Cassie said, “Uh, Grace, do you know what’s going on here?”
“Unfortunately, I do have a clue.”
The closest mothwoman spoke in fluting tones, “You have returned to us, My Queen.”
I’d thought they might pick up on my mothy DNA, and hopefully help out. This was more than I’d expected, so I floated a question. “Queen?”
“Spawn of the heir,” another mothwoman said.
Spawn of… Ryan? The heir?
My eyes bulged. “Ryan’s mom was your last—rather psycho—queen?”
Their unrelenting stares were answer enough.
“I’m sure one of you wants the job more. It’s not like I’m fully converted anyway. And don’t you people feel anything about me getting a bunch of you shot up last time?”
The men stayed still, unmoving gargoyles. The women looked at one another, then back at me. The one with the fluty voice answered, “Only your smell is right. Ryan claimed you as his. So did we. You will get used to our ways in time. As for the change being incomplete—” she smiled—“that can be remedied.”
I hated what I knew was coming.
She continued, “You need only pick a new mate from among us, and he will finish what Ryan began.”
Why, the hell, can’t Fate pick on someone else?
TWENTY-TWO
“Links of steel drape my soul,
decisions I have made.
Broken by the weight of need,
pale as death, I slowly fade.”
—Chains
Elektra Blue
My feet kicked back and forth, the way my cat lashes his tail when irritated. There was something wrong with literally being up a tree, especially since I had so many uber-powered protectors supposed to be keeping me safe. Well, at least Cassie was here to share my discomfort, except it was a little irritating to see how cool and comfortable she looked perched in my tree.
The mothwoman said, “We have many fine candidates for you to—”
I lifted a hand to cut her off, my other hand and arm encircling the tree trunk beside me. “Give me a minute. There’s so much I’m still trying to wrap my head around.” Marrying a mothman wasn’t even on the list.
You’d think lying around a hospital would have given me plenty of time of time for reflections. Then again, I’d had Shaun and Fenn for distractions. And the drama of two moms waiting on me: one of them in the middle of a divorce, her life in shreds, the other a kitsune psychopath.
They’d used me as bait, and ISIS had closed in for the kill—getting away with me. Sure, Virgil’s forces hadn’t been fully in place, and ISIS had moved in way faster than anyone expected, employing magic, and a gas attack we’d not been prepared to stop. ISIS had upped their game as wanna-be terrorists while my guys had gotten careless, consumed by their own sense of awesomeness. Despite everyone’s best intentions, crap happened and it rolled downhill, squishing me flat. The list was long and getting longer of all the people wanting me because I was born between two worlds and raised on a third.
“Things gotta change,” I said. “There’s just so long I can smash my head into a wall.”
Cassie pitched her voice low, keeping it soft, “Grace?”
I looked at her. “Go to Virgil. He’s the man for helicopter rides, if you know what I mean.”
“Yes, I do. I’ll be back as fast as I can.” Cassie crossed over. I couldn’t see her, but knew she was jumping from branch to shuddering branch. She’d do that a long while before going to ground where the Hysane could track her. She’d get to Virgil and the others and return with the chopper.
What I hadn’t told Cassie was that I didn’t intend to be here when the cavalry came. A bright and shining realization had hit me between the eyes. Only I can keep me safe. In all the stories I’d read of Japanese kitsune living among humans, happiness had come only as long as the kitsune wasn’t discovered for what she was. Once I’d been outed on the internet, there had never been a real chance to be both safe and free. Apparently they were mutually exclusive. I could live under guard, under lock and key, or break my ties—and people’s hearts—getting away.
I was choosing away.
No one could go with me who wasn’t willing to walk away from their life. Fenn and Cassie might, but I couldn’t ask for that sacrifice. With a deep, tearing pang in my soul, I thought of Shaun. He had deep ties to his life. And Michiko needed him whether he knew she was there or not. While I loved him with every furious beat of my heart, I had to face the fact that he didn’t return my feelings. If he felt anything for me at all, he wouldn’t have been flirting with Janet, with me in the same room. Giving up on him would be the hardest thing I’d ever had to do, but it was time to grow up and be an adult, ready or not.
