Originally Human (world of the lupi)

by Eileen Wilks

  "No one should like killing. There's nothing brave or glorious about it."

  "No. Yet sometimes it's the only way to stop a great evil."

  "You're sounding more like a warrior than a scholar."

  "Is it not possible to be both?"

  "Maybe." My heart was beating hard. I didn't know why. His eyes were luminous, intent on me… I wanted so much to touch him. I pulled my gaze away. "You've seen what I can do. Most succubi—those who started out that way—are naturally insubstantial, and take on form only with effort. It's the other way around for me, but…" I shrugged. "Other succubi are from Dis. Hell, in other words. I'm originally of Earth, even if I do partake of hell now, too."

  "Molly, you aren't of hell."

  My eyes flew to him. "But—you said that I was. That the curse made me of both realms."

  He shook his head. "Your memory is faulty. I said you were inherently of two realms. I can't tell which other realm claims you," he said apologetically. "I can't read that deeply. But it isn't hell."

  "But succubi are from hell. You saw what I did, going fuzzy that way. That's what demons do."

  "There are other realms where matter and energy aren't as sharply divided as they are here. I… I think I come from such a place." He smiled slowly, sweetly. "So do demons, yes, though that's not my realm, or yours. And so do angels."

  Without my willing it, my hand reached for him, to touch his face—and a car honked right behind us. I jumped. "I-I'd better get filled up." In more ways than one, but there wasn't time to hunt now. Soon, I promised myself, and opened my door and climbed down. "Want to learn how to pump gas?"

  "Yes." He didn't move, though. "One more question."

  I waited.

  "Where are we going?"

  "I wondered when you'd ask that. We're going to see an acquaintance of mine. You need help I can't give you." I closed the door and moved to the pump, selecting the "credit" option. My wallet was in my pocket. It's too easy to be separated from cash and other important items if you carry a purse. The credit card I used, like my rig, belonged to NMN Corporation. That was my little joke. NMN stands for Not My Name.

  Michael got out and came around the front of the rig, frowning. "You said acquaintance, not friend."

  "I call very few people friend. Cullen is…" I shrugged and took out the nozzle. "Among other things he's one of those who study the nature of magic. The two of you should have a lot to discuss."

  "He's a sorcerer."

  "Yes."

  "No. No sorcerers."

  "Go buy yourself a Coke," I said, handing him a five. "When you come back, we'll talk about it."

  MlCHAEL loved Coke. He bought a six-pack and drank three. He did not love the idea of seeking help from a sorcerer. He had the idea that he wasn't supposed to do that—but of course couldn't say why.

  It's hard to argue with someone who has no reasons, only feelings. I did my best. We debated it off and on all the way around the loop—when he wasn't asking about engineering, building codes, the water supply, and all sorts of other things I couldn't answer. He was desperately curious about the city, and looked wistful once it had receded behind us.

  "Maybe you can go back later," I said. We were on I-10, headed west. Headlights chained the highway on either side, orderly fireflies lighting the dark at seventy miles an hour. "There are a lot of other cities to see on our route, though. Big ones, little ones, all sorts." San Antonio, El Paso, Las Cruces, Tucson…

  "This sorcerer of yours lives where?"

  "In California."

  "That's on the west coast."

  "Yes."

  "A long drive for little purpose, since I can't go to a sorcerer."

  "You can't go home until you know where home is."

  "I'm not sure I want to go back." He slid a long, level glance my way. "I like it here. Besides, we know someone there wants to capture me. We don't need a sorcerer, Molly. We can wait for my memory to come back on its own."

  "And if the Azá find you first?" I shook my head. "Someone here wants to find you, too, and I can't protect you from them."

  "I don't need your protection," he snapped. "Your help, yes. I don't know this world. But I can protect myself."

  "Now you sound like a typical male."

  "I am male."

  I'd noticed. Oh, I had noticed... "The FBI thinks the Azá's goddess doesn't exist, and that they only use animals for their death magic. I know better."

  "They won't kill me. I am… valuable."

  "I think so, too, but will they?"

