by Kelly Meding
He opened his eyes, and for a moment they weren’t human. The animal had come out. Silver overtook most of the white, and the pupil became less distinct. Then he blinked, and while still the wrong color, they were human again. He pressed into my hand. Inhaled.
“I don’t think it’s going to be that easy,” he said.
“What has ever been easy for us?”
A puff of air that might have been a soft chuckle crossed my wrist. “Good point. How is this happening?”
I had no clue. Therian history said that infected humans were killed or went bat shit from the fever. Wyatt had transformed. Two explanations came to mind. The simplest was that Wyatt’s connection to the Break, being Gifted, affected the change. His tether to magic kept him from being consumed.
The other explanation was far more sinister—Amalie or Thackery manipulated this group of Lupa somehow, altering the way the infection worked. To what end, I couldn’t begin to guess, and I was done underestimating the lengths to which either Thackery or the Fey would go in order to meet their goals.
Not that I was going to share that particular theory with Wyatt. “I wish I knew,” I said. “But it’s happening and, in some ways, I’m grateful. What’s that saying about a gift horse?”
“I suppose. I want—”
“What? What do you want?”
“To taste your blood.” With a cry that echoed what I felt in my heart, Wyatt scrambled back and away. He hit the far wall and stopped, curling tight into himself and covering his face with his hands. “Fuck!”
I left the chasm of distance between us, too stunned to think properly. Certainly nothing had ever come easily for either of us, but we’d never faced anything quite like this before. An enemy we couldn’t fight physically was not my forte, and much like a human infected with the vampire parasite, the Lupa virus was changing Wyatt from the inside out. No one had experienced a Lupa infection in centuries. And certainly not the infection of a Gifted human. No one knew what to expect.
Could he beat this?
“Wyatt, tell me what you’re feeling,” I said.
“Angry,” he said, the word slightly muffled but no less powerful. “Aroused. Hungry.”
The perfect trifecta of emotions. “Okay, angry. What do you want to do with that anger?”
“Hunt. Fight. Eat.”
“What do you want to hunt?”
“Anything.” He raised his head, that animalistic glint back in his eyes. “God, your blood smells so sweet, Evy. I don’t think you should stay in here.”
The room suddenly felt twenty degrees cooler, and a chill ripped down my spine. It was a warning as much as a statement, and I felt the horror of it in my bones. “I trust you, Wyatt.” Somehow my voice didn’t shake.
“I don’t trust myself.”
Logic shooed me toward the door. My heart kept me still. “Then trust me.”
“I don’t want to kill anyone.”
“You won’t.”
“But I want to. The wolf wants to. He wants blood.”
“Wyatt, you’re in control. You can control the impulses of the wolf, I know you can. You’ve done it so far.”
“He’s stronger than I am.”
“Bullshit.”
He moved faster than I’d ever seen him—across the room in a blink of time. He knocked me backward and straddled my waist. His hands held my wrists by my head, and his face hovered just above mine. The glinting silver eyes and drying blood created a grotesque mockery of the man I loved. My guts twisted into knots of fear and panic, but I forced myself to not struggle. To stay perfectly still beneath his hold, even though my body screamed at me to fight back. To get away, get out from under, get to a safe distance.
“Is this bullshit?” he asked, breathing hard through his open mouth. “No, it’s a fucking nightmare, Evy, and I can’t wake up from it. I can’t shut it off. Please kill me before I hurt someone.”
Promise you’ll kill me when you’re done.
I hadn’t thought I could survive Thackery’s torture with my soul intact, and I had. Wyatt didn’t think he could survive this, beat back the wolf, and be whole again. Be himself.
But he could. And I knew he could.
“Make a deal with you?” I asked, echoing those fateful words spoken to Thackery nearly two months ago.
Wyatt blinked. Started to shake his head, then stopped. He pressed his forehead to mine, the intense heat making me sweat. This close I smelled his own fear—the sour scent of perspiration, mixed with something even more primal. He inhaled deeply through his nose, held it, then expelled it hard through his mouth. Blood-scented breath brushed my lips, and I shivered.
