Smoke Bitten

by Patricia Briggs

  “Joel is there,” she said. “Darryl and Auriele are on their way—about twenty minutes out. Dad was going to leave Kelly behind but”—another of the back windows in the rocking SUV exploded—“they were having more trouble than they expected. It took all three of them to get him into Dad’s SUV, and it took all three of them to keep him in. Finally, Dad said that given that Fiona and Harol-somebody were out fruitlessly hunting Kyle, the house should be safe enough for twenty minutes.”

  Ben would have heard that—which meant the smoke weaver knew it, too. So I should hurry and get started. Once I had begun, hopefully he would be too busy to launch a counterattack.

  Aiden touched my arm. “Joel is good protection,” he said. “Hard to bite a tibicena.” And that was very true. Some of my worry left me. “I thought I might be useful here given my background. But maybe I should have stayed home, too?”

  “I don’t know,” I told him honestly. “Tough call to make. For what it’s worth, I’m happy to have you here. If you hear me about to do something stupid, you might warn me.”

  He nodded. “Don’t put me so far away I can’t help.”

  Nonnie touched the rock and then told me, “I will help guard your children. Help Li and Kent. I will keep them safe if it is in my power.”

  “I will do my best for James,” I said, nodding. “I have a couple of guys who need rescuing from the smoke weaver, too. I’m going to try to do it all at once.”

  She nodded mutely. Frowned and then said, “You aren’t the Alpha. You aren’t even a werewolf. Fiona says that your only gift is turning into a coyote. Why are you in charge?”

  “Because Fiona is wrong about me,” I told her.

  I didn’t say anything more, because I had no idea who else or what else might be listening. And because they were not pack—and they didn’t need my secrets.

  When Li Qiang led the group the short distance to the lamppost that I had indicated, Nonnie followed. About that time, Adam, Luke, and Kelly managed to get Ben—shackled, chained, and in werewolf form—out of the back of the SUV, which now looked as though I was going to get a second chance to try to talk Adam into something other than black.

  “Over here,” I said.

  And they half carried, half dragged Ben to where I stood. All three of the men were bloody—all four if you included Ben. His rear legs looked like hamburger from the car windows. Ben, on his own, was no match for any of them by themselves, let alone all three. But they didn’t want to hurt him—and the smoke weaver had no reason to worry about hurting any of them, including Ben.

  “Ben,” I said. “Hold on.”

  “Don’t get any closer,” growled Adam.

  He was right. I didn’t heal the way that the werewolves did, and I was not nearly as strong. So I stood back and did not touch him the way I wanted to.

  “I see you,” I said. “And I have a bargain for you.”

  Ben quit thrashing.

  Adam murmured, “Set him down.”

  The other two gave him incredulous looks. But he was their Alpha and they were used to doing what he told them to.

  “A bargain,” I told him, “must have something that I want—and something that you want.”

  And I realized I had a problem. “I need Ben to be able to talk,” I told Adam.

  He didn’t tell me it was impossible, as he had every reason to do. I thought it might be impossible, too. Poor James’s breathing didn’t sound like he had time to wait at all. But this wouldn’t work if Ben’s body couldn’t speak.

  Usually it doesn’t matter much that werewolves cannot speak in their wolf form. They communicate very well using body language, and they can scratch out letters if something is very important. If a matter is truly urgent, then sometimes the pack bonds provide a way to communicate with Adam.

  None of that would work for the smoke weaver—what I needed to do required a voice.

  Adam sent Jesse to the SUV to grab a ring of keys that was in the glove compartment. She had to rummage a bit but found it. She threw the keys to me before going back to where I’d asked her to wait.

  Adam unlocked all of the chains that bound Ben. Undid the silver muzzle and the band around his chest. The only binding he left on was a heavy silver collar and a thick chain attached to it, which Adam kept hold of. Ben’s fur was burned where the bindings had wrapped him.