  "I don't know what I am," he said, his voice low and tense. "I don't know my name, or where I come from. But I know this much: they will not want me damaged."

  "What if they don't know what you are, either?"

  He was silent for several minutes. "An unsettling idea," he finally said. "One that should have occurred to me. It would depend on this goddess of theirs, wouldn't it? On what she knows and where she is."

  "She's certainly not from these parts," I said dryly. "Nor does she have a strong connection here, thank God. Her followers have been trying for three centuries to find an avatar for her. I'm happy to say they haven't had much luck."

  "For three centuries, Molly?"

  I glanced at him, nodded. "They had me picked for the honor, yes. I didn't know it, though I'd, ah… dabbled a bit with their rites. I was a wild child for awhile, or thought I was. I'd been raised in the Church, but God and I had a falling out after my parents died of smallpox. I thought He should have handled things differently. Well." I shrugged. "I was young."

  "What happened?"

  "They were trolling for converts, and they had a good spiel. The idea of worshiping a goddess appealed to me—seemed like men had had things all their way too long." I'd been in London by then, a little lost… make that a lot lost, but sufficiently insulated by the arrogance of youth to pretend otherwise. "They put on a good show, too. Magic was a major crime back then, so it didn't take much to dazzle, make it seem like they knew what they were talking about. And what adolescent doesn't like a secret society? Wisdom hidden from the masses, with a select few admitted to the mysteries." I snorted. "I was easy for them. Easy."

  "But you got away."

  "At pretty much the last minute, and not through any planning on my part. They'd tested me, though I didn't know it, and I fit Her. That's why avatars are hard to locate, I found out later—body and mind have to be matched up in some arcane fashion to Her. I, ah, got myself unmatched."

  He nodded. "Just as with crossing between realms, so must an avatar be congruent with the entity wishing to posses it. How did you unmatch youself ?"

  "Well…" I smiled. "Accidentally. Mostly I was just doing what came naturally. The night before the big ceremony—which I thought was to initiate me into their mysteries—a sweet boy named Johnny McLeod performed another sort of initiation. Her avatar must be a virgin, you see."

  He laughed.

  "She was royally pissed about Johnny, though." A little shiver travelled through me.

  They'd brought me to Her when they realized what I'd done—brought me weeping, cursing, fighting. They hadn't been gentle in their disappointment, and I'd learned what they'd planned. Then I saw Her… or, rather, what was left of her old avatar. Centuries old, it was, kept more or less alive by Her power. It—I've never been able to think of that husk as female—had looked like a mummy. Dead everywhere but the eyes…

  "She crumbled," I said. "After She cursed me. That little temper fit cost Her."

  "I'm sorry." He reached for my hand and held it. "I've called up bad memories."

  The contact was good. Steadying. For a few minutes, I let myself enjoy holding hands. But as memories faded, that simple pleasure was lost in the rise of hunger. With a sigh, I pulled my hand back.

  He was silent a moment longer, then said,

  "You were right to warn me. These Azá may not know why their goddess wants me. She won't be able to tell them much."

  "Why not? She
is a goddess—or one of the Old Ones who calls herself goddess, which amounts to the same thing. Can't she tell them whatever she wants?"

  "Communication across the realms is chancy." He sounded distracted. "And yours is so distant from most… I doubt she can convey actual words. Images, perhaps."

  "Visions."

  "Yes, and it's devilishly hard to get precise information across in a vision."

  He sounded as if he knew from personal experience. A sudden thought chilled me. "Michael, there isn't any chance that… I mean, you aren't…"

  "Aren't what?"

  I bit my lip. "One of the Old Ones?"

  Startled silence, then a sharp bark of laughter. "Gone senile, maybe? Considering my memory problem? That's good. I'll have to tell—" He stopped short. "Dammit. Dammit, dammit, dammit."

  "You remembered something."

  "Someone. For an instant I had a face, a name. A friend. I knew he would enjoy the joke, and…" He shook his head. "He's gone now."

  A tightness beneath my breastbone told me I was already too involved with this strange, uprooted man. Still I reached for his hand. "You have a friend here, too."

