Blue Moon ab-8

by Laurell Hamilton

  He'd gone to have dinner with his family. Shang-Da had gone with him at my insistence. Sheriff Wilkes had to know we weren't leaving town by now. It wasn't just the local vampires we had to worry about. Richard had called on the telephone, saying they were running late, to start without him. His mother just hadn't understood why he couldn't stay longer. All of the Zeeman men were so pussy whipped -- ah, henpecked, sorry.

  I started through the trees, and they followed me. I climbed on top of a fallen log. You never step directly over a log. You never know if there's a snake on the other side. Step on the log, then over. Tonight it wasn't snakes I was worried about. I moved slowly, picking my way through the trees. My night vision is excellent for a human, and I could have gone faster. I wanted to go faster. I wanted to fling myself through the trees and run. I didn't, but it was force of will alone that kept me walking.

  It wasn't just the death I was picking up on. It was that warm rising energy that was pure lycanthrope. I knew I could sense some of this with Richard holding my hand. We'd done it before on a full moon, but never with me alone. Never just me moving through the darkness trying to breathe past the beating of my heart and the rush of someone else's power.

  I whispered, "Richard, what have you done to me?" Maybe it was his name, maybe it was just thinking of him, but I suddenly felt him sitting in the car. I had a moment of seeing Daniel driving. I could smell Daniel's aftershave. I could feel the warm tightness of Richard's chest. I pulled away and was left staggering. If I hadn't had a tree to hug, I'd have fallen to my knees. If that moment of sharing hit Richard as hard as it hit me, I was glad he wasn't driving.

  "Anita, are you all right?" Jason touched my shoulder. And power flowed between us in a hot, skin-creeping rush. I turned to him and it felt like I was moving in slow motion. I couldn't breathe past the power and the sensations that filled my mind. Images, flashes, like watching a room through strobe light. A bed, white sheets, the smell of sex so fresh it was hot and musky. My hands resting on a smooth chest. A man's chest. That warm, rolling power that was pure lycanthrope, pure beast, filled my body, like the man underneath me. Sharp, pleasant, exciting. The power spilled out my fingertips, pulling claws from my hands like knives unsheathing. The beast pushed at the smooth skin of my body, tried to slip out and overwhelm me. But I held it, tightened my body around it, and let only my hands turn monstrous. Claws sliced that smooth chest. Blood, hot and fresh enough to taste on our tongues.

  Jason stared up at me from the bed, still pinned by my body, our body, and he screamed. He'd wanted this. Chosen it. And still he screamed. I felt his flesh give under claws. Those hands struck again and again, until the white sheets were spongy with blood and he lay motionless underneath us. If he survived, he would be one of us. I remembered not caring if he lived or if he died, not really. It was the sex, the pain, the joy of it all that mattered.

  When I could feel my body again, Jason and I were kneeling in the leaves. His hands were still on my arms. Someone was screaming, and it was me. Jason stared at me with a face almost blank with horror. He'd shared the ride, but it wasn't his memory.

  It wasn't Richard's memory, or mine. It was Raina's. She was dead but not forgotten. She was why I feared the munin. I was a necromancer with ties to the wolves. The munin liked me. Raina's munin liked me best of all.

  "What's wrong?" Cherry said. She touched me, and it opened something inside of me again. It welcomed Raina back with a rush that left me screaming. But I fought it this time. Fought it because I did not want to see Cherry the way Raina would see her. Jason wouldn't care. Cherry would care. I would care.

  There was a rush of sensations: skin damp with sweat, hands with long, polished nails on my breasts, those grey eyes staring up at me, mouth open, slack, shoulder-length yellow hair against a pillow. Raina on top again.

  I screamed and pulled away from them both. The images died as if a plug had been pulled. I scrambled through the leaves on all fours, eyes shut tight. I ended sitting, hugging my knees to my chest, face buried against my legs. I squeezed my eyes so tight that I began seeing white snakes against my eyelids.

  I heard someone move through the crunching leaves. I felt them hovering over me.

