by Cali Mann
He shook his head. “No, just . . . something.”
“Go to our room then. I got this.” I put my hand on the knob. If he hadn’t been able to smell any blood, then maybe it wasn’t as bad as I thought. Maybe she wasn’t dead.
Alex widened his eyes. “No, I’ll —”
“You’re still a kid. Let me handle this one.” I jerked my head toward our door, playing the big sister card. “Go. “
He frowned. “If Mom needs help—”
I smiled, forcing confidence that I didn’t feel into my tone. “Then, I got it. She’s probably crying over some guy.”
He shook his head. “She doesn’t cry.”
“Maybe she’s just tired,” I said. “I’ll check in on her and come get you if it’s anything serious.”
“But, Sash—”
I shook my head. “Let me do this.”
Alex frowned, resistant, but eventually, he turned and headed down the hall.
Once I saw the door snap shut behind him, I turned back to Mom’s. Cold dread curled in the pit of my stomach. Even if Alex couldn’t smell blood, there was something behind this door. Something that I didn’t really want to see, yet I had to. I was the grown-up here. I took a breath and turned the knob, opening the door carefully.
“Mom?” I asked, peering into the dark room. My hand felt for the light switch on the wall. It’d been a long time since I’d come into her room, but I remembered there being one there somewhere. Ah! Found it. I flicked the light on, and a groan came from the direction of her bed. Blinking, I slowly turned around, letting my eyes trail over the clean lines and immaculate furniture. Mom never left the smallest bit of herself anywhere one of her men might go. It was a blank slate.
I bit my lip. I was stalling. There’d been a moan—that meant she was alive. I should be grateful. Lifting my head, I gazed at the bed and the ruined body of my mother. I hadn’t cried in years, not since I was small, but the tears slid down my cheeks. Taking a breath, I inched forward to the bed. I tried to catalog her injuries, but I couldn’t focus. There was too much.
Her eyes were swollen shut, and her wrists were tied to the bed frame with what looked like wire. I unwound it as carefully as I could, but it still cut deeper into her skin. Somehow, there wasn’t very much blood, not even enough for Alex to have smelled. He’d cut her and almost immediately cauterized the wounds. If she’d been human, they’d have been permanent scars.
I swallowed and unwrapped her other wrist. When it dropped to her side, her eyes flickered and she whispered, “Thank you, baby.”
“Mom,” I half-said, half-cried. “How did he do this? Why couldn’t you stop him?”
She groaned as she tried to lift her head.
“No,” I said, “Don’t answer that. Just rest.”
Her chin bobbed.
I pulled her down so she lay on the bed, trying not to think of how much I was hurting her. She was a shifter. She’d heal, and we’d kill the asshole who did this to her. My madness would be good for something, then. I’d take the blame. No one would doubt a spirit shifter killing.
Nearly every inch of her skin was burned or cut or worse, and that was what I could see. I moved all the covers and ripped off any shreds of clothing she still wore. Once I got her settled on the bed properly, I headed for the door. Ice would help the swelling at least.
“Sasha,” she whispered, and I turned back. One eye was open almost all the way, but the other drooped at half-mast.
“Yes, Mom?” I asked as calmly as I could.
“Blood, plea—” she choked.
I nodded. “I’ll get it.” Ducking out, I went to the kitchen first, and brought several baggies of ice back. I laid them over every bruise that I could find, and she sighed.
I crept toward Alex’s and my bedroom door. This was the harder part. I kept the blood bags in our room, and my brother would want to know what was going on. He couldn’t know. He’d fly into a rage, and there wasn’t anything he could do about it. I used the hem of my shirt to wipe my face. Straightening my shoulders, I forced my lips to smile, then I went inside.
He looked up instantly. No headphones—he’d been listening for any sound. “She okay?”
“Yes,” I said, nodding. “Just tired.”
“What happened?” He stood and followed me across the room to the freezer.
