Blood from Stone Read Online Free

he’d think appropriate to kill her this time. Or what she might be capable of now, to try to stop him.
    Try, and fail. She had no illusions about that. She was good. He was crazy. Crazy trumped even very good, every time. But they could do significant damage to anyone caught up in the area during the battle. Better not to get into it at all.
    There was a reason nobody in their right mind stayed near a wizzart. Their entire maddened existence was dedicated toward channeling the energies, feeling them as completely as possible, every living cell turned toward the goal of becoming the perfect, one hundred percent Pure magical conductor. And that included their brain cells.
    Because of that, wizzarts lived in the moment, the instant of action, without any thought to consequences or responsibility, only more and more and more of the lovely, seductive, orgasmic power. There was never enough to satisfy, and chasing it made them irascible, ornery, obnoxious and deeply dangerous. She had to get away; but carefully, carefully.
    “What happened to the dog?” she asked, trying to buy time, figure out how she was going to get out of this without further head-butting.
    The last time she had seen him, he had a dog with him. Big, floppy-eared mongrel. He had named it Dog, of course. Even sane, she didn’t remember Max having much in the way of imagination.
    A look of something sad and hungry passed over Max’s face, and was gone.
    “Killed him,” he said without inflection, dismissing man’s best friend that easily.
    Wren almost laughed. Of course Max had. Poor Dog. She hoped it had been quick.
    Those bright eyes squinted, and Max scowled at her. “You can’t be here,” he said with obvious irritation.
    All right, that was not what she was expecting to come out of his mouth. Although what she had expected, Wren didn’t know. She didn’t know why he was here, miles and miles away from the last place she had seen him, right in the middle of her damn job, or why he was so pissed off, not that wizzarts needed a reason for anything.
    “You should have gone away when I told you to,” he said, his hair sparking with agitation. His hands weren’t moving yet, though. It was when his hands started to move that the storm was about to hit. Assuming that telltale sign still worked, anyway.
    “When you told…” she started to say, then stopped. Oh. The void covering the area where the house should have been. Right. Suddenly the twigs and bugs and dirt-sore knees seemed the least of her problems. Was he tied up somehow in this job? But how? No, that didn’t…feel right. There was something else underlying it all, something she could almost taste, almost recognize, but it slipped away when she tried to chase it. Why was he here? Why now? Why had he bothered to show himself?
    “Shoved you away,” he muttered. “Don’t go poking where you’ve been told off, like you got no manners. Be smart, stupid brat. For your own good.”
    He was making a faint bit of sense, which worried her even without understanding it. If she were smartshe’d nod her head, pack up, forget about the job and listen to the not-so-nice, very crazy man.
    She was smart. She was also stubborn. And, according to one of P.B.’s favorite new rants, she had developed a recent and rather disturbing case of can’t-kill-me-nyah-nyah. And nobody told her to do something for her own good, not without telling her why.
    Wren stood up, her five-foot-and-no-inches barely noticeable against Max’s sinewy height, and pulled down enough current to make her own flesh sparkle. A statement: don’t push me, old man. Maybe P.B. was right to worry.
    “I’m on a job, Max. A job that’s got nothing to do with you.” That she knew of, anyway. Shit, let it have nothing to do with him, please. No such thing as coincidence, but let it not be connected. “Let me get it done and we’re out of your hair. But you will let me get it done.”
    Her voice stayed even and low, even as