Dead But Not Forgotten
Page 31
And so the halogens became the Bat-Signal (without the bat cutout, though Hunter had taken some convincing by Remy that they didn’t need one). Of course, the next problem was how Hunter could tell Luna if she was getting close to the other were, and again Hunter came up trumps, saying they could use clues, like in the game. Hot. Warm. Cold.
A few minutes’ flight later, Luna thought at Hunter again, “Cold?”
The Bat-Signal flashed twice. Cold.
She still wasn’t close enough, but she estimated she was only a quarter of a mile out over the bayou. She flew on, the night alive with hisses and croaks and rustles and splashes. The air swarming with buzzing insects, all of them bright spots of color on her mental radar. She flapped over thick clumps of leafy trees here, sparse skeletal ones there, seeing the fat face of the moon reflected again and again in the brackish water of the sluggish creeks, and huge lily pads floating like mini islands on the still-watered ponds.
“Cold?” Luna thought.
Cold.
She spied a small spotted frog on a lily leaf and just barely stopped her automatic dive; dinner already seemed a long time ago. Then she glimpsed a sinuous gray length marked with black, winding its way toward the pad. Its ripple rocked the frog’s raft, there was a snap of teeth, and the tasty snack was gone. She turned her attention back to the search.
“Warm?” Luna asked.
Cold.
Not close enough.
Another stream.
Another reflection of the moon.
Lots more trees.
She was nearly at the two-mile limit. “Warm?” she thought.
Three flashes. Warm, the Bat-Signal confirmed.
She snapped up a passing bug to celebrate and flew faster.
Below her a lake opened out. Cypress trees draped in ghostly Spanish moss rose out of the water like a scattering of dark towers. More giant lily pads covered the surface, and here and there among them floated a solitary log. A round shape—a turtle the size of a dinner plate—swam almost silently through the water. A nearby log moved suddenly, surging through the water, one end yawning wide—it crunched down on the turtle, twisting and rolling and foaming the lake surface.
The lake was obviously alligator central. The runaway werewolf wasn’t going to be down there. And the distant shore was too far outside Hunter’s range.
She swooped back to the nearest bank.
“Hot?” she thought.
Three flashes. Warm.
Maybe Hunter’s range out here in the sticks was longer than they’d thought. She flew back out over the lake, heading for the far bank.
“Warm?” Luna asked, soaring higher to see the answer.
Four flashes lit up the Bat-Signal. Hot!
Hot! But she was only halfway there. Below her was nothing but the lake.
“Hot?” she asked, double-checking.
Hot, confirmed the Bat-Signal.
The Were was down there, but down there was nothing but freaking water. It didn’t take a genius to realize he wasn’t going to be paddling around as a werewolf, not in the middle of a lake full of lily pads and silently floating log-impersonators. That was a surefire way to end up as gator chow.
So where was he?
“Looking,” Luna thought.
A single flash from the Bat-Signal. Okay.
Flying over the moon-silvered water in ever-widening circles, she put her sensitive snout and mental radar on full alert. And got a hit as she passed over a cluster of cypress trees.
She swooped down and around their bulbous bases, zipping through the stalagmite-like knees sticking out of the water. The base of one large tree had split, forming a dark watery cave. Her nose told her the werewolf was in there. Though how he’d gotten safely out here past all those gators was a mystery.
She landed on the nearest tree where two branches split about six feet above the lake, dug her claws in, and shifted. A moment later she was squashed securely in the V, feet braced against the rough, stringy bark. A sting on her butt let her know a nasty little bug had taken retribution for all of its pals she’d munched.
She grabbed some handfuls of moss to protect her modesty, not that she was prudish, but talking to a stranger, especially a teenager, while nude could be distracting for all involved. Fixing her gaze on the tree cave, she cupped her hands and hollered. “Jimmy, I’m Luna Garza. I’m a werebat, and I’m here to help you. So get your furry ass out here.”
