Blood Moon Rising

by K. R. Thompson

  4

  “ARE YOU SURE about this?” I asked.

  It was Sunday, and true to his word, Adam showed up first thing in the morning to take me off for his surprise. I was more than slightly leery when he called the night before and told me to wear a swimsuit under my clothes. It was February, and unless he was planning on taking me south, it seemed like an insane idea. Granted, it had been an extremely mild winter and we’d had basically no snow, but it was way too cold to go swimming.

  “What about the scout teams? They might need help and we won’t be close enough to help.”

  “We’ll be plenty close enough,” he reassured me, adding even more to the mystery of where he was taking me. “Everything has run smoothly all week since we set it up. If something happens and we’re needed, we’ll be close enough to come back quickly.”

  “What about Darren?” I’d told him about what the boy had said and the feeling that I’d gotten that something just wasn’t right. Adam had insisted that he was a good kid, just having a hard time adjusting. “The blood moon starts tomorrow, doesn’t it? What if what he said is true?”

  “Don’t worry. Everything’s going to be fine. Trust me.” And with those last two words, Adam leaned in to give me a quick kiss.

  The air warmed and sparked around us and instantly I didn’t care where he was taking us or what would happen.

  “Are you ready? I promised your mom I’d have you home before nightfall, so we’d best get going. It’ll be dark by six.”

  I followed him outside to the edge of the forest, where he shifted and waited for me to take my spot on his back. I hopped up and wound my hands in his glossy black fur and leaned in close, breathing in the clean, woodsy scent of him. He trotted softly along at first, then started into a run.

  I felt the muscles in his shoulders and back move fluidly beneath me and I remembered what it felt like to run as a wolf, feeling the earth beneath my paws, seeing and smelling everything so clearly. It was times like these that I missed White Wolf, the feeling of her being just beneath the surface of my skin, her fur seeming to glide along my bones, waiting for the time I would shift and become one with nature as we ran through the forest.

  But she wasn’t mine to keep, I reasoned with myself. She’d never been mine. She had belonged to Ella. And once she did her job of keeping us safe, she left, her spirit joining my ancestor’s. She was gone.

  And I still missed her.

  Are you all right? Adam asked. You’re quiet. You seem sad.

  “I’m okay.” And I’m going to change the subject. He’s been planning this surprise and I’m going to ruin it if I keep thinking this way. “So where are we headed?”

  North, he replied. His wolf snorted, amused.

  “We’re headed north and I’m wearing a bathing suit under my clothes. Are we going to the local Y to swim? You know if I catch pneumonia I won’t be happy, but I’ll still forgive you. My mother, on the other hand, never will.”

  I promise you will be perfectly safe.

  “I’m going to hold you to that,” I joked. “Seriously, though. The underbrush is getting thicker. How much farther?” I watched as one thick patch of brush moved, rolling its branches out of the way. I knew that we wouldn’t have any problem getting through, no matter how dense the foliage became. Everything would move for Adam and as long as I leaned close to him, I wouldn’t have to worry about so much as a briar catching at my jacket. We were heading into a deep niche between the mountains and I wondered how many humans had ever come this far.

  We’re close. Adam had slowed to a walk. Wherever it was that we were headed, we were getting close. We rounded a steep curve and I heard the sound of rushing water.

  A waterfall. He stopped and let me get off and I started toward the sound of the water. Just on the other side of a thick grove of pines, I spotted it, recognizing it immediately from the memory Adam had sent me on the day I learned how to channel my ability as a Seer. He’d used this waterfall to calm me down when everything had been too much. I’d often wondered if it was a real place, but I’d never asked. Now I knew.

  The water cascaded from a ledge at least fifty feet up to a large pool at the bottom, then the water ran on to the creek. A light breeze sent a few droplets to spray against my face. The water was cold—too cold for swimming.

  “Come on.” Adam took my hand. “This isn’t the surprise.”

  He led me alongside the creek for a few yards, then helped me cross at a narrow spot.

