by Faith Hunter
I didn’t move.
“I told him all that, not to lay claim to you like a possession, but to provide you with what protection I could, from the men in the church who might still want to claim you and your land. And since we’re looking for total clarity,” he added, “I didn’t ask his permission. I informed him. Just like I informed the vampire that I was not interested in being her dinner or her sex toy.”
Occam lifted his hand and stroked his fingers along my jaw, soft as heated silk. I exhaled, the breath shuddering slightly. “Occam,” I whispered, “you might not shoulda done that. Courting is for a permanent relationship. Marriage or concubinage.”
“I was made fully aware of that by your daddy,” he murmured.
His eyes were the bright, shining gold of his cat. He was standing so close that his breath teased across my shoulder and curled down my chest. His fingers slid along my nape and into my hair and tugged along my leaves sprouting there. They shivered and so did I.
“And?” I whispered. The word was almost silent, but his cat ears picked it up.
“And I told him that when you were ready you could ask me to marry you. Or ask me to become your concubine.”
My mouth opened slightly. A male concubine? Oh. That was … new. And shocking. And—
“I told him I was yours and that if you’d have me, you were mine. I told him I’d kill any of his church people who harmed you or Mud. And because he’s a man of the Word of God, I told him I was cleaving to you. And I also told him that if you sent me away, I’d go and give you whatever time or space you needed. But that I was yours. Forever.”
“Oh …” I breathed out.
“Yes. Big-cats don’t mate forever. Werecats don’t either. But I do.”
A quiet voice in the dark of my brain hoped his tie to Soulwood wasn’t forcing this.
“I’m yours, Nell, whenever you want me.”
That didn’t sound like a Soulwood binding talking. But …
When I didn’t reply, he said, “There’s this line of dialogue in an old movie I watched when I was a kid. A knight or something like it telling his king, ‘I am yours to command.’ Nell, you’re in charge of this thing we might have, like that king was. I am yours to command. You are in charge, Nell, sugar. Totally. In every way.”
I swallowed, the sound dry and kinda rubbery. Occam’s fingers smoothed the leaves in my hairline and I felt a tremor run through me, thick and heavy and all twisted with meaning. It was like vines crawling over and across one another, winding and curling together. You are in charge, Nell, sugar. Totally. In every way … Heck fire. I wasn’t even in control of my own life yet and here was Occam pretty much giving me his life. It was a heady and terrifying feeling. I’d never had anyone give themselves to me before. “Oh,” I managed again. Definitely not Soulwood. I could think of absolutely nothing to say. Nothing at all. Silence stretched between us like heated taffy.
Occam reached out and took my hand. And lifted it to his mouth. He pressed my woody nails against his lips in a kiss that heated all the way to my toes. “Nell, sugar? Let’s eat.”
I nodded and turned to the kitchen. My legs felt a little wobbly and my breath was coming a mite too fast. Helping get the food on the table eased my shock some, however, and we sat at one end, me at my place, where I had recently staked my claim to the head of the table, and Occam to my left. That was where Leah had sat when I was part of a polygamous household. It felt strange to have Occam there, after the conversation we’d just had. The cats leaped to the tabletop and Occam said, “Later you,” as he put them down. “I got treats for you.”
“You’re spoiling my mousers.”
He grinned and picked up a thin square of ham with his fingers and bit into the greasy goodness. I used a knife and fork. “I passed a guy cutting up a downed oak tree in town,” he said, by way of conversation. “I stopped to talk and he’ll give away the wood if you’ll take care of delivery and splitting. You want it?”
“Some idiot’s giving away free wood? Yes.”
“He’ll split it for thirty bucks a cord. You want it split?”
“I’m not paying some yahoo to split wood. Townies always leave it too thick and I have to split it again anyway.”
“You got a good ax?”
“Yep.” I had a good ax and a strong back, but I didn’t say that.
“How many cords?”
“Whatever he’ll let me have. I usually go through four cords each winter. Sometimes five. If the wood is too green, it’ll have to dry this winter and I can use it next. I’ll see if Sam will handle the delivery.”
