Page 183 of A Vow of Blood and Tears

I bared my fangs at her, rising to my full height, and Visca put her hands on her hips. “Think clearly,” she said, her voice low. “Hewantsyou to come after her. How many wargs do you think he’s made in the meantime? We’ll be overrun, and Cirri will be just as dead in the end. There’s only one way to make this work.”

Horrible images flashed through my mind: Cirri broken, bleeding, sobbing. Waiting for help that never came, because her heroes were rotting in the bellies of wolves.

“Fine.” I tried to clear the snarl from my voice. “Call upon them. Tell them we’ve broken the treaty, and that I don’t give a damn. You have tonight to fix them, and then I’m going alone.”

But Wyn wasted no time. The second she had my blessing, she left the golems, digging in one of the packs on the horses.

She brought out a gilded hand-mirror and a small box, carrying them to the fire and settling before its flames. I crouched behind her, watching as she withdrew a leaf-shapedblade from the box and scored it across her wrists without preamble.

The firelight flickered across her face as she worked, holding her wrist above the mirror and letting the blood drip onto the polished silver, tipping the mirror and whispering under her breath until the blood coated the silver in a thin, even sheen of red.

Her reflection was scarlet, eyes gleaming with an animal’s shine, and as she muttered the final words the face reflected in the mirror melted, becoming an anonymous amalgam of facial features.

It took some time for her words to reach the other sanguimancers, but eventually Wyn’s reflection began to warp: her face melted into another, and another, and another. Four bloodwitches reflected at once, merging into a single visage, neither male nor female, the features constantly shifting depending on the speaker.

“Magus Olwyn,” a woman’s voice said, and the face in the mirror rippled, taking on darker hair, a higher forehead, a blockier nose.

The nose thinned, the lips grew fuller: “Ancestors, don’t tell me that’s Foria I see behind you. What about the treaty?”

“We’re in rather dire straits,” Wyn sniffed, and the face in the mirror took on her features once more. “To put it very simply, the Lady of the Rift is in Forian territory, likely captured by Thurn Hakkon. He’s made quite a few wargs since last year, my friends. We need your help.”

The face shifted, becoming more masculine, and a man’s deep voice boomed out. “Is there a reason Lord Bane couldn’t just… find a new one?”

There was a long silence.

One of the more effeminate faces winced. “Not everyone despises their wives as much as Wroth despises his, Bram. But Olwyn, the treaty… did she cross the border of her own accord?”

“No,” Wyn said softly. “No, she was abducted from our territory and brought by force. We have the ways and means to track her, and find Hakkon into the bargain, but we’re not enough. The legions are several days’ march behind us. But… he has made many new wargs, brothers and sisters. I don’t know how many. But Bane is going to retrieve her or die trying, I can tell you that.”

The bloodwitches went silent in our mirror, the face becoming anonymous again; long minutes passed as they informed the Lords they served that we were using our last, most desperate hope, relaying the situation.

The face in the mirror jittered, warping strangely; Wroth’s voice came through.

“Bane?”

“I’m here.” I leaned over Wyn’s shoulder, and between the bloodwitches and two fiends, the reflection took on proportions that were almost sickening.

“I’m coming, brother,” he said. “Wait for me.”

The leonine features of the face disappeared. He was loyal, my first brother; I owed him in ways I would never be able to repay.

I closed my eyes, even as Bram’s voice echoed out onto the plains. “Well, he’ll be there soon, Wyn. He’s not going to listen to anything I say, anyway.”

Bram vanished, and the reflection became entirely feminine.

The one with the dark hair took over, sniffing with disapproval, but her words gave me unexpected hope. “Lord Voryan wishes me to express his desire for Lord Bane to wait for his arrival, and to save him some blood.”

Two of my brothers, ready and willing to break the treaty.

Pebble by pebble, the mountain of despair crushing me down began to dislodge, sliding away.

Voryan’s bloodwitch vanished, and the reflection was soon only a mix of Wyn and Andrus’s bloodwitch.

“Andrus is…” The bloodwitch paused. “He’s already calling for prisoners. I daresay he’ll be leaving soon.”

“Thank the ancestors,” Wyn said, slumping with relief. “Thank you, Cyrene.”

Indeed. I silently wished my brothers a safe journey and a thousand blessings upon their heads.

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