“We could bind your powers after every session,” Dr. Akin said. “If you prefer.”
Scott tensed. He did not prefer. Repeated bindings ate away at a sorcerer’s magic and in extreme cases, did severe mental damage.
“So, are you ready to take me up on my offer?” Dr. Akin asked. “I can take you to your new room, let you get settled, and we can talk more in the morning.”
Scott closed his eyes and shook his head. He didn’t trust any of this, and not because he thought the doctor was lying. There was something being unsaid, some trump card that hadn’t yet been played. He could feel it.
“Do you really want to stay in a cage?” Dr. Akin asked.
“What happened to the wolf who was here before me?” Scott asked.
“I’m not sure what you’re talking about,” Dr. Akin lied. “There might have been a werewolf in here before you, but I’d have to do some checking to find out what happened afterward. We often use this room as an intake.”
Scott shifted his body to the side. “I’ll stay in the cage.”
Dr. Akin’s smile disappeared. “I was hoping you’d be reasonable. There’s a lot we can learn from one another. Our file on you suggests that underneath your brutal exterior, you have the heart of an academic.”
Scott did growl then, despite himself. What made them think they knew his heart at all? He’d like to get his hands on this file of theirs, not to mention whoever had put it together.
“Oh, we have a thorough file on you,” Dr. Akin said. “Before you were bitten at age sixteen, you never so much as had a B on your report card. You were in the advanced track, the gifted program, and in your free time you studied experimental magic with your uncle, who was supposed to take you on as an apprentice.”
Scott didn’t growl this time, but it was a near thing. He tried not to think about his uncle – his father’s brother – who had turned his back on their whole family when they refused to kick Scott out of the house. His mother had already been dead at the time, but when his father had died only two years later, it had fallen upon Scott to raise his much-younger sister, Amanda.
“Do you still dabble in experimental magic?” Dr. Akin asked.
Not as much as he liked. In some ways, he’d buried that part of himself. “What else do you think you know about me?”
“We know you have a powerful gift of intuition. That made it tricky to get to you. We couldn’t get to you directly, of course. It had to be something circumspect enough that the logical connections weren’t obviously there.”
Those connections snapped into place now. “You went after Clinton Carter on purpose, didn’t you?”
“He was perfect. You’ve never even met him, so how could you suspect that someone who went after him was actually going after you? And yet, he’s Madison’s brother, and you’d do anything for her, wouldn’t you?”
“Why would I?” Scott asked. “She’s not pack.”
Dr. Akin snorted. “The only person in Eagle Rock who doesn’t know how you feel about that woman is Madison herself. And yes, we’ve had spies in the area for a long time. Alexander was keenly interested in the area even before he made his move.”
“His bungled move, you mean?” Scott asked.
“It did not go well. For my part, it was the loss of opportunity to interest you in my research that hurt the most.”
“You thought I’d just team up with you to help you butcher werewolves?”
“Butcher wer–” Dr. Akin shook his head. “Is that what you think we’re doing?”
“I smell blood. You can’t clean the smell away, only cover it.”
“We’re trying to help werewolves.” Dr. Akin looked Scott in the eyes. “We’re looking for a cure.”
Scott’s breath caught. Wow. For a moment... just a moment... he was tempted. What a strange and beautiful new world it would be if he didn’t have the monthly curse of the werewolf to contend with. If he could just be a regular human being, unafraid of hurting those he loved.
But could he go back? The wolf wasn’t him; he knew that intellectually and yet he couldn’t deny that some piece of the beast was with him always. Would that piece go away as well, or did it represent some fundamental change to the real him? Something that magic couldn’t undo?
He growled, feeling that aspect. Feeling the small piece of the wolf that was with him always.
“Ah, that got your attention,” Dr. Akin said. “Is that what you want? A cure?”
“I don’t know,” Scott said honestly.
“Come on, work with us. It will be worth your while. You won’t be hurting your fellow wolves, you’ll be helping them.”
Scott shook his head. As tempting as a cure was, he didn’t believe this guy could find one, and even if he did, he didn’t believe that was the whole story.
“Fine, have it your way.” Dr. Akin said. He tucked his clipboard by his side and started for the door. “Oh, I almost forgot. There is one other thing we can offer you in exchange for your willing support.”
Scott didn’t ask. He wouldn’t rise to the bait.
“We can give you Madison.”
Chapter 20
IT WAS EASIER TO RESOLVE TO not let fear rule her life, Madison decided, when she wasn’t being held prisoner God-only-knew where by God-only-knew who. They fed her, so they probably weren’t planning to kill her yet, but they didn’t tell her anything. After three days she wasn’t sure if knowing the truth would help or not, but it would at least give her something new to think about.
The room they kept her in was white. The attached bathroom was white. The sheets on the bunk beds were white. The fact that there were bunk beds had her a little nervous, wondering if she should expect a roommate, but given everything else she had to worry about, that concern ranked pretty low on the list.
There were two doors out of the bedroom, one leading to the bathroom, the other leading – presumably – to freedom. She had been unconscious when they’d brought her in so all she knew about whatever lay on the other side of that door came from the glimpses she got whenever the guards brought her food. She had an impression of gray stone walls and other doorways, and thought she must be in a basement, though the lack of windows might have had something to do with that assumption.
