Twiceborn

by Marina Finlayson

  Garth unlocked the door and shoved me inside. I stumbled and fell to the gritty carpet. Jerk. I wished I still had my pepper grinder; I’d show him a thing or two. I glared up at him, and he returned the glare with interest, stalking past and hurling the car keys down on a rickety table.

  He turned to Luce as she came in and shut the door.

  “It’s later,” he said, “so start talking.”

  “Get her up off the floor.”

  She pushed past, ignoring his temper, and switched on the bedside lamps, revealing a typical room layout. Bed with two small chests either side. A round table with two mismatched chairs, and a cupboard cum wall unit opposite the bed that housed a TV and an electric kettle. Above the bed hung a tired print of a beach scene. A small bathroom opened off the entryway.

  The lamplight did little to dispel the gloom. The place was still dark and dingy, like cheap motels everywhere. The carpet smelled of smoke and old greasy takeaway. I got up, keeping as far from the angry werewolf as possible in the small room.

  He clenched his big fists and squared up to her. “How about I rip her throat out instead? What the hell is your problem? You were supposed to kill her.”

  His eyes actually turned yellow as he spoke. The wolf hovered very close to the surface.

  Luce wasn’t impressed. He was head and shoulders taller than her, but she got right up in his face and slapped him hard.

  “If you try turning wolf on me, I’ll shove your head so far up your furry arse you’ll be able to eat what you had for breakfast all over again.”

  She had a big temper for such a tiny person, and the wolf backed down. He sank onto the bed, lowering himself beneath her. If he’d been in wolf form he probably would have shown her his belly.

  “Garth’s a little emotional,” she said to me. “Don’t mind him. Have a seat.”

  She indicated the table jammed into the corner. Apart from the bed it was the only other place to sit. I took one chair and she took the other. Garth stayed on the bed, not meeting anyone’s eyes. He wore a Darth Vader T-shirt, and he looked like a sulky kid—but my experience with werewolves was pretty limited. Maybe they were always grumpy.

  There was a stain on the seat of my chair that might have been food, or blood—or anything really. I tried not to sit on it and looked around. No way out except the front door. I’d be lucky if the window on the back wall even opened. My chances of climbing out with an angry werewolf in the room were slim to none.

  Luce leaned forward, pinning me with a stern look, as if she understood my little survey of the room. “You may be under the impression I’m a reasonable person, because I haven’t let Garth kill you yet. Don’t make that mistake.”

  She was preaching to the choir here. I was already convinced this petite Asian doll was far more dangerous than the hulking werewolf.

  “I’m going to ask you some questions, and you are going to answer completely and truthfully. If you don’t, things will go badly for you. Very badly. Do you understand?”

  I nodded, mouth suddenly dry. Maybe Luce was short for Lucifer. Her matter-of-fact attitude was far more menacing than Garth’s angry posturing.

  “Good. Let’s start with something easy. Who are you and why were you locked in Valeria’s keep?”

  “My name’s Kate O’Connor. I work for my friend Ben in his costume shop, and sometimes I do these special courier jobs for him.”

  She was quick. “You mean you’re a herald?”

  “I told you!” Garth roared, leaping to his feet. “She was there! She did it!”

  “Shut up, Garth! Let her talk.”

  I waited till he sat down again. The guy was a powder keg waiting to blow. “Well, kind of. I mean, yeah, I did the jobs, but I didn’t know about any of this shifter stuff. I thought there were just a lot of secretive people around who didn’t want the world knowing their business. And then this urgent job came through …”

  I gave her an edited version of the events of that afternoon—as much as I could remember of it, anyway. It didn’t seem like the smartest move to mention visions of my hands dripping blood to these two, so I left that part out.

  “… and then I went down to the local shops to get some Panadol—” Probably best not to mention the glowing people either. “When I got home the power was out and next thing I know a werewolf jumps me in the kitchen. But you know that part already.”

  Luce glanced at Garth, who now paced impatiently in the space between the TV and the bed. He seemed to have a problem with sitting still. “Yes. Garth is … impulsive. He was meant to be gathering information. I prefer to act on facts, not gut instinct.”