  His fingers closed around mine. Then, slowly, he lifted my hand to his lips. I tried to pull it back—and couldn't, for he wouldn't release me. He pressed a kiss to my fingertips, and his breath was warm. His mouth was warmer.

  Then, thank God, he dropped my hand. I gave a little laugh that sounded far too nervous. "You've picked up some odd things on the Internet."

  "I didn't read about that." He was pleased with himself. "Perhaps it was instinct. I like the way you taste."

  "Yes, well, you taste in a different way than I do. I'm trying not to jump your bones here, Michael. You are not helping."

  "Jump my… oh. But I would like very much if you jumped my bones, Molly."

  Now the hard thud of my heart made sense. So did the way my pulse throbbed in tender places, and the hunger rising, rising… "I can kill that way, too. If I take too much."

  "But you wouldn't."

  "That doesn't make it safe." For either of us.

  "You couldn't drain me."

  I snorted. "Oh, the sublime confidence of youth."

  "The nodes," he said patiently. "I draw what I need from the nearest node, either directly or through a ley line. You can't drain them."

  The nodes? Was that what I'd felt—that sparkling, delicious energy that had flowed when he was healing? Oh, gods, but I wanted to taste that. And him. I wanted Michael. If I could—"Shit."

  "What is it?"

  "A cop, the state version. He's on my tail, flashing his lights."

  "What does that mean?"

  "He wants me to pull over. I'm not speeding," I said grimly. "I haven't broken any traffic laws. So he has something else in mind, and it probably isn't good news."

  I had no choice, though. I sure couldn't outrun him. There was plenty of shoulder, but I don't put my rig on the shoulder when I can help it. I flashed my lights to let him know I'd seen him, then waited for an exit to come along. While I waited, I briefed Michael on the various other law enforcement agencies, and suggested he let me do the talking.

  "You think he is stopping us because the FBI told him to?"

  "It seems likely. Unless there's some other player we don't know about in this game." There was an exit for a rest stop coming up, which was perfect. I signaled. The fuzz didn't bother with a turn signal, just stayed on my bumper as I slowed.

  "There may be many players we don't know about. There were… I'm almost sure there were two."

  I stole a glance at him. Sweat gleamed on his forehead. He was staring straight ahead, his gaze fixed on nothing his eyes could see. "Two?" I said softly.

  "Who came for me. She—the one who wounded me—and another. At least one other."

  "Do you think she might be the Azá's goddess?" There was no traffic on the access road. I pulled up into the curve of the rest stop and eased to a stop.

  He shrugged. "How can I tell? I don't remember her clearly, and I know nothing about the Azá's goddess."

  "I'll fill you in on her." I glanced at the side mirror. My tailgating cop was getting out of his car. "Later. Michael, I've made some assumptions for you. Maybe I shouldn't have. The FBI might be able to keep you safe from the Azá. You might not mind it if they found you."

  "No. You are right. I can't let myself be taken by any government. I'm… too much temptation."

  True, but I suspected he didn't mean it the way I did. "Open the glove box, will you? Oh—it's this." I showed him. We had the registration and insurance papers out by the time the cop turned his flashlight on us through the window.

  I hit the button to roll it down. "Yes, officer? Would you mind—" I held a hand up. "The light. I can't see you at all."

  He lowered the flashlight enough for me to see that the face beneath the Smokey Bear hat was young, but he had his cop face down pat. He looked as friendly as stone. "Are there just the two of you in there, ma'am?"

  "Yes, me and my nephew." I held out the papers that proved me to be a law-abiding citizen.

  He ignored them. "I need you both to step out of the vehicle, please."

  This was not good. Officers never ask middle-aged ladies to step out of our vehicles for a traffic violation. "What's wrong?" I made my voice breathy, as if I were frightened. It wasn't difficult.

  "If you'll just step outside the vehicle, ma'am."

  I glanced at Michael—who had the most peculiar expression on his face. His upper lip was pulled back as if he were about to sneeze, and his eyes were fixed on the officer demanding our exit. "All right," he said in a thin voice. "I've got him."

