The Ties that Bind
by Faith Hunter
Bedelia
The alarm on the outer perimeter dinged. Something had just crossed the basicwarningworking about fifty feet from the house. Bedelia finished pouring her nightly chamomile infusion and waited on the next set of alarms to see if it was the small herd of does that had been moving through the area at dusk. Or an owl. There were owls nesting nearby. One evening, just after the repairs to the house from the recent magical firebombing, the male owl attacked a rabbit exactly atop the middle warning and she nearly expired at the continuous clangor.
As she waited, she added honey to the chamomile infusion. Stirred. Sipped. Patient. Tired of the yard work mama had demanded all evening. She wanted lilies come summer, and the bulbs had to go just, “There, and there, and… no! Not there! Move ’em!”
Bedelia’s back hurt, but the yard looked great and—
The central ward dinged a distinctive set of soft notes, identifying the uninvited visitor who was approaching through the woods in back. Bedelia’s heart leaped. She frowned. Sipped again and calmed her heartrate. Once he was close enough, this particular visitor could hear her heart speed or slow and smell her reactions of any kind. And there was no way she would allow him that satisfaction.
But… Dear heavens, she had missed him.
She thought about slipping into the half bath and brushing her teeth before applying lipstick as she would have done forty years ago. Or even twenty years ago. But she was too old for that nonsense. Instead, Bedelia walked down the hallway and checked to see that her mother was deeply asleep. Mama was older than dirt—her description, not Bedelia’s—but she was still mentally sharp and agile, even at a hundred and two years of age, and her magic hadn’t waned at all. Mama was dangerous when riled, but she went to bed with the sun and rose at dawn, and once asleep, could sleep through hail and lightning storms, perimeter alarms going off, and even this visitor. But Mama had a particular distaste for this one and had no hesitation in telling him so. To keep the peace, and for a moment of privacy, Bedelia was glad mama was asleep, lying flat on her back and snoring at the ceiling.
Bedelia closed her mama’s door softly. She tried to pass it by but stopped in the half bath after all. She brushed her teeth and ran her hands through her short hair. Silver curls sprang up and caught the bright light. Her eyes were shining blue and had lost none of their beauty. But. She glanced down at herself and the comfy housedress and slippers. Too much cleavage showing. Crepey skin. She was so damn old and the extra weight…
Helikedthe extra weight. Always had.Damn it.
She slid off the old-lady slippers, took in her freshly painted toenails—red, his favorite color—damn it again. She sighed, called herself an old fool, and went to the back sliding doors. She stood, silhouetted by the bright kitchen lights, arms loose, body relaxed, and no expression on her face. She didn’t turn on the outside lights. Didn’t need to. She could see him outlined in the red glow that announced a vampire visitor, behind the middle ward of three, that one ahedge of thorns. He was watching her. He always watched her, any time they were near.
He had never been to this house. She had no idea he even knew where she lived now. His last visit was years ago, at her own home, before she had rented it out and moved in with her mama to take care of her. She had put up the exact same wards here as at her own home, and, clearly, he remembered the protocol of each. If he was here, after all this time and after what happened with her now-dead daughter, Evangelina, it wasn’t to chitchat. There must be some important reason.
A frisson of danger climbed up her spine on hooked spider feet.
Bedelia reached to the counter beside the glass doors, made a show of picking up her amulet necklace, and slid it over her head. The focal nestled between her breasts, a delicate faceted labradorite with a flash of red and purple. Bedelia was that rare breed of witch who could draw on multiple elements. She could use some stones, some types of wood, and plants. She could collect the power of strong air currents, and when the moon was high, could recharge any amulet with its power. She was dangerous. He knew it, but she wanted to remind him. She leaned a hip against the counter, picked up her cup of chamomile, and sipped. Waiting. Just in case that danger was behind Linc. Holding him prisoner and waiting for her to let down her guard.
Several minutes passed. She finished her tea. He did nothing, and the sense of danger increased.Enough, she thought, and turned to walk away. Lincoln Shaddock knocked politely on the ward. His special specific notes rang out. Those notes hadn’t rung through the air in years, not since the last time she ran him off, telling him she was too old and too tired to play vampire games.
