Serpent Moon

by Unknown

  At last.

  Whoosh. The unmistakable noise of feathers sailing through the air at breakneck speed. Adrenaline of a totally different kind broke them apart so fast they both stumbled. Holly picked up the flashlight she’d dropped and played it across the starlit sky.

  Whatever had been there was gone. Yet a scent lingered—something he’d never smelled before. Something big . . . and venomous. The thick, pungent scent of poison hung in the air, nearly strong enough to harm on its own.

  “C’mon!” Holly shouted before racing into the darkness. “I can see it!” He moved in her wake as quickly as the discomfort in his pants would allow. Apparently women didn’t have the same problem of running while aroused that guys did. But the longer they ran, the easier it got, so that by the time he finally caught up to her, he was nearly normal again.

  “What was it? What did you see?”

  She was squatting down next to a piñon tree. “Not much, really. Just a flash of something shiny in the air. But—” She reached down and seemed to lift something off the ground, her thumb and forefinger pinched together. “I did find this.”

  “Find what?” It wasn’t until he reached forward to touch her hand that he realized there was something sticking up from her fingers. Something long and sharp, and yet smooth. “What is that?”

  She regarded him with open amazement. “You really can’t see it? It’s a feather. A really cool feather.” She moved her fingers around while playing the flashlight over them. “It’s like a holograph—different colors depending on how you turn it. It’s really a shame you can’t see it.”

  He nodded and then looked back toward the lights of the camp. It was time to head back. Hopefully by the time they got there, the night wind would have blown away the scent of their kiss. “I think you found what you were meant to. Let’s head back and see whether I’m just blind, or if you’re the only one who can see this.”

  Chapter Ten

  “I THINK WE should have followed it.” Holly watched as the others examined the feather that only she could see. They poked and twisted it, which only had the effect of cutting gashes in their fingers. “Maybe I could have gotten a better visual on it or even found where it’s nesting.”

  “And maybe it swooped over us because it knew we were there. We might have only been saved from being dinner by that hillside filled with yucca. It could simply have been a tough angle to grab, and following it would have made it turn around.” While what Eric said made sense, she didn’t have to like it.

  “So, thus far it’s impervious to flame, to magic, and to blades.” Ahmad frowned and stinging magic filled the small room. “What about silver?”

  “We can check that right now,” Tony said and jacked a round from the chamber of the rifle he was holding. Ahmad put the feather on the table and lined it up with the fingers on both hands so Tony could find it. He pressed the bullet down on the feather and then looked at Holly. “Anything? I don’t smell smoke.”

  She shook her head. “Not a mark on it. If that thing is covered with these, we’re in deep shit.”

  Tatya appeared in the doorway just then, looking harried and exhausted. “What’s so important that you had to send a runner over, Ahmad? I’ve got people lined up outside the triage trailer.” The woman didn’t even glance her way. No surprise there.

  Ahmad picked up the feather and held it out toward her. “What am I holding?”

  She looked at him oddly, impatience and confusion mingled in her scent. “You’re not holding anything. Is this some sort of joke? Because it’s not very funny. I have patients to diagnose and treat.”

  Ahmad’s voice lowered to a dangerous rumble. “I never joke.” He shot an angry glance at Tony when he let out a small, amused snort. Tony zipped his fingers across his lips and looked away innocently. Ahmad walked forward until he was towering over the tiny pack leader. “Diagnose this.” He put the feather on her palm and closed her fingers around it until the doctor winced and cried out. When she opened her hand, there was blood staining the palm. The wounds healed almost immediately, but the color remained. “That is the ‘nothing’ I am holding. We were testing to see if all healers could see it, or only Ms. Sanchez.”

  Tatya felt the edges of the feather and then turned to Holly with an odd look. “You can see this?”

  Holly nodded and shrugged. “Don’t know why, but yes. It’s silvery and sort of iridescent.”

  Tatya got a wily, snide look on her face. Holly had seen it before and it never boded well. “Then I suppose you can find it if I do this.” She threw it across the room with force. It was the wrong move. Ahmad hit her with a blast of power strong enough to make her grunt and drop to her knees.

  Now his voice was razor-sharp and dangerous. “That was beyond foolish, doctor. If we didn’t need a healer at this point, I would put you down—Lucas’s wife or not.”

  Holly’s eyes followed the feather’s path. While most feathers floated on a breeze and landed gently, this one fell with weight and purpose. It spun by Eric’s head so close it probably trimmed his hair, and landed under the desk in the corner. She intentionally didn’t react to Tatya’s pissy games, or to the punishment she earned from Ahmad. She just walked over to the desk, reached down to pick the feather up, and then brought it back to the table where she put it back in the mason jar Eric had found to store it in. It landed in the bottle with an audible tink, making her think there must be some sort of metal in the feather. She screwed on the lid and then shook it a few times so everybody would know it was inside. The tone was musical, like a crystal wind chime. “We probably need to keep this somewhere it doesn’t get lost. Maybe with a label.”

