Flesh and Blood

‘As you wish.’ Zafir moved the meticulously crafted platinum prosthetic into place at the end of her right wrist. The gleaming hand lay open, the lines and creases on the palm mirror images of those on her left because it had been modeled after that hand. The hot metal had been quenched in her blood to further seal the magic.

He painted the stump of her wrist with a foul-smelling paste that burned slightly, then he adjusted the prosthetic so that her flesh touched metal. The metal was cool, but her body was warm because she’d fed from her comar before coming to give herself strength.

Using a glass spoon, Zafir scooped pale silver-white dust from a squat glass jar and sprinkled the joined area with the powder.

The pain struck in a searing wave.

A cry ripped from Tatiana’s throat and she jerked away from the agony, but Zafir grabbed her forearm and kept it pressed against the metal.

‘You mustn’t move, my love.’

Fire traveled the length of her arm and bit into her shoulder. Lava flowed through her joints, melting her bones with blinding pain. She clenched her jaw to keep from vomiting.

She could endure this. She’d endured the Castus Sanguis’s punishing use of her mind and body, and would again if that’s what it took to regain their favor. All that mattered was the unholy power they wielded and that a portion of it become hers. Pain brings clarity.

Flames licked her skin. Wisps of smoke wafted from the joint of flesh and metal. Blisters rose, filling with fluid. Her fangs pierced her lower lip, and the taste of copper washed her mouth.

‘Almost there,’ Zafir encouraged. ‘That’s my girl.’

Killing him might ease the pain. She was no one’s gir—

Daggers dug into the stump of her wrist, grinding through the muscle and burrowing into her bone. She cursed loudly. Then cursed again. And just as she was about to shove the fingers of her good hand into his chest and rip out his heart, the pain subsided to a dull throb.

She yanked her arm away from him. ‘Do you have any idea how badly that—’

He laughed triumphantly and pointed. ‘How do you like it?’

She followed the line of his gaze to the platinum fist at the end of her arm. She willed the hand to open. It did. She wiggled the fingers – her fingers – and the bright platinum digits waved back. She leaped off the table, pain forgotten.

‘Oh, Zafir, this is brilliant.’ She stared at her reflection in the palm of her hand. Pain always seemed to make her more beautiful.

He grinned at her words, showing off his fangs. Something about the contrast of those long, white teeth against his dark skin gave her a perverse thrill. He was a handsome devil. Devil being the operative word. ‘There’s more.’

‘Such as?’

He threaded his arms around her waist, turning her back against his chest. He nuzzled his mouth, cool from not feeding, into the curve of her neck. ‘Think sword, my lush wonder.’

‘Sword?’

‘Yes. A wicked scimitar or a deadly katana. Whatever you like.’ His fangs scraped her skin, and she shivered with pleasure.

‘Very well.’ She thought of the hefty two-handed blade her former husband, Malkolm, had once wielded in his mortal occupation as a headsman. She’d always admired that weapon. She should have used it on him. She sniffed. Now was not the time for burdens of the past. She focused on the image in her head.

Tingles of sensation shot up her arm from her new hand. She held it up toward the light. What was happening? The tingles became pressure and her fingers fused together.

She inhaled, the bitter air of Zafir’s laboratory clogging her throat. ‘What the—’

‘Just wait,’ he urged. His grip tightened, as if he thought she might bolt. Or turn on him. Wise boy.

Her fingers melted into a solid shaft as they elongated into a polished knife, then longer still until the blade replicated the image in her head.

‘Unholy hell.’ She went utterly still, very aware that her mouth hung open.

He laughed softly, sending vibrations through her skin. ‘You should not doubt me in the future, my sweet.’ His hands slipped lower, only to climb again once he’d breached the hem of her blouse.

She pushed him away with her elbows and broke out of the embrace, all without taking her gaze off the sword extending out from her wrist. She slashed it through the air. Perfectly weighted. ‘Bloody amazing. How is this even possible?’

‘Does a magician tell his secrets?’ He shrugged. ‘Of course, such magic comes with a price.’

The blade glinted like sunlit water, but she managed to pull her gaze away to stare him down. ‘We discussed no price.’

He whispered something in Arabic as he pulled her into his arms again. The sword shrank back to a hand.

She arched a brow, warm tendrils of suspicion growing along her spine. ‘How did you do that?’

‘I am not a fool.’ He kissed her cheekbone.

Neither was she. The fact that he’d built in his own controls angered her beyond the point of reason. Red tinged her vision. Had Lord Ivan put him up to this? If so, they both deserved to die. No one dictated what she did. No one. ‘What is this price you speak of?’

‘The only payment I require is more of what you’ve already been paying me.’ He cupped her body against the hard lines of his own. ‘If Nasir could see me now, he would be very jealous indeed.’

Barely restraining the urge to tear his throat out, she tipped her head back to let him kiss her neck. How dare he think to control her? ‘Does Nasir know what you’ve done for me?’ She’d insisted their relationship remain a secret, telling him she wasn’t ready to be scrutinized by the rest of the nobility until her hand was restored.