by Ким Харрисон
"That's not what I said," I protested. "Cut me some slack, will you? I don't know how you take care of yourself, and I was too afraid to ask until now. All I know is you go out anxious and jittery and come home calm and hating yourself."
My admission of fear seemed to penetrate, and the creases in her forehead smoothed. She uncrossed her legs, then crossed them under the table. "Sorry. It surprised me you asked. I should be good for a few days more, but the stress—" Ivy cut her thought short and took a breath. "I have a few people. We help each other and go our separate ways. I don't ask anything from them, and they don't ask anything from me. They're vamps, in case you're interested. I don't make ties with anyone else…anymore."
Single, bi vamp looking for same for blood tryst, not relationship, I thought, hearing her unspoken desire in her last sentence, but I wasn't ready to deal with it.
"I don't like living like this," Ivy said, her words unaccusing and her eyes a deep, honest brown. "But it's where I am right now. Don't worry about it. I'll be okay. And as far as Piscary is concerned, he can burn in hell—if his soul hadn't already evaporated."
Her face was expressionless again, but I knew it was a front. "So you're going to stay?" I asked, both embarrassed and proud that I had learned I could ask for help when I needed it, and boy did I need it.
She nodded, and I exhaled, reaching for my drink. "Thank you," I said softly.
The idea of leaving everything to play dead the rest of my life scared the crap out of me the way a death threat couldn't. I liked my life, and I didn't want to have to leave it and start over. It had taken me too long to find friends who would stick with me when I did something stupid. Like turning a simple snag and drag into an interspecies power struggle.
Shifting one shoulder up and down in a half shrug, Ivy reached under her chair for that paper bag. "Do you want your mail," she asked, "seeing as I brought it all this way?"
She was changing the subject, but that was fine by me. "I thought you were kidding," I said as Ivy set the sack on the table and I dragged it closer. Jenks and Jax were excited about something they had found on the list, and people had given up watching them in glances and were blatantly staring. At least they weren't looking at us.
"It's the package I'm curious about," Ivy said, glancing at Nick and Jenks while they pointed at the screen.
I dumped everything out, putting the obvious thank-you-for-saving-my-ass note from a previous run back in the bag along with the insurance bill from David's company and a late season seed catalog. What was left was a paper-wrapped parcel the size of my two fists. I looked closer at the handwriting, my eyes jerking to Nick in the corner. "It's from Nick," I said, reaching for a table knife. "What is he sending me when he thinks I'm dead?"
Ivy's face held a silent distain clearly directed at Nick. "I'd be willing to bet it's whatever the Weres are after. I thought it was his handwriting, but I wasn't sure."
Very conscious of Nick slurping his shake and reading track titles over Jenks's shoulder, I pulled the package off the table and put it in my lap. My pulse quickened and I made short work of the outer wrapping. Fingers cold, I opened the box and pulled out the heavy drawstring bag. "It's got lead in it," I said, feeling the supple weight of the fabric. "It's wrapped in lead, Ivy. I don't like this."
She casually leaned forward to block Nick's view. "Well, what is it?"
Licking my lips, I tugged the opening wider and peered down, deciding it was a figurine. I gingerly touched it, finding it cold. More confident, I drew it out and set it on the table between us. Staring at it, I wiped my hands off on my jeans.
"That is…really ugly," Ivy said. "I think it's ugly." Her brown eyes flicked to me. "Is it ugly, or just weird?"
Goose bumps rose, and I stifled a shiver. "I don't know."
The statue was a yellowish color with stained striations running through it. Bone, I guessed. Very old bone; it had left the cold feeling on my hands that bone does. It stood about four inches high and was about as deep. And it felt alive, like a tree or a plate of moldy cheese.
I furrowed my brow as I tried to figure out what it was a statue of. Touching only the base, I turned it with two fingers. A noise of disgust slipped from me; the other side had a long muzzle twisted as if in pain. "Is it a head?" I guessed.
Ivy put her elbow on the table. "I think so. But the teeth…Those are teeth, right?"
I shivered, feeling like someone had walked over my grave. "Oh," I whispered, realizing what it reminded me of. "It looks like Pam when she was in the middle of Wereing."
