A Shift in the Water

by Eddy, Patricia D.

  “You’ve known me all of two days.”

  “No, I’ve known you for two weeks. My wolf may not have been able to speak, but that didn’t stop him—me—from learning who you are. You talked to me all the time. Those memories are coming back. I know you better than I know myself right now. Can you tell me honestly that you don’t feel something for me?”

  Mara pulled her hand away. “No.”

  “I want to be a part of your life, honey.”

  “You want to stay dead.”

  He shook his head. “I thought I did. I was wrong. I need my pack. I need to find out what happened after I disappeared. I need my memories. But I need you too. Will you let me stay? Until I figure things out? Maybe . . . longer?”

  Mara pinched the bridge of her nose. A single tear escaped the corner of her eye. “Okay.”

  Cade’s grin remained for the rest of the way back to Seattle.

  Once Cade turned onto Mara’s street and pulled into the driveway, Mara sat up and groaned. “Great,” Mara said. “Aunt Lillian’s already inside. Probably wondering where the wolf is.” She nodded towards a red roadster parked at the curb.

  “Well, we should show her.” He handed her the keys and unfolded his tall frame from the car. He rubbed his palms on his thighs. Months of blisters on his lupine paws left him with scarred patches on each finger and his palms. At least his fingertips were relatively unscathed. He opened Mara’s door and helped her to her feet.

  “You’re not . . . going to shift? Are you?”

  “No.” How could he tell her he wasn’t ever going to shift again? “You’ve seen the last of my wolf.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Never mind. Come on. The longer we stay out here, the more they’re going to talk in there.” He angled his head towards Mara’s front window. The drapes fluttered and a white-haired head disappeared behind the deep blue material.

  “Goddess. This isn’t going to go well.” Mara extricated herself from Cade’s arms and trudged up her steps. Her front door flew open and Lillian blocked their entry.

  “Mara Elizabeth Taylor, what in tarnation are you doing driving yourself to Bellingham? And who the hell is this?”

  “Aunt Lil, we’re cold and wet. Can we do this inside?”

  The elderly Southern woman stepped back but watched Cade with a wary eye.

  A woman in her late fifties rose from Mara’s kitchen table and smiled. “I’m Eleanor. Your aunt told me about—” She trailed off when she saw Cade. “Well, that explains it.”

  “Ma’am?”

  “Lillian wondered where Mara’s wolf was. I didn’t know of any werewolf packs left in Western Washington.”

  Cade took a deep breath. Air. Eleanor smelled like the wind. She didn’t merely know about elementals. She was one.

  Lillian glared at Eleanor. “Are you tellin’ me he’s a damn werewolf?”

  “Yep. A scruffy one, at that. Looks a bit more wolf than man right now. Handsome enough.” Eleanor grinned and extended her hand.

  “Cade Bowman.” Cade turned towards Lillian. “Ma’am. I’m sorry we’re not meeting under better circumstances.”

  “Don’t you ma’am me. You knockin’ boots with my niece?”

  “Oh Goddess,” Mara muttered. “I’m going to go change. Cade, if you know what’s good for you, you’ll avail yourself of the same opportunity.” She trudged towards her bedroom. Cade watched her go, stunned at Lillian’s directness and Mara’s quick retreat.

  “Well?” Lillian asked. “Mara’s sick. I don’t want her losing even a single day with us over some shaggy wolf who can’t keep it in his pants.”

  “I think I should have listened to Mara,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. He should have asked Mara for a razor or a pair of scissors to make himself more presentable. “But if it makes you feel any better, my clothes are in the guest room and I’m quite capable of keeping my pants zipped.”

  Eleanor stifled a laugh from behind Lillian. “Give him a break, Lil. Look at the poor boy. He’s about to topple over and he’s soaked to the bone. He might be a werewolf, but he looked at Mara like she’s his whole world.”

  “She is.”

  “Go on then. But the two of you are going to come clean in two shakes of a lamb’s tail. I’m makin’ coffee. You drink it?” Lillian asked.

  “Yes, ma’am. Lillian.”

