This had been a good place to retreat to when the rest of the world grew to be too much, a good place to find at least a measure of solitude and quiet whenever she could find time to attend to her research and studies.
She supposed it had been as much a home as anywhere else had been, and it had been far better than most. She had made peace with the shy winged creatures that lived at the top of the redwoods. She set wards around the forest and refused to let anyone hunt them. In return, presents were sometimes left on her window ledge, a black iridescent feather, a perfect sea-shell, or a gold-veined rock, or sometimes a handful of tart red berries on a leaf, and once, there had been a string of strangely carved wooden beads.
The place had not changed, but what peace she had managed to find here had fled, and she missed it. She missed it badly.
All that it had taken to wreck it was the presence of one insouciant Wyr, a strange and ancient creature who, at his heart, was a compassionate man.
She caught movement out of the corner of her eye and her attention shifted.
Rune strode out in the champagne and ivory night. As she watched, he turned toward the cliff and started to run. With each powerful thrust of his long legs, he kicked to an astonishing speed, his vigorous wide-shouldered body moving faster and faster as he approached land’s end. Then he sprang like the great cat he was, landed in a crouch on top of the stone wall at the edge of the cliff, and leaped into the air, his arms spread wide, his athletic body thrown into a perfect diver’s pose.
As he soared into the air, he changed. Enormous wings flared into existence. Moonlight glimmered on his broad-muscled back as his body turned feline. Colossal paws tipped the columns of his four legs. The strong length of his neck and head became the pure sharp arc of an eagle’s, with a wicked, razor-hooked beak that had to be as long as her forearm and a great fierce raptor’s gaze. In the full light of the desert day, he had shone hot with color, copper and gold. In the light of the witch’s moon, his colors were darker and sharper, bronze tipped with the palest silvery edge.
Humans were not meant to bear the weight of immortality. Each Vampyre had to find her own way of coping with great age or eventually go mad. In the end, the best way to survive the endless onslaught of event as it turned into memory was to compartmentalize. Carling had countless closed doors in the corridors in her mind, doors that were shut against all the grinding relentlessness of the past. Those closed doors had, inevitably, become barriers to other things as well.
As Rune took flight, all the many thousands of doors in all the corridors in her mind opened and opened and opened, until she stood in solitude, utterly naked, and felt as she had as a child.
Rune was one of the oldest mysteries of the earth. His existence predated language itself. She watched him soar against the starry backdrop of the champagne moon, and just as the long-ago child Khepri had, she felt her soul leave her body all over again.
When ten minutes became longer than a half hour, she stopped waiting and became busy with other things.
The books screamed as she burned them. The screeching sound they made clawed at the inside of her skull.
She was braced for it. She had made Rhoswen swear to not leave the main house. That had been a fierce argument she hadn’t seen coming, and really, she had grown too tired of how everything had become such a struggle. That was going to have to change.
Then she had spelled a circle of protection in her cottage with salt around the fireplace. She stuffed her ears with wax softened with myrrh and smudged with sweetgrass and white sage, and she wore leather gloves that were also spelled so that no magic, dark or light, could cling to them.
The task was still a noxious, exhausting business, and one that she had put off doing for far too long. It was just as well she did not need to breathe. The fumes from the fire were toxic. She was soot-streaked and cranky by the time the book-burning was over.
Rune had made an excellent point. She had to think with a robustness that would help her fight to live. She must also act as if she were about to die. The black magic books were too dangerous to leave without a guardian, and she didn’t trust anyone else enough to keep them without eventually giving in to the temptation to use them.
If she did nothing, sooner or later their magic would eat through the bindings she had carved into the cabinet. Either that or some damn fool would find a way to get to them. There was always some damn fool who thought he was strong enough to handle using black magic without letting it suck him in. Hubris, cruelty, greed and stupidity. They were the reasons why black magic had survived for so long. Dark Powers dined on those qualities as though they were the finest hors d’oeuvres.
She had built the fire with cedar for more purification, and she stoked it with Power so it burned unnaturally hot and fast. When the last of the books had crumbled to ash, she stripped off her caftan and the gloves and threw them into the fire as well. Then she took the pitchers of water she had set out under the witch’s moon. She poured one pitcher of the moon-filled water over the ashes, so they were purified three times over, by salt, and fire, and water.
Finally done, she took the other two pitchers into the cottage’s bathroom. She washed away the soot from her hair and body with handfuls of soft soap she had made for just such an occasion, with eucalyptus, frankincense and lavender. She emerged from the bathroom wearing a clean cotton caftan and smelling rather pungent, but at least her skin was clear of any hint of lingering dark magic.
After checking the soggy ashes one last time, she left the cottage open so that it could air out and walked back to the main house.
The night had almost passed. Predawn was lightening the sky in the east. In the kitchen, she found Rasputin sound asleep on a cushion and Rhoswen drinking bloodwine. There was no sign of Rune, but then she hadn’t expected any. He would have known better than to interrupt her as she burned the books, but if he had returned, he would have been waiting just outside the cottage.
She left the kitchen door open as well. Cool, fresh air wafted into the house as she sat at the table. A sleepy Rasputin roused and puttered over to lie across her bare feet. She picked him up, and he curled on her lap with a grunt, tucking his narrow nose under his fluffy tail.
Then she smiled at Rhoswen and said, “You have given me more than I have ever had the right to ask, and far more than I ever expected. Thank you for your devotion, and for everything you’ve done. I need you to do one more thing.”
“Of course,” Rhoswen said.
“I need you to take Rasputin and go back to San Francisco. I know you don’t like to take care of him, so I want you to hire someone out of the household account. Make sure they pass all the required security checks, they get along with the rest of the staff, and they are available to stay in the town house. Then you are going to figure out what you want to do with the rest of your life.”
“No,” Rhoswen said. Tears sprang to her eyes.
“You should take your time,” Carling said quietly. “I know what a big lifestyle change this will be for you. I have told Duncan to set up an account with plenty of money. He should have it ready by now.”
“I won’t go.”
“Yes you will,” Carling said. She kept her eyes and voice gentle and yet adamant. “It’s past time, Rhoswen. You have not been happy for quite a while, and I have been selfish and let you stay with me for too long.”