True Colors (The Demon's Apprentice Book 6)

by Ben Reeder

  “I’m so in love with you,” I said. My right hand trailed from her shoulder down her side.

  “I never get tired of hearing you say that,” she whispered, her eyes bright. “And I never get tired of saying I love you.” She paused for a second, looked to one side, then back to me. “If I wasn’t a werewolf, would you still love me?”

  “If you what?” I sputtered.

  “If I was just a normal girl,” she said. She came up to her knees and looked down at me. “Would you still be in love with me?”

  “As long as you’re still you, yeah. Why? Is there a cure for lycanthropy I don’t know about or something?” I asked.

  “No, but,” she let the sentence trail off. “I learned how to do something...something that will make it easier for us when we...when we…”

  “Make love?” I offered.

  Her smile got bigger and she nodded. “Yeah, Sinbad taught me to….well, it’s easier to just show you. But…I just….maybe I won’t be as pretty.”

  “I’ve seen you wolf out, baby,” I said. “And you’re still beautiful.”

  “Okay.” She took a deep breath, and for a second, she seemed to deflate a little. Then, she looked back at me, and I could see what she had been afraid of. Her features had changed slightly. Her freckles were more pronounced, her nose was a little broader, and her whole body was a little softer and rounder in some places. Her hair was turning a darker shade of red, as well. Suddenly, I heard Junkyard growl, and something moved in the woods.

  In an instant, I was on my feet, accessing a folded matrix I’d stored a bunch of energy in. Junkyard was at my side, head low, ready for a fight. A black wolf stepped out of the woods, one I recognized, except the woman who should have been that wolf was crouched beside me.

  “Shade?” I said.

  “It’s okay, baby,” she said. “This is what Sinbad taught me. I can let my wolf out for a little while, let her run free. But it makes me...like this.” She gestured at herself.

  “Like what?” I said. The differences were there, but my heart refused to see them. She was still the same girl I loved, and the slight differences in her looks didn’t change that she was a goddess to me. “Shade, you’re still beautiful. You’re still you. You’re still the one I’d stand in front of a horde of demons for.”

  “I bet you say that to all the girls,” she said. Her cheeks flushed pink when she smiled at me. Junkyard leaned against me for a moment, making me look down at him. His nose came up, then dropped toward the massive black wolf trotting toward us. I knelt and let Shade’s wolf lick my face while I ran my hands through the fur behind her ears.

  “She likes you,” Shade said. “But that was never a question.” Her wolf laid a paw on my shoulder and rubbed its face against mine then took a step back. Junkyard walked up to her with his nose in the air, sniffing at her. They traded looks, then bounded off into the brush, leaving Shade and me alone again.

  “So, when she’s running free, are you still as strong and stuff?” I asked.

  “No, that’s the trade off,” she said. “I’m pretty much normal while we’re separated. So, I don’t have to worry about losing control, either.” She tilted her head to one side, letting her hair fall away from her neck and shoulder. Pale white scar tissue stood out against already fair skin in a double row of puckered wounds.

  “Is that where he…?” I didn’t quite ask. My hand reached out, but I stopped a few inches away from the bite marks, knowing what this wound was: the place where Dominic King had bitten Shade to turn her.

  “Yes,” she said, taking my hand and guiding it to the scar. “You’re the only person who’s seen it since it happened. It faded after the first full moon. He visited me the night they started to fade, said he wanted to see his mark on me. He told me it meant I was always his.” Her voice was soft, and her eyes were downcast. Telling me this was costing her, I could tell. I leaned in and kissed the marks on her skin, carefully remembering where they were.

  “Dulka told me the same thing when he put his mark on me,” I whispered after I had kissed my way around the bite mark.I took her hand and laid it on the one smooth spot on my left shoulder.

  “It’s gone.” Her hand caressed the smooth patch of skin, then her lips graced it with a warm kiss.

  “He left me plenty of others. That was the only spot he didn’t touch.”

