The Unfinished Song - Book 6: Blood Read online

  Blood

  The Unfinished Song, Book Six

  Tara Maya

  Copyright Misque Press 2013

  Published by Misque Press

  Copyright © 2013 by Tara Maya

  Cover Design by Tara Maya

  Misque

  Misque Press

  First North American Edition

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real

  persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Also by Tara Maya:

  Conmergence

  The Painted World, Stories, Vol. 1

  Tomorrow We Dance

  The Unfinished Song:

  Initiate

  Taboo

  Sacrifice

  Root

  Wing

  Blood

  Mask (forthcoming)

  Table of Contents

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One – To Get Over a Mountain

  Chapter Two – Your Worst Enemy

  Chapter Three – At the Point of a Spear

  Chapter Four – What Was Lost

  Chapter Five – What Remains

  Chapter Six – Beyond This River

  Chapter Seven – Unwoven

  Epilogue

  Contact Me

  Glossary

  Excerpts

  Prologue

  Dindi (Two Years Ago – in Yellow Bear)

  Dindi landed hard, though a cushion of dry pine needles saved her from broken bones. Through a ring of lofty sequoia, she could see a glimpse of bright blue. She bit through the honeycomb Kavio had given her to protect her teeth. For a moment, she sucked the sweet wax, but its shape had been ruined by Kavio’s last blow, and she had to spit it out. She rubbed her jaw as she rebounded to her feet. Her shins were scraped bloody, and her left elbow throbbed. Ever since Kavio had started training her in Red, war dancing, she had been collecting bruises at an alarming rate.

  The two of them were alone in the woods—unless one counted the sylfins perched in tree branches or the pixies cuddled in crocus buds, who watched and giggled—since their practices must be secret.

  “Pathetic, Dindi,” Kavio scoffed. “You’re fighting like a girl.”

  “What does that even mean?” she demanded. “Or is it just something boys say to feel superior to girls?”

  “It means you don’t take yourself or your opponent seriously.”

  “I take myself seriously…”

  “No you don’t. You think of yourself the way a girl is reared to think of herself. Like a pretty pony in a field of flowers, a cuddly bunny rabbit, a doe frolicking in the woods. Like you need to play nice, nuzzle up to the rest of the herd. You need to think like a carnivore. Don’t nibble at me. Eat meat. You have to win your Shining Name. You have to think like a hero. Stop trying to be nice.”

  “Heroes are nice…”

  “Heroes are good; they aren’t nice. Why are you standing there? Strike again!”

  She waved her staff in his direction, not connecting with anything but air.

  “Muck it all, Dindi, you did it again.” He smacked her hard with the stave, knocking her to the ground. “Stop treating me with disrespect! That’s your second problem. You don’t respect your enemy!”

  “I do!”

  “Who is your enemy?”

  “Right now, I’m fighting you, but…”

  “Who is your enemy?”

  “The person I’m fighting!”

  “Wrong!” Kavio cut down with his staff.

  “You can’t talk things out.”

  Slash.

  “You can’t make nice.”

  Slash.

  “You can’t compromise.”

  Slash.

  “You never fight a person.”

  Slash.

  “You fight a monster.”

  Slash.

  “And if you’re going to win, you better be the bigger monster.”

  He was beating her back relentlessly. She kept ducking and backing away, but it was getting harder to dodge.

  “Stop.” Slash. “Holding.” Slash. “Your blows!”

  She smacked her staff forward, and the end of the pole slammed into Kavio’s solar plexus. He flew across the dirt clearing and landed on his back.

  He didn’t move.

  “Kavio!” she screamed, running to him.

  He sat up, wincing. “That,” he said, “Showed respect. Do it again. And again. Until it’s instinct: always kill the monster.”

  Dindi (Present – Beneath Orangehorn Mountain)

  Dindi touched her lips. Kavio was dead, yet she had kissed him. Or kissed the monster who slew him…. She glanced at Umbral. What would Kavio advise her to do now?

