Bloodleaf (Bloodleaf 1)

Zan’s expression changed, noticing something other than his book for the first time since his arrival. “What’s the matter with you?”

Kate pulled up a chair behind me and made me sit. “She’s not feeling well today.”

“No,” I said tiredly. “What you want me to do? The answer is no.”

“It might be our only option, Emilie. I don’t want to see anyone die.”

“Neither do I, so . . .”

“Think about it, Emilie.” He was in earnest now. “There’s at least one documented high mage whose ability was to see death before it happened. Aren.”

“Lot of good it did her,” Nathaniel muttered. “Wasn’t very good at seeing her own, was she?”

Zan pulled something from his pocket and laid it in the center fold of the magic book: a spring of bloodleaf vine. Droplets of red sap leaked from the cut stem, staining the pages it rested on. “We have a piece of Aren right here, do we not? We can use it to call her back from the spectral plane and let Emilie ask her who will be sacrificed as the maid. If we know who the girl is, we can get to her first. We may even be able to use her to lure him to us.”

“You want to use some poor girl as bait?” Kate asked, incredulous.

“Feel free to chime in if you have any better ideas.”

I sat in silence, considering. I’d broken whatever bond existed between myself and the Harbinger. I’d cast her away. And now Zan wanted me to call her back. To deliberately subject myself to one of her terrible visions. The thought turned my stomach.

“You don’t know what you’re asking,” I said softly, tracing with my fingertip the pattern of ruby-colored veins in the leaf.

“I’m asking you to just . . . try.” He cocked his head. “You really don’t look well. Worse than when I first met you, if that’s even possible.”

“All the more reason for you to leave her alone. She needs to eat, to rest . . .” Kate had him by the shirtsleeve, dragging him toward the door. “This can wait.”

“No, he’s right,” I said, closing my eyes and thinking of Falada. “It can’t wait. I have to at least try.”

“Dim the lights,” Zan said, hurrying before I could change my mind. “Cover the windows.” He pulled every candle he could find from around the room and placed them into a haphazard collection at the center of the table. Then he struck a match, leaning in to touch it to each candlewick in turn. “Well, then,” he said as the matchstick burned down to his fingertips, “let’s get to it. Time to summon a queen.”

The instructions seemed pretty straigh

tforward. We were to all sit around the table, our hands clasped, while one of us—?Zan—?chalked the triquetra in the center of the table. “Each one of these points represents a plane from which mages draw their power.” He touched each point in turn. “The spiritual, material, and spectral planes. Over each of these planes rules a deified iteration of the human life cycle: the maid, the mother, and the crone.”

I looked up at him in surprise. I’d never heard this kind of lore; in Renalt the only deity we acknowledged was the Empyrea, ruler of the skies and souls. She would undoubtedly be the maidenly mascot of the spiritual plane, but what of the other two? I didn’t have time to ponder; Zan was already moving on to the next phase of the séance.

“It is to the spectral plane that we wish to speak,” he said, addressing the air. From across the table he gave me a nod.

I released Nathaniel and Kate’s hands and took up the bowl in front of me, the sprig of bloodleaf waiting at the bottom. With a quick flick, I drew the barest amount of blood. The temperature in the room dropped instantly.

Zan, Nathaniel, and Kate exchanged glances.

“You can feel that?” I asked. Kate nodded, her breath white in the air. My ears had started ringing, just like they had during the bloodcloth ceremony.

“The words,” Zan whispered. “You have to say them.”

I gulped and let my blood drip onto the leaves of the bloodleaf, which seemed to curl around the drops and cradle them for a moment before they disappeared into the veiny surface, completely absorbed. The ringing in my ears intensified.

I read the script Zan gave me, my words barely a whisper. “Oh Aren! Spirit of the spectral plane, queen in life, and favored of the Empyrea, we summon thee.” Then I repeated it in the old lang-uage: “O Aren! Spiritu Dei spectris planum, regina, in vita. Favorite de empyrea, ut vocarent te.”

Please, Aren, I silently begged as shadows began to collect in the corners and an unnerving, scratchy whisper began to crawl into my ears, come quickly. Then I lit the contents of the bowl on fire. The bloodleaf seemed to hiss as it burned.

The shapes were growing larger and larger, amalgamations of darkness that were not human, not animal, not grass or rock or tree . . . they did not feel like spirits that had lived and passed on. Nor did they feel like death—?they felt like whatever it was that cowered in death’s darkest shadow.

“Emilie?” Zan was saying. “Are you doing this?”

The table was rocking violently beneath our clasped hands.