  Shade took a slow, deep breath and her eyes took on the heavy lidded look I knew meant she was suddenly aroused. “I want it,” she said, her voice rough again. “And I want you to have mine. Take me from him.” She tilted her head again, exposing the bite marks.

  “Shade, I…” I tried to protest, but the thought was too appealing. My whole body was reacting to the thought of biting her there, of claiming her as mine so deeply.

  “I’m giving this to you, Chance. He took it from me. Please, help me take it back.” Her eyes welled up, and I couldn’t resist any longer. Growling, I leaned forward and took her flesh between my teeth. “Please,” she whispered, and I bit down. Her cry rang through the trees, then I felt her teeth on my skin. The familiar sensation of skin tearing was the sweetest pain I’d ever known, and I tasted blood.

  “Mine,” I said, my own voice rumbling. Neither of us said anything else while we made love again, but the whole forest heard it when we finished. Sweaty and exhausted, we laid side by side on the blanket, warmed by the sunlight through the leaves, breeze blowing soft on our skin. After a few moments, I rolled to my side and put an arm across her stomach, my lips against her shoulder for a moment. Blood from my bite trickled down her pale skin.

  Shade turned her head and smiled at me, her eyes beautiful and bright. “Yes, I am,” she whispered.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Yours,” she said. She grabbed my arm and turned so her back was against me, then put my hand over her breast. The scent of her hair filled my senses, and I kissed the back of her head, then put my lips to the bloody ring of the bite I had left on her shoulder. Warmth touched the arm that her head was laying on. I knew the feel of tears on my skin too well to miss it.

  “Are you okay?” I kissed the bite marks again. “I didn’t...did I?” I wasn’t even sure what I was asking.

  “No, I’m...okay. For the first time in a long time...I’m okay.” She snuggled up closer and wrapped her arms around mine. “I feel safe. Like this, with you holding me. I guess I’m crying because I don’t know what else to do.” I couldn’t do anything but wrap my arms around her, hold her tight and savor the moment.

  Laying there, holding Shade in my arms, made me think of a story Dulka had told me once, about a human that the Devil gave a pocket watch to as part of a deal. According to the story, all the man had to do was unwind the pocket watch by turning the knob backward three times, and time would stop for him; he would live the moment he was in forever. In the story, the man never used the watch, but for me, it had become a sort of benchmark. If I had the Devil’s timepiece, when would I unwind it? What moment might be that perfect? This was the first time I could think of that felt that good, that I would be willing to live in it forever. But even if I couldn’t actually do that, I could hang on to it, just like I was holding Shade.

  “This is a perfect moment,” I said. “If I could, I’d make it last forever.”

  “I wish you could,” she said.

  “Me, too. But I might be able to do the next best thing.” I ran my fingers through her hair, coming away with a few loose strands, then did the same thing with mine. With a quick twist, I wrapped the strands together and pulled them into a simple overhand knot. “Memoria mea memoria vestra, nostras semper insertas semper. Magis memoriam hoc locorum temporumque semper et ubique.” The magick coursed through my limbs, down my fingers and into the strands of our hair. The twin strands glowed for a moment, then disappeared in a cloud of golden motes.

  “What did you just do?” Shade asked. “What did that mean?”

  “Roughly, I said ‘Memory mine, memory yours, always intertwined,
always ours. More than memory, make this time and place always and everywhere.’ I think. My Latin has never been great. The spell, though? You can relive this moment any time you want, just by thinking about it. And if we’re together, or if we’re remembering the moment at the same time, we’ll both be here, together.”

  “So, in a hundred years, we can both relive this moment, and it’ll be just like this?” she asked.

  “Yep,” I said. “You’ll still look as hot as you do now.”

  “In a hundred years, I’ll still look this good anyway,” she said. “You, on the other hand, might be all gray haired and distinguished looking. Like a grownup wizard and everything.”

  “If I survi-” I started to say, but Shade’s hand was over my mouth. Before I could start to protest, she was straddling me, her eyes streaming and her face inches from mine. Her hand was still covering my mouth, her body shaking.