I opened the fridge and flipped through the bags of blood, taking five.
“Why does she need blood?” he asked.
I laughed, hoping it sounded natural. “She’s hungry and exhausted. She just needs to sleep.”
“You never give her my blood.” Worry lines ran across his forehead, and I just wanted to smooth them out, but my stomach was swirling as it was.
“Just this once,” I said with a shrug. “She doesn’t have anything else.”
“Are you sure she’s just tired?” He frowned. “He didn’t . . . hurt her?”
I nodded. How could he be so young and so wise? But he didn’t need to know what had really happened. “Yes, I’m sure.”
His shoulders relaxed. “’Kay.”
Good. he believed me. I marched toward the door, keeping my back straight and my pose confident. I could feel his eyes on my back, but he didn’t stop me.
After I closed the door behind me, I leaned against it for a moment, trying to gather myself. I didn’t have time to break down now. Mom needed me. Alex needed me. Pull yourself together, Sasha.
I stood and headed for Mom’s room. First things first: she needed blood. It would help her heal and recover. Then I had to keep Alex away from her tomorrow and get him safely to school. I’d skip and get back here. Too much to do—there wasn’t time to think about murdering a certain asshole fire shifter who most definitely deserved it.
5
Sasha
I didn’t sleep much at all that night. Instead, I lay staring at the dark ceiling, listening to my brother roll uneasily in his bed. As a vampire, he never slept well at night anyway, but usually I could ignore his restlessness.
Why had Mom’s lover done that to her? What would make anyone do that to another person? It wasn’t just torture; it was like he played with her. Like it was fun. What kind of psychopath did that to another person, even if they knew they were a shifter and would heal? I didn’t understand it.
Our mother had never been a maternal figure, but I knew she cared about us in her own way. She’d carried us for all those months of pregnancy, and she hadn’t kicked us out. That had to mean something, right?
When the morning light peeked through our thin curtains, I stumbled out of bed and headed to the restroom. My reflection in the mirror looked frazzled, and I had dark circles under my eyes. I hopped in the shower and tried to scrub some life into my skin. I came out raw, both inside and out.
When I got into the hall, rubbing a towel against my hair, I stopped short at the sight of Alex leaning against the wall outside Mom’s room. “Alex? What’s going on?”
He turned his head toward me, and his pale cheeks were tracked with tears.
Matching tears sprung up in my eyes, and a hard rock settled in my stomach. “I told you not to go in there.”
“I had to know,” he growled, his fangs peeking over his bottom lip. I could feel his anxious energy across the hall.
“Well,” I said, “now you know.” I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t protect him if he wouldn’t let me.
“I’m gonna kill him!” His eyes flashed, and his whole body tensed.
“You’re not.” I shook my head. “I am.”
“No way,” he said, glowering. “You can’t fight.”
“I am a mad spirit shifter,” I said. “That’ll be enough.”
He narrowed his eyes.
“You have your whole life ahead of you,” I insisted. “I’m not going to let you throw it away.”
“But you do, too!”
I snickered. “No, Alex, I don’t. I’m bound to go mad any day now. Don’t you remember what Mrs. Everett said? And Mo
m?”
“So, I’m supposed to let you kill yourself?” he muttered.
“Yes,” I said, tossing my towel back into the bathroom and finger-combing my hair. I marched over and stood toe to toe with my brother. “There’s a school for shifters.”
“What?” he asked.
“The old guy—you remember, when we were eating? The perv?”
“Yeah, so?”
“Well, he said he’s a recruiter for a shifter boarding school, and I think you should go.”
“Why me? Why not you?”
“You’re not listening,” I said. “I’m going crazy, anyway. You’ve got a chance.”
He shook his head.
I could see the thoughts going through his mind, because they were the same ones going through mine: ‘That monster beat our mother to a pulp, and he’s going to come back and kill us, too. Neither of us even have our full powers like she does.’
