“I won’t? Why not?”
“Because, one of the abilities you have is a shape-shifter. You can literally become anybody you want to, pretty much at will. I’m surprised mom never told you about that.”
“A shape-shifter? Me? I mean, I can become a cat just by touching my necklace, but I can become anybody? Anybody at all?”
“Yes. That’s a necessity for you in this job you’re doing. You’ll see,” Sybil said.
“What’s that supposed to mean, you’ll see? How do you know so much about my abilities?” She looked over at Peter. “And how come you’re not the one telling me these wonderful little tidbits?”
“I haven’t had the chance yet, mate,” Peter said. “I need to give you intense training after you vanquish this demon, and that’s part of the training.”
I saw Lyra cringe a little at hearing Peter call her “mate.” I knew why, as I had been getting visions of Lyra trying to be with Peter. I felt a little sad for her, because, as with Hale and me, Lyra and Peter were forbidden to be together. As soon as Lyra found exactly why that was, she was going to be pissed.
“Okay, then,” she said to Peter. “What do I need to do to shift?”
Peter looked at Hale. I didn’t know that they knew one another, and, if they did, I would be surprised. Shifters didn't normally like half-breeds like Peter. For that matter, they didn’t usually like witches, either. I was only accepted by the pack until Catori, with his powerful way of picking up scents, knew that Hale and I had made love. From that point on, we were only allowed to be friends, and Catori, for one, would know the moment that we went past the friendship point. If that ever happened again, Hale would be brought in front of the shifter council, called the Lupus council, and would be banished from the pack or worse. I shuddered to think what the “worse” would be.
“Hale,” Peter said, “we need a picture of somebody who belongs to this club. Can you do that? Can you give us a picture?” He motioned to me. “Lyra can take her form. Or his form, as the case might be.”
Hale nodded his head. “I can,” he said, his fingers flying across the keyboard. He nodded his head. “Okay, let’s see…” He squinted just a little. “I just hacked into the Candyclub’s roster of members.” He looked through the list. “It’s really just a matter of finding somebody on this list and then pulling up their Facebook page. It’s also a matter of finding out when each of these members frequent the club.” He grinned. “Obviously we don’t want Lyra shifting into somebody who’s already there. I would think that the jig would be up at that point.”
A few more flashed on the keyboard, and Hale had a picture of somebody. It was a man. “His name is Landon O’Neill.” He showed Lyra some pictures of him. “Now, it’s important to look at these group photos, because that will give you some indication about how tall he is and what his body type is. This is your first time shifting, Lyra, so you have to get it right.”
Lyra looked nervous. “I don’t know about this,” she said. “What if I can’t shift back?”
“Relax,” Hale told her. “Shifting is easy once you get the hang of it. I, and the rest of my Animosh pack have gotten to where we can shift at will. And shift back, too.” He made a motion to me. “Maddy has known you over the centuries, and she can tell you how easily you’ve been able to shift in the past.”
“Yes, Lyra,” I said, feeling resentful that this was one more cool power that she had that was not available to Sybil and me. “You can shift at will, and it’s never been a problem.”
At that, Lyra went to the window. “I don’t get it,” she said, looking up at the sky. “That moon is just a sliver. Don’t we have to have a full moon or something to do all this?”
Sybil rolled her eyes and Peter looked amused. “No, Lyra, that’s all a myth. The full moon isn’t necessary for you to shift or for Hale to shift into a wolf. Hale is a Lycan, as opposed to a common werewolf. He doesn’t need to wait until the full moon to shift, but can shift at will. As for you, shifting is in your genetics. It was important to mom that you be able to shift to anybody or anything, although you mainly shift into a cat. That’s the easiest form for you – it causes the least amount of stress on your body. When you shift into other people or animals, it’s very taxing for you.”
“How taxing?” Lyra asked.
“Extremely taxing. If you do this, if you shift into somebody, you’ll be at full-strength for several hours. After you come out of it, though, you’ll have to have a few days of down-time. You pretty much are only able to lay around for several days after a big battle, if it also involves you shifting.”
