by Zoe Chant
On the plans, everything had been neat and tidy. Clusters of houses—some designed to look like alpine chalets, some drawing on the classic design of good old Kiwi corrugated-iron sheds—connected by a road that wound through the basin in tandem with a picture-perfect stream. On the far side of the basin was the house that had started it all: Rena’s family home, a patchwork homestead with generations of additions and add-ons. The design of the new houses had drawn from this original: the angle of the roof here, a bay window there, wood or metal cladding there. Chaotic, but beautiful. The perfect combination of Fiona’s inner sheep and Rena’s inner tūī.
That was on the plans. In person, it was on fire.
Sheena tried to think past Oh God, it’s all on fire, but it was no use. Her brain kept circling back around.
It’s all on fire.
She breathed out hard. When the vapor cleared, everything was still all on fire.
Which was all the opportunity her sheep needed to panic.
Run! it bleated, and off Sheena went, zig-zagging down the road to the nearest cul-de-sac like a mad rugby ball. Not into the fire! she shrieked at it as her legs carried her along with her sheep’s mad instincts. “Not into the—aaargh!”
Flames roared from the nearest house. Heat slapped her face, viciously close. Shocked, her sheep let go of her body and Sheena stumbled back, not stopping until she was back on the tree line.
What is wrong with you? she asked her sheep as her chest heaved.
Someone might be trapped in there!
Sheena gritted her teeth. Maybe her relatives were right about her, after all. She couldn’t be trusted to look after herself. And you wanted to help them by getting us both burned alive? We’re not fireproof, remember? Just like we’re not barbed-wire-fence-proof and hole-full-of-boiling-mud-proof!
Wool is a little bit fireproof, it muttered.
It’s not—
Better than acrylic! it chirped. Actually chirped. Sheena groaned and buried her face in her hands.
‘Better than acrylic’ isn’t going to help against THAT! Sheena almost choked as the breeze carried a waft of stinking smoke over to her. Besides, who were you planning to save?
Silver Springs was a ghost town. There weren’t any cars in the driveways; no one was living here yet, were they?
Just Fiona and Rena.
Fiona and Rena, who were meant to come and pick her up. And hadn’t.
Sheena’s heart thudded in her throat.
*FIONA!* she shouted, sending her telepathic voice out like a fishing line across the basin. *RENA! ARE YOU THERE? CAN YOU HEAR ME?*
There was no response. Her fishing-line didn’t catch on anyone’s mind… which wasn’t unusual. She always had trouble directing her telepathy towards anyone she couldn’t see. It was as though her sheep’s miniature-ness was reflected in all aspects of her shifter powers: her telepathic abilities, her control over her sheep when she was in human form, everything.
Sheena bit her lip so hard she tasted blood.
There was one other thing she could do before chucking herself straight into the fire. Being a sheep shifter was good for more than getting her into trouble. Aunt Fiona and her mate were part of Sheena’s flock, and that meant she had other ways of sensing them.
“Ohh, I hate this I hate this I hate this,” she muttered, and opened her mind.
The world in front of her eyes went fuzzy. But she didn’t let herself close her eyes completely, even if she wasn’t going to be using them for a few minutes. Please let this not be a mistake, she thought, and looked out across the fire with her psychic senses. She was looking for other minds—other members of her flock, whose psychic presence pinged her sheep’s all-clear signal—and this was always, always when things went wrong for her.
Opening her telepathic senses like this always made her feel so vulnerable. She never felt as small as she did when she was seeing everyone else’s psychic presences laid out in front of her like a string of Christmas lights. Lambs were full of bright, bounding energy, older sheep shifters glowed like friendly hot coals, and Sheena was… small. Like a candle that could be pinched out. In her more generous moments, Sheena thought it was no wonder everyone in her family treated her like a porcelain doll. Most of the time, she was just annoyed, and kept fences up around her mind so that people couldn’t see just how snuffable her flame looked and would have less reason to coo over her.
