Pepper / INK /

Rogue Inkwalker

The scene that had called him out was grisly worse than any he had seen in a very long time, and as he stood there, there were two things he knew instantly, this was NOT the Inkwalkers doing. And whoever had done this was dabbling in the dark arts.

This was the third scene in as many weeks, and since many of the officers had been coming down with the malaise, there were fewer officers to go around so he had been pulling extra shifts to pick up some of the slack.

Not only was his back throbbing with the cold, dead pain that he came to associate with Necromancers, but also as he stood there he began to be able to read the signs and sigils and they were not Daniel’s style. Not only was the tattoo rudimentary, but there was no scythe, no judgement of death and yet the man was dead, laid out and bled by the look of it. Sigils had been drawn with fresh blood and it made him sick to his stomach because he recognized a few.

There was the Alchemic circle, which all major forms of magic used, and then there were the sigils within and without that modified the spell and its effect. The one that caught his eye was the sigil "ink" It wasn’t the sigil for "tattoo" the way that all tattoos were spoken of. It was "ink," the only thing that could be applied to was an Inkwalker’s Ink.

His brain started putting it together. This was a blood binding for Ink. A way to force the ink to stay when it wants to go. That caused him to curse under his breath, blood bindings tended to stay active sometimes for days, and were often attached to a trap spell designed to maim or kill those who tried to undo it.

"Stop!" The word was a command that stopped most of the rookie officers dead in their tracks. "You," he pointed to the one nearest the patrol car. "Get the rest of the taskforce here. "You, he pointed to the one nearest the side of the scene. "Limit access to the scene, rope it off and set the wards. I want the whole cutout blocked."

"You," he addressed the officer with the camera. "Take pictures but don’t take another step. You cross into that circle you end up like him."

"And you, Make a call in for magical Services, tell them we have blood magic." His tone left no room for argument. When the other taskforce members arrived they saw Max standing there and went to speak with him, except Robert. Robert went to look at the body more closely.

"Magic services is five minutes out. That’s a blood binding, so I don’t dare touch it. Disturbing it without knowing the correct way to do it could make you part of the spell. See the shimmer, the circle’s still active. I don’t like Robert being that close. If it boomerangs it’s likely to hit him."

It was about ten minutes later when a pair of Magic Services agents got there. They stood quietly for a moment, taking in the grisly scene. Trying to figure out where to start. A big spell like this often took a lot to break.

"I take it the Inkwalker is not available or a spell like this would have drawn him. So we are going to need some practitioners to lend us strength. An’ we need road salt, at least two bags. Pure water, and candles, moon flowers if we can find any. But the salt and fresh water are mandatory.

Max got them what they had asked for and the task Force members, except Robert who was still kneeling over the body, went to the ropes and started asking for help.

"We need Lunars who can lend them power, and Solars who know the Solar Exchange for moonlight, because this is a Necromancer’s circle and there is no telling what sort of trap spell is attached to it."

And they came, one or two at a time at first, but soon there were over a dozen, linking hands and singing the song of the moon. A few solars singing the song of the sun and changing the energy over. The whole area was washed with silver-white light and what it showed was shocking.

Not only did it illuminate the sigils and the circle, but it illuminated Robert. Robert was under a dark power. The salt was laid down in intersecting lines forming a star that broke the surface of the circle. The reaction to the last line being put in place was violent. There was noise and wind, and fog, someone screamed but the fog was blinding, and still the Lunars kept singing, louder and louder trying to drown out the wind, the song of the Sun weaving into the melody. People often forgot that sun and moon were counter-melodies that both could be sung together and harmonize, and both were more powerful when they did.

There was another flash, but this one was blue-white and the malaise and fog were gone, the wind died and the scene was clear. Robert lay on his back looking up at the sky, his nose bleeding, as were his ears, an injury caused by being suddenly released from powerful magic.

He was breathing and able to open his eyes, but when he sat up it was easier to see that the spell had, indeed rebounded on him. On his arms and legs were numerous thin cuts that covered the fleshy areas. None were deep enough to cause more than discomfort, but for even a boomerang to demand that much exchange was bad. His eyes were still clouded, not quite the right color, as if painted over with grey. Not totally black, but certainly not green either.

If anyone from medical services had known their history they might have caught it then, but the Medical Services people who checked him out were just ’rescue medics’ versed in on scene medicine, mostly touch-medicine. And the worst symptoms for what he had were still able to be hidden up to this point. But it was this one thing that started everything shifting the other way.

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Next Chapter: First Blood