Silver

by Rhiannon Held

  Silver’s struggles eased after a second, but the blood flow did not. It seeped steadily. Andrew’s lungs started to burn before he realized that he was holding his breath waiting for it to stop. It should stop, for a werewolf. Long before he used up one breath.

  He sucked in a deep breath. He couldn’t stop halfway. If Silver was going to bleed out, it should take all the silver with it. He cut along the next welt, and again. He cut and then squeezed out the blood until it no longer burned over his fingers.

  The tension in Silver’s muscles lessened as the burning of her blood did. She gave a sob of relief when it was all gone. “You killed the snakes,” she said, eyes drifting past his face, unable to focus. “Thank you.” Then she slumped into unconsciousness.

  Andrew gathered her onto his lap. He knew he should get up, especially with the silver-tainted blood soaking into the mattress, but he wanted to hold her a little longer, to make sure she was really done. His burned hand screamed with pain, but he wiped it on the blankets and clamped it to her arm to stanch the blood. It didn’t burn him further, which he figured was a good sign.

  “How did you know that would…?” Michelle came to the bed, face twisted with worry at the way the blood continued to flow. By now, the wounds on any other werewolf would have healed.

  Andrew added his other hand clamped higher up on Silver’s arm. “I’ve seen it before, during a punishment. It’s a vicious circle—panic forces you to shift and silver stops you.”

  “Seen it? Were you involved with the punishing?” The acid in Maria’s voice was subtle but there. She seemed less discomfited by the blood than the two of them, and she moved as if she planned to take Silver from Andrew. He suppressed a snarl to make her back off, and concentrated on his hold on the wounds. The blood seemed like maybe it was dripping more slowly now.

  “The European packs used silver for punishment long before I ever joined one.” Andrew didn’t bother explaining further. Slow or not, the bleeding continued. “Bandages.”

  “Why would we have those?” Maria bristled again at the commanding tone, but after a beat of hesitation and a glance at her alpha she disappeared from the room. She returned a few moments later with a cotton sheet, cream with an occasional dark green diamond. It tore easily in her hands. It took some glaring to get themselves organized but they worked it out so Andrew peeled away his fingers as Maria wrapped, leaving nothing uncovered for too long. When his hand was free, Andrew wiped it off, leaving a sodden crimson smear down his shirt, and pressed down on the bandages again.

  When they were done, the bandages turned pink and then red in lines over the wounds, but didn’t stain further. Maria looked around them both, measuring the pool on the sheets. “I think it looked worse than it was.”

  Andrew settled Silver’s arm against her chest and then lifted her. Even as a dead weight she was light. She felt like nothing but bones when he held her like this. “Where am I putting her?” She obviously couldn’t stay here. They needed to haul the silver-tainted bedding and likely even the mattress to the dump.

  “This way.” Michelle led the way down the hall. The room she ushered him into had dirty clothes all over the floor. The scent-marking hit him more aggressively because of that, but at least it was from a low-ranked female. He set Silver down on the bed. Her bandage, where it wasn’t darkening to brown, matched the sheets, cream and green to green and cream. Andrew smoothed her hair, and waited a few minutes to make sure she was sleeping peacefully. Eventually he made himself leave the room, closing the door gently behind him.

  “Thank the Lady that worked,” he muttered. The phrase came to him by long habit, but he regretted it the moment he saw Maria press her thumb to her forehead. He hadn’t meant literally.

  “The Lady takes care of her own. Silver is blessed.” Maria’s voice had that true belief tone again, and Andrew eyed her with tired hostility.

  “She’s hallucinating,” he said. The scent of blood from his shirt twisted its way into his nostrils with every breath, so he pulled it off. “Don’t let your imagination run away with you.”

  “How did she know about the baby, then, if she had not spoken to Death?” Maria crossed her arms. “No one but the pack knew.”

  Michelle made an uncomfortable little noise. She looked conflicted, like she was trying to talk herself out of agreeing with Maria. “A few friends in other packs knew. You know how people gossip—”

  “Exactly.” Andrew spoke quickly to cut Maria off. “This Death seems like an expression of her unconscious, and we knew she was probably living out here somewhere. It’s perfectly possible she came into contact with the information before, and is incorporating it into her hallucinations.”

