All but Human

by Kris Austen Radcliffe

  Rysa turned a corner and the normals took Andreas into an unsecured facility and her brother needed her right now.

  She bolted out of her door, her feet pumping, as she ran down the sidewalk. “Rysa!” she yelled. Why is she running?

  Human, she is too far away. I cannot stay at the entrance. Behind her, Dragon crawled up the side of the hospital building, then back down. I cannot go in. A blistering flash of indecision as bright as the dream sun flared through their energy.

  The choice ground into Dragon with the same cutting, crumbling depth that the beast’s talons dug into the concrete exterior of the hospital: What if they chose wrong? What if they give chase and the Fates came for Andreas? What if they stay and the Fates took Rysa?

  If they lost either, if they fell down on their job—the one fucking job they had—what would it do to their brothers? What would happen if, once again, they let family die?

  Did Rysa run because she feared Anna and her Dragon?

  The familiar paralyzing sting of needles across her skin, muscle, and bone—the pull toward her beast she could not fight—yanked on her soul and she stopped two hundred and fifty feet away surrounded by open air, snow banks, and a dirty sidewalk.

  Below her, the overpass on which she stood vibrated. A truck roared by. Under the concrete structure, a bus and an SUV jockeyed for position in the freeway traffic. The big and the mechanical rolled on by with no thought or care about what a choice meant.

  Anna placed her hand over her lower belly. All she’d wanted was to ask Rysa if this time, everything would be okay.

  Goddamned Fates, she pushed. The world echoed with the treachery of the Parcae and this moment was no different.

  Anna leaned against the concrete rail of the overpass and looked up at the brightness of the winter sky. At least this siege greeted them with a clear sky. Anna humphed and did her best to keep hold of her siege-response. There were rules to sieges. Plans to make. Choices came and went.

  AnnaBelinda, the human half of the Dracas, turned her back on the whirlwind she could not follow into the center of the city, not because she wanted to, but because, at this moment, she had to.

  Come back, Dragon pushed. We will guard the hospital.

  But they could not enter the building. We are ineffective, she pushed.

  I will flatten myself against the walls.

  Anna nodded acknowledgement to the dragon speaking in her head but glanced over her shoulder hoping that this one time, a Fate would not cause more problems than she solved.

  Rysa did not return.

  Anna shoved her hands into her pockets as she walked toward the hospital. She would fish her phone out of the back of the van. She would make the necessary calls. She would get this under control.

  And she would not think about the choices.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Somewhere nearby, a woman screamed. A gun fired. But Ladon dreamed of wells so deep their air thickened to liquid. Of heat and cold roaring and cyclones. Impossible places and a sun so large it filled the sky and hung over the Dragon’s Rock on which he sat, once again, naked.

  There had been stairs to the stars but they were too tall and too steep and he had to climb them the way he’d climb the rocks of a cliff and now he couldn’t remember. So he sat on the granite of the cold Rock and tried to breathe but shades swirled around his feet and knees and chest. They fogged his vision and jabbed like fingers into his nose and mouth. He’d inhale but out here, only the shades over his face provided air.

  No Wife. No Dragon. Only the shades.

  The dream stripped Ladon more naked than the meat of his body could tolerate.

  He remembered numbers but they were wrong. The tensile strength of the shades confused everyone but six plus two came through anyway. Six…

  Tendrils curled from the too-large, remembered sun, all bright, hot, and colored by low frequencies. He reached out, thinking that perhaps this time, touching the star might burn away the shades.

  A blanket pulled off his face and his reflection stared down at him. He was in a confined space, one that jostled and hummed and rubbed upholstery against his cheek. Next to his head, a door opened.

  “You’re a pathetic mess,” his reflection said.

  He wasn’t on the Dragon’s Rock. He was in the back seat of a car and his reflection was evil. Others had medical descriptors, words about the mind and what happens when it’s strained too long, but they didn’t get to the true grain at the center of his reflection. That infinitesimal core squeezed down by the pressures of the universe and changed by the alchemy of the world into a crystal of pure evil. It grew in a filthy time. It suffered.

  Its trials made it the man it was today.

