The Gathering dr-1

by Kelley Armstrong

  “It’s there, if you dig deep enough. That’s what my mom said, anyway.” He cleared his throat and sat up straighter. “What you read—that was about witches, right? Cast curses? Wear animal skins and change form?”

  “Right.”

  “Well, that’s not us. Mom said we probably shouldn’t even call ourselves skin-walkers, because of the confusion, but we had the name first. Real skin-walkers, like us, go back to before Columbus ‘discovered’ America. It’s a kind of supernatural race. We’re born into a family of skin-walkers. We can change into mountain lions. We get our energy from nature. We have healing powers and some control over animals.” He met my gaze. “Sound familiar?”

  He reached over to put a hand on my arm, and I realized I was covered in goose bumps.

  I pulled away. “Go on.”

  He hesitated, then continued. “Mom was told the new kind of skin-walkers started out as assistants to the real ones, who were tribal healers and protectors. Our kind—Well, it’s a long story and I’m sure you’re not that interested yet. I can give the history lesson another time. Point is that we aren’t the skin-walkers they believe in these days. Our kind went extinct.”

  “Annie doesn’t look extinct to me.”

  “That’s because—” He stopped, wincing, then stretched out his legs and rubbed his calves.

  “You okay?”

  “Muscle pains. I’m getting them a lot lately. I think it’s close. The first Shift. Are you—?” He exhaled. “Later, right? Keep explaining. Okay. Skin-walker families lost their powers. Mom said it was a survival mechanism. They were being killed off by the new human kind of skin-walkers, and so all of a sudden, they started having kids without powers.”

  “Those kids weren’t a threat, so the others left them alone.”

  “Right. But some families still passed along the old stories. Like Mom’s. It was like telling your kids that your family used to be famous warriors. It didn’t mean anything anymore, but it was cool. Then these people got in touch with her. People from other skin-walker families. They said scientists had figured out a way to reactivate the gene.”

  “Reactivate a skin-walker’s powers?”

  “Right.”

  “Why?”

  He shrugged. “If we don’t have them, we feel it. Mom said it’s like being born a blind artist or a deaf musician. There’s this … drive. This itch you can’t scratch. There were people in her family who went crazy, and everyone said that was the reason. She worked her frustration out in art, but she said it was never enough. Something was always missing.”

  “So they reactivated the gene. For you and Annie.”

  “And others.”

  “Like me.”

  He nodded. “Annie was the first. When everything seemed to go fine with her, they did a full first wave of trials. They were in it together, our mothers. Of course, they worried about what might go wrong. Whether they’d done the right thing. They started getting paranoid. Then one of the mothers said she’d overheard the scientists talking about taking the babies away after they were born. So they ran.”

  “All of them?”

  Another nod. “They split up because they thought that would make them harder to find. Later … well, later, Mom started thinking they’d overreacted. The woman who said she overheard the scientists had already wanted to leave.”

  “So maybe she made the story up. If they all went together, any efforts to find them would be split. It made it easier for her to get away.”

  “Right. But when people talk about taking kids away from their parents …” He shrugged. “It brings up bad memories.”

  Residential schools, he meant. I didn’t know a lot about it in the United States, but I knew it was a big issue in Canada, where, for over a hundred years, Native kids were taken from their families to live in state-funded, church-run schools.

  From inside the cabin, Annie yelled, “Rafe?”

  “Right here!” he called back. He got to his feet, then turned to me. “Hold on. I’ll be right back.”

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  “THERE WASN’T AN ACCIDENT with Annie, was there?” I said when he came back. “It’s not brain damage. Not really.”

  “No.” He stared at the cabin, looking so sad that I had to resist the urge not to slide closer. “It started soon after she began Shifting. Just small things at first. Not interested in her art anymore, not interested in school, getting restless, wandering off and staying away until she was hungry. I figured it was just a combination of the Shifts and our mom’s death.”

  “But it wasn’t.”

