Blood Winter (2 page)

“The couch is big enough for her and Beyul both.”

“You and Alexander are probably too loud and energetic for either beastie to sleep well if one of them tried to share the bed. But maybe they like to watch,” Tyler said, waggling his brows up and down. His knife still spun between his fingers.

Max flushed despite herself. She wasn’t used to having someone special in her life and in her bed. Ever since becoming a Shadowblade, she’d kept everyone at arm’s length, resorting to one-night stands to scratch her sexual itches. But then Alexander had come along and changed all that. Sort of. She was still trying to figure out how not to fall back into the habit of closing him out. During the days in bed, when she could float on the amazing feelings he awoke in her, things were just about perfect. But then nights came, and she had to deal with all her fears and knee-jerk patterns of shutting down rather than dealing with too many conflicting emotions. Alexander had a lot patience, but it was running out. After that—after that was something that was starting to give her nightmares.

“Maybe they do watch,” she said with a shrug. “’Course, I wouldn’t know. I keep busy, you know.”

“Which reminds me, where is the fair Alexander tonight?” Tyler glanced around at the other tables in the covenstead’s dining commons, where several other Shadowblades and Sunspears were eating. “You didn’t forget to unlock his handcuffs, did you?”

“No, just wore him out. Turned him into a puddle of satisfied man-goo.”

“Way too much information,” Tyler said, sitting back and making a face.

“You asked.”

“My mistake. Let’s change the subject. I don’t need to hear any more about your sex life. What’s the schedule for tonight?”

Max sipped her Ugly Juice before answering. Tyler was going to hate her answer. “I am leaving you in charge of the Blades for a while.”

He straightened, and his knife stopped spinning as he held it tight in his fingers. Like he was about to cut someone’s throat. “Why? Where are you going?”

“Well, that’s the fun part. I’m going to town.”

Tyler scowled. “Town? What for? Every idiot in Missoula has formed up into armies and gangs, and they’ve been fighting over food, gas, water, and territory. They don’t take to strangers. They shoot first and ask questions later. You know as well as I do that the last time we sent anyone into town, they barely got out in one piece. You can’t dodge a rifle bullet, and you won’t see it coming.” His words spilled out in a froth of worried anger.

Max kept her voice even. “The problem is, we have no idea what’s going on down there. Giselle wants me to find out.” She hesitated. “I’ll be fine. I’m not going to get hurt.”

“Right. That’s what Niko thought, and now he’s dead, along with how many others? I bet our indestructible angel friends thought the same thing, and where are they? Laid out in a stone vault like corpses, neither dead nor alive. It’s bullshit. We should stay the hell out of Missoula until they sort themselves out. When the dust settles, we can go find out what’s what. Most people think the only good witch is a dead witch—and the Change has only made them believe it more.”

She sighed quietly. Niko had been her best friend. Tyler’s, too. Losing him was beyond painful, and Tyler had reacted by being both wildly reckless with himself and more protective of everybody else. But Max wasn’t made to stay locked up safe; she was a weapon. She still had a job to do, and hiding in Horngate wouldn’t get it done. She told him as much.

“Then I’m going with you.”

She shook her head. “I’m taking Alexander. You’re staying here.”

He stared at her, his chin jutting. The Grim beside him rose and growled, her green eyes lighting with emerald sparks. Max wasn’t sure if the beast was threatening her, threatening him, or just generally commenting on the noise.

“You don’t trust me to have your back,” he said finally. “Is that it? You think I got Niko killed.”

“No,” she said emphatically, leaning forward and grabbing one of his hands. “Bad luck got Niko killed. Bad luck and bad magic.” She sat back, her fingers tapping restlessly. “Besides, Alexander was there, too. I don’t blame either one of you.”
I blame me.
“The fact is, I’m saving you from living hell. You really don’t want to come with me today.”

He didn’t give an inch. “Oh?”

She sighed. “Remember what you said about Kyle needing a keeper?” Max lifted her hand to her brow in a casual salute. “Head keeper reporting for duty.”

His lips slowly widened into a grin. “That
does
sound like a good time. Let me know when you’re ready to bury the body. I want to help.” Then he frowned. “He’s a liability in town. Why take him?”

“Oh, it gets better. Tory and Carrie Lydman are going, too.”

