by Apryl Baker
“No, that was Luka.” Conner shifts, pushing Micah even closer to me.
“Why would we need heat?” That makes no sense.
“Shifters use heat to heal wounds, both physical and metaphysical,” Micah explains, the strain in his voice evident. “Being surrounded by the heat generated from bodies piled all together gives us a sense of home, of pack. It makes us feel safe so we can let our natural healing process begin. I’m guessing Luka knew we had to simulate that to heal.”
Luka nods curtly, still upset with me. Deal with it, Gypsy Boy, I think snidely. He should know by now I do not take kindly to anyone trying to order me around. I spent too many years where everything I did was because it was something I had to do.
Micah opens his eyes and I groan. Colors flood my field of vision and my stomach flips.
“Concentrate, Micah. Pick a spot and focus on that. It helps bring the colors into focus. You’re making me so dizzy I think I’m gonna hurl.”
“Sorry, Blue.”
I stare with him at Luka’s head and help him to focus the colors. It takes a minute, but he starts to learn how to separate them. I’d picked up how to do it quickly. Not sure why, but I did.
“I need to call Bree, Luka.”
He frowns, clearly not liking to have to move an inch. He leans up, supporting his weight on his elbows. The worry that’s buried beneath the anger seeps through, and I cup his cheek gently. “I’m fine. I promise.”
“You scared me, Munya.” His voice goes soft and he leans down, his nose nuzzling mine. “I no…” He closes his eyes, unable to voice his fears. I wrap my arms around his neck and pull him down to me. When his lips meet mine, the kiss is full of everything he doesn’t have the words to say. When he pulls back, he looks the tiniest bit less frightened. “Just no do that again, Munya. If I lose you…” He shakes his head.
“You’re not going to lose me, Luka. I’m right here and I’m fine. Believe me.”
“Don’t expect me to get all warm and fuzzy and kiss you.” Conner makes a gross face at Micah, who laughs and makes even Luka chuckle. Conner always has a way of lightening the mood. Especially when it comes to Luka. I don’t think Luka even wants to like him, but he does.
“Now, let me call Bree and see if we can’t find Saidie some help, okay?”
Luka nods, his gaze skating back to Saidie, but he refuses to budge when I try to push him off. I roll my eyes and do my best to make the call.
Bree’s phone goes to voicemail three times. I’m about to give up when she finally picks up. “What’s up, girl?”
“We need help.”
“What? What’s wrong?” Bree is instantly alert. Something sloshes.
“Are you in the bath?”
“Umm…yeah?”
A voice I recognize says something, and my eyes narrow. “Is that my brother?”
“Uhh, maybe.”
“Gross!” I so did not need that image in my head. I have no issue with him and Bree dating, but I don’t want to know the details of their sex life.
Jason is cracking up, and Bree shushes him. “What’s wrong?”
“Saidie’s back.”
“She shouldn’t be home yet. There’s no way she can have learned to control her abilities.”
“She hasn’t. Her magic is out of control.”
“Then why is she back?”
“She’s not just back, Bree. She’s messed up. I mean messed up the way I was when I first went to Compton. Aleric says she has something called Ghost Fever.”
“How the hell did she get that?” Bree’s normally gentle voice goes hard.
“The necromancer Uncle Sabien took her to did it to her. I don’t know all the details. She can barely talk, and she’s burning up with fever. Do you or your family know any necromancers who can help her?”
“There’s a woman my grandfather knows. She’s not a necromancer, but she does know a little death magic. She’s called an animator. Let me call her and see if she can get here or if we can bring Saidie to her.”
Bree doesn’t even bother to say goodbye. She just clicks off, as worried about Saidie as I am.
“Bree knows somebody who deals in death magic. Even though she’s not a necromancer, she should be able to help Saidie. She’s calling her now.”
“There’s a difference?” Conner frowns, trying to understand.
“Mais, yes.” Aleric nods. “D’ose who deal in death magic will never be a necromancer. Dey can raise de dead, yes, but dey cain’t pull a body from de ground older den, say, thirty years. It is not in der power to do.”
