Under His Skin

by Jennifer Blackstream

  He picked up her skin, as reverently as one would pick up a sleeping newborn babe. He would give Morrigan her battle, but it wouldn’t be with Ana. He would use her spell to give Ana her old life back and then he would dive into the deepest depths of the sea. There were plenty of toos in the water for him to fight. Surely the hatred he felt for those people would be enough to satisfy the bloodthirst of the goddess?

  Silently, he backed out of the room. Once her bedroom door was closed securely behind him, Brec turned and practically flew down the stairs. The Morrigan had said he didn’t have much time, most likely her way of ensuring that it was Ana he tested his battle prowess on. If he was going to circumvent that tragedy, he had to hurry.

  He turned on the lights in the kitchen, giving him enough light to see by without turning on the living room light and risking the glow creeping into Ana’s room and waking her. Holding his breath, he retrieved his knife. The feel of the weapon against his palm, the blade shining in the light, heated his blood.

  Before he realized what he was doing, he’d turned back to the stairs--back to Ana’s room. It wasn’t too late to punish her. It would be so easy . . .

  Sweat broke out on Brec’s forehead as he fought to turn to the lower level of the cabin. The thirst for vengeance was like a lover’s whisper in the dark, beckoning him to depravity. He had to hurry if he was going to do the spell and still have time to flee before Morrigan really turned her attention to him. The war goddess was not playing fair.

  He spared only a moment to locate the mortar and pestle he’d used earlier and then turned to leave the kitchen. After quickly making his way down to the circle of herbs and oils, he laid Ana’s fur on the floor. Given what he was about to do to it, he felt almost silly being so gentle, but he just couldn’t bring himself to be otherwise. This was Ana’s life he held in his hands and to treat it with anything but respect was unacceptable.

  The sight of the brilliant white fur surrounded by the harsh ashen edges twisted his gut, helping him to fight back his temper. He forced himself to imagine what it would be like, to dig his fur out of a blazing fire only to find it burnt beyond healing. Lost to him forever. Surely he could forgive Ana . . .

  Suddenly the image of the person throwing his skin into the fire wavered and changed. Now it was Ana holding his skin as she stood before a fireplace full of flames. She swung the fur toward the blaze and he lunged forward. He could almost feel her neck snapping under the strength of his fingers, her head lolling lifelessly against the floor . . .

  Biting his lip to hold back a cry, Brec shoved those images out of his mind. Morrigan was growing impatient for her fight. He had to hurry before she resorted to full out hallucinations.

  Forcing himself to concentrate, he ran his gaze over the herbs in the circle, mentally comparing it to the list of ingredients in his head. Lanolin, beeswax, almond oil, foxglove, poppy, poplar leaves, and aconite. He frowned. She didn’t have any cinquefoil. His gaze fell on a green plant with yellow flowers surrounding a brown center. A trickle of relief eased the tension in his shoulders. Henbane would work just as well.

  Gathering up the herbs and oils he needed, he put them in a pile. He wiped off the mortar and pestle with a clean cloth before adding the ingredients he needed. Working diligently for several minutes, he carefully minced up the herbs and put them all in a small clay bowl. The beeswax and lanolin added a thick gooey texture to the mixture and the sweet scent of the almond oil just about canceled out the bitter scent of the henbane. Taking a deep breath, he set the bowl to the side and turned his attention to the skin.

  Slowly, he picked up his knife, bracing himself against the bloodthirst that touching the weapon now brought him. The bone blade shone in the light and Brec’s mind whirled to another time, and other place. What if Morrigan had been right? What if he’d been meant for the battlefield?

  He’d only ever told Micah about one of his battle dreams. His brother had brushed it off as the subconscious fantasy of a younger brother wanting to be a warrior. But Brec knew now that those dreams had been more than just dreams. The nights when he’d woken up with a flush in his hands, as if the blood he’d spilled in those gory dreams had stained reality . . . they’d been shadows of a possible future.

  Brec’s head swam in heated waves as he fought off memories of those dreams. Never had he been as confused, as conflicted, as he was tonight. Bu there was one thing he was certain of--he could not leave Ana without her skin. He would use Morrigan’s spell to return her life to her and then he would take the skins she’d stolen and return them to their owners as well. No skinwalker would face another sunset without their skin--not if he could help it.

  He took a deep breath to steady his nerves and then put the razor sharp blade of his knife against Ana’s skin. A wave of nausea washed over him as he began to slice a strip from the middle. Brec gritted his teeth. All he needed was a strip, three fingers wide, of undamaged fur. It would work. It had to work.

  It was unnatural to cut up a skin. Wrong on so many levels. The pit of his stomach boiled with revulsion, instinct screaming at him to stop. Morrigan was right, this was a sacrifice. All that was missing was the blood.

  Every slice wound his nerves tighter. Sweat broke out on his forehead and he had to fight to keep his hands from trembling. He was cutting out the only part of her skin that wasn’t blackened, the only part that still looked like what it had been. If this didn’t work, she would have even less than she had before. Even less . . .

