by Bella Jacobs
I crack open the door with a smile, my grin widening when Kite does a double take. “Wow,” he breathes, appreciation flickering in his gaze as the basket of toiletries drops to his side. “You look…incredible.”
“Thanks,” I say. “It’s nice to have clothes that fit again. I can’t wait to tell Selkie thank you.”
He waves a hand. “She’s a sweetheart and happy to loan you anything you need. She wanted to be here to join the welcome committee, but she’s on daycare duty until five. But you’ll see her at the party tonight.”
“Party?” I ask, excitement and anxiety fizzing inside me. I can’t remember the last time I went to a party and wonder if I’ll remember what to do.
“Of course.” He scoffs. “You think I’d bring you home for the first time and not throw you a party? Besides, we’re always up for an excuse to play music and dance until dawn. You’ll learn once you’ve been around the shifter world a while—bears have a reputation.”
“As party animals?” I tease.
“As connoisseurs of carnal pleasure,” he says with a wink. “We like to drink good beer, eat good food, dance all night and take decadent, three hour naps the next day.”
“Sounds nice,” I say, my belly grumbling loud enough to echo off the tile walls of the bathroom, making us both laugh. “Especially the food part.”
“Then let’s get you a snack. My Aunt Nan is going to smoke an obscene amount of salmon for the feast tonight, but that doesn’t mean we can’t pre-game.” He holds out the basket. “You want any of this stuff? I personally don’t think you need it, but…”
I take the basket with a smile. “Probably the deodorant would be a good call, and I’m inclined to listen to people who tell me what to put in my hair. Left to my own devices, my signature look is rat’s nest with a side of frizz.”
“I like your hair,” he says, adding with a happy gleam in his eyes, “And I like you. And I’m glad you’re here.” He leans in, pressing a kiss to my cheek that makes me feel warm all over. “Meet us in the kitchen when you’re done. I’ll have snacks ready.”
I thank him and close the door, completing my primping rituals to the best of my ability, grateful for the lotion his sisters so thoughtfully provided. It’s clearly homemade—something silky and light that smells of citrus and sea grass—and once it has soaked into my skin, a beautiful fresh scent rises around me every time I move.
I’ve never given a ton of thought to smelling good, aside from basic cleanliness, of course, but all of a sudden, I long to smell sweet, tempting, to give Kite a reason to bring his nose to my neck and inhale. I shiver at the thought, secretly hoping there will be time for us to be alone soon. So far I adore his family and friends, and I’m coming to care about all of the men on this mission with me, even Luke, though I know he probably won’t be around for long.
But with Kite…
With Kite there’s already something more, something so strong that when I slip into the kitchen to find the large table next to the stove surrounded by three gorgeous women I can only assume are his sisters, I can’t help but feel a little letdown. I’m excited to get to know them: I’m just equally excited to keep getting to know their brother…
“There you are, welcome, welcome, baby girl!” The woman at the far side of the room rises from her seat at the head of the table and crosses to me with her arms outstretched. She’s petite—no more than five three and a hundred pounds—but with well-defined muscles on the bare arms visible in her simple black shift dress and a powerful presence that surrounds me in warmth and welcome as she pulls me into a hug.
I blink in surprise at the sudden sense of familiarity, but then it hits me. “Mina?” I ask as I draw back from the embrace, gazing down into the human face of Kite’s mother. Aside from the wrinkles around her eyes when she smiles, and the faint streaks of gray in her long black hair, she looks more like his big sister than a mother of seven.
She grins in acknowledgement. “Sorry I couldn’t meet you like this before. I was out fishing all morning and ran out of time to change.”
I laugh as I shake my head. “I’m sorry. It’s just…I thought Kite was joking when he called you his sweet little mama before. Now I get it.”
Mina grins. “That’s confusing, isn’t it? Growing up in a shifter community, you get used to the fact that human size doesn’t have much to do with the size of your kin form. But I imagine a lot of this must be shocking for you. You’ve only known you were one of us a few days, is that right?”
