Wolf's Bane

by Kelley Armstrong

  I had good reason to be suspicious. Elijah is up to something.

  I take two steps in the direction Elijah disappeared. Then I stop short.

  I will confront him. I will get to the bottom of this. But first I need to tell Kate. Otherwise, if I go after him, she’ll think the worst of me, and we don’t need that. We really don’t.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Logan

  I’m heading outside to talk to Kate about Elijah when one of the counselors stops me. It’s a guy I haven’t met before. He’s wearing a Team Necromancer shirt that looks slept in. Judging by his face, though, he hasn’t slept at all. That could mean he was up all night partying, but his face sags, making him look ten years older, his eyes dark with deep exhaustion.

  I remember what Kate and Elijah said about whispers in the woods. Werewolves don’t usually hear ghosts, but it’s possible that a whisper or two could break through if the ghosts are strong enough . . . or if there are enough of them.

  That might explain this necromancer’s exhaustion. Ghosts often pester them to deliver messages, as if a necromancer’s sole purpose is to play spirit-world FedEx.

  “Is everything all right?” I ask him.

  “Hell if I know,” he mutters, low enough that he probably doesn’t mean for me to hear it. Then he says, louder, “Tricia needs to speak to you. I’m supposed to escort you to her office to wait.”

  In other words, she’s heard about the trouble last night. Well, I knew I’d need to deal with this. Best to get it over with. And I won’t mind having access to her office while I wait. Maybe I can find my cell phone.

  The necromancer takes me upstairs and down a hall to an unmarked door. He opens it and waves me inside.

  The door shuts, and I look around. This isn’t the office. Not the main one, at least. It’s walk-in-closet sized with a desk and a few chairs. The empty coffee mug on the desk proclaims, “Life is short. Do stuff that matters,” and there’s a laptop cord hanging from the sole outlet. The laptop, however, is nowhere in sight.

  I cock an ear to the door. I can hear the voices of what might be counselors. Before I can make out words, footsteps stream into another hall. Their meeting seems to have broken. I wait for Tricia, but all the footsteps move on toward the dining hall.

  When this end of the building goes silent, I ease open one desk drawer. Empty. Another reveals a notebook with a watercolor mermaid and an Anaïs Nin quote on the front: “I must be a mermaid . . . I have no fear of depths and a great fear of shallow living.” I crack it open to find what seem to be Tricia’s notes on the camp. A quick leaf through fails to divulge any dastardly experimental plan. Nor does it hint at the disorganized chaos I’m seeing today. It’s the polar opposite, in fact.

  Within these covers, Tricia has the conference organized in a way that would make Paige proud. It is meticulously detailed with the kind of schedule I’d hoped for, discussion and debate and education, mixed with outdoor excursions and activities. She even made changes yesterday morning to accommodate Kate and me. For example, orienteering had been changed to us leading a lesson in wilderness tracking, showcasing our skills in a way that suggests she actually knows something about werewolves.

  Yet if that was her plan, why did she tell us to keep our supernatural race a secret?

  Something changed after she wrote this. It must have.

  I look at yesterday’s schedule. When we arrived, the group was supposed to be listening to a panel discussion on half-demon subtypes. Instead, they’d been doing a team-building exercise. When I skim the schedule, though, I don’t see any team-building exercises.

  After dinner yesterday, small group sessions were indeed on the schedule. I look at the list of groups, and something about it niggles the back of my mind. When I can’t make the connection, I file it and move on.

  Following the group sessions came a bonfire and marshmallow roast. That didn’t happen. Everyone had been in bed by ten, yet according to this schedule, the bonfire went from nine to eleven, and Tricia had added a note that if the counselors weren’t too tired and discussion was going well, the fire could extend to midnight for those who wanted to stay.

  I’m so engrossed in the notebook that I don’t hear footsteps until the last second. I shove the notebook into the drawer, and I’m still sliding into my chair when the door opens. It’s not Tricia, though—it’s the exhausted necromancer.

