by Zoe Chant
Then they were past, the truck still turning, travelling backward. A jolt rattled her teeth so hard she tasted her own blood. The vehicle slammed to a halt, tilted crazily with two wheels lodged in a ditch.
Her ears rang. She clawed at her seatbelt. It seemed to take an age before the strap finally released its stranglehold on her neck. She sucked in a grateful, shaking breath.
“Cal?” she croaked.
The engine had cut out, but the headlights still stared blindly into the dark. The harsh glow illuminated Callum’s slack face. He hung from his own seatbelt, slumped over the steering wheel. Blood masked his features.
“Cal!” She scrambled across to him. He didn’t rouse at her touch. His pulse beat weakly against her searching fingertips.
Something moved in the beams of the headlights. Something big and shambling, with shaggy brown fur. Eyes glittered red, meeting her own through the windscreen.
It was a bear.
A grizzly bear. An adult male, the biggest she’d ever seen.
She froze, not daring even to breathe. The bear rose onto its hind legs, towering as high as the truck, still holding her gaze. Lips wrinkled back from finger-long fangs. It wasn’t a snarl.
The bear looked like it was smiling.
The massive paws slammed down. She shrieked, covering her head, as the windscreen cracked and crazed. The bear’s claws screeched across the glass.
She yanked frantically at Callum’s seatbelt as the bear drew back for another blow. With the strength of desperation, she wrestled him free, hauling him out of reach just as the bear’s paw smashed through the glass.
She scrabbled into the back of the vehicle, dragging Callum’s limp body over the rows of seats. It wasn’t much more cover, but at least the bear couldn’t just scoop them out like shucking an oyster.
A big black nose poked through the hole in the windscreen. Nostrils flared, huffing. The snout withdrew, replaced by a beady, gleaming eye. It studied them for a long moment.
The eye blinked, and disappeared. The truck bounced as the bear took its paws off the hood. In the narrow gap between the seats, she caught a glimpse of the massive silhouette dropping to all fours again. She could hear its claws clicking on asphalt as it circled the vehicle.
It was coming round the back. No point ripping apart the front of the truck when it could just tear off the rear door.
That’s not right, it’s not possible, bears don’t do that! some distant part of her brain was yammering. But there wasn’t time for disbelief.
Instinctively, she groped in the darkness. The bear’s heavy, panting breath sounded from outside the truck, barely a foot away. A weapon, she needed a weapon. Something, anything—
Her hands closed on a familiar shape.
Bless Seth and his arrogant disregard for regulations.
She’d never thought she’d be thankful for B-squad’s sloppiness, but she was now. Encouraged by Seth’s lax attitude, they always took every chance to cut corners and shave a few minutes off their chores.
By, for example, leaving their gear in their truck rather than properly returning it to the tool store.
Claws scrabbled at the rear door. With a shriek of metal, the hinges gave way.
In one smooth, practiced motion, Edith yanked the chainsaw to life.
The blade roared like an animal in the confines of the truck. The bear recoiled, only just managing to jerk its foreleg back in time. It stumbled backward, tripping over its own paws in its haste to evade her swing.
She screamed wordlessly at it, brandishing the snarling chainsaw. Any ordinary animal would have fled in panic, but the bear just retreated a few more steps, ears flattening.
The heavy muzzle swung, looking from her to the sky. The bear shifted its weight on its paws as if in indecision.
Its eyes met hers again. It wasn’t the still, enigmatic regard of an animal. A cold, assessing intelligence cut through her as though spreading her out for dissection. There was a person behind that stare.
A low growl built in the bear’s throat. The huge muscles of its shoulders bunched.
With a roar, it charged.
Time seemed to slow. The bear was a tsunami of teeth and claws, blocking out the world. The chainsaw felt as useless as a toy sword in her hands. She braced herself anyway.
A tawny blur streaked out of the sky, smashing the bear aside. The huge animal roared in pain and outrage, tumbling head-over-paws and crashing into a pine tree.
Edith stared.
