Page 20 of Resurrection
Chapter 7
Seiran had gone to bed, finding Kaine curled up in his space, and rather than waking him, crawled in beside his youngest to sleep. He’d need to press his kid in the morning, or sometime the next day. Find out what was happening with Kaine, and how he could help. If he hadn’t been so tired, and the clock reading after two in the morning, he’d have woken Kaine then. He wrapped his arms around his baby, pulled the blankets up, and closed his eyes.
He felt Kaine leave sometime later, but didn’t rouse. He also heard Kura come in, felt her kiss him on the cheek, before the house settled into silence again. Only then did he sleep hard. Falling into dreams of watching Gabe unravel again.
That was when someone shook him, and he jolted awake, sitting up in bed and breathing hard. He’d had enough abrupt awakenings over the years to not instantly attack, but finding Gabe in his bedroom, leaning over him, made his heart race and put a spell on his lips. Seiran stopped just before unleashing it.
The windows were shut tight against the light, though fingers of the glow still made it through, illuminating Gabe, and Seiran stared at him. Had he gone revenant? His eyes were green, and he didn’t really avoid the bits of light spilling into the room.
“Gabe?” Seiran asked, wondering if he was actually awake. Gabe kept looking toward the door. That was when Seiran heard it. A banging. It was a thud that shuddered the house, the vibration rolling through Seiran’s core.
“That golem thing?” Gabe said. “It’s trying to get out. Sorry to wake you. But no one else is home, and I was worried when it started throwing itself on the wards.”
All of that was a lot to process straight from sleep without any coffee, but Seiran jumped out of bed and headed toward the door. He was surprised to find the hallway filled with sunlight. How had Gabe gotten upstairs? Normally the pull of the sun made him super tired and he’d be in bed by sunrise. Vampires claimed it felt like it burned, though Seiran had never actually seen sunlight make a vampire burst into flames. It appeared to be closer to midday, but the vampire seemed wide awake and unharmed.
“Doesn’t the sun burn?” Seiran asked.
“No,” Gabe said, appearing thoughtful as if only realizing that vampires didn’t normally spend a lot of time in the sun. The banging shuddered through the house again.
Seiran took that for what it was, unimportant at the moment, and raced down the stairs. Gabe was right. The golem was throwing itself at the door, bouncing off the wards, battering itself against the magic. It didn’t bleed, but it didn’t look human anymore either. Somehow the tie Seiran had to it wasn’t strong enough. Why was it trying to get out at all? It should have been at peace among the organic matter of the garden. The fairies wouldn’t have messed with it, and in fact, seemed to be missing from the garden, likely disturbed by the golem’s unnatural presence.
Had something called it? Was that why it was freaking out?
Gabe stood in the kitchen, keeping his distance from the door. “Shouldn’t you unravel it?”
“I need to find who made it before I do that. People died to create that,” Seiran defended keeping it whole.
“All death magic requires death, and blood,” Gabe said quietly.
“Are you remembering more?”
“A little, in small chunks.” He looked away. “If you give it blood, you might have better control of it.”
“But?” Seiran could tell he left something unsaid.
A wave of darkness crossed Gabe’s eyes. Almost like something lurked inside. Though Seiran knew there was a revenant inside of all vampires, he hadn’t before Gabe went to ground. He had studied long enough now to know a lot of their secrets. Him standing in the sunlight surprised him, the revenant not so much.
“I can’t help the jealousy that rises at the thought of someone else having your blood,” Gabe admitted. He kept his gaze focused on the floor. “I don’t know how I will react. Which is not fair or rational, and I’m sorry.”
Well, that was a conundrum. “You’re saying that I need to give the golem blood to control it, but that if I do so, you might lose control of your revenant?” Seiran clarified.
“Maybe?” Gabe sounded apologetic.
Seiran thought about that for a minute but headed to the door to the arboretum. He threw open the door, almost expecting the golem to charge him through the ward, or stop, but it continued to throw itself into the ward like a mindless battering ram. “Forest, stop,” Seiran called, trying to bind it by the name again. That was golem basics, bound with their name and blood.
Bam!Forest didn’t even pause. Seiran wasn’t sure he recognized the name at all. Okay so maybe it did need blood. He called roots from the earth, asking them, rather than demanding because the earth hated demands, for the roots to wrap around the golem, to stop him. Maybe if Seiran cut his finger? Gave it a few drops? He glanced back at Gabe who stood a few feet away, gaze on the golem.
The roots rose, and tried to create a bond, but the golem ripped right through them. “Fuck,” Seiran said. He had two choices now, tempt it with blood, which meant bigger than a pricked finger, or unravel it.
“Should it have this much power away from its creator?” Gabe asked.
No. And that was the problem. With Sei’s power wrapped around it, True Named, and distance from the creator, it should have been little more than a clay doll. “I’m going to have to give it blood,” Seiran admitted, bracing for Gabe to go nuts.
The darkness flashed over the vampire’s face again, and he swallowed hard, but focused on the golem. “I can try to hold it. You’ll have to feed it blood as well as etch symbols of ownership in your blood on it.”
Seiran gaped. “You know a lot about death magic?”
“I’m a vampire,” Gabe said. “We are death magic.”