Tempest

by Laura Marie

  “What about the Fae?” Chloe asked.

  “There beneath the surface. I’m not hurting them.”

  “That’s really cool,” Chloe said.

  I knew what I was doing was cool, but Chloe didn’t sound nearly as impressed as I thought she would be. Of course, she had a lot on her mind. In fact, the longer I carried on, the more depressed she seemed to get.

  “Are you okay?” I asked, cutting the crap with the weather and letting the sunshine return.

  Chloe pulled up her shoulders without answering me.

  “Talk to me, Chloe,” I said. I knew that Chloe was down, but I felt like she was even more down now, after I had tried to cheer her up.

  “I guess I’m just jealous of your control,” Chloe said. “You don’t really realize how serious it is until you don’t have it anymore. It’s really messed up. I’m sorry.”

  I shook my head. “Don’t be.”

  I hadn’t thought about that. I had tried to distract her, but I could understand how it would only make her feel worse, especially since I had been the one that had been losing control when I had arrived in Safety Beach.

  I hesitated for a moment before carrying on. “You know, I didn’t always have control like this. You know how bad it was. But I accepted who I was, and that helped a lot. And I talked to people who knew what was going on. I wouldn’t have been able to do it alone.”

  “Don’t lecture me, Emily,” Chloe said. “I don’t want to hear about it. I’m not going to talk to someone about it, and I don’t want to be a vampire. I’m not going to accept that this is who I am.”

  “I’m not trying to lecture you. I’m just trying to help you.”

  I was trying to help Chloe, but it had the opposite effect. She was getting angrier and angrier with me.

  “You see, you will never understand what this is like – you think you lost control, and maybe you did, but that was not part of you. Being this thirsty, wanting blood this badly…it’s ripping me apart.”

  “Maybe if you feed it will help,” I suggested.

  “Stop saying that!” Chloe was suddenly furious. Her rage crackled around her, her vampire magic rising up, and it was a lot stronger than it had been before. The magic pressed against me, a giant hand sucking all the air out of the room.

  But I was stronger, too. My magic rose up; air tore around the room, ripping at the peeling wallpaper, tugging at our clothes. The angrier Chloe became, the more her magic rose up, the more mine grew to counter it. I didn’t know where this would end. I was sure we could tear this house apart if we wanted to. I didn’t want that.

  “Chloe, it’s me,” I shouted above the roar of our power. “I’m not here to fight you.”

  It was as if Chloe snapped out of whatever trance she had sunken into, and she blinked at me, registering who I was. I hadn’t realized that her loss of control was this bad. For a moment, I wondered if it was possible that she had committed the murders. If this was what she was like when she lost control while she was conscious, how much more damage could she do when she didn’t know who she was?

  Chloe fell to her knees and started crying. “I don’t know what to do anymore. I’m so sorry, Emily.”

  I shook my head and walked to her, kneeling in front of her. I was careful not to touch her.

  “It’s okay. We’re going to be fine.”

  “It’s getting worse,” Chloe whispered. “I’m blacking out more and more often. I have no idea what to do anymore. I am losing every part of me that meant something.”

  I didn’t know what to say. I wanted her to feed for her own good. But Chloe wouldn’t hear of it. I didn’t know how else to help her. I wasn’t the right person for the job. I was her friend, but right now that wasn’t enough.

  “Have there been any more kills?” Chloe asked. She was almost terrified to find out the answer.

  “No,” I said.

  I could taste her relief.

  “Everything is going to be okay,” I said. “You are safe here, you are still in control. The fact that you didn’t hurt me proves that. And I know you’re not the one that committed the murders. As long as you’re here, aware of what’s going on, we’ll know that it’s not you. I already know that, but you need to know that, too.”

  Chloe nodded.

  “Thank you, Em. I don’t know why you put up with me, but I really appreciate it. Right now, you’re my only friend.”

  I shook my head. I wanted to tell Chloe that Reece was on her side, too. But I knew she wouldn’t have wanted him to know. It was better if she didn’t know that I had told him, that he was going to help me prove her innocence. If nothing else, I would allow Chloe to preserve her dignity. In a situation like this, it could be a lifeline.

  I stayed with Chloe as long as I was able to. Eventually, I had to leave her to go back home. But until then, I would show her that I wasn’t scared of her, that I believed in her, and that she was still the person who had become my best friend.

  Sometimes, when we lose faith in ourselves, we just need someone else to help us back onto our path.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  I waited until I knew my mom had gone to bed. Victor wasn’t staying over, thank God. When the house was quiet, and the darkness hung thick in the passage and around the windows, I tiptoed to the front door.

  I wore all black, in the spirit of sneaking out, and I got out of the house without a hitch.

  As soon as I was outside, I took a deep breath, relishing the fresh air. Chloe and I had snuck out of her house a couple of times, but this was the first time I had snuck out of mine. For a human, my mom had ears like a fox.

  Maybe all mothers of teenagers had that. Chloe’s mom took sleeping pills, but mine didn’t.

  Reece met me on the corner in his pickup truck, just as arranged. When I hopped in, his eyes glowed like emeralds and anticipation was in the air between us.