  The werewolf stopped pacing long enough to snarl at me. “She’s lying! Are you going to believe this garbage about losing her memory? Bloody convenient, if you ask me.”

  “But nobody did, so keep your mouth shut.” Her aura flared a brighter blue as she stared him down. Did that mean she was close to changing herself? Or did changes in the aura reflect the shifter’s emotional state? So much I didn’t know. “You were telling me how you ended up Valeria’s prisoner.”

  “Right. Well, after Ben saved me from your friend here, we hid out while Ben tried to find out why I was attacked.” I met Garth’s glare with one of my own. He certainly didn’t look like someone who’d been shot a couple of days ago, though he had a wild look to him, as if he’d been running on adrenalin for a while and needed a good sleep. I knew how that felt.

  His pacing made me nervous. Would he attack again? I watched him out of the corner of my eye as I continued. “He told me about the shifters. Said he had lots of contacts. I guess one of them must have sold him out, or maybe you weren’t the only ones looking for me, because Nada turned up on the doorstep with a couple of thugs and took us back to the house in Mosman. I’d never heard of Valeria or Alicia before Garth accused me of working for them, but Nada thought I was in league with Jason, which is even more ridiculous. I mean, sure, he’s my ex-husband, so at least I know him, but I’d rather jump off a cliff than do anything he wanted.”

  “You’re the one Jason married?” Surprise flashed across her face, then hardened into deep suspicion. Damn it. Garth made me so nervous I’d started babbling. Why did I even mention Jason?

  “That traitor!” Garth rumbled.

  I glared at the werewolf. “Trust me, whatever he’s done to you, he’s done worse to me.”

  “You were married for five years,” Luce said. How did she know that? “You expect us to believe that in all that time you had no inkling Jason wasn’t human?”

  “I don’t care if you believe it or not. It’s the truth.” It made me sound like an idiot. Hell, it made me feel like an idiot. How do you miss something like that? “But I don’t see what our marriage has to do with anything. Until tonight I hadn’t seen him in more than six months.”

  In fact, I could have told her down to the day how long it had been: the last time had been at Lachie’s funeral. Seven months and two days ago. But she didn’t need to know that.

  “But Nada accused you of working with him.”

  I shrugged. “Nada didn’t seem exactly rational where Jason was concerned. I told you, I’m not working with anybody. I didn’t know any of this even existed till two days ago.”

  “What did Nada think you two were up to?”

  That was a tricky one. Why hadn’t I kept my mouth shut? “I’m not sure. She said Jason had killed Leandra, but maybe she thought I had something to do with it.” And maybe I did. Damn, I wish I could remember.

  Garth threw his arms up in exasperation. “Jason killed Leandra? Do you think we’re stupid? He wasn’t even there!”

  “She said he poisoned her.” She also said I’d stabbed Leandra to death. Basically, no one knew diddly-squat. Especially me. No wonder Luce and Garth were suspicious.

  “Really. Then why did we find her with her chest cut open right after you left? You thought you’d make sure of it in case the poison didn’t work?” Garth whirled on Luce. “This is
crap. There was no poison. How much more of this do we have to listen to?”

  She ignored him. “The woman in the garden—what did she look like?”

  Sick. Like someone dying of poisoning, come to think of it. “Elegant. Taller than me, blonde hair. She was wearing a grey business suit.”

  Luce nodded. “And what did she give you?”

  “An envelope. The usual sort.” Please don’t ask me who it was for.

  “Did she say anything to you?”

  Help me, Kate. “She knew my name—but I don’t remember anything else.”

  Garth loomed over me, his eyes glowing yellow again. “This whole story stinks worse than three-day-old fish. I say we kill her now.”

  I shrank back in my seat, clenching my teeth on half-truths and omissions. There had to be something I could tell them to help my situation.

  “She did give me something else, though.” At least, I thought she did. Where else had it come from? Hopefully it didn’t prove me guilty of some heinous crime, but with Garth so set on blood I had to risk it. “A black stone.”

