“Ana?”
The gentle tone of the pixie’s voice only made the tears well up faster. Giving in to the urge to sniffle, Ana refused to look at Nu. Instead, she focused on getting dressed as quickly as possible so she could get the hell out of the room that reminded her so much of what she’d lost.
After dressing, she made her way down the stairs to her living room. In an effort to keep herself from thinking of Brec, she decided to concentrate on the snow that the open door had allowed the wind to blow all over her living room during the night.
She went into the kitchen and retrieved a bowl and a towel. Returning to the snow drenched living room, she began to scoop up what snow she could, drying what she couldn’t scoop up and wringing the towel out as she went. All the while she felt Nu watching her work.
Emotions she wasn’t ready to face stubbornly continued to bubble to the surface of her thoughts. Her brain traveled back in time to before she’d lost her fur. Back then, she’d thought she was happy. She was alone, but that was all right. She was independent, relying only on herself for contentment. Her gaze wandered over to the pixie, standing on the table in front of her. His blue eyes followed her every movement and she couldn’t help the question that leapt to her lips.
“Are you going to leave?”
Nu’s eyebrows met his hairline. A second later, a small smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Do you want me to stay?”
Without meaning to, she nodded. The gesture felt right, so she kept it up. “Yes. I . . . I don’t think I want to be alone.”
Nu’s gaze softened with a kind sadness. “Are you sure it’s my company that you want?”
The warmth that had started to build in her heart froze. Tears burned her eyes as she struggled to draw a deep calm breath. “I thought my skin was all I needed,” she whispered. “I thought I would be happy.”
“And now?” Nu asked softly.
The tears fell down her cheeks. “I’m not,” she admitted, a sob punctuating her sentence. She dropped the towel and covered her face with her hands as she gave in to the tears. Sobs jerked her body, coming even faster when she felt Nu land on her shoulder and begin gently stroking her hair.
“Ana, why don’t you go look for him?”
“Even if I could find him, it wouldn’t matter. He gave me the greatest gift in the entire world and I offered him nothing but violence in return.” She sighed, clearing her throat to speak through her tears. She could still see the blood dripping from his hand when she closed her eyes.
“You know, when you freed me from that cage, I said to myself ‘I’m going to make sure she’s happy before I leave her.’” He frowned. “If I’d known how difficult that was going to be, I would have said ‘I’m going to make sure she has what she needs to be happy before I leave her.’”
Ana laughed softly. “You were trying to make me happy?”
Nu nodded seriously. “It wasn’t easy either. You’re scary when you’re mad.” He shrugged. “Still, I knew that Brec would figure out a way to give you your skin back and the only way to make sure he stayed—despite your charming personality—was to give him a chance to be the big bad warrior he seems to fancy himself as. Telling him about the other skins you’d stolen gave him the perfect opportunity.” Nu frowned. “Didn’t really rise to that challenge though, did he? He’s about as scary as a rose petal.”
An image of Brec standing at the foot of her bed, knife in hand and rage burning in his eyes, sprang to Ana’s mind. “He can be scary.”
Nu shrugged. “If you say so.”
Ana tilted her head, looking at the pixie in a new light. “I had no idea you were so conniving. How do you know so much about Brec?”
The pixie rolled his eyes. “He’s the healer for his people, a real big wig. He was in Mrs. Downing’s shop all the time. If I heard him say it once I heard him say it a thousand times, he doesn’t want to be a healer he wants to be a warrior.”
“Why? Why on earth would anyone with a gift for healing want to be a warrior?”
“He thought it would be more glamorous. It didn’t help when that female he was seeing kept making passes at his warrior-brother.”
A pang of jealousy stabbed Ana in the heart. “Brec has a mate?”
“No, she left him. As you would know if you’d been listening to me properly, she wanted a warrior.”
Ana scooted over to sit with her back against the couch. Nu hopped off her shoulder to pace along the armrest.
“I think it would be wonderful to be a healer,” Ana said wistfully. “To be able to take away pain and suffering, to have people come to you for help.”
“You could be a healer,” Nu pointed out. “You’ve been trying to heal your own fur for years, surely you’ve learned something?”
His words echoed in her head and Ana turned them around, testing their weight in her mind. She had learned a lot. Mostly about burns, but she’d learned other things too. She knitted her eyebrows together in thought. And she could always learn more.
“Maybe you could convince Brec to train you,” Nu suggested excitedly, seeming to warm to the idea.
Doubt dampened Ana’s stirring excitement. “He’s only seen me at my worst. He’s seen me lie and steal, he’s seen me give up on life completely.” Her cheeks flamed with embarrassment. “He’s seen me melt into a babbling puddle of nothing.” She pulled her knees to her chest and crossed her arms over them, dropping her forehead to her arms. “What reason would he possibly have to agree to train me?”
“How about the fact that he loves you?”