  He shook his head. “It kept getting worse. She’s not … She’s not Annie anymore. I mean, she is, in some ways, but she’s … simpler.”

  “More animal than human.”

  He nodded. “She still takes care of me, but in a different way, protecting me, like with that guy today. But now I’m the parent. I make sure we have clothes and food and a place to live. I’m not complaining—she did it for years, and it’s time I took some responsibility. But …”

  “You want your sister back. You think she’d want to be back.”

  “I know she would. I mean, if that happened to me … If it happened to you …”

  My heart started thudding so hard I struggled to breathe. Shifting into animal form, running and experiencing life as a cougar—that part sounded amazing. But truly becoming an animal, giving up all my dreams, my future? I felt sick just thinking about it.

  “She’s getting worse,” he said in a low voice. “She Shifts more and more. One day, maybe she won’t Shift back.”

  “But that’s not normal, right? Obviously skin-walkers were still human. Something went wrong with the experiment. That’s why you’re here. You came looking for another subject, hoping to find leads to the group that did this, to see if they can fix her.”

  He nodded. “When Mom found out about the cancer, she started searching for the other subjects. She contacted someone who really didn’t want to tell her anything but finally said he knew where one girl was. You. Here. When Mom was dying, she said if anything went wrong, to come here and look for you. She knew the name of the town and what your mom looked like, but that’s all I had.”

  “Only my mom is my adopted mother. So you started going through all the girls, trying to find the one with the birthmark. If you were looking for a Native girl, though … kind of obvious, wasn’t it?”

  “I wasn’t. Your mom’s white.”

  “W-what?”

  “That’s what my mom said. It’s how your mom’s family hid. Intermarriage. She had Native blood, but she looked Caucasian—hazel eyes and light hair.”

  “And my dad?”

  “I don’t know. It was all in vitro fertilization.”

  My guess was that the sperm donors carried the gene, too. That would make sense, if you were trying to resuscitate a genetic trait. My dad must have been full Native, then. Not that it mattered now. Well, it did matter. I was half white. Or close to it.

  For genetic shocks, that didn’t quite match finding out I could change into a cougar, but it was close. I felt a weird squeezing panic in my chest, like waking up one day and looking in the mirror to see a stranger.

  “So you figured I wasn’t the girl you were looking for. You gave it a shot, but halfhearted, just in case.”

  “It wasn’t like—”

  “You thought it was Hayley, didn’t you? Hazel eyes, blond hair, right age.”

  “Kind of. But not really. I was—” He exhaled, gaze dropping to his hands, folded in front of him. “Hayley liked me. Enough to tell me anything I wanted without asking why I wanted to know it. She was on the swim team, and she’d have seen just about every girl here in a swimsuit …”

  “She could tell you if anyone had a birthmark. She’s seen mine, but she didn’t mention it.”

  “No, and I got the feeling she wouldn’t even if you had one.”

  So he had to see for himself. That was why he’d wanted to go swimming yester
day. To confirm his suspicion.

  He continued, “I thought maybe it was Sam. Hayley wouldn’t have noticed if she had a birthmark. Mom wasn’t completely sure that you’d be here with your mother. She knew she’d given up one of her twins.”

  “Twins?”

  “A boy and a girl. Multiple births are common with skin …” He trailed off. “You really didn’t know, then.”

  “That I’m a skin-walker? That my mother is white? That I have a twin brother? No, apparently there’s a lot about myself I didn’t know.”

  “I’m not doing this right. I …” He slid closer, arm going behind me, but I jumped away so fast I almost fell off the log.

  “Just tell me the rest,” I said.

  “My mom knew that yours gave up one of her kids to make them both harder to find—the scientists would be looking for twins. When she heard that you surfaced up here, she presumed you were the one your mom …” He looked over, like he’d just realized he was telling me that my mother chose to keep one of her children, and it wasn’t me. “Maya …”

  “Go on.”

  He swore and shifted position, giving me a look like he wanted to make this easier.