A hush fell over the bayou for a breath, and then the buzzes, rustles, and splashes rushed back in like shocked whispers as if the local inhabitants had suddenly noticed a human had appeared.
“Hurry up,” she shouted again. “We ain’t got all night, y’know.”
The tree cave stayed dark and silent. Had her nose got it wrong?
She sent a mental question: “Still hot?”
Four flashes from the Bat-Signal lit up the distant sky. Hot!
Freaking werewolf was ignoring her.
“You’ve got five minutes,” Luna called, “before I fly out of here.” Then acting on a hunch, she added, “Your friend Gordon is still alive.”
Before the echo of her voice faded, water rippled and something crawled slowly out of the tree cave and clawed its way up onto the thick-spread base of the cypress.
It didn’t look like a wolf. Its head and body were rounded, not pointed. Its fur, even slick and shadowed by the water, was mottled with dark patches. Its tail was wrong, too: short and stubby. And were those tufts on its ears?
Just as Luna was wondering what in freaking hell had happened to the poor Were, it hit her why the animal looked so wrong.
She wasn’t looking at a wolf, as she’d been expecting, but a huge bobcat.
The twoey was a freaking shifter.
Well, that explained why he’d bypassed Dallas and headed for Bon Temps. He really had been looking for Sam.
The air around the bobcat shimmered, and a scrawny teenage boy took its place. He shook, then sat huddled on the tree’s sloping trunk, skinny arms wrapped around his drawn-up knees, eyeing her with patent distrust. She recognized his thin, dark face, his black tight-cropped curls, currently dotted with water drops that glinted like diamonds in the light of the moon. Definitely the runaway, Jimmy.
“Gordy ain’t dead?” Jimmy’s question was rusty, as if he hadn’t used his voice much recently. Or he’d been crying. Which, of course, he had been.
“He isn’t,” Luna replied gently. “The shot didn’t kill him.” Then because she wasn’t about to sugarcoat things, she added, “But he’s in a coma. The docs aren’t sure if he’ll pull through.”
A mix of grief and anger crossed Jimmy’s face. “If he dies, it’s Mr. Nicholson’s fault.” He said it in a sullen croak, like he didn’t expect Luna to believe him but he had to say it anyway.
It sounded as if there was a story to be told, and truths to be sifted—especially considering how fast and easy Jimmy had changed from bobcat to human; shapeshifting didn’t look as new to him as the police report said—but other things needed to be dealt with first.
Luna directed a quick thought at Hunter. “Found him.”
The Bat-Signal flashed, Okay. Then after a brief lull, it flashed six times: code for Good-bye and good luck. Remy and Hunter were going home.
“Good-bye and good luck to you, too,” Luna thought with a pang of sadness. She’d probably never see the brave little boy or his protective dad again. Then she leaned forward and fixed the teen with a stern look.
“Did you attack Gordon?” she asked.
“Course not!” Jimmy’s head jerked up in affront. “Gordy’s my best friend.”
“The police report said he had bite marks on his throat,” Luna said, eyebrows raised in silent question.
“Well, yeah.” Jimmy looked embarrassed. “I bit him. Gordy wanted to be a w
erewolf like me.”
Of course he did. Never mind that Jimmy wasn’t a werewolf but a shifter, so he couldn’t bite anyone and change them. The teen was an orphan; he didn’t know any better.
“So,” Luna said, keeping the exasperation out of her words. “If Gordy wanted to get bit, and you weren’t attacking him, how did things end up with Mr. Nicholson shooting at you?”
Jimmy sniffed loudly. “Like you’d believe me. Or care.”
Teenagers! “Instead of having fun in Dallas with my friends,” Luna said evenly, “I’m sitting in a tree, in the middle of a gator-infested lake, in a swamp, talking to you. I think that counts as me caring, don’t you?”
Jimmy frowned. “Suppose so.”
“Glad to hear it,” Luna said. “And as for believing you, I won’t know if I do until you’ve told me what happened. Why don’t you start with something easy like how you got out here?”