“So, Saidie could raise a hundred-year-old corpse?” I ask out of curiosity.
“Won’t,” Saidie bites out.
“Why not?” Conner is clearly fascinated. He’s had a morbid fascination since I’ve known him, but in this, I’m curious too.
“Price…too high.”
“Raising de dead, it require a price, a blood sacrifice,” Aleric explains, shifting into a hunter’s stance. “De price for dat type of resurrection is a human sacrifice.”
I stare at my best friend in a mixture of fear and awe as she reacts to Aleric’s statement. Saidie’s breath comes hard and fast. Her eyes dilate and turn the color of stones. Cold air pours off her in sheets. I’d almost say she’s vamping out, but she isn’t a vampire. Terror screams at me from her eyes. “Did Madame try to make you do that, Saidie? To sacrifice a human being?”
She shakes her head.
“Dat is not wha’ Madame wanted from her.” Aleric’s stance goes even more rigid.
“Wouldn’t tell,” Saidie whispers.
“Wouldn’t tell what?” Conner pulls himself from Micah and crawls over to her.
“Never tell.”
“You can tell us, Saidie,” Conner soothes. “What didn’t you tell her?”
“Luka and Alex.” Tears stream down her cheeks. “Saw the picture…and wanted to know where they were.”
“What did you say?” Luka whispers.
“But you didn’t tell her?” Conner asks softly, ignoring Luka’s question.
She shakes her head, a shudder going through her.
“Did she try to make you tell her where they were?” Conner continues his questioning, never breaking eye contact with her. His eyes dilate and stare off in the distance. I’ve seen him do this before. Conner sees visions. Part of his Celtic heritage. He’s trying to see what Saidie went through. Sometimes he can force a vision, sometimes he can’t.
She starts to shake, her eyes going wide. The gray streaks surrounding her begin to attack with force. I don’t know how to stop them from hurting her. Dammit, what is the use of having magic if you can’t use it to help someone?
“Do you see now, little brother?” Aleric snarls at him. “She protect you and de girl. Bad things were done to her and she never tell Madame anyt’in’. You owe her your life.”
Luka takes a deep breath, falling on top of me. My arms go around him while he works out the truth of what Aleric has just told him. He despises necromancers. His first instinct was to kill Saidie, and now Aleric is telling him she not only protected him, but me.
My phone starts singing in my hand, and I struggle to bring the phone up while doing my best to breathe under a very heavy Luka.
“Bree, can your voodoo lady help us?”
“She’s not a voodoo lady,” Bree says quietly, obviously irritated. “Don’t disrespect her like that, Alex.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be disrespectful. I’m just tired. Almost dying will do that to a person.”
“Dying?”
The phone rattles, and my brother’s on the line in a heartbeat. Or speakerphone, really. I hear the echo. “Dying? What’s going on, Sis? Are you okay? You’re not hurt? It’s not trackers, is it?”
No, thank God. I don’t think I’d be up for that today. Trackers are shifters who can be hired to find someone. They never fail. They are also lethal. If t
heir orders are to kill, the object of their hunt dies. Simple as that. Usually. Last Thanksgiving, a group of them tracked down me and Jason. They found me first, but thanks to my uncle, I’m still alive. He’d been waiting for them to show up and killed all but one of them, the one that escaped.
“I’m fine, Jason, I swear. Saidie’s magic doesn’t mix so well with mine. When I touched her, I had some kind of weird reaction, and it almost killed me. Aleric said she was drowning me in death or something.”
“That shouldn’t have happened, Alex.” Fear coats Bree’s words as they float over the phone.
That can’t be good.
“Why not?”
“A necromancer’s power can’t affect a witch that way. The only person they can drown in death is the dead or another necromancer. You are neither an animated corpse, a zombie, or a necromancer. Her magic should have had no reaction when it met yours.”
Double crap.
“You said yourself, Bree, that there hasn’t been an Elementalist born in over two thousand years. How can you be sure her magic wouldn’t affect me?”
