by Ben Reeder
“Thanks,” I said.
“Hey, it’s better than Sweetie Pie or any of the other names I call you.” She grinned at me, and I had no smartass answer for her. We were among the Roma, anyway. They were helping Galen onto a table that had been draped with sheets. He laid back, his face ashen, his shirt and pants dark with his own blood. A woman with gray streaks in her hair came to the table with a younger man behind her.
“Yoska, get a line in him, Ringer’s Lactate,” the woman said as she put on a pair of gloves.
“What are you doing to him?” Shade demanded as the woman began pushing the exposed organs back into the wounds. The younger man pulled a glass bottle from the bag, then a needle and a coil of clear tubing.
“He’s lost too much blood to heal himself,” the woman said. “And these lacerations were inflicted by another theriomorph. He’ll die before his body can heal them if I don’t help it along.” She worked at arranging things in his belly while her assistant attached the tubing to the needle and jabbed it into Galen’s arm, then attached the other end to the bottle and handed it to a Roma boy standing nearby.
“Hold this up in the air,” Yoska said, then turned to the woman. “Line’s in, Jeta.”
“Good,” Jeta said. “Hand me the stapler, then go back to Varo and see if your sister got the bleeding stopped.” Yoska nodded and handed her a long, rectangular instrument. Taking it in hand, she began working her way up the long gashes in his chest, pinching skin together and squeezing the handle. Each application left a metal staple in Galen’s skin, holding the edges of the cut together. Shade moved forward, but I put my arm in front of her. “His body will take care of the internal injuries faster if he can heal the damage to his skin first,” Jeta said, not looking up. “Staples cause less damage.”
“How do you know so much about how we heal?” Shade asked,
“It’s better for all of us if I don't tell you that,” Jeta said. “Your friend should be okay in a day or two. Werewolf claw and bite injuries don’t heal the same as normal wounds, but the internal injuries heal faster if the skin is intact. Now, I must see to Patrin’s son. But,” she paused and looked to Shade and me for a moment, her gaze dropping for a second. “I never thought to see a Were’ fighting to save one of our own. These are strange days. Strange, indeed.”
My grandfather came over to us, his brow creased and his lips pressed together. “As grateful as I am,” he said, looking between us, not meeting either of our eyes, “you should go. One night is not enough to change the hearts of the Mulani. There is still little love for your kind here. And, there are things that are not for the eyes of…” He paused, looking a little uncomfortable.
“Gadje?” I supplied.
“Outsiders,” he said.
“If one of yours has been bitten, we can help him if he…” Now it was Shade’s turn to look uneasy.
“He will not turn,” grandfather said. There was a finality to his voice, and both Shade and I caught it.
“You’re going to just kill him?” Shade asked, her voice rising.
“Not if we can help it,” the olde man admitted. “He is Mulani. It is not the same for us.”
“Mom was right,” I said.
“Please, go,” he said before I could continue. “These are not things you should know.”
“Come on,” she said. “Grab Jester and bring him back to the lodge with you.” She turned and started away, then came back, her face turning red. “Please.”
“Sure thing,” I said. “I’ll meet you there.”
She leaned in and kissed me. “Thank you. I love you, baby.”
“Love you,” I said with a smile. Things were getting a little better. I scooped up Galen and carried him to the passenger side of my car. He’d stopped bleeding, but I took the sheets from the table just to be sure. I didn’t want to have to explain why there was blood on my seats. Shade led the way back to the camp, and the rest of the pack stayed close on my nose and tail until we turned down the road to the lodge. When I stopped, Shade opened the passenger door and took Galen out, carrying him inside.
She’d just laid him down on the bed in the room off the main hall when we heard the Cadillac pull up. Shade nodded toward the doors, and the rest of the pack cleared out of the room before Kain opened the door. He pushed it open hard enough to make it slam against the wall and stormed in.
“What in the Hell were you thinking?” he yelled.
“When?” Shade asked before I could say anything. “When I defended the Romani, when I let them save Jester’s life, or when I didn’t kiss your ass hard enough?” I smiled and leaned back against the wall, content to watch Shade butt heads with him.