  “We’re going right up there,” he said, pointing to a small outcropping of rocks that sat a few yards up.

  I didn’t see the opening in the rock until we were on top of it. The bush that had been covering it moved its branches, letting us pass.

  “Wait here for a minute. I’ll be right back,” he promised, then disappeared into the darkness.

  He came back a couple of minutes later with a lantern and took my hand, leading me deeper into the cave. Candles lit a narrow passageway, their flames sending flickering light against the walls.

  There were dark, painted images on the rock that reminded me of caveman drawings and I found myself wondering how long it had been since anyone other than Adam had been in this place

  “Where are we?” I asked, when I felt the atmosphere change, becoming warmer the farther we went. I spotted the pool of water then, down in the belly of the cave. Candles were lit all along its edge, casting light far enough that I could see the bottom of the pool.

  “Lean down and feel the water,” Adam said, a big grin on his face.

  I knelt down and let my fingertips touch the surface. “It’s warm!” I said, surprised.

  He nodded, happy with the fact that he had indeed surprised me. “It’s a hot spring. I found it years ago, when I first became a Keeper. I’ve never told anyone about it. It’s sort of my secret place, though I’m sure some of the old ones know it’s here. My grandpa would definitely have known about it.” He walked over to the wall, tracing his fingers along some of the painted figures on the wall. One of them was a man kneeling beside of a wolf. “The paintings tell stories. I remember him telling them to me when I was small. This one is obvious, of course. The legend of my people.”

  “It’s beautiful,” I said, looking at the illuminated walls of the cavern and the glistening, dark pool of warm water. “Thank you.”

  He walked over to me and held out his hand, helping me up. “You’re welcome.” He leaned in close and traced his finger along my cheek, then kissed me softly.

  The air popped and swirled around us for a long moment. Then, he broke the kiss and leaned back. “Want to go for a swim?”

  I smiled. “You bet.”

  He pulled his t-shirt over his head, pitching it to the side. The jeans went next and in the next instant, there he stood in his swimming trunks. For some reason, he didn’t just ditch the jeans as he had the shirt. Instead he moved them closer to the edge of the pool before walking around to the shallow end where a small set of steps had been hewn into the rock. He was up to his knees in the water before he looked up at me.

  “Coming?” he asked.

  “Yep, I’ll be there in just a minute.” There was no way I was taking my clothes off in front of him, I decided. Even if I did have a suit on beneath. I felt my cheeks flush at the thought.

  I walked to the back of the cavern, where a large flat rock sat in the corner. I dodged behind it and took off my shirt and pants, folded them and sat them in a neat pile, before emerging in my navy blue swimsuit.

  I spotted a dark shape near the bottom of the pool and knew it was Adam. The candlelight showed him swimming toward the opposite side. I took the same route he had taken earlier and walked down the steps into the warm water.

  The pool was much deeper than it appeared, the water coming up to my shoulders.

  There were tiny bubbles coming from the rock beneath my feet, spiraling along my skin as they made their way to the surface.

  “Ooh, that’s nice,” I moaned, resisting th
e urge to make a seat out of the steps and treat this like my own personal spa.

  I heard a light splash beside of me and Adam surfaced, his head dark and sleek, like a seal’s. “Do you like it?” he asked.

  “I think I’m in love,” I admitted. “You may end up bringing me here a lot.”

  He laughed. “I can do that.” He pulled me against him so that the back of my head rested on his shoulder. I relaxed and looked up at the ceiling, noticing that there were a few drawings up there too.

  One, was of a dragon, its claws holding the top of a mountain. Immediately I thought of the boy at school. “We have one of those at school now, don’t we? A dragon?” I asked, pointing up at the painted figure.

  “Yes,William is what you’d call a dragon. His mom and dad are, too. They were from this area originally and just moved back. William has a twin brother named Logan but he’s staying at Imperium University until he gets a better handle on his magic. His parents didn’t tell him what he was early on, and he’s had a hard time adjusting. The school will help that.”

