P.A.W.S.

by Debbie Manber Kupfer

  “And yet he seems concerned...” mused Jessamyn. “ Do you think there’s any chance he knows you’re a shapeshifter?”

  “I don’t see how. No one knew that.”

  “Your amulet,” said Jessamyn quietly. “May I see it?”

  Miri reached under her shirt and pulled out the silver cat charm. As Jessamyn touched it, Miri noticed that its eyes started to glow, and she had to resist the urge to morph into her feline form.

  “It is very important,” said Jessamyn, returning the amulet to Miri, “that you show your charm to no one outside of P.A.W.S. Do you understand?”

  “Of course, ma’am. Do you really think that this is what my uncle was looking for?”

  “I cannot be sure,” replied Jessamyn, “but I think it is crucial for you to stay vigilant. I also think it’s important for you to begin your training as soon as possible. Now that Joshua has returned from his errand, you will start training with him tomorrow. He will be your mentor. You are dismissed.”

  As Miri walked out of Jessamyn’s chamber, she glanced back over her shoulder and noticed that once more Jessamyn was in bird form. This time she was a huge golden eagle. Jessamyn in eagle form peered into the churning waters of the silver scrying bowl.

  Miri went back to her room, mulling over in her mind what she had seen in that bowl and thinking about all that Jessamyn had said.

  Chapter 12

  Josh caught up with Miri at breakfast the following morning. She was pouring milk on her Rice Krispies and trying to ignore Danny and Lilith, who were once again openly flirting one table over from theirs.

  “I thought we’d take a walk this morning,” said Josh.

  “Fine by me,” Miri replied, anxious to get away from the happy reunited couple and angry at herself that it bothered her so much. Danny seemed conceited, loud, and selfish. It truly looked like he was the perfect match for Lilith. So why was their interaction bothering her so much? Stupid, stupid, stupid.

  They finished up their food and cleaned off their trays. Josh then led Miri down the corridor to the large oak door through which they had entered a week before. It was Miri’s first time out of the institute since she arrived, and she was surprised to discover that she was a little nervous as she followed Josh up the long spiral staircase which led to the door in the cedar tree that exited into Forest Park.

  It was very early in the morning and the park was deserted. It was a dull and cloudy day, and light drizzle sprayed Miri and Josh as they walked.

  “Can I ask you a question, Josh?”

  “Fire away,” he smiled.

  “Well, it’s something I’ve been wondering about. You’re a werewolf, right? Yet you can change into a wolf at will, not just at the full moon. How’s that possible?”

  “I couldn’t at first,” said Josh. “My first few moon cycles were horrible. On the eve of the full moon, I would get more and more restless. I’d pace around the hut where Alistair was keeping me, and then, as the moon rose, Alistair would push me outside. I would fight it each time, sure that if I tried hard enough, I could escape this curse. But the more I fought, the more painful the transformation would be. Once changed, I was filled with strange and terrible urges. Alistair forced me to watch as he chose his victims, and urged me to participate.

  “‘Joshua, my cub,’ he would say, ‘come taste this young lady. Her flesh is so sweet, it will make you strong. Do you like her, Josh? Maybe we should keep her. She would make a fine addition to our pack.’

  “I’m proud to say that I was always able to resist, but at the same time I was scared of my own urges. Part of me wanted to give in, wanted to taste the flesh and blood of fellow humans. But I knew that if I did that, even once, I would lose my humanity. So instead, I tried to satisfy my urges by stalking animals during those full-moon transformations. I’d substitute a rabbit or a squirrel for a human victim.

  “Alistair wasn’t happy with this. He claimed that I could only reach my full potential by consuming human flesh and blood, and it is true that Alistair himself has some remarkable powers. For one thing, he is incredibly strong. I would compare his strength to that of the biblical Samson before his encounter with Delilah. Secondly, he never seems to age. He claims to have lived for centuries, though I don’t know if this is true. Finally, and this I can vouch for, he can hypnotize his victims by staring into their eyes and reaching into their minds.

