19.6

Zyrdicia was in a grim mood by the time she at the Old Temple in Lyr. She stopped in a secret room inside the labyrinthine structure to dress. She needed to be outside, to walk in the city to clear her head and loosen stiff vertebrae.

She muttered an obscenity at an image of Zyr she passed as she exited the black edifice. She paused at the entrance. Perched on a hill in the center of the Old City, it commanded a magnificent view of the oceanside metropolis. The sun had just set. The dusk's last glow bathed the clouds on the horizon in a blood-colored hue. She inhaled the salty, urban smell of the breeze, enjoying the city's collective pulse.

She looked off in the direction of the Red Zone. The crimson, magical glow of the district's street lamps had just alighted. From the distance, she could make out the burnt out shell of the Cauldron, black and menacing against the evening sky. It was nothing but a ruin.

She leaned against the enormous pillar of the temple's entrance, trying to decide where to go. After a century of life here, she knew thousands of people. There was no one worth visiting. The people she poured her heart out to were mostly all gone. She was hardly in the mood to start sifting through acquaintances to rebuild the Inner Sanctum.

She started down the steps, resolving to go to the Harbor District. Portia was there, looking at business records. She had not spoken to Portia since the morning after the coronation. It would be good to reconnect.

Zyrdicia walked out toward the street, passing through the shadow-filled Temple Gardens. She paused at the vine-covered iron gate separating the gardens from the Temple's ancient graveyard. A red mound of roses in front of Magnus' family crypt caught her eye. She had put Magnus out of her mind, until now. She had never even said goodbye.

The crypt drew her like a magnet. She was not particularly looking forward to visiting Magnus' final resting place, but she needed to see him.

Magnus had been lain to rest, next to Arcus, his father. The gray, granite crypt structure a prominent position in the Old Temple graveyard. Since Zyrdicia deposed the Priests' theocracy, one normally had to have her personal permission to be buried in this particular graveyard. It was hers, after all. No one had asked her about Magnus, though. Despite the fact that she had been the cause of his death, in her absence, it was simply assumed that she would want him within the Temple grounds.

She secretly disliked this particular place of the dead. Too many friends were buried here from the old days. A whole generation had grown old and perished in her era in Lyr. This graveyard was filled with ghosts of dusty memories of her youth - friends who had aided her when she hunted Crusaders, friends who had helped her create the first Council, friends who had recreated the greatest city in the world from ruins when she liberated it from both theocrats and Philonian scourge. Coming here always made her feel nostalgic and lonely. Philip was the last of that generation, the last witness to that glorious, dynamic past. Before long, he would have a place here too.

As she wandered through the elaborate headstones in the shadow-filled space, she wondered idly how many more generations of spent companions she would see rest here. Someday she would run out of room for them all. She stopped at the door to Magnus' family's crypt. The entrance was literally knee-deep in roses.

"Oh, Magnus. Even in death your female admirers pursue you," Zyrdicia sighed, shaking her head softly as she stared at the mound of blooms. She had not expected to feel as sad coming here as she did. She had never felt guilty for killing anyone in her life. The one kill for which she bore no real responsibility now haunted her mysteriously.

She shoved the flowers aside so that she could open the door. She unlocked it with magic, then walked inside.

Her fingers trailed along Magnus' father's ebony sarcophagus. It did not seem that long ago that she had presided over his funeral. She whispered reverently, "Arcus, your passing never troubled me. You had the foresight to leave me your son to fill your place."

She stopped in front of the new, unfamiliar sarcophagus she knew would house Magnus' body. "You, however, abandoned me entirely!"

She bent to kiss the black, rune-covered stone container. She stared at it a long moment, then sighed deeply. "I miss you so much. I can't stand not having you around to talk to. I have to bring you back."

"You are such a selfish bitch! You would make me come back from the Underworld just because you are lonely. Fucking typical!"

The familiar, sarcastic voice came from the open door to the crypt, behind Zyrdicia. She jumped visibly. She smelled no one. She heard no pulse. She whirled around, then blinked at the unexpected sight of her friend. Her surprise lasted a scant second. The next instant she was at the door flinging her arms happily around Magnus.

"Can I safely assume this means you are not planning to kill me a second time?" he smiled, squeezing her and kissing her cheek.

"I am so happy to see you!" she smiled.

"I kept telling myself when you showed up, I would kill you. Then I saw you draped over my coffin and you melted me," he laughed, nuzzling his face against her cheek. "Mm, you're so warm. I missed you too."

"Do you forgive me for killing you?"

