by Dianna Love
Mr. Rat’s nails scratched the rough surface when he angled around and crept closer.
What was that vermin after? Did he think she was dead and fair game as a meal? She probably smelled worse than a two-day-old corpse. She’d been wearing the same clothes for days with no shower.
Lifting her hand with the palm out, she ordered, “Leave and live, or stay and die.”
Powerful words coming from a woman with no weapon, less than twenty dollars in her pocket and not even a tingle of energy in her fingers now.
The rat took another couple of steps closer, pausing an arm’s length away. Close enough for her to see his whiskers twitch and dark eyes flick back and forth.
Not that she wanted to harm any animal, but she wondered where her blasted energy had gone. She had no real idea what would trigger it again, other than terror.
That had definitely worked. Too well.
She’d had no control either time when the energy had surfaced in a blast of heat and power.
She muttered at the rat, “Please go. Don’t be stupid.”
Pulling her hands close to her body to push herself up, she paused. Why wasn’t that rat scurrying off? Energy or no energy, most creatures that size would run.
Suspicion bloomed in her mind.
What if the Cadell leader had sent this rat?
Siofra had grown up hearing stories about Mother Cadellus, a witch revered by all the Cadells Siofra had been shunted between. That witch supposedly used necromancy to see through the eyes of a dead animal and speak through its mouth.
Siofra’s skin crawled at the idea of this being a dead rat moving around, and narrowed her gaze to evaluate the small critter.
It showed no sign of having been reanimated. Not that she was familiar with those things or had ever witnessed such an act, but she’d seen dead animals. This one sure looked healthy and alive.
Sitting back on its butt, the rat gave her a curious look.
That didn’t seem normal.
Siofra waited to hear a woman’s voice spill from its mouth, but that didn’t happen.
Finally, it waddled off toward the nearest dark shadow.
“Thank you,” Siofra muttered. “One battle won today and no one died.” She slowly reached her feet and bit her lip to keep from crying out. Her legs had gone through hell just getting here. Please tell her the mission for homeless people would not be far.
She’d walked all night and into early morning to reach this city. After that, she was never going to chide herself again about not exercising. That was why she’d slept like the dead for a few hours.
Her feet and legs were hurting, but they’d just have to suck it up and deal with the pain. That, she could handle, but her body wouldn’t go much farther without real food. She put her hand on the wall next to her when a wave of dizziness hit her.
It passed, but her body had a limit. She needed to feed it, and soon.
Wiping the sleep out of her eyes, she kept an eye on her surroundings while taking stock of what she still possessed. Baggy trousers and a T-shirt she’d found digging through a clothing donation container near the edge of the city. Those clothes had been meant for the needy and she could be their poster child at the moment. She’d found sneakers a size too large, plus a dishtowel she used as a scarf to cover her hair.
Back at the city where she’d caught a bus in Texas and had been able to buy a few things, she’d slipped a pair of scissors into a thrift store dressing room and attacked the white hair that had fallen to her waist for years.
Now the wavy locks barely reached her shoulders in a hairstyle more destitute waif than chic.
Retying the scarf around her head, she moved to the edge of the parking deck where she had a great view of the Ohio River.
She’d seen the sign early this morning as she walked through this part of the city. That river would account for the cool breeze wafting across this level. Four levels below, two vehicles entered the parking garage. She had to leave now while this place was relatively empty.
Her stomach growled, reminding her again that she’d eaten nothing but peanut butter crackers during the long hours it had taken to walk over thirty miles from where she’d escaped in Ohio.
The shifters who’d captured her before Golden Eyes arrived hadn’t bothered to search her pockets, so her last twenty dollars was still there from when she’d gotten away. But she couldn’t spend money she needed for food as she traveled further.
The lynx shifter had been more than happy to share lots of information with Siofra before they were captured, like how to find a mission for the homeless when she needed a decent meal. Siofra had made plenty of notes on a scrap piece of paper during their long ride.
Freedom should feel exciting and wonderful, but she was still on the run. The Cadells never stopped hunting anyone who escaped.
Pulling the tail of her T-shirt up, she did her best to clean her face until she found a bathroom.
Once she ate a decent meal, she’d be revived enough to make it further.
She gathered what few items she possessed and shoved them in the flowery tote bag she’d found at the same donation box, and headed for the stairwell. When she reached street level and started toward the busiest direction, unnaturally cool air brushed her skin.
A presence formed next to her.
Siofra closed her eyes, wishing for peace at least until she found a way out of this city, but this spirit stood so close that hair lifted on her arms and the air chilled even more.
Could she first get a cup of coffee and food?
“What?” Siofra asked, opening her eyes to find the filmy image of a woman in her late twenties with ebony skin. She wore contemporary clothing of jeans and a frilly blouse. She had dark braided hair, grayish eyes and a nice smile. Nothing had changed from the last two times Siofra had met her.
She’d started calling the ghost Abigail, because the name seemed to fit.
The ghost floated backward, remaining ahead of Siofra as she walked.
