One True Mate 7_Shifter's Paradox

by Lisa Ladew

  ...and hoped the planet had cars.

  Applause. He turned and ran for the steps, something clutched in his hand. His check for $500. Evie held her breath. He saw them.

  “Harlan!” Leilani cried out. Evie itched to take over Leilani’s body, just to touch Harlan one time.

  “Hi?” Harlan said, coming down the steps, a tiny worry-line between his eyebrows, looking impossible young and free. “Do I know you?”

  “I’m Leilani,” Leilani said, a young woman of twenty-five, wearing a hospital gown, hair long, probably knotted and dirty, wild eyes, sing-song voice. Evie only stared.

  The windows of her eyes were hazy, her vision worse than it had been when they’d talked with the dragengel.

  The same words she'd just heard, and before Evie could get her bearings, Leilani loosed her hold. They were sliding, rushing, slipping back to Leilani's body.

  Harlan, Leilani moaned.

  Harlan? Had Leilani taken them back there because Evie had been thinking about Harlan, had asked the meadow to take her to Harlan? Was there any chance at all the Harlan was fated a one true mate and Leilani was her? Evie thought there was a chance, had thought there was a chance back when she’d first found Leilani, because of the story Harlan had told her a long time ago. Need to move, to act, surged inside her. She had to get Leilani to the KSRT.

  Time rolled around them. Unstable. Were they still in Leilani’s body? Were they heading through time? Evie couldn’t tell. She yelled to Leilani. We’ll get to Harlan, I swear! But we have to get there by moving to him in space, not through time! Was she even making sense? She had no idea.

  Leilani, take us back to The Roosevelt. We’ll get up and walk out. That's how we have to do it, from your body. No, that wasn't quite right. She tried again. From your body in the present. The current present.

  Leilani knew exactly what she was saying. What if we’re tied?

  Then they were screwed. Back to Rhen’s meadow? No.

  Time shook and whirled around them in utter, inky blackness and nothingness, whipping Eventine’s hair. We'll figure it out! she cried. Time to go Lani, you do what you do best, and get us back to now, and I’ll do what I do best and get you to Harlan, I promise, I swear I will. That boy, he’s an adult in our present. A cop. He will take care of you.

  Slam. Into the present, the current present, into Leilani’s body, which had been sleeping, but now they were up and moving and Leilani was out of her room and running down the hallway in her bare feet and her Roosevelt gown and she was frantic, her drugged psyche trying to keep the thought in her head what they were supposed to be doing and Evie was just trying to keep up, it was so hard to think in Leilani’s body but she helped as much as she could, lent strength and will and energy and certainty.

  “Harlan, we have to find Harlan,” Leilani cried out loud in the corridor, but it didn’t matter because Joel was already there, running for her. Leilani stopped short and fled the other way, hitting the exit door at a run, winding down the stairwell, all those metal stars.

  Clang clang echo echo as her feet hit them, Joel in the stairwell above them, yelling, yelling: “There is no Harlan,” he yelled down at her, looking over the handrail, his face a mask of anger. “No Harlan. He’s not real, Leilani, you’re seeing things!”

  Leilani panicked. Evie was flooded with the emotion.

  Rip, tear, slam, bludgeon

  Through time they went, tumbling like they were in water, and it was sunny and they were almost somewhen and …

  Leilani stood in sunlight, under a tree, in front of her were wolven males, Eventine could smell them but not see them because Leilani’s eyesight was worse and worse as it had ever been, and the males were only hazy blobs. Evie searched for time cues in the environment as Leilani’s mind wobbled, but the trees and sky and house did not tell her when it was.

  Leilani’s voice. She’d spotted Harlan already, picked him out of the males even though her eyes were blurred and Evie could barely pick him out. By scent? “Harlan, they say you’re not real. Is it true?”

  The males scrambled, all of them coming toward Leilani. Eventine struggled to put names to blurry faces and bodies.

  Leilani’s body jerked. Pain shot through her arm. Her body stopped responding. Her consciousness shut down. Just before her eyes closed, Evie saw they were back in the Roosevelt, on her back on the floor, and Joel was standing over her, a needle in his hand.

