by Cathy Clamp
To hell with Kansas and the new turn. I focused inward, trying to find Sue’s mind while I still could. You’d think that was an oxymoron. After all, I was in her mind, so how could I not find it? But not so. I was in her body. Brains are big places when you’re looking blindly for where a person in a coma might have hidden themselves to escape the situation. Was she lost in her memories, or trapped in her own pain center, too hurt to focus? It was sort of like searching for a black cat in a dark room. You’re looking for small and furry, and near the floor is the likely spot. But not the only one. I tried the likely spots first, near the vault door I was visualizing and near where I could hear voices.
I found a tiny, bright thread huddled near the door—like she’d used everything she had to get it open to find me. Sue?
Knew . . . you’d come. Not too . . . much time now. They’re arguing . . . not . . . sure it’ll happen in time.
I’ll give you whatever time you need, Sue. I’m tough. I’ll keep you going as long as you need.
A tiny bit of golden sunrise filled my head and it made me smile. You’re . . . sweet. And I know . . . you too well. No good to . . . argue.
Damned straight.
Maybe it would help to get her mind off it. How’s the remodel of the apartment going? I’d left it totally up to her, since she’d never really gotten to decorate before without having to please someone. I could live with just about anything, so long as she kept my recliner as is. But it was tan, so it would blend.
She knew what I was doing. I could tell, but she played along. Sometimes it takes two to ignore reality in a crisis. Frustrating. The accent wall they painted . . . with the red I showed you . . . mixed wrong. It’s . . . a weird mauve-y burgundy, instead of the lipstick color that matches . . . the flowers in the . . . drapes. She was starting to wear out, so I threw some more of my own power into the thread of her mind. Yeah, I knew it was going to probably speed up the process, but it was all I had to keep her mind with me. Lose that, and the body doesn’t much matter.
It’s okay. We’ll just paint over it.
Do . . . favor. ‘Kay? Finish it . . . for me. Lelya has design. Even . . . if something—
I let out a small growl. Nothing’s going to happen to you. I won’t let it.
Now a small laugh. Nobody . . . to shoot . . . this time, Tony.
The thread started to fade away and I panicked. I grabbed it before she could react. Fine. If magic wouldn’t work, what about life force instead? I’d had to do this once before—pull from my own body to give to her. It wasn’t magic, per se. I just used magic to deliver it. Of course, if I gave her too much, I’d die. But them’s the breaks.
The thread brightened just a little but before I could speak, a whispering started. It was faint at first, but then it began to echo and peal like bells in our collective mind. Krhlow plihep . . . krhlow plihep . . . Krhlow plihep! They weren’t words in any language I’d ever heard, but they had an immediate effect. The sound wrapped around our collective head, pulling, tugging. Demanding we rise up to meet them.
More noises, but they still weren’t words. Rghnl olpnst nbwiq! Hoplez requay. Now I could hear more voices and I could make a few of them out. Amber’s soft alto and Ahmad’s smooth, but angry baritone. A third female voice was mixed in, but I didn’t recognize it.
Blue-tinged fire, the color of an oven pilot light, started to crackle at the edge of my vision as the words were repeated over and over. A chant. Was this the ritual Sue had mentioned?
Her voice was filled with relief. Yes. They’ve decided. I’d . . . hoped to keep . . . you separate, in case . . . goes wrong. But . . . too late now.
No big deal. We’d deal with it as it came. Sorry. You’re stuck with me.
A light laugh that warmed me. I can . . . live with that.
The fire danced and crackled, higher and higher until the blue filled the landscape of our mind, covering it in light and shadow like mist over a moonlit English moor. Now more colors joined the blue in tiny pinpoints, blinking, sparkling, twirling. It was a Hubble photo, or the Aurora Borealis.
I’ve never seen the Aurora. Have you been to Alaska?