Lyra shrugged her shoulders. “I guess I can think of a worse fate than having to lay around and watch television for a few days while Peter brings me breakfast in bed.” She smiled at Peter, who looked uncomfortable. I knew why – Peter loved Lyra as much as Lyra loved him. That was always the case. But Peter knew the score – he had been there before when he and Lyra had hooked up in previous lifetimes. He knew the punishment, and he wasn’t going to go there. Lyra, on the other hand, had no memory of any of that, so she was going to keep trying.
Kind of like Hale and me, I thought ruefully. I couldn’t get it through my thick head, either, that Hale and I couldn’t be together. Being next to him like this made me feel almost uncomfortable, because my feelings for him were so powerful, yet they were unrequited. It didn’t help that, like Hale, I had an unusual sense of smell, so his scent – musky, masculine and sweet – made me wild. I knew that I had the same effect on him, so us being so close together in this apartment…I wondered if he was feeling as turned-on as I was.
“Okay,” Hale said, bringing all of us back into reality. “I swear sometimes, getting these battle plans together is like herding cats. Anyhow….” His fingers danced over the keys. “The other place is called Madame X,” he said. “And let me get this roster down.” A few keystrokes later, and he was into the Madame X database.
“You make that look easy,” Sybil said, and I was thinking the same thing. “If these sex clubs knew how easy it was to hack into their systems, I would think that they would get better security.”
Hale nodded. “Hey, what can I say, I’m that good. Sorry, I guess it comes with the territory of being descended from trackers. Back in the day, the trackers were experts at following tracks and could find anyone at all just by looking at the way that tree branches were felled and by following human and animal tracks. They could find anyone by looking at clothing and threads left behind, and could know just by looking at footprints if the man was carrying something and when these footprints were made. The current trackers can do all that, but we also have innate expertise in hacking computers. So, don’t look at me like I’m a hero. Thank my ancestors for this.”
“I guess that means that these sex clubs don’t have a porous system so much as you just have unusual expertise,” I said, breathing in his scent and trying to tamp down my feelings.
“Yes,” he said with a smile. He stood up and put his hand on my shoulder, and I momentarily lost my breath. “If you will excuse me,” he said, his face close to mine. At that, he went into his bathroom. I wanted to follow him, remembering what we did on the counter of that bathroom, but I knew that wouldn’t be appropriate. To say the least.
He came back out in a matter of minutes and sat back down at the computer. “Alright, let’s see….Michaela Jones.” He nodded to Lyra. “Here’s a picture of her. Again, look at her height relative to the people she’s standing next to. That’ll give you some indication on how tall she is, and what her body type is.”
“I don’t understand,” Lyra said, looking at the picture. “What, I’m just supposed to look at this picture and become this person?”
“That’s exactly right,” Sybil said. “Touch your necklace, you’ll see how easy it is.”
Lyra nodded her head, studying the picture. “And Hale is just going to turn into a wolf before our eyes?”
“Well, no,” Hale said. “I mean, yes, but
I don’t do that until I’m out on the street. If a huge wolf starts running through the hallway of this apartment building, there’d be some freaked-out people, and my landlady would put my ass on the street if somebody sees the wolf coming from this place. It’s just like anything else – you have to be clandestine when you do stuff.” He shook his head. “That’s why I could never understand Catori’s decision to locate our pack right here in Brooklyn. There’s all kinds of chances that we’re going to draw attention to ourselves, but he likes the vibe of the city and the bike shop is close by. So, what can you do? He’s the boss. Personally, I’d like to live in the country, but I have to go where the pack goes.”
Lyra was looking like she wasn’t able to understand any of this. I also saw fear in her eyes, although she was trying hard to cover it up.
“Okay,” she finally said. “Give me those pictures.”
Hale handed her the pics, and she sighed and briefly touched her necklace. “Here goes nothing.”