The people who brought her food dressed in army fatigues and carried some kind of assault rifles. They didn’t speak, just set the tray of food down three times a day, and collected the old tray. They didn’t precisely ignore her; as a matter of fact, they watched her like a hawk, but no matter what she said they did not reply. She tried singing a question once, only to receive a slap in the face to shut her up. Apparently, they knew about her gift.
She had taken to thinking of them as stone faces, partly because they may as well have been carved from granite and partly because it made her less anxious to think of them as inhuman. After all, she sensed they thought of her that way.
Her room was furnished with cable TV and as she had endless hours with nothing else to do, she watched it. Morning talk shows, which she had never cared for in the past, now became her one connection to the outside world. The one way she could be sure there still was an outside world, rotating on its axis as usual. Only her world had stopped spinning.
She didn’t believe she would survive, although she had not gone so far as to reconcile herself to death. She wanted to think she couldn’t die without at least knowing why, but how foolish was that? Of course she could die at any moment, and the stone faces probably wouldn’t lose sleep over having to carry out the order.
It all must have something to do with Alexander DuPris’s Magical Underground, because why else would his underling have taken her prisoner? But what? Was Alexander the one doing experiments on werewolves? And to what end? If he wanted to lead the country, could he get away with something like that?
She could just be jumping to conclusions, but she had precious little else to occupy her mind. Captive days were lonely days, and the TV provided cold comfort. It was eithe
r think about what she was doing here, who “they” might be and what they might want with her, or else wade through a lifetime of regrets in the manner of someone saying good-bye to her life.
She still had hope. Two hopes, really. First, there was Evan, who despite everything she had trusted enough to allow him to keep a sample of her blood in a secure location. He could find her with it anywhere, he’d once told her. At least as long as powerful sorcerers weren’t blocking his spells.
Then there was Scott, who might even now be searching the country for Clinton and, by extension, her. As long as Scott remained free then he might once again come to her rescue.
If she ever saw him again... no when. When she saw him again, she had a lot of things to say to him. She wanted to start by thanking him for saving her life, and apologizing for not doing so before. He hadn’t deserved that from her, no matter what had happened after the moon had risen that night. She owed him – not in the literal sense that Evan had paid off – but respect. Gratitude. Humanity.
When the door opened at five o’clock, Madison was confused. Dinner usually came at six, and they hadn’t deviated from their schedule in three days. But then she caught a glimpse of blue scrubs, similar to the ones she’d been wearing ever since she arrived. A moment later Scott came into view not, as she’d hoped, to rescue her, but with his hands in manacles.
Two stone faces came in behind him, one shoving him forward with the butt of his assault rifle. The other unlocked Scott’s manacles before retreating from the room, never taking his eyes off of Scott. For once they didn’t have their stone faces fixed on her at all.
“Scott,” Madison whispered as the two stone faces backed out of the room and the door slid shut behind them. The loud click of the lock sounded more final than it had before.
Scott looked at her, sitting on the bottom bunk with the TV on, and seemed to drink her in from head to toe with his eyes. The look made her feel uncomfortable, but that wasn’t what had her heart hammering against her rib cage.
“You’re a prisoner,” Madison said. Hope shrank in her mind, down to a tiny pinprick.
“So are you.”
“I know. I went to Texas. Just to look. I didn’t do anything but sit in a cafe, but then I saw this man I recognized...”
“One of Alexander DuPris’s men?” Scott filled in when she didn’t finish.
“How did you know?”
“Lucky guess.” His eyes hardened then began a sweep of the room. After a cursory inspection he began to walk a circuit around the small space.
“What are you doing?” Madison asked.
“They said they didn’t have video cameras in here. I’m not taking their word for it.”
“Video cameras?” Her cheeks grew warm. She hadn’t thought of that. She’d showered in the bathroom and changed right here in this room. “Scott? Do you know what you’re looking for?”
“Oh yes. My parents were accomplished thieves. They taught me everything they knew.”
“They did?”
He turned off the TV mounted on the wall and started feeling around behind it, then he ran his hands down the wall and to the small console beneath.
“Have you ever-?” Madison started to ask.
“No,” he said abruptly, almost angrily.
“Is there a way out of here?” She hardly dared to ask, hardly dared to hope, but there was still that pinprick standing between her and real panic.
“A way out of a maximum-security facility warded by several heptades of sorcerers and guarded by armed magical militia?”
Madison swallowed, hard. “I-I see.” Well, that was it, wasn’t it? She was here at the sufferance of her captors, whoever they were, and Scott was trapped with her on the wrong side of the cell door.
Scott was trapped with her...
“When is the next full moon?” Madison asked suddenly.
“I’m not sure. Probably not for two or three weeks.”
Madison looked around the room, then focused back on Scott. “Why did they put you in here with me? What is this about? I don’t get it.”
Scott put his finger to his lips and made a motion with his other hand. It took Madison a few seconds to understand, mostly because the accumulated fears of days of captivity were coming to the surface now. She could no longer hold them at bay, and she wasn’t even sure why she’d want to.