  Umbral had held her hand and guided her through the cave. The white limestone cavern was a large, uneven space, a mouth with a thousand teeth, stalactites and stalagmites gnashing toward each other with only a handbreadth between many of them. At the center of this forest of limestone, someone had polished flat ground from the jagged jaws of rock. Fourteen immense stalactites dangled like stone icicles from the ceiling in a perfect circle around the space. From six of these stalactites dangled cocoons the size of death jars, which bulged as if they held something heavy.

  Here, Dindi and Umbral had danced, and invoked the corncob doll. The Vision they shared was terrifying. The Bone Whistler intended to use human sacrifice to revive the Aelfae in the cocoons… and perhaps to resurrect the entire Aelfae race.

  The six cocoons began to hum. They blushed with light, soft and sweet at first, but growing sharper, brighter, spicier until the air was so bright it burned their tongues. They fell to the ground. The illumination subsided, but the cocoons still glowed eerie colors. A scratching sounded from within.

  Hands clawed at the webbing—from inside. Human forms ripped and tore their way free of the cocoons. The liberated beings were naked, three men and three women. Five of them uncurled wet wings from their backs and flapped them until the wings were full and dry.

  The Aelfae lived again.

  Chapter One

  To Get Over A Mountain

  Vessia (Generations Ago - During the War)

  Vessia smelled humans, and it wasn’t pretty.

  Mud crawlers, her people called them. An insult to good, clean mud. The human stench was closer to offal—a whiff of bad blood on top of damp fur and rancid corn. It soiled the wind even from here.

  She stood on a rocky outcrop overlooking the grassy fields of the canyon floor, her wings camouflaged like a moth, to blend with the mottled grays and browns. Human warriors filled the valley on both sides of the river with their campfires. This was no innocent sheep drover clan, wandering too far north. It was an army up from the Rainbow Labyrinth, sent to hunt Aelfae. Spells guarded the only pass into the canyon, yet the human Tavaedies had known the dance to remove the boulders in the path.

  Vessia crept back from the edge and rejoined the other seven Aelfae scouts. They camped inside a natural circle of huge stones, surrounded by trees that leaned over the stones to touch crowns, forming a canopy of branches. No trees grew inside the circle itself, but the ground was thick with wet, fallen leaves.

  “The humans are here,” she said. “I suggest no one take wing anytime soon.”

  “They can’t hit anything past their own noses with those spears,” scoffed Gwidan. He worked the string into his bow, testing the knots and the tautness with a few plucks. “If they ever figure out how to use my sweet device, then I’ll worry.”

  “I won’t worry even then,” said Xerpen. He stretched out on a log with his legs crossed at the ankle. Like all of them, he wore little over his splendid physique besides a dabbling of paint and leaves that would enable him to blend into the forest.

  “If you were the last Aelfae in Faearth, you still wouldn’t worry,” said Gwidan.

  “No, and why should I? One look at my handsome face, and they’d probably make me their chief.”

  “Go on then, show them your face. I’m eager to see an Aelfae become chief of the humans.”

  “Later maybe,” said Xerpen. “Right now I’m busy with a new song. I can’t seem to get the ending right.”

  He warbled a bit on his reed flute.

  A dark-haired beauty, Mrigana, sat near Gwidan, whittling arrows for him. Never much for chatter, Mrigana inclined her head, acknowledging the human threat and Vessia’s command. In contrast, Lothlo and Yastara nuzzled by the fire, so lost in mutual appreciation that Vessia wasn’t even sure they’d heard her.

  Hest tended a boar on a spit over the fire. “What if I fly in the other direction?”

  “It’s not worth the risk,” Vessia said. “I’m sure they have scouts, same as we do. There are probably humans combing these mountains as we speak.”

  “I really need some rosemary, and we have none.”