  "Got—" I swung my head back. "Oh, my." The stone-faced cop was truly stony now. Frozen.

  "What should we do with him?" Michael asked. "I can't hold him very long."

  Chapter 8

  I took a slow breath. Steady, I told myself. You've seen stranger things … but at the moment I couldn't think of any. "What did you do to him?"

  "I froze him. You can ask him things," Michael said helpfully. "He won't remember later, if I tell him not to. But hurry."

  "Ah…" I looked at the poor, frozen young man and asked, "Why did you stop me?"

  "There's an APB out," he said. It was bizarre. His mouth moved, but nothing else. His eyes stayed fixed on a spot near my left shoulder. "For your plate number."

  Great. "Why is there an APB out on my license plate?"

  "You're wanted by the FBI."

  Pete, the rat, had not been sufficiently charmed. He must have made a full report, and now someone in the government wanted to get their hands on Michael. The Unit?

  Some other corner of the bureaucracy? "This is not good news. Michael, can you make him do more than forget this conversation? Could you make him think he misread the license plate and that I'm someone else altogether?"

  "I believe so. He has no shields." Michael sounded professionally disapproving, like a dentist whose patient hasn't been flossing.

  A couple of long minutes later the trooper spoke again, his gaze still fixed over my left shoulder. "Sorry to bother you, ma'am." Then, suddenly, he came unstuck. He gave me a brisk nod and headed back to his car.

  I slumped back in my seat. "That was weird. That was so weird." I watched in the rearview mirror as the trooper's car pulled away. "If I'd known you could do that, I would have gotten you to take care of Pete."

  "I… didn't know I could, either, at that point."

  His voice sounded funny. I straightened and looked at him. His head was tilted back against the headrest, and he was almost as pale as he'd been when I first found him. "Are you okay?"

  "It always gives me a headache to do that," he said absently. "A real mother—"

  "Whoa. That's considered a very rude phrase."

  "Oh. Is the word fuck offensive?"

  "Yes, unless you're actually doing it, or about to do it."

  "Odd. There are several words with a primary or secondary meani
ng involving copulation that do not offend. At least I don't think they do. Screw, lay, sleep with, mate, ball—"

  "It's all in the context. Michael? You said 'always.'"

  "I remembered… a little more." He turned his head to look at me. In the muted light from the dash, his eyes had an odd sheen, almost reflective. Like cat's eyes. "I performed the same spell on myself just before I came here. I didn't know if my transit would be successful, and I couldn't let them… learn from me. So I told myself to forget. But I was rushed. Something went wrong."

  "You forgot too much?"

  "I forgot how to get it all back." The twitch of his lips might have been meant for a smile. "There are seventeen versions of this saying in the various realms: whatever can go wrong, will."

  "We call it Murphy's Law. You look wrecked." I unbuckled my seat belt and stood. "I'm going to get you some ibuprofen."

  "This is a remedy for pain?"

  "Yes."

  "Good. The nearest ley line is thin, hard to draw from with my head pounding. And the Houston node is too distant to reach directly."

  "Houston has a node?"

  "Of course. So many people could not live so closely without one. They would become insane. Though that node is well below the land surface, and the energy is badly scattered. I suspect electricity… ah." His eyes lit up. "You brought me the Coke to drink."

  He had the oddest gaps in his knowledge. I had to show him how to use "the Coke" to swallow pills. Then, abruptly, I shut off the engine and told him I was going outside to think.

  THERE'S so little real night left in the Western world. Here, halfway between Houston and San Antonio, the sky was hazy, the stars thin. But the moon was fat and profligate with its borrowed light. I started walking along the curve of road that denned the rest area.

  There were trees. I could hear a dog barking somewhere, far in the distance. And all those noisy fireflies on the interstate swishing by, making good time on their way to wherever. The grass was soft beneath my feet and the breeze held a pleasant, green scent, but I missed the smell of the sea.

  I ached.

  Lord knows I should have been thinking about the fix we were in. I tried, but my intentions kept scattering, then re-forming, lined up behind one thought like iron filings obedient to the pull of the magnet.