  Mentioning it awoke a strange longing in me. I felt the stone’s loss like a missing tooth, a space where something should be.

  “A black stone.” Garth’s voice was heavy with disbelief. “Why would she give you a black stone?”

  Luce leaned forward, face intent. “A stone? Or more like a disk, about so big?” She made a circle the size of her palm with her fingers.

  “Definitely a stone. About the size of a marble.”

  She flicked a glance at Garth. “Could be some kind of geas.”

  “Do you still have it?” Garth asked.

  I shook my head. “Nada’s got it.”

  He rolled his eyes in another how convenient comment. Clearly he refused to believe anything I said.

  “Never mind the stone,” Luce said, brushing his objections aside with a wave of her hand. “Earlier tonight, when I first entered your room, you said something to me. Do you remember?”

  What kept you? I wasn’t likely to forget such a peculiar experience. I’d felt so happy to see her. At last, someone I could trust! But I’d never met her before in my life.

  Shame the feeling had gone. Her expression now gave me no clues as to whether she was friend or foe. At least with the werewolf I knew where I stood.

  “Why did you say that?” She leaned closer, her gaze intense. This was the crux of the matter. She’d come to kill me, and those three little words had changed her mind. But if she expected rational explanations, she’d come to the wrong place.

  “I’ve been having some … visions … since I, ah, met Leandra. They’re more real-feeling than dreams, and they come when I’m awake, more like memories. But they’re not. At least, not of anything that’s ever happened to me.

  “I had this one about you. I don’t remember much now, but you were in an old warehouse. Your face was swollen and bruised, and you had … burn marks.” I swallowed. Remembering the damage to the delicate creature in front of me made me feel ill. That much of the vision was still crystal clear. I could recall the emotions, but not the details.

  “I had the feeling I’d been searching for you for a long time. I was desperate, but I wouldn’t give up hope. And then I found you, and there was so much blood … I thought you were dead.” Like a broken doll abandoned on the concrete floor by some careless giant’s child. “But you opened your eyes, and whispered ‘what kept you?’ and I had to laugh. And then you started laughing too, and … and that’s all I remember. The feeling of relief. It seemed so real, even though it wasn’t my body in the vision—like in dreams, where you can be someone else, but it’s still you inside. And then tonight, when I opened my eyes and saw you, the feeling came to me again from the vision, of how thankful I’d been to see you … and I guess it just slipped out.”

  Wow, that sounded lame even to me. I didn’t need to look at the werewolf to know how impressed he’d be.

  Luce’s poker face was much better. They could have invented the word “inscrutable” for her.

  “That was Leandra,” she said, and her voice wasn’t quite steady. Maybe not so inscrutable after all. “Leandra found me, when I’d given up hope.”

  “So what?” Garth, of course, was still spoiling for a fight. “She could have heard it anywhere. It doesn’t prove anything.”

  Luce didn’t even spare him a glance. Her dark almond-shaped eyes never left my face. “I’ve never told anyone that story, and I’m pretty sure Leandra didn’t either. No one else knows.”

  She stood and turned away, as if she’d caught Garth’s restlessness. I watched her pace, horribly aware my life depended on her. There wasn’t much I could do if she decided to let Garth have his way.

  Suddenly she whirled and caught Garth’s arm. I jumped, heart hammering, but she only tugged him into the bathroom with her.

  She shut the door to keep their conversation private, but insulation isn’t a huge priority in cheap motels. Though she kept her voice down I still heard her words, echoing off the tiled walls.

  “I believe her.”

  Garth started to argue, but she cut him off. “Even if she did hear that story somewhere, why would she say ‘what kept you?’ now? She had no way of knowing what that moment meant to us. It was as if Leandra spoke to me!”

  “Leandra could have told her about it before she was killed,” Garth protested.

  “For heaven’s sake, Garth! You’re so set on revenge you’re not using your brain. ‘Please, dear herald, delay stabbing me to death for a moment while I tell you this deeply personal and entirely irrelevant story from my past.’ Is that how you think it went down?”