  But she couldn’t keep her hold in the body. She dug in with mental claws, and still she was jerked out, tossed through space, landing on her ass on the forest path to Rhen’s meadow.

  Leilani was nowhere in sight.

  10 - Time Passes Quicker in the Meadow

  Evie shot to her feet. She was at the end of one of the three forest paths that led to Rhen’s meadow, the same one she’d come in when she’d died. The Path of the Catamount.

  “Show me,” Evie demanded of the meadow, but then Leilani appeared from nowhere, just behind Evie on the path that went on forever if you headed off in the wrong direction. Leilani came in fast, momentum spilling her to the ground, where soft cream-colored plants that should have been green cuddled her, curving to cover her body.

  Evie lunged for her, grabbed her around the elbow, pulling at her. “You ok?”

  “Ok to go, ok to go,” Leilani said, her voice little more than a whisper, her face curved toward the ground. She gave Evie a thumbs up.

  “Good.” Evie pulled at her. “Try again, we were almost back in that last time.”

  But Leilani’s thumbs up drooped and she pressed her face farther into the dirt, not saying a word. Evie would give her a moment. She could have a moment, could have a minute. She could have some time and then they would get right back in there they had to get back in there, get back to the Ula, the Earth, back to trying to make things different this time.

  Leilani’s shoulders shook and her back trembled, but she made no noise. “Leilani?” Evie said, letting go of her elbow, moving a hand up to Leilani’s shoulders. “Lani?”

  Leilani didn’t make a noise, but she didn’t respond either. Her shoulders were still, stiff, her crying stopped, her face still pressed away from Evie into the grasses.

  “Look, we can take a break again. I’m sorry, we don’t have to go back right away. We need a breather.”

  Leilani relaxed slightly. Evie pulled at her. Leilani let herself be rolled over, until she was flat on her back on the path, staring up into the sunless sky.

  Her eyes were a blank and terrifying silver that reflected all light.

  Evie gasped. “Fix her,” Evie hissed to the meadow. “Fix her, please. We won’t travel again. Just do it this one time, please.” Her voice broke. The meadow did not take orders, and there was no guarantee that Evie would get what she was asking for.

  Leilani cried out and her back arched, her hands flying to cup her now-closed eyes. The top of her head and her toes touched the ground, her belly button bent up to the sky, and then she collapsed to the ground, still, silent.

  Evie stared, her mind working quickly, flipping through and discarding new strategies, new plans.

  Leilani blinked. Opened her eyes which looked normal. A rich brown. She stared at the pinkish sky. Evie held her breath. Leilani looked at her slowly. “I can see,” she said, in an informational tone. Telling Evie it had worked.

  Evie sat back in the grasses and took a deep breath. That was a scary one. But now what? “We need a new plan, Leilani. Explain it to me, every detail, of how you travel, of what it feels like and maybe we can figure out what you can do different or how we can get back into your body without time travel.”

  Leilani’s expression went sad, far away, and she turned her face away from Evie, curled onto her side on the ground, away from Evie.

  Crap. Desperation clawed at Evie and she grappled with it, knowing decisions made out of desperation only led to despair. They had to get back to Leilani’s body. But Leilani was not ready.

  Evie stood and paced, breathi
ng heavy. Take care of Leilani. How? This was not something she was good at, never having the time or inclination for girlfriends when she’d been alive. Leilani needed someone else. But she was the only one here. But even the catamount would be better than her. Which gave her an idea. The bear guardian. Bearen were generally good with the nurturing and Evie would be glad to leave it to them. But the guardian was wild…

  “Rhen,” Evie whispered, throwing a glance at Leilani. Still. Quiet. Eyes closed. “How can I help her? What can I do?”

  A bed appeared on the side of the path, nestled between dark trees with pink leaves, a forest bed twined with roots and leaves like they were in a fairytale. “Seriously?” Evie muttered under her breath. The bed morphed. A couch, a normal one, but one of those big ones that formed a half-square, the middle filled with ottomans so it was like one big couch bed, a cotton-candy pink one. A little better. Pillows? Pillows everywhere. Pink and black, pink and black, mounded six feet high, spilling over the sides onto the ground.