All I really need is to decide is where to go so Wocky can’t track me with the demon brand.
I wanted to go back and to say goodbye to Michiko, Drew, Jill, Fenn, Fran, and Madison. They became like family in such a short time. But they’d want me to stay, and that would be messy. Especially if I had to choose between Moms. Maybe, after things calmed down, I could sneak back and make sure they were okay.
I was leaving them with equal pieces of my heart. What was left over was a tiny, cold lump of memories that I’d need to keep going.
Churrr! The sound echoed inside me. Taliesina’s gold eyes opened in the back shadows of my mind. My inner fox was reminding me I’d always have her, too. My face felt heavy with sadness, but that thought made me smile.
I became aware that all of the moth people had gradually crept closer along their assorted perches. The women were close enough to reach out and touch. All compound eyes were on me. They whirled with a soft, dusty blue. Wings twitched. Their antennae rippled, though there was no breeze in the cold air. I got the feeling they were sniffing me, absorbing my scent the way Tukka’s pack had when I was adopted into his clan.
“Sorry to disappoint you, but I must.”
The women echoed me, “Must?”
I pulled on the planetary magnetic field. My thoughts used that energy and my aura to cross over the veil. Gravity sloughed off a little, leaving me lightweight. The orange haze of my aura appeared, dancing along my skin. The closest moth people moved their hands through my body. They couldn’t see me anymore, but I could see them fine, along with their off-green auras. Everything else in the forest was now charcoal-colored.
I leaped through the closest mothwoman—passing straight through her—and landed on another tree’s branch. I kept going, needing distance for now. I kept an eye out for Hysane that might be running a blind search pattern for me. So far, no dragon men down below was good news. I also kept the usual watch for ghosts and demons. Oh, for the simple times when spooks and evil spirits were my only worry.
I stopped in the fork of a huge oak tree—serpentine limbs stripped bare by autumn—and checked my back trail.
Gosh-darn bugs are following my scent even though I’m in the ghost realm. Can’t anyone take no for an answer?
I had to lose them. The moths would be a dead giveaway of my position if this kept up. I needed a stream, since I couldn’t swim through the earth right now. I riffled through my thoughts. When I’d first come to the area, Jill had used her personal supercomputer to pull up some maps of the area. Closing my eyes, I saw the screen, blowing up the image so I could now review it in fine detail. The ranch was at the edge of one her highway maps. Beyond that, on the other side of the highway, was a reservoir. It was fed by several streams. That was the area I needed.
Or maybe not.
If I reached the highway and had my timing right, I could go immaterial and catch a ride with an unsuspecting stranger. Inside a vehicle moving at high speed, I could probably lose the bugs. I’d have to take the first passing car. I wouldn’t want to stand there exposed for too long.
I launched from the oak, veering back in a large circle to get past the moth posse on my trail. Bounding from tree to tree, I had to occasionally drop height or climb a little, b
ut I made sure to stay off the ground. The bugs had to spread out while seeking my scent. This slowed them down. I soon lost sight of them over my shoulder.
I worked up a sweat despite the low gravity, feeling strain from all the abuse my body had taken in the last few days. The wounds had closed and all, but my endurance had taken a hit. I felt myself weakening and checked my aura. It was burning off at a faster-than-normal rate, like I wasn’t quite myself. My new, baby wings fluttered happily as I shot through space. Maybe that was it—too much weird mixed in my DNA. My kitsune and shadow-man natures had long ago worked out an accord. Now they were adjusting to mothy elements.
More reason to hurry and catch a ride before weakness makes me stop.
A headache set in by the time I reached the highway. Standing on the center line, I looked down both sides of the road. No vehicle in sight. I reached up to brush back a lock of hair. The heel of my hand brushed skin where I didn’t expect any. I probed with fingertips and found a large bump. I checked the rest of my forehead and found a second goose egg. The bumps were squishy, like the ones on my back had been before wings had popped out. From the positions, having seen the moth people up close, I knew what was coming next: antennae.
