© 2014 Gem Sivad LLC. All rights reserved. Blood Stoned, A Jinx story
Chapter Seven
Wincing, I squatted next to the glowing embers and used a stick to stir flames into life. I needed coffee.
The fixings were stacked next to the campfire and I helped myself to beans and the grinder. After I’d set the brew to perk, I chose a spot on the log close to the blaze so I could inspect my foot.
The thistle had embedded itself beneath two layers of skin, and I had to dig it out. I squinted at the pesky thorn once I had it in hand. Hard to believe such a little thing could cause such discomfort.
I reached for my handkerchief to blot away the trickle of red oozing from the hole in the bottom of my foot. Searching for the scrap of cloth, my bloodstained fingers brushed across the rock in my pocket. Startled, I felt the bloodstone pulse with life.
“Ahhh, you’re hungry,” I murmured, wondering if anyone’s blood would do or if mine alone fed the magic in the stone.
Curious to see what would happen, I touched the rock to my foot. A white light emanated from the torn flesh, cleansing and sealing it.
If I hadn’t been concerned about my earlier nightmare, I would have enjoyed testing the limits of my new acquisition to get the answers to some of those questions.Was my proximity to the rock the reason my knees had healed? I’d hoped that I’d suddenly developed the ability to fix myself. I had no answers, only questions.
I wondered how often I could draw on the power in the stone. And could I store only a certain amount of magic, or would it hold an infinite amount? I seriously doubted the latter since apparently it had been drained earlier.
But most of all, I needed to know if I could use this as an amulet to enhance my magic. Would it be an external source I could always use to boost my healing talent?
Please don’t let it be like my current gift, with a will of its own. I stared at it glumly, contemplating that possibility. I didn’t know the answer to any of the questions and had no time to experiment to find out. I tucked it back in my pocket for later inspection and turned to the real issue to be considered.
I needed to think. Aside from the bossy jaguar prowling beside me in my dream, I felt quite certain something else had been stalking me. I struggled to remember the first part, frowning at the dark sky above.
Something had been calling me. I shuddered, mentally distancing myself from the hypnotic lure I’d felt. If it hadn’t been for Hunter…
The thought of Hunter made me look around, wondering why he’d left me alone so long. For that matter, the entire camp wore a blanket of silence. The night critters had quieted and the flying insects were gone.
Everything and everyone was asleep—except for me. Suddenly, alarmed, I clutched the bloodstone and willed a mage light. A perfect ball of bright appeared and lit my way as I crossed to where Clarence stood tied to a tree. His eyes were closed and he swayed on his feet.
“Clarence,” I whispered, scratching him behind his ear. “Wake up.”
My horse responded by dropping his head lower as he settled deeper into sleep.
Am I still dreaming? Panicked I clutched the bloodstone in my fist and listened for signs of life. And there it was—the vibration in the air that made my stomach churn. And again I saw the vision from my dream of deadly bats flying from the railroad tunnel.
“Hunter,” I screamed. “Wake up!” Someone had set a sleep spell on the camp and even as I stumbled toward the tent where Hunter slept, death winged its way toward us.
~~~~~
They were a hunting pair. For a moment, the big male stopped to admire his female as she padded with feline grace across the desert landscape.
She stared at him over her shoulder, her green-eyed gaze urging him to catch up.
Tonight we will find prey and feast. Hunter stalked next to his mate, moving closer than necessary so he could rub his head against her golden pelt and enjoy her musky scent.
She turned on him, butted him roughly, and then slapped him with sharp claws across the nose. Confused and angered, he growled, flashing fangs with his warning. Instead of backing up, she lunged at him again.
“Wake up, wake up. Wherever you are, come back to me.”
If he was dreaming he never wanted to wake up.
~~~~~
“Please, please… I need your help,” Maggie begged, shaking him.
Hunter came alert, and the jaguar part of him left over from his dream, roared a challenge. His mate’s terror pulled him the rest of the way from the world of illusion.
