by Helen Harper
“What do you mean ‘true harbingers of evil’? What kind of evil? Vampire evil? Shadow men evil?”
“Try large-scale death and destruction evil.”
“Oh.” I paused. “So not bunny rabbits then.” I felt a brief shiver of heat inside me.
John held out his hand and I dropped the stone back into his lined palm.
“So what’s next?”
His brow furrowed further and he looked at me with troubled eyes. I had a nasty feeling I knew what he was going to say next and felt a brief nervous tremor.
He sighed heavily. “I’ll have to file a report with the Brethren.”
Dammit. Up till now, for at least as long as I’d been old enough to be aware of how the pack was run, any reports John had sent to the Brethren had been after any Otherworldly messes had already been cleared up, and the details had been purely informative and retrospective. In other words, requiring no further action. This reeked of a mess that was about to begin instead – and for me that spelled danger, especially if the Brethren were going to gallop on down to ‘save’ us.
I eyeballed John with a mixture of hope and scepticism. “Really? We can deal with death and destruction without them.”
Unfortunately his voice was flat. “No. Something on this kind of scale is something they need to know about.”
“Will they come here? Do I need to leave?” I asked quietly, curling my nails painfully into my palms.
He didn’t pause before answering, which I suppose was slightly reassuring. “I shouldn’t think you’ll need to. Even if they arrive with a delegation to see our little pack, we can mask you well enough – of course as long as you’re not in a position where you’d be expected to shift. Julia’s been improving the lotion since the Brummie delegation were here last autumn. With that on, even the Lord Alpha himself won’t be able to smell a hint of your humanity.”
I felt an immense wave of relief. As far as I was concerned, this was my home, even if the Brethren would strongly disagree. And probably summarily execute me for daring to think otherwise. Because I was human – and humans were not permitted to even know about the Brethren or the mere existence of shapeshifters, let alone live with them for seventeen years.
As for the lotion, shifters have an animalistic sense of smell. The first time another pack’s members had visited us, years before when I was just a kid, Julia had set to work creating the lotion that now, on occasion, we used to hide my all-too-human scent. She’d been getting better and better at it. Fortunately the fact that I spent all my time with my pack meant that the worst of my so-called human stench was already covered by sheer transference, while the lotion did the rest. I had been meaning to ask what was in it for years but had always thought better of it. Sometimes ignorance was bliss.
John looked at me steadily. “I won’t let you be put in any danger.”
I forced a laugh. “I can look after myself. More than most shifters can.”
“The Brethren aren’t like most shifters. In Cornwall we’re generally an amiable and peaceable bunch who fight off the odd wild bunny.”
I smiled despite myself.
He continued, “Don’t dismiss what you’ve already heard about them. They’re different. But also don’t forget that they’re strong and unforgiving because they have to be. Without the Brethren keeping the local packs like us in check, there are those shifters who would,” he paused for a heartbeat, “cause trouble.”
Actually I knew of a few who’d cause more than trouble. “But you’re the alpha here. Can’t the local alphas keep the troublemakers in their packs in check?” I was aware that there was an irritating whiny note to my voice but I seemed unable to prevent it. John’s voice, in return, remained calm and steady.
“A lot of my power comes from the fact that I can draw on the Brethren when I need to. And alphas can be troublemakers too,” he added with a slight smile.
I nodded slightly, trying not to let the nervous panic rise any further. I usually tried to forget that there were big bad things out there like the Brethren. It wasn’t good for my health to think about the what ifs. Like what if the Brethren discovered who I was and killed me? What if they killed the whole pack for harbouring me? What if my mother hadn’t compelled the Cornish pack to take me in? What if she was still alive? What if…
Nope. It didn’t do any good.
“Anyway,” John continued, “from what I hear the new Lord Alpha is eager to stamp his authority across the Kingdom. He’s already made several visits to different packs and I have no doubt that sooner or later he’ll make his way to us whether we wish it or not.” He watched me carefully. “It might be better to get it out of the way while we can still maintain some control over the situation.”