‘Cause I’m just not enough of a freak as I am. What’s coming next?
Yap! Taliesina wanted my attention.
I closed my eyes and looked into my mind’s shadowscape. I saw her: a large fox shadow with golden eyes and antennae, nine tails, and—by golly—large moth wings of brown and gray, flecked with molten gold. In this vision, I was running on the wind with tufts of orange flame around all four ankles.
Taliesina seemed to be telling me this was my ultimate metamorphic state. Or maybe that was just her wishful thinking.
I shook off the image and opened my eyes as a vehicle braked next to me, as if the driver could see me waiting for a ride. I’d have been concerned, but I recognized the station wagon and the driver. It was Great Scott the Mouse Whisperer and his Indigoer. Twice now, when I’d been desperate for a ride, this guy had shown up out of nowhere to provide it. I was beginning to think he ran a preternatural taxi service, except he’d never taken a penny from me. This was the first time I’d seen him from the ghost realm though. He looked the same, except his aura was a pure and shining white gold with the area over his heart a silvery blue. I had no idea what that meant, but I thought it was good.
He rolled down the window and stuck his goofy face out the window. He was unshaven and had a disarranged, white-guy afro of curly brown hair. His gaze raked the space I was in, but his focus remained vague.
I was standing on asphalt so I figured the Hysane would read the ground and come after me, unless they’d gotten tired of waiting and had settled for just getting zombie-demon Ryan in their clutches. I crossed back, running around the grille of the car. My aura and Scott’s snapped out of view. The indigo of the car burst up out of the ashen color it had been as all the world’s colors returned. Scott saw me from the corner of his eye and pulled his head back in. His face turned to follow me as I came around and got into the front passenger’s seat. My wings elastically flattened against the back of the seat, taking no damage. Watching out for the mice he traveled with, I made sure the way was clear before I carefully closed the door.
A large gray mouse poked its head out the hole where a radio should have been. A white mouse sat on the dash, watching me with unblinking red eyes. A brown mouse came past my headrest, ran down my shoulder, and paused on my pants leg, staring up at me with a hopeful gleam in his eyes. A hungry gleam. A black mouse with garnet eyes glowered up at me. Sitting on the tip of my left shoe, he flicked his hairless tail like a whip. For some reason, a Devo song played in my head. The phrase “Whip it, whip it good” echoed repeatedly.
Scott hit the gas and we surged down the road, heading south. “Good to see you again,” he said. “What have you been up to?”
“The usual,” I said, “fighting for my life against all comers. Speaking of which, Scott, have your furry pals been fed lately?”
“No, not really. They finished off the beer nuts last night. Actually, I’m on my way to buy lettuce before they start in on the electrical wiring or the brake lines—again.”
“Always a thrill to ride with you, Scott.”
He threw me a fast grin, his usual air of world-weary innocence firmly in place.
The road behind us was clear of moth people and Hysane. The way ahead was open. No police barricades or black helicopters setting down. We’d soon reach a truck stop and restaurant area. Virgil and the gang might be there, or could have called in the black helicopters to go airborne. Further down the road was the Van Helsing School for Gifted Slayers where Madison and Fran lived with their peers. The HPI was farther on. Beyond that lay a scattering of small communities. All of this meant I’d have to pick a destination soon. A small challenge, finally. If not for the starving mice, I’d have breathed a sigh of relief.
TWENTY-THREE
“Otherness isn’t far at all.
It just might come if you call.
Don’t search for what can’t be unseen.
Hide in the safety of your dream.”
—The Safety of Your Dream
Elektra Blue
We passed the highway reststop and kept going. Scotty spoke without taking his eyes off the road. “You can’t bug out on the world yet, Grace. You made a promise to your friend Madison. Besides, running only works if you run toward something, not away.”