  Antoine shook his head. The big cat was very obviously worried. He was leaning against the wall, musk glands going overtime. It made him smell like a wet cat box to her nose. “Non. It is best if only those in this room know of its existence.” His French accent was getting thicker. Holly noted that all the council members reverted to their primary language when stressed. “It will be difficult enough to tell the people outside that their worst nightmare is one they can’t see. They don’t need proof. It will panic them. Already there are children who start crying when branches move in the wind. We don’t need them running screaming into the night to alert the humans.”

  “Speaking of which,” Tatya said in a much more humble voice. “That park ranger stopped by again. I used a little persuasion on him and convinced him there weren’t nearly as many people here as his eyes told him. I also told him we would be going to the new site come daybreak. I hope that’s true.”

  Tony tapped his rifle on the toe of his shoes. The leather of his gloves and his shoe squeaked in different pitches. He tipped his head. “That all depends on what hints the big guy can give us. I think it’s time to do that hindsight. I’d like to do Lucas too, just to see if there’s anything he saw that could help us. Number of fighters, maybe, or how many they killed.”

  “Agreed,” Ahmad said with a nod. “There are few secrets to be kept at this point and I believe you’re capable of keeping any . . . confidences you might find.”

  Tony shrugged. “Have so far. Nothing in this head that anyone would believe, even if I told them. Best I could hope for is to write a novel someday.”

  “Which you won’t do, of course.” Antoine’s voice held both humor and a command.

  Tony smiled, but it was a dark smile, rather than a friendly one. “Of course. Doc, would you make sure they’re both in good enough physical condition for a hindsight? I need to take a leak upstairs and then we’ll be ready.” He motioned toward Holly and Eric. “You might want to do the same. No telling how long this will take.”

  It couldn’t hurt. Holly shrugged and followed him up the stairs. But she’d barely taken two steps toward the kitchen—which thankfully now smelled of baking bread—when Tatya screamed from downstairs. Tony flew by her, rifle barrel leading the way. She and Eric weren’t far behind.

  “Mon Dieu!” Antoine’s voice sounded bot
h horrified and fascinated. Holly pushed her way into the room to see everybody gathered around Lucas’s bed. Or was it Lucas? The man she’d known her whole life seemed to be . . . melting. No, it was more like bits of him seemed to be blending and then reforming and turning into something completely different.

  “For what it’s worth, this is very cool to watch with second sight. I don’t think this is going to be fatal . . . per se.” Tony sounded very sure of himself, and Holly couldn’t figure out why. Tatya tried to get to Lucas, but Ivan was holding her firmly in a bear hug. She wept and wailed as her husband of many years basically became another man before their eyes.

  It was over in moments and the medium-built Latino with the familiar salt-and-pepper hair was now a slender, muscled Native American with waist-length, shining black locks.

  Tatya sniffed the air and then panicked all over again. “Who is that man? That’s not Lucas. Where is my husband? Is this some sort of sick joke?”

  Tony stepped forward first, once the new body was fully in place. “No, actually I think this is the real Lucas. Remember that girl back in Boulder? What was her name . . . Liz? The badger. Anyway, she could see through illusions. This guy here—” He picked up Lucas’s hand and checked for a pulse. “This is exactly how she described him when we were at her house. She saw through the illusion he’d put around me too. I think this is who he used to be, when he was Inteque. I’ve seen his aura shift when he changes personas, like putting on a new suit. He changes everything—visual, scent, and aura. I watched him change from his Lucas persona to one that I’ve seen before . . . just once. But, we’ve got a bigger problem than just that thing out there.”

  At the questioning looks from the council members, Tony met each of their eyes in turn. “Guys, Lucas isn’t Sazi anymore. His aura’s flat gone. He’s full-blood human.”

  AFTER EACH OF them had sniffed Lucas and tested him for magic by pressing him with theirs and waiting for an answering ping, Holly watched as each of them tried to come to grips with what was possibly the first Sazi to ever lose his magic. That he was one of their greatest was apparently totally freaking everyone out, so that they were now trying to gather themselves in various rooms, deciding what to do next. Tatya was inconsolable, and couldn’t even bring herself to touch this strange man until she heard his voice and could see the man she knew as Lucas in his eyes. She poured healing magic into him until her skin was gray and gaunt. But there didn’t seem to be anything to heal. Holly had only touched him briefly, but he was in perfect health . . . physically.

  Except that his eyes were still closed, and nobody seemed to be able to wake him up.

  “So, what do you think?” she asked Eric in hushed tones as the council closed themselves in a room to confer and Tatya parked herself at her husband’s side. Holly had managed to fill two bowls with the fragrant beef stew before the cooks opened the doors to the rest of the refugees. She blew on a spoonful. “Do you think it has something to do with the snake attack?” She chewed with gusto while Eric stirred the contents of his bowl. They’d added the right amount of garlic and the salt level had gone down significantly.

  He took a bite and let out an appreciative Mmm. “Glad you had them suck out some of the salt. It’s nearly too salty now.”

  She nodded. “That’s why it’s the last thing you normally add to a stew. It builds up fast and is a pain to get back out.”

  They ate for a time, cross-legged on the floor. You’d have thought that furniture would have been top on the list of things to buy for new pack headquarters—before they brought down people, at least.