“And when you let a low ranking member of your pack defy you in front of the rest of the pack!” he bellowed.
“Chance is still my gothi, and I still trust his judgment,” Shade said. “Pack ranking didn’t suddenly make him stupid or something.”
“He has no business advising a higher ranking member,” Kain said, his voice still loud. “The Clans don’t have advisers, and you shouldn’t be listening to anyone but me.”
“News flash, Kain,” Shade said. “We’re not in Boston, my pack is not a Clan pack, and I run it the way I see fit. I don’t answer to you.” Kain came forward and loomed over her.
“You run this pack at Sinbad’s discretion, and now that he’s out of the...out of action, I’m the ranking alpha in the area, which means you answer to me now. You need to teach this gamma wolf a lesson in respecting his betters.”
“He was right, Kain,” Shade said. “He saved Jester’s life, and who knows how many others? So no, I’m not going to punish him for doing the right thing.”
“The right thing is respecting his alpha and keeping his damn mouth shut unless he’s told to speak.”
“Not in my pack,” Shade said, her hands on her hips. “I don’t give a damn how they do it in Boston, I need someone around me who isn’t going to kiss my ass if they don’t agree with me. That’s what my gothi does.”
“If you won’t maintain any discipline in this pack, then I will.” He turned and backhanded me so fast all I saw was a blur.
I was aware of the last part of the skid across the parking lot, then Kain was walking through the doors toward me. Shade jumped out the ragged frame of the window he’d knocked me through and ran in front of him.
“Damn it Kain, leave him alone!” she yelled at him.
“Then learn to run your pack the right way, so I don’t have to keep your dogs in line.” He stopped a few feet from me and looked down at me while I struggled to get to my feet. “You give her advice if she asks for it,” he said. “Otherwise, shut the hell up. You are nothing but a bottom-ranked gamma wolf. Don’t forget it in my presence again. Am I understood?” His will smashed into mine, and I nodded. My phone rang in my pocket, and he dismissed me with a casual flip of his hand.
“What?” I asked, not even looking at the ID on the phone. My eyes never left Kain while he got in his car and drove off.
“Hey to you, too,” Lucas’s voice came over the earpiece. “Surly much?”
“What is it?”
“We got the results back, and Wanda’s got a pretty decent idea of what happened when Tyler was killed. We’re at Dr. C’s place right now.”
“I’ll tell Shade,” I said, then hung up. The last part was for Lucas’s benefit. Shade was already headed my way. “You heard?”
She nodded and straddled her bike. “See you there, baby,” she said. The bike buzzed to life, and she was leaning forward to keep the Ninja’s front tire on the ground. I got behind the wheel and pulled out a couple of minutes behind her, my eyes going to the passenger seat where Junkyard usually sat. My heart had a little pang as I realized I missed him, then my eyes went back to the road, and I was slamming on the brakes. The car skidded to a stop, the front end sliding to the right, narrowly missing Kain.
“Damn it!” I yelled. “What the hell, man?” I opened the door to confront Kain
, and his fist hit me in the chest. I went flying backward…again. This shit was getting old.
“You never raise your voice to me!” he yelled. His fist came at me again, but this time I was ready and blocked the punch. “And you never,” he kicked me, “dare raise your hand against me.”
“Even when you’re trying to hit me?” I asked, my voice rough as I felt something broken shift in my chest.
“Especially not then,” he said. “It’s my right.”
“Even when you’re wrong?” I popped off, unable to resist the play on his words.
“I’m never wrong.” He threw a haymaker that I dodged under, then a kick I managed to jump away from. Both moves left him wide open, but I only realized the attack was there after the opening was gone.
“Until you open your mouth.”
“Be still, damn it!” The words hit my brain hard, and I stopped moving. His fist came toward my face, and I only thought of dodging after it was too late. I saw white and then stars clouded my vision for a moment, then my ribs took a shot from his boot. I flew through the brush until I hit a tree, and I felt my body bend the wrong way before I bounced off the trunk and landed on my already broken ribs. The wind rushed out of my lungs like it was late for dinner with a beautiful woman, and he was on my again, his fist pounding into my face a dozen times.