“Blood sucking bats… Killed the fox… Drained Sullivan…” Maggie gasped out the first part but it was her final message that removed the final cobwebs from his brain.
“They’re coming.”
Without questioning how she knew what she knew, or why everyone in the camp was enthralled, he raced to warn the others. Wolf and Lynx were in their animal forms, both curled up and slumbering on the floor of the tent they shared. Hawk was perched outside in a tree, his head tucked under a wing. All were oblivious to the world and nothing he did roused them.
Bear and Coyote were gone from camp and Hunter wasted no time worrying about them.
“What are you doing?” he asked Maggie when she pulled a piece of chalk from her pocket and began tracing a circle on the ground.
“Drawing an ambit,” she told him without looking up from her task as she progressed around the sycamore tree. “I hope,” she muttered not for his ears, but he heard the doubt in her voice just the same.
Hunter carried the three beastmen into the circle and laid them next to the old horse.
“Hunter I don’t know if I can make this work. If it doesn’t, then you change to jaguar and get away.”
“Little witch, mates hunt together,” he growled. His rainha wanted to protect him. He chuffed, displaying disgust at the idea of running away, while his jaguar considered pouncing on the enemy from a hidden spot.
He hadn’t bothered putting on clothes when he’d hauled his unconscious friends to the circle, so when Hunter pulled Maggie into his arms, both beast and man enjoyed the feel of her against naked flesh.
She hugged him back, wrapping her arms around him and rubbing her face against his chest. He thought about lifting her in his arms and bounding away to safety. But then, she drew away from him to stare up at the sky.
“Do you hear that?”
He didn’t hear so much as feel the press of many wings as they vibrated in the air.
Nodding agreement, he nuzzled her cheek, stepped back, and changed. He would kill that which made his rainha tremble in fear.
Things happened quickly after that. The bats Maggie warned of became more than a vibration in the air as they swarmed closer.
Hunter refused to leave her side, and, as jaguar, stood next to her in the middle of the circle while she whispered a chant that made his fur stand on end and his whiskers burn.
“Mine,” she screamed and raised her arms. Blue light shot from the circle she’d drawn and shimmery walls climbed upward, merging in the center of the ring, creating a dome over them.
As soon as Maggie’s shield snapped in place, claiming the space inside the ring as her territory, Hunter’s friends jerked awake, and her horse raised his head, glaring suspiciously at the wolf, the lynx, and the hawk.
The bats arrived. Human or otherwise, no one in the circle was unafraid. Wings, eyes, and teeth blanketed the outside of the sphere and bats crawled and hopped over each other and across the top of the dome, looking for a way in.
“Hunter,” Maggie gasped when the air popped and blue sparks ignited. One of the bats was pushed through the protection ward by the weight of the others. Stunned, and unable to fly, it fell; before it hit the ground, Lynx snatched it from the air and ate it.
“Don’t anyone move,” she ordered them.
Hunter braced his body as Maggie sank her fingers into his pelt, clutching him. She held the bloodstone in the other hand, pointing it at the sphere as she continued to chant.
When the outside of the bubble turned a molten red and bats began bursting into flames, Hunter’s muscles bunched and he couldn’t repress his roar. Lynx snarled, Wolf howled, and Hawk changed into a man.
Hunter wanted to grab Maggie, leap through the ring of fire and carry her to safety. Instead, he stood on four paws leaning against his mate’s side. Inside the ambit she’d drawn, they were surrounded by a vortex of magic. Power rushed through her, pulling wild magic from him too.
Maggie’s chant stirred the air into a whirlwind and her hair drifted upward, becoming a tawny halo around her head. As her whispered incantation left her lips the wind caught the murmured plea and turned it into a thundering order. Hunter flattened his ears feeling the pressure as elemental forces gathered and filled the bubble.
The jaguar had no concept of how long he stood by his mate watching the inferno on the other side of the shimmering wall. Finally, at dawn, Maggie slumped to the ground and the shield fell.
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