  “Don’t you dare say that, Chance Fortunato,” she said, her voice as unsteady as her body. “Don’t you even think it. I couldn’t bear it if something happened to you, so don’t go making me think about it.”

  “Shade, I’m sorry,” I said when she pulled her hand away from my mouth. She ran her hand over her eyes, looking down at me, suddenly her usual, perfect self. “I wasn’t thinking.”

  “Yes, you were,” she said. “I’m the one who should be apologizing. After what happened at prom...I really thought I was going to die.” She laid down on top of me, her hair making a curtain on either side of my face. “And I remember thinking, when you picked me up, that if I died in your arms, well that wouldn’t be so bad. Ever since then, it’s really hit me hard, how many times I’ve come close to losing you. When you fought King, going up against Etienne, facing the Council because of that, then when Dulka almost got you back. And Boston.” She closed her eyes and shuddered. “Those two months when you were at Franklin were the longest months of my life.”

  “They weren’t easy for me, either,” I said.

  “Oh, God, I know,” she said. “And you lost a good friend. I just...call me selfish, but I don’t even want to think about losing you. Especially not now.”

  “Now that you know what an amazing lover I am?” I asked, cupping her face in my hands and pulling her down to kiss me.

  “Well, you’ve got potential,” she said. Suddenly, she sat up straight, her head moving.

  “What is it, baby?” I asked. She was on her feet in a heartbeat, and when she turned toward me, her eyes were yellow.

  “I hear something,” she growled. I flipped my feet back over my head and rolled to stand, facing behind her. With a breath, I opened my Third Eye, letting my mystic senses kick in. Almost immediately, I saw what might have Shade alarmed.

  Standing at the edge of the clearing was a human shaped figure. But even with my Sight, I couldn’t get a clear read on it. It was like a person shaped hole in reality, a dark spot where light never went. I tapped Shade on the shoulder and pointed, but by the time she turned, it was gone. But it hadn’t left without a trace. In its wake, it had left a powerful imprint.

  “What is it baby?” Shade asked as I walked to the place where the figure had been.

  She turned in a slow circle, head bowed a little. “I can’t make sense of it,” she said. “Getting my senses back all at once sort of overloads them for a few seconds. Shit!” Her head came up. “That’s my phone.” She took off toward the trail, leaving me to follow. I looked to the spot where the figure had been. It felt like a powerful spirit had been there, but I didn’t get any of the creepy vibes I would if a demon or some other entity had been there. And if it wasn’t an outright threat, it took a distant second place to whatever was important enough for someone to reach out to Shade on her dark phone, the separate phone she maintained was only known to her pack, Wanda, Lucas and me. If that phone was ringing, it was more important than whatever random weirdness New Essex might be up to. I just wasn’t as comfortable running around naked in the woods as Shade was. I grabbed my pants and practically jumped into them, then grabbed my boots and shirt before I followed her down the trail.

  When I made it up to where we were parked, she was leaning over, her hands on the seat of her bike. The phone was still in her hand, and her shoulders were shaking. The second I stepped off the trail, she turned and looked at me, her eyes blazing amber.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “Someone killed one of my pack. Tyler’s dead.”

  Chapter 2

  ~ Justice may be blind, but she isn’t stupid. ~

  Charles Donovan, lawyer

  For once, Junkyard wasn’t eager to get out and pee on something. Maybe he sensed the way Shade and I felt. Maybe he could smell it when death was on the wind. When I got out of the car, he stayed put, laying his head on the door instead, and looking at the scene with puppy-dog eyes. Shade waited for me at the door to the old camp lodge, talking with Galen, Tyler’s best friend. His eyes were red and his expression was one of pure grief. Shade had one hand on his shoulder, her own voice soft and reassuring as I came close enough to hear.

  “It’s just that...I talked to him yesterday,” Galen said. “We were going to go hang out at the lake today. But when I got here, I could smell it. I knew he was dead.”

  “Did you go inside?” Shade asked. “Did you touch anything?”