“You can’t,” I said, sighing. “We can’t do anything.”
He banged his head against the wall.
I sighed, staring at him. My brother wasn’t so little anymore, and he wanted to stand up for the family. I got that. I really did. But this wasn’t the time for him to try to take responsibility. He needed to get his own life and his own powers under control.
Mom’s lover would be back. He’d had too much fun the first time. We needed to talk to the recruiter and get Alex out of here, then Mom and I needed to be ready to face him down. It was the best plan for everyone. It was the only plan that made any sense.
Pushing past him, I headed toward our room. “Get your things. We’re going to school.”
“No,” he said. “I’m not leaving her . . . like this.”
I swung around. “She’ll be fine. I’ll look after her. He won’t be back right away.”
He scowled. “Can’t.”
“You’ll do as I say,” I growled.
He ignored me, and, yanking his backpack onto his shoulder, he headed for the balcony.
I watched him go with a feeling of sadness. I headed for our room to grab some more blood bags for Mom. She needed all she could get if she was going to heal.
* * *
After I’d done what I could for Mom, I went out to look for the old guy. He had to be lurking around the apartments somewhere. Alex had smelled a wolf scent last night, and we knew Mom’s lover wasn’t an earth shifter. I didn’t understand why Alex hadn’t smelled the fire shifter when he’d obviously been here. Of course, rock shifters probably didn’t have a scent like wolves or vampires.
I found him waiting at the stop where we usually caught the school bus. He looked haggard and tired. “Are you sleeping out here on the street?” I asked.
He raised an eyebrow. “You care?”
“No,” I said, crossing my arms. “It’s just not a very good look for a recruiter.”
“So, you believe me now?” he asked. “And no, I’m not sleeping here. I do have a hotel.”
“I want to,” I said, haltingly. “But I’ve never heard of this place—this academy—and I don’t know anything about you.”
“Well,” he said, standing and offering me his hand, “I’m Noah Reed.”
I frowned at it for a long moment and then shook it. “Sasha Wren.”
He nodded. “Why don’t we grab some breakfast and talk about it?” He gestured down the street.
I shrugged. “Not very hungry.” But then I sighed. I needed to make an effort. “How about coffee?” I pointed to the hole-in-the-wall coffee shop across the street from our apartment building.
“Okay,” he said, and we walked over together. “It’s just you, your brother, and your mom out here?”
Grimacing, I asked, “Creeper much?” Just how long had he been following us around?
He laughed. “It’s kind of my job.”
“Hmm,” I said. “Yeah, it’s just us.” Not much use in lying. He’d been watching us for some time, and I did want something from him.
“Your brother has been showing his vampirism for a while?”
“Just this year. He hit puberty hard.”
“He’s got good control for only coming into it recently.”
“Yeah. Mrs. Everett, she helped a bit.”
He smiled. “The earth shifter who lives downstairs?”
Apparently, he’d been watching us very closely. I nodded.
“Good. It’s important to have friends in this world.”
We entered the coffee shop, and he ordered two coffees. I slid into a booth near the window. I wanted to make sure I could see the apartment. I needed to be sure that the asshole didn’t sneak in while I was away. Although I didn’t think he’d come back right away, I had been wrong before.
I wondered if Mr. Reed knew anything about Mom’s lover, but I was afraid to ask. What if they worked together and this was all some kind of scam? I shoved that thought back where it came from. How could it be? How would beating up my mother make us go to this academy?
He slid into the seat across from me, setting a coffee in front of me. He then proceeded to add four sugars and a healthy dose of cream to his.
“Breakfast in a mug?” I asked.
“Might want to try it yourself sometime,” he said, gesturing to me. “You get too skinny hanging out with air shifters all the time. We forget that they have blood to keep them satisfied.”
“Oh,” I said noncommittally. “What makes you think I’m not an air shifter?”
“Your wolf calls out to me in your dreams.”
I blinked. “What?”