Bree sighs. “I can’t, but, Alex, I do have elemental powers, an affinity for wind. I’ve never been affected by a necromancer before.”
She just had to go and point that out, didn’t she?
My hand clenches around Micah’s, and he yelps in pain. “Sorry,” I mutter and relax my grip. I forget sometimes how strong I am because of the lupine gene in my blood.
“Alexandria?” Luka shoots me a concerned look. “Your eyes are starting to glow with your wolf.”
I already know that. I can feel my wolf as she comes to the front of my consciousness, responding to my panic. We know Bree has a point. Saidie’s magic shouldn’t have affected us, but it did. Why? We don’t know, and it frightens us. Change is not something we handle well.
“Shh, Blue, it’s okay. I’m here.”
His calm surrounds us and allows me to separate my mind from hers. He’s the only one who can help me do it.
“This is scaring me, Micah. Why did her magic affect me, us?”
“We’ll figure it out, Blue. Don’t panic. Stay calm.”
“Sis, are you okay?” Jason barks into the phone, his voice going growly. It looks like my wolf isn’t the only one who is pushing on its cage.
“I’m fine,” I assure him. My back is starting to hurt, and I shift, making sure Luka rolls so I am on top of him, my head buried under his chin. His arms are as much home to me as Micah is. “We’ll sort this out later. Right now we need to help Saidie. So, can your friend help her?”
“No. She can’t get here. She’s taken a job that requires her full attention. She did give me a name, but you’re not gonna like it, Alex.”
I narrow my eyes, a sinking feeling in my stomach. “Who?
“Your mom.”
Jason and I both hiss when the words leave her. Alesha Blackburne Reed abandoned Jason and me when we were little. Walked away and left us crying in the dirt. She’s the reason I spent the better part of my life in a nut house.
I hate her.
“She’s not a necromancer or an animator or whatever you called it.”
“No, but she knows about Ghost Fever and might be able to do something to at least make that go away. Even my grandfather agreed. Your mom is our best option.”
Before I can say anything, Morgan’s phone starts blowing up. He pulls it out and looks at the texts flooding the device.
“Shit.”
“What?” His eyes have gone wide.
“Trackers.”
Chapter
Seventeen
I stand up so fast I almost trample Luka. He’s up just as fast and pulling me close. “What is it?”
“Trackers,” Micah replies tersely. “My pack just texted to say they’ve been spotted in the area, and they’re tracking them.”
“Where?” Luka’s stance becomes predatory, and it calls to my wolf in a way like no other. She comes snarling to the front of my mind. Here, in our territory? They dare to challenge us here? Our skin hums with a warm heat and our nose flares, taking in all the smells, looking for a scent to track.
“Focus, Blue, control her.”
I take slow, deep breaths and concentrate on separating my mind from the wolf pacing in my head, snarling at her confinement. She wants out.
“Ethan is sending some of the pack to deal with it.” Micah slides his phone back into his pocket. “He’s also sending someone to watch over your dad and Emma.”
Ethan is the alpha, the pack leader. I’ve never met him before, but I’ve only been to see the pack once. Right after my wolf woke up, Micah dragged me off to the pack the first full moon in case I shifted. Nothing happened. I still haven’t shifted. We don’t know why. My wolf is awake and can make me go a little crazy, but no shifting. A good thing as far as I’m concerned. Shifting hurts.
The yowling of a cat catches our attention. Here. In. Our. Territory. My wolf snarls, her teeth snapping at the invisible bars of her cage.
“Conner, go tell Saidie’s family to hide and no come out until we come for them.” Luka drags me with him to the window, his eyes searching the neighborhood. We smell his fear, and it feeds our own. We need to run, to find them, to keep our brother safe, to keep our mate safe.
“Calm down, Blue. No one’s going to hurt you. We won’t let them.”
“Here, Micah, they’re here.”
“Shh, it’ll be okay. Ethan and the pack will be here soon.”
“Ethan’s coming?”
“Yeah, his betas will be with him. You’re fine. No one’s getting past him.”