  “Seriously, Hest? Rosemary?”

  “This boar isn’t going to season itself, Vessia.”

  “I shall season it with song,” Xerpen said grandly. He began to sing, “Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme…”

  “Really not the same, Xerpen,” said Hest. “And, by the way, that is the dumbest song I’ve ever heard.”

  “I’m hurt.”

  “One of your worst. And that’s saying something.”

  Vessia said firmly, “No flying.”

  Hest sighed. “No rosemary.”

  One person was not
seated around the campfire, but Vessia had only to follow Gwidan’s disapproving glance to find the last member of their band. Xerpen touched him on the arm. “Play your bow, Gwidan, and I’ll sing.”

  Gwidan nodded. He added strings to his bow so he could pluck them. The beautiful, eerie sound echoed a fall of water over round stones. In his voice as rich and deep and sweet as cream, Xerpen began to sing an old song:

  To get over a mountain,

  go through it.

  To destroy your fear,

  go to it.

  To escape your worst enemy--

  keep him near.

  You can only find peace

  at the point of a spear.

  What was lost will be found

  in what remains.

  What is unwoven shall

  be regained.

  To receive the greatest gift,

  become the giver.

  To swim, keep your eye on the land

  beyond this river.

  Kia sat by herself with her back to one of the big rocks, almost out of sight of the others. She didn’t acknowledge Vessia’s approach until Vessia touched her shoulder.

  “I hate you,” said Kia.

  “Still having trouble?”

  “You can turn into anything you want,” said Kia. “A bird, a butterfly, a wolf, a cat. Why can’t I become anything? What’s wrong with me?”

  “There’s nothing wrong with you, Kia.”

  Kia kicked a bare foot at the wet leaf carpet. “It’s not just shapeshifting. What kind of Aelfae has no wings?” She lowered her voice to a whisper hoarse with pain. “I know what the others call me behind my back. ‘Kia the Human.’”

  Vessia had heard the cruel nickname. She squeezed Kia’s shoulder. “Nobody thinks you’re a human.”

  “Have you ever thought…what if I am?” Kia clutched Vessia’s hand as a drowning woman would grab a rope. “What if I were switched at birth or something? It happens.”

  “Kia, you’re being ridiculous. Lothlo is your father, and Yastara is your mother. I was there on the day of your birth, and, even now, I see the light of your parents’ auras flowing in you.”

  “I can’t see those threads.”

  “I do.”

  “I don’t even have six Chromas. All Aelfae have six Chromas. Only humans have less. Except me. The freak.”

  “You’re not a freak.”

  “The footprints all lead in that direction.”

  “And I’ve told you before, you do have six Chromas. Some of your colors are just…weak. It happens, even to Aelfae.”

  “Never to you. You’re the perfect Aelfae. Did I mention I hate you?”

  Vessia kissed her forehead. “Keep trying. Don’t force it.”

  “You do realize those two bits of advice are mutually incompatible, right?”

  Vessia laughed and would have retorted, but she saw a shadowy figure move among the rocks on the opposite side of the circle. Swiftly, bone blade already in her hand, she moved to intercept the silhouette.

  It was only Mrigana. A complex asymmetrical braid, sleek and black, cascaded down her right shoulder, decorated with purple nightshade blossoms. Like Gwidan, she wore a bow across her back.

  “A word?” Mrigana asked. She glanced back over her shoulder at the others gathered around the fire. “Apart.”

  Vessia moved closer and kept her voice low, as Mrigana had. “Share your worry; we’ll eat it together.”

  “This is not the first time the humans have found us.”

  Vessia had hunted down the same fear. Three times in as many decades, the humans had sent warriors to scour the Aelfae from their supposedly secret settlements.

  “Their hunters are good,” said Vessia.

  “Against our magic? Not that good,” said Mrigana. “And they showed no hesitation, no scouts, no testing party. They simply threw their whole army at us, all at once. As if they were sure we were here. They even knew the dance to part the rocks across the pass.”

