Hidden Realms

by Dean Murray

  I threw the brush into the trash and went to leave but she hadn't relinquished her grip on my arm. "Alec, everyone's talking about Adri having collapsed. What else have you heard?"

  My laugh wasn't very gentle. "You forget, sis. For all that you feel isolated you hear more about what's going on among the student body than I do. I haven't heard a peep about any of this."

  Rach looked for a moment like I'd gone too far. I finally reached out and pulled her into a hug. "I don't know what everyone is talking about, but she did collapse in Physics her first day here. It seemed like it was a trick, so I suspect she's just trying to cash in on her newfound fame as Brandon's latest toy."

  She wasn't happy with me now. "Alec, she's not like that. We've talked a little after school and I really don't think she's pretending."

  There was no point continuing the conversation. I disengaged myself from Rachel and headed off to class.

  Rachel had a point. While I didn't really converse with anyone outside the pack, I had the ability to be in the know if I wanted to be, I'd just been tuning out the background chatter lately.

  I spent part of my time in Chemistry listening to whispers and came away astonished. The girls in the school were being even more brutal than normal and it looked like Britney, Adri's supposed best friend, was leading the push. If Adri had really been hoping to generate popularity out of her attacks, it had just backfired on her in a major way. Somehow I'd gone from being disgusted by her antics to feeling sorry for her.

  I hurried straight to Physics, and was pleasantly surprised to find Adri had beaten me to the class. She registered my presence about the time I sat down, and momentarily seemed confused as she reached for her notebook.

  She looked over questioningly at me, and the sight of her with her mask removed actually drew an honest smile out of me. It had been so long since someone had returned my smile it took me a second to realize she was smiling at me. She blushed and broke eye contact as the bell rang.

  Mrs. Alexander finished up the roll and opened up the floor for any questions that the class might have regarding the light unit we'd just finished up. Predictably, the first hand up was Sammy's. I'd shared three classes with her over the last four years and she'd been the teacher's pet in each of them.

  Sammy launched into a question regarding glowing blue light around reactor cores that I promptly tuned out. We weren't going to be tested on it and when I was really ready to learn about it I'd just jump online and do some research.

  As Mrs. Alexander finished up her explanation the next hand up was Adri's. Judging by the sudden jump in Adri's pulse she was nearly as surprised as I was.

  "Is the light always blue? Is it ever a whitish-gold color?"

  There wasn't any reason for the question to set off internal alarms, but it did.

  "Not that I'm aware of. The water will actually emit quite a bit of ultraviolet light, but for whatever reasons, the electrons don't ever seem to release any electromagnetic radiation down in the lower energy levels like infrared, or even the visible red. You'd need red and all of the other colors to generate a true white light."

  The reason suddenly became evident as Adri opened her mouth again. "What about some other mechanism? One that wouldn't just make water glow with a dancing gold light, but plants too. Do you know of anything like that?"

  The pencil I'd been twirling between my fingers snapped into two pieces as I realized just how badly I'd been played. I didn't hear a word of Mrs. Alexander's response.

  She'd just coyly described exactly what we saw when we shifted forms. Suddenly everything made sense. She hadn't been scared about facing Cassie down because she could have easily torn Cassie in half. She wasn't just a wolf, not with a glow like that. She had to be a powerful Fir'shan, one who'd knowingly impinged on the territory of two separate packs.

  That explained the lack of history. Her identity, her mom's identity, they'd both been manufactured just before they'd moved here. They'd been detailed enough to pass Donovan's initial background check, but there hadn't been anything else to them.

  Only things were even worse than that. She wasn't just some random Fir'shan. She had allied herself with Brandon after turning down my offer of protection. Suddenly I was completely certain who Brandon's contact on the Coun'hij was. There was no way of knowing which one she was. There were plenty of them who hadn't been seen by anyone.

  I looked up in time to catch Adri's smug grin and almost threw myself at her. Rage washed through me but I kept the barest edge of control. I couldn't afford to act right now or they'd destroy the entire pack as retribution.

  The show of confusion that flashed across her face gave way to understanding as she realized I'd finally seen through her facade. It was all I could do to remain seated through the rest of the class.

  I tracked down the rest of the pack between classes, told them to stay clear of the new girl, and then spent the last hour refusing to answer Jasmin's questions. Her mood deteriorated in pace with the minute hand on the clock and by the time the day ended I wasn't sure I was going to be able to stall her long enough to explain developments to everyone simultaneously. Luckily the rest of the pack was just as antsy as she was, and they all but ambushed me.

  I followed everyone to the cafeteria.

  "Okay, you kept me in suspense the entire time I was trying to grind through stupid math problems. What is going on?"

  "Adriana Paige, the new girl, she's a Fir'shan."

  "That's impossible. Sure, she glows, but I've never got any kind of shape shifter vibe off of her."

  James' tone was insulting but I let it pass.

  "She's got the glow of a Fir'shan, a powerful one at that. She faced down Cassie when any normal human would have been running away in terror. Donovan hasn't been able to track down any information about her or her family that wasn't in the initial, basic background check we ran, and finally she just described exactly what we see in wolf form to the entire class under the guise of asking about the light unit we just finished up."