I snorted “Whatever,” and quickly changed the subject back to the wichtlein’s stone. Bureaucratic protocol might demand that we had to inform our lords and masters about it, but I was curious as to whether ‘large-scale death and destruction’ was really going to happen, or if it was just scaremongering. “How seriously should I take this rock?”
John’s expression was suddenly completely humourless. “As to that, I’d say as seriously as possible. The ways and actions of the Otherworld are rarely without good reason.” He held the little black stone between his finger and thumb and gazed at it quietly for a moment before placing it inside his shirt pocket and buttoning it over.
I frowned. If John was treating the situation that gravely, then it definitely merited my more earnest attention. “I’ll stay here and scout the area, and see what I can find.”
“Are you armed?”
I had my usual throwing daggers taped to my arms. And, of course, there was my blood. “I’m good.”
“Okay, then. I need you back at the keep by sunset though, or I’ll send Anton out looking for you.”
I threw John an evil look. Anton and I were not exactly mates. He laughed lightly and, picking up his broad-brimmed hat that he’d left at the side of the clearing, turned towards the keep.
I watched his retreating back for a moment and then started looking around, belatedly realising that I hadn’t thought to ask him about the rumours he’d heard that had made him come here in the first place. Scuffing the dirt in a few places that looked as if it might have been disturbed, I wondered if the gossip had been related to the stone. It certainly made a strange noise but it would never have been loud enough to attract anyone’s attention from far away, and the village itself was at least ten kilometres from here. Maybe the wichtlein that had left its little offering in the first place had been of the loud variety. I shrugged and continued looking carefully around me. Despite my best efforts, I couldn’t find any more shiny stones though, or traces of anything else. I paused for a moment, trying to use my spidey senses but clearly I was either no superhero or there was nothing to be found. However, my gaze fell to the area on my right, which was dark despite the afternoon sunshine, and contained dense undergrowth that could be hiding all manner of things. Hopefully not actual spiders.
I forced my way through and sniffed the air. It was heavy and musty but felt natural. I ploughed ahead. Peering through the tangle of creepers and trees, it seemed as if there was something up ahead. Certainly not anything alive, or even undead, but there was something there that looked as if it didn’t belong. I squinted, but couldn’t work out what it was from this distance. I guessed I’d just have to push through the maze of prickly gorse bushes to find out then. This would have been easier if I’d been wearing jeans instead of my running shorts.
I took a deep breath and gingerly stepped past the first clump, wincing slightly as the sharp thorns scored the skin on my thighs. I gritted my teeth and carried on, hoping this was going to be worth it. By the time I reached the other side of the thigh-high bushes, although I’d already gotten used to the mild irritation of the pain, beads of blood were forming down the front of my legs. Cursing John, wichtleins and the world in general under my breath, I looked up and realised that what I’d spo
tted was a length of black cloth. Odd. I checked around it, in case it was a trap of some sort, but it appeared to be merely hanging on its own from the branch of a gnarly oak tree. I tugged it a few times but it was fairly stubborn so I yanked harder, falling backwards into the gorse as it came free.
“Shit!” I swore loudly, and even looked around to make sure that no-one had seen my fall. I wouldn’t have put it past some of the pack to have set all this up just to have a laugh at my expense. Grimacing in pain as the thorns pulled away from my skin, I forced myself up and looked at my prize.
It was about three yards long with a skein of silver thread running through each side. It was unlikely that a Cornish local had left this behind, given its thorny location and heavy feel. I raised it to my nose and sniffed, before choking as the unmistakable stench of death hit my nostrils. Definitely not a local, then. Unlikely to be a pack member playing a practical joke either – their sensitive sense of smell would have made it difficult to even get close to the material. Yet there was obviously something Otherworldly about it.