“I’ll help Sam, if he wants,” Occam said, casually.
I hesitated, feeling that there was something more than general kindness and neighborliness in his tone, but since I couldn’t decipher what it might be I let it go. “You know Sam will likely have a brotherly talk with you, now that you talked with my daddy. It might contain threats of bodily harm should you beat me.”
“I would certainly hope so, Nell, sugar.”
I wasn’t completely sure what he meant by that, but it didn’t sound as if he intended to fight Sam. “Okay. Long as you’re prepared for whatever Sam throws your way,” I said.
“I give you my word of honor,” Occam said, his face grave but his eyes alight with mischief, “that I will not eat your brother.”
I burst out laughing, which he surely intended. I sobered quickly and said, “Sam knows you’re a wereleopard. That means others in the church might. And some a them—some of those—others might want to hurt you.”
“I’ll be careful on all fronts.”
Before I could figure out what to say next, our cells dinged with texts from JoJo. “This is getting to be a bad habit,” Occam muttered, reading his aloud. “‘Highway Patrol found Rick’s car. Crashed. Rick not there. Get there ASAP.’ There’s a GPS and a map. It’s close to Rick’s house.”
I read mine aloud, “‘Get to Rick’s house and see if he’s there.’ Ditto on the GPS and map.” It was the first time ever that I had used the word ditto. It felt all modern and townie coming out of my mouth, but there wasn’t time to enjoy it. It was still light out and too early for a summoning, but this accident of Rick’s felt bad on multiple levels.
We dropped the dishes in the sink and raced outside, me grabbing my gear on the way. “Do you know if Rick was wearing the antimagic amulet made by the Knoxville coven?” I asked as we bounded down the steps.
“I never saw him put it on. Doesn’t mean he didn’t.”
We roared out of the driveway, Occam in his fancy car and me a lot slower in my Chevy C10 truck.
It took more than half an hour to get there, and as I drove, I got word that Tandy would be joining me at Rick’s place. Rick had moved recently to a rental house on Hunter’s Trail, near a swatch of wooded land and a low ridge of hill marked by one of Knoxville’s ubiquitous and overbuilt power lines. There were black walnut trees growing in the area, and I remembered the black walnut branch at the witch circle. I’d never been to Rick’s and was surprised as I drove up the short drive. I had expected a bachelor pad and found instead a comfortable-looking family home with shutters and a small, covered front stoop. Tandy pulled in behind me and I followed him up the walkway to the porch. “Can you tell if he’s here?” I asked.
Tandy stopped and looked around, or would have if his eyes were open. He turned in a circle with his eyes closed, as if seeing things I couldn’t. “No,” he said. “I don’t sense his emotions in either form.”
“His emotions are different in cat form?” I asked, surprised.
“Very. Rick is primitive, hungry, and violent when he’s a cat. There’s less disunion in Occam’s human and cat sides, but he’s been a cat for a long time and has managed to put himself back together emotionally.”
“How?” I asked.
Tandy hesitated. “He hasn’t told me, but I think Soul knows. I think Soul helped. Occam’s emotions are very restrained, well-ordered, and structured. He’s reserved and deliberate
, and when he does lose control of his cat, he gets it back quickly. There are times when he has more difficulty than others, of course, but for the most part, Occam owns his emotions even when in leopard form. Rick loses command when he’s a cat and has to fight to dominate his were-self. Sometimes he doesn’t manage that.”
“Oh.” I didn’t ask what areas Occam’s cat had trouble with. That seemed too intrusive.
Tandy gave me a small smile. “You have no idea how important it was for Rick to fight off giving in to his cat last night. He’s come a long way.”
Our cells dinged and we had both received text photos of Rick’s car from Occam. The car had skidded off the road into the scrub and was wrapped around a small tree, the side bashed in where the tree had stopped its momentum and spin. At a glance I’d say the car was totaled. Flipping through the pictures, I noted that the interior was shredded by claws and his sliced and tattered clothes were in a heap. There was blood on the steering wheel and puddled in the seat. Occam’s caption to the photos was a simple, Be careful. He’s cat.