“I swam. Cats can swim, y’know.” His tone suggested it was a stupid question, which Luna admitted it probably was. Though how he’d managed not to end up as gator chow . . .
“Fair enough,” she said. “Why don’t you tell me how you found out you were a shifter and take it from there?”
Jimmy wriggled about a bit, then let out a deep sigh.
“First time,” he said slowly, and then his words rushed out, eager to tell his story now that he had an audience, “I turned into a hamster like the classroom pet.” His face screwed up in disgust. “I knew I was a were ’cause I’d seen them come out on the TV, but I thought that was it, and I was stuck turning into something small and useless every full moon. Then next time I turned into a cat like the one at the home. That’s when me and Gordy worked out that I was changing into the animal I looked at before the moon rose. So we found a picture of a wolf, and it worked!” He grinned. “Werewolves are the best.”
Of course they are, Luna thought, if you suffer from delusions of superiority. Like every werewolf she knew. And small didn’t mean useless! She clamped down on her irritation; Jimmy didn’t know any better. But he could learn, if he got the chance. He and his pal had been smart to work out the mechanics of shapeshifting without any help.
“So Gordy wanted to be like me,” Jimmy carried on. “Once we found out I could be a wolf, anyway. No one bothers you when you’re strong and tough. But that stupid Mr. Nicholson was always on our backs, and when he saw my wolf, he didn’t even shout or nothing, just pointed his gun at me. Gordy threw himself in front, and took the bullet.” He shuddered. “It must’ve hurt bad ’cause Gordy screamed an’ then he made this funny gurgling sound and Mr. Nicholson was going to shoot again . . .” Jimmy trailed off, staring down at the dark water.
“So you went for the gun,” Luna finished softly. Brave kid.
“Yeah,” he muttered, then raised his head and stared straight at her. “Is Mr. Nicholson okay?”
Luna could hear the fear hanging on his question the same way she could see the thick Spanish moss dripping off the tree.
“His arm’s tore up,” she replied matter-of-factly. “And you broke a couple of bones. He’s gonna have a scar or two, but he’ll live.” Which was good, more than the idiot man deserved after shooting at a couple of innocent kids, just because one was two-natured.
“I knew I hadn’t hurt him bad,” Jimmy said, his face twisting with frustration. “I was careful. I just want to know if he’s gonna turn into a werewolf? Now I’ve bit him?”
Luna shook her head. “He can’t,” she said. “You’re not a werewolf, Jimmy. You’re a shapeshifter. Shapeshifters are born, not bitten.”
“But it said on the Internet this guy got bit by a werewolf and he turned into a wolfman.”
“That’s something that only happens with weres, Jimmy,” Luna replied. “Not shapeshifters.”
“Oh.” Jimmy’s face fell. “But that means Gordy won’t be a werewolf.”
“No, he won’t,” Luna agreed. “But isn’t it more important that he gets better?”
He nodded, chin dropping sadly to rest on his knees. A couple of seconds later he muttered, “Good thing Mr. Nicholson won’t turn into a werewolf, either. He don’t deserve to be one.”
And you don’t deserve what’s happened to you, Luna thought.
“C’mon,” she said, “you can’t stay here. Those gators are going to start thinking about their empty bellies soon. How about we both head for somewhere more comfortable?”
The teen half sniffed, half sneered. “What for? It ain’t like going back’s gonna change anything. Now I’ve attacked Mr. Nicholson and they all know what I am, they’ll lock me up and throw away the key. I might as well stay here. None of the other animals will bother me if I stick to shifting into a bobcat.”
The twoey coalition, especially with the packmaster throwing his weight around even though the young shapeshifter wasn’t technically his responsibility, would do more than lock him up, Luna thought, her heart heavy. And for a moment she wondered if life in the bayou was better than none at all. Except that Jimmy was just a kid, and he hadn’t done anything wrong. Why should he have to pay for someone else’s stupidity? Only how to persuade him to come with her?
