by April White
I made my voice as quietly threatening as I could and I stared Raven right in the eye. She reacted just like the bully she was. She backed down. Without fail, stand up to a bully and they tuck tail and run.
“And if you or any of your little posse harass Olivia or Ava again, the photo goes on the school server and everyone finds out what a sneak you are.”
“Where will you sleep?”
I smirked. “In the west wing.”
Oh, she hated that. I could tell that a million thoughts were scrambling around her evil little brain at once. The west wing was for boys. Adam sleeps there. I must be a total slut. Probably the worst part for her was that she couldn’t even tell anyone.
I put my finger to my lips with a smile as I left the room. “Not a word, Crow,” I whispered as I left. Her eyes were angry little slits and I laughed as I shut the door. I felt instantly free.
I took the stairs at a jog, passing a group of younger girls on their way up. “What time is it?” I called to them.
“Five forty-five,” one called back in a high voice.
“Thanks!” I’ve never been able to wear a watch because I magnetize them. About three months on my skin and watches stop working. My mom says I inherited it from her and the only watch she can wear is the clock on her necklace. I had fifteen minutes to find Adam in the library and make it to the Bear’s office.
Both the twins were waiting for me there. Adam was leaning against a table with his arms crossed in front of him, clearly annoyed. “What’s your problem?”
“I don’t remember signing up to be school tour guide.”
“Shut up, Adam. It’s not Saira’s fault Mr. Shaw wanted you to take her.” Ava smiled and a little of my grumpiness melted away.
“I need to get my suitcase after this. Where, exactly, is it?”
“Third floor, south wing. The linen closet by the bathroom.”
“Thanks for rescuing it. The Crow’s pretty much on the warpath with me now.”
Ava looked concerned. “Do you want to bunk with me and Melody? I could make a bed on the floor.”
I shook my head. “Don’t worry about it, I’ll be fine.” I looked at Adam. “The Bear won’t deal well if I’m late again. Can we go?”
“The Bear? Has he heard that?”
“Not a chance.” I grinned at him and he finally lightened up.
“Let’s go.” He was out the door with me right on his heels.
The Bear
Adam led me down a main floor hall, past closed doors, to the west wing. “The classrooms are in the main hall and south wing. Teachers have their studies all over the school, but Mr. Shaw likes being in the west wing. Probably so he can listen in on us upstairs.”
“Are you guys really that loud?”
“Nah, besides the occasional football game down the hall.” By football he meant soccer of course. “But I’m sure he’d be up there in a second if he heard female voices.”
“So, no girls in the boys’ wing and no boys’ in the girls’ wing.”
Adam shot me a lecherous look. “There are all kinds of cozy little nooks in this place. I’d be happy to take you on a tour.”
I rolled my eyes. “And I’m sure you’ve found them all.” I played up the disgust, but his comment made me nervous. I didn’t want my new room to be discovered by anyone, much less some horny teenagers hunting for a hang-out.
We stopped outside a heavy wooden door. “Here you are. Offices of Doctor Shaw, PhD and MD, right on time.”
The door swung open suddenly and Mr. Shaw stood glaring down at us. Actually, he wasn’t that much taller than Adam, but he looked so imposing it made perfect sense he could change into a Bear. The man was practically one already.
“That’ll be all, Arman.” His voice boomed but Adam didn’t even flinch.
“What time should I be back for her?”
Mr. Shaw looked at me, then back at Adam. After finding us together this morning he probably figured we were going to sneak off somewhere.
“I can find my way back.”
“I will walk Miss Elian back to the Library. You are excused for the evening.”
Adam grinned. “Later!” He bolted down the hall and I was alone with Mr. Shaw. I had the thought that I should be nervous, but I wasn’t. Mr. Shaw’s office looked like the kind of room I imagined Sherlock Holmes lived in. There were plant specimens and deer antlers sitting on shelves full of books. The furniture was old and comfortable with a massive desk that looked like a Rolls Royce after a fender-bender. Scarred and battered, but still gorgeous and well-made.