Magnus' frowned, "That wasn't you. I saw your eyes when I died. You weren't in them."

"Baal. I lost control of him. It was my fault. I'm so sorry!"

"Forget it. It's done with. Are you OK now?"

"I killed Baal. Sort of."

"That isn't what I asked."

"More or less," she nodded, her tone unconvincing.

"That bad?" Magnus coaxed, concerned.

Zyrdicia shrugged.

With Magnus, there were never any lies or pretenses. She had no need of them. After denying vehemently earlier tonight that anything about the event still bothered her, now she was in a place of refuge. She still felt raw and vulnerable when she thought about what Baal had done to her. No one had ever overpowered her that absolutely. That feeling was sufficiently unfamiliar to leave her convinced for the first time in her life that no one else was safe enough to let inside that memory.

No one had ever made her feel like prey until Baal arrived. When she had taken on other entities beyond her capability in the past, it had always been a close call. She always left them at least gravely wounded. And she had always gone back to finish them eventually. With a few, it had taken years of preparation and planning. But not a single being who she had set her sights on had ever escaped for good. Yet now Baal now sat in a palace of platinum somewhere in Hell, gloating. She was sure of it. She had cost him his freedom, but he had ravaged her soul. In her mind, there was nothing fair about the exchange.

"What happened?" Magnus prodded.

"Later. Let me look at you first."

She pulled back enough to look at his face. She put one hand on each of his cheeks. His body was unnaturally cold. One of her gloved fingers moved to his mouth. She pulled his upper lip up gently. "Nice fangs. Still growing?"

Magnus nodded unhappily. "It hurts like hell."

She peered carefully into his eyes. The rich brown of his irises had faded to a milky gray. The transformation was barely complete. As undead went, he was still weak, and very unprotected. "Damn it!" she whispered, displeased by the energy with which the responsible necromancer had vested him. "I wish I had brought you back myself."

"I wish you had too. I wouldn't mind it so much then."

"You wouldn't mind being my slave for eternity?" she laughed.

"Like anything would be different."

"Who did it?"

"Klex," Magnus answered, naming Balthus' second-in-command at the Magic Guild. The mage was gifted in some respects, but he lacked the infernal energy necessary to create truly spectacular undead.

"He controls you?"

"Unfortunately. I never realized before how much I hate that little fuck."

"What does he want?"

"He brought me back to kill Balthus. He wants a seat at the Council."

"Like that will ever happen. Does the Council know you are back yet?"

"No. My guess is without you here, they can't hold a meeting to appoint a new Assassin Guildmaster."

"There won't be a new Assassin Guildmaster. I like the old one too much," Zyrdicia grinned, pulling him into another hug. "I will kill Klex for you, dear. You'll be free of him soon," she promised, kissing his cheek.

"Thank you. I've missed you terribly." He again nuzzled his face against the side of her throat. She heard him inhale deeply.

She sensed intuitively what he was smelling. "Have you been feeding?"

"Not much. Klex has brought me victims a couple of times. I don't have the strength to go beyond the graveyard to hunt on my own. No one wanders through here at night. It's as though I can smell a whole city filled with blood just outside my grasp."

"Magnus, if you go wandering, you'll be easy prey. You can't go out there yet," Zyrdicia said very seriously. "When was the last time you fed?"

"Two days ago."

"Fucking Klex!" she snapped angrily. "That's not enough. In the beginning you have to feed several times a night. Your body needs the life energy to sustain the magic."

"The hunger is unbearable."

"I can appreciate that better than you can possibly imagine," she whispered darkly.

"Hunt for me tonight. Please?"

She met his eyes, entwining her fingers in the long, dark hair bound behind his neck. "I will do much better than that," she smiled softly.

She pulled away from him and went to the crypt's door, pushing it shut. A whispered word locked it magically, preventing interruption.

He watched her uncertainly, not yet daring to hope. She sat down upon the lid to his empty sarcophagus.

"Sitting on my coffin? Have you no respect for the dead?" he teased.

"Respect for the dead is why I'm doing this. Come here." She reached into his leather coat to retrieve a long dagger she knew he kept there. "Poisoned?" she asked, looking at the blade closely.

"No. Not that one. It's clean." Standing in front of her perch on the sarcophagus, he watched her intently. He stood so close that his thighs brushed her knees. "You don't have to do this, Zyrdicia. It doesn't matter what blood I take."

"Yes, it does matter! Mine is infused with my magic. If I had been the one who raised you, you would not need it. But now you do. It's the only way I can correct Klex's error." She moved her knees apart and pulled him nearer. "By the time I'm done with you, you'll be the most powerful fucking vampire in history."