  Eric finally responded as she dipped a chunk of bread in the sauce. “What do I think? Frankly, I’m stumped. I can’t think of a single snake bite that could cause this kind of reaction. And one of the pack leaders of the Minnesota pack, Myrna Mueller, was a Sazi historian. She visited our place a lot when I was growing up. I heard nearly every story about the early days of the wolves, and I never heard a hint of this.”

  Holly shook her head and raised her brows. “I’ve heard of her. She never made it to Boulder, but I heard she had some great stories. Nothing about a big snake bird, huh?”

  “No, I didn’t mean that. She had plenty of stories about Marduc. Once I heard the name I realized what we were up against. It’s not good, for the record. But it’s not this.” He pointed toward the stairwell.

  He paused long enough that Holly had to prompt him. “So? Four-one-one me.” He opened his mouth to reply when she heard a chirping sound, like birds in the woods. It made her heart race. She reached for the small pink object and held it up with a flourish. “My cell phone! We’ve got a signal back. Maybe it’s one of the family.” That made Eric sit up straighter. She opened it and saw a weird series of numbers. Was it Australia? “Hello?”

  “Holly? Oh thank God I finally reached you!” She had to struggle to recognize the voice and then realized it was Dale. He sounded really . . . odd.

  “The cell towers went down. It’s been a zoo here. I don’t even know where to start. I’m just glad you and Rose are safe.”

  There was a pause and then his voice went flat. “Then you haven’t heard. I’m so sorry, Holly. But Rose is dead. They’re all dead.”

  Rose? “No, that’s not true. Maybe she just went without you. But I told her to go before Larry came. But he couldn’t have come because he was with me. Dale, no!”

  Now the voice sounded tired, as though he’d been crying but there weren’t any more tears. “I don’t know what you told her, Holly. But she never came to tell me. I was working the drive and found a few decent stones. I realized it was nearly daybreak when I got topside. When I went in the house . . . there they were. Scattered in every room. Most were snakebit, but a few had been stabbed.” Dale came from snake lineage, so he’d know what it looked like.

  Eric touched her shoulder, sympathy plain on his face. But there was nothing to be said. Her sister was gone. That was two of the Sanchez sisters who were dead now—both taken too young and for stupid, evil reasons.

  “God, Dale. I don’t know what to say.”

  “I warned her. I swear I warned her this was going to happen. One of these days, I told her. One of these days they’ll find out and stop you. Kill you.” Now he was crying again, and his sobs tore at her heart. “And now . . . they did. But—” He paused and snuffled a few times. “I can make sure it doesn’t happen to anyone else. You know people in Wolven now. Rose said you worked for them. She was real excited for you, except she missed you being like her. She was going to change you back, like they changed the others back.”

  Whoa. Eric’s face registered the same shock. He took the phone away from her. “Dale? You don’t know me, but I’m Eric Thompson. I’m a Wolven agent and I’m here with Holly. Repeat what you just said. “Who are they and what sort of change were they planning?”

  “Hello, Agent Thompson. I’m glad Holly’s got someone there with her. I was worried that they’d gotten her too. Rose would be . . . heartbroken to have something happen to her baby sister. She . . . that is—” He snuffled again and seemed to mumble to himself for a time.

  Eric spoke forcefully. “Stay with me, Dale. I know you’ve had a shock. But stay with me, okay? You there?”

  “Yeah. I’m here.” The cold, dead voice was back. God, Holly wished she could reach through the phone lines and hug him. He had nobody, was in a strange town, and his wife and everybody he knew was . . . gone. “Ask your questions. I’ll tell you what I can.”

  “Who are they?”

  Another snuffle and then a fairly firm voice. “FMU—Family Members United.” He paused and then said with a small chuckle, “You know, they’d originally wanted to call it Family United, just so they could call themselves FU. But Rose was the one who suggested Members, just so nobody would really notice them out there. Wanted everything low-key. You can ask Holly about that. She was there at the beginning too.”

  She felt her face grow hot as Eric turned steely eyes on her. He’d hav
e questions after he was done with Dale. Dear God. Could she have stopped all this?

  “Go on.” Eric’s voice was firm and sure, but his scent was just short of furious. The question was with who. “What change had they planned?”

  “They developed a drug. The actual name was RSA17, but everybody in FMU called it the cure. It sounds like just what it was. A drug that could change a Sazi back to human. It could have been a great thing—a way to heal attack victims like Holly, help those who are near-turns get rid of the side effects. But the thing was, they didn’t want to give people a choice. They decided to go on the offensive . . . change anyone they felt like. And they felt like starting at the top. All the big dogs of the council.”

  “Like Lucas.”

  Dale agreed. “Him for sure. He was on Rose’s short list for not protecting Holly back when she was human. And their dad was another one. Rose thought he deserved to know what it was like to be just human. He’d always looked down on Holly and Rose. And his wife too, if Rose wasn’t bullshitting me about that. But the thing was, they couldn’t ever get the drug completely stable. It had some weird side effects. Made people crazy, like Lucas’s son. The youngest one.”