Ember

by Ophelia Sexton

  "Sir?" asked one of the cops as he and his partner emerged from their vehicle. "What happened? Are you all right?"

  An intense beam of white light from the officer's flashlight blinded Daniel.

  I am nowhere near all right, he thought hazily. I'm naked and covered in blood. How the hell do I explain this?

  Shock and the pain from his injuries drowned out his attempts to think of a plausible story as the two officers approached warily.

  Then Daniel caught their scent.

  The good news: both police officers were shifters, too.

  The bad news: they were coyote shifters.

  There was a long history of bad blood between the Sandia Mountain Pride and Albuquerque's six resident coyote packs.

  Daniel knew he was screwed. But he just wasn't ready to give up, not with Chris still in the house.

  "Another one," the first officer said as he knelt at Daniel's side. Daniel saw that his nameplate read "Martinez."

  Officer Martinez shook his head. "This is the fourth one tonight. What the hell is going on?"

  "Sabertooths," commented the second officer, whose nameplate said "Gonzales." He'd obviously caught a whiff of Daniel's scent. "Figures." He sounded disgusted.

  Daniel was used to the contempt that his lineage received from the other shifters in town, so he ignored it.

  He gathered his fuzzy thoughts. "What...about the other three?" he rasped. "Are they okay?"

  He saw Officer Martinez's expression change from annoyance to sympathy, and knew the news wasn't good. "Homicides. Friends of yours?"

  "Yeah," Daniel managed.

  Tommy. Alicia. And Lizbeth, too. Daniel squeezed his eyes shut. He couldn't believe that they were all gone.

  Unlike him, they'd never hurt anyone. Just tried to keep the pride's business affairs running while Pete and the others languished behind bars.

  "I'm sorry for your loss," Martinez said softly.

  "You know anything about what the hell is going on tonight?" demanded Gonzalez.

  "I heard that it's a hostile takeover," Daniel said, still panting from the effort—and the agony—of shifting while wounded. He managed to twist his lips into a smile. "I got a warning phone call about two minutes before three guys broke into my place and shot me. They were going to finish me off, but you guys scared them away. Thanks for that."

  "What's your name, sir? You live here?" Martinez asked.

  He was the older of the two officers, his short black hair heavily sprinkled with gray.

  "I'm Daniel Langlais, and this is my house."

  "Got any ID?" demanded Officer Gonzales.

  "Yeah." Daniel remembered that he was currently naked, and added, "My wallet's in the house."

  He saw the officers take in the shattered doorframe and the door lying on top of the hallway tiles. He didn't want the officers go in there, not when Chris was still hiding.

  Got no choice, he thought.

  "Junior," he called. "All clear. You can come out now."

  All Clear was their safe word. If Chris didn't hear it, he wouldn't leave his hiding place. After Chris had come to live with him, Daniel had spent a lot of time drilling his nephew about what to do in an emergency.

  Tonight, that training had paid off.

  The officers tensed as the closet door opened slowly.

  Daniel quickly assured them, "It's my nephew. He's just a kid. I told him to go hide."

  "Holy shit, they wanted to take out a kid, too?" asked Gonzales. He made a disapproving noise. "You cats are hard core."

  Not all sabertooth shifters. Daniel bit back the protest. No one ever believed that shifters from his lineage were anything but violent thugs.

  Chris emerged from the closet, peering wide-eyed around at the wreckage in the front hall. He had the strap of the big duffel slung over his shoulder.

  His eyes widened when he caught sight of Daniel sitting on the porch, naked and bleeding. He rushed over.

  "Uncle Dan, you okay?"

  Daniel nodded. "Looks worse than it is," he lied. "Hey, Junior, can you dig my wallet out of that bag and hand it to Officer Martinez?"

  "Yes, sir," Chris answered, and obeyed

  Martinez opened Daniel's wallet, and eyeballed the contents before extracting his license. "I'll be back in just a minute, sir."

  License in hand, he headed for the patrol car.

  "So, your name is Chris?" Officer Gonzales asked, his tone friendly now, instead of the barely disguised hostility that had had him barking questions at Daniel a few minutes ago.

  Chris nodded. "Yes, sir."

  "What's your last name?"

  "Langlais," said Chris. "I'm Christopher Daniel Langlais."

  "Chris, can you tell me what happened here tonight?" Gonzales asked.

  Chris shot Daniel an inquiring look.

  Daniel nodded and tried to focus. It was hard. All of his injuries were throbbing with red-hot intensity, and blood kept trickling into his right eye.

  "I was sleeping and Uncle Dan woke me up. He said we were in danger. He told me to go hide in the closet, so I did. I heard a bunch of loud noises, and some men talking about not wanting anyone to see them, and then I heard your police car."

  "So, you didn't see the men who hurt your uncle?"

  Chris shook his head. "No, sir."

  Gonzales was a shifter, so he had one more question for Chris.

  "How about their scents? Anyone smell familiar to you?"