She gritted her teeth and tried not to think about that. If Fiona and Rena were around, she would be able to see them. She strained her mental eyes, hunting for any sight-feel of either of them—Fiona’s wooly bonfire, Rena’s warbling flutteriness. Anything.
There was nothing. Sheena sighed with relief and was busy reeling in her mind again when something moved at the far reaches of her psychic senses. She gasped. It wasn’t a member of her flock, but it was someone. Not a light, but a presence.
Vaguely aware that the fuzzy non-psychic world was moving around her, she tried to focus her mental vision. The light pulsed gently, then flickered out.
For once, Sheena was glad to refocus on the real world and find she’d wandered off. Especially since she hadn’t wandered into the fire. She was halfway around the tree line, arcing towards her aunts’ house—exactly where she’d sensed the strange presence.
As soon as she came out of her mind’s-eye blur and saw where she was, she stumbled and caught her knee on a rock, but that was par for the course.
She righted herself and ran.
Grass whipped against her shins. She half-slid, half-stumbled down onto the driveway in front of Fiona and Rena’s place. She couldn’t sense the mystery shifter now, but she could smell—something. Something more than the choking smoke. Something… alive.
She turned away. The fire that was consuming the rest of the township hadn’t reached the homestead. Yet. Staying here a few minutes and trying to save whoever was stuck here wasn’t stupid. Was it?
Or is my brain as stunted as the rest of me? Some of her cousins would probably think so. Aroha for one. Sheena swallowed.
*Hello?* she called, sending her telepathic voice out like a fishing line again as she reached the front door. This time, something caught it. *Hello—whoever you are, there’s a fire—*
Did her aunts have a house guest? They tended to adopt anyone who crossed their path. What if they’d left their visitor here while they went to pick her up? And she’d missed them, somehow, but their guest was still here. That must have been what happened.
Break the door down! her sheep suggested.
I’m not strong enough to do that! A dozen images flashed through her mind, each less likely than the last. Or any of those things! I can’t FLY, how am I meant to get in the skylight? If there even is a skylight!
She pounded on the door again and shouted out loud as well as telepathically. A quick glance over her shoulder. The fire hadn’t leaped to the nearest cluster of houses yet, but it couldn’t be long. “Hey! Hello?! Is anyone in there?”
Her sense of the strange shifter kept flickering in and out of focus. At last she swore and pulled out her phone. By some miracle, she had signal again. And a few percent of battery left; enough? Maybe?
She found her Aunt Fiona’s contact and called her. The phone rang for long enough to get her worried, then she heard her aunt’s voice.
“Sheena? How are you—oh, f—” Fiona let off a string of curses. “You were meant to arrive today. With everything else going on—shit. Tell me you’re not—”
“I’m at the house.” Sheena almost shouted down the phone, not sure whether Fiona’s garbled speech was a result of a bad connection or her just not listening properly.
“No, don’t be at the house! Shit! Fuck, fuck, fuck this whole piece of shit—”
Sheena didn’t have time for her aunt’s favorite rhetorical devices. “Auntie Fi, I’m here, everything is on fire—”
“He really did it?” That wasn’t Fiona’s voice; Rena must have been close enough to the phone to hear,
or Fiona had her on loudspeaker. “Get out of there, girl, fast as you can.”
“I wasn’t planning on sticking around,” Sheena grumbled, one eye still on the fire behind her. “I just need to get your houseguest to wake the hell up first and come with me!”
“Houseguest?”
“Whoever it is you’ve got staying. If you could call them, or tell me where you keep the spare key and I’ll let myself in and get them up—I keep trying to contact them but there’s something wrong with my telepathy, I can’t reach them.” She thumped her fist on the door again. “Open up!”
The door swung open.
“Sheena, hon, we don’t have anyone staying with us.” Fiona’s voice was eerily flat.