  “You’ve got to be joking. There’s an actual school for dragons?” I asked, incredulous. “Why am I just learning this now?”

  Adam laughed. “Yeah, it’s for all shifters, not just dragons. You didn’t think there was only magic in Bland County, did you? Do you remember what I told you about magic when you first saw the Sasquatch?”

  “Where there is life, there is magic.”

  “That’s right. Life stretches out much farther than Bland County. Imperium is a school for shifters who have a hard time adjusting to their magic—to fitting in amidst those who don’t understand what they are. It’s a good place, or at least, from what I’ve heard it is. Hopefully Logan will be able to move back here soon and be with his family.”

  My brain chewed on that bit of information for a minute or two, while my eyes wandered back up to the ceiling. They landed on a solitary figure, high on the arch above us.

  At first glance, I thought I was looking at a painting of a regular person until I saw the unmistakable sharp teeth in a wide mouth, hands painted into sharp claws. Then I spotted a heap of what appeared to be bodies around its feet.

  “What is the story of that one?” I asked, knowing that I didn’t truly want to know. Normal people would have asked for a story about one of the happier looking paintings or look for more dragons perched on mountains. But then, I wasn’t normal.

  “That,” Adam said, his voice low in my ear, “is a Skinwalker. It is one of the oldest tales of my people and it is one that most definitely does not have a happy ending. In fact, it’s a story you already know.”

  I stared at the painting as the candlelight danced across it. The figure of the Skinwalker, the bodies…then I noticed something else. Pictures of animals. A crow, a wolf-like animal, and a bear, seemingly all painted nearly on top of one another, but with human legs at the bottom. A shapeshifter. One I had already met.

  “Crow Woman,” my breath came out in a hiss.

  “Yes, Crow Woman was a Skinwalker, but that picture is of another—he was the first one who practiced the dark magic. The old ones say that long ago, before the white men came to this land, there was a medicine man who discovered a magic that would let him take the form of any animal he chose when he wore its pelt, so long as he had been the one to take the animal’s life. Darkness overtook him and he turned to taking the lives of his people in hopes of becoming more powerful.” Adam whispered, his voice taking on a nearly haunting tone. I shivered in spite of the warm water and he hugged me closer to him, arms wrapped tightly around me before he continued. “Only when there was no one left did he realize what he had done, but then it was too late. He found that he had lost everything for that great power. He had let it consume him. Before I knew of Crow Woman, I often thought that Spritebloods and Skinwalkers were one and the same, though I’d never seen Wynter shift into an animal of any kind. Now that I’ve met both Crow Woman and Wynter, I can tell the difference between the two. I believe Spritebloods were born to be the creatures they are, but Skinwalkers were humans who wished for power. They were made.”

  The ceiling left in a flash and a different scene took its place. I felt my heart drop to my stomach as the images took over—as the vision showed me what had happened in our absence.

  Adam felt me stiffen in his arms. “What is it?”

  I felt him turn me around, but all I could see were the skeletal branches of the forest, the dry, cracked earth beneath my feet. I knew what we would find when we left the cavern—what we’d see once we made it back home.

  “It’s a Deadland. The Pack has found a Deadland.”

  “WILLIAM WAS ACTUALLY the one who found it,” Erik informed us. “But I’m pretty sure it didn’t look as scorched then as it does now.”

  The dragon boy ducked his head, ashamed. A bright red flush crept into his cheeks. “Sorry. It’s a self-preservation instinct. Everything was fine—and then it wasn’t.”

  “Shoot flames first, ask questions later, right?” Michael joked, elbowing the boy in the ribs.

  The flush deepened and a small wisp of smoke curled out of William’s right nostril. “Don’t tell anyone I torched the woods.” The worry in his voice caused the words to come out squeaky. “I’d be the first dragon to have to go back to Shifter’s U.”

  “Shifter’s U?” I asked. “Do you mean Imperium?”

  “Yeah. Imperium sounds stodgy, so everyone who’s ever been there calls it Shifter’s University, or Shifter’s U,” he replied. “Seriously though, please don’t tell anyone that I did that. When you leave, you’re supposed to have complete control over your instincts—especially when they involve flames.”