Sue’s voice was stronger, drowning out the voices in the background. The abrupt change startled me. She sounded almost normal and the lift it gave me was astounding. Go ritual! Yeah. When I was eleven. My dad took me on a cruise up there. Said I could still be amazed, and it would be too soon that nothing would, so he wanted to let me have a few memories of awe. It was a pretty amazing year. We did the Grand Canyon, Old Faithful, and Mount Rushmore and then to Alaska before we set sail for China and a grand tour of Europe. Missed a whole year of school for it, and had to make it up the next summer. But it was worth it. We bonded at a time when I was still angry I was an orphan. Mom had only died a couple of years before and I’d just found out that Dad wasn’t my real father. It was a rough time. Later I realized getting tight with him was more the plan than being awed. He was a pretty bright guy.
Long diatribe, and pretty useless information. But it was keeping her entertained. Her smile added a bright glow of orange and yellow to the landscape. He sounds like a good dad. I wish I could meet him sometime. I had a good dad too. I miss him.
Yeah, it’d be good to see him again. Except we’re both dead.
I immediately winced, considering the circumstances. It wasn’t how I meant it to come out, even though it was the truth. To the rest of the world, Tony Giodone and Suzi Quentin were dead—killed in a rival mob massacre at an airport a year ago.
Right now I feel alive! Like I could do anything.
It was the truth. Energy seemed to be swirling all around us in a heady rush that was like the adrenaline high of winning a race. We could probably figure out a way with Carmine’s help.
Ooo! And we could see Linda and Babs again. I haven’t talked to them in forever. I don’t even know if Babs had the baby. It’s been so busy and then . . . well, this happened and I sort of withdrew.
I’d noticed. She’d always struggled with depression, which is why I suggested the decorating. It worked for a while, but I didn’t realize there was an underlying cause of her anxiety. Stupid. I know better than that. I should have dug when I’d first realized it.
“What in the hell is going on up there? Tony’s had some sort of collapse. He’s mumbling Sue’s name and he’s bleeding from his mouth.” It was Lucas’s voice I heard and for a brief moment, I could see the inside of the living room, from the bottom up, and in black-and-white. Lucas had a cell phone to his ear, while the girls were helping Paul from the room. Apparently, I’d gone wolf at some point. I always see in monotones after I’ve shifted. I didn’t like that I was bleeding, but there wasn’t much I could do about it. I didn’t really feel any pain, so I couldn’t imagine it was too serious. Or, it was really serious and I’d completely left my body and was trapped inside Sue’s head.
The living room faded to black and the beeping started again. I could hear a reply from Sue’s right, so he must have called the clinic. But I didn’t recognize the voice. It was female, though. It must be one of the nurses. “This is Sarah. They’ve started a ritual, Alpha. One of the ones from the book of Dr. Wingate’s sister, Aspen Monier. The human woman was dying, and—”
Lucas growled, low and deep, and his voice held not only anger, but fear. “Who authorized that? There aren’t enough people there to approve such a risky venture. We don’t have any idea what could happen.”
The woman’s voice turned tremulous. “I . . . I’m sorry, Alpha. I don’t know anything other than what I was told. Dr. Wingate, Councilman al-Narmer and Holly Sanchez are in there now. The door’s locked, so I can’t ask.”
“What in the hell is Holly Sanchez doing there? She’s just a child.”
Now the woman’s voice turned from afraid to matter-of-fact. “She’s twenty-seven and she’s turning into a really good healer. She’s all we’ve have since June, when we lost all our doctors here. I had to take two children to the emergency room
in Boulder in May to set broken limbs because we didn’t have anyone to treat them. All I could do was pray that nobody did blood work or called Social Services.” She paused when Lucas started to growl again. “They didn’t. Between their parents and me, we convinced them the kids were playing in a tree and fell. It explained the scratches and bruises from their dominance fight. I’m sorry, Alpha, but I’m doing the best I can.” The tremors were back in her voice again, but they were from anger, not fear. “We’ve called and called, but nobody’s listened. The clinic has gone from a staff of six to me in a year and nobody has bothered to check on us. And I’m only an R.N. with no healing magic. What did you expect to happen?”
His reply was interrupted by an angry hissing sound, so I couldn’t make it out. Something was happening and it didn’t sound good. The noise finally drowned Lucas out entirely and I could sense Sue’s fear. It was hard not to, since I was sharing it. I didn’t have any warm fuzzies about the situation either.