He goggled and shook his head. “Explain to me why you are taking a stupid witch and a pair of teenagers—one of whom is a bitch on wheels—into a war zone. Use small words. I’m feeling slow.”

“Because Giselle wants me to mingle and spy, and Kyle and the girls are about as close to ordinary people as you can get for Horngate. Add in that Tory and Carrie have been threatening to sneak off by themselves, and Giselle figures that they’ll get it out of their systems and be useful at the same time.”

“That’s insane. I can’t believe their parents agreed.”

“The girls are of age. And as crazy as it sounds, Giselle is right. We need intel on what’s going on in Missoula. Not knowing is like having a bomb in the backyard and just guessing when it will go off.”

Tyler rubbed his lips with his knuckles. “Kyle’s a loose cannon. He’s just as likely to chase butterflies into a hornet’s nest as help you.”

“I’ll handle him,” Max said. “Even if I have to club him over the head. But he’s good to have around, just in case. His magic could come in handy if we run into serious trouble.”

“Trouble? Tory and Carrie are nothing but trouble. You won’t be able to escape it,” Tyler scoffed.

“The girls are excited to help. They think it’s all a game. And since we’re going to start at the River Market, I’m sure they’re hoping to find a new pair of shoes or some makeup.” Max rolled her eyes. Teenage girls. Pre- or postapocalypse, their priorities never changed.

“Aren’t you ready yet? We’re all waiting for you.”

Max glanced up at the nineteen-year-old girl standing in the doorway, keeping her expression neutral. Tory was her niece—a walking tornado of hormones and emotion. As Tyler said, a bitch on wheels. She was stubborn, angry, resentful, and mouthy, and she had a knack for getting on Max’s last nerve.

She scanned Tory slowly from head to foot, taking in her fashionably ripped skinny jeans, her low-cut rhinestone-studded shirt revealing the top of her lacy bra and a healthy amount of cleavage, and a pair of spiked boots. Her golden hair hung loose to her waist and was curled and teased. Her full lips sparkled with gloss. She looked, in a word, sexy. Sexy as hell. Max glanced at Tyler. He stared with widening eyes, his mouth dropping open.

Men. They were so easy.

She looked back at Tory. “You know you aren’t going hooking on the Vegas Strip, right? You may want to tone it down. We’re trying
not
to attract a lot of attention.”

“You may be, but I’m not,” Tory said, jabbing her thumbs into her back pockets so her full breasts thrust out. Tyler nearly choked. “You want information. Boys see a hot body, and they do nothing but talk. Their brains drop to their dicks, and they get diarrhea of the mouth.”

Max couldn’t argue with that. If she needed proof, there was Tyler. She shook her head. “Your mother is going to love this. She’ll kick my ass.”

Tory tossed her hair. Her face was rounded and sweet. Camouflage. Max was pretty sure that at nineteen, the girl could chew up most people and spit them out without breaking a sweat.

“You know, the world doesn’t revolve around you,” Tory said.

“Are you sure, Buttercup?” Max drawled, clamping down on her irritation. “You want to go into town, but you’re not going anywhere without me. That pretty much means I’m the center of your universe tonight, doesn’t it?”

Tory’s cheeks flushed red, and her eyes snapped with fury. She dropped her hands to her sides, her fingers curling into fists. “Yeah? Well, you need my help, too—besides, once I talk Giselle into making me a Shadowblade, I’ll be able to do anything I want, whenever I want, just like you.”

Max met her niece’s gaze for a long moment and then glanced at Tyler. His body was chiseled in stone. She could feel his emotions flaring hot and wild. It had been just over a month since Niko had died, adding to the too-long tally of Shadowblades and Sunspears Horngate had lost since the Change—when the Guardians had flooded the world with magic. Both Max and Tyler knew that those supernatural warriors needed to be replaced in order to protect the covenstead, but the reality was too much to handle right now. The grief was still too raw.

Abruptly, Max swigged down the last of the Ugly Juice and stood. “Let’s go,” she said, and led Tory out of the dining commons. Spike trotted behind them.

Tory kept abreast of Max despite her aunt’s fury. It was actually impressive. Most humans cowered around an aroused Blade, much less a full Prime like herself. But then again, Tory was a burning ball of anger and resentment. Fear was a foreign concept to her.