  The reactions varied from outright disbelief on Dom's face to cautious doubt from Isaac. I thought for a second I was going to lose them, but then Jasmin, who'd been pacing since she came into the room, almost fell down.

  "He's right. I saw her do something else today that didn't gel with normal human actions. She's got to be one of us, and extremely powerful to be able to hide the fact she's moonborn." The pack instantly devolved into a whispered argument.

  Again, there was a range of responses. It was obvious that whatever Jasmin had seen was linked somehow to the oath she'd taken earlier, which didn't exactly endear her to anyone. Isaac was cautiously in favor of waiting Adri out until her purposes became more obvious, while James wanted to ambush her before school and kill her.

  I let them bicker for nearly an hour before I finally shut them up and told them that we were going to adopt a wait-and-see posture. There were several questions, and it wasn't until I told them that I didn't want anyone leaving Rachel alone with her that I realized Rachel had just spent the better part of two hours in the tutoring lab, the same one that Adri had started working at just a few days earlier.

  Chapter 8

  Rachel wasn't happy when I told her our suspicions about Adriana. Somewhere along the line she'd decided that the new girl was going to be her new best friend and she refused to believe that Adri could possibly be someone sent to help Brandon bring us down.

  My normally composed little sister ran the whole gamut of teen angst over the next two hours. She cried, yelled, threw things at me, and generally did all of the things I'd never have let anyone else get away with.

  I left partway through the tantrum when Isaac sounded the warning that we had Brandon's pack inbound. Brandon's people proceeded to all but run us into the ground over the remainder of the night. We saw each individual in the pack at some point, but never all at the same time. It was obvious they were rotating people out on a regular basis so they could wear us down. Unfortunately knowing that
was what they were doing didn't help.

  By the end of the night we were all tired and sloppy. Vincent chose that opportunity to set up a little ambush and only sheer dumb luck put Isaac close enough to Jasmin to drive him off. I finally stumbled back home just before seven and found Rachel awake and waiting for me.

  "Okay, Alec. Here's the deal. I won't fight you on this Adri thing on two conditions."

  She didn't even blink at my exhausted stare, so I finally nodded for her to continue.

  "One, I still get to go to tutoring. You can assign whomever you want as bodyguards, but I need to be able to go there or I'll never pass Mrs. Campbell's class."

  I slowly shook my head. "We can tutor you here."

  "That will never work and you know it. Everyone's already spread too thin trying to keep up with Brandon's latest series of provocations. The last thing any of you can do is spend an hour or two holding my hand through basic algebra."

  "Not that I'm agreeing, but what's the second condition?"

  "I need your help starting a rumor. A counter-rumor, really."

  I already knew where this was headed, but Rachel went ahead and said it outright.

  "Adri needs someone sticking up for her. Whoever started the gossip about her collapsing is ruining her life and we need to help."

  "It was Britney, and the last thing she needs is help from us. You realize if we're right that she's probably one of the Coun'hij. One of the really terrible ones that nobody can put a face to because they can't risk what would happen to them if we all knew who they were."

  Rachel shrugged unconcernedly and the matter was settled. I assigned Isaac and James to take turns chaperoning her, and then the two of us pooled what we knew about her and Rachel came up with a counter-rumor that I thought was a little over the top, but which she was positive would do the trick.

  I showered and then we all motorcaded into school. Rachel filled Dom in on the plan on the way, and then it was time to execute.

  I was surprised at how much fun it was. Dom and Rachel got started right away, but I didn't get my first opening until English. When I heard Tina Jones and Nikki Thomas begin discussing Britney's rumor I leaned over and interrupted them.

  "You guys should really get all your facts straight before you go off half-cocked like that."

  I thought it was a little gruff, but Rachel and Dom had both suggested I play the role of high-and-mighty king of the social food chain to the hilt.

  "What do you mean? I've talked to three different people who saw her collapse in physics her first day here, and everyone knows she's odd. The only reason Brandon ever even noticed her is because she pretends to be clumsy and throws herself at him every chance she gets."

  I shrugged nonchalantly. "I'm not saying she hasn't collapsed, but hasn't it occurred to either of you to wonder why it is she's doing so?"

  "Um, like because she's a freak? I'd think it would be pretty obvious that's she's faking it for attention."

  "Try again. Nobody's that good of an actress. There's something in her past that's got her pretty messed up, everyone else is just too dense to see it."

  My script had run out after my second comment. I'd never meant to give any kind of reason for Adri's behavior, it had just kind of popped out of me. The startling part was that I wanted to believe it was the truth. It would be so much better if this really were a series of freakish anomalies. If she wasn't faking, maybe she wasn't a rogue Fir'shan intent on taking our pack down.

  The only question was, if she wasn't faking, then why hadn't I ever wondered what was causing her panic attacks?

  The question was one that stuck with me through the rest of the day. Our whisper campaign was highly successful. It seemed hard to believe, but in the course of just an hour and a half almost the entire school was abuzz with a new set of carefully-crafted rumors.