"Does that mean I'm going to see you more often?"

She shrugged unhappily. "Since you're going to live forever, in another century or so, I'm sure you'll be quite sick of me."

"Never," Magnus sighed, running his fingers affectionately through her hair. "I've been so lonely since Klex raised me. I've been here by myself every damned night. It's awful!"

Zyrdicia frowned. Loneliness was something she understood. She had no answer for it. It was awful. She tended to assume she was the only one in the world who suffered it.

She started to pull the blade down her left wrist. Magnus stopped her suddenly, placing his hands over hers and squeezing hard. "Wait! Are you sure you want to do this?"

"Damn you! Why is it every time we are about to have an intimate moment, you panic and ruin it by asking me whether I want to change my mind?"

He pulled his hands away, stung by the rebuke. His eyes moved to the blade severing the soft, white tissue of her wrist. His nostrils flared at the first sight of the crimson fluid. She held the wound up to his lips wordlessly. He did not hesitate to take it, sucking the blood flow hungrily.

She guided his head with the wrist, down toward her lap. She rested the opened appendage upon her thigh, instinctively keeping the wound below the level of her heart in order to increase the flow of blood for her friend. She knew how to do this. She had, after all, been fed upon before.

Magnus bent obediently, following the fluid he craved. Her free hand caressed the back of his shoulders as he bent over her.

"When that wrist slows, open the other one yourself," she whispered, closing her eyes. She smiled as she felt his hunger. Now that he had tasted her blood's power, he would take as much as she was willing to give. Never again would he claim all blood is the same. The sensation brought a content sigh from her. It reminded her of someone else. Someday, when Magnus was stronger, she looked forward to letting him feed from her throat. It was a form of intimacy she could share with no one else in the material world. Of all the undead, vampires most closely resembled the Sephiroth. Sad that they lack wings, she thought wistfully. Even wingless, she almost preferred Magnus this way. The thought of having him around forever was immensely comforting.

Eventually he straightened and kissed her closed eyelids with bloodstained lips. "I love you," he murmured, pulling the dagger blade smoothly across the surface of the other wrist. "Now, and forever."

"I know. And I pity you for it," she whispered as he returned to his desperate feeding. A weightless, light-headed weariness settled over her as her body responded to the blood loss. She leaned forward over his back, resting her cheek against the leather coat covering his spine while he bent over the opened artery.

When she had given him all that she could, Magnus kissed her forehead gently, then stretched her passive body out atop the enormous, black stone lid of the empty box in which he had been lain to rest. Reeling from the blood loss, she had no desire to move. He wrapped her tightly in his heatless arms, content to be near her.

Eventually the story of Baal's torment came from her lips in a chagrined whisper, as though she were afraid anyone else might overhear it. She was deathly still as she told him what had happened, her eyes screwed shut tightly.

He listened intently to the story of what Baal had done, what Azriok had done, the constant blood temptation she heard in every mortal heartbeat now, the perplexing change in her body. Worst of all, she admitted what had been secretly gnawing at her for days - a thought so bitter she scarcely dared give voice to it. She feared now that Hell had already won - that the entire event had been planned to play out as it did, to dupe her into letting Azriok inside her soul.

"What's going to happen when they find out what happens when I kill?" she whispered weakly.

"The blood hunger?" he smiled. "Who cares? It means we can enjoy dinner together just like old times."

"That isn't funny! I can't control it."

"Dirk hasn't figured it out yet?"

"No. He's totally confused as to what's bothering me."

"Because you won't tell him. . ."

"He'll think I've turned into a demon for real," she sighed unhappily.

"That's what you are afraid of," Magnus crooned, caressing her. "And it's just as silly now as it always was. You have a nicer ass than any demon I've ever seen."

Zyrdicia smiled weakly. Her mind wandered in the ether of semi-consciousness. "Now that I hear everyone's thoughts, I'm amazed at how similar men's thoughts are. They're all the same."

"I've been telling you that for years. Now you overhear men thinking about your ass all the time?" he laughed.

"And my breasts. Sometimes my legs. Always body parts," she murmured drowsily.

"You can't sleep!" he nudged. "I don't have a soul anymore, remember?"

"I don't want to sleep," she protested.

"Then keep talking to me. Tell me why you are afraid Dirk will think you've become a demon," he coaxed.

"He takes everything so seriously," she frowned. Dirk was wonderful to play with, but he would never be able to give her the unconditional, absolute adoration that Magnus could. Magnus was the one she intuitively turned to in moments of weakness for succor and emotional safety.

