Denied--A Novel of the Sazi

by Cathy Clamp

  Claire held up her index finger. “Actually, before we do that, let me run upstairs for a second.” She jumped up and quickly left the apartment, leaving the door open. Anica could hear her footsteps as she ran up the stairs. It was only moments before they returned down again and Claire lugged in three stretched-tight plastic grocery bags. “Alek and I did a major shopping run on the way back because I emptied all my cupboards before we left. It’s mostly healthy, with some junk food thrown in, but I’ll be happy to share. I figured it was this or eat at the diner, and I’d really rather avoid Paula.”

  Anica looked at Rachel, who blanched and winced. “What?” Claire asked. “Has she whacked out again? Do I need to sleep in wolf form for a few days so she doesn’t jump me?”

  Another wave of sadness hit Anica and her eyes teared up. “No. You do not need to fear anymore. Paula was killed yesterday.”

  Claire nearly dropped the bags in her hands and did set them down rapidly before sitting down again. “Oh, Anica. I’m so sorry.”

  No, she wasn’t. The pepper scent was strong in the air. Like Rachel, Claire didn’t like Paula. “That is kind of you to say.” Anica could hear her own words come out raspy, harsh, and brimming with the scent of lie, just as Claire’s words had.

  Claire winced at her anger. Her blue eyes showed a flash of sorrow and her scent finally turned misty, at least with regret. “Okay, you’re right. I’m not sorry. Well, I’m sort of sorry.” That was at least the truth. “I’m sorry for you, because you seemed to get along. But I’m not surprised, I guess is what I mean. Paula made enemies easier than friends.”

  Anica rubbed at her runny nose. “This is true. I hear of many people who do not like her. But I do.” She blinked back tears. “And I will miss her. She did not deserve to die like that.”

  Claire reached forward and touched her hand, more curious now than sad. But Anica couldn’t expect so much anger between them to simply disappear. “What happened?”

  Rachel shrugged and sat forward, reached for the grocery bags, and rose to take them to the kitchen. “Nobody knows yet. Her throat was ripped up and there was a lot of blood. But the house is rubble now, so we might never know for sure.”

  “Oh, wow! I didn’t realize the fires had gotten that close to town. We had to detour a long way to get here. But it didn’t seem to have dropped into the valley.”

  Anica shook her head. “Not burn down. Blew up. There was a bomb in house. We almost explode with it.”

  Now Claire gasped as Rachel confirmed the details from the kitchen. She looked over the top of the refrigerator door. “Yep. Anica was the big hero yesterday. She smelled the bomb and got us all out. Me and Dalvin and Bobby, plus the already-dead Paula.”

  “Wow! You guys had a busy day. I don’t see a bunch of human police, so I presume you stowed the body somewhere?”

  “The basement at Polar Pops,” Rachel said with a nod. Then she looked at the contents of the final bag and let out a small, nearly silent cheer. “Milk! And eggs! And wine! Oh, you are the best, Claire. We’re having breakfast, Anica.”

  “Yes, good. I like chicken eggs, however you cook them.”

  Rachel let out a chuckle. “Chicken eggs? As opposed to what? Ostrich?”

  Now Anica could finally let out a small laugh, but she could feel her eyes burning. She didn’t doubt they were red. “Duck. We had many ducks when I am little. The eggs are very good, and big.” She paused, not sure whether Rachel was supposed to know, or Claire. But Rachel was there yesterday, so she deserved to know. “You should also know. There was second bomb, today. At my home.”

  Rachel froze, halfway from the kitchen with three filled glasses of orange juice. “And it didn’t occur to you to lead with that information when you got here?”

  Anica held up her hands. “There were so many things, in so short a time—”

  Rachel started to return to the kitchen. “You two talk. I can hear from here. I’ll get breakfast started.”

  Claire wasn’t sure what to say for a long moment. Then she reached a hand out, flipping her fingers while staring at the glasses. “I think we should start with one of these. It sounds like this story could go on for a while.”

  It did.

  By the time Anica finished telling them about the morning and previous night, the breakfast plates were empty and her throat was sore from talking.