Ivy flicked her eyes to mine and back to the statue. As I watched, her face went paler and her eyes went frightened. "Damn," she muttered. "I think I know what it is. Cover it up. We are in deep shit."
Twenty
I jerked when Nick suddenly appeared at the table. His long face was flushed, angry and frightened all at the same time—a dangerous mix. "What are you doing?" he hissed at Ivy, snatching the statue up and holding it close. "You brought it here? I sent it to her so no one would find it. I thought she was dead. They couldn't make me tell who had it if I sent it to a dead woman, and you brought it here? You damned fool vampire!"
"Sit," Ivy said, her jaw clenched and her eyes shifting to black. "Give it to me."
"No." Nick's grip tensed to a white-knuckled strength. "Save the aura shit for someone it works on. I'm not afraid of you."
He was, and Ivy's hand trembled. "Nicholas. I'm hungry. I'm tired. I don't give a crap about your stupid ass. My partner is in deep shit because of you. Give it to me."
Adrenaline pulsed, hurting my head. Nick was near panic. The karaoke machine started up with something sad and melancholy. Jenks was watching us, but the rest of the bar hadn't a clue that Ivy was about ready to lose it, pushed to the edge from stress and being far from home.
"Nick," I soothed. "It'll be okay. Give it to me. I'll put it away."
Nick shifted and Ivy jerked, almost reaching for him. Licking his cracked lips, Nick said, "You'll hold it for me?"
"I'll keep it," I assured him, fumbling for the lead-lined bag and extending it. "Here."
Hollow-cheeked face frightened, he carefully placed it into the pouch. His swollen fingers started curving around it, and I pulled it to me, tightening the drawstrings. It wasn't any magical hold it had on him; it was greed.
Hand shaking, Ivy grabbed her drink and downed it to ice. I kept an eye on her while I put the statue in my bag, then put the bag on my lap. It felt heavy, like a dead thing. From the corner came Jenks singing "Ballad of the Edmund Fitzgerald." The skinny guy at the bar was watching him, having turned completely from the game recap. Jenks could sing?
"Sit," Ivy breathed, and this time Nick did, taking Jenks's spot beside me and putting Jenks's coat on the chair beside Ivy. "Where did you find that?" she muttered.
"It's mine."
I shifted in my chair, smelling our food coming. The woman didn't look at anyone as she placed the food down and left. The tension was so thick, even she could sense it. I stared at my plate. There was my fabulous burger, oozing juice, with lettuce, onions, mushrooms, cheese, and, oh God, there was bacon on it too. And I couldn't eat it because we had to argue about Nick's ugly statue first. Well, to hell with that, I thought, removing the top bun and picking the onions off.
Ivy refilled her glass from the pitcher, a growing rim of brown around her pupils. "I didn't say whose is it. I said, where did you find it?"
Nick pulled his plate closer, clearly wanting to ignore her but making the healthy decision not to. "I can't believe you brought it here," he said again, motions jerky as he rearranged his pickles. "I sent it to Rachel so it would be safe."
Ivy glared at him. "If you use smart people in your takes without telling them, don't complain when they do the unexpected and ruin your plans."
"I thought she was dead," Nick protested. "I never expected anyone to come help me."
I ate one of Jenks's fries. There wasn't any ketchup on the table, but asking for so
me would get us thrown out. Humans blamed the Turn on tomatoes, but they were the ones who had done the genetic tinkering. "And why are they willing to pack up to get ahold of it?" I asked.
Nick looked ill. "I don't have to tell you anything."
My lips parted in disbelief, and I turned to Ivy. "He's still running his scam."
"I'm not." His eyes were wide in an innocence that couldn't reach me anymore. "But the Weres can't have it. Don't you know what it is?"
His last words were a hushed whisper, and Ivy glanced past me to the door as three underdressed, giggling women pranced in. Immediately Becky started in with a high-pitched chatter, her eyes tracking to Jenks. I think she had called them about fresh meat.
"I know what it is," Ivy said, dismissing the women. "Where did you find it?"