Sheena blinked into the sudden darkness behind the open door. “What do you mean? I can sense that someone’s here. And… and the door’s open now, actually, so I’ll just…”
“Sheena, you need to get out of there. Right now. It’s not—”
Her voice cut off. Sheena frowned and looked at her phone. Dead.
But the door was open. Sheena took a step forward before her aunt’s words settled in. Get out of here? Right now? It’s not—what? What isn’t it?
Safe? She looked over her shoulder. Everything was very, very on fire—no shit it wasn’t safe.
“Hello?” she called out tentatively, pushing the door further open. “My name’s Sheena. I don’t know if you’ve looked outside lately, but…”
There was no one inside but suddenly, Sheena’s skin prickled with a wash of cold sweat. The air flickered and she jerked back, raising her hand to shield herself from… nothing?
“Wh-what?” she muttered to herself. The corridor was empty. There wasn’t even a curtain over the door that could have swung across and frightened her, so why was she so shaken?
It had felt like something was coming straight at her, and then… nothing.
Sheena raised one shaking hand to push her hair off her face. She was trembling so badly her phone fell to the ground.
What’s wrong? her sheep asked, nuzzling against her. Why are you acting so weird?
“I—” Sheena licked her lips. Her breath was coming in short gasps. I don’t know? You don’t feel that?
Feel what?
Feel… She shivered. Afraid?
No, her sheep replied stoutly. I don’t care what you said about being no better than acrylic. I’m not going to let some stupid fire stop us from doing what’s right!
Not afraid of the fire, of… Sheena shook herself. Yes of the fire, she meant. Didn’t she? Because there was nothing else to be afraid of. Just fiery death.
And letting some poor arsehole die because she was too busy freaking out like the helpless munter everyone thought she was to help them.
That scared her. Letting herself down because of her limitations was one thing, but letting down other people? She couldn’t live with that.
And you dropped your phone! Her sheep sounded scandalized. I don’t know where you get off, teasing me about being scatterbrained when you don’t even—look, it’s right there, pick it up before you stand on it or something—
Sheena shook her head. Her sheep wasn’t making any sense. She was shivering like she’d just crashed into a frozen lake, and it was talking about her phone? She didn’t have time for this.
Her sheep was still trying to nudge her back towards her phone. She reached out as though she was going to pick it up and, while her sheep was distracted by its success, quickly constructed a mental picnic basket around it.
Hey! her sheep bleated. Mmmf!
There, Sheena thought. She felt dizzy for a moment, as the basket that would keep her sheep temporarily out of her hair settled in place.
The picnic basket was the one surefire method she had of stopping her sheep from running away with her. It was like an internal version of the walls she used to keep other shifters from peeking into her inner self. With the walls on the outside and the picnic basket on the inside, what was left of Sheena felt like she was being squeezed in a sliding door, but at least she wasn’t constantly fighting her sheep’s twitchy instinct to run at the first sign of trouble.
She hurried inside, blinking as her eyes adjusted to the darkened corridor. “Hey! If you’re in here—” she began and froze.
There it was again. The uncanny sensation that something was rushing towards her. And… a smell.
The hairs on the back of her neck rose. This wasn’t the normal geothermic stink, even if the way it kept wafting in and out of reach was the same. She took a few tentative steps, moving her head from side to side to try to pin it down.
It was nasty. Sweet, but bad sweet. Like coming back from a week away and finding the power had gone off. Milk curdled, vegetables slimy, cheese weeping. Or a glass of wine left in the sun until it was all vinegar and flies.
She grimaced, but the smell was gone again as quickly as it had appeared. Sheena lowered her head bullishly. Someone was here—someone who shouldn’t be, obviously, given how they were avoiding her, but she couldn’t let that stop her. Or a wee bit of BO. She needed to get them out of here.
“My name’s Sheena,” she called, then glanced back over her shoulder. The fire hadn’t gotten any closer. “Look, I know shit’s weird right now, but it’s going to be safer outside than stuck in here—”
The words died in her throat.