  Cade strode quickly into the guest room and shut himself inside. After he draped his wet clothes on a chair, he sat heavily on the bed. He was exhausted again. If he wasn’t worried about Livie showing up or leaving Mara to explain his presence alone, he’d stretch out on the bed and rest. Food. He needed to eat. He pulled on a dry pair of jeans and a quiet knock came at the door.

  “Cade?”

  “Come on in, honey.” Cade reached for a sweatshirt as the door opened. Mara stood there in a pair of gray fleece pants, a frayed green sweatshirt at least two sizes too big for her, and thick gray socks. She looked frightened and lost—much like he felt. Her eyes locked on his chest and a faint blush colored her cheeks. “Sorry,” he said and tugged on the fleece.

  “I wasn’t complaining.” She covered her mouth with her hand and stifled a laugh. “Clearly the stress is getting to me. What did you tell Aunt Lil?”

  “That my clothes were in here.”

  “Are you sure about this?” She hugged herself tightly and leaned against the door jamb. “She’s going to give you the third degree.”

  “I think she’ll be more interested in what Eleanor has to say about your illness. They have been gossiping about me the whole time I’ve been in here.”

  Mara raised a brow.

  “Weres have better hearing, sight, and smell than humans.” He snaked an arm around her waist and she tipped her head up at him. Cade brushed his index finger along her cheek. “I saw those dark circles this morning. They’re gone now.”

  “But my fingers? The shaking’s getting worse.” She leaned back and showed him her hands. Cade took them and held her fingers securely. She was right. She was getting worse.

  “Your element is water, my dear. You’re dehydrated. Come sit.” Eleanor’s voice floated into the bedroom on a breeze. Mara looked around, confused. The voice sounded like it was right next to them but they were alone in the room. Her house wasn’t large, but the kitchen was down the hall and around a corner.

  “Well, it’s not like that’s the weirdest thing that’s happened today,” Mara muttered.

  “Air elementals can eavesdrop,” Cade explained.

  “Is it too early for a drink?”

  When Mara and Cade rejoined the older women in the kitchen, coffee was waiting for all of them. Eleanor set a glass of water in front of Mara. “Drink this and you’ll feel better.”

  The water slid down her throat and soothed her nerves. She longed to get in the pool down the hill and swim a few dozen laps. If she could do that, she could function. But with Cade at her side and Livie on her way, there wasn’t any chance of that happening soon. Not to mention that Aunt Lil looked like she wasn’t going to let Mara out of her sight.

  Cade’s stomach growled, drawing Mara’s gaze. She hadn’t even noticed how haggard he looked. He cupped his mug of coffee protectively in his hands, but his shoulders slumped and his eyes were hollow. She rose and snagged the box of cookies, a chocolate bar, and large slice of pie from the cabinet and dumped the lot in front of Cade. “Eat something, shaggy man.”

  “Are we havin’ high tea or talkin’ about who the hell the werewolf is and what’s makin’ Mara sick?” Aunt Lil demanded.

  “Cade’s about to pass out,” Mara said with a hard edge to her voice. “He needs to eat a lot more often than we do. Especially now.”

  Cade put away three cookies before anyone spoke again. Not a single crumb hit the table. He dug his fork into the pie, but paused before taking a bite. “Thanks, honey. I’m okay. I want to know what Eleanor has to say about your illness.”

  “You call all the girls you know ‘hone
y’?” Lillian asked suspiciously.

  “No.” Cade laid his hand over Mara’s. A subtle tingle ran through her body and she intertwined their fingers. She had doubts that they could ever be anything to one another—or that she had enough time left to contemplate such an eventuality—but for the moment, she relished the feel of his strong, rough hand gripping hers. She needed all the comfort and reassurance she could get.

  Eleanor sipped at her coffee and smiled. An eddy of air wrapped around the table, ruffling Mara’s damp locks. “There are four main elements: earth, air, fire, and water. My element is air. It’s how I heard you talking about your symptoms earlier. You’d be surprised how often air elementals work for intelligence agencies. I spent several years working for the FBI in my youth until I met my late husband. I can carry sounds and scents for up to half a mile. I can also move objects.” She held her hand over the chocolate bar and inhaled deeply. The candy rose from the table, flipped in midair, and landed in front of Cade. “If I was outdoors on a particularly windy day, I could even lift you five or ten feet.”