  “As you know, after my first encounter with Alistair, I was unable to tell anyone who had attacked me. I would try, but the words would not come out. Alistair had used his power of hypnosis to effectively gag me. It was only after I had spent a considerable amount of time working with Jessamyn here at P.A.W.S. that I was finally free to talk about my attack. Jessamyn was also able to put protective wards around my mother so that Alistair has not been able to harm her.

  “I’m even able to visit my mom occasionally, though recently Alistair has become more active and Jessamyn has suggested it is safer if, for now, I stay away. She scries her sometimes for me, though, and I know that she’s physically okay, even if she has never really gotten over the loss of my father.”

  “Was it also Jessamyn who taught you how to control your transformations?” Miri asked.

  “No, that was Gerard. He was my mentor, a wise werewolf who had lived many, many moon cycles. He taught me and the other cubs to control our urges and ultimately to control our forms. I still am forced to change during the full moon, but the transformation is no longer painful, as I no longer fight it. At other times, I can choose to be wolf or human. As a wolf, I have developed my special skill of tracking, and for that, I also owe a debt of gratitude to Gerard.”

  “What happened to him?” asked Miri.

  “He died last December. As I said, he was growing old, and the lycopanthy finally took hold of him.”

  “Lycopanthy? What’s that?”

  “It’s the disease that we werewolves all carry, and it’s incurable. At some time in the future, hopefully not for many years, my body will start to degrade and it will become increasingly hard for me to hold my human form. At that point, I will have to make a tough decision. I can reject the wolf part of me and understand that this means that my human form will be greatly weakened and I will not have long to live. This is the path that Gerard chose. Or I can reject the human part of me and live out the rest of my life as a wolf. Of course, there is the third path, the one that Alistair took, but I refuse to become a monster, and neither would Gerard.”

  ***

  “So,” asked Josh, “how has your first week at P.A.W.S. been?”

  “Confusing,” Miri replied. “It’s a lot to take in at once. And, well, my roommate is not helping very much.”

  “Ah,” smiled Josh, “I’m guessing Miss Lilith is not too keen to have another cat in her territory?”

  “You could say that,” said Miri.

  “What you’ve got to understand is that Lilith, like most members of P.A.W.S., had a tough time in her early life before she found her way here.”

  “Did you track her down then, like me?”

  “No, that was Danny. Cats can sense other cats in distress. It was bugging him for days. He picked up the distress signal, but he couldn’t locate it. Each night he would go out to prowl, conferring with street cats and squirrels.

  Finally, he found her way out at the edge of St. Louis County. She had fallen in a ditch in cat form and was covered in mud. Plus, she was really scared. Something had attacked her, something that to this day she will not talk about.”

  “Where did she come from?” asked Miri.

  “That’s a mystery too. Not even Danny can get a hint from her. She never talks about a family or any kind of life before P.A.W.S.”

  During their conversation, Josh had been leading Miri through a series of paths through Forest Park. She hadn’t really been paying attention to where they were going because she had been so involved in listening to Josh. Now she was surprised to notice that they had walked up to the south entrance
of the zoo. They did not enter the zoo but continued walking around its perimeter until they reached a wooded part of the park behind the west side of the zoo.

  “What are we doing here?” Miri asked Josh, puzzled.

  “I want you to meet someone,” replied Josh cryptically, “but first you need to change into your feline form.”

  Miri concentrated on her amulet and felt the now- familiar warmth coursing through her body as she shifted her shape. She wondered at how easy it was now for her, how natural, as if part of her was always a cat waiting to come out. Miri felt pleasure in slowing down the transformation, sensing each part of her metamorphosis.

  By the time she had transformed, so had Josh, his change as seamless as hers. When they were both in animal form, Miri had learned that they could still talk to each other. She guessed it was a kind of telepathy that shapeshifters shared. For Miri it felt like the words came through her whiskers. She wondered briefly how it felt for Josh.