  "Don't touch me," I said. It was almost another scream.

  I heard whoever it was kneel in the dry leaves before Jamil's voice came. "I won't touch you. Are you still getting the memories?"

  He didn't ask if I was seeing the memories. I found the phrasing strange. I shook my head without looking up.

  "Then it's over, Anita. Once the munin leave, they're gone until called again."

  "I didn't call her." I raised my face slowly and opened my eyes. The summer night seemed blacker somehow.

  "It was Raina again?" he made it a question.

  "Yes."

  He knelt as close as he could get without touching me. "You shared the memories with Jason and with Cherry."

  I wasn't sure if it was a question or a statement, but I answered it: "Yeah."

  "It was a full visual," Jason said. He was sitting with his bare back against a tree.

  Cherry had her hands pressed to her face. She spoke, face hidden. "I cut my hair after that night, after what she did to me. One night with her was the price for not having to do one of their porno movies." She jerked her hands away from her face, crying. "God, I can smell Raina's scent." She rubbed her hands against her jeans, over and over, as if she'd touched something bad and was trying to wipe it away.

  "What the fuck was that?" I asked. "I've channeled Raina before, but it wasn't like that. I've got glimpses of memories, but not a full-blown movie. Nothing like that, ever."

  "Have you been trying to learn to control the munin?" Jamil asked.

  "Just to get rid of it, them, whatever."

  Jamil moved closer to me, studying my face as if looking for something. "If you were lukoi, I'd tell you, you can't just turn the munin off. If you have the power to call them, then you must learn to control them, not just shut them out. Because you can't shut them out. They'll seek a way into you, through you."

  "How do you know so much?" I asked.

  "I knew a werewolf who could call the munin. She hated it. She tried to shut them out. It didn't work."

  "Just because it didn't work for your friend doesn't mean I can't do it." I could feel his breath warm against my face. "Back off, Jamil."

  He scooted back, but he was still closer than I wanted him to be. He sat back in the leaves. "She went crazy, Anita. The pack had to execute her." His eyes went past me into the darkness. I turned to see what he was looking at. Two figures stood in the darkness. One was a woman with long, pale hair and a long, white dress like something out of a 1950s horror movie. If you were playing the victim. But she stood very straight, very certain, as if she were anchored to the ground like a tree. There was something almost frightfully confident about her.

  The man with her was tall, slender, and tanned dark enough that he looked brown in the dark. His hair was short and a paler brown than his skin. If the woman seemed calm, he seemed nervous. He gave off energy in a roiling bath that breathed along my skin and made the night seem hotter.

  "Are you well?" the woman asked.

  "She shared the munin with two of us," Jamil said.

  "By accident, I take it," the woman said. She sounded faintly amused.

  I was not amused. I got to my feet, a little unsteady, but standing. "Who are you?"

  "My name is Marianne. I am the vargamor for this clan."

  I remembered Verne and Colin talking about a varga-something last night. "Verne mentioned you last night. Colin said he'd left you at home to keep you safe."

  "A good witch is hard to find," she said, smiling.

  I looked at her. "You don't feel Wiccan."

  Again, I knew she smiled at me. Her peaceful condescension grated on my nerves. "A psychic then, if you prefer the term."

  "I'd never heard the term vargamor before last night," I said.

  "It's rare," she
said. "Most packs don't have one anymore. Considered too old-fashioned."

  "You aren't lukoi," I said.

  Her head cocked to one side, and the smile was gone, as if I'd finally done something worthwhile. "Are you so sure?"

  I tried to get a sense of what had made me so sure she was human, or at least not lukoi. She had her own energy. She was psychic enough for me to notice. We'd have recognized each other without any introductions. We might not have known the exact flavor of each other's abilities, but we'd have recognized a kindred or rival spirit. Whatever power moved her, it wasn't lycanthropy.

  "Yeah, I'm sure you're not lukoi," I said.

  "Why?" she asked.

  "You don't taste like a shapeshifter."