  “But—” Michelle said a little weakly. Where Maria had her arms crossed, the alpha more hugged herself, probably thinking about the child.

  Maria gave Andrew a pitying look. “I’m sure it’s frightening to be confronted with someone who sees more than we do—knows more than we do—”

  Andrew shoved past her, purposely jostling her shoulder. His clean clothes were down in the car. “You’re welcome to your delusions, but leave her out of them. We want to pull her out of the madness, not encourage her in it.”

  Andrew made it halfway down the stairs only to meet Craig coming up. “What in Lady’s name have you been doing up here?” he snarled. “Killing her?”

  Andrew looked down at himself and realized what a picture he presented, stinking of silver-tainted blood with his shirt a crimson mess balled up in one hand. He could practically see the thought on Craig’s face: Butcher. Scents from the rest of the house filtered into his attention, fear and discomfort from the rest of the pack as well. They had chosen to hide from it instead.

  “I bled out the poison.” Andrew shoved past Craig. The sooner he got his change of clothes, the sooner he could get cleaned up. He could only hope the pack calmed as the smell dissipated.

  10

  Empty. The snakes were dead, and though her arm throbbed, it did not burn. But everything was still so empty where her wild self should have been. Silver called for her wild self, screamed for her into the new silence that the snakes had left. It was safe for her to return. Silver sobbed, and begged, but couldn’t find even the drifting scent of her wild self on the breeze.

  She found the warrior’s scent instead as she became more aware of her surroundings. Death was gone, but the warrior’s wild self had his head in her lap. He had fallen asleep while guarding her. She smiled and used her good hand to ruffle his ears. “You killed them.”

  “You survived the full moons before. He should have guessed you would survive this one too,” Death complained from the entrance to the den. His voice was familiar to Silver, male and warm, but she couldn’t place it. Memories of everything before the fire were partially burned away, and those that remained were slippery when she tried to hold them.

  “You’re angry because he took me from your grasp,” Silver told Death, and the warrior stirred. His tame self sat up from his slump against a tree, and reached first for her arm. He examined it, turning it this way and that. He was clumsy in his attempted gentleness, like he wasn’t quite sure how to go about it.

  “The fire no longer burns,” Silver told him, gritting her teeth against the pain he caused.

  He set it down, watching her face. “I think you’re healing a little faster than a human. That’s something, at least.” His eyes caught hers. “Can you shift?”

  Silver broke the gaze, turning her head and biting her lip so he couldn’t see her tears. “I still can’t find my wild self. She ran too far to know it’s safe to come back now.”

  “It’s up to you.” The warrior’s hand on her cheek turned her head back. His wild self licked her good hand, encouraging. “But the silver’s gone. And shifting would help you heal…”

  Silver drew in a deep breath. Maybe he was right. Maybe she needed to do more than call. If she reached for her wild self, reached as far as she could for her, maybe she would be t
here in the dark beyond the edge of the Lady’s realm.

  So Silver reached. Reached into the nothingness and strained with every ounce of her being to even brush her fingers against a hint of fur. Her muscles screamed with the effort, cramping, but she just couldn’t. Couldn’t reach, couldn’t hold on. She let go, falling short. She had failed yet again, and now the pounding ache from her arm pulsed through her abused muscles.

  “Can’t,” she gasped, and fell back into more comfortable darkness.

  * * *

  Andrew swore at length as Silver slumped from her seizure back into unconsciousness. Going to wolf form and back should have jump-started her healing, and it had seemed logical that she would be able to shift now—but that was idiotic. The silver hadn’t been in just her arm, not if her brain had been affected. Some undoubtedly remained throughout her body and in her bloodstream. He was lucky his idiocy hadn’t pushed her back into the dangerous circle of the night before.

  He checked her arm again, but the seizure didn’t seem to have caused any fresh bleeding. “I’m sorry,” he said, then lifted his head at the sound of someone approaching.