A creature crouched between her and the bear. Golden wings spread wide, shielding her behind vast pinions. A tufted tail like a lion’s lashed from side to side. Powerful muscles gathered to spring.
She recognized those feline haunches, that eagle head. She knew what it was.
It was…utterly impossible.
The bear rose to its full height, rather more stiffly than before. Blood streaked its fur. It roared at the creature in challenge.
The griffin’s huge beak opened. Its answering shriek split the air. It rose up on its hind legs too, dwarfing even the grizzly. Every golden talon unsheathed, razor-sharp and ready.
The bear flinched. It looked past the griffin, straight at her. Hatred burned in those red, alien depths.
Then it turned tail, and fled into the woods.
The griffin took one great bound after it, then stopped. Its enormous wings shivered for a moment, as though it was on the verge of taking to the air in pursuit of the bear.
The griffin shook itself a little, turning with swift, predatory grace. It folded its wings, the glimmering feathers tucking neatly against its sides. Deep golden eyes fixed on her.
For all the griffin’s size and strength, its gaze was as gentle and warm as sunlight. A strange jolt of recognition gripped her heart. Somehow, she knew those eyes.
The griffin cocked its head, its attention sliding past her to focus on Callum’s unconscious form. It hissed, surging forward.
She’d almost forgotten she was still holding the idling chainsaw. She raised it again, though it felt even more ludicrous to threaten this glorious creature with such a mundane tool.
“P-Please don’t try to eat him,” she said, blocking the griffin’s path. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
The griffin blinked at her.
It settled back on its haunches. And then it settled back more, its outline blurring, shifting into—
“Edith.” Rory straightened, holding up his hands. “It’s me.”
Chapter 25
Seth tripped, one boot jarring into the weeds. Cursing, he cast around with the feeble beam of his cellphone flash, finding the edge of the road again.
The growl of an approaching engine brightened his black mood. He turned hopefully, sticking out his thumb.
“Well, screw you too!” he yelled, as the headlights swept past without pausing.
Seth set off again, punctuating every step with curses. Antler was just a distant cluster of lights behind him. He had no idea how far he’d walked so far, or how much further it was back to base.
“I’m a dam’ hotshot,” he muttered to himself, squinting through the warm fog of tequila. “Don’ care about a lil’ hike. Do it ev’ry day. Easy peasy.”
He didn’t care if it took all night. He’d be damned if he called for someone from his squad to come pick him up, like a little girl crying for momma. No way was anyone ever finding out about tonight.
Except if Rory told them.
Which he no doubt was, right at this very minute.
Likely he was back at base already, that hot-ass Edith chick snuggled up against his side. The two of them spreading the story across the whole crew. Everyone laughing their heads off.
Seth’s fists clenched at his sides. When he finally got back to base, he was going to…to…
Piss his pants again, probably.
Just the thought of confronting Rory again made his bladder squeeze ominously. He had to stop and take a long pull from his bottle of liquid courage to steady
his nerves.
He wasn’t a coward. He wasn’t. The only explanation was that Rory had used some kind of trick on him. Seth had always known in his gut that there was something weird about that guy. Something weird about all those foreign freaks on A-hole squad.
It wasn’t fair. There was no way he could go toe-to-toe with psycho Rory and his hypno-stare. It wasn’t a fair fight.
So he wouldn’t fight fair either.
Oh, he would have his revenge. On freaky Rory and that little tease Edith.
Yes.
All this was her fault. She’d led him on, and then dumped him without a backward glance. Likely the two of them had planned the whole thing, just to humiliate him.
Maybe he’d punish her first. Rory was crazy about her, plain as day. Hurting her would be the best way to hurt him. Yes.
Yesssssss.
The thought echoed oddly in his skull, hissing. He frowned at his tequila bottle. Maybe he was a teeny bit drunker than he’d thought.
He shook his head to clear it, and set off again. The road swerved and swayed under his boots. His feet were starting to hurt. Another thing to add on to the end of his long, long list of grudges. Oh, Rory and his bitch were going to pay.