  He almost threw up when he finished. Before him, Ana’s skin lie in ruins, a perfect strip of fur amidst a pile of burnt scraps. It didn’t even look like a fur anymore.

  The room swam around him and he put a hand to the floor to steady himself. It will work, it has to work, oh Morrigan, please make it work.

  He groped for the ointment. Clutching it in a shaking hand, he began to smear it over the back of the fur, along the soft layer of skin. He whispered another prayer that it would work. When he was finished, he held up the strip of skin. He wouldn’t know if it worked until he put it on her. Could he put it on her as she slept? Could he--

  “Brec?”

  Ana’s soft voice cracked against his ears like a whip. Brec’s shoulders tensed, his hands closing around the strip of her mutilated skin in his hands. He swallowed hard, his throat dry with sudden nerves. This wasn’t how he’d wanted to show her. Not with him still kneeling amidst the ruins of the thing she held most precious.

  Slowly, Brec turned to look over his shoulder, his mind reeling as he tried to think of some way to hide the scraps of her fur while he explained what he’d done. He opened his mouth to speak just as his gaze landed on Ana.

  She stood there behind him, naked except for his fur clutched around her like a blanket.

  “You stole my skin,” he choked. “You stole my life. Without it, I couldn’t return to my home, my friends, my family.”

  “Tell me why you did it,” he whispered, a wild demand echoing in his tone. “Tell me why I shouldn’t take your skin now, the way you so readily took mine.”

  “You’ve done this to others?”

  “You think you can steal that which is most important to us and not suffer any consequences. You don’t know what it’s like to suddenly find that the thing that makes your life possible—the thing that makes your life worth living—is gone and can never be replaced. Tell me how many skins you’ve stolen? How many lives have you ruined?”

  “Listen to the lack of sympathy in her voice. She’s a monster and she has to be stopped. You can make her tell you where those skins are. You can end the others’ suffering . . . Don’t let her act fool you.”

  One memory after the other slammed into him, fanning the flames of his fury. She’d stolen his skin. Why had he forgiven her for that? Why was her own loss so important that it excused taking his skin from him? The vein in his temple throbbed, pulsing with each thud of his heartbeat. He clenched his hands into fists, glowering at the siren before him. How could he have f
allen in love with this thief? How could he have ever forgiven her?

  Ana’s eyes widened. Her hands clutched his skin, pulling it tighter around her as if for protection. The sight of her nails digging into his fur broke the thin thread of Brec’s control.

  Time seemed to slow down. Brec flowed forward, releasing Ana’s skin to fall to the floor as he dove for his own. Ana’s eyes widened even further and her jaw dropped.

  “Brec, what are you--” she gasped.

  He knew the moment her gaze landed on her skin. Mid-lunge, he saw the horror blossom on her face, the shock in her icy blue eyes. His hands closed around his skin jerking it from her body even as she threw it off in a desperate lunge for her mutilated skin.

  Brec stood there sucking in deep breaths, clutching his skin to his body. Behind him a heart clenching howl pierced the air. Tendrils of unease curled around his nerves as he slowly turned back to Ana.

  “You bastard,” Ana sobbed, falling to her knees beside the pile of scraps that had been her fur. “You’ve destroyed it. Why? Why?”

  She dropped her hand to the floor, sliding it back and forth until her fingers closed around the handle of the bone knife. Brec snarled and threw his skin behind him, out of harm’s way, as he tensed in preparation for Ana’s attack.

  “You manipulated me,” he growled.

  “I trusted you!” Ana screamed.

  She charged forward with a wail that would have shamed a banshee. The knife arced through the air, and Brec reached out to grab her arm and halt her strike. Ana jerked the blade at the last moment and he hissed in pain as the blade bit into his hand. Wetness trickled over his skin as his blood flowed from the wound. The scent of copper filled the room, infiltrating Brec’s senses. Adrenaline burned like acid through his veins and he roared.

  Before Ana could bring the knife down for a second strike, he grabbed her arm, twisting it until she shrieked in pain. The bone knife clattered to the floor and he kicked it away.

  “You don’t care about me,” Ana wailed, her eyes bright with angry tears. “You pretended to care about me so you could destroy my skin. You only wanted to punish me.”

  “And what do you care about, Ana?” Brec ground out. “You stole my skin to replace your own. You held other skins prisoner while you tried to find your cure. Who matters to you more than you? Who else matters to you at all?”

  Brec pulled her arm farther back, dragging another scream from Ana’s mouth. She didn’t care about him. She’d never cared about him. She cared only about her fur and she would destroy anyone for even the slim hope of getting it back.

  Erupting in a flurry of movement, Ana attacked him. She bit, hit, scratched, and screamed. Brec roared as her nails dragged angry red paths down his chest, her teeth biting into the flesh of his arm. Throughout it all she shrieked and sobbed, filling the air with her despair and fury.

  Brec’s head swam on a hot ocean of blood. Every burn from Ana’s nails and teeth seemed to feed his need to make her pay. He’d cared about her, had started to love her, and now he could see the truth. She cared only for her skin. Never for him.