  Whatever Garth thought, I didn’t get to hear it as she ploughed on. “I think you’re right. Leandra did tell her, but as a kind of password, because she needed a way to let me know I could trust this woman that wouldn’t be obvious to others.”

  “Like who?”

  “Like Jason, or whoever really did kill her. I think this stone she gave her is a geas, her last message to us.”

  “Geez, Luce, you’re going too fast for me.” Welcome to my world, buddy. It’s confusion city here. “A geas? But they’re always on scales.”

  “Well, maybe some kind of trigger spell. I won’t know until I see it.”

  There was a long silence. When the big werewolf spoke again, it sounded as if every word was dragged out of him against his will. “I guess we need to find it then.”

  For once we agreed on something. Every time someone mentioned that damned stone I felt a hollowness like a gnawing hunger. It could be a geas—whatever that was—or a piece of bloody unobtainium for all I cared.

  I just knew I wanted it back.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  I slept fitfully for the remainder of the night, fully clothed on the queen bed, Luce stretched out next to me. I wasn’t used to sharing a bed with another person any more, and I woke up every time she rolled over. Under the bandages my shoulder itched like crazy. Hopefully that was a good sign.

  Garth slept on the floor by the door, curled up with his tail tucked round his nose. I contemplated a bathroom break sometime in the small hours but the instant I swung my feet off the bed he came awake, yellow eyes gleaming in the dark. He growled, an ominous sound which raised the hairs on the back of my neck, and I decided I could wait till daylight after all.

  The sound of the TV woke me. I’d fallen into a deep sleep at last, and it was nearly two o’clock in the afternoon according to my watch. Two talking heads discussed the highlights of the Sydney Festival in bright happy tones while Garth, human again, crunched his way through a bowl of Coco Pops. Guess he’d slept late too. There was no sign of Luce, which made me nervous. No one wants to be alone with a homicidal werewolf.

  I sat up. His bowl brimmed with little brown balls shedding their chocolate coating into a sea of rapidly browning milk. Pure sugar masquerading as breakfast cereal. The last person I’d seen tucking into it with such gusto had been Lachie, but he
’d had the excuse of being five years old at the time.

  “What?” Garth grunted. “Did you expect me to eat raw meat for breakfast?”

  I shrugged. I hadn’t given much thought to the typical werewolf diet, but I would have expected a little more protein. He’d be high on a sugar rush in twenty minutes.

  “Where’s Luce?”

  “Out.”

  Guess he didn’t like breakfast conversation.

  In the bathroom I finally gave in to the maddening itch and peeled the bandage back to check my shoulder. I stood there so long, staring at my arm, it was a wonder Garth didn’t burst in, thinking I’d somehow escaped.

  How was this possible? I ran a tentative finger over the fine white scars on my arm. No bleeding, no scabs—not even reddened, healing skin. These scars looked as if I’d been clawed years ago. Hurriedly I checked my stomach, checked everywhere, but it was the same story. Less than forty-eight hours had passed, but I could barely see the place on my stomach which had hurt so much. The scar had faded to such a thin white line it took some finding.

  Wow. I stared at my reflection. The mirror was spotted with age and the light from the single globe was dim, but it sure looked like me staring back. Only I’d never had super healing powers before. Supernatural healing powers.

  Back in the main room Garth resolutely watched TV, pretending I wasn’t there. I studied the back of his head. I’d never seen exactly where Ben’s bullet took him, but it had brought the werewolf down and stopped him dead in his tracks. I shuddered, remembering the hideous thing sprawled on my kitchen floor among the broken plates. He’d certainly looked dead, at least for a little while. Must have been a shot to the heart, or somewhere equally vital, for an effect like that. Yet he sat there eating Coco Pops as if nothing had ever happened.

  Supernatural healing powers indeed. Was Ben’s friend wrong? Was I turning into a werewolf after all? I tried a snarl, wondering how it would feel to have a wolf’s teeth, a wolf’s jaw.

  Of course Garth picked that moment to look around.