You've done this before, she scolded her odd reluctance.
I didn't know him then, her thoughts returned. I don't want to cause him pain.
"If you'd rather not-" Grey made as if to withdraw his hand and she tightened her grip, looking up into his eyes.
Was that a flash of hurt she saw there? Did he truly want her to do this? So much that her refusal would cause him pain?
"I'm just-" She sighed. "Nervous. This will hurt, and I don't like doing that to you."
Instead of stoically squaring his shoulders and assuring her he could withstand any pain, Grey threw an arm over his grimacing face, turning away from his threatened forefinger. "Go on." he moaned. "Hurt me. For the good of the magic, I can endure the torture."
She laughed at his nonsense, an embarrassing snorty sort of giggle, and she stabbed the lancet into his finger.
Grey abandoned his playacting and lowered his arm to watch as Pearl squeezed out a tiny drop of blood, scooped it onto the side of the lancet, and stirred it into the wine.
"Are you sure that's enough?" He lifted his finger toward her. "I have more."
"It's quite enough for this experiment." How could she get more of her blood into the glass without him noticing, given the intensity of his watching?
"Perhaps we should relocate to the drawing room next door," he suggested, solving her problem yet again. "Amanusa asked for comfortable chairs when she worked her justice magic at the conclave in Paris."
Pearl picked up the glass. "Lead on, oh master of magic."
16
GREY GAVE PEARL a look, as if suspecting her of mocking him-which she was, but only a little. Then he did as she wished, turned his back to her and led the way out of the dining room and down the few steps of the corridor.
It was harder than she thought to carry the glass and squeeze more blood out of her finger. The wound had closed, and in desperation, to get the job done before Grey turned back around, she used the lancet again.
This time, she went too deep. The blood wouldn't stop welling up, no matter how tight she pinched. Only a droplet at a time, but it would not stop. She dipped her finger into the wine, hoping the sting of alcohol would help, but that only seemed to make it run more.
Finally, she put the finger in her mouth, licking away the wine, then biting down with her teeth in hope it would cut off the flow. Grey turned as he opened the door and caught her with her finger in her mouth. "Is it still bleeding?"
She went into the drawing room, away from potential exposure to curious servants. "I don't think so." She removed her finger to speak.
Grey shut the door and came to inspect her wound, which was-drat it all-still seeping. He didn't put it into his mouth this time, thank heaven. Pearl didn't think she could bear that warm, wet, intimate touch again. Not without collapsing to the floor because her bones had dissolved. He licked his thumb and pressed it hard against the tiny puncture, pinching her fingertip until it went white. Then he looked at it again. When a few seconds passed without any more blood welling up, he pronounced her healed.
"Perhaps it takes someone else's spit to seal a sorceress's wound," he suggested.
"Perhaps so." Pearl couldn't say anything else. Her insides were quivering too much. So were her outsides. The wine in the glass she held almost splashed out, her hands shook so.
Grey pretended not to notice. It had to be pretense. How could he not see such shaking? He indicated the red, betassled chairs, inviting her to sit. They had high backs and low arms to accommodate a lady's full skirts. Pearl handed him the wine before taking up his invitation. She didn't want it to spill.
"Shall I drink first?" he asked as she collapsed into the nearest chair.
Pearl reviewed her mental notes yet again. Whereupon he drinketh of the blood, she shall wait while the sorcerye spreadeth throughout him, for the passynge of a tenth part of one houre. If she had to wait, that meant he should drink first, didn't it?
But the waiting came after the infusing of the sorcerye into thee blood. Had she done that?
She hadn't. She'd been too busy with walking and poking her finger and then trying to get the bleeding to stop. Was it too late to do it now? If it wasn't, would it mess up the spell? If she put a little more blood in, would that fix things? If she put in more blood, would her finger stop bleeding again?
"Um . . ." She would try to put the magic in the blood already in the wine first. Pearl called magic, as she'd been practicing, and it rose. From her blood and her bones, it welled up like a warm spring rising from the earth. Or like a drop of blood from a punctured finger.