Both of our cells dinged again with, No tracking dogs. Rick will kill anything that hunts him.
“That would be bad,” I said in response to the text. “Do we wait here?” I asked my partner.
“JoJo wants us to open the back door in case he comes home and needs to get in. Then she wants us to wait half an hour since the crash was so close by. I have the security code to the back door. Come on.”
Inside, the kitchen was scrupulously clean, not a dirty dish anywhere. The main living space was dusty, but not terribly so. The house was modern and sleek, with a wood dining table and chairs in the dinette, an oak kitchen with stone cabinet tops, and comfortable, squishy furniture and a big-screen TV in the living area. The house was cold, the air-conditioning set at sixty-five. It was empty and had the feeling of having been empty for hours.
I couldn’t help being snoopy. There was nothing in the small pantry except a half-empty box of rice, a bag of flour in a plastic ziplock bag, four extra-large cereal boxes, three cans of crushed tomatoes, and a bread bag with moldy bread heels in it. What Rick’s house lost in the bachelor pad department, the refrigerator made up for in guy supplies. There was a carton of milk, take-out containers, and a pizza box with half a pie in it, the pizza dried out, wrinkled, and growing a spot of green fur. And beer. Four twelve-packs of local microbrewery beer. Beer had no effect on werecats unless they drank a gosh-awful lot of it. Rick had a gosh-awful lot of it.
I looked in the garbage and the recycling. There were a gosh-awful lot of empties too, and not much of anything else. Rick used to like to cook, but there was no indication that he had ever used the pots and pans. The dishes in the cupboard had a layer of pollen and dust on them.
The laundry nook had a basket that contained boxers and socks, another holding a set of sheets, and still another with outerwear clothes in it, some from the previous night. Everything stank of man and sweat except the outer clothes, which also stank of horse. I lifted the pair of jeans on top and studied the creases. Jeans creased according to the way they were worn, and dirty denim, especially very dirty denim, could tell a trained investigator how they were most commonly used. These had been worn sitting, straddling, the creases stretching from crotch to knees, and were worn on the bottom from sitting on a saddle. I was sorta surprised that horses didn’t bolt when they smelled Rick. Mouser cats lived in barns, but werecats had to smell dangerous on an instinctive level. More bloody. I dropped the jeans and spotted a pair of low-heeled Frye western boots. They smelled of horse and hay and manure. I put the boots back, frowning. I hadn’t known Rick rode, but clearly he did. I closed the laundry door, ignored Tandy’s censoring stare as I snooped.
I found the stairs up and glanced into each of the two bedrooms up there. The one on the left was empty except for a sheetless air mattress. The one on the right was just empty. The bathroom was scrupulously clean, or maybe never-used clean.
Back downstairs, I found a neat half bath hidden under the stairs and then Rick’s room in the rear of the house. This room was a disaster. The bed linens were rank and piled on the foot of the bed. There were piles of clothes everywhere, some folded in stacks, others clean but rumpled in baskets, and still others on the floor, obviously dirty. His en suite bath was filthy, mold growing on the shower tile, soap scum coating the sink. I backed out quickly, fearing I might actually catch something in there.
The only neat thing in the master suite was the bookcase on the wall across from the bed. On the shelves were dozens of books with topics ranging from music theory to the Merged Laws of the Cursed of Artemis, which was a book on were-creature law. Part of me wanted to open it and read, but there were scraps of paper sticking out like bookmarks, each with notes jotted on them, and that felt too much like prying. Which I was doing anyway. There were science books and a book called Quantum Physics for Dummies. There were books in French, and one in an African language I couldn’t read and which I didn’t know Rick could speak, or maybe just read. The other things on the shelves were small drums, some looking African or maybe New World tribal. A small collection of wood flutes nested in an oiled wood box that looked antique. There was a purple candle that had burned down into a puddle of wax on a tiny plate, and a black rock that was polished smooth on two sides, fractured and broken on the others. There was a small box with a drawing of a saxophone and the name Vandoren labeled on front. It was half-full of things that looked like small tongue depressors. Everything on the shelves, except the Vandoren box, was coated with a heavy layer of dust and pollen, suggesting that the room hadn’t been cleaned since before spring.