  If there were any other way to hold a crazed werewolf, Adam would have done that instead. But the wolf had very few weaknesses, and steel bindings alone were not enough to hold the strongest of them. And, Bran had told me once, never assume that you have one of the werewolves who can be restrained without silver. If you make that mistake, it might be the last time you get a chance to be wrong.

  Ben sat still for it all.

  Adam glanced my way—and that was when the smoke weaver went for him. I knew it was not Ben. I didn’t need to see it in his eyes to know that Ben would never attack Adam.

  Adam had the other wolf on the ground so fast I didn’t see him move. He put his head next to the great mouth as it snapped and growled.

  “Change,” said Adam.

  I felt the hard tug from the pack bonds as he pulled power from all of us. Kelly staggered and Luke reached out to steady him.

  Adam leaned closer and licked Ben’s face where blood gathered from a small wound. “Change.

  “Hold him down,” Adam said, his voice strained.

  Luke and Kelly piled on. Changing for a werewolf is a horrible, painful, and slow process. The more dominant wolves can change relatively quickly—ten or fifteen minutes, a little faster if they pull hard on pack bonds. Wolves lower in the pecking order, like Ben, took longer—except when their Alpha forced power into the change.

  But the painful part was important. I tried really hard not to touch a werewolf who had recently changed to either form for a few minutes because their skin was hypersensitive—and their muscles and bones ached from being reshaped and moved. Ben, changing to human with Adam, Luke, and Kelly on top of him, had to be in agony.

  I hoped the smoke weaver would feel some of that, too.

  I glanced away from Ben and my eyes fell upon the rock that held—or that was—James Palsic, and I found myself wondering why he’d been turned to stone instead of made a puppet.

  According to my calculations, the smoke weaver was limited in the number of people he could control, and not being able to take me over at all had made him, according to Ben, obsessed with me. He had taken Ben, who belonged to our pack, and Stefan. How had he known about Stefan? Maybe Stefan had been coming to our house when I didn’t answer his call? The hitchhiker didn’t count, because she had been earlier. Lincoln could also have been lurking around our house when he’d been bitten, but the weaver had been riding him while still controlling Ben and Stefan—which meant that he should be able to control three people at a time.

  It made sense, having taken Lincoln, that the smoke weaver was aware of these wolves and could choose another victim from among them after Lincoln died. But why had he turned James into a rock? Why hadn’t he bitten him if he could control one more person?

  And I thought of Fiona’s reactions to Lincoln. She dealt with witches, why not fae? Assuming that she did not care about Lincoln—which I thought might be a safe assumption to make about her. What if she had bargained with the fae instead of opposing him? They had, after all, a similar goal. The smoke weaver, like Fiona, was driven to attack my pack. I didn’t know why.

  James was taking Fiona’s pack from her, and the weaver had acted against him. That made sense. But again, why turn him to stone when he’d be of more use bitten? His mate would know that he was bitten, I thought. And then I had a terrible thought. What if he had not bitten James—because he had bitten someone else?

  Oh. Oh no.

  He had bitten someone else. Not Li Qiang, not Kent or Nonnie. I would know if it were on
e of them; I was pretty confident that I could read the signs. He had bitten either Fiona or her mate. And I was betting on her mate. And that meant—

  “He can talk now,” said Adam sounding tired.

  One enemy at a time, I told myself firmly, squelching panic as far down as I could. This was a chance, possibly my only chance, to send our unwelcome visitor back to Underhill.

  Kelly and Luke pulled Ben up to his knees so he was looking at me. Adam kept hold of the chain.

  “Mercy,” Ben croaked, his eyes terrified. Because he’d known all along what I’d just understood. It hadn’t been the smoke weaver kicking the bejeebers out of Adam’s SUV. It had been Ben, desperate to convey the information we all equally desperately needed.

  “I know,” I said. “I just figured it out.”

  Adam frowned at me and I shook my head. It didn’t matter because there was nothing to be done until this was finished.

