Winter's Kiss: An Athanate Novella (Bite Back: Outsiders Book 2) by Mark Henwick

Author:Mark Henwick [Henwick, Mark]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Marque
Published: 2016-10-06T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

I was stunned into silence while my mind tried to grasp the significance of what Kumai had said, while at the same time racing ahead to see what use I could make of it in negotiating my House’s freedom.

Athanate abilities vary, and those abilities can sometimes be traded between Athanate through a gift of Blood. Sometimes.

If my bite extended kin’s lives, and that ability was transferred in my Blood, then every House would want to share. That could be parlayed into influence and power. For Prowser, if I belonged to her House.

For me, possibly, with clever negotiation.

But as I sat there with my mind whirling, a sense of revulsion came over me. I stopped thinking of it in terms of abstract concepts like independence and power. My vision narrowed to one Athanate, somewhere in the world, sitting beside her dying kin, trying to console herself with the Athanate’s most famous and ancient poem, the Lamentation of Arunne: This is the gift and the sorrow of the Athanate; to see your loves pass before you like the days of summer, while your heart still beats. To keep your vigil in the shadows, and rise again with every sun.

It wasn’t as if my Blood would make kin immortal, but what would she give, that grieving Athanate, for a few more years with her kin? And what kind of monster would I be to refuse? Or even to demand something in return?

Kumai interrupted my thoughts. “There is, however, a problem.”

Of course. I looked up at him and waited.

“There’s a second possible ability that may be caused by your Blood.” He stirred uncomfortably. “It relates to the time you spent without kin while you suffered your amnesia.”

“Yes?” After Scott had been detained here, and Ralph and Jasper had died in the crash, I had suppressed all memory of being Athanate. I hadn’t bitten anyone for a year.

“A literal reading of the Agiagraphos might regard that as epitre.”

He was speaking English now, but he used the Athanate word so that I could grasp the weight of it. Epitre could be translated as ‘unorthodox’, but that was a pale reflection of the meaning. If an Athanate went rogue and killed humans for the pure pleasure of taking their blood, that was epitre. Such rogues were killed without hesitation by other Athanate. Even Houses that were in mortal feuds with each other would put that aside to team together and kill rogues.

Kumai had just told me that some Houses would treat me like a rogue.

“But why?” I managed to ask.

He shrugged. “You survived without kin, without even Blood.”

“And it nearly killed me.”

“After a year. Other Athanate would fall into a coma after a few weeks.” He shifted again. “This House does not regard it as epitre. Many of the Eastern Seaboard association, however, do. It was this complication that hampered us while you suffering amnesia.”

I frowned. “What do you mean?”

“The first step was entirely our fault. We held Scott and sent a message to you through your kin requiring you to come to Chalkos Hall.

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