The Red Scrolls of Magic

“Fear is all some people understand,” Shinyun said.

They were standing close together. Magnus could feel the tension running through Shinyun’s body. He took her hand and gave it a brief, friendly squeeze before he dropped it. He felt a faint pressure of her fingers in return, as if she’d wanted to squeeze back.

I did this to her, he thought, as he always did, the five small words that circled in his mind repeatedly when he was around Shinyun.

“I prefer to believe that people can understand a lot, when offered the opportunity,” said Magnus. “I like your enthusiasm, but let’s not drown anyone.”

“Spoilsport,” said Shinyun, but her tone was friendly.

They parted ways once they reached the bathhouse, Shinyun to find her contact and Magnus to find a bath.

The Aqua Morte was a vampire-run bathhouse, which seemed a peculiar marriage to Magnus. It was four giant heated mineral baths, each the size of an Olympic swimming pool, and several smaller rooms filled with single tubs. Magnus paid for time in one of these smaller rooms and went to change.

The vampire clan who ran this establishment were a contrary lot. They had also used the bathhouse as a controlled feeding zone for centuries, until the Nephilim put a stop to it.

Magnus considered that so far this was not such a demanding assignment. He went into his assigned room, let the towel slide down from his waist, and stepped into the sunken tub. Steam drifted up from the near-scalding water. It was just barely tolerable, the way Magnus liked it. He sank into the tub until only his head was above water, letting his body acclimate to the burn, feeling the waves of pain and pleasure shoot up and down his body. He perched his arms over the sides and leaned back. The ancient Romans had known how to live.

He had a few bruises and scrapes left over from the night on the train, and the night the mansion collapsed on them. By now they were faint, and ached only if he moved in a particular way. He could have healed himself anytime, but chose to let time heal the wounds. Not because he enjoyed the pain; far from it. When he had first learned to heal himself, he’d spent copious amounts of time and magic doing away with every single little hurt. Over the centuries, though, he’d learned that these minor injuries were part of life. Suffering through them made him appreciate being whole and well.

Right now was a perfect example. Magnus could feel each individual ache and cut throb in the hot bathwater and dissipate with the steam. He closed his eyes and relaxed.

Magnus had paid for a private room, but after a time he felt a presence hovering nearby. Before he could say anything, someone rudely invaded his tub, disturbing the flat surface and sending ripples of mineral water sloshing over the side.

Several sharp words came to mind and he opened his eyes, ready to deliver them. Instead he was surprised to see Shinyun sitting on the edge of the tub, wrapped in a towel. She was leaning against the wall beside her, resting her face on an elbow.

“Oh,” he said. “Hello.”

“I hope you don’t mind the intrusion.”

“I do, actually, but it’s all right.”

Magnus passed a hand over the water’s surface and a towel materialized around his waist. He didn’t think Shinyun was making a pass, and he didn’t personally have a problem with nudity, but it was an odd situation.

Shinyun carefully moved Magnus’s phone, which he had set on the side of the tub, out of the way as she reached for a hand towel. She wiped her face, which she did not actually need to do. She was clearly buying herself time.

“Did you get anything?” Magnus asked. “From your contact, I mean.”

“I did,” said Shinyun slowly. “But first I have a confession to make. I overheard your conversation the other night, about how you killed your stepfather.”

Magnus had been speaking in a low voice. “So you eavesdropped. Magically eavesdropped,” he added.

“I was curious,” said Shinyun with a shrug, as if this excused her. “And you’re famous, and you work closely with the Nephilim. I thought you had no problems, that you lived a life of careless luxury. I didn’t think you were like me.”

She bowed her head. In this moment, there was an earnestness to her that Magnus hadn’t seen before. She seemed more vulnerable, more open, and it had nothing to do with the fact that they were both sitting mostly naked in a hot tub.

She looked up at him. “Do you need a drink?”

He didn’t, particularly, but he sensed she might want one. “Sure.”

A silver platter appeared a few seconds later with a bottle of Barbera d’Asti and a couple of large balloon glasses. Shinyun poured for each of them and floated Magnus’s glass over to him. They touched glasses.

She was struggling with her words. “I know your story now. It is only fair you know mine. I was lying to you before.”

“Yes,” Magnus said. “I thought you might be.”

Shinyun drained her glass in one gulp and set it aside.

“When my demon mark manifested, my betrothed did not love me despite everything. My family rejected me—the whole village rejected me—and so did he. Men came with shovels and torches and cries for my life, and the person I’d always thought was my father handed me over to the mob. My beloved was the one who placed me in the wooden box to be buried alive.”

Shinyun slid down in the tub until she was nearly horizontal, and only her face, still as a death mask, broke the water’s plane. She looked up at the marble ceiling. “I can still hear the dirt falling on the coffin, like the heavy drumming of rain on rooftops during a typhoon.” She curled her fingers beneath the surface of the water. “I clawed until my hands were raw.”