"I can't believe you actually married that man!" Magnus grimaced. "Did Baal make you lose your fucking mind?!"

"It's not for forever. When I'm done, I'll walk away. For now, I need him."

"But do you care about him?"

"I hate that word - 'care.'" Zyrdicia rolled her eyes wearily. "I don't 'care' about anything. We just had a fight about that word."

"Tell me!" Magnus smiled eagerly. His smile faded once he heard the story of the latest spat. "That's really dumb."

"He is, sometimes."

"Not him. You!"

"Go to hell."

"Been there, done that," Magnus grinned, kissing her forehead. "Although I love being the only person in the world authorized to care about you, I'd like to know that other people take care of you when you aren't with me. It would really piss me off if they didn't."

"What are you saying?"

"As long as you need him, let him care. You need it. You've always needed it. You're a mess when you don't have people to take care of you."

"I don't need it from him!" she protested.

"Bullshit. If you hadn't found me here, what would you have done?"

"It's not like that with him," she sighed. "I can't even tell him about the blood hunger-"

"Or the fact that it still sometimes feels like you have Baal's in claws your back?" Magnus nudged.

"It's all so embarrassing! Too much like weakness. And I especially can't tell him what happened with Baal."

"Why especially?"

"Everyone already thinks I lost! It's humiliating."

"Zyrdicia, you were fighting a ten-thousand year old god whose element is warfare. What the fuck did you expect?"

"To win. And I did."

"Then why are you acting like what happened has to be a big secret?"

"Dirk would have gotten angry at me about Baal trying to-"

"Rape you," he said, using the words that she would not. "Electrocute you. Torture you. Paralyze you and dine on you. Crush you to a pulp."

"You don't have to remind me," she grimaced. "Then there would have been a fight about it being my fault for leaving in the first place." She paused, hesitating.

"What?" he nudged gently, smoothing her hair out of her face.

"He doesn't really know how to cuddle. It's like he's still learning. He'll embrace me when he wants something, to manipulate me, or to show off to an ex. Or when it's foreplay or even after we're done playing -"

"But not just for it's own sake, because you need it?"

"Exactly," she nodded. Magnus understood the secret pleasure of just holding each other in the darkness for hours for no reason other than the closeness. He always had with her.

"So teach him," he nudged.

"He won't let me. Sometimes he growls about it annoying him. He puts up with it when I insist -- which is no small thing, for him. I've been so needy for touch since I got back -- I'm sure I'm driving him nuts."

"So? This is you. Make him do it! You never used to be this self-deprecating. You used to say anyone you chose to cuddle with was lucky. Did Baal shake your ego that badly?"

Her brow furrowed. "I've never felt as out of control of my life. No one's ever had me as off balance as I am now. I'm used to friends adoring me, bending over backwards to keep me happy. Before I had you and the rest of the Inner Sanctum for affection, and Dirk was just for play. Baal took that all away."

"Not anymore, darling," he smiled, kissing her cheek. "I'll always be here for you. Not even death could keep me from that."

"Thank you. I'm not going back this time. Not until I feel better. I feel so starved."

"You know he'll come after you."

"You think he will?" she murmured uncertainly.

"He has before. Why don't you save him the trouble this time?"

Zyrdicia's lids drooped as she pondered it. The blood loss made her mind feel like it was full of something thick and sticky. Honey, she thought. Sticking to every synapse.

Magnus was quiet for a few minutes, pondering whether he needed to make a visit to Karteia through the trade gate. "Zyrdicia, you feel starved because you are starving yourself right now."

"What?" she blinked, confused. "I am not!"

"I hate having to tell you this for his benefit. But it kills me to imagine you there on your own. Maybe I can at least keep you from making yourself miserable."

"I am not -"

"Yes, you are. You never keep secrets like this from your friends. You always dump on us when you're upset. This time you aren't letting anyone there in close enough to give you what you need. Self-destruction is an art form with you."

"Not anymore. I can't play death-defying games. That's all over," she protested. "For me, there is no more Death to defy."

"So you found a new way to pursue it. Instead of your body, now you're doing it with your head."

"That isn't true!" she protested adamantly.

"Hello? I know you. Here's a tip: milk the relationship with him for all its worth. Trust him enough to do that." He grinned impishly and added, "And if he abuses the trust, rip his heart out."

They held each other for hours. So content to be held, she forgot about the time. Before she left Magnus, she opened her wrists once again for him. There was less blood for him to take, but the time that had passed had given her body a chance to regenerate at least a little of it. He took it gratefully.