  “Your secret is safe with us, dude,” Tommy told him solemnly. “Besides, I think you gave that tree over there character. It looks better since you touched it up.”

  The tree he referred to was smoldering, its branches crackling with a quickly dying fire. As I watched, one fell to the ground in a smoky heap.

  “Do we know how the Deadland happened?” Adam asked Erik. “Nikki and I were just through here a couple of hours ago and everything was fine.”

  “I’m not sure, but there’s something over there that you’ll want to see,” Erik pointed to the far side of the burnt tree. “I can’t say that it’s what caused the Deadland, but it’s as good an answer as anything else I’ve got.”

  We followed him, being careful to steer clear of the fallen branch, until we made it to the other side.

  The carcass of an animal lay on a flat rock on its side. It was fairly big, with four legs, but had no head or fur. Someone had taken those parts away.

  “Was that a…” I trailed off, not sure what I wanted to say since I wasn’t sure what animal it had been.

  “Coyote,” Adam finished for me. “Yes.” I looked up and saw the hard line of his jaw and the way the silver in his eyes sparked, angrier and hotter than any fire that William could have thrown at the tree. “Someone killed it for its pelt.”

  “See, that’s what made me lose control,” William said uneasily. “I’d been patrolling with Albie and his mom. Nothing at all was out of the ordinary for the whole afternoon. We split up, they headed home and I had started this way as a shortcut to head for mine, when I noticed that something felt off to me. The atmosphere was heavier and the trees even seemed to change around me. The next thing I know, a coyote springs at me from thin air. It was just short of taking out my throat and landed in front of me, snarling and snapping. Instinct kicked in and I morphed and torched the tree, though I was aiming at the coyote. I forgot to compensate for the change in height or I might have had a chance at getting it. The coyote was gone in a split second, seemed to just disappear into thin air. I thought it moved around to the back of the tree, so I came back here. Then, I found this. It was gray, the same as the fur that’s left on the legs of this one, but there’s no way this is the coyote that came at me. Not unless someone managed to kill it, skin it, and leave before I m
ade it back here.”

  “Would someone skinning an animal be able to bring a Deadland back?” Tori asked, her hand linked with Brian’s.

  I hadn’t seen them arrive, but there they were, standing just behind William.

  An invisible wind came up from the ground, stirring up the dying leaves at our feet. It gusted toward the smoldering tree and shoved against it in one strong push, instantly putting out the last of the hot embers as if it had decided that it had had enough of the unwanted fire.

  My voice sounded uneven as I answered Tori’s question. “If the magic they are using is dark enough, my guess is yes, it would bring back a Deadland. What I don’t know, is how we’re going to get rid of it.”

  5

  ADAM GOT ME home by nightfall, but only barely. The sun was setting when he walked me up on the porch.

  “Do you want to come in and eat some cake?” I asked. “Mom didn’t say anything about my birthday, but she never does. She still thinks it will be a surprise if she pretends that she forgot about it, then pops out with a birthday cake. She does it every year.” I grinned, remembering the year before when she’d tripped over the hallway rug and sent an ice-cream cake flying across the room to splat all over Tori. That surprise had caught everyone off-guard.

  He smiled. “I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

  I heard the front door creak behind me and turned to see Emily hopping excitedly from one foot to the other. “I told Mama you’d be here when I opened the door. I knew you would, but she said that you might be a few more minutes.” She stopped hopping and her eyes glazed over for a second. Then she added, “Tori and Brian are coming too. They’re on their way.”

  “They didn’t say anything about it earlier. Did they tell you they were coming over?” I asked her.

  “No.”

  “Then how do you know.”

  She shrugged, then turned and walked back inside. “I just know things sometimes.”

  Adam chuckled, sending a thought as he followed me. You look shocked, Nikki. You are the Seer. If your little sister didn’t have even a little bit of the magic, I’d be worried.