  “So you figured it was Sam,” I said. “She came here alone, so that fit, too. Only she didn’t want anything to do with you, meaning there was no way you were getting close enough to check for a birthmark.”

  “No way I wanted to either,” he muttered. “I asked her out. She said no. When I tried taking the slow route, getting to know her, she told me to take a hike, and when I didn’t, she went after Annie.”

  “What?”

  “Annie came by to get a look at her. Like with you, because I thought she was the one. Sam wanted her to tell me to back off. Annie laughed. Sam was about to take a swing at her when I got there. She stopped and she said she wasn’t going to hit Annie. Doesn’t matter. It completely freaked Annie out. And completely pissed me off. She could tell Annie was slow. It was like kicking a puppy that wants to play.”

  Sure, Sam was quick with her fists, but she was never cruel. My guess was that she’d just raised her hand in anger. An instinctive reaction with Sam.

  Yet she’d had a few run-ins with other girls at school. Was I defending her because she was nice enough to me?

  I said, “And that’s when the cougars started taking an interest in me and you realized you’d been chasing the wrong girl.”

  He nodded, calm, like he had no idea what he was admitting.

  I continued. “But I’d already made it clear I wasn’t impressed by the bad boy routine, so you had to figure out what would impress me. Honesty. Let me see past the bad boy front and make me feel special, as if you liked me so much you’d let down your guard for me.”

  I wanted him to say no, I was wrong, that wasn’t how it happened at all.

  He didn’t even try. I supposed, when this was over, I’d be grateful for that. But right now, it hurt. Hurt so bad. After everything I’d just found out, you’d think this wouldn’t matter, but the rest of it was too hard to wrap my head around. I needed time for it to sink in. This sunk in. Like a dagger.

  “So I guess you found what you were looking for,” I said. “The girl you were looking for.”

  My words twisted with a bitterness I wished I could suck back in, and his lips parted in a curse, as if he’d just realized what he’d admitted.

  “It isn’t like that.”

  “Yes, it is. You chased me for the same reason you chased all the rest. You thought I was the one. You chased me harder because you were pretty sure I was. That’s why you came to my party. That’s why you took me up on the roof. It was you who dosed my drink, wasn’t it? Hoping I might be willing to shed some clothing, so you could look for a birthmark.”

  “No! I did not drug you, Maya. Yes, that’s why I hit on you. That’s why I hit on every girl. But you were different.”

  Because I was the one. I got to my feet.

  “I don’t know anything about my mother or skin-walkers or scientists. But if everything else you said is true—and I have no reason to think it isn’t—then I need to find these answers as much as you do. So I’ll help you. Right now, though, I need to go home.”

  “Maya.” He took my arm.

  I shook him off. “I need to go home, okay? I have a lot to think about. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

  I walked away. He didn’t try to stop me.

  My relationship with Rafe was a lie. He’d chased me for a reason. He’d kissed me for a reason. Even when I’d looked into his eyes and thought I’d seen something special, it was there for a reason.

  He’d tricked me. Lied to me. And the worst of it? I’d seen it coming.

  I’d watched him go after half the girls at school. I’d rolled my eyes and said I couldn’t believe they fell for it. When he made a run at me, I shot him down and I was so pleased with myself. I could see through the guy when no one else could.

  Yeah, right.

  Sure, I’d fended off his interest easily … because he wasn’t all that interested at the time. Once he decided I might be who he was looking for, all he had to do was change tactics and I fell harder than any other girl.

  Still, I’d suspected that he had a goal I couldn’t see. But I didn’t care. I didn’t want it to be true, so I told myself it wasn’t.

  As much as I hated Rafe at that moment, the person I was most upset with was myself. As I trudged through the forest, I wallowed in that pain because it kept the rest at bay. Focus on the guy who played me for a fool, and I didn’t need to think about being a skin-walker, having a twin brother, having a white mother who chose my brother over me. I didn’t need to think about Annie, about becoming like Annie. Nope, just concentrate on the jerk that I’d really liked. Much easier that way. For now, at least.