  I get to my feet. “If Tricia’s delayed, I’d like to speak to my sister. I’ll come right back.”

  The necromancer shakes his head. “If I see Kate, I’ll send her up, but I have my orders, and right now, I think we’d better just do what Tricia wants.”

  “What’s up?” I say. “This isn’t the conference I expected.” I pause and then meet his eyes. “I don’t think it’s the one you expected, either, nor the one Tricia planned.”

  He hesitates, and he seems on the verge of admitting it, but then suspicion sparks behind his eyes. Whatever’s going on here, I’m still a werewolf, possibly the cause of the trouble.

  I open my mouth to speak, but he turns and says, “Come on,” to someone I can’t see. Mason appears, his jaw set. When the necromancer reaches out, as if to prod him in, Mason only has to look at the guy’s hand, and the necromancer pulls back.

  Mason walks in. The door shuts behind him.

  That’s when Mason sees me. “Fuck.”

  “Yes, I’m here. If this is about last night, though, those guys tattled. Not me.”

  Mason grunts and slumps into the chair beside mine. When our arms brush, he shoots me a look, as if that’s my fault. I rise and walk to the desk, slide open the drawer and remove the notebook again. Then I lean against the edge of the desk.

  “This conference isn’t going according to plan,” I say.

  “You just figured that out? I thought you were some kinda genius.”

  “I mean it’s literally not going according to plan. I have the schedule here. It was off-course before Kate and I even arrived. If I ask what activities took place yesterday morning, is there any hope you actually participated and would know if they’re different than what’s here.”

  “No.” A beat. “And yes.”

  “No or yes?”

  “The conjunction was ‘and’ not ‘or.’ You asked two questions. I gave two answers.”

  I think that one through. “No, you didn’t participate. Yes, you’d know if they were different.”

  He only grunts, which I suppose is as close to agreement as I’ll get. I rhyme off yesterday morning’s five activities.

  “Yes, yes, yes, no, no.”

  “Did you participate in any of them?” I ask.

  “No.”

  “Remind me why you’re here?”

  “Never told you why.”

  When I wait, expectantly, he groans, as if I’m a five-year-old pestering him incessantly.

  “Bribed,” he says.

  “Bribed?”

  “Yeah, that thing where someone has something you want, and to do that, you gotta do something you don’t want to.”

  “You agreed to attend the conference as a vampire representative, but whoever bribed you didn’t specify that you needed to actually attend any sessions.”

  The hint of a smile plays on his lips, one of self-satisfaction. “Yep.”

  “So you’re in self-imposed solitary confinement,” I say. “That must be a fun way to spend a week.”

  “It’s not solitary anymore,” he shoots back. “Unfortunately.”

  “Then go back into the forest. I fixed the tent for you. Well, mostly. And, no, I’m not giving you our room no matter how much you grumble and glower. Feel free to try throwing me out again. I could use the exercise.”

  I don’t look up from the book as I talk. I’m thumbing through it, sure there’s a clue here. It isn’t anything obvious. It’s just a random note that my mind made, analyzing the data and extracting a nugget of information that surfed past on a brain wave before I could snatch it. I keep skimming
, hoping to see that wave rise again.

  Then it does.

  “Half-demons,” I murmur as I skim the list of small group sessions. “There are a lot of half-demons here.”

  “Because there are a lot of fucking half-demons. Randy bastards breed like rabbits. And how come no one’s concerned about them? Their daddies are demons. Demons. But no, the ones you need to watch out for are the overgrown puppies and the overgrown mosquitoes.”

  “It’s a matter of population infiltration and familiarity. As you said, there are a lot of half-demons. They take up an inordinate slice of the supernatural population pie, and therefore other supernaturals are familiar with them in ways they aren’t with the much rarer werewolves and vampires. Familiarity may breed contempt, but the lack of it breeds fear.”

  “Thank you, Professor Danvers.”