I set my poultice on the desk and turned toward the bookcases. A fantastic brass microscope was set up on a shelf next to an open wood case with various eyepiece fittings. It was definitely an antique but it looked brand new.
“A Ross binocular microscope, circa 1870.”
“It’s beautiful.”
“I come from a very long line of scientists and medical doctors.” The distance in the Bear’s eyes suddenly cleared and his gaze became pin-sharp. “Sit down, Miss Elian.”
I obeyed. His voice didn’t allow for anything else. He picked up my jar of poultice, opened the lid and smelled it. One eyebrow raised and he pinched some between his fingers and rubbed it thoughtfully. Then he finally nodded. Mr. Shaw put down the jar and unbuttoned his shirt. I had a moment of pure flight instinct. The man was taking his shirt off in a private office with a female student. But then my reason took over and I realized I wasn’t afraid of Mr. Shaw. Maybe it was stupidity because the guy was enormous and could easily take me down physically, but on a purely gut level I knew I had nothing to fear from him.
And in fact, Mr. Shaw himself suddenly seemed to realize that what he was doing must seem very odd to me. His eyes widened and I could swear I saw a hint of redness creeping up his neck. But then he turned his back to me, peeled open a big, white, square bandage, and bared a very nasty gash on his shoulder.
“I need your help if you please.” His voice was gruff and I guessed it was probably very hard for him to say those words to anyone, much less a seventeen year old girl. “It’s getting infected and I don’t do well with antibiotics.”
I came around the desk to his side and picked up my poultice. “Should I rub it into the wound or just pack it on?”
Mr. Shaw looked at me with that eyebrow again. “I don’t think I could take rubbing it in.” There was a half-smirk on his face and I responded with the same.
“Right. Should I re-use this bandage when I’m done?”
“No, I have a fresh one.”
I went to work on the gash, trying to be gentle as I packed it with the poultice, but I had to push the green mess in pretty hard to keep it from falling off. I could tell it hurt him, but Mr. Shaw just clenched his teeth and let me work.
“A bit of olive oil or animal grease mixed in will help keep a poultice in place.” His voice sounded tight.
“Yeah, sorry about that.” I wiped my hands on my jeans and peeled the backing off the new bandage. When I was done the Bear flexed his shoulder experimentally, then nodded and pulled his shirt back on. “Thank you. We’ll see tomorrow whether you’re any good at this or not.” The words were harsh but his tone was almost playful. “And I’d appreciate if you’d keep this business to yourself.” He indicated his shoulder and I smirked.
“A little tough to explain bite marks to your fellow teachers?”
Mr. Shaw stared at me through narrowed eyes. “What makes you think it’s a bite?”
I shrugged. “Jagged edges and infection. Mouths are the dirtiest things on the planet.”
“Human mouths.”
“Animals too, if they’ve just eaten.”
The Bear’s voice sharpened. “Perhaps I was mistaken to trust you.”
“No. Just mistaken if you think I’m stupid.” I could not believe I was getting snarky with a guy who turned into a Bear. I thought I was going to have to run, but the rage that crossed Mr. Shaw’s face lasted only a second before
he erupted into booming laughter. I let out the breath I’d been holding and smiled.
“Impetuous maybe, but not stupid. Yes, it was an animal bite. One of the groundskeepers’ damn hunting dogs.”
“So you were out last night?”
Uh oh. Too far. Mr. Shaw’s eyes narrowed again and he studied me carefully. “What do you know about last night?”
“Nothing. I just thought I heard a dog, that’s all.”
“Indeed.” Mr. Shaw stood up suddenly and crossed the room. He took the old microscope down from the shelf and set it on the desk between us. “What, exactly, do you know of the Immortals’ Families?”
The abrupt change in subject startled me. I took a deep breath. “I know the Elians can travel through time. I know the Armans are Seers and the Rothchilds are descended from War.” Mr. Shaw nodded, so I continued. “I’ve heard you’re a shape-shifter and judging from the wound on your shoulder the rumors that you’re a bear are probably true. And I’ve heard Vampires exist because Death made them.”