I searched around again for any other traces of anything, but came up short. There were no signs of a trail to be seen. I certainly wasn’t a tracker of John’s standard but I was fairly competent despite my lack of shifter super-senses. However, there was nothing; in fact it was as if the cloth had just dropped dramatically from the sky. The mystery deepens, I thought cryptically. Still, perhaps John might be able to shed more light on it. After all, for all I knew, wichtleins were merely keen fashionistas along with casually dropping ominous rocky notes of doom for random passers-by.
Looking up, I realised that the afternoon was turning into dusk, with the blue sky darkening over just a tinge. I glanced back at the gorse, the only way out, and sighed. Better get going, I figured. After this, I didn’t think I’d be wearing any pretty skirts for a while. Well, to be fair, I didn’t actually own any skirts, or dresses, but that didn’t mean I didn’t want the choice to wear them if I wanted to – without looking as if I’d travelled through a meat grinder, at least.
It took me some time to get back through the thorny bushes and return to the clearing. I had another quick look around, just in case I’d missed something, but there was nothing there. Trying to avoid touching it with my bare skin, I put the black cloth over my shoulder, and headed westwards for the keep. The light-hearted feeling I’d had earlier that day during my run had completely dissipated. The potential Brethren visit notwithstanding, John was clearly taking this whole omen very seriously. I made a mental note to check the keep’s library later for any information about wichtleins. It was possible I could dig up something useful on the Othernet too.
I wasn’t far from home when Tom, my sparring buddy, bounced up to me. His tortoiseshell hair glinted in the fading daylight and his smile matched his sunny appearance. “Hey Red! Where have you been all day? And what is that awful smell? Have you been digging up old graves again?”
“Out for a run, then I helped John with some poking around in the forest. I found this on my way.” I pointed at the cloth from where the offending reek was coming. He couldn’t help himself from leaning closer and inhaling deeply, then recoiled away from me in disgust. Tom was the kind of guy who’d fart under the duvet then be compelled to lift up the cover to sniff.
“Eeugh! Let me guess, you were down a rabid rabbit hole and came across the shroud of Bugs Bunny?”
Clearly, my recent exploits had not passed without comment across the pack. I considered telling him the truth but figured that if John hadn’t mentioned it to the others yet then it was probably not my place to say. “Something like that,” I said dismissively, waving a hand airily in front of me. Tom shrugged and grinned, moving around to my non-death-cloth-wrapped side and placing an easy arm across my shoulder.
We walked companionably towards the large grey castle-like building. Even after living here for years, I still felt a little thrill whenever I saw it looming towards me. Cornwall’s history was steeped in Celtic myths and rumour had it that our keep was built on the ruin of a centuries-old Celtic castle. It certainly wasn’t a fairy-tale castle with turrets and steeples, but its solid squatness was both welcoming and reassuring. The grand oak gate at its entrance bore marks of various violent fights and incursions from the past, either from the shifters who’d lived there in years gone by, or from even earlier inhabitants, and the rippling imperfections in the various visible glass windows hinted at its lack of modernity. Behind the keep, out of sight, was Julia’s little herb garden in which she grew any manner of weeds to feed her various concoctions, while in front lay a long drive covered in pale-pink shale which had the unnerving habit of jumping up by themselves and chipping a long line of visitors’ gleaming car paint. However, regardless of anything, it was my home and I loved it.
Julia was just inside the door when we entered, pinning something up onto the notice board. She was a tiny woman with grey hair, slightly older than John and a whole lot scarier. She’d lived with the Cornwall pack her entire life and treated everyone as if they were naughty children. She fixed me with a death stare. “Mackenzie Smith, don’t you dare come into the keep with that…thing. It smells like Hades.”
I lightly touched the cloth on my shoulder without thinking and then recoiled slightly at the shudder its touch gave me. “I need to show it to John,” I protested.
“I don’t care. It is not entering this building and defiling our living space. Besides, John has already gone out.” She sniffed delicately and continued to glare at me until I rolled my eyes in acquiescence and began to back out.