  I continue as if he hadn’t spoken, still flipping pages, my words more musing aloud. “Given their overall population density, it isn’t surprising there are so many half-demons at this conference. All the subsets must be represented. Of the small group sessions, there’s one for witches, one for sorcerers, one for necromancers, and four for half-demons. That suggests fifty percent of the campers are half-demon.”

  “More like sixty-five.”

  He’s not being sarcastic. I don’t comment on the fact he obviously paid more attention to his fellow campers than he let on.

  “I’m curious about the staff,” I say. “Tricia is half-demon, and I saw a couple others—”

  “One witch, one necro, four half-demons. There was supposed to be a sorcerer, but he started a new job or something. And, no, I wasn’t taking notes. I have a photographic memory.” A pause. Then he glances over. “Not going to correct me and say photographic memory is a myth?”

  “That would be rude.”

  He snorts a laugh and shakes his head. “You were thinking it, though.”

  “I presumed you meant eidetic memory, and I would never correct you. You know what you have. I don’t.”

  “It’s not eidetic memory, and yeah, I know what that is—when the brain takes a snapshot of an image and stores it in memory. It appears sometimes in children and disappears as they grow up. True photographic memory—the ability to recall text and images—has never been proven. It’s a myth.” Another snort, disgusted now. “I wish.”

  I say nothing. I just wait.

  After a moment, he continues. “They were supposed to remove side effects. That’s what the experiments were for. For the werewolves, that meant easier shifting and a lower predatory instinct.”

  While he may have heard this, I’m initially surprised he bothered to remember it. If he does have the fabled photographic memory, though, he’d remember whether he deemed it important or not.

  “That’s where I got it from,” he says. “My memory. It came from the experiments. I bet they thought it was a feature. If you live for hundreds of years, what tweak might make life easier? An improved memory. So you don’t forget things. So you don’t forget a goddamned thing. Fucking amazing, right? All the mistakes you make, all the things you wish you could forget? You won’t. All those people who come and go in your life? All the people you care about who die? Hell, yeah, you don’t want them to fade into pleasant dreams. Let’s keep everything right there. Front and center.”

  I open my mouth and then realize he won’t want sympathy or even understanding. The bitterness in his voice tells me that nothing I can say will help.

  The hell of a vampire’s life is outliving everyone they know, everyone they care for, everyone they love. Eventually, those memories do fade, and there’s mercy in that.

  There is no mercy in this. Giving Mason a photographic memory is the cold practicality of science, devoid of any consideration or empathy. Everyone wishes they had a better memory, so wouldn’t that help vampires in their long lives? No. No, it would not.

  “What’s this half-demon nonsense you’re babbling about?” Mason says into the awkward silence.

  It takes me a moment to reroute my mental train. Then I nod and say, “Whatever’s going on here, you and I aren’t affected. Neither is Kate or Elijah, who are both werewolves. Holly is a witch. Not affected. Allan—a guy we knew from years back—isn’t affected, either, and he’s a sorcerer. Last night, that one guy who attacked us was also a sorcerer, but the other two were half—”

  Footsteps tap along the hall. I shove the book back into the desk, but the footsteps head down the other hall, instead. They’re soft, barely audible. The steps stop. A moment later, someone taps on a door, and it’s definitely in the other hall. Probably a camper hoping to speak to the counselors, knocking tentatively, knowing they’re in no mood to hear complaints.

  I check my watch. “It’s been nearly an hour since they brought me in. I’m going to speak to Kate. If they find I’m gone, would you say I ran to the bathroom, please?”

  He shrugs, which I take for agreement. I listen at the door. When I’m sure the hall is empty, I turn the knob. It doesn’t budge. I jangle it, in case it’s sticking. It isn’t.

  We’re locked in.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Kate

  After Elijah dumps me, I go to find my brother and let him know Paige isn’t coming today. Logan isn’t in his room—I knock and no one answers, so I say, “Yo, Mason. Is my brother in there?” I don’t get an answer. I knock again, and I know that if Mason was there, he’d tell me to fuck off and stop knocking. He doesn’t.

  I head outside next. Holly’s still there, Allan having wandered off.