  A giggle from her left. Leilani was sitting up, her hands pressed against her mouth like she were a little girl, at the pink couch with the pink and black pillows piled up into the trees. Evie smiled. More pillows?

  More pillows, pink and black, the forest and the path filled with pillows, Evie standing in a pile of pillows up to her shoulders. “Leilani!” she cried. Leilani would be completely buried. “Less pillows! No pillows!” The pillows were gone. Except for 4 on the couch-bed.

  Leilani was giggling again. “I almost smothered,” she said, then collapsed into giggles again.

  Got it. Breather, she needs a real breather, not a bullshit one where I watch the clock. Got it. Food? Drinks? A reasonable amount? Stuff she likes?

  She would not watch the clock for as long as possible…

  ***

  Evie lounged in the bed-couch, sipping her Jameson’s and Ginger. Leilani had started with Yoohoo, then soda, and now she was on hot chocolate, potato chip bags piled around her. She held her stomach. “Oh I think I’m gonna puke.”

  Evie nodded. “You probably should. I’ve never seen anyone eat that many potato chips before.”

  Leilani stared into the forest and the relative silence was comfortable. They’d only talked about light things, the weather, the birds. Leilani had napped. Evie had meditated, a tense, hard meditation that was barely better than nothing, but by the end of it, she’d felt able to wait for a bit longer. She had not asked the meadow to see what was going on in the real world or how much time had passed there in the hour Leilani had been sleeping. “How long have you been living at the Roosevelt?” Evie said, surprised at the question that came out of her mouth. She hadn’t planned on speaking.

  Around them, birds tweeted, insects droned, the deep hum of late dream spring lulled them, without being too hot or humid. The meadow always seemed around 75 degrees F.

  Leilani didn’t answer for a long time. When she spoke, she asked her own questions. “Harlan, your mate, he’s a nice guy, right?”

  “Great guy. The best. A true warrior.”

  “You miss him.”

  A statement. Evie couldn’t respond to it for a moment, because it made her think of something important. She steeled herself and forced it out. “I think you might be his mate.”

  Leilani turned her neck slowly to stare at Evie, eyes wide, disbelieving. She shook her head. “He’s your mate.”

  “I’m dead,” Evie said flatly. Fact of life. Of death. There was no sugar-coating that her and Harlan would never be together again. “He never found a mate last time, and I think it might have been you.”

  Leilani’s expression was stricken. “No, no he’s not, there’s no way.”

  Evie shook her head and stared off into the forest, her eyes on the Pink Jays swooping for bugs. “Hear me out. I’ve had a long time to think about this.” A Pink Jay came their way, hovering like a hummingbird in front of the couch. Impossible. “Harlan has a prophecy,” she said. “The Knotted Wolf Anchors Time’s Keeper.” She looked at Leilani. “Time’s keeper. That’s you.” Her stomach soured as she realized he had that prophecy when she’d recognized him as her mate. Could she have been wrong?

  Leilani looked even more horrified if that was possible. “I can’t, he’s your mate, I would never…”

  Evie shook her head. “You will. I’m dead, remember? He deserves his mate, if it’s you now.”

  Leilani looked around at the forest, at the pink leaves and flowers, the black bark and dirt, the sky that was so pale you could almost imagine it was blue. “Why?” she whispered, one tear tracking down her cheek. “Why did I meet you? I’ll never be able to look at him without seeing your face, remembering how sweet you were to me. And I’ll always be sad that it’s me, not you with him.”

  Evie’s throat lumped. Simple wolven kindness and Leilani lapped it up like she’d never had so much as a kind word. Harlan would need to take extra special care with her, to always be sweet and gentle. One cross word would break her. If Evie were still in Rhen’s meadow when the two of them got together, she could coach Harlan, whisper ways to be sweet in his ear while he slept, help him work through his worries and frustrations so he never took them out on her. There were only about a thousand problems with that scenario, but she ignored them all. “I just want him to be happy,” Evie said. “Both of you, I want to see both of you happy.”