I looked at him. “Just who are you, anyway?”
“Nobody special.”
Several of the mice looked at him as if they couldn’t believe what he’d said.
Scotty slanted me a sideways look. “You said you’d have your friend’s back when she went to face her mom, the wanna-be vamp.”
“You know an awful lot for a mouse whisperer in an indigo station wagon,” I said.
He looked at me again. For a moment—like a magical glamour falling away—his face shone with an inner light, young and perfect, molded from starlight into a dream. His tired eyes held galactic depths never fathomed. In those terrible reaches, galaxies—pinwheels of light—danced in endless spirals of joy. Ghost-white wings fanned out from his back as if the car had lost all substance, or some new dimension had opened to my senses. Several loose feathers fluffed past me, vanishing against my door in small pools of light. A feather settled on my hand and melted like a snowflake. My hand warmed, glowing soft white for a moment. Then the blaze of light and his wings faded and he was just Scotty again. His bright smile was for me alone, a thing to treasure, having nothing to do with hitting on me. He’d simply shown me his heart, asking nothing in return.
“You’ve seen unnatural evil,” he said. “Those shadows prove the Light.”
“You’re not…?”
“God? No. That’s well above my pay grade. I’m your guardian angel.”
What? Wait! Really?
“I have one of those? With all the trouble I’ve been getting into, I thought you were on permanent vacation.”
He sighed. “Flowers need storms. Perfect protection withers them. A life kept from struggle is not blessed.”
“Yeah, but still—”
“When things were bad, did you stop to think how much worse they could have been?”
“I … guess not.”
“People are oblivious to a lot of the help they receive in life. It’s always ‘why me, why me, why me, whine, whine, whine, whine, whine.’ The five minute delay in heavy traffic is never appreciated, though it keeps them from a three-car pile up elsewhere where they would have died. No matter the apparent chaos, there is always a plan.”
I let the subject drop, just saying, “Thank you.”
He paused, mouth open—as if there was much more to his gentle rant—but his easy smile returned. “My pleasure. So where do I drop you?”
“You’re right about Madison. I need to keep my promise. Drop me off at the Van Helsing School.”
&nb
sp; He nodded. “An honorable decision. We fight best for ourselves when we fight for others.”
“Uh, sure, I guess.”
Heaven sure seems to have a weird way of doing things.
While I had Heaven’s ear, so to speak, I thought I’d ask a question that had been bothering me. I’d grown up thinking I was a normal teenager. I’d gone to church, even though no one else in my family had bothered. I’d actually liked it. “Do you think God minds that I’m not human? I mean, I’m kitsune, for Christ’s sake, and a few other things.”
The car surged down the highway, the outside a blur of trees. Scotty took his time putting an answer together. At last he said, “God is love. He doesn’t restrain that love. Hell will one day be full of people he loves, who went their own way instead of His. All He asks for is faith. Every touch of faith is answered, no matter who it comes from. I’m not human either, Grace. It’s not a requirement.”
That made me happy. I was almost able to ignore the mice creeping around me until we pulled up to a private drive. I opened the car door and got out carefully so the mice wouldn’t escape. “Thanks again, Scotty.”
He smiled. “Just doing my job. See you around.”
I nodded, carefully closing the door. The indigo station wagon pulled away.
I turned toward the front gate in the outer chain-link fence, a fence capped with razor wire. Beyond it there was a no-man’s land filled with rows of concertina wire, three-foot spirals stretched like killer Slinkys. Then came the second fence, and another gate. Cameras panned my way, sending my image ahead to whoever was on duty inside at the monitor room. I stopped at the intercom, pushing a buzzer. I was kept waiting a few minutes, left to enjoy the rich stink of garlic. Along the main drive were mulch-covered fields, dormant with fall, but the earth still wore a residual stench as a badge of honor. I had yet to meet a vampire, but all this security made me respect their prowess as enemies.
Destiny's Child (Kitsune series Book 3) Page 16