Tony?
I hear it too. Ignore it and talk to me. No sense in getting worried. Might be a normal part of the ritual. Tell me about the Chicago pack. How are Yurgi and Pam?
They’re—She paused and I could tell she was listening to the noise, which was getting louder, seeming to come from above. It wasn’t the sound of a snake. I’ve heard them. This sounded like bacon sizzling in oil. Hot enough to burn. They’re good. She seemed to get her feet under her, so to speak, and was able to continue on like the hissing wasn’t growing like an approaching storm. They finally found a house they both like. It wasn’t easy. Pam wanted a big kitchen and two bathrooms for when they have kids, and Yurgi insisted on a real backyard, with a patio big enough to hold barbeques. He’s seen them on television and has always wanted to have one. Those are hard to come by in the price range they could afford.
I couldn’t help but chuckle. Yurgi Kroutikhin was a Russian immigrant, exiled from his former wolf pack in Siberia and sent to live in America with our pack leader, Nikoli, as the omega—lowest wolf. Yurgi wound up saving the pack leader’s life and Nikoli decided to reward his sacrifice by helping him buy a house—the second biggest thing to Yurgi you could imagine. The first biggest thing is having kids. Apparently, in the Siberia pack, he wouldn’t be allowed to breed. Nikoli doesn’t care and, in fact, thinks kids keep the pack strong.
They’re the closest things to friends that Sue and I have in Chicago. Yurgi thinks I’m a god in wolf form, because I keep the others from picking on him too much.
They decided—ow! I flinched too as a small stinging sensation came from somewhere on our left side. It wasn’t an arm or shoulder. It was inside our mind. Then another one made me wince and suddenly it was raining little sparkling bits of color like meteorites. Everywhere they landed they stuck and burned. At first it just made you yip, but after a few seconds it started to feel like a hailstorm pounding on our collective mind, except with bits of lava. There was nowhere to hide and no way to stop whatever was happening. All we could do was yelp and finally scream.
Fire filled the landscape of our mind. Pain erupted from places I didn’t know could feel pain until our entire reality was never-ending pinpricks of searing heat—death by a thousand cuts. If the ritual was supposed to be helping, it wasn’t. I fought back with the only thing I had, my Sazi magic. I raised a shield, pulling on what little I could feel of my body. In the process, I realized that Ahmad was still somehow attached to me. Whether or not he was aware of it really didn’t matter to me. What mattered was that there was extra energy in my head and if I could harness it, I could keep the fire from burning us up.
Borrowing someone’s magic for your own use isn’t like grabbing a rope out of your neighbor’s garage. It’s more like asking to borrow their hand, taking it off their body, and then expecting it to grab something at your command. Sure, with the right stimulus at the right nerve endings, it can. But you have to know what you’re doing.
I didn’t.
But Sue’s screams had turned to whimpering and it made me crazy. That’s a weird thing about wolves. We literally can’t stand to sense our mates in pain.
I reached out and grabbed that black-red stream of the snake king’s power, not even caring that it would be like touching a high-tension electric wire. The tiny bits of pain became one massive wave that drove me right to the edge of sanity. But slowly, as though dogging the head of a charging bull with sheer brute force, I turned Ahmad’s energy until it was not only connected to me in Kansas, but Sue in Boulder. Or maybe it was vice versa. An immediate change in our collective head happened. The mist on the ground turned red and an odd scent rolled across my nose . . . or was it Sue’s nose? It smelled of nuts but sweet—heavy yet somehow delicate. Most importantly, though, the bits of fire fell into the red mist and dissolved. No more pain.
I had no idea what Ahmad might do to me once he figured out that I was stealing magic from him. But I didn’t figure it would be good or pleasant.
You hanging in there?
The pause was too long. forcing me to ask again. Sue? Are you okay?
Her voice sounded a little . . . odd, but seemed okay overall. I’ve been trying to decide. But yeah, I think I’m okay. I feel a little strange, but strange is better than bad.
“Sue, we’ve finished the ritual.” It was Amber’s voice and it wasn’t echoing like she was intruding on Sue’s mind. We were hearing it with ears. “I’m going to give you an injection—try to bring you out of this coma. But I’m going to need your help, so really concentrate on waking up. Okay?”