“What can I do for you, Abigail?” Siofra asked, not expecting a reply. No one walked near her at the moment. Over the years since she’d first seen spirits, some had spoken to her, some tried to communicate with hand signals and some just stared until they got on her nerves. Why hitting puberty had opened a door to the dead, she had no idea.
She’d never had a spirit harm her or anyone else. Not until the one showed up when Dyson attacked her. Had that spirit given Siofra the deadly power?
That was a scary thought.
After a few seconds, a shimmering Abigail shook her head slowly from side to side.
What could that mean?
“I have to find food,” Siofra explained, glancing around to be sure no one noticed her. “I need you to move, please.”
Being on the run meant not drawing attention, a concept lost on ghosts.
She could walk through Abigail, but the one time she’d tried that with a spirit, something in her body had short-circuited her brain and she’d blacked out.
She’d regained consciousness flat on her back.
This was not the time to lose touch with the world.
Abigail had gotten her into trouble the last time they’d met, while Siofra was on kitchen duty.
Siofra took a side step, hoping to slip past, but Abigail floated over and shook her head again.
Siofra got tough. “I asked you nicely to move. If you don’t do it, I’ll walk through you and you’ll explode into a million bits of light.”
That was such a lie.
Frowning at Siofra, the spirit must have believed her. She floated to the side and held an arm out with an irritated look on her face as if Siofra was being unreasonable. Siofra started forward, then glanced over one more time to find the ghost had vanished.
If she weren’t so freaking tired, she’d have just crossed the street to see if taking a different sidewalk would have made the ghost happy, but Siofra had a limited amount of energy. Nothing was stopping her from reaching food.
Ghosts had been helpful as she escaped, but they had also caused her problems with their erratic behavior in the past.
What was she supposed to do? Sit here all day waiting for a positive sign from a ghost? Not the wisest move when she had no identification and only enough money to buy a handful of snacks to hold her over when she walked between cities with shelters.
The one thing she couldn’t do was draw the interest of a cop. Worst place possible for her to be was in jail, because one of the Cadell groups would eventually find her if she stopped moving.
If that happened, she’d end up locked in a cage, if she survived their brutal punishment.
Or worse than that. The Cadells would sell her to the Black River pack. She shuddered over the stories she’d heard about what they did to females in their labs. Those miserable bounty hunters in Ohio had laughed and talked about waiting to sell the female shifters and their children to that pack.
But her golden-eyed white knight had shown up to save them.
She swallowed at the memory. Why did she miss him? He was a shifter after all, a male shifter at that.
Because he was so incredibly nice and protective, her heart argued in his defense.
And he had a strange energy, too. She would tuck that memory of meeting him into a special place for someone who couldn’t be lumped in with all other male shifters. Someone who had given her a moment of peace she craved to feel again.
Shaking off the memory, she put her mind to finding food.
Foot traffic picked up as daylight peeked around buildings.
When she saw a college-age woman waving a sign that offered a sandwich special at the deli behind her, Siofra smiled.
She’d found an information source.
Walking up to the pretty young woman, Siofra waited to be noticed. The smell of food coming from the shop almost took her to her knees.
“Want a Reuben on rye, tall drink and chips for only five bucks?” the young woman asked.
“Thanks, but I can’t afford that,” Siofra said, then rushed ahead with what she did need. “I’m looking for the mission.”
“What mission?”
Siofra licked her dry lips and said, “Wherever they feed the homeless?”
That’s when the woman took a step back and gave Siofra a full inspection.
A new female ghost shoved her face between them. Siofra swatted with her hand as if flies had attacked her and muttered, “Stop it. I’m starving.” She was also lightheaded and getting dangerously close to passing out if she didn’t eat very soon.
Now the sandwich-sign woman changed her expression from concern for a hungry person to fear of a crazy woman talking to invisible people. Argh.
Siofra leaned to one side, past new ghost lady, to see the sandwich woman pointing to her left and saying, “There’s a soup kitchen that way.”
The ghost wore a striped blue dress with puffy short sleeves, white apron, sneakers, and her nametag read Thelma. She shook her head fervently.
Clamping her teeth, Siofra tried to talk without moving her lips. “Get out of here.”
She must have spoken louder than she intended.
The young woman with the deli sign snapped, “Hey, I’m working. I belong here, so don’t be telling me to do anything.”
“Sorry. I wasn’t saying that to you,” Siofra mumbled and tried to get past the blasted ghost, who now swayed in whatever direction Siofra took.
Everything spun in Siofra’s vision. She had to reach the soup kitchen.
“You need to move on,” the woman said as she backed toward the door to the restaurant, clearly going for help.
She had no idea how much Siofra wanted to move on and get to the food, but Thelma wouldn’t butt out of the way.
Slowly, Siofra circled Thelma, who looked even more demented than she’d just acted. Amazingly, Thelma remained floating in one spot. Maybe she’d reached the end of her territory. In one of the conversations Siofra had with a male ghost who regularly came to her at camp, but only in a specific spot, she’d asked whether he could leave that location.