  “Snacks!” Holly says and puts out her hand. Then she catches my expression. “What’s wrong?”

  I open my mouth to say that Paige isn’t coming, and instead hear myself say, “I just got dumped by my fake boyfriend.”

  She scrambles to her feet. “What?”

  I force a laugh. “No big deal. It was a joke anyway.” That’s where I want to leave it. Instead, I hear, “I’m doing something wrong, aren’t I? Giving off a . . .” I wave my arms. “Anti-boy vibe or something. Scaring them away, and I have no idea how or why.” I rub my face. “Sorry, I don’t mean to get angsty. Not over a fake boyfriend. It’s just . . . The way he did it, I still feel dumped.” I suck in a breath. “Shit. Stop that. Sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize. He obviously hurt you. What’d he say?”

  “That it’s over. Then he practically ran from me when all I was trying to do was warn him about what happened to Logan last night. The situation is getting worse, too, and now Paige isn’t coming until tomorrow.”

  I explain. Then we split up to hunt for Logan and Allan. I go back inside while Holly circles the building to check all the various groups out here. Inside, it’s practically empty, and I wonder whether we’ve missed the call for a group meeting. The distant murmur of voices suggests we have.

  I’m standing at the top of the steps, ready to start tracking my brother’s scent when I realize that everyone who isn’t outside seems to be in that meeting, which means the other end of the hall is silent. The end of the hall where our cell phones are kept . . .

  I creep in that direction. If I hear so much as a cough, I’ll retreat.

  I continue to the office and put my ear to the door. Silence. I step back into the hall, close my eyes and listen, focus everything on that.

  Silence. Complete silence.

  I rap on the office door as softly as I can, but the sound still seems to echo in the silence. When no one answers, I turn the knob. It’s locked, which surprises me because I thought Elijah broke it last night. I twist firmly, and it doesn’t snap—it just disengages. Nice security. A credit card probably would have worked just as well.

  I slip into the room. It’s brightly lit, the sun streaming through the skylight, which I’m sure is awesome for the electronics. With the door shut and the sun blazing down, it’s got to be ninety degrees in here. Who the hell designed this place?

  I wipe away a bead of sweat and look around. There’s a desktop computer
—the one Elijah tried breaking into. There’s also a printer with paper in the output tray. I flip it over to see a stack of sheets for a workshop we were supposed to have this morning. The printer menu screen tells me they were printed late yesterday afternoon. No one even bothered collecting them.

  That’s troubling, but it isn’t why I’m here.

  Elijah said they keep the phones in a locker. I find three lockboxes. One’s too small to hold phones, so I ignore it. The other is unlocked—it’s a long, narrow container that’s open and empty. I strike gold with the third. It’s a phone-charging cabinet. I’ve seen simple versions in libraries and airport lounges, a box a couple of feet square with pull-out shelves for the devices.

  I open one drawer and see . . . Nothing. It’s empty. I open the next. Same thing. I keep opening.

  The charge-box is completely empty.

  Maybe this is one of those devices that seem supercool until you actually use it and realize a simple shelf with plugs would have worked better.

  I leave the box and look for anything big enough to hold two dozen cell phones. There’s nothing, really. The office isn’t that big. I open drawers and glance into the shallow closet, but it’s mostly office supplies and a nest of tangled device cords. The only boxes are for printer paper. They’re big enough, but no one’s going to dump twenty cell phones into a cardboard box. There’s no better way to ensure mutiny than to hand teenagers back their devices with scratches and dings. Sure, they already have scratches and dings, but we know every last one of them, and we’d better not find new ones.

  There’s a metal container under the printer paper cartons. I’m moving aside the first cardboard box when the contents shift in a way that paper doesn’t. I open it to see the phones. Two dozen cell phones, tossed into a cardboard box as if headed for recycling.

  That must be what these are. Recycled phones. Maybe for a game or some kind of cool tech project. As I pull them into the light, though, I see a phone case that looks like Doctor Who’s blue phone box. Anime characters decorate another.