“Shade shouldn’t be taking advice from you, and if you know what’s good for her, you shouldn’t be offering it. You’re just a gamma wolf, not even worth her attention. You shouldn’t even be talking to her, much less sleeping with her!” He hit me again, holding me up by the collar of my shirt.
“She chose me,” I moaned through split and bloodied lips.
“She doesn’t know what she needs,” he slapped me hard enough that I saw new constellations in my vision. “She doesn’t need some pathetic, sniveling weakling like you. She needs an alpha. She should be with me, damn it…someone like me, a real alpha.” He dropped me, and I struggled to my knees.
“You?” I asked. “Isn’t she a little underaged for you?”
“Now that’s weak,” he laughed. “I said someone like me, not that she should be with me. You’re making shit up, kid.”
“I know what I heard,” I said, the words coming out as a growl.
“And I know what I said. Making shit up isn’t going to change the truth. This is exactly what I’m talking about. You’re not only weak, you’re a liar.” He drew back his fist again, and I did the only thing I could think of:
I changed. Fast. The world went pale and bright, my jaw stretched forward and my arms and legs drew up close and went furry. Kain’s fist knocked a huge chunk of the tree trunk behind me, and my four-legged form was tearing up the turf with each step. Kain roared behind me, then I heard him take off in pursuit, snarling only a few feet behind me, still running on two legs instead of four. Trees whipped past like scenery in an anime action segment, but it never felt like I was in danger of running into things. My pace went from a leg-churning panic sprint to a longer stepped run, and my feet seemed to know the way to where I was going, even if my brain didn’t.
Then I heard it. The sound of my name, only it wasn’t my name. Or was it? Maybe I had never heard it spoken so perfectly. All I knew for sure was that I was being called. I turned toward that call, and it became a song. The wolf in me understood the notes, the rhythm, the lyrics. And in that song was my path. My stride became even longer, and I heard Kain cursing behind me. I wove my way between trees, down a gully and up the other side, my feet finding the easy path, certain Kain couldn’t take the same route without changing. Brushed snapped behind me as he crashed through it, using brute strength to try to keep up with me. I slipped between the trees he muscled aside behind me, then found myself with the scent of water ahead. A stream…I knew this path, knew the stream meandered five times across my path to safety. I ran across the log that spanned the first twist, and heard it slide down the bank behind me, dislodged by my passing. I clambered down the next bank and followed the streambed, my paws finding the submerged rocks and shallow spot for about fifty yards, then broke right, headed southwest, where I knew there was another point where this stream branched off. I ran down the embankment, across on the three rocks that rested along the middle. Then up the rotted tree limb that broke beneath my weight, dumping the thick trunk into the creek when I jumped off of it to land on the far bank. Kain would have to run down and back up or leap across the watery route. The crashing and cursing was gradually getting further and further behind me, and I could sense the place I was going.
With every step, it came to me that I knew these woods, as long as that song was still in my head. As long as that voice was singing the path to me, I not only knew the land, but the easiest path to take. My lungs were burning, my tongue was dry and my legs felt like lead. But Kain had worked harder, and I could hear the effort in his breathing, hear how his footfalls were getting a little slower. I veered right, slipping into and through a stand of pine saplings, the needles catching on my fur but not slowing me down, then under the low branches of a pine tree. I was almost there.
I saw her when I broke from the stand of pines, into an open field. Twin cairns of rocks stood on either side of me, and the dark woman was visible in the shade of an oak tree on the other side. It was the woman from the park, and I knew, without knowing how, that it had been her voice, her call that I’d been following here. With a final effort, I broke into one last, desperate sprint across the meadow, toward the scent of humans. Halfway across the clover covered turf, I saw a trio of humans emerge from the other side and my pace faltered for a moment, until I saw the face of the largest one in the middle.