Bedelia swiveled back to the slider doors, thinking, watching his body language. With one hand, she lifted her mixed-amulet necklace and pressed the bloodstone amulet between the thumb and forefinger of her left hand. Thehedgefell in a delicate sprinkling of sparks that looked like a rainbow of fireflies darting hither and thither. Her workings were always pretty, not just utilitarian like anyone could make. A pretty one took skill and power and patience to layer the energies just so. The lights of the fallinghedgedanced across Linc, brushing over him and bursting in a rich red color as they fell. That used to be her special welcome for him. She had never changed it. Linc’s eyes landed on her and she knew that not bothering to alter it had been a mistake.
He moved across the lawn to the house, long, lean, lanky, yet with a vampire’s grace and easy stride. No one followed him. Whatever the danger she was feeling, it wasn’t holding Lincoln Shaddock against his will.
She pressed the bloodstone again and the middle ward rose with another shower of sparks. She opened the slider door, touched the inner ward, and it fell. And Linc was standing there, on the back deck, his eyes on her. He smelled of barbeque, which was unusual for a vamp. They usually smelled of flowers and herbs and, more rarely, of old blood. Linc ran a BBQ restaurant and he often cooked the meat himself. Lincoln Shaddock was not the usual vampire
Linc
He stood silently in the trees, on the outside of the first ward. He knew to the inch how far back he needed to be to keep from setting it off. He knew because he had courted Bedelia Everhart. Once upon a time, he had crossed over her wards on a regular basis. Bee was a very powerful witch, but like most witches, who seldom altered the style of their magics, she had kept the positioning and manner of her wards the same, though they were much stronger now. It was much more painful than just decades ago, to be this close.
With a vampire’s eyesight, he watched through the distance and the trees as she made an infusion. At this time of night, it would be chamomile. She was wearing a rose-colored housedress and pretty pink slippers. She had gone gray in the last few years. He liked the color on her, yet his heart wrenched at the sight of it. Once she stopped sipping on his blood, she had begun to age at the rate of most witches. Barring an accident, she would still live to be over a hundred, but she would look it and feel it and she would die far too soon. And take what was left of his heart with her. She sipped her weeds and hot water. He missed the taste of that stuff on her mouth. He missed everything he had given up when she refused to allow him to continue to be a fool. When she had put her foot down. When she had walked away.
Lincoln Shaddock, Master of the City of Asheville, took his life in his hands and passed over the outer ward, striding close to the middle one. Thehedge of thorns. The Everhart witch family had been working on this ward for decades. This one was a doozie-and-a-half. It might fry him if he wasn’t careful. He felt it the moment the ward recognized an intruder. He stopped, watching her, waiting.
Bedelia sipped, put down her cup, and walked down a hallway and out of sight. Once upon a time, that had meant she was checking on her daughters. Now it meant she was checking on her mother. He waited. Eldercare was sacrosanct in blood-servants, so the human need to take care of the old ones, he understood.
When she returned, she was barefooted, and he saw that her toes were painted scarlet. Linc smiled into the dark, and then that smile faded as he wondered if she even remembered.
She picked up her cup and sipped again, staring right where he stood in the dark of a night with an unrisen moon. Witch magic told her where he stood. Her arms were loose, body was relaxed, but there was no expression on her face, no smile of welcome and joy. He watched her. Both of them waiting. Both of them knowing that him, being here, meant there was a passel of trouble somewhere already.
Bedelia reached to the counter beside her and picked up her amulet necklace. She slid it over her head. Bee always did have a gift for the dramatic gesture. This particular gesture reminded him that she was powerful. She was dangerous. And that she would not be trifled with. The focal nestled between her breasts, and a shot of desire raced through him like the taste of her blood.
She leaned a hip against the counter, picked up her cup, and sipped again. Waiting.
Ah. In case someone had forced me here,he thought. To this place and time.
He wasn’t certain what to do to assure her he was not hiding a threat in the trees behind him. What had he done that very first time? Something… His mind swept back. Had he brought her flowers?No. He had brought her caviar and smoked salmon and toast points. And a bag of movie theater popcorn.She had ignored the fancy food and eaten the popcorn.