Ana snorted. “He doesn’t love me. Sex isn’t love.”
“Oh, yes, he just wants you for your body,” Nu said sarcastically. “That’s why he jumped your bones the first moment he got here.”
“Yeah, I really had to twist his arm.”
Nu narrowed his eyes. “If he wanted sex he would have taken it when you so graciously offered to let him in the shower with you.”
Ana’s cheeks burned at the pixie’s bold argument and she cleared her throat. “I—”
“You don’t owe me an explanation,” Nu interrupted. “I’ve never been robbed of what made me, me. I don’t know what it’s like to be trapped in a human body, with human senses and human weaknesses.” He tilted his head. “But don’t let what you or Brec have done in the past scare you away from the future you want. Brec is a healer, at his core he wants to help people. If you ask him to train you, I don’t think he’ll say no.”
It was hard not to believe him. She wanted to believe him, wanted to run to Mrs. Downing’s and beg the nosey woman to tell her how to find Brec. Even now her traitorous mind tortured her with images of the selkie, a fantasy of his face lighting up with pleasure when she asked him to train her. She wanted to believe that all she had to do was ask, and she’d get everything she’d dreamed of.
She wanted to, but she couldn’t.
“I can’t face him like this,” she said finally. “All he’s ever seen from me is selfishness. I have to show him that I’m not that person anymore.”
She pushed herself off the floor. Nu watched her with a wary expression on his tiny face.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m going to make sure all the skinwalkers got their skins back.”
“Ana, wait. That could be dangerous. They may not be as forgiving as Brec.”
Ana smiled at the concern in the pixie’s voice. It was nice to have someone who cared.
“They won’t know me. I took their skins when they weren’t around and without their skins their senses couldn’t have been sharp enough to recognize my scent. I could walk up and shake their hands and they wouldn’t know I had anything to do with their skins’ disappearances.”
She unwound her skin from her wrist, holding it against her chest like a child as she walked to the front door. The icy wind bit the bare flesh of her face as she stepped onto her porch and closed the door behind her. Smiling into the cold, she wrapped her fur around her waist. A
rush of warmth swallowed her as warm white fur slid over her skin, encasing her in the form of a fox. Invigorated by her plan and the faint flickering hope of a bright future, she dove off the porch, and raced across the snow.
As she ran, Ana thought back over the different furs she had stolen. Guilt bit at her as she imagined the faces of her victims. She didn’t fight the guilt or try to bury it. The time for denying the consequences of her actions was past and now she was going to make amends.
The seal-skins she’d stolen wouldn’t be a problem, Brec should have been able to return those easily. The rough one would be the brown bear. An image of the big man floated in her mind’s eye, just a product of her imagination since she’d never seen him. He had been the first of her victims.
Six months ago she’d been wandering through one of the wilder parts of Alaska, a heavily forested area just north of Haines. Part of her had gone out there hoping to meet a wild animal that would put an end to her suffering. Instead, she’d found a large brown fur, tucked in the branches of a tree.
She could still remember the way her hands had trembled when she’d pulled the thick skin down from the branches, her heart nearly exploding out of her chest as she waited to see if the noise had alerted the skin’s owner. The sounds of someone coming had frightened her, allowed her to move with almost superhuman speed as she escaped back to her snowmobile with her heavy load. He’d never seen her, but she’d heard his roar of pain when he’d discovered his skin missing. That sound had haunted her sleep for weeks and had been partly to blame for her decision to stop returning the furs.
That sound echoed in her ears again, pushing her to run faster. She ran for miles, each one zipping by with a speed that seemed insane to her after being human for two years. It felt wonderful to fly over the snow, leaping over fallen logs and piles of dried up twigs, darting through trees with a grace she’d thought she’d forgotten. She got so caught up in the pure joy of running in her fox form that she didn’t notice right away that the roar echoing in her memory wasn’t a memory anymore.
Ana stopped dead in her tracks, her heart seizing in her chest as a booming roar seemed to shake the branches of the trees over her head. She raised her nose in the air, tentatively sniffing to see what waited for her ahead. She froze. Selkie. A few deep breaths confirmed her suspicions and her heart leapt into her throat. Brec? Was Brec out here with the medved?
Images of a giant with a booming voice holding Brec in a vice-like grip flared to life in her mind. She imagined Brec trying to return the man’s fur only to be blamed for its theft. She almost choked on her fear. What if he hurt Brec? What if he killed him?
What have I done? Leaping into action, she resumed her race over the snow, praying she wasn’t too late. Less than a mile ahead of where she’d stopped, she heard that booming voice again.
“Get back or I’ll blow her head off!”
The deep baritone echoed into the forest, sending birds of all sizes scattering to the winds. Ana’s heart pounded and she crept forward, keeping low to the ground so as not to be seen. When she reached the top of a small rise, a feeling of dread fell like a weight over her body.