But I’m not fine. I can feel the fear overtake me, twist my stomach into knots. The snarling in my head increases, drowning out the buzzing I usually hear. My body starts to hum, to shake. I feel dizzy, hot. The colors swirling in my vision only make it worse.
“M-M-Micah,” I gasp. Something is wrong. ”M-M-M…”
“What’s wrong with her?” Conner’s voice sounds muddled, far away. I can’t focus on him. I want to hurl. My skin pulses with heat. What is…wrong…with…me?
“Micah!”
Pain tears through me, white hot and merciless. Fire burns through every inch of my body. Acid replaces the blood flowing through my veins, burning every cell within me. My bones start to shift, and I scream, falling to the floor.
“Dammit!” Micah yanks me away from Luka and pulls me into his lap, clamping his arms over my chest and anchoring his legs over mine. “She’s gonna shift!”
“Everyone out!” Luka roars.
“Don’t touch me!” Saidie cries when Luka goes to move her.
Fire burns through us. We can smell the stink of fear coming off her. We want to bury our teeth in the soft flesh and savor the taste of her hot blood as it spills down our throat.
“Touch her, brother, and you woan like wha’ happens.” The promise in his voice is lethal.
“And if she shifts and hurts her?”
“You woan like dat either.”
The heat on our skin intensifies. Our bones stretch, shift. Our muscles tear, and we scream again. Our skin ripples. I can see it, and I’m reminded of what heat looks like drifting up from a hot concrete surface. Our body is the concrete, and the need to melt, to change, is eating away at us.
No, my love, you will not shift, a memory in our mind whispers. The pain we’d felt in the dream when he’d forced us to shift to human form slams into us again. We whimper, our senses on overload. It is too much.
“Who was that?” Micah whispers. “Is he from the dream?”
I can’t focus on Micah as the pain rips at us. Power flows through us, his power. No, he won’t do this. He won’t deny us the right to shift.
We try harder to force the shift, and our body bucks and twists. Micah holds us down, but we need out. Our body feels like it is being ripped apart. We are in th
e nine circles of hell. All we know is pain.
“Micah, what the hell is wrong?” Luka demands.
“I don’t know…”
“Blue?” We feel Micah surrounding us in warmth, smell the clean scent of fresh grass and honeysuckle. We reach out for him and hit a brick wall.
“What the hell?” Micah hits the same wall.
We hear the dream memory laugh.
“Micah!” Luka’s tone is desperate.
“I don’t know, Luka.” Frustrated, he tries to reach out to us again. “Something’s wrong. She can’t shift. Something’s blocking her.”
“Blocking?” Luka sounds as confused as we are.
“I can’t get around it.” Micah’s voice blurs, going gravelly as he fights for control of his own wolf. “It’s like a wall or something…”
We buck in his arms as another wave of agony rips through us. The pain is too much, and we throw back our head and howl, our coppery black hair flying in all directions. We have never felt pain like this. It hurts on a level that defies logic and reason.
Luka grabs us and helps Micah hold us down. We don’t want to be held down. We want out.
“Where is this Ethan?” Luka’s voice is full of fear. “This is bad, Micah. It kill her soon.”
“I don’t know.” Micah grapples with our arms. ”I don’t know how much longer I can hold on. Do something, Luka.”
Cold wind blows into us, cooling the fire enough so I can see past the wolf. My breath comes out in short ragged bursts.
“Micah, help me,” I beg. “It hurts.”
“Shh, Blue, I know it hurts. Ethan will be here soon. He should be able to help. Just hold on.”
My fingers start to pull into my hands, and the bones in my feet begin to lengthen, and then it all just stops, like someone hit the pause button. The pain is overwhelming, unbearable, and my wolf takes over.
“Calm down, Munya,” Luka soothes. “Try to be still. Just breathe.”
We snarl at him, the sound decidedly that of a wolf. Stay calm? Does he not understand the pain we are in?
“Ethan will have his hands full.” Luka pours more power into us. “She does not seem to be in a very accommodating mood.”