Lots of ways someone could get hurt out on the line. A faulty chainsaw. A misheard command. A rip in a fire shelter.
I have a better way.
He stopped, tripping over his own feet as he tried to see who had spoken. “Who’s there?”
Silence. The road stretched out in both directions, empty. The only thing he could hear was his own harsh breathing. The forest was pitch-black and impenetrable.
A twig snapped, somewhere in the darkness under the trees. A deep, ancient instinct prickled down his spine. He hefted his tequila bottle by the neck, holding it like a club.
“Don’t come any closer!” He brandished the bottle at the lurking shadows. “You don’t want to mess with me!”
I want to help you.
The voice didn’t come from the bushes. It sounded in his head without involving his ears at all. That couldn’t be real. He was definitely drunk.
I can help you get revenge. The voice coiled through his mind like a snake. We have the same enemy.
Even his hallucinations were pissed off with Rory now? Heh. Maybe he could get a dancing pink elephant to squish the bastard.
“Yeah?” he said, entertained by the experience of talking to his own subconscious. He should get this drunk more often. “Awesome. Got any suggestions for me?”
Let me in.
“You’re already in my head, dumbass.” Wait. Was he insulting himself?
Let me in fully. If you let me in of your own free will, I will be more powerful than you can imagine. More powerful than our enemy. I promise you, everything you desire will come to pass, if you just let me in.
He shrugged, taking another swig of tequila. “Sure. Whatever.”
Laughter filled his mind, drowning out his own muzzy thoughts. Something huge lunged out of the bushes. He was abruptly, icily sober…but it was too late.
Fangs bit down.
And there was nothing left of Seth at all.
Chapter 26
“Hang on.” Edith stared around Rory’s crowded cabin. “You’re all were-griffins?”
“We’re called shifters.” Rory leaned back against the log wall, giving Wystan as much space to work as he could in the small common-room. “And we’re not all griffins. My type of shifter is very rare.”
“Not as rare as mine,” Wystan murmured, his sensitive fingers probing at Callum’s skull. “Or, for that matter, Blaise’s.”
“Yeah, Rory, don’t go giving Edith the impression griffins are special or anything,” Joe said, grinning. “I mean, there are a whole five of you guys in the whole world.”
Five griffins seemed like a lot to her. It was certainly five more than she’d expected. If she hadn’t already been sitting down, her knees would have buckled.
All the squad looked so ordinary. Well, not ordinary, exactly—Rory could make anyone walk into a post, and all the others were just as good-looking in their own different ways. But she’d seen them drinking coffee and scratching bug bites and washing their socks. What sort of magical shapeshifter washed socks?
“So if you aren’t griffins,” she said faintly, “what are you?”
“Pegasus,” Callum said, as if simply stating that his hair was red.
Joe waved a casual hand. “Sea dragon here.”
Fenrir barked. The dog stood up, shook himself…and blurred.
Edith jammed her knuckles into her mouth, biting back a shriek. She shrank back in her chair as the enormous, bristling thing padded toward her on feet the size of dinner plates, claws clicking ominously.
The creature stopped, tail drooping. Red eyes like burning coals gave her a distinctly wounded look.
“You can’t act all injured,” Rory told the monster that had been Fenrir. “What did you expect would happen, springing your full shift form on her without warning like that?”
The monster grumbled low in its throat, sinking back onto its haunches.
Rory’s mouth quirked, as though someone had said something funny. “Yes, but I’m not a hellhound.”
Edith unstuck her fist from her mouth. “H-he’s a shifter too?”
“Yeah,” Blaise said. She was perched cross-legged on the back of the battered sofa, behind Callum. “There’s a reason I told you not to let him sleep on your bed.”
Rory shot a dark glare at the hellhound. “That better have been her idea, not yours.”
Fenrir looked as innocent as a pony-sized wolf with hellfire eyes could look.