  She laughed then, and it was a rich, musical sound that managed to be wholesome and earthy all at the same time. "I like your choice of senses. Most humans would have said I didn't feel right. Feel is such an imprecise word, don't you think?"

  I shrugged. "Maybe."

  "This is Roland. He is my bodyguard for this night. We poor humans must be watched over for fear that some overzealous shapeshifter might lose control and harm us."

  "Somehow I don't think you are that easy a prey, Marianne."

  She laughed again. "Why, thank you, child."

  Her calling me child made me add about ten years to her age. She didn't look it. It was dark, but she still didn't look it.

  "Come, Anita. We will escort you to the lupanar." She held out her hand to me like I was supposed to take it and be led like a child.

  I looked to Jamil. I hoped somebody knew what was going on, because I was lost.

  "It's all right, Anita. The vargamor is neutral. She never fights or takes sides in challenges. That's how she can be human and run with the pack."

  "Are we involved in a challenge or a fight that I don't know about?" I asked.

  "No," Jamil said, but he sounded uncertain.

  Marianne interpreted for me without being asked. "Introducing two outside dominants to a pack can lead to fighting. Having someone as powerful as Richard is raising the hackles on our younger wolves. Having him sleeping with our pack's only two dominant females makes it worse."

  "You mean we may get into a pissing contest," I said.

  "A colorful phrase, but accurate enough," she said.

  "Okay, now what?" I asked.

  "Now, Roland and I escort you all to the lupanar. The rest of you may go ahead. You know the way, Jamil."

  "I don't think so," I said.

  "No to what?" Marianne asked.

  "Do I look like Little Red Riding Hood?" I said. "I'm not taking a stroll in the woods with two strangers. One of them a werewolf and the other a ... I don't know what you are yet, Marianne. But I don't want to be alone with the two of you."

  "Very well," she said. "Some or all may stay. I was thinking that you might like privacy to speak with another human tied to the lukoi. Perhaps I was wrong."

  "Tomorrow in the light of day, we can talk. Tonight, let's just take it easy."

  "As you like," she said. Again, she held out her hand to me. "Come. Let us talk as we all troop to the lupanar as one big, happy family."

  "You're making fun of me now," I said. "That won't put you on my A-list."

  "I make fun of everyone a little," she said. "I mean no harm by it." She waggled her hand at me. "Come, child, the moon is passing above us. Time wastes away."

  I walked towards her with my five bodyguards at my back. I didn't take her hand, though.

  I was close enough to see the condescending smile clearly now. Anita Blake, the famous vampire hunter, afraid of some backcountry wisewoman.

  I smiled. "I'm cautious by nature and paranoid by profession. You've offered me your hand twice now within just a few minutes. You don't strike me as someone who does anything without a reason. What gives?"

  She put her hands on her hips and tsked at me. "Is she always this difficult?"

  "Worse," Jason said.

  I frowned at him. Even if he couldn't see it in the dark, it made me feel better.

  "All I want, child, is to touch your hand and get a sense of how powerful you are before we let you inside the boundaries of our lupanar again. After what you did last night, some of our pack fear you within the boundaries of our lupanar. They seem to think you will steal our power."

  "I can tap into it," I said, "but I can't steal it."

  "But the munin already reach out to you. I felt you call your munin. It traveled through the power we have called tonight in the lupanar. It disturbed it like plucking on a thread of a spider's web. We came to see what we had caught, and if it were too big to eat, we would cut it loose and not take it home."

  "The spider metaphor worked for maybe two sentences, then you lost me," I said.

  "The lupanar is our place of power, Anita. I need to get a sense of what you are before you enter it this night." The laughter was gone from her voice. She was suddenly very serious. "It is not just our protection I am thinking of, child. It is yours. Think, child, what would happen to you if the munin within our circle rode you one after another? I need to make sure you can control at least that well."

  Just hearing her say it made my stomach tight with fear. "Okay." I held out my hand to her like we were going to shake hands, but I gave her my left hand. If she didn't like it, she could refuse it.