Instead of answering the question, that ghost had looked surprised. In Siofra’s mind, she’d heard the question, Why would I do that?
At the next large intersection, Siofra fell into step with a loose group of people dressed too casually to be office workers. They were happy and chatting. Probably enjoying a day off or on vacation, something Siofra had read about normal people doing.
Would she ever feel normal?
When the light changed, she looked across the street to see the soup kitchen. Yes!
Hurrying forward now with renewed energy at the thought of eating, she wiggled her way through the slowpokes meandering along.
A half block before she reached the kitchen, an ethereal being ahead of Siofra rushed back and forth through people walking on the sidewalk.
One man sneezed and rubbed his arms as if chilled.
Another blurry spirit came at Siofra from the street side this time. Both filmy beings rushed around her then, in and out of the crowd.
Keeping her head down, Siofra stepped one way, then the other, trying to outmaneuver these ghosts. Had her presence in this city somehow pissed off the local ghosts?
People were starting to complain about being bumped and rubbing their arms as if chilled when the temperature had to be in the eighties already.
Thelma appeared in front of Siofra again and held her arms out to each side, making it clear Siofra would have to walk through her.
Evidently Thelma had no territorial restraints.
Siofra could see the place for food. Why was Thelma blocking her way? Was there a threat? She didn’t see anything except indigent people entering the building. Besides, if Siofra did not reach that soup kitchen, then she might as well lie down and die right here. She had nowhere else to go for help and without food she was in danger of passing out.
Still, confusion and fear had her backing up. She bumped into someone. She jumped forward and spun around to find a middle-aged woman in a dress suit glaring at her.
Lifting a hand in apology, Siofra mumbled, “Sorry. My mistake.”
Behind the woman, two more spirits joined the translucent circus in progress.
After the woman stalked past her, Siofra swung back around and hissed, “Stop it.”
Thelma had a disgruntled look on her face, but remained planted in the middle of the sidewalk.
Stand here until she passed out or barge ahead and try to reach the food?
Screw it. Siofra was so close to being faint from hunger she could hardly think. Maybe now that her new energy had surfaced, she could use it in a good way and move through the waitress spirit.
She started forward and Thelma crossed her arms.
The other ghosts began flying faster and now emitted sounds of wailing and moaning.
Siofra looked around to see if anyone else heard it. Nope.
The noise climbed to a deafening level in her head.
She covered her ears, but that did nothing. She panicked and ran ahead, blasting through a wave of cold air. Not enough for her to black out, thankfully, but the frigid blast rocked her body.
Everything blurred and that hideous noise got worse.
She waved her hands, batting at the wraiths. “Stop it.”
“What’s your problem?” a guy yelled. “I’m on freaking crutches.” He pushed her to the side as he passed.
Siofra stumbled and nearly fell. Was Thelma behind this fiasco?
Why?
Horns honked. People were shouting and someone shoved her in another direction. Siofra couldn’t make it all stop. Her vision whirled and blurred. She backpedaled and stepped off a short drop.
The sound of cars crashing filled the air.
Caught in the turbulence of ghosts and the world spinning around her, Siofra took off running with her hands over her ears, screaming, “Stop it. Make them leave me alone!”
Someone shouted, “Look out! Stop!”
&n
bsp; More icy cold blasted her face and skin. Her body felt as if it separated from her mind. Dead faces flew at her from all directions.
She swatted wildly, trying to knock the ghosts away, and slapped herself in the process.
Tires squealed.
Something hit Siofra in the back. She went flying forward, landing on hard pavement.
Finally, everything was quiet and dark. She gave in and shut her eyes.
Chapter 8
Monday afternoon, Spartanburg, South Carolina
Rory clamped his hands around each side of the gurney holding his body as Cole Cavanaugh pulled the wrapping off the mangled mess that had once been a healthy leg.
Shit, he wanted to throw up.
Twenty hours and it hadn’t even started healing.
His claws kept shooting out the tips of his fingers and his toes, then he’d force them out of sight again. He couldn’t blame that on Ferrell. Trying to shift happened to any of them when they were heavily wounded, because they healed faster in animal form.
But whatever had been off with Ferrell for a while was getting worse, which was saying something. His jaguar had never seemed normal.
Sucking in a hard gulp of air, Rory released it in a hiss.
Cole hesitated for a second, then finished unwrapping the leg. “Sorry, buddy. This sucks, but that wound smells bad already. Have you healed at all since yesterday?”
“Not much,” Rory mumbled, fighting to keep his stomach from erupting. Even his shoulder that had begun healing after the nymph touched it had slowed in mending.
Any other time, his smaller wounds would be closed up by now, even with him in human form. Blood would have stopped oozing from even significant wounds. But not the leg.
Ferrell had gone entirely silent. Not even any gory pictures. That was another thing that didn’t happen. When Rory was wounded, his jaguar would slam around, howling in pain until they shifted and healed.
Never a quiet moment with that beast injured, so why now?
Giving Rory’s leg a long look, Cole cocked an eyebrow at him. “Why aren’t you healing?”