In the half a second she’d looked away, the hallway in front of her had filled with smoke. Thick, rancid yellow smoke. It’s on fire, she thought, telling herself to move, reminding her sheep that out of fright or flight it had always chosen running the hell away, so time to get on with that, right? Because where there was smoke there was… fire…
Two fires. Pinpricks of flame, not on the walls or the floor but floating in mid-air. They blazed brighter as Sheena watched and the sweet-sick smell filled her nostrils.
Not fires, she realized as they got closer and the smoke below them twisted into the shape of fangs. Eyes.
Run.
It wasn’t her voice, or her sheep’s. It didn’t nudge up against her mind like another shifter’s telepathic voice. It rattled around the inside of her skull and pressed down on her until her knees almost gave out. Icy fingers clenched around her heart.
Run!
She ran. So fast and so blindly that she almost sprinted straight into the fire. Her feet skidded as she turned around. The trees—she had to get to the trees. Away from the fire, away from—
Footsteps behind you in the darkness. A chill breath on your neck. Eyes in the shadows. There’s no escape. It will find you.
Fear rose up inside Sheena, some primeval instinct that overrode everything else in her mind except the knowledge that she couldn’t possibly get away. Eventually, it would find her. But even if running was useless, she had to keep running, because it was better that exhaustion got her than—than—
Not that way! her sheep screamed at her. The fire!
Sheena swore as heat burst against her face. A ragged breath and her lungs filled with the rotten stench she’d scented earlier. She twisted away from something she couldn’t see but knew was there and ran down the street. Fuck. Into the street, surrounded by houses that were on fire, and—wait—there—if she could reach that gap, she’d be able to make it back into the trees—
She almost made it before another crash of fear sent her stumbling backwards.
Angry tears sprang to her eyes as she hit the ground. Gravel tore at her hands and knees. This time when she caught the sweet-sick scent, she kicked out automatically and hit—nothing.
She stood up slowly. Her face felt hot and stung when she touched it. She winced, eyes skittering over the burning houses, the smoke coiling up in the still air, the empty streets. The nothingness that frightened her so badly she’d almost run into a burning building.
Think, she begged herself silently. Not her sheep, for once. This time, she was begging herself, because she was the one whose mind wanted to run away from whatever was… whateve
r this was. Just stop, and… think.
Something was after her. Something that made every part of her remember she was prey, not predator. She couldn’t see it yet, but she knew it was coming, the same way she knew up was up and down was down. Maybe that made her crazy.
She might be crazy, but she wasn’t stupid. Not so stupid that she would run straight into a fire instead of away from it. Not unless what was happening here was real.
She had to do something to defend herself.
What? her sheep bleated, confused. What are you defending yourself from?
A sob of laughter lodged in her throat. Her sheep was right to be confused. Defend herself? She was a sheep shifter. Sheep didn’t defend themselves; they panicked, and ran astray, and let themselves be herded into little boxes.
Wait… Her blood ran icy cold. Was that what had just happened to her? Was she being herded?
Herded by what? her sheep sounded baffled. What are you doing? Stop running!
Stop running? No, I can’t let it—
Sheena blinked. Her heart was still racing, her armpits and back were wet with sweat, but she wasn’t afraid anymore.
The fear had slipped away so neatly, it was as though it had never existed.
A new sliver of unease wound itself around her heart. It felt different to the fear. It felt like it was hers, as though the fear before had been somehow outside of herself. Battering against her defenses. Herding her.
She stood completely still, blood hammering in her ears. What was going on?
What is going on? her sheep repeated. Hang on—can you smell that?
Hard not to, she replied. The putrid, sweet rotten smell felt like a physical sludge in her nostrils.
No, not that… Her sheep’s voice faded out and Sheena felt its attention turn away from what she was seeing and hearing. She clutched desperately for the picnic basket but her sheep was too quick for her. It hijacked her senses and Sheena felt dizzy as her body tried to concentrate on too many smells and sounds at the same time. When it tried to drag up her psychic vision again, she put her foot down.
