coming out of the top, the other black with silver twined around it. “This is my Pair-bond with Bastien—it’s a blood-bond, sex bond, love bond. We haven’t had a formal ceremony—like a wedding—the full binding—yet, though. We’re both a little nervous about that.”
Then she flipped open the short sheath and drew out the green stick shown on the tattoo. It looked like jade.
“It’s my baton—do you want to see it?” The offer was cheerfully made, but her gaze watchful.
As soon as Marian touched the cool jade, a hard shock jolted up her arm. She hung on as the energy—Alexa’s energy—whirled through her, then settled, itchy, under her skin. As she stared at the baton, carved figures appeared, and the flames at the end danced.
Alexa’s eyes widened and she nodded incisively. “Good. I thought you might be able to handle and use it. My husband, Bastien, can hold it for a couple of minutes, use it once, but that’s all. It’s good to know that you could wield it in an emergency.”
“What emergency?” Marian said faintly, her stomach tightening, watching mercury flow viscously in a glass tube under the flames.
“On the battlefield, if I fall,” Alexa said.
Marian dropped the baton. Alexa caught it—or rather, it flew into her hand. Marian stared at the woman, fit and strong, with the scar running down her cheek and somber eyes. Alexa heaved a sigh.
“I was afraid that they’d leave this to me. That miserable old man. But maybe you won’t be fighting. Many Circlets don’t.” She shrugged, but her voice was faintly condemning. “Let’s walk and talk.”
“I’m not staying here. I have a life back home.”
“Which is?”
“Boulder.”
“Ah.” Alexa’s smile was quick and charming, but she covered the ground rapidly. “Thought I pegged you for an academic.”
“I’m working on my doctorate in Comparative Religion and Philosophy,” Marian said stiffly.
Alexa halted in the small meadow. A couple of large rocks graced the center, looking like seats. She turned to Marian and tapped herself on the chest. “Swordmarshall Alexa Fitzwalter, Esquire, Attorney at Law.”
“You’re a lawyer?” It was the last thing Marian would have guessed.
“Was.” Alexa hitched herself up on one of the rocks and wiggled to get comfortable. “Nice seat, warm from the sun.” She smiled serenely at Marian. “Now I do all my fighting on a battlefield, not in a courtroom.” A shadow lingered in her eyes.
Marian wasn’t ready to hear her story. She had to make something else very clear, first.
“I’m not staying. I can’t. I have a life I must return to.”
Alexa lifted her chin. “I have a life I crafted here.”
“I have a brother with MS.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” Alexa held out her hand, and Marian took it—this time a sweet comfort flowed between them.
“It’s progressive regressive MS, so it comes and goes. I’m hoping to find a cure to take back. Maybe I can become Powerful enough to cure him with magic?”
Alexa just shook her head. “I’m not sure how healing magic works here. I’ve seen great wounds healed.” She grimaced. “But it usually takes more than one person and some serious spellchants. For a disease, I just don’t know.”
“My mother is back home, too,” Marian said. She ran her hands through her hair as she took the rock seat next to Alexa. It felt as if many had sat there before—to talk, to eat, to watch the stars at night.
They sat in silence for a moment before Alexa spoke. “I suppose you’ll return to Earth when the Snap comes, and stay. To be honest, I don’t know how much of our magic here will translate to magic there.” She waved a hand. “I never made it all the way back home during the Snap—”
“The Snap?” Marian asked.
“I’ll tell you about it later.”
Marian sighed. “All right.”
Alexa’s hazel eyes appeared greener. “I didn’t have any family at home, nothing much to go back to, not compared to what I have here.” She shrugged and her smile quirked. “Though a vision I saw indicated I’d become a federal judge if I went back.”
Marian didn’t doubt it. The woman was walking determination.
“I can’t stay,” Marian said. “I can’t leave my brother.”
“All right. But I’d better tell you what’s going on, anyway.”
“That’s a very good idea.”
9
“Let me tell you why you were Summoned,” Alexa said.
“As long as you don’t expect me to stay,” Marian cautioned.
“Too bad. Lladrana needs all the help it can get, and I can tell by your aura that you’d be a lot of help.” Alexa slipped from her rock to sit on the sun-warmed ground.
Marian did the same and tried not to think about bugs.
Her expression completely serious, Alexa said, “The fact is, Lladrana is in deep trouble. There are monsters invading from the north.” She shot Marian a glance. “I’m not talking about other people with differing belief systems, but real, live, evil monsters. The Lladranans usually call them ‘horrors.’”
Bossgond’s images of monsters came to Marian.
Alexa frowned. “Watch.” With a sharp indrawn breath and narrowed eyes, the air between them hazed. A huge, vicious-looking creature hulked into view. It had long, sharp teeth that dripped saliva. Curving, knifelike claws extended from its lifted forepaws.
“Render,” Alexa said. She kept the image up and rotated it, until Marian had to swallow hard.
The second monster was worse. Bigger even than the render, it had putrid yellow fur, horns and spines along its arms, head and back.
“Slayer. It can shoot the spines. They’re poisonous, of course.”
“Of course,” Marian said faintly, wondering if she was turning a shade of green.
The slayer vanished and a third horror appeared. Worse. This one had lizardlike gray skin, a round knobby head with burning red eyes and a hole for a nose. Each shoulder sported an arm and two tentacles with suction cups.
“Soul-sucker,” Alexa said. “But it really just drains your life-force.” She waved a hand.
Just? Marian thought she squeaked, but Alexa showed no evidence of hearing her.
The next horror that appeared metamorphosed between two shapes. A black weblike substance and a dark manlike thing with rudimentary head, arms and legs.
“It has a penis, too,” Alexa said unsteadily. “Sangvile. One tried to rape me as it sucked my Power from me.”
The thing turned its head and its burning gaze struck Marian like a blow.
This vision disappeared once quickly, as if Alexa didn’t like remembering it. Marian couldn’t think how anyone could survive an attempted rape by the hideous being.
“Dreeth,” Alexa said on a sigh, and something Marian recognized formed. At her exclamation, Alexa smiled.
“They look like pteradons, don’t they?” Alexa said.
“More like a quetzalcoatluses with big bellies.”
“Quetzalcoatlus. That sounds like the Aztec god.”
“Yes, they were the largest of the flying