  “How is she?” Michelle paused in the doorway, muscles taut. Andrew could see that having an unfamiliar Were in her house was beginning to tell on her. He didn’t exactly like being the unfamiliar Were. Avoiding any assumptions about another Were’s relative status made every single interaction an exercise in painful neutrality. Michelle ran a hand through her hair, and then stretched her posture into something more casual. “I heard her voice.”

  “She knocked herself out again trying to shift.” He nudged Silver’s shoulder so she was lying in a position that was a bit more comfortable. “If bleeding out the silver didn’t help, I’m starting to think she might never shift again.”

  Michelle looked nauseated. “It’s cruel that she’s still alive, trapped that way.” She lifted Silver’s injured arm and let it fall back limply. “I don’t think I’d want to keep on living on those terms. I’d want someone to take care of me.” The words fell into a sudden dead feeling in the room, like a stone tossed into a well that didn’t splash.

  He felt the same way, to be honest. But it wasn’t about him, or Michelle. Silver had made it across the country, traveling on foot. Two feet, not four. Now the panic of the moment was gone, he realized there had to have been full moons before this one, and she was still here. How much easier would it have been for her to give up long ago? That wasn’t a strength of resolve he was going to argue with. “She seems to feel differently, though.”

  “True enough.” Michelle smoothed Silver’s hair. “We got real bandages. But is it better to not mess with it?”

  It took Andrew a beat to realize she was waiting for him to answer. How was he supposed to know? Silver seemed to be healing like a human and he had no more experience with humans than she did. His lack of a true pack had forced him more into their company than some Were so as to not go mad, but nothing more. “They were shallow cuts. It’s been all night. I’d think we could chance it.” That would clear some of the stink of blood that lingered on her, too. It was better in the rest of the house, but sitting next to her, it set him subliminally on edge. He felt like he should be hunting the injured prey to finish it off.

  Michelle nodded and scooted over like she expected Andrew to move so she could take his place at Silver’s side. “We’ll take good care of her.”

  Andrew didn’t get up yet. “I was thinking I might take her with me. Seattle’s not that far away. They might recognize her in person when they wouldn’t from a description.” The arguments seemed thin when laid out like that. But he couldn’t leave her here, not when the Portland pack had proved themselves incapable of taking care of her. He didn’t know any more than them about injected silver or human injuries, but at least he’d done something instead of standing by. “Maybe she’ll recognize somewhere herself.”

  Michelle bristled, apparently able to guess what Andrew wasn’t saying. “Last night caught us by surprise, that’s all. It’s not going to happen again. She’ll just slow you down, you know that.”

  Andrew tilted his head at the last second so they didn’t lock eyes in a challenge over Silver’s still form. She would slow him down a lot, dammit. But. He scrubbed at the stubble on his cheek, using the movement as an ostensible reason for avoiding Michelle’s eyes. “We can decide after breakfast,” he said, pushing himself to his feet. He’d appreciate a shave, too. Maybe the best course of action would become clear when he’d had time to wake up a little.

  He bolted his food standing in the kitchen, tension thick as other Were came in and out, sneaking glances at him. Andrew wondered if they were thinking “Butcher” too. Tom bounded in like a breath of fresh air. “Is she okay now?”

  Andrew speared an egg chunk with his fork. “She’s out of immediate danger, anyway. I don’t know how okay she really is.”

  Tom made a pfft noise with an exaggerated face to go with it. “Thanks, though. It was hard to listen, and not be able to do anything. I’m glad you could.” He dodged the light punch Andrew aimed at his shoulder and left him to his food. Andrew sighed. If only he really was whatever heroic version of himself Tom seemed to see.

  Andrew scraped up the last of his eggs and put his plate in the dishwasher but didn’t manage to escape before Craig appeared. The beta brought a sense of congealed anger with him, though it seemed less directed at Andrew than the night before. Michelle must have filled him in on the details of what Andrew had done.

  “I suppose Michelle is still determined to keep her?”

