Owl

by M. Raiya

  Heavily, I flew into the yard. Some pines had fallen over the road. The willow by the water had taken out the dock and lay in a sprawl across the beach. The kayak would have been crushed anyway. Anton wouldn’t be able to bring his boat in, even if he was coming this way. That would probably be a good thing.

  My maple was still standing, but a limb had come down over the driveway. The house itself looked okay, as much as I could see of it under the layer of leaves and small limbs that littered everything in sight like a fresh green blanket. I hoped this storm hadn’t been too widespread, or it was going to take the state months to recover. Not that I would probably be around to know.

  My grandfather was standing in the middle of the yard, in human form, on the spot where Maylee and I had crashed. He looked bigger than I remembered, and he had always been a huge, strong, imposing man. He was completely bald, though from shaving or premature hair loss, I had never known. He didn’t even have eyebrows. He stood with his legs spread and his arms folded like an incarnation of some forest god of destruction, and it suddenly made me wonder if his wrath was what had caused this.

  He made me feel like a very small owl, shaking from cold and pain.

  I landed in my maple, just so I could give Vin’s room one last glance. A haven denied me. My grandfather raised one arm and pointed down at his feet. Helpless as a falling leaf, I flew to the ground before him.

  I shifted. At least I wanted a voice before the end.

  But he didn’t give me a chance to use it. His left hand shot out, grabbed my chin, and wrenched my head back so my eyes gazed into his. I felt tendrils of his mind deep inside my own. They had always been there, hidden, probably placed there when I’d been a child. I could not block him, or fight him—he was already there, plundering my thoughts with a painful ruthlessness that made me marshal everything I had and wrench my head way from him.

  But he’d already seen all he needed. A knife appeared in his right hand. I recognized it as one from the kitchen inside. I’d just lost one like it underneath the Turtle. But this one was dirty and a little rusted, as though it had been lying in the woods for a couple of weeks. It was probably the one I’d dropped somewhere out there that first night, after I’d taken it away from Vin.

  How appropriate, I thought, as he pressed it against the side of my throat.

  I tried to pull away, but his control was so perfect that all I could manage was to shakily croak out, “Why?”

  “Because I loved Jasine,” he said.

  I knelt there shivering. The name was vaguely familiar. After another second it came to me. That had been my grandmother’s name. “Didn’t she—didn’t she die the night—my mother was born?” I could hardly get words out, but I needed time. Vin had once suggested that my grandfather wasn’t as strong as everyone thought he was. If that was true, maybe…. But the knife felt sharp against my throat, and I didn’t think it would take much strength to slit it.

  “No,” he said, looking at the knife. It was bitterly cold against me, even through the wind and rain. “She did not die. Her soul slipped into your mother. I felt it happen. All was well until Beth married your father. How could I see my Jasi’s eyes looking at another man with love?”

  My grandfather’s insane, I thought, gazing up at him, trying to see if there was anything of the man I’d loved still there.

  “The accident I contrived did not kill Irwin as I had hoped, but it left him no longer worthy of my challenge. But then you were born, and she looked at you with the same expression.”

  Dear God. My poor father had never known what had happened. And my mother—she must have had no idea. I was so shocked it took me a moment to realize my grandfather was still talking.

  “I’d waited for my chance for sixteen years. I admit I liked you, Gabriel—your wit, and your intelligence, and your bravery—but were you content with the mercy I showed you when I banished you? No. You had to reveal yourself to another human. So I offered you a merciful death through Maylee, but no, your friend spoiled that. So we planned today carefully, and you and he ruined it again. So now you die at my hand.”

  I swallowed hard, feeling my throat move against the knife. Was that my last swallow? Would I die instantly, or would I feel my blood draining away? Would this death be better or worse than being eaten alive? I looked at my grandfather and saw water washing across his face from the rain. Or was it tears too?

  I had to keep talking. “Grandfather, I didn’t know. I’m so sorry. Where is she buried? Would you take me there so we could visit her together?”