To be fair to her, despite the keep’s vaguely menacing appearance outside and shabby interior within, it was well-kept with a seemingly everlasting lemon-fresh smell. I had long suspected that she hired brownies to clean it at nights, but had never been able to catch any of them to prove it. As Tom virtually sprinted up the stairs to get out of her way, I flounced outside and headed for an unused shed beside the north face of the keep, tying the cloth securely to a post inside before stomping ungratefully back in. She was waiting for me in the hall.
“When will he be back?” What I really wanted to know was whether he’d called the Brethren yet and if they were really coming to our little corner to investigate.
“He said he’d be some time dear, but that he’d probably return by supper.”
I scowled in annoyance. Now that I’d removed the evil-smelling object from her notice, she’d reverted to calling me dear again. Julia called everyone dear. I knew she wasn’t trying to be patronising but any endearments of any sort wound me up. Duck, hen, chick, even Red as Tom insisted on calling me, all annoyed me. Mack was fine. If you were Julia or John, you could get away with Mackenzie, but woe betide anyone else who tried that one. My red hair wasn’t the only fiery thing about me. I was pretty sure that from the moment of my arrival at the keep, the whole pack had been aware of my volatile temper. And it wasn’t entirely my own fault that I’d fly off the handle at times. Despite my mother’s last words to keep my bloodfire a secret, I’d mentioned it to Betsy, a werelynx shifter the same age as me, when we’d pricked each other’s fingers at age nine and sworn a blood pact of friendship to each other. I think at the time I’d just been happy to have finally found a friend. She’d vowed – and still to this day continued to assert the same, I might add – that she’d felt the fire inside my blood when we’d pressed our pinkies together. And, naturally, a scant three hours later the whole pack knew that I had a strange heat inside me that shaped my emotions and often directed my actions. I was pretty sure that most pack members were under the impression that it was a particular side effect of being a puny, red-haired human, and my limited experience outside the shifter world meant that I couldn’t genuinely say otherwise. Certainly, since that day, I’d learned never to entirely trust Betsy with a secret again. John, for his part, had merely raised an eyebrow and gently suggested that I made sure the fire didn’t burn me out. Ha bloody ha.
I murmured something bac
k at Julia and headed for the kitchen, hoping I could find something to eat and avoid having to sit down and pretend to enjoy Johannes’, the resident pack chef’s, cooking with the rest of the pack later on. Betsy herself was in there washing a plate. She arched an eyebrow at me.
“You smell…interesting, Mack.” She looked behind me. “Is Tom with you?”
I shrugged. “He was but he disappeared when Julia started harping on at me.”
She looked oddly disappointed for a second before returning to the sink. “Are you coming to the Hanging Bull for a jar tonight?”
I opened the fridge and dug inside for some bread and a hunk of cheese before sitting down at the large scarred wooden table. “Nah. I want to hit the library and check out a few things.”
“Your young policeman might be there.”
“He’s not ‘my’ anything.” I started sawing at the creamy cheese. I’d had a very brief affair with the local copper. His name was, and I’m not joking here, Nick. It hadn’t lasted long. I’d had the feeling that he was looking for a little wife to keep the home fires burning while he saved the village of Trevathorn and its environs from dangerous washing-line thieves and the local drunks. That was never going to be me. In fact, as nice as he was, I rather felt that I’d had a lucky escape.
I finished making my sandwich and started chewing it down. Unfortunately, Johannes took that moment to enter the kitchen. He saw me eating and gave me a baleful look.
“I…er…I’ll be here for dinner, Johannes, I just need a little snack,” I said hastily.
He humphed grumpily and began peeling potatoes. “Dinna think that you can pull tha wool o’er my eyes, dahling.”
“I’m not! I’ve been out all day, didn’t have lunch. I wouldn’t miss your cooking for the world,” I swore, hating myself for the lie – and Johannes for the endearment.
Betsy choked back a guffaw. “Just make sure you give her double portions to make up for that lost lunch, J.” She leaned over to him and gave him a peck on the cheek. I forced a smile. It’d serve me right, I supposed. She winked at me on the way out and I pulled a face at her in return.