  “Wow,” Rachel finally said from her curled-up position in the brown recliner that was big enough to fit Papa and her both, “it’s … been a wild couple of days for you.”

  “Oh,” she added after pouring the last bit of pink wine down her throat. She raised her glass at them. “I forget one thing. Papa tell Bojan and I that our visa applications are denied. So all of this?” She snapped her fingers on the other hand, frustration and anger finally rising to the surface. “None of it really matters. I must go back to Serbia.” She tightened her grasp on the juice glass, staring at the clock on the wall that was ticking away her time here, and let out a small yelp when the glass exploded in her hand. The pain was immediate, sharp. Her attention flicked to Rachel. “I’m sorry. I did not mean to break your glass.” She just wasn’t sure if she’d intended to hurt herself.

  Anica started to stand up, but there was glass everywhere. She wasn’t sure where to move that it wouldn’t cut the couch or her clothes.

  The other women smelled more sad than surprised at the broken glass. “Don’t move,” Claire said. “I’ll get a trash can.”

  Rachel also got out of her chair and leaned over to pry open Anica’s closed fist. Streaks of red that smelled of copper began rolling down her palm to land on her jeans. Once again, she couldn’t feel the pain when her hand should be throbbing. Rachel plucked several pieces of glass from her hand and turned to carefully set them on the top of the table near her knees. “You’re bleeding, sweetie. Try not to dig them in deeper.” When her friend turned back to get the next, smaller shard, they both watched as the skin began to mend. The glass slowly rose out of her palm as if a magnet were pulling it toward the ceiling. “Whoa. Claire, come look at this.”

  Carrying a white plastic trash can, the third woman came over, and they all watched all the glass shards, big and small, begin to rise up and out of Anica’s skin, falling over to land in her palm. Soon only the red stains on the glass were evidence she’d ever been cut. Claire shook her head. “If I didn’t know you were a three-day, I’d swear you were alphic. That’s exactly what happens to me when I get stabbed by something.”

  Anica took a deep breath and admitted one of the things she’d wanted to talk to Rachel about. “I think it is Tristan. When we hit the wall after meeting the bad man, it was like this. For first few seconds, I hurt like nothing I have ever felt. So many things felt broken. Then, minutes later, woof! I felt no pain, even though I know I should hurt. The next morning, I hurt again, but then it fades, like never there.”

  That interested Claire. She looked at her very seriously. “Do you feel strange when you’re near him? Like you can’t take your eyes off him? Can you hear him in your head?”

  Anica nodded. “He is very pretty, but it’s more than that. It is like I cannot help myself, even when other, more important things are happening. I only hear him in head when he talks to me.”

  Rachel began to pick up the pieces of glass and drop them in the trash can. “Ooo. You’re thinking they’re mated? Can it happen that quick?”

  Claire moved the trash bin closer and looked at her askance as she reached down to pick up some shards that had fallen to the floor. “Uh, yeah. It did for me, and for you too, if you remember. Alek got hooked to me when he gave me mouth-to-mouth, before I’d ever seen his face, and Dalvin got hooked to you in a crisis, right?” Then she looked at Anica. “Any crisis happen with you and this Tristan?”

  “Before bad man?” When they nodded, she sighed. “When I am not able to breathe from smell in forest—” Rachel let out a short laugh that made Claire’s brows rise. “Tristan is at hospital. When doctor we
nt to find medicine, Tristan stays with me, helps me breathe.”

  “And there’s the smoking gun,” Rachel said. “I should have thought of that myself. I saw Tristan leaving the hospital with your father when I got there.”

  “No,” Anica replied. “There was no gun. He just helped me breathe with magic. He asked permission to enter my mind to talk to me because I could not speak. He helped me tell doctor what was wrong.”

  Rachel gave her a small smile and touched her arm. “A smoking gun only smokes after it fires. Finding a gun that’s smoking means it’s the likely reason a bullet was found.”

  One of the things she liked best about Rachel was her ability to explain things in a way that made sense without being condescending. It was why she trusted her not to lie or tease her. “So my healing like this and being able to speak into Tristan’s mind are the bullets and Tristan helping me is the gun?”