  Throwing his weight forward, Brec tackled Ana to the floor. He grabbed her other wrist and pinned them both to the floor, using his weight to hold her body down. Her body thrust against his as she tried to throw him off, the softness of her naked curves a sharp contrast to the furious line etched into her face. The feel of her body against him sparked desire in his belly and he gritted his teeth. The fact that he still wanted her, even after all of this, only fed his anger.

  With a roar that came from the depths of his belly, Brec released her wrists and sat up. Before Ana could resume her attack, he wrapped his hands around her throat and began to squeeze.

  At first, Ana tried to scratch him, her head thrashing from side to side as tears continued to roll down her cheeks. A strange calm came over Brec as he increased the pressure on her throat, feeling her pulse throbbing against his hands. He had to be careful not to break her hyoid bone. He didn’t want to kill her, not really. She deserved to suffer, he wanted her to suffer, but he would not live the rest of his long life with her blood on his hands.

  Blood on your hands.

  An image of Morrigan leapt into Brec’s mind just as Ana’s eyelids fluttered, her eyes rolling back into her head as she lost consciousness. He could practically hear the goddess laughing, see the smug look on her face. Morrigan had gotten the fight she wanted.

  The emotion left Brec’s body in gut-wrenching rush, leaving an eerie calm in its wake. He released her throat and straightened his spine. Red imprints from his fingers decorated her neck, taunting him with what he’d just done. The sound of heavy breathing assaulted his ears, and he realized it was coming from him.

  The numbness clutched his brain, making it hard to think. He didn’t fight it, didn’t even try. He wanted to be numb right now.

  Brec slowly rose up from Ana’s body and then stepped back to stare at what he’d done. Her face was red and swollen from crying. Tears dried on her cheeks, some still dripping from her chin. The anger that had vibrated off of her only moments ago had faded with her loss of consciousness. Without it, she looked . . . frail.

  “Brec?”

  Nu’s voice drew Brec’s gaze to the ground by Ana’s head. The little pixie was checking her pulse.

  “She didn’t ask me what I was doing.”

  The pixie frowned, pulling away from Ana and fixing his stare on Brec. Apparently he’d satisfied himself that Ana was still breathing.

  “What?”

  “She stole my skin to replace her own. She was willing to trade my life for hers.” He shook his head, frowning as his sluggish brain tried to think the situation through. A hint of pain threatened to follow on the heels of his anger.

  “So you decided to hang around for a day or so, have sex with her, and then punish her?” the pixie snarled. “What kind of--”

  “She attacked me. After all we’ve been through, everything we’d started to . . . everything I’d started to feel. None of it meant anything when she saw her fur. She didn’t even ask.”

  “You say that as if you would have reacted any differently if it had been you to walk in on someone slicing up your skin.”

  The pixie wasn’t wrong. Brec’s nerves hitched as an image of his own skin, cut to ribbons, danced before his eyes. Yes, he probably would have reacted just the way Ana did. He closed his eyes and shook his head. But that didn’t change anything.

  Pain slid its claws around Brec’s heart and squeezed. He’d finally gotten what he wanted: a woman who wanted a healer, not a warrior. Now he realized what he needed: a woman who wanted him.

  He bent down and scooped Ana’s limp body into his arms.

  “What are you doing?” Nu demanded. He flew up to Ana’s shoulder. “Brec, stop. What’s wrong with you? What happened? Why did you cut up her fur?”

  Brec ignored the pixie, too tired to offer an explanation. Moving with a mechanical numbness, he carried Ana upstairs and tucked her into bed. His fingers danced over her throat with a healer’s tenderness as he used Alaunus’ gift to heal the bruising and make sure there were no serious injuries. Finally, he stepped back. With one last look, he left the room.

  “Brec, where are you going?”

  “I’m going to return the skins she stole,” Brec answered calmly. “Just as I said I would.”

  “What about Ana?”

  Brec glanced at Nu as the pixie landed on his shoulder. “I’ve done all I can for Ana. When she wakes up, give her the scrap of her fur that has the herbal ointment on it. Tell her to put it around her waist like a belt. It should give her everything she wants,” he added bitterly.

  “She wants you,” Nu insisted.

  Not bothering to argue, Brec continued to make his way to the basement. He retrieved the skins, carrying them out of the dark hole they’d been in for so long. On his way back through the living room, he picked up his own skin.

  “Brec,” Nu wailed. “You can’t lea
ve!”

  “No,” Brec corrected him quietly. “I can’t stay.”

  As he closed the door behind him, the cawing of a crow drew his attention to the railing around Ana’s porch. Brec glared at the bird, fresh anger heating his blood.

  “I hope you’re satisfied, Morrigan. I hope you’re bloody satisfied.”

  The crow tilted its head and flapped its wings. It stood there, silently staring at Brec. Waiting.

  “Fly away, Morrigan. I’ve got enough blood on my hands without your help.”

  The crow cawed again and flew away. Brec shook his head and strode off the porch, down the dock to the water. He didn’t even look back at the crow. He’d had a taste of both lives now. He glanced down at his hand, still bleeding from the cut Ana had inflicted.

  Blood on my hands.