I hated every fucking thing about this, and nearly jumped out of my skin when he said, “What?”
“I want a week. At least a week to help you. Isolation, chains, whatever you want, but I want you to try with me. Try to beat this.”
“Why?”
“Because I love you, you jackass.”
He raised his head and gazed at me with a chaotic mix of pride, love, terror, and pain. “I thought I was a dumbass.”
“Dumbass, jackass, any kind of ass.”
He smiled. “I love you, Evy. I’m sorry for turning my back on you.”
“You had every reason. I was a coward.”
“No, I was wrong.”
“It doesn’t matter now.”
He seemed to realize his exact position over me and made a surprised sound caught somewhere between a grunt and a squeak. He climbed off and scooted back until he could lean against the wall. The thin gown had twisted immodestly, but he didn’t seem to notice the draft. I sat up slowly, careful not to show my utter relief at being free. I hated being held down like that, by anyone.
Wyatt traced a finger across his teeth. “How can you look at me and not see a monster?” he asked.
“Because I didn’t fall in love with your black eyes and straight teeth, Wyatt Truman,” I said, recalling his own words to me so many months ago. “I fell in love with your confidence and your loyalty and your ability to piss me off in five words or less. In the way you can see the logical side of things that I usually can’t. All of that is still there, Wyatt. It just has to work a little harder now.”
He gave me a wry smile. “I’m not you, Evy. I won’t heal from this.”
“You don’t know that.”
“You’ll risk it?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t—” He cleared his throat, eyes suspiciously bright. “I don’t know if I can live like this. Or if I want to.”
Goddammit, I was not going to cry. “Give me a week. Please.”
“What if they don’t give me a week?”
“They who?”
“The Assembly.”
A blast of anger flushed my cheeks. “Fuck the Assembly, if they think they get to dictate your fate. Their decision to eradicate the Lupa centuries ago is what led us to this. They don’t get to decide if you live or die.”
“Don’t be so sure, child,” a deep, vaguely familiar voice said behind me.
Wyatt froze, tensed, hands splayed against the wall on either side of him. I twisted around and onto my knees, one hand automatically reaching for the knife still strapped to my left ankle. I stopped before I actually grabbed it, once I recognized the faces standing in the doorway.
Flanked on either side by Astrid and Marcus—each wearing identical expressions of disgusted surprise—was Elder Marcellus Dane of Felia. He was the one who’d spoken.
Chapter Twenty-two
2:40 P.M.
“Don’t be so sure of what?” I asked as I stood up. Kept myself between Wyatt and the door.
Elder Dane ignored my question, his attention on the man crouched behind me. He seemed more fascinated than upset, but I’d learned a long time ago to never underestimate the poker face of a Therian. “Remarkable,” Dane said. “There has not been a recorded human infection by a Lupa in centuries.”
“Yeah, no shit.”
“Sto
ne,” Astrid said sharply. A warning to stop being so snippy with a Clan Elder. One who’d just indirectly threatened Wyatt’s life, and that was not okay with me.
“Wyatt’s broken no Therian laws,” I said. “His life isn’t up to you to save or end.”
“On the contrary,” Dane said, “his infection by a Lupa makes this an Assembly matter by default.”
“Because the Assembly ordered the extinction of the Lupa Clan five hundred years ago?”
“Yes. They were a destructive, bloodthirsty Clan then, and their habits have obviously not changed. Your human now carries their genes in his blood, and it must not be allowed to spread.”
“You don’t know that he can spread it.”
“Half-Bloods are just as infectious as full-Blood vampires.”
“He’s not a vampire, and neither was the bastard who bit him.”
Astrid and Marcus shared a look behind their Elder’s head. I didn’t know what it meant, but at least they weren’t rushing to Dane’s defense.
“You would take the risk of him infecting other humans?” Dane asked.