One of the guys at the bar was humming. While we sat hunched over our food and argued, Jenks had some guy at the bar singing about a tanker that had sunk forty-some years ago. Shaking my head in wonder, I returned my attention to Nick. "We're waiting," I said, then wrangled my burger to my mouth. My eyes closed as I bit into it. Sweet bliss, it was good.
His eyes stressed, Nick picked up one of his burgers, leaning his elbows on the table. "Rachel, you saw how there were three packs on that island, didn't you? All working together?"
I scrambled for a napkin. "It was freaking weird," I said around my full mouth. "You should have seen how fast their alpha Wered. And they were nasty too. Like alphas without the restraint. Cocky little bastards…" My words trailed off as I took another bite.
"That's what it does," Nick said, and Ivy swore under her breath. "I found it in Detroit."
"Then it's the focus?" she whispered, and I waved a hand for their attention, fry weaving between the two of them, but they weren't listening to me. "That thing can't be the focus," Ivy added. "It was destroyed five millennia ago. We don't even know if it even really existed. And if it did, it sure as hell wouldn't be in Detroit."
"That's where I found it," Nick said, then took a bite. A small moan came from him. "You can't destroy something that powerful," he mumbled. "Not with rocks and sticks. And not with magic." He swallowed. "Maybe with a car crusher, but they didn't have them back then."
"What is it?" I insisted, only marginally aware of the flirting going on across the room between the stanzas of men dying on the waves. Get a clue, Jenks.
Ivy pushed her untouched plate with her burger away. "It's trouble," she said. "I was going to make him give it to the Weres, but now—"
"Damn it!" I shouted, and the three women ogling Jenks giggled and jiggled—in that order. I lowered my voice. "Someone tell me what I have sitting on my lap before I explode."
"You're the professor," Ivy said bitingly to Nick, taking a fry from Jenks's plate. "You tell her."
Nick washed a bite of his first burger down and hesitated. "Vamps can either be born or bitten, but the only way to become a Were is to be born one."
"Duh," I said. "Witches are like that too, along with most of Inderland."
"Well…" Nick paused, his eyes flicking everywhere. "…the Were holding that thing can make a Were by a bite."
I chewed and swallowed. "And they want to kill you for that?"
Ivy brought her head up. "Think about it, Rachel," she cajoled. "Right now, vampires are at the top of the food chain."
I made a telling face at her as I took another bite, wrangling a piece of bacon.
"What I mean is we have more political power than any other Inderlander species," she amended. "Because of how we're structured, everyone looks to someone else, the top vampires owing so many favors that they're as effective as a political house member. It's a tight web, but we generally get what we want. Humans would get itchy with their trigger finger except that our numbers are held static by only the undead being able to infect a human with enough virus to make it even possible to Turn them."
I stole another of Jenks's fries, wishing I had ketchup.
"Weres, though," Nick said, "don't have political power as a group because they won't look to any but their pack leader. And their numbers can't increase any faster than their birthrate." Leaning forward, Nick tapped the table with a swollen finger, his entire mien changing as he became the instructor.
"The focus makes it possible for the number of Weres to increase very quickly. And the multiple packing you saw on the island is nothing to what will happen when it gets out that the focus is intact. Everyone will want a part of it, merging their pack into the one that holds it. You saw what they were like. Can you imagine what would happen if a vampire ran into a pack of Weres acting like that?"
Jenks's half-eaten fry dangled from my fingers, forgotten. Slowly it was starting to sink in, and it didn't look good. The problem wasn't that the focus would allow Weres to pack up. The problem was that the focus would keep them packed up. Worried, I glanced at Ivy. Seeing me understand, she nodded.
The island Weres had been together for days, maybe weeks, and that had been with only the promise of the focus. If they had it, the round would be permanent. I thought back to the ring of Weres surrounding me on the island, the three packs united under one Were holding the strength of six alphas. Their cocky, savage attitude had been shocking. Walter had not only drawn his dominance from them, but also channeled it back into every member without the tempering calm and moral strength that all alphas had. That wasn't even bringing up how fast they could Were if they muted each other's pain. Add to that their new aggressiveness and a resistance to pain?