Max slowed, reaching down to scratch Spike’s ears. “You ready to give up going out during the day?” she asked. “Because Shadowblades fry—literally—in the daylight.
Poof!
Burn to ash in a matter of seconds. Or Giselle could make you a Sunspear, but they have their own problems. The dark poisons them. Sometimes slowly, but within an hour or so if they don’t get inside.”

“You just don’t want to give me the chance to be like you,” Tory said, stepping in front of Max with her hands on her hips. “You still hate Giselle for turning you, and you think just because you don’t want to be a Shadowblade, nobody else will, either.”

Max considered the accusation. Six months ago, there might have been some truth to it. But things had changed. Max had changed. She no longer resented being turned. She liked what she was. It allowed her to protect the people she cared about.

Except for Niko.

A worm of grief wriggled through her heart. At least she could protect them better than if she were still human. And if Tory were turned, the girl could at least protect herself. Still, Max doubted she had the slightest clue what being a Shadowblade really entailed.

“You won’t be able to have kids,” she said. “So you’ll want to think about having one before you’re turned. You have to eat a minimum of twenty thousand calories a day, more if you get into a battle or have to run thirty or forty miles or toss around a few cars. That’s not so easy with food getting scarcer. You’ll have healing spells, but you’ll need them. You’ll end up hurt a lot, and I’m not talking hangnails. Broken bones are easy, but you’ll get shot, knifed, burned, mauled, shredded—all in a day’s work. That will happen with depressing regularity for your entire life.

“The healing spells won’t help with the pain. That’s all yours. Let’s hope you have a high tolerance. You won’t age, as you can tell.” Max gestured at herself. At fifty years old, she still looked the way she did when she was twenty-one. She looked more like Tory’s sister than her aunt. “That means you probably shouldn’t fall in love with any ordinary humans. They’ll age and die long before you do. Then there’s the binding. Most witches bind their Blades and Spears. There are some good reasons for that—Giselle will know when you’ve been hurt, she’ll be able to summon you when she needs you, and she can help you heal faster through the binding. On the other hand, you won’t be able to ever get away from her, and you’ll be stuck serving her unless she releases you. Or you die. That works, too.”

“You’re trying to talk me out of it,” Tory said. “It’s not going to work.”

Max shook her head. “That’s not it at all, Buttercup. Giselle got me drunk and asked if I wanted to be superstrong, never age, never get sick, all that sort of thing. I said sure—who wouldn’t say yes? But I thought it was all a joke. Next thing I knew, it was months later, and I was a Shadowblade, chained to serve her. I was a slave. Things might have been different if I’d really been willing. I just figure you ought to make an informed decision.”

Tory sniffed and pushed her hair behind her ears. “Don’t call me Buttercup. I know what I’m doing. But Giselle says she’s not going to do it. I know why, too. It’s
you
. She doesn’t want to piss you off, for some reason.” Despite the defiant edge to Tory’s voice, Max could tell the girl was thinking about what she’d said.

“I’m not going to stop you. Turns out I’m pretty happy being a Shadowblade.”

“So you’ll talk to Giselle?” Tory’s expression suddenly glowed with passionate hope, the kind only the young and naive can really feel.

“Sure. But don’t be in a hurry. You’ve got to wait until you’re twenty-one.”

Tory’s joyous triumph collapsed. “What? Why?”

Max shrugged. “It’s a magic number.”

“But people don’t
have
to be exactly twenty-one, right? Alexander was twenty-five when he was made.”

Max’s brows rose. How the hell did Tory know that? She swallowed her curiosity and the sharp jab of jealousy that accompanied it. It wasn’t like Alexander didn’t have a right to tell people about his life. “He was turned more than a hundred years ago by a flesh witch. Maybe she didn’t care about the numbers. Giselle does.”

“Couldn’t Uncle Kyle do it if Giselle won’t?”

“Only if he wanted to be banished from Horngate—or killed. Giselle won’t tolerate anyone stepping on her toes.”

“
Killed?
” Tory repeated, her eyes widening.

“Yep. Oh, that’s another thing about being a Shadowblade, Buttercup. You’ll be killing things. Maybe people, maybe creatures, but you’ll be spilling a lot of blood. Sometimes you’ll use weapons, sometimes you’ll kill bare-handed. Get used to the idea. That’s a major part of the job. If you want, I could take you out hunting to see how you do with that.”

Tory swallowed and didn’t answer. Instead, she spun around and started up the corridor in silence. Max fell in beside her.