25
Lyra
It seemed like, every time I turned around, something new was coming out of the ether. Now I was a shifter. I had no clue about that, and resented my mother for not telling me. Granted, she only had so much time to fill my head with lore, but the fact that I was a shifter, to me, should have been at the top of the list for her to explain to me. She only told me that I could shift into a cat, and that was all that I knew. If I had known that I had the ability to shift at will into anyone or anything I wanted to, then that would be helpful knowledge to me. To say the least.
I wondered what else was going to be thrown at me. I was looking forward to getting my full training with Peter. I assumed that I was going to have some downtime at least. This whole operation to get this demon was rushed, and I knew why – the demon was going to kill again. But was it always going to be like this? Just flying by the seat of our pants? That wasn’t what I signed up for, but, then again, I didn’t really sign up for any of this. I was just forced into it. Still, it seemed that, even if I was being forced into it, I still should have had some kind of advanced training before going into a battle like this one.
“Okay,” I said, “now, Peter and I got here a little late. I guess I don’t know why we’re going into sex clubs, and why we’re going into these sex clubs in particular.”
Maddy piped up. “Hale thinks that the demon is going to stay close to his house, because he has an ankle monitor on. And, since this particular demon is known for his lasciviousness and sexual perversion, Hale figured that he would be hanging out at one of these two sex clubs which are both located within 1000 feet of his home.”
I was incredulous. “What do you mean, Hale figures that the demon is hanging around these clubs? Why can’t you see him? Or Sybil – she sees spirits, can’t she see him?”
Maddy shook her head. “No. This demon’s magic is blocking all of us.” She looked over at Peter. “And you, too, right? Can you see where he is?”
Peter looked at the wall, appearing to concentrate, for several minutes. He closed his eyes and then shook his head. “No. I’m not getting anything either, mate. Sorry.”
“You guys are a bunch of losers,” I said. “Just watch how it’s done.” I closed my eyes, thinking that, since I was the all-powerful demon slayer, I would just automatically get a read on where to find this guy. After a few minutes, I wasn’t getting anything. In frustration, I touched my necklace and tried to concentrate. I immediately saw poor James Woodson, still in the Gloaming, still looking fearful and about to cry, and my heart broke.
But I didn’t get a sense on where to find the demon who was occupying his body.
When I opened my eyes, everybody was looking at me expectantly. No, strike that, they were all looking at me with a see, I told you so, now who’s the loser look on their faces.
“Hey, as Hale pointed out, I’m new at all of this.” I felt embarrassed. “Okay, then, it looks like we have to find this demon the old-fashioned way after all. So sue me.” I couldn’t apologize for calling them losers, even though I was secretly sorry. Apologies have never come easy to me. “What if he’s not at either of these clubs? And why would he necessarily be at a sex club, anyhow? He’s a demon, he probably has all kinds of perversions.”
“His name is Asmodeus,” Hale explained. “One of Satan’s most powerful, and is known for his sexual perversions.”
“Amadeus? Isn’t the the name of that movie about Mozart?” I asked.
“Not Amadeus, Asmodeus,” Sybil said, with a roll of her eyes. She glanced at Peter and the two of them shot knowing glances. I could tell that they both were extremely wary that I was the one who was supposed to do all this, and, truth be told, I was feeling the exact same way. “And, just trust us, he’s probably going to be at one of these clubs. Now, do you have these two people in your mind? The ones that you have to become?”
I sighed and concentrated on the picture of Landon O’Neill first. “This is dumb,” I said, when I really wanted to tell them how scared I was about doing this. What if Sybil was wrong, and I was just stuck as this guy forever? Then what? I saw the Twilight Zone where the thieves had a watch that stopped time, and they used it to rob a bank. Their plan was to stop time, rob the bank, and hightail it out of the bank before clicking the watch and resuming time. Well, they broke the watch, time was stopped for good, and that was that.
What would happen to me if, like those thieves on the Twilight Zone, something went wrong and I couldn’t get back? I’d be stuck, that’s what. I didn’t want to live my life as somebody else. I wanted to live my life as Lyra Yates.