  “It’s too late for that, Gabriel.” The hot knife pressed against my throat, and then I felt it slit my skin with a slight popping sensation. It didn’t hurt, except for a little burn. Something warmer than rain ran down my chest. It had to be my blood. I couldn’t move my head to look down.

  It was happening. I was really dying.

  My grandfather went on as though he didn’t know he’d just slit my throat. “She is safe inside your mother. I will let your mother only love me.”

  Desperately, I managed to ignore the blood and say, “Grandmother was a teacher, wasn’t she? An elementary school teacher? She must have loved to read. I bet that’s who I get it from. Do you know how much I like to read, Grandfather?”

  He smiled a little bit. “She had books everywhere. I used to want her to go flying with me, and it was all I could do to get her out of whatever she was reading.”

  “You used to read to me too. Remember sitting in front of the woodstove? You read all the Burgess Books to me. Lightfoot the Deer was our favorite.”

  He didn’t answer.

  “You gave me Bear the bear, Grandfather! I cuddled with him every night. Is he still by my bed, do you know?”

  “I loved her so much.”

  I wondered if he couldn’t remember or just didn’t want to. There was anguish in his voice. I understood it. I had heard it in Vin’s voice when he thought I was dying. I felt it in my heart now.

  My grandfather’s hand shook. He repositioned the knife, and then it bit down harder on my neck. A wave of fresh warmth flowed down my chest, but I knew that the wound was still shallow. The knife must be dull from the rust. When he cut an artery, my blood would begin to spurt, and then I’d know it was over.

  Then what would happen? Would Vin feel me, a ghost owl forever haunting him?

  “I love someone too, Grandfather. His name is Vin. If you end my life, he will feel as you do. And—” I groped for words. “We don’t have a daughter for me to come back in, so he’ll never see me again. Please don’t do that to him.”

  He shook his head. “Maylee didn’t like your Vin. She wanted him to die. Because you hurt Andrew. She wanted to hurt him. And now Maylee is dead too.”

  “I didn’t hurt Andrew. The bullies did. I shifted to save him.” I was starting to feel weak, but at last, I’d gotten to say the truth.

  “I know,” he said. “That’s why I let you live. But now it’s too late.”

  Lethargy slipped through me, and I found myself starting to wish this was just over with. It was harder to focus on his face. Maybe the cut didn’t need to be deep enough to hit an artery to kill me. I’d already lost a lot of blood from being bashed on the rocks.

  I had to keep trying. “I’m sorry about Maylee. It was an accident.” Sort of, anyway.

  “It doesn’t matter. Nobody loves each other like Jasi and I do.”

  I didn’t feel as cold any longer. The pain was moving farther away, and a warm cloud began to surround me. Like falling asleep, I thought drowsily. Maybe my grandfather did still love me and was letting me go gently. Maybe my talking had gained that much for me. I let my eyes close and thought of Vin. I remembered riding on his shoulder, how it felt to turn my face into his neck and nip his ear gently….

  “I am alone,” I heard my grandfather say from somewhere far away, out in the cold and rain.

  I didn’t want to fight the soothing warmth that surrounded me. But still there was a little sp
ark in me that didn’t want to give up. Death was going to have to take me. I wasn’t going to go to it. Gathering my strength, I pulled myself back to reality.

  “Please don’t do this, Grandfather,” I heard myself say. Or tried to say. Or wanted to say. “You’ve been carrying so much pain for so long. Let the rest of us help you.”

  The knife answered by biting down even deeper. There was a strange, new throbbing in my neck. I could feel the pressure of my grandfather’s thumb against the wound now. He must have cut the artery and only his thumb was keeping me alive. When he moved it, there would be nothing left to do. It was too late already.

  “I have magic too,” I whispered.

  “I know,” he said and moved his thumb.

  I love you, Vin, I thought.

  But I didn’t feel the spurting of blood I’d been waiting for. I didn’t feel death’s darkness. I felt the heat of power flood me, pulsing outward from my throat to my heart to my extremities, leaving me tingling with new strength, coursing through my brain and pulling my senses back, heightened. My blood sang in my veins, pulsed in my bones.

