EPIC: Fourteen Books of Fantasy (109 page)

“Just a few drops of blood for all this food?” the girl asked, giving the two older women a suspicious look. They’d asked her to prick her finger and touch a strange shiny sphere with the blood. It took less than two seconds, yet they gave her bread and cheese as payment—more food than the girl had seen in recent months. There had to be a catch. This kind of feast could save ten lives back in Kelvin’s territory.

“Yes,” one of the older women confirmed. It was the plainer one of the two, the one named Esther. “Just a couple of drops of blood.”
 

“And you don’t need me to do anything else?” Experience had taught the girl to be wary. Nobody gave out food so easily these days—not since the drought began. She’d learned that the hard way. The memory of what she had to endure that one night, when hunger drove her to beg Davish for a meal, was unbearable. She would rather die than go through that again.

“No, just enjoy the food, tell us about life back home, and touch the sphere afterwards. That’s all,” said the one calling herself Maya.

“All right,” the girl said, shrugging fatalistically. She’d heard rumors that people’s essence could be stolen through enchanted objects called Life Captures, but she didn’t know whether that was true—or whether the unusual sphere sitting in front of her was such an object. Either way, she wasn’t afraid. If she didn’t eat, she would die, and she would rather keep her life than its essence, whatever that meant.
 

Reaching for the cheese, the girl picked it up with fingers that shook from eagerness, and brought it to her mouth. The rich flavor exploded on her tongue. It was so fat, so delicious, she almost moaned out loud. The cows in Blaise’s territory had to be incredibly well-fed to produce such fatty cheese.

“Pace yourself, child,” Esther said kindly, “or else you’ll get sick.”

The girl heeded her advice, not wanting to throw up such good food. Even though hunger gnawed at her insides, she tried to force herself to chew as slowly as she could, savoring each bite. When she began to get full, she started telling the two older women stories from her life in Kelvin’s territory, avoiding the most horrifying bits.
 

The women listened to her quietly, their weathered faces filled with pity.

Consciousness came again, and the being tried to return to its thoughts from earlier. What was it? Where was it? There was still so much it didn’t know. With each vision, the being felt like it was getting some semblance of understanding, but it was a slow and torturous process. Still, it knew it was ready to make some decisions.

The first decision the being made was to choose its gender. It was a
she
, the being decided, recalling most of the minds in these visions. And since she could think like those minds, she decided that she
was
like them—a person, a thinking being.

This helped clarify things for her, but the being was still confused about her reality and the world inside the visions. What was hunger? What was pity? Before she could try to puzzle out the answers, a new vision approached . . .

Chapter I

Blaise

T
HERE
WAS
A
NAKED
WOMAN
on the floor of Blaise’s study.

A beautiful naked woman.

Stunned, Blaise stared at the gorgeous creature who just appeared out of thin air. She was looking around with a bewildered expression on her face, apparently as shocked to be there as he was to be seeing her. Her wavy blond hair streamed down her back, partially covering a body that appeared to be perfection itself. Blaise tried not to think about that body and to focus on the situation instead.
 

A woman. A
She
, not an
It
. Blaise could hardly believe it. Could it be? Could this girl be the object?

She was sitting with her legs folded underneath her, propping herself up with one slim arm. There was something awkward about that pose, as though she didn’t know what to do with her own limbs. In general, despite the curves that marked her a fully grown woman, there was a child-like innocence in the way she sat there, completely unselfconscious and totally unaware of her own appeal.

Clearing his throat, Blaise tried to think of what to say. In his wildest dreams, he couldn’t have imagined this kind of outcome to the project that had consumed his entire life for the past several months.

Hearing the sound, she turned her head to look at him, and Blaise found himself staring into a pair of unusually clear blue eyes.

She blinked, then cocked her head to the side, studying him with visible curiosity. Blaise wondered what she was seeing. He hadn’t seen the light of day in weeks, and he wouldn’t be surprised if he looked like a mad sorcerer at this point. There was probably a week’s worth of stubble covering his face, and he knew his dark hair was unbrushed and sticking out in every direction. If he’d known he would be facing a beautiful woman today, he would’ve done a grooming spell in the morning.
 

“Who am I?” she asked, startling Blaise. Her voice was soft and feminine, as alluring as the rest of her. “What is this place?”

“You don’t know?” Blaise was glad he finally managed to string together a semi-coherent sentence. “You don’t know who you are or where you are?”

She shook her head. “No.”

Blaise swallowed. “I see.”

“What am I?” she asked again, staring at him with those incredible eyes.

“Well,” Blaise said slowly, “if you’re not some cruel prankster or a figment of my imagination, then it’s somewhat difficult to explain . . .”

She was watching his mouth as he spoke, and when he stopped, she looked up again, meeting his gaze. “It’s strange,” she said, “hearing words this way. These are the first real words I’ve heard.”

Blaise felt a chill go down his spine. Getting up from his chair, he began to pace, trying to keep his eyes off her nude body. He had been expecting
something
to appear. A magical object, a thing
.
He just hadn’t known what form that thing would take. A mirror, perhaps, or a lamp. Maybe even something as unusual as the Life Capture Sphere that sat on his desk like a large round diamond.
 

