by Tracey Ward
"Medic!” someone screams.
I toss my empty gun into the basket behind me and sprint toward them. Someone slams the guy’s door shut, latching it tightly as the other men pull him away. He leaves a trail of blood behind him.
I push my way to the middle of the group, ripping my mask off. My face hurts instantly, screaming in pain against the cold that punctures my skin like a thousand tiny needles.
“Get him on the other side of the fire!” I shout. “I can look at him there!”
“Eventide?!” someone shouts incredulously.
I recognize the voice. It’s Holster. He’s pulling on the wounded’s feet, dragging him toward the fire.
“Hurry!” I shout back.
He and another Forces member pull the guy outside the entryway. Someone else thrusts a black bag in my hands. The same bags we use during triage.
They run off, heading back to the doors. To the fight. Everyone but Holster.
He steps into my space, crowding me until the bulk from our coats are pushing against each other. He pulls his mask off to show me his face. For once he’s not smiling.
“That’s my partner. You better take good care of him,” he commands quietly, his words dripping with unspoken meaning.
“I’ll do everything I can.”
“You better hope that’s enough.”
He yanks his mask back down. Throws his shoulder into mine as he passes.
I rip my gloves off, digging into the bag and replacing them with medical ones. My hands are immediately cold but at least I have dexterity. I pull of his mask, surprised to find out that it’s not Krysan. It’s not Holster’s partner.
“What’s your name?” I ask him briskly.
His lips are pulled tightly over his teeth. “Mason,” he grinds out.
Holster’s old partner. The one he destroyed.
I don’t understand it, but I don’t have the time to try.
“My name is Liv,” I tell Mason as I unbutton his coat.
I pull at the sides to get it off his chest so I can see his injury, but it won’t budge. Mason barks in pain, arching his back off the ground. Something is holding his coat in place. Something in his shoulder.
I cautiously dip my finger inside the hole in his coat. Whatever it is, it’s hard and rough. Narrow like a knitting needle. Slowly I pull the breast of the coat up and over it, laying the bloody material to the side to get a better look. What it is I can’t exactly tell. It doesn’t make any sense.
It’s bone white, smooth on the outside and rough on the end where it was shot at. It curves slightly, narrowing where it’s impaled into his shoulder. It reminds me of a tusk, ones like walruses and elephants used to have before they went extinct. But this is smaller. Thinner. More like a claw.
But how big would an animal have to be to have a claw over five inches long?
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Gray
“No one knows,” I tell her, laying my head back on the cushions of her couch. “No one has ever seen one. We’ve never had a chance to measure them.”
Liv stands in the kitchen waiting for her tea to brew. She offered me some but I turned it down, too tired to drink. Too tired to think.
Fighting off the vishers took three hours and countless rounds. Finally they left as the fire was dying down and the cold was starting to sink into the cave. I was piss my pants scared the entire time, but what helped was having Liv there. I thought it would make it worse, I was desperate for her not to see it, but guiding her through the process actually helped me pack it in. I went step by step with her. I was able to keep my fear in check, keep thoughts of last year and Micah out of my mind. At least until it was over. Then I panicked.
I saw the blood on the ground. On the door. The streak it left across the floor where a body was dragged away. It was all too familiar a scene. And to make it worse, Liv was missing.
I knew she had dropped her gun to run to help the guy who got spiked, but after that I lost track of her. When it was all over I couldn’t find her. Finally I got the call that she was at the hospital with Dr. Kanden. Turns out she rode in the truck with Mason, keeping pressure on his wound the entire time. She didn’t leave his side until the doc took over.
When I got to the hospital she was waiting for me outside. Her hair was a mess, her face pink from the frost. The sight of her coat covered in blood made me sick inside, roiling hot in my stomach in a way that I still can’t shake. It’s why I’m here on her couch instead of at home in my bed. I’ve tried to leave twice but I can’t.
“You have no idea what a Visher looks like?” Liv asks in amazement.
“We have an idea. They’re white. Covered in fur. Tall. They have claws.”
She stands in the kitchen watching me, waiting.
I spread my hands over my head. “That’s it.”
“Do they show up every year?”
“Almost.” I fold my hands on top of my head, closing my eyes. “They only come out in the cold. We don’t have to worry about them during the day. We think they hibernate. Right now they’re gathering food.”
“And they hunt you.”
“Us and anything else they can find out there. Bears. Wolves. Arctic birds.”
“Bodies?”
I open my eyes reluctantly, taking my time before answering.
“Be honest,” she pleads calmly. “I really want to know. If more of the Eventide washed ashore after you closed the doors, would the visher’s have eaten them by now?”
“Yes.”
She nods her head slowly. She knew the answer when she asked it. She’s not shocked and she’s not destroyed. “If Gav was out there, he’s not anymore.”
“Probably not.”
“Did the vishers come last year?”
“Yep. They did.”
“Is that how Micah died?”
I blink, carefully keeping my face steady. “How did you know that?”
“You never told me what happened to him. You told me how your mom died. And your sister and your dad, but never Micah. I figured it must have been something horrifying. Something you were there for.” She shrugs, looking down into her empty mug. “This fit.”