  “She’s right that it doesn’t really make sense to keep her with me when I’m hunting her monster.” Something about Craig’s tone made Andrew want to poke at the subject. He sounded like he was less than supportive of his alpha’s wishes. That was worrying.

  Craig snorted and slopped coffee into a mug. “It doesn’t make sense to keep her, period. Girl needs putting down. She’s never going to heal, and just think about her babbling like that in front of humans. She’ll be hemorrhaging Were secrets like she was blood.”

  “Lucky for her, you’re not going to get the chance to ‘put her down.’ She’s coming with me.” Rage rose in Andrew, but he channeled it into purpose rather than violence toward Craig. If that’s the way things were, no way he was leaving Silver here and giving Craig the chance to wear Michelle down. No way.

  Craig’s lips started to curve into a sneer, but Andrew curled his fingers into a fist meaningfully, and the other man seemed to recall what had happened last time. His face fell blank and he moved aside.

  Michelle met Andrew in the hall as he left the bedroom, the sleeping Silver in his arms. She planted herself, feet a little spread, hands on hips. “I thought we’d discussed this.”

  “I discussed it a little with your beta, too.” Andrew clenched his jaw so he didn’t speak too loud and wake Silver, though she seemed to still be more unconscious than asleep. “He seemed a big fan of mercy killing. She’ll be coming with me.”

  “Lady. Craig!” Michelle spat the name as she turned. “I can control him,” she said without turning back to him as she jogged down the stairs. Most of the resistance faded from her tone, however, leaving resignation in its place. Andrew followed her down, and as he expected she didn’t stop him from detouring to the front door.

  It worried him to load Silver into the car in daylight, but the neighborhood was quiet and modern enough that few knew their neighbors. And Andrew never underestimated the power of an authoritative manner to convince humans that he had every right to do whatever he was doing.

  At some point in the drive, unconsciousness seemed to pass into true sleep for Silver. It was more peaceful than he remembered from their night in the hotel, no quiet whimpering from presumable nightmares. She turned onto her side on the backseat, injured arm tucked underneath her. She left her good arm a little outstretched like she was embracing something.

  The smell of fast-food tacos for lunch didn’t wake her,
and neither did shaking her shoulder after he’d finished. Maybe with the silver drained from her blood, a small portion of her natural werewolf healing had returned, keeping her asleep as her energy finally went to ease old injuries. Andrew picked another mall parking lot, child-locked the back doors, and left another message on Seattle’s phone. This time if he didn’t hear in a few hours he would keep going north and knock on Seattle’s door if he had to. Seattle could just deal with it.

  His phone rang five minutes later, but it identified the call as from Boston, not Seattle. Andrew answered, and his tension eased as they exchanged greetings. “Is Rory pitching a fit about my being gone too long already?” Andrew asked after updating the older man on Silver’s condition. “It’s been two days.”

  Benjamin chuckled. “Give him another day or two. But no. I need your permission as enforcer to take care of some business.” He paused, and Andrew filled in the rest. If it was just permission he needed, not action, he wasn’t surprised Boston was avoiding going through Rory. Andrew could give that easily enough over the phone.

  “There’s a male lone who popped up around our northern border. I know checking him out would usually be your job, but under the circumstances I thought perhaps I could send one of my own people after him.”

  “Please do,” Andrew said. There were other alphas he wouldn’t trust to kick a lone out of their territory without antagonizing him, but not Benjamin. He could handle it. Better it not wait until Andrew returned, too. The lone might get settled in.

  “Thank you.” Andrew filled in a silent bow of Benjamin’s head. “And how goes your own search?”

  “Seattle’s got something to hide, that’s clear enough. Whether it’s to do with Silver’s monster remains to be seen.” Andrew glowered at a point out on the blacktop. “I’m starting to think I should just go up there, permission be damned.”

  Benjamin made a neutral noise that Andrew nevertheless could tell meant he disagreed. Andrew waited him out, and he finally explained. “Do you have any evidence Were are in immediate danger? Otherwise, you’ll have destroyed your chance of getting information from them for nothing. Your reputation is bad enough as it is.”