“Um.” As much as Edith tried to tell herself that he was still Fenrir—sweet, clever, loyal Fenrir—her monkey hindbrain was screaming wolf wolf run aieeeee! “Can he turn back into his real self now, please?”
“Actually, he can’t.” Wystan didn’t look round, still busy checking Callum for concussion. Cal winced as the paramedic shone a penlight into his eyes. “Or at least, he claims he can’t. He’s always in his shift form. He can tone it down enough to pass as a regular dog, but he isn’t a dog who can turn into a hellhound. Somewhere under that fur is a man. Animals can’t be shifters.”
Fenrir rumbled again, showing a hint of fang.
“You are a shifter,” Rory said firmly. “No matter what you think.”
Edith looked from one to the other. “Wait, you can understand him?”
“Yes, but not the way you think. Hellhounds talk to their pack members telepathically. We’re his pack, so we can hear him in our heads.” Rory rubbed the back of his neck, looking a little awkward. “In fact, the rest of us can talk to each other mind-to-mind too, since we’re all mythic shifters. Sorry.”
Edith was confused. “Why are you apologizing?”
Rory blew out his breath. “Because we’ve occasionally done it in your presence, to talk about things we couldn’t share with you. I know you felt excluded. I’m sorry for that.”
“It was unconscionably rude of us,” agreed Wystan. “Please accept my sincere apologies, Edith.”
“Mine too,” said Joe, his usual grin sliding away for once. “You’re our bro, Edith. We should have been straight with you from the start.”
The others nodded as well. Even Fenrir hung his head, tail curling against his belly.
Edith looked round at all their solemn, disconsolate faces. A giggle bubbled up, turning into a full-blown belly laugh. She toppled sideways, shaking with uncontrollable mirth.
Now they were all staring at her as if she’d lost her mind. Understandably.
“We broke her,” Callum said.
“N-no,” she hiccupped out. “Can’t you see how funny it is? All this time, I thought it was me. I always miss things that everyone else finds obvious. But for once it’s not because I’m autistic!”
She hadn’t meant to say it. The word had just slipped out, carried on her wave of giddy relief. Her laughter caught in her throat
. She froze.
Blaise started giggling. Joe joined in as well, with his loud, unrestrained whoop of exuberant joy. She found that she was smiling again too, though she wasn’t sure why.
“Oh man.” Blaise wiped her eyes, shaking her head. “Is that what you’ve been hiding from us all this time? That must have been awful for you. And all along we were keeping our real selves secret too.”
Callum’s mouth actually crooked up. She’d never seen him smile before. “Ironic.”
A warm hand fell on her shoulder. She looked up at Rory’s profile. His eyes were on the rest of the squad, but his voice was pitched for her alone.
“I told you that I needed someone whose quirks matched ours.” Heat seemed to flood out from his touch, filling her with fire. “You fit with us. We all know that. I hope that you do too.”
Fenrir crept forward. Tentatively, he laid his head in her lap, as he’d done so many times. Out of sheer habit, she scratched behind his ears. His tail wagged.
And just like that, it didn’t matter that his eyes were red flames, or that her leg instantly went numb from his weight. He was himself, and she was herself.
And they were exactly as they should be.
Rory’s hand tightened a little on her shoulder. When he spoke, though, it was to Wystan. “You haven’t told her your animal, Wys.”
Edith shook her head, grateful for the distraction from the confusion of emotion welling within her. “By this point, I’m not going to be surprised if he turns out to be a unicorn.”
“Ah.” Wystan grimaced. “Good.”
Blaise and Joe exchanged a glance, and started laughing again, harder than ever.
Edith stared at the paramedic. “You’re an actual unicorn?”
Wystan rumpled his white-blond hair, looking embarrassed. “Somewhat. In a manner of speaking.”
“You can’t be somewhat a unicorn,” Edith said blankly. “It’s a binary state. You’re either a unicorn or you aren’t.”
“He’s a unicorn,” Callum said, casting a faintly disgusted look at Blaise and Joe, who’d now chortled themselves into incoherent heaps.