“Not one of us,” a woman wearing a heavy sweater that seems too much for the cozy kitchen pipes up from the table. “She’s ancient lineage, mama.”
“Best check yourself and respect herself,” adds a younger woman with a red polka-dot bow in her hair and thick black liner on her upper lids. Their tones are good-natured, not judgmental or angry, but I can’t help feeling like I’ve done something wrong.
“I’m still not sure what I am,” I say, wanting to apologize, but not sure what to apologize for. “I know I’m supposed to have multiple forms, and I sort of…caught fire by accident once. But aside from that, I’m mostly a mess.”
“A hot mess sounds like,” Red Bow teases, rising from her chair. She holds out a hand. “I’m Leda. Also a hot mess, but for much less respectable reasons.”
“Leda likes to go fast,” Kite says from the sink where he’s washing a bowl of cherries that look absolutely delicious. “In addition to being chief of our police—the cool cop, the one who never hands out speeding tickets—she’s one of the top motocross racers in the northwest.”
“Top crashers in the northwest in more like it.” Mina tuts as she wraps her arm around her taller daughter’s waist and hugs her close. “How many bones have your broken now, crazy girl?”
“Seven or eight.” Leda grins. “But I’m hoping for an even dozen before I retire. What about you, Wren? What do you want to do with your one wild and wonderful life now that you’ve been sprung from the cult?”
My lips part, but Kite clears his throat before I can speak. I glance his way and he shakes his head, making it clear honesty isn’t the best policy here. I guess our mission is secret even from trusted family.
Or maybe just most of the trusted family. The somber look that settles on his mother’s face makes me think she knows more about what the future holds for her son than she’s told her daughters.
“I’m not sure,” I answer, deciding it’s close enough to the truth. I’m not sure what I’ll want to do once our mission is over, or if that will even be my choice to make. If I’m in charge of creating harmony and balance in the world, will I have time for a career? Hobbies? A pet, even? “The past week’s been a whirlwind.”
“I can imagine,” the sweater-snuggled woman at the table pipes up. “I’m Vera, by the way. I would come give you a hug, but I’m fighting off a summer cold and I don’t want to risk infecting you. Since you just got off all those shifter suppression drugs, your immune system is probably still compromised.”
“Vera is a doctor,” Leda supplies, pressing her palms together in prayer position and lifting her gaze to the ceiling. “She’s the good daughter, the angel to my devil.”
Vera snorts. “Oh, please. I got into more trouble as a teen than you ever did. You were just too little to remember how many times Mom kicked my ass for sneaking out.”
“I do not kick anyone’s ass,” Mina says primly. “I put my foot down. Firmly.” She waves me closer. “Come sit down, Wren. Take a load off, eat something. Kite’s put out several options, but if there’s something else you’re craving, let me know, and I can send one of the grandbabies on a run to the market. They’re out playing in the backyard, but I’m happy to put them to work.”
I settled into a chair beside Mina’s. “Oh, no, this is perfect. Amazing.” I scan the plates. There are at least three kinds of cheese, an equal variety of crackers, a tray mounded with carrots and whisper-thin asparagus, a bowl of fruit, some pasta salad, other assorted Tupperware co
ntainers of leftovers, and Kite adds the bowl of cherries to the mix as he sits down on my other side.
“Just how much do you think I’m capable of eating in one sitting?” I ask beneath my breath, gazing up at him out of the corner of my eye.
“I don’t know,” he says, grinning. “But I look forward to finding out. Nothing sexier than a woman with an appetite.”
The words make me blush, but when I glance around the table, none of the other women seem fazed by the comment. Either they’re used to Kite flirting with women, or he’s already alerted them to the nature of our relationship. As I load my plate, I can’t help but hope it’s the latter.
The others join me in my snack, and the conversation turns to tribe business—how the oyster harvest is looking, who’s in charge of the hillside gardens this year, and whether they can afford to buy new books for the Bookmobile that services all the various villages on the tribal lands.
“So this isn’t the only settlement?” I ask, intrigued.