Mr. Shaw scowled again. “That’s hardly comprehensive knowledge.”
“You’re right. I only know what I’ve found out in the past three days. And believe me, that’s not a lot.”
He sat back in his chair, put his hands together in front of his mouth, and studied me over the tops of his fingers.
“Can I ask you something?” I thought of a million questions I wanted to ask, but one had been nagging at me all afternoon.
“Yes.”
“Are there other time-traveler kids besides me?”
He drummed his fingers together as he considered his answer. “It’s possible. But not likely.”
“Why?”
“Occupational hazard, I suppose.”
“Oh come on, that many people have disappeared in time?” No way was I going to believe I was descended from a family of idiots.
He smiled at my indignation. “There have never really been too many of you to begin with. I’m actually surprised to meet you. When Millicent didn’t marry I assumed the Elian line would be dying out with her.”
Now it was my turn to stare. “No way am I the last Elian! Families don’t just die out like that.”
Mr. Shaw closed his eyes for a moment and took a breath. Then he touched the microscope on his desk. “There used to be another branch of your family who claimed direct descent. In fact they held the council seat for a time in the 1800s.”
“Millicent didn’t say anything about them.”
“She wouldn’t. She’s descended from a younger sister. Her elder cousin held the seat.”
“So? What happened to her?”
“She was murdered. Along with the entire council.”
My eyes widened. “By who?”
A fierce glint came into the Bear’s eyes. “By my great-great-grandfather’s brother.”
The Bear was watching me closely; his eyes seemed to challenge my reaction. So I gave him none. “Is murder a hereditary trait or can I consider myself safe?”
He cracked a wry smile. “You’re safe. For the moment.”
I shrugged. “I guess that’s all I can hope for in present company.” I sat back in my chair. “So, what happened?”
Mr. Shaw touched the microscope on his desk absently as he spoke. “William Elliot Shaw was the oldest son of the oldest son. His father was Speaker of the Council and the most powerful shifter of all the Clan families. Will was being groomed to take over his father’s council seat and leadership of the shifter Clans.”
The way the Bear’s eyes glanced at me could be considered casual, but I know a predator when I see one. He was judging me, looking for weakness, surprise, horror, whatever would give him the advantage. Half my brain was listening to his story; the other half was busy trying to stay one step ahead of him.
The Bear’s voice was hypnotic as he continued. “Will had everything; brains, looks, money, charm and power. His younger brother looked at him as a hero and his family adored him. Even the Ungifteds saw Will Shaw as a leader among men.”
Mr. Shaw’s fingers stroked the microscope with something close to adoration. “He was an acclaimed scientist who did amazing work in genetics at a time when it was a brand new field of study. This microscope was his. He acquired it the year before he split.”
“He… ‘split’? As in ‘left’?”
Mr. Shaw shook his head. “Not the American slang. We use the term ‘split’ to describe a very rare condition among shifters. In fact it’s only been documented one other time among the Clans, but the case of Will Shaw is the most famous.”
“He’s famous?”
“Robert Louis Stevenson learned of his case from a doctor at the Bethlem Lunatic Asylum where Will was committed after the murders. You may have heard it called ‘Bedlam.’ He was diagnosed with split personality disorder, but apparently he had lost complete control over his animal form and was in a constant state of partial shift, sometimes coherent as a human, but usually more bestial in behavior and appearance. Stevenson based his story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde on Will Shaw.”
It took a moment for me to process this. I’d read “Jekyll and Hyde” in Sophomore English and the idea that the character could have been a real person was as horrifying as it was sad. I almost felt sorry for Will Shaw.
Then the Bear pulled me back to reality. “Shaw went to a council meeting with his father, Jonathan Shaw, your ancestor, Melinda Elian, the Arman twins’ great-great-great grandmother, Lisette Arman, and the seat-holder for war, Spencer Rothchild.”