  My grandfather looked down at me, confused, and then at his hand that held the knife. Blood was dripping from his thumb. He must have nicked it with the blade. And our blood had mingled.

  And our power. Vin had been wrong. My grandfather had all the power he’d claimed he had, and it flowed into me.

  Even then, if he had stepped back, lowered the knife, I would have forgiven him because I understood the grief of losing love. But he lunged for me, shifting form in the air so that all I saw were wings and talons coming for my face. Never again, something deep in me screamed, and I sent a blast of magic at my grandfather with everything I had in me, my power and his own.

  It hit him hard. He back-winged, and I felt the wind from his wings on my face even stronger than the wind that was already pummeling me. The air was full of power and heat. My grandfather hovered before me, filled with rage that I’d stopped his attack. His body seemed to grow larger than any owl I’d ever seen, a creature of feather and air and wind, all fury. But I faced him and did not look away from his eyes that were so deep and dark and laced with twisted emotion.

  He screamed. The sound was more human than owl, and I realized he was shifting again, or trying to. His wings beat the air, and they were arms that were strong, but not with the right kind of strength. He was falling, or was he making one last, terrible lunge for me? He cried out again, and I thought maybe he was calling for help. I reached for him, and there was terror on his face, but it was too late. With a roar of wind, he burst into flame.

  Fire consumed him, so hot I fell backward, but I saw him, owl and human both, writhing for an instant before he vanished in a smokeless rush.

  In the sudden silence, a single feather drifted to the ground before me.

  I WAS kneeling beside the motionless feather, pressing what remained of my shirt to the wound in my throat, when Vin quietly crouched next to me and laid his arm across my shoulders. I wasn’t sure how much time had passed or where he had come from. Power still coursed through me.

  “What happened?” he whispered.

  I was too overwhelmed to form words as I turned to him. Vin was bleeding from dozens of cuts, his wrists and ankles were raw, and he was leaning on me heavily.

  “I jumped out of the boat.” He nodded over his shoulder toward the wreckage of the dock. In the distance, I could see Anton’s black boat powering away through the waves. Coleen and Jack were staggering across the beach toward us.

  I looked back at Vin, feeling love washing out of me into him and back like the waves we’d just been battling.

  “God, your throat,” he said.

  “It’s okay,” I said. The heat or the power or something, had slowed the bleeding.

  He reached to me.

  “Vin, no,” I said suddenly, but it was too late. His raw hands touched me. My blood, and my grandfather’s blood, mixed with his blood. There was power everywhere, spilling out and back and forth between us.

  “Riel?” he gasped.

  I’d never imagined anything like it. I covered his hands with mine and held them tightly as magic warmed and healed us both.

  “Riel, I feel—strange,” he whispered.

  I did too. It was as though the magic that had been trapped in my grandfather, bottled up and compressed into roiling anger and hatred and insanity, was now free to take shape as it was meant to be. It swept into a new host with joy. I watched as Vin’s eyes began to glow with their own light. He drew a deep breath and then another. “Whoa,” he said.

  “Just ride it,” I said, knowing how he felt because power was coursing through me too, deciding it liked what it was finding. It settled into my very bones, and was still at last.

  Vin raised his gaze to mine.

  “Okay?” I asked.

  He managed to nod. “Am I an owl?” he whispered.

  I hadn’t thought of that. “Maybe.” All I knew was that we were still alive. I held tight to his bloody hands. “I love you, Vin. I love you so much.” After what I’d just been through, that was all I wanted to say. And I kept saying it over and over until he laughed and leaned forward and stopped me from talking by kissing me.

  AFTER A long time, or a few minutes, I couldn’t tell which, Coleen’s voice came from close by. “Gabriel, let go of my son.”

  I couldn’t look away from Vin’s blue, blue eyes, the most beautiful eyes I’d ever seen. Hands grabbed me, tried to pull me away, but I shrugged them off and refused to move.

  “Do not touch them,” a woman commanded.