I close my eyes again, pulling my hands down over them. “You’re a detective. You should join Forces.”
“I’ll tell Fuller that. He’ll love it.”
“He’d have a heart attack. No girls allowed.”
“Is that a rule?”
“Not officially.”
She snorts. “I might go down to his office demanding a shot at the job just to spite him.”
I laugh. “The scary thing is I believe you’d do it.”
“In a heartbeat.”
“What happened to the mousy girl fresh off the boat? The one who was afraid of the dark and did whatever she was told?”
“That girl drowned in a dress, Grayson” she tells me flippantly, “and she’s never coming back.”
I smile at her haughty tone. At the strength in her words that makes her sound bigger and badder than she looks.
I hear her cross the room. Feel her sit down on the couch next to me.
“He showed up at the hospital while I was there,” she tells me quietly. “He saw me without you.”
I let my hands drag slowly down my face, pulling heavily on my cheeks. My lips. My chin. “Seriously?”
She nods solemnly. “Yes.”
“Hell,” I swear, dropping my hands to my lap. “I’ll get an earful for that in the morning.”
“Probably not.”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“Because I told him I was ready to go unguarded. It’s been months since the paint on the door and nothing else has happened. I reminded him that you’re healed and on nights like this the city needs you more than I do. He agreed with me. He said you’re back to Forces as of this morning.”
I sit amazed, stunned by the sudden shift. By my world being tilted off its axis. “Of course he did.”
She purses her lips bri
efly. “Don’t be mad at me.”
“I’m not,” I assure her, not entirely sure it’s true.
“I should have said something to you about it before I talked to him, but he showed up and he demanded to know where you were, and I didn’t want to see you get in trouble over me again so—“
I put my hand on her arm. “Liv, it’s okay. I’m not mad.”
“You won’t have to get up at four-thirty in the morning anymore.”
I chuckle faintly. “That’s a bonus.”
“You’ll get to go back to work with Forces. You’ll get your command back.”
I close my eyes again, counting my breaths. Falling asleep. “Thanks to the vishers I’ll have plenty to do.”
Liv pauses. It could be minutes. It could be all night. My sense of time is lost in the haze of impending sleep.
“You and I, we’re good, right?”
“Yeah, Liv,” I yawn loudly. “We’re good.”
***
I wake up warm. My right side is burning up, sweat sticking my shirt to my skin. I blink several times, trying to clear my eyes until finally I can see the room. The lights are all on. The furniture is yellow. This isn’t my apartment. It’s Liv’s. And she’s curled up under my arm, tucked against my side.
This is bad.
Gingerly I lift my arm off her body. My watch takes its sweet time coming into focus.
Seven in the morning. Liv hasn’t slept past four thirty since she got here, but of course this is the morning she decides to do it. Now that I’m trapped in her apartment. Now that I need to go into work with Forces. I’ll have to walk to my room in front of everybody on first shift milling around the halls heading out to work.
It’s a good thing Captain Fuller already agreed to pull me off guard duty because if last night didn’t seal the deal, this morning would.
No one will believe this was innocent. I’m not even sure I do. Listening to her soft snore vibrating in the back of her throat I can’t help but smile. I have to fight the urge to lower my arm back down. To drape it across her hip. Put my palm back on her thigh.
I shift quickly to the left, out from under her. She falls forward fast, but I’m faster. I have my hand under her head just in time to ease her down to the couch gently.
She’s still out. Still snoring.
I go to her room to grab the blanket off her bed. She’ll be cold soon without me to leach heat from. She’s always cold. She never says it but I see it. As I lower the blanket over her I wonder if it’s wrong to leave like this. Sneaking out without waking her.
I don’t know, but I do know I can’t stay.
Seven o’clock means people have thirty minutes to get work, meaning they’ll leave the building in the next fifteen. I can wait that time out, rush to my room to get ready in record time, and risk being a little late or I can step outside the door and hope no one sees me until I’m near my own door. If I get caught I can pretend I just closed it and I’m going to the bathroom. It’s dangerous but it seems worth it. Whatever it takes to get out of this apartment right now.
I crack her door, listening to the sounds in the building. I hear singing echo out from the bathroom, off key but distant. Nothing else. No footsteps. No conversation.
Taking a steadying breath I yank the door open, dart outside, and close it quickly. I fumble with my keys to lock it, in a hurry but not willing to leave Liv vulnerable. A glance down the hall tells me it’s still all clear.
The singing continues. I think it’s Fren.
It’s terrible.
Finally Liv’s door is locked. I hurry to my door, still in the clear as I unlock it. Or as I try to. The key jams, unwilling to turn.
I’m trying to unlock my door with Liv’s key.
I switch to the right key, shoving it in the lock. It turns easily.
“Morning, Gray,” Krysan yawns.
I look over my shoulder sharply, surprised to see him coming out of his room across the hall. “Hey, man,” I reply, trying to sound casual.
I don’t, but luckily he’s half asleep and shuffles right past me. Unfortunately his roommate comes out right on his heels.
“Grayson,” Holster greets me coldly.