  When Chris shook his head again, Gonzales turned his gaze on Daniel.

  "Yeah," he said, between gritted teeth, desperately trying to control the urge to barf.

  Shock did that to you. He'd been shot twice tonight, and his body was letting him know that it was not happy with this state of affairs.

  He added, "They were sabertooth shifters, but new guys in town."

  "You get a clear look at them?" Officer Gonzales sounded skeptical.

  Daniel shook his head, which was a mistake. The world spun crazily for a few seconds as his gorge rose.

  When he could speak again, he said, "They were wearing ski masks. But I recognized their scents. Aaron Messerzahn, Valentin Zǔb and Nikola Lakeĭ. They're all from California and they showed up in town last week."

  "Always some kind of trouble going on with you sabertooth shifters." Gonzales scowled. "With no visual ID, it's gonna be tough to prove it was them. Unless we get some fingerprints or something, no Ordinary judge is going to issue a warrant on the basis of scent alone."

  "I know that," Daniel said, tightly. "And so does Messerzahn. It was a coordinated attack on key members of the pride. He had this all planned out."

  "Rest assured, we'll be watching all three of those guys closely from now on," Gonzales said. "This many murders and assaults in one night? The news is gonna have a field day with this." He shook his head, looking grim.

  Officer Martinez returned. "No outstanding warrants on Mr. Langlais here," he announced. "Not even a parking ticket. But I gotta ask—you any relation to Pete Langlais?"

  Daniel stifled a groan. He was hoping that these cops wouldn't make the connection. "My younger brother."

  "Seriously?" Gonzales exclaimed. He sounded pissed off again.

  "We can't pick our relatives, man," Daniel said, wearily. And felt like shit when he saw Chris's expression twist in pain.

  "Well your brother got his partner killed," Gonzales said, hotly. "Rich Montoya was a friend of mine."

  "I'm so sorry," Daniel said with sincerity. "I was deployed to Afghanistan at the time. I didn't hear about what happened until afterwards. Sounded like a real cluster—" He suddenly remembered that Chris was listening, and hastily edited his words. "—pluck."

  He hated mentioning his military service as a way of getting special treatment, but he couldn't afford to have these officers decide to arrest him. Not when Messerzahn and his thugs were still roaming free and looking for Chris.

  "Didn't realize you were a veteran, Mr. Langlais," Martinez said, giving his partner
a warning glance.

  Gonzales wasn't quite ready to let it go. "So, you weren't involved any of the stuff that happened back then?"

  "Nope." Daniel's head hurt too badly to risk shaking it. "I enlisted right after high school. Mostly to get away from all the BS pride politics."

  "Okay." Martinez shone his flashlight over Daniel, and frowned. "Sir, do you want us to call an ambulance?"

  "No." Daniel knew that going to a hospital emergency room staffed by Ordinaries always posed a big risk for a shifter. There were just too many tests that could reveal their otherness.

  There were shifter doctors, of course, and some of them made house calls, but most shifters had to be at death's door before they'd risk going to a hospital.

  "You sure about that?" Martinez asked. "You look like you're pretty badly injured, Mr. Langlais.

  "I'll live," Daniel said through gritted teeth.

  He was pretty sure that this was a true statement. He also knew that he was going to feel like hammered shit for the next day or two.

  At least shifters healed fast.

  "Look, man," said Gonzales, unexpectedly. "I was a Navy corpsman, and I got a TacMed Downed Officer Kit in the car. If you won't go to the hospital, let me at least patch you up while my partner here takes your statement."

  "Thanks," Daniel said, surprised by the offer. "I'd appreciate that."

  Officer Gonzales was as good as his word. While Daniel gave his statement and explained what had happened, trusting Officer Martinez to edit judiciously for his Ordinary superiors, Gonzales disinfected and bandaged up Daniel's wounds as best he could.

  Chris sat silently on the porch, clutching the big black duffel on his lap, and didn't take his eyes off Daniel.

  "There, done," Gonzales said, finally, after taping down the final bandage. "Looks like one of those bullets just grazed your head. And you're lucky that the one that went through your arm didn't hit any bones." He frowned. "You might have a cracked rib or two, though."

  "Yeah, I figured that," Daniel said. It hurt to breathe, a deep throbbing ache that spread from his left side into his chest and back.

  "Are you going to arrest the men who hurt my uncle?" Chris asked unexpectedly, as Gonzales was packing up his first aid kit.

  "We're gonna try our best," Martinez answered. He tapped his nose. "Coyotes never forget a scent. But we'll need more evidence to convince the Ordinaries. Don't worry, though," he added when he saw Chris's dismayed expression. "We'll be keeping an eye on those guys, and they'll slip up sooner or later. They always do. They get cocky, then we get them."

  "You take good care of your uncle, okay?" Gonzales asked, seriously. "He just took bullets protecting you."