“This is the real settlement,” Leda says, popping a cherry into her mouth and talking as she chews. “The casino village is a Disney version of tribal culture for the tourists, something for them to checkout in between losing their money. And the village by the highway is basically a military installation disguised as Main Street.”
“We were attacked by Kin Born forces a few years back,” Vera explains. “We lost a lot of people, so we learned to be more vigilant.”
“And more heavily armed.” Leda spits her cherry pit onto her plate with a sharp thwup. “Luckily the casino wasn’t damaged in the raid, so we still have lots of money coming in to buy big, deadly toys.”
“Let’s leave that talk for the council,” Mina says, pushing her plate away.
“Mom hates guns,” Leda offers in sotto voce.
“I do not. I hate that we’ve drifted so far from our roots,” Mina says. “There was a time when the shifter community had honor, even in times of war. For thousands of years we fought with only the gifts of our kin forms and nothing more. The day we started using mankind’s weapons on each other was the day we signed away a sacred piece of our culture. Of our souls.”
Silence falls, even Leda apparently having nothing sarcastic to offer in response. I twirl a cherry stem between my fingertips, wondering if Mina knows her gentle son is a crack shot, and if so, what she thinks about it.
“Now tell me about catching fire, baby girl.” Mina pats my shoulder with an encouraging smile. “Let’s see if some advice from an old timer can get you feeling a little more in control of these gifts you’ve been given.”
“I would love some advice.” I thread my fingers together into a single fist my lap. “Honestly, I’m scared to death it’s going to happen again and I’m going to hurt someone by accident.”
“That’s your first step, then. Got to get rid of that fear.” Mina rubs her palm up and down my back, sending soothing energy coursing through my muscles, making me feel instantly relaxed. “Fear takes you out of your head and your heart, both of which you need to control a shift. If you let fear call the shots in your body, it’s going to force a shift, which is only going to make you feel more out of control and more afraid. It’s a vicious cycle, yeah?”
I nod. “I learned that working with troubled kids at the shelter I run. Fear is at the root of pretty much every behavior issue, even if it manifests as anger or bullying or drug abuse.”
Mina nods. “Right. So you’re a step ahead. You know how to spot fear, know where it likes to hide out and the disguises it puts on to trick you.”
“It was anger when I caught fire,” I say, the pieces begin to fall into place. “I was thinking about my sister, and I got so insanely angry, but…” I shake my head. “Beneath the anger, I was afraid.”
“And what were you afraid of?” Mina asks.
I exhale. “I was afraid that… That I’m going to lose my parents. If they knew what they were doing, if they did it realizing that the meds were making us sick…” I meet Mina’s compassionate gaze, throat going tight as tears prick at the backs of my eyes. “I can forgive them for hurting me, but not for killing her. If I find out they knew, then they’re murderers, and I can’t forgive them for that.”
I feel Kite’s hand on my knee beneath the table, and a second reassuring wave of comfort rushes through me, making me laugh softly even as I sniff back the tears trying to escape my eyes. “You guys are better than Valium and a puppy snuggle. I bet no one around here needs antidepressants, huh?”
Mina smiles. “We try to alleviate pain when we can, those of us who have a gift for it. But even bears get the blues.”
“Though, bear snuggles are way better than puppy snuggles,” Kite jokes, clearly trying to lighten the mood. “One look at Luke makes that obvious.”
“Ugh, wolves,” Leda says, rolling her eyes with a huff. “Why must they be so cranky and sexy and utterly irresistible?”
Kite scowls. “No more wolves for you. Especially that wolf. Stay away from him, Leda. I’m serious. He’s an ex-con, and I don’t trust him as far as I could throw him.”
Kite pulls his hand from my knee, but not before I sense another emotion humming beneath his skin. He’s afraid, too. I want to tell him that he doesn’t have to fear Luke, but no matter how much a part of me is softening toward the wolf, the fact remains that he’s killed people and feels zero remorse about it. At least six people, and maybe more—we didn’t get into the specifics of how he became so skilled at assassinating people without getting caught in the first place.