  “You think there is a traitor.”

  Mrigana inclined her head.

  “It must be one of the Cursed,” said Vessia.

  Unfortunately, that was all the Aelfae these days, except the eight Uncursed who formed Vessia’s band. The human hex had spread like a disease, claiming more and more Aelfae every generation. The deaths of the young ones were the hardest to bear. Children were born only to wither and die before their parent’s eyes, little lives briefer than a blink. Other Cursed lived with the shadow for many turns of the seasons, seemingly hale, only to gradually wrinkle and wilt, as humans did, like a slowly rotting fruit. Vessia’s secret fear was the Curse that slipped in unseen and unsuspected; an Aelfae who took a spear to the chest, or a tumble down a cliff, might simply fail to rise again the next dawn. Without realizing it, they had been robbed of their faery immortality. Vessia had died many times, but always awakened the next morning. One day, she feared, she would not wake.

  The Cursed who knew their affliction became bitter, desperate. They did foolish things. It had become necessary to hide secrets from them, to protect them from themselves. This was why only the Eight Uncursed knew the dance to open the pass to the Hidden Canyon.

  Yet, somehow, humans had found their way in.

  Mrigana brooded over an accusation she would not hatch.

  “Surely, it could not be one of us,” Vessia argued against her unspoken words. “Why would any of the Uncursed betray the Aelfae?”

  “Why, indeed. If we learn that, we will learn who among us is the traitor.”

  “It’s not Kia,” Vessia said, this time arguing against her own doubt. “No matter what her troubles, she is no more human than you or I. She is Aelfae, and she is loyal.”

  Mrigana shrugged.

  “I refuse to start distrusting our own kind,” said Vessia. “Not without proof. If we bite ourselves, we do the humans’ job for them.”

  “We may be immortal,” said Mrigana. “But we don’t have forever to defeat the humans in this War. One day, our people will run out of places to hide.”

  “If that day comes, we will stand and fight.”

  “If that day comes, we will lose.”

  “Do you remember when we could see the future as well as the past? Before the humans came and wounded the world.”

  “Yes.”

  “You alone still have that gift.”

  “Less and less.”

  “Because Lady Death has stolen our future,” whispered Vessia. “You cannot see Aelfae in the future because we are not there.”

  Mrigana bowed her head. “All I see of the future are glimpses…and always of humans.”

  “There is something that might save our kind... but I was going to wait until our need was most dire to try it.”

  “Vessia, our need is most dire.”

  “Then I will announce it to everyone. Come.”

  Vessia walked back into the circle and clapped her hands three times. The chatter stopped; even Kia left the shadows and came forward. The Uncursed stood around her, and around the fire, in a rough circle, ready to talk, fight or dance, at her word.

  “I have found a way for us to travel the Faerie Circle again,” she told them. “To the future.”

  “See the future?” Yastara wrinkled her nose. “In the Looking Bowl?”

  Lothlo snorted. “That useless thing.”

  “No,” said Vessia. “We will not just see into the Circle. We will travel the Circle, as we used to be able to do, before humans wounded the world and stole our future as their own. We cannot go to the old places to join the Circle; the minions of Lady Death guard the Seven Sacred Places. We cannot join the Circle outside a Sacred Place; the Curse of Lady Death veils the magic from us. But this will help us forge a new path.”

  Vessia unfolded the cloth in which she had hidden her treasure, then raised it over her head for them all to behold.

  She held aloft an object the size of a sunflower, and made of woven reeds folded into six petals. Each petal was painted a different color: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple.

  “It’s a windwheel. When the petals spin, they paint a rainbow on the wind. It will dance on its own as long as sky kisses earth. We need only start the circle. It will send our Patterns into the future, and it will draw us back to our starting point. With it, we will weave our Patterns into the light of a future day. And then, hopefully, return with what we learn.”