  "Offering the left hand is an insult," she said.

  "Take it or leave it, vargamor. We don't have all night."

  "That is more true than you know, little one." She put her hand out as if to touch mine but stopped with her hand just above mine. She spread her hand above my skin. I mirrored her. She was trying to get a sense of my aura. Two could play at that game.

  When I raised my hands up in front of my body, she mirrored me. We stood facing each other, hands spread wide, not quite touching. She was tall, five-foot-seven or five-foot-eight. I didn't think there were high heels under that long dress.

  Her aura was warm against my skin. It had a weight to it, as if I could have wrapped her aura in my hands like dough. I'd never met anyone with such weight to their aura. It confirmed my first sense of her. Solid.

  She pushed forward suddenly, wrapping her fingers around my hand. She forced my aura back in upon itself like a knife thrust. It made me gasp, but again, I knew what was happening. I pushed back and felt her waver.

  She smiled, but it wasn't condescending now. It was almost as if she were pleased.

  The hair at the back of my neck tried to crawl down my spine.

  "Powerful," she said. "Strong."

  I spoke around a tightness in my throat. "You, too."

  "Thank you," she said.

  I felt her power, her magic, move over me, through me, like a rush of wind. She pulled away so abruptly it staggered both of us.

  We were left standing a foot away from each other, breathing hard like we'd been running. My heart thudded in my throat like a trapped thing. And I could taste her pulse on the back of my tongue. No, I could hear it. I could hear it like a small ticking clock. But it wasn't her pulse. I smelled Richard's aftershave like a cloud that I had walked through. When the marks were working through Richard, it was often scent that let me know what was happening. I didn't know what had caused them to act up. Maybe the power of the other lycanthropes or the closeness of the full moon. Who knew? But something had opened me to him. I was channeling more than the sweet smell of his body.

  "What is that sound?" I asked.

  "Describe it," Marianne said.

  "Like a clicking, soft, almost mechanical."

  "I've got an artificial valve in my heart," she said.

  "It can't be that."

  "Why not? When I lean forward to the mirror to apply eyeliner, I can hear it through my open mouth, echoing against the mirror."

  "But I can't hear it," I said.

  "But you are," she said.

  I shook my head. I was losing the sense of her. She was pulling away from me, putting up shields. I did
n't blame her, because, for just a second I could feel her heart beating, limping along. The sound hadn't made me sorry for her or empathetic. The sound excited me. I felt it pull things deep inside my body. It was almost sexual. She'd be slow, an easy kill. I looked at this tall, confident woman, and for a split second all I saw was food.

  Fuck.

  25

  We followed Marianne and her guard, Roland, through the darkened trees. I'd have caught that damn dress on every twig and deadfall. Marianne floated through the woods as if the trees themselves let her and the dress pass gently through. Roland paced at her arm, gliding through the woods like water down a well-worn channel. Jamil, Nathaniel, and Zane moved just as gracefully. It was the rest of us that were having trouble.

  My excuse was that I was human. I didn't know what Jason and Cherry's excuse was. I tried to step on a log and missed. I ended up on my stomach, arms scraping along the rough bark. I straddled it like a horse and couldn't seem to get my leg over the other side. Cherry tripped on something in the leaves and fell to her knees. I watched her get to her feet and trip over the same damn thing. This time she stayed on her knees, head down.

  Jason fell in a tangle of dry tree roots at the end of the log I was sitting on. He fell on his face and cursed. When he got to his feet, there was a scrape on his chest deep enough to show blood, black in the moonlight. It reminded me of what Raina had done to him. She'd cut his chest to rags, and there wasn't a scar on him from it.

  I closed my eyes and leaned over the log, resting my forearms on it. My arms hurt. I raised myself slowly and looked at them. I'd scraped them up enough so that blood was slowly filling the wounds in spots. Great.

  Jason leaned against the end of the log, far enough away that we wouldn't touch. I think we were all still afraid of that. Didn't want a repeat.