“It might be dumb to you,” Maddy said, “but it’s important to us that you get this right. Now, again, do you have the picture of this Landon O’Neill in your mind?”
My heart was pounding, and I wanted to stall. In fact, I wanted to run out of that apartment and never come back. If it weren’t for that brief vision of poor James in the Gloaming, I would have done just that. You have to do this for James. It wouldn’t do for this demon to keep killing while he’s occupying that poor kid’s body. James will come up from the Gloaming and face life in prison or the death penalty if that happens. Funny, I didn’t think about the possible victim that this demon was going to kill, only James. I guess that was because I had a personal relationship, of sorts, with James, where I didn’t know this potential victim at all.
I sighed and concentrated on the picture of Landon O’Neill. I touched my necklace and said some words in Latin. Again, the exact words that I needed to say that enabled me to shift just came to me out of the ether.
And, just like that, I looked at everyone and they looked at me with a mixture of approval and astonishment. “Works every time,” Sybil said with a smile.
“What do you mean?” I asked, and immediately realized that my voice was extremely deep. Like that of a man. “I don’t feel any different at all.”
“Look in the mirror,” Maddy said, pointing to a mirror that was across the room on Hale’s wall.
With great trepidation, I went over the mirror. I closed my eyes before I approached the mirror. Relax, Lyra, it won’t be that bad. It won’t be that bad. It won’t be that bad.
I opened my eyes and screamed.
Staring back at me was a man. Blonde hair that was cut close on the sides and high on the top, like the current fashion was for the metrosexuals I saw around town. Big green eyes, a straight nose and full pillowy lips. I put my hand on my cheek and felt my stubble. I looked down at my arm and saw a tattoo sleeve. I was suddenly wearing a sleeveless button-down shirt, tight jeans and boots. I felt my chest, and, instead of feeling the squishiness of my breasts, I felt only hard muscle.
Self-consciously, I guided my hand to my crotch, and, yup, I felt a penis there. That, perhaps more than anything else, freaked me out. A penis! And balls! What was the world coming to?
Sybil and Maddy both were looking at me with approval, like they thought that I was hot. I had to admit that Hale and Peter also were lookin
g at me with approval, but not that they thought that I was hot, but because I was able to shift into this dude so quickly and thoroughly.
“That’s right,” Sybil said in a teasing way. “Aw, Lyra, you should shift like this all the time.” She raised her eyebrows. “You look smoking.”
I turned back around and looked in the mirror again. Now that my new reflection wasn’t such a shock, I kinda saw what Sybil was talking about. Truth be told, I was hot. Or, at least, Landon O’Neill was hot. Smoking, in fact. I narrowed my eyes, thinking that I had seen my reflection before, and then suddenly had a flash.
“Hey, this dude is a male model,” I said. “Look up his name on Google images. I think that you’ll see him there.”
At that, Hale put in the name “Landon O’Neill,” and, sure enough, professional photographs of Landon popped up everywhere. There was Landon in a suit and tie, modeling the latest man-bag. Here was Landon in a tuxedo, modeling for wedding wear. There he was, modeling for swim wear. Here he was, in a perfume ad.
“Huh,” Hale said, and then shrugged his shoulders. “So, you’re not the most inconspicuous person ever. It’ll just have to do for now. Sorry about that. I didn’t mean for you to turn into a public figure.”
I groaned. “Try to be more careful. Incidentally, what’s going to happen when I find this demon? Do I shift back into Lyra, or what? And how do I kill him in a public place?” So many questions, so few answers. Dammit.
“Obviously not,” Peter said. “You can’t just go up to a person in a club and lay him out. You’re going to have to force him out of the club and into a private area, or else you’re going to be accused of murder. Or Landon will be, if you persist in his form when you kill the demon.”
“I can’t do that to Landon or anybody else,” I said. “So, of course, I’ll shift back to Lyra once the demon is found. But, again, how do we get this guy alone? He’s going to be in the middle of a crowded club, doing god-knows-what in there with god-knows-who. How are we going to get him alone?”
Lyra's Magic: Witches of Manhattan Book One Page 18