I set Jenks's fry down, no longer hungry. Weres were fairly submissive in Inderland society, the alphas the only ones having enough personal power to challenge the vampires' political structure. Remove that submissive posture, and the two species were going to start clashing. A lot. That's probably why the vamps had hidden the focus in the first place.
Crap, if the vampires knew about it, they would be after me too. "This isn't good," I said, feeling ill.
Making a puff, Ivy leaned back. "You think?"
From across the bar, Jenks finished his song, immediately falling into a sleazy version of "American Woman," gyrating his hips and making the three women and one of the truck drivers cheer and whistle. Jax was above him, making sparkles. I wondered if anyone had any inkling the world was changing, starting right here in this little bar.
Wiping my fingers clean, I reached for the bag on my lap. "It can shift the balance of Inderland power," I said, and Ivy nodded, the tips of her hair swinging.
"With the explosive destruction of dropping a tiger into a dog show," she said dryly. "It's believed that Weres used to have a political structure very similar to that of the vampires. Better, since Weres never betrayed another as vampires are known to do for blood. Their hierarchy revolved around who held the focus, and eliminating it shattered the Weres' social structure, politically castrating them and leaving them squabbling in small packs."
Nick started on his second burger. "They were going to forcibly convert humanity, according to the demon texts," he said, taking off the top bun to eat it like an open-faced sandwich. "Those who wouldn't voluntarily become a Were were killed. Entire families whelped or murdered in the name of Were conquest over vampires. They would have had a good chance of succeeding but the witches crossed from the ever-after about that time and sided with the humans and vampires. Using witch magic, we beat them back."
Nervous, I slipped my flip-flop off and on to make a popping sound. I wondered what he had given a demon for learning this. I'd never heard it before, but Ivy had, so maybe I just hadn't taken the right class. I couldn't help thinking that perhaps witches were really at the top of the food chain, our independent ways and lack of political structure aside. Every earth spell on the market, whether used by human, vampire, or Were, was made by a witch. Without us, their little political wars would be fought with sticks, stones, and nasty words.
"The focus was destroyed," Ivy said, her voice low and her eyes thick with worry.
Nick shook his head.
Gulping down a swig of soda, he said, "It's demon made, and only a demon can destroy it. It has been passed from vampire to ranking vampire for generations."
"Until you sold a piece of your soul for it," I whispered, and Nick went white. Stupid-ass human, I thought, then hid my own wrist.
Jenks finished his song amid cheers and friendly shouts. He bowed and blew kisses, stepping off the stage and making his light-footed way to us. A camera flashed, and I wished I had remembered mine. Jax flitted over the ladies at the bar, charming them thoroughly and helping his dad avoid them. The mood of the bar had shifted dramatically thanks to Jenks; now even the looks our way from the truckers had a touch of daring voyeurism.
"Food's here?" Jenks said, handing me my wallet before dropping down and grappling with the first of his burgers with the enthusiasm of a starving adolescent. Jax stayed with the women, distracting everyone and staying safely out of the adult conversation. "What'd I miss?" Jenks added, taking a bite.
I sucked at my teeth and gave Ivy a wry look. "Nick swiped a Were artifact that can tip the balance of Inderland power and start a vampire-Were war," I said, putting my wallet away next to the Were statue. I needed to call David and get his take on this. On second thought, maybe I shouldn't.
Jenks froze, his cheeks bulging with food. He met everyone's eyes to figure out if we were joking, but it wasn't until Nick nodded that he remembered to swallow. "Holy crap," he said.
"That's about it." I sighed. "What are we going to do with it? We can't give it to them."
Nick picked at his fries. "I'm the one who started this. I'll take it and disappear."
In a smooth motion of grace, Ivy reclined in her chair. She looked calm and possessed, but I could tell by her fingers searching for her missing crucifix that she wasn't. "It's not that simple now, professor. They know who Rachel is. Jenks they might give up on, but by saving your ass, Rachel put her own on the line. She can't go back to Cincinnati as if it never happened. They will follow her through hell for that thing." Putting the flat of one arm on the table, she leaned forward, her face threatening. "They will hurt her just like they hurt you to get it, and I'm not going to let that happen, you dumb little shit."