  “Everything good?” He asked.

  I nodded. Reece started the truck and pulled off into the night.

  We headed back to the woods where I had visited the crime scene. We weren’t supposed to be there, but seeing that the place had been deserted before, I was sure that we would find the same scenario now. Reece just wanted to run around as a wolf to see if he could find something, a scent, a trail, anything that would help Chloe.

  I hoped and prayed that we would find something. I didn’t want to accept what would happen if it turned out it really had been her. I wasn’t even willing to think about it.

  When we arrived at our destination, Reece parked his truck in the parking lot at the Lazy Eye Diner. It was the one place it would draw the least amount of attention, although the parking lot was completely empty at this time of night.

  “Let’s just hope no one sees that and decides to ask questions,” Reece said, hopping out of the truck.

  “We’ll be okay,” I said. I didn’t know this for a fact; I was hoping.

  Reece and I headed into the trees. He walked next to me, a bounce in his step, and he was alive with preternatural energy. Even though he was still in human form, I could feel the werewolf magic dancing on his skin, charged in the air around us. It rubbed against me like fur, a smell of something wild in my nostrils. He was raring to go. I glanced up at the moon. It wasn’t even close to being full.

  What was it like for him when the moon was full and his wolf was forced out? Maybe one day I would ask him.

  “How much farther?” Reece asked.

  “It’s a short distance to walk, still,” I said.

  “Then we should stop here,” Reece said. “It’s better if I have ground to cover, to notice the difference when I find something.”

  I nodded. I wasn’t an expert on this. Reece had to tell me what he wanted to do. Tonight, he was calling the shots.

  While I watched, Reece started stripping off his clothes.

  “What are you doing?” I asked in horror.

  “I can’t very well change into wolf form with these on,” Reece said casually. “
You have no idea how many pairs of jeans I’ve already ripped. It ends up costing a fortune.”

  I averted my eyes, blushing furiously. How embarrassing. Reece didn’t even seem to care that I would see him naked. Were all wolves like this? When I turned my head away, Reece chuckled as if he was amused by my reaction.

  “I know you don’t want to see me naked, but if you want to see me shift, you should watch now. Apparently, it’s quite spectacular.”

  He was inviting me to look at him while he was undressed. I wasn’t sure what to make of it. But I was extremely curious. I had never seen a werewolf changing form in front of me. And it was something I had been curious about.

  So I looked.

  There wasn’t much to see. Reece had knelt on the ground in front of me, his back turned to me. His skin was a deep caramel color in the darkness of the forest, and it trembled lightly with the magic that he summoned.

  As I watched, his body started to change. The magic grew around me, and it was wild magic, the kind of power that I hadn’t felt before, but it was familiar nevertheless.

  His body started transforming. Bones shifted underneath his skin, lengthening, popping or cracking, and I winced.

  “Doesn’t it hurt?” I asked.

  But Reece didn’t answer me. Or maybe he did, but it was nothing more than a series of growls.

  The skin on his spine split open, and honey-colored fur grew out of it, stretching across his body like a blanket.

  For a moment, Reece was nothing more than a misshapen bi-pedal monster. But then, with a shake, he slipped into his wolf form.

  The wolf was large. I had thought it would be the size of a dog, but this wolf was the size of a small pony. The body was strong and lithe, and those green eyes glowed chartreuse in the night.

  Reece threw his head back and howled. It was an eerie sound that promised all kinds of danger. Goosebumps raced over my arms, and a shiver slid down my back.

  The wolf turned his head and looked at me. He pulled up his lips in a snarl, and it was scary as hell. For a moment, I thought I might be in danger.

  But Reece came closer to me. I stood frozen on the ground, unable to run if I wanted to. I relied on my magic to respond, the power that would help me out as it had when I had been with the vampires. But there was nothing. It was as if I’d hit a blank.

  The earth started trembling beneath my feet. It was only a light rumble.

  “Are you doing that?” I asked. My voice was small.

  Reece pushed a wet nose into my hand and licked it, and I calmed down. Somewhere in there, behind the jewel eyes and the fur and the teeth, Reece reached out to me. Conscious, friendly, an over-sized dog.

  He couldn’t communicate in wolf form, but I knew what came next. After a moment longer, Reece spun around and shot into the woods like a bullet.

  I closed my eyes and focused on my magic. We weren’t too far from the Fog that surrounded the vampire chapel and, even though werewolves and vampires didn’t get along, I needed to try to push the Fog back as far as I could so that Reece could search far and wide for something, anything, that would prove Chloe’s innocence.

  Tonight, we were making sacrifices on behalf of two whole species. But for Chloe, anything.

  I reached out with my magic until I found the Fog. The vampire power was strong; it was their equivalent of a cloak. But my magic was getting stronger, too. I pressed against the Fog, pushing it back, revealing more of the forest around the chapel.

  I knew when I reached the chapel, I couldn’t push back the fog any further. I hoped that what I had managed to unveil for Reece had been enough. I held onto my magic, pressing against the Fog for as long as I could.