  “This is the official start of your training, Miri,” Josh explained. “Among the animals in the zoo is a single animagus. We can talk to him from here, but first we have to separate his thoughts from the multitude of other animals that live here in the zoo.”

  “How do we do that?” Miri asked, confused.

  “First I want you to close your eyes and concentrate on all the voices you hear around you. Can you identify them?”

  “Not really,” Miri replied. “They seem just like noise.”

  “It helps if you focus on one kind of being at a time.

  On the other side of this fence is an elephant. Her name is Nelly.”

  “Is she the animagus?”

  “Heavens, no! That would be extremely difficult to accomplish. No, Nelly is just an ordinary elephant, but still, as a fellow mammal, you should be able to contact her and have a rudimentary conversation. Close your eyes and think ‘elephant’.”

  Miri did what he said, feeling a little stupid. She pictured a large gray elephant with wrinkled skin and a long trunk. At first, nothing changed. She still heard the familiar jumble of voices that always plagued her when she was in this form. Then suddenly she stepped back in surprise. It felt like she had just been nudged in the belly. “Hello, Nelly!”

  “Hello,” came the faint reply. “Hungry. Peanuts?”

  “I have her,” Miri said excitedly.

  “Very good,” said Josh. “Now, looking into the elephant enclosure is a four-year-old girl. Her name’s Rosie. I want you to concentrate on Rosie’s aura. It’s important that you recognize the feel of a human aura. Concentrate on Rosie as you concentrated on Nelly, but this time, don’t talk to her. It would frighten her if she heard a voice in her head, and you don’t want to scare her.”

  Miri concentrated and was surprised to discover that she not only could recognize Rosie’s aura, but she could also see a picture of her in her mind as if the little girl was standing right there next to her, rather than fifty yards away from her on the other side of the fence. The little girl had blonde hair and blue eyes and was wearing a red jumper with a picture of Curious George on the front. Miri could sense that Rosie was very, very excited about seeing Nelly.

  “Okay,” said Josh. “Now that you know what the auras of a regular mammal and a regular human are like, I want you to combine them in your mind and do a sweep over the whole zoo. Somewhere in the zoo is an animagus. If you go slowly and filter out the auras of those who are simply animals or simply humans, you should be able to find the animagus.”

  Excited by her interactions with Nelly and Rosie, Miri set to work searching, but this proved to be a far harder task than she expected. There were so many different auras in the zoo, both animal and human. But she kept going, determined not to fail at her first task. Forty-five minutes later she was almost ready to give up when suddenly she noticed a subtle difference in one of the auras. It seemed to have a double layer. Miri focused her mind, her whole body tensing as she concentrated. Eureka! I have it! Involuntarily, from deep inside her cat throat came a purr that radiated through her entire body.

  The animagus agent at the zoo was a chimp who lived in the old Primate House at the end furthest away from where they were hidden in the trees. His name was Ian, and he said that he had been living in the St. Louis Zoo for just over ten years. He acted as a liaison between the animal world and the human one and was content in his role.

  “Why don’t you guys come into the zoo and see me?” he asked.

  Miri looked at Josh for guidance. “Sure,” he said, and changed back into human form. Miri followed his lead and they walked back around to the zoo entrance.

  The St. Louis Zoo was free, so they were able to walk right in together with the crowds of tourists.

  “Okay,” said Josh to Miri, after they entered. “Now find Ian.”

  “What?” she said, confused.

  “You can use the same senses when you’re in human form as you can when you’re a cat,” explained Josh. “It just takes a little more concentration. Try closing your eyes and concentrating on Ian’s aura.”

  Miri did what Josh said, feeling a little self-conscious there at the zoo, but no one seemed to notice anything odd. She was surprised to find that when she concentrated, she did indeed know where Ian was. She started walking, with Josh following, and soon they saw an old brick building ahead of them.

  “He’s in there,” Miri said, pointing.