  “Who the hell are you? That’s my son, and he’s hurt, and I don’t like the look of this.” Coleen’s voice was full of righteous mother’s anger.

  “I said, step away from them.”

  “This is my property!”

  “And these are my clan members. Back!”

  “Vin is not part of your—”

  “Coleen.” Jack cut her off. “It’s Vin’s life. Let him decide.”

  Despite everything I was feeling, I was shocked that Jack would take our side and not hers. Dimly, I wondered what had changed him so much. At the same time, I felt a stab of guilt for my part in the way Coleen was feeling, but I couldn’t do anything about it right now.

  “Oh wow,” Vin said.

  I looked up to see owls flying down out of trees like leaves. Dozens of them landed on the ground in a circle around us and turned into people. Most of them wore flowing clothing of soft browns and white and gold, hair unbound and blowing in the wind like wings. I knew them all, loved them all, and now, none of them would meet my eyes. Not even my parents. They were all looking at the feather on the grass before me.

  I drew a deep, steadying breath as the last of the owls shifted. Andrew was not there, nor were any children. I thought at first that they’d come in response to my phone call for help, but then I realized there hadn’t been time. They’d already been here, probably because my grandfather had compelled them to be. They formed a complete circle around the feather, including Vin and me in it. But not his parents.

  “We have to get these boys to the hospital,” Coleen said sharply.

  “Go into your dwelling and stay there,” the woman who had spoken before said, raising thin and trembling arms to the sky. Her white hair blew straight back from her face as she faced them. Lorna was the oldest one of us, and it was her right to conduct what I knew was about to happen.

  Before Coleen could erupt, I spoke, even though I knew it was not my place to intervene. “Please, let them watch. I owe them a life-debt.”

  Lorna never glanced at me, but she lowered her arms. “Very well. Stay silent,” she said, turning back to face the feather.

  Hoping Jack and Coleen would obey, I also turned to face all that remained of my grandfather. But I took Vin’s hand and held it tightly. He was trembling a little, but he, too, turned away from his parents and looked at the feather. I wasn’t sure how much he’d seen and heard be
fore I’d known he was there.

  Lorna gathered herself and then said in a clear tone that cut through the wind, “Let everyone remember Angus Lane and Maylee Hower.”

  I stilled my mind and remembered my grandfather as he had once been. I remembered Maylee as the young shifter who had come to our clan for help and hoped that at last, she would find whatever it was that she had been seeking. Gradually the images of my grandfather’s hand with the knife and his horrible ending and Maylee’s fierce yellow eyes stopped trying to intrude. I knew they would never leave for good, but they would not haunt me any longer either.

  As everyone finished their personal farewells, they raised their eyes to Lorna. When the last of us looked to her, she stepped forward. “In the way of the past, our next leader will be chosen.” She walked forward, bent, and picked up the feather from the grass. Holding it before her by the shaft, she began to walk slowly around the inside of the circle, facing outward, pausing in front of each person. She started to Vin’s right, so that I would be last.

  My heart began to pound. I knew that everyone believed I would be chosen if magic alone determined the result. If a child had been born with magic since I’d been banished, Lorna would have delayed the ceremony until that child was present. But as far as I knew, there had never been an instance when the heir had a hand in the old leader’s death. I might very well be passed over, and what that would mean for the clan, I had no idea. If someone else was chosen, would my magic go to them? What would that do to me? If it didn’t, would that person allow me to live, knowing I was more powerful? My power felt quiet within me now, but I could still feel it reverberating in my bones in a way it never had before.

  Lorna’s slow progress continued.

  Did I want to become leader? Yes, I did. I wanted my clan to change, to know the freedom I’d found from not living under my grandfather. I wanted them to be able to grow without the threat of elans or compulsion hanging over them. And I most definitely didn’t want someone else, someone new, to have power over me, to be able to compel me, to threaten me with an elan. Heaven forbid if a new leader was strict about the policy against homosexuality. The thought of someone compelling me not to be with Vin made me sick.