the docks farther down. The sea lapping gently in and out on the beach was strangely comforting in moonlight.
Leesil tried to push aside any troubles that did not require immediate attention and focus on the moment at hand. Of course, some memories, old and deep, haunted him no matter what, but tonight the beach was peaceful, Magiere was alive, and Brenden might finally be able to mourn and someday recover from the loss of his sister. And Chap was on the mend. What more could he ask of life?
He strolled down the shoreline at a steady pace, and soon he found himself thinking about the tavern roof and getting an advance from Magiere for some new clothes. She needed some as well. Had she mentioned something about already ordering a new shirt? Maybe she had. Magiere.
He tried hard not to think of the previous night, and found himself testing the bandage around his wrist. He felt the lingering ghost of her lips and teeth on his arm.
Leesil shook himself. It wasn't bad enough that the whole event had been macabre and grotesque-it was somehow alluring. Or perhaps that was just because of her and not what had happened, what he'd been forced to do not to lose her.