“Focus, children,” Mina says gently. “We’re doing kin work right now, not human work.” She brings her other hand to my back, until both palms are resting on my shoulder blades. “Can you take a deep breath for me, baby girl? Let’s see if we can help get rid of some of this fear trying to take control.”
I inhale, feeling a bit like I’m at the doctor’s office, though no doctor has ever made me feel so instantly relaxed, grounded, or…whole.
I close my eyes, and Mina murmurs, “That’s right. Focus on your breath and go deep inside. With every inhale you draw in light and with every exhale you cast out darkness.”
My lungs expand, filling all the way and then stretching just a bit more before I part my lips and send the air out in a long, slow stream, visualizing black smoke streaming into the air, leaving my interior lighter, freer.
“Now imagine the world inside you lighting up as the shadows fade away,” Mina continues. “And when you’re ready, open your eyes and take a look around.”
Sensing she means eyes other than the ones in my head, I imagine a smaller version of me cracking her lids somewhere in the tunnels inside my mind. But when Mini Me opens her eyes, I’m not in a dark warren or a crowded closet, I’m on a small boat in the middle of the ocean, brilliant blue and dazzling water all around me as far as I can see.
Chapter 27
Wren
A soft sound of surprise escapes my lips, echoing across the waves.
“What do you see?” Mina asks, farther away than she was before.
“Water,” I say, my voice dreamy and distant. “The ocean. All around me. I’m on a small boat.”
Mina hums thoughtfully, but when she speaks there’s no judgment in her tone. “Interesting. What else can you see? Any islands? Land in the distance?”
Little Me lifts a hand, shielding her eyes from the glaring sun. I scan the horizon in one direction, finding nothing but more water. But when I turn, I spot land not far away. “There’s an island,” I say, squinting harder. “It’s small and rocky, and there’s something on it… At the top, but it’s too cloudy to see clearly… Looks like there’s a storm moving in.”
“Inhale light and exhale shadow,” Mina repeats. “Inhale and exhale and see if you can clear those obstacles away.”
I obey, and after only a few breaths, the clouds part. “A volcano,” I say, the sight making sense in a deep, intuitive way I don’t completely understand at first. But then it hits
me, “Fire. That’s my fire form! It lives on that island.”
“Perfect!” The pride in Mina’s voice reminds me of my mother, of Abby, and how utterly thrilled she was to see me hit each tiny new milestone on the road to growing up. The thought makes me sad, and a moment later the clouds are back, cloaking the island so thoroughly I can barely make it out against the horizon.
“It’s okay,” Mina says, seeming to sense that I’ve lost my clarity. “This is a great first look around. Before you come back to us, see if you can find anything that might be connecting your boat to that island. Maybe a rope or something? Could even be a brighter shade of blue beneath the waves or a warm vein running through cooler water.”
I study the waves, but they’re all the same crystalline blue, a color that brings to mind Greek islands and bleached white houses perched on cliffs bursting with bright pink bougainvillea. It’s a Mediterranean ocean, which is strange, considering the only oceans I’ve ever seen in real life are the grayer waves off the coast of the Pacific Northwest. I reach down to trail fingers beneath the water, seeking signs of that warm vein Mina mentioned, but the ocean is all the same—almost too cool and getting colder the longer my fingers stay beneath the surface.
I’m about to tell Mina that I can’t find anything, when I spot it, a long ribbon of seaweed about fifty feet down, waving gently in the current. But it only moves up and down, remaining otherwise in place as other pieces of seaweed pass it by.
“I think I’ve found it,” I say. “There’s a thick rope of seaweed leading from the boat to the island.”
“Excellent,” Mina says. “That’s what you’ll use to connect to your other form. Sometimes just laying your hand on it and focusing for a beat or two is enough to instigate a shift.” She laughs as she hurries to add, “Though, don’t do it now, if you don’t mind. I’m pretty attached to these wooden chairs. Been in the family for three generations.”