Grey had seated himself in the other chair before the fire, waiting patiently, one foot keeping time to silent music at the end of his crossed legs. He held the wineglass casually, as if it were no more than an after-dinner glass of port.
Pearl closed her eyes and opened her magic senses, fumbling in the dark to find the blood in the wine. Except it wasn't dark. Grey had a sort of glow about him. Not magic, exactly, but potential. As he said, a whole body full of it. His sorcery potential gave a rosy tint to his glow, but as she looked, she saw silvery glowing wisps floating around and through him. Conjury, she thought, waiting to be tapped.
There. That was the blood-mixed wine, the brighter ball of red light, the warmth held in Grey's hand. As she noticed it, the magic inside her seemed to notice it, too. The magic flared, searing her, then it pounced. It flew from her into the blood, as if the mere act of separating the blood from her body and searching it out informed the magic what she wanted done.
The magic burned along her veins as it left her, making her gasp with the sharp, scorching pain, and it was gone, leaving only the pain behind.
She gasped for breath, trying hard not to whimper. After another moment or two, she realized Grey knelt by her chair, calling her name, chafing her hands. "I'm fine," she said.
"Liar." He took her chin and turned her face to peer into her eyes.
"I wasn't fine, but I am now," she clarified. "Truly."
"I felt the magic move." Grey gripped both her hands, refusing to release her gaze. Pearl couldn't make herself look away from the concern in his dark, beautiful eyes. "You are not ready for this."
"I am." She looked for the wine. Surely he hadn't spilled it so they had all this to go through again. "It is only-I should have remembered to put the magic into the blood sooner. The book warned of it, that sorcery burns unless you act quickly. I forgot. I was too slow."
Her smile was surely more of a grimace. "You can be sure I won't forget again. But it's merely pain. No actual injury."
"Pain is not ‘mere,' " Grey scolded.
He'd set the wine on a side table, she saw. It was safe.
"Yes, it is," Pearl said. "If there is no injury, it goes away quickly. And it is gone. I am fine. No pain. No harm done." Gently she eased her hands from him and gestured to the wine. "The magic is in the blood, in the wine. It needs to be used. We should use it. You drink first. Half."
"Amanusa only required the men her magic searched to drink a mouthful. A good swallow."
"Then you shouldn't have poured so much wine. It must all be drunk. We cannot leave any behind." She gave him a crooked smile. "Are you afraid of the taste? So much wine will hide the taste of so little blood."
"It's not the taste I'm afraid of." His lips twitched as he looked at her, betraying his teasing. "I've never done this before. I'm a sorcery virgin. Be gentle with me."
Pearl shook her head at him, her own lips twitching with a smile. "We're both sorcery virgins. We'll simply have to fumble through it like a pair of newlyweds. Close your eyes and think of England." She paused and went on more seriously.
"That's probably best-to think of England. So I don't inadvertently stumble across something I don't want to know. Something you don't want me to know. I will try not to intrude on your deeper thoughts, but-well-remember that virginity?"
Grey's expression was faintly alarmed, which likely meant that behind that beautiful face he'd gone into full-blown panic.
"We don't have to do this," Pearl said. "I'm sure Elinor will let me practice on her."
"No, no." Grey cleared his throat. "I'm game. Best you practice on me. Magic-master, after all."
He stood and crossed to the side table where he stared at the wine in its glass for a moment. Then abruptly he picked it up and drank half the contents.
"There. That's my half." He handed the glass to Pearl. "Now you."
"I will try very hard not to intrude," Pearl promised, looking into his dark brown, melting eyes. They melted her, at any rate.
She dragged her gaze from him and pinned it on the wine. She wasn't much of a wine drinker. She didn't like the taste. So would it be better to drink it all down at once as Grey had, or eke it out in swallows?
Swallows, she decided. There was too much left to throw back all at once, the way she'd seen Irish laborers toss back their vile whiskey. She'd likely choke on it, sputter, and embarrass herself. Besides, a series of sips-large sips-would use up the time she had to wait on the magic.