“I would take the risk of him infecting me,” I replied. “He’s fighting the effects of the wolf, and he’s strong enough to beat it. We just need time.”
“Time is in short supply of late.”
“I’ve noticed.”
He quirked a bushy eyebrow. He was either annoyed at being talked back to, or amused at the novelty of it. I imagined most Elders were used to the whole “I say jump, you say how high” method of giving orders.
“Look,” I said, “let Dr. Vansis run some tests, at least. In the meantime, I will keep him isolated.”
A moment passed, and then Elder Dane nodded. “I admit, I did not come here prepared to pass judgment on this matter,” he said. “In the absence of an appointed voice of the Assembly, I have volunteered to act in that capacity.”
Fancy way of saying that with Jenner dead, Dane got the job. “So you’re here about Thackery.” And considering the fact that both Astrid and Marcus were here, instead of down the hall, meant only one thing.
“You’re done questioning Thackery?”
“The exercise proved fruitless, even with the administration of Sodium Pentothal,” Marcus said. “He gave up nothing of use, despite the loss of three fingers.”
Ugh. Instead of a sense of poetic justice, the knowledge disturbed me. “So we still don’t know where he’s keeping Ava and Aurora?”
“No. Just that they are with the three surviving Lupa children.”
“What about the vampires? Did anyone—”
“Phineas informed us of the vampire Isleen’s theory. We’re looking into the name Matthew Goodson and any connections to Thackery.”
“Nothing from Thackery on that?”
“Just gloating over how perfectly his plan to infect them worked.”
Fucker.
“Don’t assume,” Wyatt said. His interjection stole everyone’s attention. He was concentrating on the floor, conjuring up the words. Keeping his thoughts together. “Don’t assume he’s finished.”
“He’s in custody,” Elder Dane said.
“The hybrids at Boot Camp. The sinking ferries.”
“He means that Thackery likes redundancies and backup plans,” I said. “Just because we have him here doesn’t mean there’s not something out there waiting for a signal. Something bigger.”
“Something capable of infecting the other vampires?” Marcus asked.
“Exactly.” The thought of it chilled me. I also couldn’t believe that I hadn’t thought of it sooner. “He has three Lupa soldiers left who could be out there doing anything for him. Even flipping a switch on a countdown. He said that something was already in motion that we couldn’t stop.”
“It’s an interesting theory,” Elder Dane said, not convinced.
“We’ve dealt with this psycho before,” I said. “He doesn’t do anything half-assed, and he doesn’t walk into a room without an exit strategy.”
“We should inform the royal Fathers,” Astrid said. “If they decide there is a threat, it might be safer for them to evacuate the city. At least for the short term.”
“Agreed,” Marcus said.
One more outcome I was helpless to directly affect. If Thackery had a redundancy in place, he wouldn’t tell. Or he’d tell us just in time for us to watch it kill every vampire who’d ever used Matthew Goodson’s sunscreen.
“Did the Assembly reach a majority regarding Jenner’s death?” I asked.
Elder Dane gave me one of those looks usually reserved for stuff you scrape off the bottom of your shoe. “Assembly decisions are not your concern,” he said.
“The hell they aren’t. I work here, too, and Michael Jenner was a friend of mine. Not to mention the fact that Thackery’s pups are holding on to my goddaughter and her mother, and killing Thackery too soon means they die.”
My spiel seemed to throw Dane for a moment. He frowned at me. “You aren’t arguing to spare Thackery’s life?”
“Hell, no, I’ll dance on the bastard’s grave when he’s finally in it. One man’s death cannot replace the loss of Michael Jenner, to both his Clan and to the Assembly. All I ask for is time. Time to find Aurora and Ava, and to find the three Lupa children before Thackery is killed.”
“And you believe you can do this?”
“I have to try.”
“How much time do you require?”
Please, oh please, let this be a yes. “Well, Thackery’s deadline for reporting back to the Lupa is seven o’clock tonight. If he doesn’t, the last child of a nearly extinct Clan dies.”