She pondered for a moment, then made a show of looking around, and said, “Spending your life as a bobcat isn’t going to change anything, either. I expect it’ll be pretty boring, too. No computer games, no Internet, no TV, no movies, no music. Though, of course, it’ll liven up during hunting season.” She grinned. “Bet you’ll make a pretty fur coat one day.”
He blinked at her, horror widening his eyes. “Fur coat?”
“Yeah, that’s what they use bobcat skins for,” she said cheerfully. “They’ll probably stuff your head and mount it on a wall, too.”
She saw his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed.
“If you come with me, Jimmy,” she said softly, “I’ll help you.”
As she spoke, something inside her clicked into place. And she knew she was going to do exactly that. She was going to go to the coalition and make them do the right thing by this runaway shapeshifter. And not just them, but the rest of the world, too. Even if it meant fighting for the rest of her life. Just because weres and shifters were different, it didn’t mean they were any less human. And it didn’t mean they shouldn’t have rights. Luna fixed Jimmy with a serious look. “That’s a promise.”
He stared at her, suspicion, skepticism, and hope warring in his eyes. “Okay,” he said finally, and cautiously. “I guess you helping me’s got to be better than being a fur coat.”
Luna grinned, and said, “Hey, bobcats can’t fly. Think you can change into a bat, Jimmy?”
Ten days later Hunter received a short letter sent to his aunt Sookie’s address. The envelope had a New Orleans postmark but no return address—secrets needed to be kept, after all.
Dear Mr. Hunter,
I am writing to thank you, and to let you know what happened to the sad boy. You were very brave and smart, and his rescue would have been very different, and difficult, without you.
Well, he is no longer sad, as his best friend was not dead as he thought but only hurt. And now the friend has made a full recovery.
As for the boy who was sad, he is now living with an old friend of mine in New Orleans, who is going to make sure he does not get into any more trouble, and where I am sure he will be very happy.
Please could you let your dad know, and tell him a huge thank-you, too.
Love and best wishes,
Batwoman
THE SUN, THE MOON, AND THE STARS
DANA CAMERON
Dana Cameron was always a Pam fan. She wanted to see more of her past, which I only hint at in the books. Dana decided to start with Eric’s creation of Pam as a vampire, weaving that into her own story about why Pam loves being a vampire and the trouble that enjoyment—and Pam’s nature—get her into.
—
I blame the artists. The men, most especially. They taunt us with ideas of freedom, and fail to tell us that it exists only in their prose, their pictures, their verse. I vowed I would give up the sun, the moon, and the stars for that kind of freedom. When I sneaked out to visit my darling, I thought myself daring, a tragic heroine. After that night, I understood I had been living a mummified existence, bound by corsetry and social niceties.
Before, I did not know myself, with my “wild” ways, to be alive but immured.
And yet if I hadn’t been trying to live, to feel, as the poets claim we must, I never would have drawn my master’s attention. If I hadn’t tried to leave the drab, mortal path I was confined to, I would never have died and discovered true life.
I remember shadows from Before. A shadowy existence, shadows between our garden and that of our neighbors’. I thought that place was Elysium: It housed my closest friend and, occasionally, her cousin, my love. But mine was nothing but a weak imitation of life, soon to be snuffed out entirely, a feeble gesture at something more than a muffled existence. A young lady’s fanciful imagination that her tentative efforts to trammel convention were real, meaningful. Potent.
Then came a series of shocks, too many things wrong all at once. That stranger waiting just outside my garden gate, as he’d waited in the chilly winter churchyard in past weeks.
Watching me.
“I have news, from—” He nodded at our neighbor’s house, where my love was no doubt writing poetry to me at that moment.
His words puzzled me. “I’ve only just left—”
“He has a plan for the two of you to be together, and it demands urgency. We are too visible here.” He followed me through the garden. “You should ask me in.”
I was dazzled. The stranger was blond, an Adonis. Something not quite the gentleman about him, and yet I did not hesitate.