He chuckled. “That’s why I’m a recruiter. I’m able to hear earth shifters, or well, spirit shifters when they have earth dreams.”
I sipped my coffee, ignoring the question in his words: Are you earth or spirit, my dear? Not going to tell you, creeper. The bitter taste of the coffee tripped down my tongue, and I tried to think about what the important questions were.
“What is this academy?”
“Thornbriar Academy is a school, well, a boarding school in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Do you know where that is?”
“Yes,” I said, watching him. I didn’t know what to make of this guy. “And it’s for shifters only?”
“It is,” he said. “It’s a safe place for our people to practice and learn to control their powers. We have students as young as twelve and as old as twenty-two.”
“That’s a big age range.”
“They are separated by age into an upper school and a lower school,” he said with a smile. “And bullying isn’t tolerated.”
I frowned. Creeper. Exactly how far had he taken his surveillance? My hands squeezed around my coffee mug. “What do they study?”
“Everything. Regular human subjects, like art and science and English, as well as those specific to shifters—our history and our culture.”
My mind clung to that one word: art. Alex could have classes in what he loved. That was all that mattered. “How much does it cost?”
He smiled. “There are scholarships for students like you and your brother.”
I bristled. “What do you mean—’like us?’”
Lifting his hands from the table, he gestured innocently. “I just meant if you don’t have the resources, Thornbriar Academy has ways of assisting.”
I nodded tightly. “And you’ll just take him straight there?”
“Him?” Mr. Reed narrowed his eyes. “Both of you. Thornbriar will be good for both of you.”
I forced a smile. “Not for me. I’m happy where I am, but Alex needs help with control.” I glanced toward the street. “And he doesn’t do so well with human bullies.”
Mr. Reed stirred his coffee, muttering to himself something about stubborn jackasses.
“What was that?” I asked sweetly.
He rubbed the side of his forehead. “I used to be a regular recruiter, you know.”
“What do you mean?” I thought that was what he was.
“Someone who goes to the old families and encourages t
hem to send their children to Thornbriar. It was nice, safe, and easy work.” He lifted the lapel of his rumpled shirt. “But then I fucked up.”
“You did?”
“I recruited a spirit shifter, and she turned our world upside down,” he said.
My forehead wrinkled. “What does that mean?”
He met my eyes. “It means I’ve been on the road for months now and you two are the only new shifters I’ve been able to track down.” He rubbed his temple. “Well, you and that fire shifter who nearly took my eye out in Sacramento.”
I wanted to ask what happened to the spirit shifter he’d found, but I didn’t dare. She was probably dead. That’s what Mrs. Everett said they did to every spirit shifter that they discovered. I pressed my lips together.
Mr. Reed ran a hand through his hair. “But that’s my job now, looking for lost shifters and taking them where they’ll be safe, cared for, and trained properly.”
“So?”
He laughed. “So, young lady, things are a lot more challenging when I’ve got to hide out for days just to find out if you guys are really shifters then talk you into going to the academy, and it’s a pain in my ass. Can’t you just make it easy on me?”
“Nope.” I shook my head. “You’ve been creeping on me for days. You should know I don’t make things easy on anyone.”
He snorted. “You’re eighteen. You won’t get this chance again.”
I shrugged. I was done being surprised by how much he knew about me. Had he combed the school records? “My brother or no one. That’s the deal.”
Mr. Reed just looked bewildered, like he couldn’t understand why I was turning down the deal of a lifetime. Which was probably for the best. If he knew my mother was upstairs, beat half to death, or that I was a spirit shifter on the verge of losing my sanity, who knew what he’d do?
Standing, I smiled. “Don’t take too long to decide.” Then I turned and walked away.
6
Sasha
Over the next few days, Mom improved. Each day, she was able to move more and more, and she started eating regular food and needing less blood. Alex and I both hovered over her like anxious birds, until she couldn’t take it anymore.