  Galen shook his head. “No, I just opened the door and saw…” He closed his eyes and looked down, fresh tears sliding down his cheeks. “All I could think to do was call you.”

  “You did the right thing, Jester,” Shade said, calling him by his pack name. “You did exactly the right thing.” She pulled Galen to her, then looked to me and nodded. Taking care of her pack members was her job. Taking care of the details was mine. I took a few steps away, pulled out my dark phone and hit the speed dial for Lucas.

  “Hey,” he said as soon as he answered. “Dr. C’s not happy with you, dude.”

  “He can wait,” I said. “This is more important. I need you to get ahold of Detective Collins.”

  “Collins?” Lucas said, his voice rising a notch. “What happened?”

  “Nothing good,” I said. I was tempted to end the call there, but Lucas deserved better than that. “Sorry. Someone killed Tyler. I gotta go. I need to call Sinbad next.”

  “I’m on it,” Lucas said. “I’ll make sure Dr. C knows, too.” He ended the call, and I hit the speed dial for Sinbad.

  “What?” he answered after a few rings.

  “Whisper’s dead,” I said.

  “What?” he repeated, this time sounding less surly and more surprised.

  “Someone killed him at the lodge. Shade and I just got here. I’ve already called in help to deal with this. But we thought you should know, too.”

  “I’ll be out there in an hour.”

  “She can handle this,” I told him. “We’ve already got this under control. She has this under control. She doesn’t need you coming out here and taking over or tearing her a new one on top of everything else.”

  “I’ll be sure not to do that,” he said, his tone a little lighter. “But I’m still coming out there.” The phone clicked when he hung up. I slid the phone back into my pocket, shaking my head while I walked back toward Shade and Jester.

  “I heard,” she said when I got closer. “I want to take a look before they get here.”

  “You know the drill,” I said. Jester turned away, and she opened the main door to the lodge.

  Tyler was laid out on an old table from the dining hall that was off the lodge. Two of the legs had been broken so that it was at an angle. His head was at the lower end, his arms were spread out to his side, and his right leg had been bent so that his foot was next to his left knee. One eye stared at us, the gaping eye socket of his left eye bloody, and slashes all over his body. But most disturbing was the gaping hole in his chest. Beside me, Shade took a slow, unsteady breath and put her hand to her own chest. My own brain replayed the memory of a demon running a claw through her a few mont
hs back. It was just one of a hundred nightmares that played in my head every night, but it was one we shared. I blinked, etching the image in my memory, then I looked around the room, blinking every time I saw a detail I wanted to remember.

  Blood splattered the walls, straight lines and arcs of brown dots or streaks, and smears of it were on the floor, the furniture as well. The rest of the room was trashed, the TV and game system smashed into little pieces, most of the furniture either splintered or slashed to reveal foam stuffing. Whatever happened here had been brutal, and it hadn’t been quick.

  “Can you see anything I can’t?” Shade asked.

  “Haven’t tried yet,” I said. I took a cleansing breath, let it out, then let my eyes unfocus a little to open my Third Eye, the source of my mystic senses. Violent death left powerful impressions on the world around it, and this time was no different. Dark red spots marked where blows had landed, with a brighter shade that followed Tyler’s movement around the room, his fear getting stronger and stronger all the way. The trail of bright red ended in a dark gray patch. I blinked for a moment, not seeing the faint trail leading from the dark gray area to where his body was. Most times, the aura of death would linger on the body and follow it around. But not here. The other thing I didn’t see was the imprint of the other person’s aura. Usually, a killer left just as strong of an impression as the victim, since killing someone violently normally involved equally violent emotions. But whoever it was had somehow masked themselves. I blinked, then turned to Shade.

  “I got nothin’,” I said. “You smell anything?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Another wolf. But only in the room. It’s as if they simply vanished.”

  “And I’m not seeing any signs of a teleport or any other magick. This is all kinds of messed up.”

  “Poor Tyler,” Shade whispered. “Why would anyone want to hurt him?” I put my arm around her shoulders and stepped back, guiding her away from the door.