  Mara gripped Cade’s hand tighter. This was too much. She wasn’t sure what to say.

  Eleanor didn’t wait for a response. “Your element is water. What happened earlier? You and your wolf were soaked to the skin. Did your element do that?”

  “I . . . believe so. I was scared. I heard . . . this is going to sound crazy. I heard music. It was overwhelming. This deafening roar of noise—but it was a sound I craved. I’d never heard a song so beautiful and moving. I followed it. That’s the best I can explain. I didn’t know what to do. I knew I had to get away.”

  “From what?” Lillian asked, leaning forward. “Did that wolf hurt you?”

  “No,” Mara and Cade replied in tandem. “It was a misunderstanding. Cade didn’t touch me. It’s not important what triggered it, but all of a sudden there was water everywhere and I couldn’t feel my body anymore. The music was gone. I passed out. When I came to, everything hurt. I couldn’t stand and my hands shook. If that’s what using my element is, I don’t want to feel like that ever again.”

  Eleanor laughed. “It won’t be like that every time. Your body will acclimatize to your element. Think of it like athletic conditioning. The first time you try a new sport, you’re sore because you use muscles that previously were unused. Your element is the same way. The water you manipulate in the world around you becomes a muscle—an appendage if you will. With use, you will manipulate it with ease. What you heard—the roar, the noise, music—that was your element resonating with your body.”

  Lillian stared at Eleanor and raised a thin white brow. “How is all this related to what’s killin’ her?”

  “You are familiar with yin and yang?” Eleanor asked. Everyone nodded. “Water’s opposite is fire. The two must live in balance with one another. Mara has fire within her. If she used her water element often, it would balance that fire. Ignoring it is detrimental to her health. The fire takes over.”

  “That’s why my blood doesn’t carry oxygen properly?” Mara asked, straightening in her chair. Despite the fantastical nature of Eleanor’s claims, there was logic to her words that Mara’s medical training reinforced. “Fire consumes oxygen. If there’s too much fire inside of me, it robs my blood of what it needs?”

  “Yes, dear. If you used your element every few days, it would keep the fire in balance. Without this, you will weaken, but the extreme nature of your illness vexes me. Most elementals are trained from a young age, so there are few reports of those who make it into adulthood without knowledge of their abilities. It is passed down in the blood, you see. The power to manipulate the elements. Every elemental has all four traits within them. One is dominant. Your mother or father must have been an elemental as well. Possibly both of them.”

  “Mara was adopted,” Lillian said. “Her mother died when she was a baby. There weren’t any medical records available. I tried to hunt them down when she got sick, but I never found any. Her father wasn’t listed on the birth certificate.”

  “That’s a pity,” Eleanor said. “It would explain a lot if there was a fire elemental in her line. If Mara had more fire in her than most water elementals, her illness would make more sense to me.”

  Mara shook her head and leaned forward. “I don’t understand.”

  “Every elemental has two elements. That’s the yin and yang I spoke of. Your primary element is the one that sustains you. That’s water. If you had more fire in you than most, you’d need stronger water charms to balance it out.”

  “Is this why I can’t stand the heat?” Mara asked. “Because I have too much fire?”

  Eleanor beamed. “Yes, dear. The heat helps the fire within you flourish. I carry earth and air within me. Whenever I have to go into a basement or spend hours in a stale, sealed building, I feel ill. Earth elementals cannot fly in airplanes. It can kill them. Fire elementals do not deal well with rain.”

  “The one that nearly killed me didn’t seem to mind being on Orcas for seven months,” Cade muttered. “Even when the rains came. She and her earth elemental had no problems maintaining their charms on the ground or on me.”

  “May I?” Eleanor asked, holding out her hand for Cade’s. He nodded and laid his hand in hers. She brought it close to her nose and inhaled deeply. “You bear some residual fire, wolf. But there are hints of earth as well. What did the charm do to you?”