What the hell? How do you concentrate on waking up? I hate it when doctors say bullshit stuff like that.
Sue chuckled. It means the alarm just went off and I can either hit the snooze or drag myself out of bed. I think it’ll work better if you go back to your body and I wake up to see if the ritual did what it was supposed to.
What exactly was it supposed to do? Was it some sort of healing chant, like shaman stuff?
I could feel her shoulders wiggle a little as she tried to describe it. Not precisely. The goal was to bind me with magic. Make me something . . . different. Not a shifter like you, but not entirely human either. If it worked, being your mate won’t hurt me anymore. I’ll have magical blood.
Um . . . huh. That wasn’t exactly what I expected to hear. You’re okay with that? Does it have side effects? Because really, what doesn’t? Even medication can give reactions.
She gave the equivalent of a mental shrug. Time will tell. A chance at living is better than the certainty of dying.
Tough to argue with that. And you’re sure you want me to go?
Yep. I’ll handle things here. But hurry back soon. We’ll have things to talk about, either way. I felt a push that moved me toward the void that separated us. I was being shown the door and I couldn’t say I liked it very much.
You’re keeping something from me, aren’t you?
The sunshiny light that filled the landscape should have warmed and comforted me, but all I could feel was suspicious. Oh, probably. Guess you’ll have to come back and find out what, huh?
It wasn’t like Sue to play games and I was starting to get worried that something strange had just happened. But I wouldn’t be able to tell until I got back and saw her face-to-face. I’ll see you later tonight. Stay safe until I get there.
Looking forward to it. At least that part was true, so I grudgingly slipped from her mind and closed the door again. But first I made it back to the normal kitchen door that we were both familiar with. I couldn’t seem to sense anything from Ahmad, so I was hoping that ending the ritual had ended our connection.
I came to in a twitching, screaming rush that came out as a howl of fury. Lucas was the only one in the room and he’d clamped down such a tight hold on me that I’d apparently pulled several muscles struggling against it. Once I had my head about me, though, I was able to slow my breathing and let my legs relax. It was only after staring at me for a long moment that he realized I was back to me again.
“You ready to be let go now?”
He eased on the magic holding my head so I could talk. My tongue was dry and the metallic taste was probably the blood Lucas said I was frothing with. “I think so. It hasn’t been a fun few minutes. How long was I out in real time? Felt like a century in Sue’s head.” Now the pressure holding me down released completely and I was able to shakily get up onto my four paws. “What’s the situation here? Are you going to change me back, or have you gotten everybody out of the house and I’m going to stay a wolf for the time being?”
Lucas stood and walked toward me carrying a pair of jeans that would be far too big, along with a nondescript gray T-shirt. They weren’t going to be enough to leave, and I really, really wanted to get the taste of blood out of my mouth. “You’ve been this way for about an hour. The girls drove to the store for more meat and to the motel to get your duffel. Since we hadn’t even unpacked, you’ll have everything you need to make yourself presentable again. I sent Paul to visit his neighbor, just in case anything went wrong.”
I felt a brush of magic that increased in strength to the point of pain and then I felt my body starting to shift. It’s hard to describe the sensation of changing from wolf to human. My legs broke and re-formed, lengthening and changing how the muscles attached. The fur pulled back inside my body until there was just a soft coating of dark hair on my forearms, legs, and chest. The mouth changing back is the weirdest. People like me who have had braces would understand the sensation. It’s like right after the screws are tightened. It hurts, right at the site, but there’s pressure everywhere.
Then I was human again, but one who felt like he’d just been hit by a bus. I got to my feet with the help of the built-in planter next to the door and my hamstrings told me I’d be limping for a week. Pulling on the pants was something of a challenge, because my legs really didn’t want to raise up without a screaming fit. More planter holding got the job done, but I do hate pulling up a zipper without underwear. It takes patience and extra attention to detail to prevent . . . accidents—neither of which I have tons of lately. “Well, that was an interesting ride. I think I’ll stick to the carousel next time, or maybe cut off the wrist band altogether.”