There was a sound system on the middle shelf; it was dust free and probably hooked up to a house Wi-Fi system. I pressed the on button and a jazzy blues song came on. I hit off.
In the corner was a silver metal stand holding a brass saxophone. The sax wasn’t dusty either, showing that, whatever was going on with Rick in terms of filth and cleanliness, and whatever that meant about his mental state, music and horses were a big part of his life. He seemed to be clinging to things that had kept him sane, things that had kept him human. The values and ideals that had made him the man he once was.
I wanted to hear him play, but I had a strange feeling that listening to him would make me sad. And I also knew that I was searching for something of the man Occam might be, in the things that made up Rick’s life.
“Nell? Your emotions are all over the place today. You need to talk?”
I turned to Tandy, who stood in the master suite doorway, watching me. “No. I think … I think I’m okay.” I looked around the clutter and organization, the filth and cleanliness. “I think I’m going to be fine.”
“But you’re sneaking around Rick’s home. Why?”
Frowning, I turned in a circle, my hands on my hips. “I feel as if I’m missing something and …” Then it began to come clear. I spoke through it slowly. “The public part of the house is fine, if not immaculate. The private part is a disaster. Like Rick’s private life. This space proclaims that Rick is a slob. It shouts the fact that, unlike other bachelors, Rick can’t have a woman over to spend the night”—I pointed to the bed—“so why have clean sheets and a clean bathroom, right? Why not let it go to ruin? And he did. Everything is messed up here except the books and the music and horses, as if only those things are keeping him sane. Someone needs to talk to Rick. You’re a counselor of sorts, right?”
“Of sorts,” Tandy said softly. He tilted his head toward the front of the house and led me back to the living area, speaking over his shoulder. “Rick may need more than I can offer.”
“You won’t know unless you try,” I said to his back. “And being afraid of Rick’s cat is not a good reason to abandon him.”
“I’m not abandoning Rick.” Tandy sat on the sofa and gestured me over. “Have you talked to him about the callings?”
I grimaced. “No fair throwing my words back on me.” I took the opposite side, my back to th
e arm and my knees drawn up. That showed self-protective body language, so I swiveled around and sat with my feet on the floor. I was uncomfortable and didn’t know why, except that I had a feeling Tandy was reading me and that made me feel violated. It wasn’t lost on me that he was doing to me what I had been doing to Rick when I snooped. “Okay. Fair question. Go ahead.”
“When I was first hit by lightning—”
“Three times in a row.”
“Right. I had no idea what had happened to me, no idea that trauma could turn on the genes that make sensitives into empaths. There are so few empaths that I’d never heard of them. I had no way to process what was happening. I didn’t realize that I was picking up the thoughts and feelings of the doctors and nurses and technicians who were taking care of me. I just thought I had brain damage and my own emotions were flying all over. Until my girlfriend came to see me in the hospital.”
I stopped frowning and fidgeting. This was Tandy’s story and I’d never heard it from his lips. “What happened?”
“At the time, I hadn’t seen myself in a mirror.” Tandy touched his face, the pale skin and the darker reddish Lichtenberg lines that traced across his flesh like the veins of leaves or the tributaries of rivers as seen from the skies. “The lights were off. She walked in and took my hand. She had been crying. She said, ‘I thought you were dead. I was so worried.’ A nurse followed her in and turned on the light. And I felt her reaction. I was the ugliest thing she had ever seen. She jerked away, with a little scream, and ran out of the room.”
“Did you ever see her again?”
“Yes,” Tandy said softly. “With her new boyfriend. We passed on opposite sides of the street. She pretended not to see me, but I knew her enough to feel her revulsion even across the lines of traffic.”
“That stinks.”
Tandy tilted his head as if agreeing.
“And yet you and JoJo are together,” I said.
“Jo likes my skin. She thinks it’s sexy.” He gave me a grin showing his slightly yellowed teeth, even the enamel marred with fractures of Lichtenberg lines.