Roland Dandry looked like an oversized hobbit. Plump, his curly, brown hair a little unruly, his round, pleasant face never far from a smile. Sweat beaded his high forehead and darkened the armpits and neck of his light green shirt. Beside him were two other familiar figures. Lucinda and Riker, former clients of mine, and now former victims of Dulka’s. As I got closer, Dandry pulled a thick, uncarved wand from his pocket and pointed it my way. Lucinda reached for an amulet that hung around her neck, and Riker brought his hands up, glowing rings on his fists. Their eyes were on me, then went to Kain when he burst from the trees behind me. In my head, I pushed back at the wolf, and over three steps, went back to human, pushing up with my hands and staggering forward until I collapsed at Dandry’s feet.
“Help me,” I gasped, looking up at him, my arms and legs heavy, breath coming in gasps.
“With pleasure,” Dandry said, his normally pleasant expression settling into a determined frown as he turned his attention to Kain. “That will be quite far enough, sir.”
“This is no business of yours, mage,” Kain said. “The boy is part of my pack. He answers to me.”
“Your authority ended two hundred yards behind you,” Dandry said, and the tip of his wand started to glow. “You’re standing in my hearthstead. And, Chance is a friend. So I would turn around and leave if I were you.”
“You’re not me,” Kain said, and took another step forward.
“That’s a good thing.” Dandry’s frown deepened a little, and he moved his wand a little, like he was tapping something with it. The air got thick, then I heard the thump of something hitting flesh. Kain flew back toward the far side of the field, and Dandry got a prim little smile on his face.
“Being you isn’t very much fun right now,” the plump little mage said. “Riker, help Chance up. Lucy, a shield, please.” Lucinda stepped up, her hair grown out into its natural brown, one side of her head shaved, her eyes rimmed with dark makeup. She’d traded her fetish-Barbie wardrobe for jeans and a t-shirt, and she made it look fierce by slashing the bottom half and the sleeves.
“Now we’re talking,” she said, her voice a little deeper than I remembered, a little more sultry for it. Riker pulled me to my feet and draped an arm around his shoulder, hoisting me up like I weighed next to nothing. He’d always been strong, but his tendency had been for
physical augmentations. But the callouses on his hands and the bulk he carried said this was all the product of good old fashioned hard work. Kain’s roar reached us, and Lucinda stepped in front of Dandry, hands up and moving in an intricate pattern. I watched Kain charge toward us, still in human form. Lucinda grinned as she brought her hands together, index and middle fingers on each hand held upright, thumbs touching, palms forward. With a mischievous chuckle, she raised her hands a little and titled them forward. Seconds later, Kain hit an invisible barrier face first. His legs kept moving forward, though, so his feet went out from under him and he landed on his shoulders. Then Lucinda laid her hands flat and brought them down. Dust rose around his body, and I heard the whump of something big hitting the ground on top of Kain.
“That, sir, was a rudimentary shield spell,” Dandry said as he walked forward a few steps. He laid a hand on Lucinda’s shoulder and smiled at her as he passed. Her face lit up at the silent gesture, then she turned her full attention back to Kain. “Cast by a first year apprentice with a bad attitude and a penchant for illusion. I’d bet it feels more like she dropped an elephant on your chest, though. When a mage says that you’re standing on his or her hearthstead, it means something. We’re going to let you up, and give you another opportunity to leave under your own power. And this time, you really should walk away.” He gestured to Lucinda, and she relaxed her hands. Grass and flowers straightened when the force pushing them down disappeared, and Kain sat up.
“We're not done, Fortunato,” the alpha hissed, and I felt a chill of fear in the pit of my stomach. “And you,” he pointed to Dandry, “The Conclave will hear about your insolence.”
“Oh, please do contact the Conclave,” Dandry said, his face breaking into a smile. “I’m sure they’ll file your complaint right next to mine. You’re still standing on my hearthstead, sir. After I asked you to leave twice. Once more, and I’ll be justified in using lethal force. So, please, leave.”
Kain turned and started walking toward the line of stone cairns that marked the edge of Dandry’s hearthstead, taking his time. “Come on,” he muttered under his breath. “Try something, you fat little fuck.”