“Holster.”
“Just getting in?”
“No. I was in the bathroom.”
He looks me over as he walks by, following Krysan down the hall. “You’re still wearing the same clothes as last night. Have you even showered?”
“I just did.”
“Your hair is dry.”
I jerk my door open, openly glaring at him. “What are you, my mother? Don’t worry about what I do.”
“Your mother is dead,” he answers matter-of-fact.
My hand clenches tightly on the doorknob. “Watch your step.”
“Yeah, man,” Krysan protests angrily. “Mom’s are off limits.
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking,” Holster lies. “Look, Gray, I’m just saying you seem like you’re tired. You should get some coffee. Something rich and dark. Put a little sweetness in it, huh? A little creamer?” He smiles lasciviously. “Or is that what you were just doing in the Posher’s room?”
I take a step toward him, my fists clenched at my sides. “I’ll kick your ass.”
Holster laughs as Krysan shoves him back. He gets between the two of us, forcing Holster into the stairwell door. He casts me an apologetic glance before following him out.
My blood floods through my veins painfully. I’m not big on fighting. I’ve never thrown a punch that wasn’t in a training situation, but if you put Holster in front me right now I’d blacken both his eyes.
A door on my right opens. I step inside my apartment before anyone else can see me. I can’t worry about Holster right now. I’ve gotta get ready for work as fast as I can or I’ll be late my first day back. Liv may have put me in the clear about taking her to the doors last night but wasting Captain Fuller’s time is an unforgiveable sin any day of the week.
I’m dressed and out the door in four minutes. That’s all it takes to run a comb through my hair, a brush over my teeth, and throw on a fresh uniform. I’m sure I look haggard, but who doesn’t after the night we all had?
Liv, that’s who. She steps out of the bathroom just as I’m passing it. Even with sleepy eyes and ruffled hair she looks perfect. And surprised.
“Grayson, hi.”
“Hey.”
“I was just using the bathroom.”
“I figured.”
She flushes. “Right, of course. What else would I be doing? I’m so used to telling you where I’m going and why. You don’t need to know all of my everything anymore. So I’ll—yeah, I’ll let you get to work. I’ll go.” She goes to step past me, but stops short, her movements fitful and nervous. “This is weird, isn’t it? I didn’t think it would be weird, but it is. I was just in the bathroom and I was lonely without you there to talk to. That’s not normal.”
I grin at her nervous energy, at the rambling that’s so unlike her. “It’s not, no.”
She twists her hands together. “I’m nervous.”
“I can tell.”
“But I’m excited too.”
“That’s good.”
“What are you going to do without me all day?”
I smirk. “You mean who’s going to annoy me all day?”
She smiles mischievously. “Holster?”
“More than likely.”
“Well, I better let you go so he can get to it.” She pivots around me, lithe as a dancer. Graceful as a song. “And don’t act like you won’t miss me because we both know you will.”
“Oh really?” I chuckle.
“Yes, really. You’re not fooling anyone.”
“What about you? You think you’re going to miss me bossing you around all day?”
She smiles warmly, the heat lighting her amber eyes. “I already do.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Liv
I’m late when I get to work. Abby gives me the stin
k eye. I smile at her sweetly in return. Dr. Kanden is getting a debriefing from the night nurses so I wander the halls looking for things to do. Rooms to clean. There’s nothing. Nothing to fix. Nothing to do. No one to talk to.
I wasn’t being cute with Grayson this morning. Okay, yes, I was being a little bit cute, but that doesn’t mean what I said wasn’t true. I already miss him. My life here started with him. He’s been part of it almost every minute of every day for nearly four months and now that he’s missing I’m a little deflated. Not sad, not exactly. Just lonely I guess.
“Hey, Liv,” Abby calls to me from the lobby.
I take my time answering her, giving a lot of attention to every little thing between me and the lobby. The open door on an empty room. The smudge on floor. Retying my shoe. Finally I emerge, my face open and expectant.
“Yes, Abby?”
“Go check Mason’s bandages,” she orders. “They need to be cleaned every couple hours.”
“Does he know about me?”
“What about you?”
“Dr. Kanden makes it a point to tell new patients about me, about who I am, before having me see them. It helps avoid incidents. Not everyone wants to be treated by me.”
“Not everyone cares either. Get over yourself and go clean his bandages.”
I grit my teeth together tightly, putting on my Council Table smile. It’s like a silk rose; stunning yet artificial. “Whatever you say, Gabby.”
She scowls. “It’s Abby.”
“That’s what I said.” I push through the doors into the hall. “Gabby.”
Mason is the only patient in the hospital today. Last week the pregnant woman from the earthquake was here having her baby, for real this time. She smiled when she saw me. I gave her a wave, but I didn’t give her my hand. My bones couldn’t take it again. She and her baby were here for three days before checking out. I got to hold the little guy before he left. He was ghostly white with a full head of dark, downy hair and eyes so green they glowed. He was beautiful and sweet and the smallest thing I’ve ever been afraid of. I didn’t know I was holding my breath until I handed him back to his father. I nearly fainted with relief when I watched him go.