  Cade pulled his hand away and rubbed the back of his neck. “It stopped me from shifting. I don’t know how. I think she explained it to me, but those memories are fuzzy. The sun itself didn’t burn as hot as whatever she did to me. Whenever I tried to shift, the fire inside of me would flare up and the pain—I couldn’t think. I couldn’t breathe. Even after I escaped the island and was here with Mara, I couldn’t shift back.” He shuddered and Mara squeezed his thigh. His lips twitched in a half-smile at her as he linked their fingers.

  “I think I was dying when I freed him. I’d never felt as terrible as I did that night,” Mara said quietly.

  Eleanor nodded. “The charm likely had both earth and fire components. Mara’s water element reacted to the fire you were exuding. The body is remarkable at preserving life in desperate circumstances. Tell me, you are experiencing some physical weakness? Exhaustion?”

  Cade nodded.

  “Mara and I can help. I will teach her a few simple charms. Ones that will not leave you half-drowned,” Eleanor said with a grin. She picked up a small leather pouch from the floor and set it in the center of the table. It opened to reveal four clear glass vials. One glowed red, another blue, a third brown, and the last one was clear. They appeared empty other than the pale colors within. “The four elements. Fire, water, earth, and air. These are yours now, Mara. Keep them close while you learn, they will help you focus. For now, both of you put a hand on the table, palm up.”

  Eleanor placed the vial of dark brown earth and the glowing red fire vial in Mara’s palm. Cade held the water and air vials. The glowing vial was warm and a vague kernel of nausea flared in her belly. She stifled a little grunt of discomfort.

  “Focus on the fire, Mara, and take Cade’s other hand.”

  Almost immediately, the nausea faded. Mara looked at Cade. Behind the brilliant blue of his eyes, she saw his wolf: wild strength and dominance. The alpha he used to be stared back at her. She nearly forgot the burning vial in her palm.

  Eleanor laid her fingers over their joined hands. “Try to sense the water in Cade’s vial. Do you feel it?”

  Mara closed her eyes. A tingling energy flowed between them. A familiar melody, the one she’d heard every time she’d used her element, started as a whisper. There was something cooling about the music. It flowed down her arm, through her chest and belly, and down to the vials in her hand. Gradually, the pain under the vial of fire dissipated. “I feel something. It’s odd. But nice.”

  “Send it back to him. You have two points of contact in your palm. Earth and fire. Cade holds their opposites. Air and water.�
�� Eleanor pressed down on the vial of fire in Mara’s hand and she hissed out a breath.

  “Stop. It hurts,” Mara whispered. Cade tightened the grip on her hand and growled low in his throat.

  Eleanor clucked in disapproval. “You can end the pain. Find the water around you. Use the connection between you and the wolf.”

  The nausea returned with a vengeance. Mara moaned. Her entire body shook with tremors and a cold sweat broke out over her forehead. Her palms dampened. Pain thudded through her chest with every beat of her heart. Her head started to throb. The dull roar of her heartbeat replaced the pretty tinkling melody. “Can’t.”

  “Mara!” Cade snatched the vials out of her hand and grabbed her as she slid off the chair. He pushed his own chair back and pulled her into his lap. She slumped against his hard chest and burrowed her face into his neck. His scent surrounded her. “You’re okay, honey. I’ve got you.”

  When Mara’s heart rate slowed and she no longer felt dizzy, she looked up at Eleanor. The air elemental was frowning and shaking her head. She reached for Mara’s palm and examined it. An angry red burn slashed across the skin. A few whispered words and a breath of cool air wafted over Mara’s palm, soothing it.

  “That vial is barely warm. It should not have affected you so dramatically. This may be why you were close to death. The fire within you is stronger than I thought. One of your parents must have been a fire elemental. Fire usually begets fire or earth. A fire elemental with a water child is rare, but not impossible,” Eleanor said.

  “What about my sister?” Mara asked, extricating herself from Cade’s embrace and returning to her own chair. “Would she be an elemental too? She might know about our parents. She was twelve I think, when our birth mother died. The idea of having any contact with Katerina scares the crap out of me, but I could try to find her.”