  “We’re here now, Ben. Now we have to do it this way or it will be an even bigger disaster.”

  “Okay,” he said. “Hurry.”

  “Smoke weaver,” I said. “I have a bargain.”

  Bargains, properly made, Ariana’s e-mail had read, are complicated things.

  “Bargains must be made,” he said. His voice was Ben’s, but it was not Ben.

  “If you come here, in your own—”

  “Blood and bone,” supplied Aiden.

  “Blood and bone,” I said, trusting him. “You may bite me once to test your power against mine. You in your most powerful form.”

  I was guessing that this was a factor. What bit Stefan had been much bigger than the rabbit who bit Ben. If the rabbit had been enough, why would the weaver trade up to bite Stefan at nearly the same time and place? Stefan was a very old vampire and a power in his own right among his kind. Ben might be a beloved member of our pack, but his actual age was very close to my own, and he was pretty far down the pack structure in power. Stefan was much tougher prey than Ben.

  “If I win?”

  “Then I am yours,” I told him.

  He snorted. “What then the incentive? I could come upon you when you least expect it and have the same result.”

  Could he? I wondered. Why hadn’t he, then? But it is important when dealing with immortal creatures to not allow them to distract you from your goal.

  “Ask me what happens should you lose,” I told the smoke weaver.

  “What happens if I lose?” he asked.

  “Because I have defeated your magic once before,” I said, “it is only fair that I should pay you a penalty for the opportunity to make a bargain where the odds are not in your favor.”

  Above all else, a proper bargain is balanced. I hoped that I had judged it correctly.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “What would you?” I asked.

  “Answer three questions,” he said.

  I pretended to consider it.

  “I will answer one question because you come here where I am,” I told him. “I will tell you one true thing because I have already withstood your bite once.”

  He stared at me. “Why do you bargain?”

  “Fair question,” Aiden said.

  “It is important to know if your bite at fullest power will affect me—or else I will always be worried that you will sneak up behind me in the dark.” True—but not the answer to his question.

  Flattered, he smiled. It was Ben’s face, but it was not Ben’s smile. “I come,” he said.

  And then Ben went limp in Kelly’s and Luke’s arms, and he began, brokenly, to swear. He looked up at me once, and I shook my head. It would take too long to explain—and at this point there was no good to be had telling the others. The weaver knew that we’d left our vulnerable alone in our home with only one protector—because Ben knew we’d left our vulnerable alone in our home with only one protector. And what Ben knew, the weaver knew, and what the weaver knew—Fiona and her mate knew.

  Joel was home. That would have to be enough.

  13

  I found spare clothing, the metallic emergency blanket, and a real blanket in the back of the SUV. It took me a few minutes because as bad as the outside of the vehicle looked, the inside was worse.

  The leather upholstery was slashed, seat stuffing scattered in chunks ranging from baseball size to pea size. One of the inner linings of the doors had been broken into two. The whole of the back two-thirds of the car was liberally sprayed with blood, as were the first two shirts I found.

  I took the results of my search to Ben. He was curled up on the ground shivering convulsively. Kelly had wrapped his large body around Ben’s to help him keep warm. Luke crouched with his hand on Ben’s shoulder, talking to him in a low voice. It didn’t matter what the words were, it was the familiar voice that soothed him.

  It probably would have looked a little odd to someone who didn’t know they were werewolves.

  Adam stood a little back from them, holding the chain attached to the collar Ben wore. Adam had to stay far enough back that if the weaver took Ben again, Adam would be able to control the situation. But I could see from the expression on his face that Adam would rather have been in Kelly’s or Luke’s position.

  The lamppost group had ventured nearer. Aidan and Jesse had stopped at the rock that was James Palsic. Jesse stood next to it . . . to him. She glanced up furtively to stare at the eyes that had no recourse but to look back. Aiden touched him, running his hands over the stone gently, as if petting a dog.