  Physics was even more of a trial than I'd expected it to be. Adriana was back to pretending nothing unusual had happened. Mrs. Alexander was keeping a close eye on us for whatever reason, so there was nothing to do but watch impassively as she angrily moved her desk next to mine. Being within arm's reach of her made my skin crawl, but I refused to let her understand just how much I'd figured out.

  Isaac nodded at the end of the day when I reminded him he was on Rachel watch. Rather than complaining about the duty he just added a few extra books to his bag and started towards the lab. I hadn't managed to catch the titles of any of them, but it was a good bet they weren't in English. Isaac spoke more languages than anyone else I'd ever met, and unless he was deep in the midst of learning a new one, he generally could be found reading a novel or history book in Italian, Spanish, German or Arabic. There were a few more rattling around inside his head but it was nearly a full-time job to try and keep up with his scholastic endeavors.

  Arriving home was a distinct relief. I wanted nothing quite as much as to head to my room and catch up on the hour and a half of sleep I'd missed the night before, but there were more important things to be done.

  Donovan met me at the door with a thick letter. He always knew when I was going to go visit her. At first I'd assumed he was just tracking the food shipments, but over the years there had been a couple of times when there hadn't been a food shipment to give me away. I quickly checked that nobody was within hearing range and then took the letter.

  "How do you do that, Donovan?"

  "I've had much of the raising of you these many years, Master Alec, but I'm not so vain as to assume that I have answers to all of your questions. Occasionally something pressing comes up that is completely outside of my ken. It's only natural to assume that when those times arise you'll visit our mutual friend."

  I would have expected a level of sorrow to go with such a confession but Donovan didn't seem melancholy, at least not more than the occasion called for. I grasped his arm in a most unprofessional display of appreciation and then tucked his letter away and left.

  Even after all these decades of service and care, he still didn't feel it proper for Rachel and me to embrace him, but sometimes it wasn't about what he needed. Sometimes we had to do it simply because we needed reassurance from the man who'd replaced a murdered father and an absent mother.

  The R1 was crouched in one corner of the garage, sleek and low like some kind of shiny predator. I slipped a pair of sunglasses on, walked the bike out to the driveway, and then streaked down our lane with the instant power that you couldn't find anywhere else outside of a four-hundred-thousand-dollar car.

  Once I turned off of the main road I opened the throttle up and felt the thrill of my front tire coming off of the ground at sixty miles an hour before the first corner came up and I had to lean on the brakes.

  I threw the bike over with a heavy dose of counter-steering and then used both lanes to streak around the corner at a significantly higher speed than I could have managed in my Porsche. All too soon the trip was over and it was time to start checking my back trail.

  I pulled up to the dilapidated shed that would serve as a hiding spot for my bike and then spent a few minutes with a pair of binoculars looking for signs that anyone had followed me. This stretch of road began well inside the pack's territory and didn't connect to another road for nearly sixty miles, so the only way for any of Brandon's wolves to stumble on it would be for them to either penetrate very deep into our land, or detour out nearly one hundred and fifty miles and come in from the other side.

  I ensured that the road was well-maintained on this side through a stream of anonymous bribes to a couple of DOT employees, but the other side devolved into a pot-hole filled mess. The payments were technically illegal, but I made sure that they included enough cash to pay for the actual cost of maintaining the road, and so far my pet bureaucrats had been passing along the state's cut as instructed.

  A few minutes later I was traversing the little-used path down to the cabin, and then knocked on the door.

  Mallory answered, moving slowly as always. She favored me with a smile at the unexpected
visit, accepted Donovan's letter and then motioned me towards one of the empty chairs in her tiny living room.

  "Much as I enjoy your visits, I know you don't stop by for an unscheduled trip unless something is bothering you. What's happened, Alec?"

  "I think we've got one of the Coun'hij in town pretending to be a normal human while she aids Brandon in his effort to tear the pack apart."

  Mallory's face was wonderfully expressive. It was one of the few parts of her battered body that didn't hurt and she used it in place of the body language more common to the moonborn.

  "You're sure she's a shape shifter?"

  "It's all circumstantial, but it's adding up. She's got no history, doesn't show up on any of the databases we've managed to get access to so far. Her glow is stronger than Brandon's, but she doesn't ever seem to raise any power, which would hint at a control so solid that it's almost unimaginable. She faced down Cassie in front of Brandon's entire pack and then turned around and seems to be dating Brandon. She knows things she shouldn't know."

  For several seconds Mallory didn't respond. The room began to arc with power as she brought her beast back under control. Mallory's control was good. It hadn't always been, but the injuries she'd received the night my father had died made shifting form excruciating, and she'd had to master her beast to avoid unnecessary agony.

  "I'm probably not the most objective individual when it comes to the murderers on the Coun'hij, Alec."

  "You were there. You saw what happened; you are the only living person who fought them instead of just bowing down and waiting for the ax to fall."

  Mallory looked up with fire in her eyes and for a moment I saw the powerful hybrid lurking inside the frail woman I'd known nearly my entire life. The hybrid who had been one of my father's most loyal supporters, the one who'd attacked Agony when he'd been bleeding my father to death.

  "That's not fair to Donovan. He stood up to them."