  "I know." Chris nodded. "Uncle Dan is my hero. Did you know he has lots of medals?"

  That made Daniel uncomfortable. He wasn't anyone's hero. And he sure as hell hadn't deserved those medals.

  "If anyone saved your life tonight, Junior, it's these two police officers," he said, harshly. "Messerzahn and his buddies handed me my ass. I couldn't stop them. If Officer Martinez and Officer Gonzales hadn't shown up, we'd both be dead meat right now."

  It was humbling to admit the truth. Daniel wondered whether he'd been stupidly naïve to think that a sabertooth shifter could live a peaceful life, especially in this pride, with its troubled history.

  "Hey, man, don't be too hard on yourself. It was three against one, and you didn't have a gun," Gonzales protested, surprising Daniel again.

  He could have sworn that the younger coyote shifter had disliked him on first sight. What had changed his mind?

  "I guess we'll officially have to report this as another violent home invasion, likely gang activity," Martinez said with a sigh. "We'll make sure to let Homicide know that Messerzahn, Zǔb, and Lakeĭ should be considered as possible suspects. And that they should be considered extremely dangerous." He shook his head. "I'll run a search to see if there are any outstanding warrants for these guys in California. I'd be surprised if there aren't."

  He put away his notebook. Gonzales picked up his first aid kit and rose to his feet.

  "Are you gonna be okay here?" Martinez asked, with a pointed look at the shattered front door. "I'd ask for a squad car to come and babysit you, but we're the only shifters on duty tonight." Daniel clearly understood the unspoken second half of that statement: And I'm not going to put any Ordinary cops in the path of a shifter rampage.

  Accustomed to the realities of being a sabertooth shifter, Daniel hadn't really expected any useful help from the Ordinary authorities. And he sure as hell couldn't stay in Albuquerque, not while Messerzahn and his guys were still at large and gunning for Chris. All he could do was take his nephew and run.

  But run where?

  That was the kicker. No other sabertooth pride would take in an adult male stranger unless it was for an arranged mating.

  If he just showed up in another pride's territory uninvited, they would kick him out with extreme prejudice...if they didn't kill him outright for trespassing on their territory. The only way he could get around that would be to challenge a high-ranking pride member to a duel and fight for a place in the new pride.

  Pride politics. Ugh. Daniel had spent his entire adult life trying to avoid that kind of toxic bullshit. He'd seen his share of combat in during his deployments. Now he just wanted to live a peaceful life and feed people.

  Was that too fucking much to ask? Apparently.

  Daniel knew that he'd been very lucky tonight. If he was dumb enough to stay in Albuquerque, Messerzahn's thugs would catch up with him sooner or later. His workplace wasn't a secret, and neither was Chris's school, located three blocks away.

  Where could I go that Messerzahn and his pride wouldn't dare go?

  Then it hit him. He remembered hearing about Justin Long, the First of the New Braunfels Pride of Texas, who had left his pride and married into a bear shifter clan up north in Idaho.

  Before leaving, Long had done something truly revolutionary, an act that had shaken up the other sabertooth shifter prides all across North America: he had banned challenge duels and instituted elections for his pride's leadership positions.

  From that point on, the New Braunfels Pride's leaders weren't necessarily the strongest, most aggressive shifters, and they didn't stay in power as absolute rulers until someone ever stronger and more aggressive came along.

  The new pride council and the Pride First acted like any Ordinary city council, with limited terms of office and restricted powers.

  Long's move had been fiercely debated on all of the online shifter forums. Some of the big-city prides had reorganized themselves to copy the New Braunfels Pride. But many others had vehemently rejected the idea of changing their pride structure and had doubled down on the old-fashioned way of doing things.

  At the time, Daniel had read the debates out of curiosity before moving on, but hadn't really gotten himself involved in the politics.

  Now, he realized that there might actually be a place in this country where shifters of all lineages appeared to be welcome. And where he might be able to ask for sanctuary—with all of the protections that entailed—for Chris.

  "I don't think so," Daniel answered Martinez honestly. "I plan to pack up and leave town as soon as you leave."

  Martinez nodded. "Sounds like a good idea. We have your cellphone number, right? We'll be in touch if we have any questions for you, or any updates."

  Chapter Four – Refugees

  The sun rose as Daniel drove north through endless miles of desert.

  The mental fuzziness and physical shakiness brought on by the shock of his injuries finally wore off after he finished the 32-ounce travel mug of hot coffee and the stack of breakfast sandwiches he'd bought at a fast-food drive-through on the way out of Albuquerque.

  Now he started to second-guess his decision to drive north and apply for sanctuary.

  Because Daniel had finally remembered the name of the town where Justin Long was living...Bearpaw Ridge.


  The very same town where those bear shifters had managed to fend off Philippe Bertrand and the upper ranks of the Sandia Mountain Pride without a single injury on their side.

  The same town where Pete had tried and failed to kill a bear shifter's mate.

  That Bearpaw Ridge.