  His reflection sniffed and wiped blood off its cheek before poking Ladon in the chest. “Only the weak die in the back of a car.” The reflection looked pleased with itself. “You better live long enough for me to meld you in, you son of a bitch. I want my dragon.”

  Words formed in Ladon’s mind: Fuck you.

  His reflection scoffed. “You kiss the sweet thing with that mouth?” He poked Ladon again. “You’ll chew up her innocence.” A snicker made Ladon’s reflection sound like an injured rat. “I’ll do it right. I’ll strap her down and leave bruises.” He snickered again. “Cuts and stab wounds.”

  No words formed this time. Only a three-dimensional cathedral of complete context and meaning: Regret for not killing his reflection sooner. A map of how he would do it when the shades pulled back and he could breathe again. A wall meant to keep his reflection from the people who were not here—Mate, Sister, Friend, Brother—the people who understood his patterns and modulations. His Nest. His—

  The reflection slapped his face and clicked its tongue like a snake. “You think I can’t sense that? I see now, you murdering emperor’s whore.” He thumped his chest. “I’m more Human than the Human. Heh.” Ladon’s evil reflection giggled.

  Part of his body moved. A damaged limb. Pain happened but the shades blocked that, too. There was nothing out here. No air. No protection. Just speed and fear and the truth: When I hurt you, please forgive me. Please come for me. Words his wife-mate once set free when she was like he was now, locked into seeing dreams six months ago. At the beginning…

  Not the beginning. There was no beginning, only being. Only—

  “Hey hey hey!” His reflection slapped him again, but this time he pulled back and looked around as if he didn’t want others to see what he did. “I told you. No dying!” He slapped again.

  Again, the number six. Six…

  “That’s it,” his reflection snarled. “I wasn’t going to do this until we got home but it seems you’re stupid and weak.”

  The mouth of his reflection opened wider than it should and its teeth gleamed like a Burner’s. Its tongue writhed. Lips locked over Ladon’s mouth and nose.

  And something with teeth and claws crawled into his throat.

  Ladon coughed but the thing slithered down and in and it wiggled like a mass of gelatin. Or an egg sack.

  A new, unreal terror blossomed around the wiggling thing and Ladon rolled off the seat onto the car’s floor, his damaged arm lodging between his weight and the seat, but he lunged forward anyway, and stuck his head out the door.

  Vomiting didn’t happen. He wretched and heaved and gagged, but the thing with the teeth and the claws clamped onto the inside of his neck.

  “It stays in.” His reflection snagged Ladon’s good shoulder and pulled him out onto a wide swatch of turf.

  Three small prop planes sat nearby, each near an outbuilding. Four bodies lay in a pool of blood spreading over the grass next to the closest plane.

  They were parked on a small air strip with murdered normals.

  “Get up. We need to get to another airfield.” His reflection yanked on his arm. “I want a jet.”

  Ladon staggered to his feet. He had ice bugs in his throat and his reflection murdered normals. “I’m going to slit your throat,” he coughed
.

  His reflection punched. Ladon’s already pulsing head snapped to the side. “You are going to fill my little buddy with the information I need. You are going to tell it all your secrets.”

  Ladon had no secrets to tell.

  His reflection tossed him into the back of a prop plane. “Oh, but you do, honey-kins.” The face of his reflection appeared between the seats as he placed headphones over his fake-Ladon ears. “That beast has a name and I want to know what it is.”

  Wasn’t he supposed to be with his beast? The beast was always there, always near, always in Ladon’s mind.

  An engine started. His evil reflection leaned between the seats again. “That’s right. Think about my dragon. Make all the pretty colors of his real name.”

  “His name is Dragon.” Ladon’s name was Human. Brother. Husband.

  The plane moved. Ladon rolled on the seats. Up front, the fake thing giggled like a toddler. “Sure it is, loverboy. Sure it is.”

  When the plane pitched upward, Ladon’s broken arm slammed against the seat and the pain of the new jolt made it through the fog. He groaned, his vision clouding, and closed his eyes.

  “I do my research, Ladon-Human. I know your idiosyncrasies. I know there are things you never tell the world. But you’re going to tell me.”