  The vampire magic knew that I was pushing against it. It fought back, doing what it had been set in place to do. It tried to protect the chapel and its whereabouts. I understood that, and we weren’t here to do anything to the chapel itself. We didn’t want to invade the vampire territory. But the murder had happened on the very edge of the vampire country, and it had to be done.

  As if someone had woken up and stepped in to take over, strengthening the power that the Fog already possessed, I was suddenly snapped back. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t push against the Fog again and make a difference.

  Whatever Reece was going to find now was going to be completely up to him. I hoped that he didn’t veer too close to the chapel, that whoever was out there trying to strengthen the Fog, would leave him alone. We weren’t here to look for trouble, we were merely here for one of our own.

  When Reece returned, I turned my back and allowed him to shift back into human form and change into his clothes again.

  “Did you find anything?” I asked when he was decent.

  “I think so,” Reece said. Even though he was in human form, he looked at me with wolf eyes. “I picked a scent of something, of someone. Someone who wasn’t Chloe, and who wasn’t the victim. I think it’s something to go by.”

  Relief flooded through me. I knew it wasn’t enough to convince the vampires or the police that it wasn’t Chloe. This had been for Reece and me to know that our friend hadn’t done anything terrible.

  “Thank you,” I said to Reece and gave him a hug. “Let’s go home. Tomorrow, I’ll tell Chloe.”

  I didn’t want to wait until after school. Instead, I stopped in at the abandoned house before, leaving home a little earlier than usual. When I stepped into the abandoned house, Chloe was already awake. She didn’t look like she had slept at all.

  For a couple of days, in fact.

  “I have news,” I announced.

  I explained to her what Reece and I had found, but I didn’t tell her that Reece had been the one to sniff out the scent. I didn’t want her to know that I had told him what was going on.

  “And you think this means that it wasn’t me?” Chloe asked, but she sounded skeptical.

  I nodded. “Of course. If it were you, I would find your magic all over the place, not someone else’s.”

  Chloe pulled up her shoulders. “I don’t know if it means anything, though. What if you just sensed someone else who had been there to investigate?”

  I stifled a groan. Was Chloe set on being negative about this?

  “Did you black out last night?” I asked.

  Chloe shook her head. “Actually, no. I didn’t.”

  I smile broadly. “You see? This is good news. We’re going to figure this out, Chloe. You’ll realize that this isn’t nearly as bad as you think it is. It feels awful now, but in no time we’ll look back at this and laugh.”

  Chloe chuckled without expression. “Look at me, I’m laughing already.”

  I knew that Chloe was in a bad mood and I understood why she couldn’t be happy about what I had told her. But Reece and I would continue to find proof that it wasn’t Chloe and, eventually, she would have no choice but to believe us. Until then, I would keep my spirits high, and I would try to cheer her up whenever I could.

  Chloe hadn’t blacked out, and it was a good sign. If another murder happened and she hadn’t blacked out, it would be proof that it wasn’t her. Of course, I didn’t want another human to die; it would be the worst way to prove Chloe innocent. But I wanted her to understand that she wasn’t a monster.

  Reece and I both believed it, now we needed Chloe to believe it. We needed her to do a lot more things, like talk to someone who could help her with her issues and find a way to drink blood that would be acceptable to her. But that would come in time. For now, we had to convince her that she wasn’t the villain.

  I was in a good mood when I walked into the English building. It sucked without Chloe by my side when I walked into English class, the one class where we sent so many notes. It was where we talked about all the important things. But it was only a matter of time now. If it meant we could absolve her from blame, I was willing to take this time without her.

  I sat down behind my desk and started to take notes. Without Chloe being next to me, I might as well pay attention to
what was going on in class. I would be writing exams about this, soon.

  I was sure to make an extra set of notes for Chloe. I hoped that she had a look at the homework I took her every day, even if it was just to distract her. I wanted her to come back to normal life when all of this was over.

  I wanted my friend back, and I was going to make it happen, no matter what.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  My mom, Victor, and I sat in a coffee shop that looked out over the main road. My mom and I used to come to this coffee shop together, to catch up, to spend time together, to be mother and daughter again.

  But now this place belonged to her and Victor. Like everything else in my life, she had taken what was supposed to be ours and given it to him.

  Whatever, I didn’t care. I told myself that Victor was nothing more than a season in my mom’s life. She had had boyfriends before. They never lasted very long.

  It just wasn’t so easy when you’d been with a Warlock like my Dad before, and life had been colorful and filled with mystery.

  Of course, I hadn’t known this back then. I had only found out I was a witch about a year ago. But a lot had fallen into place when I’d found out. I had suddenly understood a lot about my life that just hadn’t made sense.

  It was only a matter of time before Mom got sick of Victor, too.

  That day couldn’t come soon enough.

  “What’s going on with school, Ducky?” Victor asked.

  I groaned without bothering to hide it and rolled my eyes.

  “I have a name,” I snapped.

  “Emily!” my mom cried.

  “That’s the one,” I said.

  “That’s enough,” my mom said with that look on her face that meant a punishment would come next, although I doubted she could punish me any more than forcing me to spend time with Victor.

  “It’s okay, babe,” Victor said.

  God, please could this stop?