  As they entered the old monkey house, a loud voice echoed through Miri’s head: “Hey, you guys, over here!”

  The voice was coming from a cage in the corner of the large building. Miri and Josh made their way over there. Miri didn’t truly know what she expected, but definitely not what she found. The “cage” was hardly a cage at all. It was more like an elaborately furnished luxury hotel room complete with satellite TV, Jacuzzi, and a drinks bar. Ian the chimp was dressed in a tuxedo and fluffy pink bedroom slippers and was sipping a large banana daiquiri.

  “Glad you could make it. You’d better have brought me some bananas, Josh!”

  Josh opened the backpack he had been carrying and brought out a huge bunch, which he tossed to Ian, and then Miri noticed something else odd. The glass in front of the cage was not really glass; it was just the illusion of glass. Also she realized that despite the fact that the monkey house was full of visitors looking at the various primates in their glass homes, no one but them was coming near Ian at all. It was as if, for everyone else, Ian and his living quarters did not really exist.

  “You guys want to come in and watch a show? They’re showing an old Tarzan movie on TBS in ten minutes.” said Ian enthusiastically.

  “Not today, thanks,” said Josh. “I just wanted to introduce you to Miri and ask if you’ve had any news.”

  “There has been some buzz. You should go talk to the wolves, Josh. They’ve been really restless lately.”

  “Thanks for the tip, Ian. Enjoy your bananas.”

  They left the Primate House and walked back towards the zoo entrance.

  “Aren’t we going to talk to the wolves?” asked Miri.

  “No point now,” said Josh. “They sleep during the day. I’ll come back tonight.”

  Chapter 13

  Cynthia Katz stared with disgust at the woman sitting on her living room sofa. It wasn’t just the leather jacket or ripped jeans that bothered her, or even the bright purple hair, multiple piercings, and tattoos. It was that this woman claimed to be a family member. It was bad enough that they’d had to take in that mess of a niece three years ago, but now along comes this woman who claimed to be the brat’s mother and David’s long-lost sister!

  She had been brushing her favorite fur wrap in preparation for her Ladies’ League meeting tonight when the doorbell had rung, a rude ring, like whoever was outside was leaning on the button. As soon she had opened the door, this creature had burst into her home, sunk down into the sofa in front of the log fire (fake, of course; a real fire would have been far too much bother and mess), taken out a cigarette wi
thout asking permission, and was now flicking the ash into her aspidistra plant.

  “Hello, Sis,” she introduced herself. “I’m Nora!”

  “Excuse me! Sis? I am NOT your sis,” exclaimed Cynthia, outraged.

  “Well, I guess you are, seeing as you married my big bro and all,” explained Nora.

  “Well, if you’re talking about David, he’s not here,” said Cynthia emphatically. “If you want to see him, you’re going to have to come back another time. He’s... he’s at an important meeting, and I’m not at all sure when he’s coming home.”

  “Oh, I can wait,” said Nora, putting her feet up on the coffee table in front of her. She was wearing huge combat boots coated with mud.

  Cynthia gasped, “Do you mind!”

  “Not at all,” smiled Nora. “I’m starving, by the way. What have you got to eat around here? Oh, and a beer would just hit the spot.”

  Cynthia backed into the kitchen. She should tell this horrible woman to leave, she knew that, or else call the police. But instead, she opened the refrigerator and pulled out a Budweiser and some leftover pizza. She zapped the pizza in the microwave for a minute and then brought the beer and pizza back to Nora.

  “Thanks, Sis,” said Nora, grabbing the pizza and beer while Cynthia winced. “You not having any?”

  Cynthia nervously sat down in the armchair opposite Nora. When was David coming home? As soon as he comes home, we get rid of her. This must be some kind of mistake. He can’t possibly be related to this creature.

  “Nice place you have here,” said Nora brightly. “Maybe I’ll crash here for a while.”

  At this, Cynthia’s face turned pale. “Oh, no!” she said, not even attempting to hide her horror at the proposition.