  I will not, Ladon thought. I cannot.

  The world vanished into a haze of clouds and engine decibels.

  My name is in dragon, he thought. No one can say dragon.

  No one but the beast himself.

  Chapter Forty-Three

  “What the hell am I eating?” Daisy disconnected her call to The Land and chewed on the thing labeled “Nutrition Bar – Chocolate” and tried not to throw up.

  Her father was on a plane flying in from Portland. A security detail from The Land would taxi onto the runway within minutes. They were to pick up Rysa and head for the airstrip, to take the Branson plane south to Texas.

  When she called The Land, Daisy had heard Renee screaming in the background. The home plane had taken off before AnnaBelinda called. Now Renee was stuck in Branson while her boyfriend was in critical condition in a level-one trauma hospital in St. Paul.

  Daisy glanced at Gavin driving, and her heart pounded. What if it had been Gavin who’d been shot and she was stuck two states away? She looked away, thinking that right now she would be better off concentrating on the disgusting “food” in her hand than on the what-ifs of her relationship.

  The van bounced along the freeway toward Rysa. Derek leaned against the wall in the back next to the frazzled and semi-coherent Brother-Dragon, and looked as if he wanted to chuckle but didn’t have the strength. “Rysa says the nutrition bars taste like the ‘butt end of a moldy pork chop.’”

  Daisy swallowed a waxy, disgusting bite and folded the wrapper over the rest of the bar. She felt better, and if she needed another boost she’d force herself to down more later. At this point she was more worried about her cousin than her own fatigue.

  “I need to stitch that.” She pointed at his arm.

  Derek frowned. “Do you know what to stitch?”

  “Daisy.” Gavin glanced over his shoulder as he drove. “Come up here, please.”

  She nodded and patted Derek’s arm. He bled still, and more than he should. He needed stitches, but he refused to allow them to stop. Time was of the essence.

  She settled onto the step between the two seats. Radar slept on the floor of the passenger side, and Ragnar on the seat. The cats were in their box behind Gavin, meowing but safe. None of the animals were comfortable, but they needed to rest. And they were out of the way. “Thanks for driving,” she said as she stroked her dog’s head.

  Gavin checked the mirrors before changing lanes. “What did the people at The Land say?”

  “Not a lot.” They didn’t know a lot. “Andreas is hurt. Praesagio will coordinate between us, AnnaBelinda, Rysa, and their planes in the air.”

  Gavin nodded toward the back of the van. “You need to heal his cut, not just stitch it up. If we get caught by Vivicus, we’ll need him in top condition.”

  “I can’t. Rysa fixed him so that enthrallings don’t work on him anymore. I can’t hit him with ‘animal’ and shut down his human parts the way I did you.” She’d tried twice without telling Derek. Both times he’d frowned and shook his head. Not only was he not enthrallable, he was also exquisitely aware of any and all expressions of Shifter and Fate abilities around him.

  “Whatever is keeping you from healing people cannot be part of your physiology.” Gavin tapped the steering wheel. “You healed Dragon and calmed him down at the house. He’s neither human nor animal.”

  Daisy glanced into the back. Derek looked pale.

  “You healed me twice, after you figured out how to bypass whatever circuity is in the way.” He nodded over his shoulder again. “If you don’t heal Derek, we’ll have to drag his ass into the ER. Then what do we do? We can’t take Dragon in. They’re connected now.”

  He was right. She needed to heal the cut on Derek’s arm. “How?” Random blasts didn’t seem to have an effect, either. “It’s not just my animal healer. When Rysa healed him and made him impervious, she made it difficult for healers to affect him, too.”

  Gavin frowned. “From what I can tell, Dragon is able to see the tissues involved in a wound. Not ‘see’ them the way Rysa ‘sees’ but actually, physically see them with his three-dimensional dragon vision. The beast’s abilities are physiological.”

  “But I can’t see his maps.” And right now, she doubted Brother-Dragon’s mind was in any shape to map anyway.

  “Ask him to show you.” Slowly, Gavin raised his hand off the steering wheel. His fingers curled into the number sign for six. Then he wiggled his entire hand, to signal dragon.

