“But you won’t kill her? I won’t commit murder, not even to be free of this damn curse,” he growled.
“She’ll be fine…probably.” The witch smiled smoothly. “Now you’d better run along, my dear Reddix. The lthss will only remain inactive until you find her and press her skin to it. Then you’ll have a few solar weeks to get back to me. If you take longer than that, it will begin to feed on you. And that wouldn’t be pleasant, now would it?”
She was already herding him out the door, but Reddix wasn’t content to leave before he had all the answers.
“Wait.” He frowned at her. “I still don’t know what’s in this for you. Why should you help me? Why is this girl’s blood so important to you?”
“Oh, it’s not. Not really.” Xandra smiled brightly. “Although there is power in purity of spirit, which I can never again hope to possess myself.”
“But I still don’t understand why you’re willing to help me.”
“I…because I…”
The witch began to shake. Her yellow eyes suddenly rolled up, showing only the whites, and her voice deepened to a strange sonorous tone.
“Dark and Light
Wrong and Right
When one finds Peace
The other may Fight
Day and Night
Growth and Blight
One in Love
The other in Flight
Tied together
Fate to fate
Strangers, brothers
Mate to mate
Prisoners they no longer be
When one is healed
The other is free.”
“What?” Reddix stared at her, wondering if she was having some kind of a seizure. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
Xandra’s eyelids fluttered, and she suddenly looked normal again. Or as normal as a swamp witch with pale white skin, yellow eyes, and fingers with too many joints could look, anyway.
“I beg your pardon, my dear Reddix. Where were we?”
He frowned. “I was asking why you’re willing to help me in the first place.”
“Oh. Because in this deal, I can’t lose.” The witch patted his cheek, or tried to—Reddix jerked away before she could touch him. “Tsk tsk, so skittish.” She shook her head. “Anyway, as I was saying, I can’t lose. If you return bringing the girl with the healing hands and I cure you of your RTS, I’ll have done a favor—one which I expect to be repaid—for the future Clan Overlord.”
“And if I don’t?” he growled.
Her yellow eyes glowed. “Then I’ll get to watch as the Clans that threw me out clash in a bloody civil war. I’ll get to watch as the Touch Kindred and all they love burn.”
“Burn…as they burn…burn to ashes…”
“Reddix? Reddix, wake up.” There was a sound like snapping above his face, and then someone patted his cheek, gently but firmly.
Reddix flinched away from the touch instinctively. Despite the briefness of the contact, he could feel the concern of whoever had touched him like some warm, sticky syrup dribbling over his cheek. Ugh.
Abruptly, he was awake, and the memory of his encounter with the witch dissolved. Only the stinging of the tiny lthss embedded in the flesh of his wrist remained. He shuttered. Gods, of all things to dream of…
“Can you hear me?”
“‘Course I can hear you. I’m not fucking deaf.”
Reddix forced his eyes open and saw a concerned face—a male with ice blue eyes and white-blond hair—leaning over, staring at him.
He immediately felt naked. Where was his hood? He reached for something to cover his face but the other male stopped him.
“Don’t. Your hood is safe, and I’m the only one here. I won’t touch you again except to examine you, and that will be very minimal, I promise.”
“Who are you?” Reddix licked his lips with a tongue that felt like sandpaper. “Where am I? What happened?”
The male smiled, and Reddix felt his amusement, tart-sweet at the tip of his tongue.
“One question at a time,” he said. “I’m Sylvan, one of the physicians aboard the Mother Ship, and you’re in a private room in the Med Center.”
Reddix frowned. “You still didn’t tell me what happened.”
“You fell and bumped your head.” Sylvan frowned. “According to your friend, Saber, you lost consciousness well before that, though. Has this happened to you before?”
“Once or twice,” Reddix said before he thought about it. Immediately, the other male’s concern increased, making him even more uncomfortable. Damn it, why hadn’t he lied? “I mean, not really, no,” he amended quickly.
The blond physician frowned. “Mmm-hmm.” Clearly, he didn’t believe Reddix. “Saber tells me you have RTS.”