Mr. Shaw’s voice was emotionless, like he was reading a newspaper account, not telling painful family history. “There is no record of what happened in the meeting, only that it ended in a bloodbath. The local constable described the scene as ‘carnage, with bone, blood and tissue the only identification of humanity in the room at all.’”
The Bear’s eyes glinted in the lamplight as he watched for my reaction. “They arrested Will Shaw, still covered in the council’s blood and raving about an execution. Had it been left up to the shifter Clans they would have torn him limb from limb. But he was in Ungifted custody and the Families didn’t need any more attention than they already had. When he was committed to Bedlam they left him there, a raving lunatic, as a warning to the other Families about the horrendous cost of madness.”
Mr. Shaw smiled wryly and sat back in his chair. “The other Families look at the Council murders as an unfortunate, but isolated event that happened a very long time ago.”
I studied Mr. Shaw. He seemed relaxed in his chair, posed as if he had just told a ghost story to a child. But underneath the nonchalance was something else. The predator watching to see if the creature in front of it was a threat, an equal, or food. I spoke carefully. “But it was a Shifter who killed them all.”
“And a son who killed his father.” The Bear’s voice matched mine in its careful tone.
“The Clans haven’t forgotten, have they?”
“The Shaw Family was stripped of its lineage. We no longer have the right to lead or even speak at either Clan Council or the Council of Descendants. The Descendants of Goran don’t forget… or forgive.” His tone of voice was still carefully neutral, but the muscles of his jaw clenched tightly. The accident of birth that made him a Shaw cost the Bear a lot more than being a Shifter did. And somehow this giant man had trusted me with that knowledge.
I decided I liked him.
“Does that microscope still work?”
He smiled. “You want to try it?” I nodded and he set it up on his desk so I could see. Then he took a box of slides from the bookshelf, selected one, and motioned for me to look.
I put my eye to the eyepiece. There were two strands of hair on the slide. One I recognized as human and the other one looked coarser, like it was maybe from an animal.
I looked at Mr. Shaw. “Human hair. Female Caucasian, in her 40s or 50s. And an animal, possibly dog, but something with a fairly fine coat that gets groomed often.”
He rais
ed his eyebrows at me. “You sure about that?”
I set my jaw. “About the human hair, definitely.”
“How did you get gender, race and age?”
“From the color. It’s blonde, but uniform, like it’s been dyed. A Caucasian woman is the most likely person to do her hair that shade of blonde.”
“And her age?”
“The dye-job starts at the root and looks expensive. Most young women get highlights if they’re going to color their hair. Older women who are just starting to go gray will start at the roots.” I shrugged. “It’s a logical guess.”
“It’s an educated one.” The Bear’s voice actually sounded friendly for a second. But only a second. “But you’re wrong about the dog.”
“Okay. Not a dog. But an animal of some kind. It’s too coarse to be that color and human.”
“It’s mine.”
I looked at his head then back at his face. “No it’s not. Your hair is way finer than that.”
He smiled in that predatory way that gave me the creeps. “But I’m a Shifter.”
I stared at him, then crossed my arms in front of me. “So?”
The Bear seemed amused at me. He plucked a sandy brown hair from his head and laid it on a fresh glass slide. “Look again at the two strands of hair.” I obliged. The non-human hair was clearly much thicker and coarser than the blonde hair and I highly doubted it came from Mr. Shaw’s head.
He replaced the slide with the fresh one and I looked again. It was the same coarse, dog-like hair from the other slide. I shook my head as I looked at him. “Your hair looks totally normal. There’s no way this is the same hair.”
He bent his head toward me. “Touch it.”
I reached a tentative hand forward and he rolled his eyes, grabbed my hand, and put it on his head. “See?”
His hair felt completely normal to me and I pulled my hand back. “You’re full of crap. It’s exactly like mine.” I don’t know what possessed me to speak that way to a teacher, but I was getting annoyed. He arched his eyebrows at me at sat back with an amused smirk on his face.