She almost said something else, almost asked what he meant, but some dim part of her mind registered what he was trying to say. They were being bugged – there wasn’t a video camera in the room, but there was a microphone recording every word they said.
She clamped her mouth shut before she said something she’d later regret.
Scott came to sit next to her on the bottom bunk, so close that she could feel the heat of him through twin layers of blue cotton scrubs. The heat called to her. Some insane part of her wanted to reach out and grab hold of it, letting it fill her and provide her some semblance of comfort.
“Are we going to die in here?” Madison asked, the question springing from her lips before she could stop it.
“No,” Scott said firmly.
“Please don’t lie to me. Why are they keeping me here? They could just wipe my memory and set me free, don’t tell me they couldn’t.”
“They could,” Scott said.
“Then why?”
“Because you’re the leverage they’re using against me.”
Madison let that sink in for a minute. She inched closer to Scott until her leg brushed against his. She heard a slight indrawn breath next to her but he didn’t make another move, and neither did she.
“You can’t let them,” she said, though her voice shook. “Don’t worry about me.”
His arms came around her then, pulling her fully against him so that her head rested on his chest. She breathed him in, borrowing his strength, drawing forth what comfort she could from the dangerous man who held her fate in his hands.
Chapter 21
WHEN MADISON COLLAPSED AGAINST HIM, IT was Scott’s turn to tremble. He didn’t want to let her go, and some treacherous part of his mind thought that he didn’t have to. He could make her his, here in the bowels of this prison. No one was stopping him, least of all Madison who clung to him as if she might not let him go.
Oh, Dr. Akin was a smart man. He’d known that Scott would have been perfectly content to stay in the cage rather than help him with anything – at least until he dangled Madison in front of him like some kind of perverse treat. It made Scott sick to think of Madison being used that way, but even worse was the implied threat to Madison’s life if Scott didn’t behave like a well-trained puppy.
Dr. Akin would die. Slowly. Scott let himself dwell on various revenge scenarios to help keep him from doing anything really stupid – like kissing Madison. The exercise worked, at least for a while, but as Madison’s shaking subsided and she continued to cling to Scott for comfort it was all he could do to keep his hands from roaming.
She trusted him. She was afraid, but not of him, not immediately. The thought humbled him, especially since he’d lied to her. He didn’t have any way to guarantee her safety. Quite the contrary, he was likely to get her hurt. He refused to consider that he might get her killed.
He had lied to her in another way too, a lie of omission but a bigger lie for all that. He hadn’t told her about Clinton – about what they had done to him, what he had done to Scott, and what Scott would have to do to him. He should tell her, but he knew he wouldn’t.
He had no idea how long they stayed like that, he only knew it ended too soon. When the door opened and one of the jailers came in, Madison pulled away from him, taking her softness and warmth with her and leaving Scott feeling empty.
The jailer, one of the men who had ushered him into the room before, came inside carrying a tray of food which he set atop the dresser. A second jailer, a woman this time, stood guard by the door with her assault rifle ready and her eyes fixed on Scott. He stared her down, neither of them blinking,
until both jailers backed out of the room and closed the door behind them.
Scott’s nose twitched in anticipation of the meal, which smelled like chicken and potatoes.
“It’s always dry,” Madison said. “They don’t exactly hire gourmet chefs here.”
“I’m too hungry to care right now.”
He was, too. He devoured the food, and though he needed big gulps of water in between bites to get the chicken down, it tasted wonderful to him.
After dinner, Madison turned on the TV. Scott suspected that she didn’t want to have to talk to him more than she wanted to watch sitcoms, but he didn’t mind. He needed time to think, to come to terms with his new reality, and to plan.
He climbed up to the top bunk, stretched out across the firm mattress, and stared at the popcorn ceiling about three feet above his head. Then he closed his eyes and found his quiet place.
He found his magic in an instant, but as he suspected, he would only be able to use it in limited ways. There was a cage of magic around this room more solid than the walls, and he couldn’t even see through it to the fortifications that might be around the rest of the compound.
Still, he clung to hope. He didn’t have a clear idea yet, but he realized he had two advantages. First, he had Madison, unbound and able to sing. They didn’t seem concerned by her gift or her minimal talents, but he had seen some of what it could do and he would not underestimate it – or her.
Second, they didn’t understand his link to the moon. He felt the pull of the moon now, even through layers of steel and concrete, and it occurred to him that he might be able to get a fix on the time of the month by the flow of magic through his veins. The process took some time, especially since he had to take into account the absence of his familiar node, but he finally found his answer – there was no moon at all reflecting the light of the sun in the Northern Hemisphere that night. His powers were at their weakest now, but they would grow over the next two weeks, giving him time.
Scott wasn’t aware of the passage of time until he heard the TV click off and felt Madison climbing into bed. He wished he didn’t have such a clear picture of her lying there beneath him, but he was entirely too aware of her presence. He heard every brush of fabric as she tried to get comfortable. He smelled her unique scent, without the usual warm vanilla he had come to associate with her. That must have come from a shampoo she used at home. Here they gave her unscented soap so there was nothing masking the clean scent that was all her.
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