Three men hid behind various trees just outside the medved’s cabin. Each of them held a long narrow gun, a rifle she guessed. They had them trained on the cabin. The scents riding the frigid February air told Ana the three gunmen were selkies.
“No one has to get hurt here,” one of the selkies yelled. “Just let her go.”
“I want to know who stole my skin!” a deep voice bellowed from inside the cabin. “Give me a name or this one dies!”
Ana tensed as her gaze riveted to the door of the cabin. She couldn’t see anyone, but the selkie had said “her.” It wasn’t Brec being held hostage. The thought was cold comfort. Ana knew that regardless of who the medved was holding, whatever happened to her would be on Ana’s head. Her throat constricted with panic. It was her the bear wanted.
The selkies shifted, each of their faces growing more grim as the seconds ticked by. The selkie that seemed to be the leader was tall and stocky. There was something about him that seemed familiar. He resembled Brec, though he was bulkier and didn’t have the same graceful air. Ana paused to wonder if they were related, a slightly-hysterical attempt to distract herself from what she knew she had to do. The selkie leader gestured for the other two to circle around the house. He raised his rifle.
“You have your skin back.” His voice remained calm, but loud enough for the man inside to hear. “Whoever took it doesn’t have it anymore. The name is irrelevant.”
“It is not irrelevant to me. I will not feel safe until I feel their blood on my hands and watch their life fade from their eyes.” The medved’s voice rose to a near hysterical pitch. “I will have my security back!”
Ana stepped forward, a certain peace rising from deep inside her to fill her entire being. The entire world faded, growing fuzzy around the edges. Warm energy wove through her muscles and with every step she took she grew a little calmer. She knew what she had to do. There was no sense dwelling on fear. She’d put herself first for far too long.
The lead selkie glanced over at her, but didn’t react to what he had no reason to believe was anything more than a fox. Ana slipped her skin off, stepping out of the fur like a child coming out of the womb. The chill Alaskan wind howled in triumph as it attacked her exposed face. Gripping her skin in her fist, she wrapped her arms around herself, trying to keep the worst of the cold from stealing the warmth from her body. Trying to speak past the sudden lump of fear in her throat, she stood facing the cabin, ignoring the look of shock on the selkie’s face.
“I’m here,” she called, her voice surprisingly calm and even. “I took your skin.”
The door to the cabin flew back and splintered against the wall. A hulking man stood in the doorway, careful to stay behind the small female he held in front of him like a shield. The petite brunette’s eyes were wide as saucers, her fear almost palpable on the wind. His hand tightened around her arm and she cried out, staring at Ana like a life line. His other hand held a rifle.
“You?” the giant man growled. “It was you?”
The hostage’s panic gave Ana strength. She had to be strong, had to stand up and admit what she’d done. She couldn’t let this woman she didn’t even know pay for her crime. Forcing herself to stand straight, Ana nodded. “It’s my blood you want, not hers. Let her go.”
“Are you insane? You’re giving him another victim, get your ass over here now!”
Ana flinched at the lead selkie’s incredulous voice and furious command. She yearned to do as he said. She stood in the open, with nothing to protect her from the looming consequences of her actions. Despite her grandiose decision to trade her life for the female selkie’s, she was scared. An image of Brec, his palm bleeding from where she’d cut him, sprang to her mind and she steeled herself against her fear. She was going to do this. She had so much to atone for.
“Let her go and take me instead,” she said loudly, proud that her voice only shook a little.
The medved shook his head, anger shining brightly in his eyes. Ana ran her gaze over the huge rug of a coat that hung down his back where he had it draped over his shoulder. Brec had calmed right before her eyes once he had his skin back. It was the natural reaction of a skinwalker to feel secure when draped in their animal skin. Shame bit into her nerves. Brec had only missed his skin for twenty-four hours. The medved had been without his for six months. The lump in her throat swelled as she wondered how much of his sanity had survived his skin’s absence.
The medved shifted in the doorway, his eyes seeming to grow larger and wider the longer he stared at her. “Tell me why you did it,” he demanded. “I want to hear your excuse before I kill you.”
Icy fear frosted down her spine. She fought to stand as tall as she could, meeting the bear’s eyes with as much strength as she could muster.
“Weakness,” she said softly.
“I can’t hear you!”
“Weakness,” she blurted out louder. Swallowing hard, she stepped closer. “I took your skin because mine was taken from me and I was too weak to cope with the loss.”
“I’m not blind, I saw you change form,” the brown bear seethed his golden eyes flashing. “You’re not a skinwalker, you’re a werefox. I know the difference. What sort of a fool do you take me for?”
“My skin was returned to me by someone who worked a miracle.” Tears crystallized in her eyes and she rubbed them away before they could freeze. When her hand came away from her face, her teeth began to chatter. Her fear seemed to combine with the cold to make her entire body shiver and soon she stood trembling before her enraged victim.
Under His Skin Page 24
