Blood in Her Veins (Nineteen Stories From the World of Jane Yellowrock)(16)
Loriann studied the tarot placement for a while, while Rick tried to read something—anything—in the cards. “Animals,” Loriann muttered. “Vampires. Change everywhere.” And then, “Ahhh. I see.”
“Well, I don’t.”
She gathered up the cards and put them away, then brought her needles and tattooing equipment closer. “Your future is both set and undecided. There are two moments when you will be allowed to choose, and both moments will change the course of your future. One is now, with the tattoo and the blood I’ll use to bind you to Isleen. You may choose canines, equines, or felines. Which do you desire?”
He almost said horses, but the word that came from his mouth was “Cats.” He stopped, surprised, because he detested his sisters’ cats, and preferred dogs and horses. He shook that away and asked, “But why me? Isleen said something about revenge on Katarina Fonteneau. Is that Katie of Katie’s Ladies?”
Loriann nodded. “Katie did something bad to Isleen a long time ago. I’m not sure what. But she can use this spell to get back at her through your bloodline.”
“How?”
Loriann looked at him in true surprise. “Because Katie is your mother’s great-great-something-or-other-grandma.”
“N—” Rick started to disagree and stopped.
The memories of some weird things returned. Money for his education, deposited into his account, a gift from a distant cousin. His sister’s medical bills for leukemia, the huge ones not covered by insurance. They had amounted to nearly four hundred thousand dollars. Paid in full by that same distant cousin. His mother disappearing on Christmas Eve every year for an entire night. The strange French-accented voice on the phone several times, calling for his mother. At night. Always and only at night.
Son of a bitch. He was related to one of the city’s most powerful vampires. And the cops had sent him in undercover to find out about her—
“I can tell you don’t have tats,” Loriann said, drawing him back from his past. He turned his face to hers, trying to hide his shock. She shoved her hair behind an ear and almost smiled. Her eyes flickered down his body and back up, lingering at the V of his legs before she returned to her work. “This may hurt.”
The first needle pierced his skin.
? ? ?
At dawn, Loriann put away her torture implements. Rick was sweating, shaking with the continual pain. He had no idea how people could go through this over and over, getting full-sleeve tats, tats on their necks and throats. Under their arms, on their privates, on sensitive, tender skin.
Loriann sighed, and he felt fatigue move through her and into his own skin, a shared exhaustion. Over the course of the night, he had become deeply aware of the little witch, pain bringing them close, making him conscious of her breath, alert to the slightest shift of her posture and position, sensitive to her ever-changing emotions, responsive to her intense concentration. It was as if they were two parts of one creature, sharing energy, breath, and his pain—one part administering pain, the other part enduring it. His blood had sealed the deal, trickling several times across his shoulder to the stone beneath him.
He shuddered as his tormentor unclasped the shackles on his right arm. She stepped to his left arm and unclasped that restraint as well.
He tightened his muscles as he had done over and over in the night to relieve the pain of immobility, contracting and releasing. He dragged his numb arms up and shoved his elbows under him. Groaning, he forced himself upward, reclining on his elbows and forearms. Loriann moved clockwise through the dim dawn to his legs.
“I’m going to let you relieve yourself now,” she said softly. “Eat something. Drink. Shower off.”
“Clean up my blood on the stone?” he said, mocking.
“No,” she whispered. “It stays.”
He understood. It was part of the sacrifice.
She clicked his left leg shackle loose. He didn’t tense. He didn’t let his breathing hitch, knowing that somehow, through the bond established during the night of pain, she would expect what he planned. In a moment he could get away. Disable Loriann. Get to the city’s vampire headquarters. Tell the blood-servants what was going on. Get help for the kid, Jason. But no matter what, no way was he lying down again on the black stone.
The shackle fell from his left leg with a heavy clank. The witch moved to his right leg. He couldn’t feel sensation beyond agony in his limbs, but he forced the toes of both feet to wiggle, and he could see them move in the slowly brightening light. He closed his eyes and breathed in. Brought up his free leg. Tried not to tense in preparation for a lunge.
A click sounded, different from the other sounds. He opened his eyes, looked down. And cursed. With a clumsy roll, he rose and stumbled across the barn. Was brought up short. He tumbled to the dusty floor. Loriann had attached a shackle to his right ankle and had run a chain from that to one of the rings in the black stone. The chain was less than ten feet long.
Lying in the dust of the stable floor, Rick started to laugh, the sound hollow and echoing. The peals sounded half-mad. And he couldn’t stop.
He rolled to his back and held out his leg, shaking it, the chain’s heavy links tinkling low. If he had an axe, he could try to cut through it. Or he could cut off his foot. And bleed to death getting to help. Of course, if he had an axe, he could kill Isleen . . . and thereby kill Loriann’s seven-year-old brother, Jason. Rick was as trapped as Loriann was.