  I could hear him murmuring, “Remember who you are. Remember.” Over and over as if it were a spell, but I couldn’t sense any magic.

  Li Qiang and Kent were keeping watch over them, but Nonnie approached Adam while Luke and Kelly grabbed the clothes and blankets from me and used them to wrap Ben up.

  “He hasn’t talked again,” Luke said in a low voice. “We think he’s in shock.”

  “No wonder,” I said. “My fault. If I’d worked it through better, I could have told you I needed him human. It would have been easier on him if you didn’t have to make him change so fast.”

  “Werewolves are tough,” said Luke. “Don’t fuss, Mercy.”

  “So we just wait?” Nonnie said tightly. “How long?”

  Adam looked at her thoughtfully. After a moment she started to squirm.

  “We wait,” he said softly, “for my wife to risk her life for your mate.”

  He looked over at Ben, who was dressed in sweats that were too big for him on the bottom and just right on the top. Luke wrapped him in the soft blanket first, and then the thin metallic one.

  Then he looked at Nonnie, who had lowered her eyes and looked as though she was seriously regretting saying anything. Adam shook his head at himself. I knew that expression.

  In a much gentler voice he said, “Mercy is risking her life for Ben and anyone else who might encounter this creature because Mercy is the only one who has the ability to make this bargain.”

  “Why is that?” Nonnie asked.

  Then she held up a hand. “Sorry. Not my business. I’m sorry.” She looked at the rock and then back toward Adam. “What I should be saying is thank you. You had no need to come to our aid at all after what we’ve been doing.”

  “Desperate people do desperate things” was Adam’s reply. “We all understand that.”

  Kent gave a low warning whistle, then said, “It’s getting darker.”

  He was right. The sun was still high in the intense blue sky, but the area we were standing in was growing shadowed. I inhaled—and bless Hannah’s granny’s potion—and the magic scent that was unique, as far as I could tell, to the smoke weaver filled the air.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, the waiting is over,” I said quietly. I kissed Adam, and it was a good kiss even though I had to do it from an awkward angle so that I didn’t interfere with his ability to mana
ge Ben.

  Then I walked to the middle of the driveway, halfway between Jesse’s car and Adam’s. Away from all of the people. I was pretty sure that the smoke weaver had to treat with me, and complete our bargain, before he went out biting anyone else. But pretty sure wasn’t certain, and I didn’t want him closer to anyone else than necessary.

  A circle centered, more or less, on my position in the middle of the circular drive, and continued to darken, as if someone were drawing it with shadows.

  Kelly and Luke had pulled the blankets off Ben again. And then Adam kissed the top of his head and pinned him to the ground so he could not move. Kelly stood on one side of them, Luke on the other, ready to help in case Ben broke free.

  Like a Christmas snow globe, the dome over our head, cutting us off from the rest of the world, was invisible. But I could feel the resulting pressure drop as the circle sealed. Circles like this were something I associated with witchcraft. But this didn’t smell like witchcraft—it smelled like the smoke weaver.

  The darkened edges of the circle began to fill with smoke, covering the ground in folded layers that grew thicker and rounder until they reminded me of the rolled-up dough for a cinnamon roll before you cut it, or . . . the coils of a snake.

  The smoke had left a little area around Adam’s group and another around James’s rock. I didn’t like the look of them separated.

  “Kids,” I called, “get closer to Adam.”

  Jesse and Aiden tried, but the smoke between them thickened and grew taller. Just before I lost sight of them in the smoke, I saw Luke make a rolling leap over the top of the coils. Hopefully he made it to Jesse and Aiden. I believed that Kent and Li Qiang had meant it when they told me they would guard my family, but I felt better having one of the pack with them.

  I now had a smallish area to stand in, about ten feet around, but clear, more or less to the top of the dome—though even the surface of that dome was darkening. Meanwhile, the layers and layers of coils were becoming more real, and solid. Giant silver scales glinted iridescently in the filtered light that drifted through the smoke.