  Rachel bumped shoulders with her as she stood, and then looked at Claire. “Told you she was bright. Here, let me get the hand vacuum for the rest of the glass.”

  The front door opened. Amber walked in. “Everyone getting settled in here? Oh, Claire. I saw Alek earlier but didn’t ask—how was the trip?”

  “Y’know,” Rachel said as she turned to look at the doctor with a slightly annoyed expression. “A lot of people knock before they walk in someone’s home.”

  “Bodyguards don’t knock. It sort of warns the bad guys if they’re already inside.”

  “You are our bodyguard?” Anica was a little surprised. The doctor did not seem like someone who used violence. She was petite and even her animal form was small. “Can you fight?”

  Claire let out a burst of surprised laughter that she quickly stifled with a hand over her mouth. Amber put one hand on her hip and raised a single reddish-gold eyebrow at the Wolven agent. “Does the thought of me fighting amuse you, Agent?”

  She quickly shook her head. Her scent was shocked at the idea, but Anica wasn’t sure why. “Good God no! The exact opposite, in fact. When I was training at Wolven Academy, Lucas always told me that the obstacle course was designed to your abilities. It took me close to a year to make some of those jumps. Lucas said you used to spar with him when you were in town. If you’re still alive, you’re good. Frankly, if I can ever become as good a bodyguard as you, I’ll be thrilled.”

  The bobcat doctor dipped her head, in both acknowledgment and gratitude. A beam of sunlight made her hair glow like a flaming halo. “While I was very annoyed with Lucas that he kept you hidden from even me, you’ve proved yourself to be fairly competent as a bodyguard yourself.”

  “Okay, okay,” Rachel said with a roll of her eyes that made Anica smile, “the mutual admiration society is getting a little too sweet for my taste. Let’s talk about specifics. Why does Anica need a bodyguard to begin with? Who are we watching out for?” She scratched at the back of her head, making the pom-pom of hair bounce like she was on a trampoline.

  “The quick answer is, we don’t know.” Amber shrugged one shoulder, not looking terribly concerned. “We’re not actually positive Anica is a target. This may have nothing to do with her. Or her brother or father, or even that particular house. That’s what we need to figure out.”

  Anica brushed off the last bits of glass from her pants and stood up. “I am not a good investigator, but I have ideas. May I say?”

  Amber nodded and closed the door behind her. “Let’s have it. I’m open to ideas.” She walked a few steps and sat down in the recliner that Rachel had vacated. If Rachel had seemed swallowed by it, Amber seemed to fill it completely and comfortably.

  All eyes were on Anica. If it had been anyone except these three women, she might have frozen. But they had been nothing but kind to her, supportive, so she took a deep breath and spoke. “Part of this I must talk to think, yes? So please hear what I am trying to say when I may not say it well.”

  Rachel nodded, sitting down on the couch next to her. “It’s okay. We get it.”

  She nodded and stared at the table for coffee at her knees. She found that staring at glass—the flickering light and ghostly reflections of the ticking clock and people—helped her focus. “Bobby tell me to look where things go and how they came to be there.” Nobody spoke, interrupted, so she continued, “Tristan came to be here because snake councilman, Ahmad, tell him there is dangerous man here. There is dangerous man and he admitted he has been here since Ahmad is here. All people were checked by Dalvin and other Wolven man. But other Wolven man is also bad man, so we don’t know if he lies.”

  Amber leaned forward. “You’re right. Tamir could have been bought. He could have known Lagash was already here.”

  “Lagash! Yes, that is name Tristan tells me. But no, I do not think Tamir is working for him. He is little bad man. Lagash is big bad man. Tristan fears him and he is not afraid of Sargon. I was very afraid of Sargon, so I must trust Tristan on what defines ‘bad.’”

  Claire and Rachel had similar dropped jaws in the glass reflection and their scents were stunned. “Tristan knew Sargon and wasn’t afraid of him?” When Amber nodded, Rachel took a deep breath but didn’t let it out for a long time. When she did, it was slow, like air leaking from a balloon until it was spent and limp.