  The beast had long, sharp talons with precision tips. “Are you saying to have him point?”

  Gavin grinned. “Think of it like anatomy class. You get to go down and deep in your cousin’s arm. Stitch him up and then focus your entire zap on that one spot. It might be enough to override the circuitry.”

  Would it work? Daisy glanced into the back. Quickly, she kissed her brilliant boyfriend’s cheek. “Thank you.”

  His blue eyes flashed. “Doing my best to be useful.”

  I love you, almost escaped. A full, heartfelt admission of what she’d been feeling since Halloween—before Halloween—but the familiar twist that accompanied the thought smacked it away. Loving him put him in danger, and if she had learned anything from the past few hours, Gavin was particularly vulnerable to the dangerous.

  She kissed his cheek again and squeezed his shoulder. “Wish me luck.”

  Gavin returned his attention to the freeway. Ragnar returned to sleeping. Daisy moved into the back again. She knelt between Derek and Brother-Dragon, and carefully touched both their cheeks.

  “We need to heal that wound,” she said.

  “I am fine.” But Derek winced.

  Brother-Dragon’s hide flashed and his hands moved, but Daisy only picked out not and human and heal.

  “Are you having problems signing?” She stroked the beast’s crest. This could not be good.

  “He says I am not his human and that I do not heal as well as Ladon.” Derek frowned. “I am to listen to you.”

  The beast snorted.

  Derek growled. “If I am not your Human, then get out of my head, beast.”

  Brother-Dragon’s hide flashed. Derek winced again.

  “Stop arguing!” Daisy would have slapped them both, but it would not help. “Brother-Dragon, can you see where Derek needs healing?”

  The beast pointed at his arm.

  “I need you to be more specific.” Daisy tapped the floor. “Which bin has the med kit? I need sutures.”

  Brother-Dragon rolled toward Daisy.

  “He says the one behind the driver’s seat.”

  Daisy opened the bin and looked down into the pitch black shadows under the van’s floor. “How the hell
do you find anything in here?”

  Brother-Dragon’s glowing hand dropped into the bin.

  “No, Brother does not have a ‘system.’” Derek closed his eyes. “Brother’s ‘system’ consists of tossing everything under the floor and letting the gods sort it out.” The visibly nauseated Derek leaned back against the wall of the van.

  Brother-Dragon pulled out his hand.

  Derek winced. “Yes, it is true, beast.”

  “Hey!” Daisy caught sight of two cases that looked likely enough to hold the needed sutures, but she’d need to crawl under the floor to snag them, and she could only pull out one at a time. “Which case is it? The red or the orange?”

  Derek opened his eyes. His mouth rounded as if he wanted to say a word but could not. “Show her the correct tone.”

  Brother-Dragon flashed the exact red of one of the cases, with the exact depth of color, texture, and reflectivity.

  “Red one it is.” Daisy pulled it out.

  “The color of fresh blood,” Derek groaned.

  “Brother-Dragon,” Daisy threaded up the finest sutures in the case. “I need you to show me exactly where inside the wound to stitch. The exact position on the artery. Okay?”

  The big beast laid down his head.

  “Yes, beast, she wishes you to show her the spot that bleeds.” Derek looked like a frustrated parent.

  “I know you are disoriented, but I need you to cast a glow on Derek’s arm while I stitch. And I need you to use your talon to point inside the wound where I need to do the stitching. We don’t have the equipment I need to do this right, so I need your help, okay?” Daisy wadded up new bandages.

  The beast sniffed at Derek’s face.

  “I love you too.” Derek closed his eyes.

  “Ready?” Daisy lifted off the blood-soaked stocking cap over the wound.

  Blood oozed. Brother-Dragon sniffed and flashed, then flicked out one talon. As gently as he could, he parted the wound and pointed with the tip of his talon at the nick in the artery in her cousin’s arm.

  Daisy stuck her finger into Derek’s flesh. Stuck it in along the beast’s talon, up to the end of her fingernail, and fired the strongest, most focused jolt of healing her body was capable of making directly at the hole that should not be there.