  I realized that my hip hurt a little, but when I stopped for a better look, the bullet graze was already scabbing over. Already healing. I shivered.

  As I tugged my shirt down to cover the hole in my jeans, I thought about getting shot, which made me think about the dead guy. If being a skin-walker explained my healing powers, did it also explain my reaction to his death? And Mina’s? I’d met Mina, so I felt sparks of pity. The other guy, though, had been a threat, so I felt nothing. Reacting as an animal would. Like a predator would.

  I shivered again.

  When my cell phone blipped, telling me I had a text message, I almost didn’t answer. It wasn’t Rafe—he didn’t have a cell. But there wasn’t anyone else I particularly cared to speak to. I wasn’t even sure what I’d do when I got home. Tell my parents I’d eaten dinner at Rafe’s? Pretend everything was okay? Or walk in and say “Hey, remember what that old woman at the tattoo studio said? Well, it turns out she wasn’t crazy after all.”

  No, I wasn’t saying anything to my parents. At least not until I was sure Rafe was telling the truth. In my gut, I knew he was. But informing my parents that I was, apparently, a member of a formerly extinct race of supernatural beings? Not until I knew more.

  When I did check my phone and saw the text came from Daniel, my gut plummeted. I was supposed to meet him tonight. But how could I act like everything was okay? Keeping a secret from him was even worse than keeping one from my parents. Harder.

  I checked his message.

  Come over whenever you’re done with dinner. My dad’s not home yet.

  As I read it, I realized I did want to go over. See Daniel. Tell Daniel. Get advice from someone I could trust, really trust.

  I texted back saying I hadn’t stayed for dinner so I had to grab something to eat.

  Come anyway, he texted back. I’ll make spaghetti.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY MINUTES LATER, I turned the corner to see Mr. Bianchi’s car in the drive and knew there wouldn’t be any spaghetti tonight. Cooking any of Daniel’s mom’s Italian recipes was forbidden when his dad was home. I was about to text to ask if he still wanted me to come over, when I saw him, out back in the boxing ring he’d made with Corey y
ears ago.

  I crept up behind him. I was good at that. Some of my friends joked it was my Native blood. But it wasn’t, was it? Quiet as a cat.

  The guys had made log benches for spectators, back when they were twelve and had visions of every girl in class lining those benches, swooning as they showed off in the ring. Never quite worked out that way—if there were spectators, they were more likely to be heckling than swooning—but the memory made me smile as I lowered myself quietly onto the bench behind Daniel.

  He was shadowboxing, throwing punches and dodging an imaginary opponent. He was dressed in his usual gear—sweatpants and a tank top, both emblazoned with the school logo. I sat there and watched him, muscles flexing, sweat dripping from his dark blond hair, spraying with every swing, the silence punctuated by soft grunts when a blow seemed right and frustrated snorts when it didn’t.

  As I watched him, I started to relax. This was familiar. The sight, the sounds, the feel of the bench under my fingers, even the faint smell of perspiration—it was familiar and it was real and it made the last few hours drift away, wisps of a nightmare disconnected from reality.

  Finally, he sensed me there and danced in a circle, fists falling to his sides, feet still moving. His face lit up in a grin so big it chased away the last of my worries.

  “I’m guessing spaghetti is off the menu?” I said, nodding toward the house.

  “Yeah. We’re going out instead. My treat.”

  I didn’t want to go out, but I would. Right now, I just wanted to be with him.

  He looked over at me. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Liar. Is it Rafe?”

  When I hesitated, his hands clenched, jaw clenching with them.

  “That son of a bitch,” he muttered.

  “This is the part where you get to say ‘I told you so.’ ”

  He swore and came over to sit beside me. “What happened?”

  He meant with Rafe, but I didn’t want to tell him about Rafe. Instead, I thought of everything Rafe told me, everything I desperately needed to share. But I couldn’t see any way to start.