  Evie couldn’t hold herself back any longer. She looked. Show me, she whispered inside her own mind. Show me them all. What is going on? How long has it been? She held her breath as the Serenity swam into view. The farmhouse. Burton. Harlan. Canyon and Timber in the back. The Police Station. Wolven everywhere. All males. Grim determination. Working. Running. Jaggar. Face set in a grim line. Upset. Searching for something. Someone. Leilani. How long? Look for a calendar. For anyone talking about what was going on. Check the babies. How old are the young? But wait, there’s Wade. Upset. Another crisis. Shay and her babies, gone, taken by the boyfriend. No one knows where or how. But how long has it been since Kendra was born? Fly to the farm, to Trevor’s farm. Get a look at Kendra. How old was she now? But a look at her and another at Track and Treena told Evie nothing. The young looked six months old but that couldn’t be. The pups were crawling. Babbling. Not Kendra. She couldn’t touch the ground, she would melt it. Her only attempts at crawling were from daddy’s wingtip to wingtip. It couldn’t have been 6 months, could it? Get closer, what are people talking about? Any time clues, time cues? There. Ella and Trevor whispering about Track. He’s almost a month old, why hasn’t he shifted yet?

  Leilani jumped, bringing Evie’s attention back to the meadow. She was bent at a weird angle, her face pulled into a grimace, her elbows out.

  “What!?” Evie whispered, crawling to her friend, fearing the worst. Leilani only moaned, unable to move her mouth for a second, before the shock to her nervous system finally faded. Something devastating had happened to Leilani’s body, and she’d been able to feel it all the way from the meadow.

  “Show me,” Evie whispered to the meadow, horrified. Leilani did not need more shock therapy. The colors rippled.

  Evie followed the ripples to the Roosevelt, but a dark diesel long-bed truck pulled in to the parking lot of the Roosevelt, drawing her attention there. A police vehicle. Jaggar got out in the bright mid-afternoon sun, wearing dark blue khakis and T-shirt, his badge tucked under his shirt, his gun hidden. He looked good. Great actually. Tall and strong, thick forearms, hard expression, head shaved bald for some reason. He’d filled out nicely, become a male she was proud of. He scented the air, and his expression hardened. He headed toward the front door of the red brick building. Harlan jumped out of the passenger seat and yelled for Jaggar. Had she thought Jaggar looked good? Harlan looked phenomenal. More muscle on his frame, more hardness in his expression. He’d gone salt and pepper, grown a beard, and man did he make it look good. She’d subsisted on glances of him through the meadow for 29 years, and although it had not been near enough, it had been all
she had.

  The males were moving fast, in the back door, in the Roosevelt and Eventine had to get back in Leilani’s body now.

  Evie grabbed Leilani’s hand. “Harlan, he’s there, he’s found you. We have to get back to your body, we have to make sure he finds you.”

  Leilani squeezed Evie’s hand, catching her urgency, her desperation. “How, tell me how?”

  “Aim and jump,” Evie said, then squeezed her eyes shut and did what she’d said, aiming for Leilani’s body like the ring in the water, sensing its location through their physical connections

  Tumble, slide, rip, no! Evie hung on tight to the present moment. Leilani, stay here. Here! Now!

  Leilani was gone. Where? Evie strained to hear. Had she gone back to Rhen’s meadow? On purpose? Couldn’t help it? But Evie was there, she’d somehow made it into Leilani’s body and it was sticking. She was there alone.

  The Roosevelt was dark and quiet, the whoosh of Leilani’s blood in her ears the only sound. Evie tried to tune in, tried to grab ahold of Leilani’s senses. It was harder without Leilani there, even harder than if Leilani was fighting her. It was like Eventine had to run Leilani’s bodily functions first, clumsily, using up much of her mental resources to do it, and only after everything was working correctly could she try to see and hear. Leilani’s eyes were closed. Blink. Blink. She’d almost opened one a sliver.

  Ok, how’s the body. Check in. Any pain? Anything not working? The body was heavy, the nerves buzzing, but seemed ok. If she could just get Leilani out of this “hospital.”