  “Who is this Tristan? I don’t think I’ve ever seen that name in the Wolven files.” Claire seemed more confused than concerned. She was interested and listening closely. Her attention was so complete that if it weren’t for the glass Anica might have been unable to continue.

  “You wouldn’t have,” Amber said, almost offhand. “He’s been off-grid for centuries. He’s a very, and I stress this word, dangerous man. Ris … or Tristan, was an assassin—the person certain Council members would call in to make people disappear. He never failed, was never seen, never scented, never caught. Nobody really knows why he stopped. Almost everyone, myself included, thought he’d died or been killed when he tried to eliminate someone who was finally better than him. But he’s here now and we have to deal with that. All of us.”

  She decided to ask the question, because Amber was likely to be the only person who would know the true answer. “Am I mated to him?” She didn’t really understand what it meant, but she needed to know.

  Amber shook her head. “No. You’re not. At least, not yet. Maybe not ever. But he is mated to you. And I have to tell you, that terrifies me.”

  “Why?” She really wanted to know. “He is not a bad man. Not like Lagash or even like Tamir. Perhaps dangerous, yes. Like Dalvin is dangerous, or Papa. But not bad.”

  The bark of a laugh was the doctor’s response. “You are so young, Anica. Tristan is not the right man for you. You need to leave, disappear, and never let him find you. It’s too dangerous for you to stay here.… I don’t know if I can even explain it to you.”

  She shrugged. “Then do not try to explain. You have lived long, and I know I must respect that. But I have not lived at all yet.” Anger rose into her and she raised her eyes to meet the doctor’s, even if Mama would consider it rude. “I tire of everyone who tells me what is right thing for me.” Saying the words out loud made all the pain of a decade fill her like dark, thick fluid. Her mind flashed to a lifetime of lowered eyes, quiet obedience—

  “Anica, you need to understand—” The doctor’s eyes were glowing golden with power. Anica felt the power try to surround her, tame her, but she threw it off with a wave of her hand. Blue power flashed against golden and the room lit up like a festival. But she didn’t feel festive.

  She snapped, finally snapped, and it felt so good to raise her voice, to yell the pain into the air. “No! You understand! Mama tell me how to live when I am little and I obey. But obeying is what makes me target to be taken by the snakes. The snakes tell me to obey and I do. Then they hurt me, rip open my flesh, make me into something I hate! But then … like a dog to bell, I fall back into obedience to Papa, who tells me to make the others into bears. Where once, just once in my life, I was the equal of Papa and Mama that was taken
away too! Then other bears tell me I must move … give up what little left of me. Now government tells me I must go back, now that all of what was me is gone there.”

  The others seemed to be stunned into silence and it was only then that she realized she’d stood and was pacing around the room, like a trapped animal. Well, she felt like a trapped animal. “It was only when I finally refused to obey that I was able to escape the caves and find my way home. It was only when I refused to obey that I found men to love, even for a little while, and became a woman. It was only when I refused to give away our home that Bosnians were forced to go to mediator.

  “I tire of it all!” She found herself in the farthest corner of the kitchen, surrounded by cabinets, with nowhere left to go. She slapped her recently injured palm down on the counter and felt no pain. “No. No more. It is time for me to tell me. I refuse to leave. Maybe I mate with Tristan. Or I do not. I might go to college, or perhaps become famous. But please do not tell me I am foolish, or young or stupid. I am all of them, and none of them.”

  “You go, girl.” Rachel’s voice was a whisper, and there were shining tears in her eyes.

  Amber let out a great sigh that came from deep in her stomach. “Josette told me you would have to find your own way. All of you. I was sent here to watch … things unfold. The future is a tricky thing, though. Every time I think I’m doing the right thing, it turns out to be the wrong thing.

  “I hate seers and all their—our—manipulation too. I hate, like you hate, being told what to do. So … fine. Do what you think is best. I won’t interfere. I hope I never have to attend your funeral, though. Because Tristan will be bound by the mating to try to save you, no matter how dangerous things get. Your choices could drain him, kill him. I don’t really care if he dies. He’s earned that a thousand times over. But then you’ll die too. He’s already healing you, and it’s not without cost to him. The more you’re hurt, the weaker he’ll grow. Lagash likely knows that.”