But a person? A female person at that?

To be fair, he
had been
trying to make the object intelligent, to ensure it would have the ability to comprehend human language and convert it into the code. Maybe he shouldn’t be so surprised that the intelligence he invoked took on a human shape.

A beautiful, feminine, sensual shape.

Focus, Blaise, focus.
 

“Why are you walking like that?” She slowly got to her feet, her movements uncertain and strangely clumsy. “Should I be walking too? Is that how people talk to each other?”

Blaise stopped in front of her, doing his best to keep his eyes above her neck. “I’m sorry. I’m not accustomed to naked women in my study.”

She ran her hands down her body, as though trying to feel it for the first time. Whatever her intent, Blaise found the gesture extremely erotic.

“Is something wrong with the way I look?” she asked. It was such a typical feminine concern that Blaise had to stifle a smile.
 

“Quite the opposite,” he assured her. “You look unimaginably good.” So good, in fact, that he was having trouble concentrating on anything but her delicate curves. She was of medium height, and so perfectly proportioned that she could’ve been used as a sculptor’s template.

“Why do I look this way?” A small frown creased her smooth forehead. “What am I?” That last part seemed to be puzzling her the most.

Blaise took a deep breath, trying to calm his racing pulse. “I think I can try to venture a guess, but before I do, I want to give you some clothing. Please wait here—I’ll be right back.”

And without waiting for her answer, he hurried out of the room.

Leaving his study, Blaise briskly walked to the other end of his house, to ‘her room’ as he still thought about the half-empty chamber. This was where Augusta used to keep her things when they were together—a time that now seemed like ages ago. Despite that, entering the dusty room was just as painful now as it had been two years ago. Parting with the woman he’d been with for eight years—the woman he’d been about to marry—had not been easy.
 

Trying to keep his mind on the task at hand, Blaise approached the closet and surveyed its contents. As he’d hoped, there were a few dozen dresses hanging there. Beautiful long dresses made of silk and velvet, Augusta’s favorite materials. Only sorcerers—the upper echelon of their society—could afford such luxury. The regular people were far too poor to wear anything but rough homespun cloth. It made Blaise sick when he thought about it, the terrible inequality that still permeated every aspect of life in Koldun.
 

He and Augusta had always argued about that, he remembered. She had never shared his concern about the commoners; instead, she enjoyed the status quo and all the privileges that came with being a respected sorcerer. If Blaise recalled correctly, she’d worn a different dress every day of her life, flaunting her wealth without shame.

Well, at least the dresses she left at his house would come in handy now. Grabbing one of them—a blue silk concoction that undoubtedly cost a fortune—and a pair of finely made black velvet slippers, Blaise exited the room, leaving behind layers of dust and bitter memories.
 

He ran into the naked being on his way back. She was standing near the entrance of his study, looking at a painting his brother Louie had made. It was of a village in Blaise’s territory, and the scene it depicted was an idyllic one—a festival after a big harvest. Laughing, rosy-cheeked peasants were dancing with each other, a traveling harpist playing in the background. Blaise liked looking at that painting. It reminded him that his subjects had good times too, that their lives were not solely work.
 

The girl also seemed to like looking at it—and touching it. Her fingers were stroking the frame as though trying to learn its texture. Her nude body looked just as magnificent from the back as it did from the front, and Blaise again found his thoughts straying in inappropriate directions.
 

“Here,” he said gruffly, entering the study and putting the dress and the shoes down on the dusty couch. “Please put these on.” For the first time since Louie’s death, he was cognizant of the state of his house—and ashamed of it. Augusta’s room was not the only one covered with dust. Even here, where he spent most of his time, the air was musty and stale.

Esther and Maya had repeatedly offered to come over and clean, but he’d refused, not wanting to see anyone. Not even the two peasant women who had been like mothers to him. After the debacle with Louie, all he’d wanted was to be left alone, to hide away from the rest of the world. As far as the other sorcerers were concerned, he was a pariah, an outcast, and that was fine with Blaise. He hated them all now too. Sometimes he thought the bitterness would consume him—and it probably would have, if it hadn’t been for his work.

And now the outcome of that work was lifting the dress and studying it curiously, still as naked as a newborn baby. “How do I put it on?” she asked, looking up at him.

Blaise blinked. He’d had practice taking dresses off women, but putting them on? Still, he probably knew more about clothes than the mysterious being standing in front of him. Taking the dress from her hands, he unlaced the back and held it out to her. “Here. Step into it and pull it up, making sure that your arms go into the sleeves.” Then he turned away, doing his best to control his reaction to her beauty.

He heard some fumbling.

“I might need a little help,” she said.

Turning back, Blaise was relieved to see that all she needed help with was tying the lace on the back. She had already figured out how to put on the shoes. The dress fit her surprisingly well; she and Augusta had to be of similar size, though this girl appeared more delicate somehow. “Lift your hair,” he told her, and she did, holding the long blond locks with unconscious grace. He quickly laced the dress and stepped back, needing to put a little distance between them.