Something in Elder Dane’s face softened. I’d hit a nerve. “To ransom a child is the mark of a true monster,” he said. “I can give you until seven-thirty. After that, the Equi Elder will demand his justice.”
“Thank you, Elder Dane.”
“Just find the child and her mother.” He glanced past me. “And contain him. The Assembly will rule on our position on his status at a later time. Too much else is of greater concern to us.”
I didn’t care if we ranked below his laser wart removal—I’d bought us time. Both to find Aurora and Ava, and to help Wyatt get a handle on his new dual nature before it drove him bat shit crazy. Or worse.
Elder Dane left with Astrid close behind. Marcus lingered in the doorway, his gaze on the man behind me. “Can you handle him?” he asked.
“Yes,” I replied. “Where’s Gina?”
“Awaiting word. Shall I send her in?”
“Yes. Get her up to speed, then have her come with Dr. Vansis so he can draw some blood.”
“All right.”
“Three fingers, huh?”
Marcus smiled wickedly. “Two fingers and a thumb. Right hand.”
“Damn.” I glanced at my left hand and the smooth bump where my pinkie used to be. This time I felt a tiny nudge of satisfaction.
“Small comfort to Jenner’s widow and children.”
“True.”
Marcus slipped out.
“Evy?” Wyatt asked.
I turned. Squatted in front of him. His mouth was pinched, the tips of his canines peeking out beneath his upper lip. Eyebrows furrowed, deep in thought.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Jenner is dead,” he said in such a way as to be convincing himself.
Uh-oh. “Yes, he is. We killed the werewolf who attacked you, and then we trapped and killed two more. Thackery was angry, so he killed Michael Jenner as payback.”
“You killed two more.”
“Yes.”
“I’m so confused, Evy.” He rubbed his eyes with his fingertips, then squeezed the bridge of his nose. “My mind is racing with so many thoughts. Not all of them mine, I don’t think. I’m angry about Jenner, and I’m angry at you for killing the Lupa. I shouldn’t be angry at both. The Lupa are our enemies, but I’m one of them.”
“No, you aren’t one of them,” I said. “You are still a human being in all of
the ways that count.”
He bared his teeth. “I want to hurt you for hurting them.”
“But you won’t.” And there was no way in hell I’d tell him that Phin was the one who’d actually killed two of them. I’d rather have Wyatt angry at me than at one of the Lupa’s natural enemies. Truman versus el Chimal was not an epic showdown I had an interest in witnessing.
“All of this anger, Evy, it burns. I want to release it, but I don’t know how, except to fight or hurt, but I don’t want to do that.”
“What about exercise? We can go to the gym or to an empty store so you can run and burn some energy.”
“Maybe. It might help. Oh God, you smell good.”
Any other day, I’d have thought that a compliment. Right now it was just creepy as hell. “Don’t think about what you smell. Tell me what you see.”
“I see you.” His gaze traveled over me, around the room. “White walls. A bed. A monitor. But it’s different. Sharper. It all seems … brighter. Are my eyes different?”
“Your sight’s definitely improved. And your eyes kind of changed color.”
“Silver?”
“Yeah.”
“Will they change back?”
The plaintive sorrow in his voice made me ache for him. “I don’t know. I hope so. The Lupa are bi-shifters. Maybe once you get a handle on the wolf, you can control the change.”
“Maybe.” He didn’t sound convinced.
A hand knocked softly on the door frame. If Wyatt had been a wolf, his ears would have perked and swiveled toward the sound. Instead, he sat up a little straighter, attention fixed on the door where Kismet and Dr. Vansis stood. Kismet’s face was blank, collected and calm, even though her left hand shook slightly. “May we come in?” she asked.
I looked at Wyatt, who seemed to defer the decision to me. “Yes,” I said. “Slowly, please.”
She took a few steps in and stopped. I really didn’t blame her.
Vansis put a small tray down on the foot of the bed. “Mr. Truman, may I draw some blood from your arm? I’d like to run a few tests.”
