Shadows flickered in his eyes, and I lifted an eyebrow. What had ruffled his feathers? His gaze speared Dell, a twitch in his jaw. His cheeks were flush, and hers were too. She wiped her lips with her thumb and shot me a wink.
My eyebrow climbed higher. Usually Isaac tore a page from Theo’s book and toyed with his women. Gave them flowery words and shored up the hope they might be the one who settled him. For once the shoe appeared to be on the other foot—paw? Dell was making her interest clear. She was ready to play the game, and Isaac appeared unnerved to find himself the prize.
The pair squared off against one another in the center of the backyard created by circling our Airstreams. Twinkling lights strung between each trailer bathed the area in a soft glow and made Dell’s eyes sparkle.
Isaac couldn’t turn his back on her fast enough. “Have you been doing your stretches?”
As flat and hard as an open-handed slap, his voice jarred me to attention.
“I’ll take that as a no.” He anchored his hands at his hips. “When was the last time you took magic into yourself for the purpose of shifting aspects?”
“This afternoon.” As he well knew.
“That was a gut reaction. Acting in self-defense doesn’t count. That’s not skill, it’s not choice, it’s your fight-or-flight reflex,” he lectured. “When was the last time you purposefully used your magic to instigate a change for reasons other than saving your neck?”
Thinking back over the past few weeks, I worried my bottom lip with my teeth.
“Okay, let’s try this another way.” A hearty sigh heralded his disappointment in me, but that was nothing new. I was an old pro at disappointing those I loved. “When was the last time you shifted prior to today, period?”
“Two days ago, and once a day for several days before that.”
His shoulders relaxed. “How many sources?”
“Three, I think.”
He rolled one of his hands, expecting a recitation.
“A kraken, a legacy and a warg.” It felt like I was missing one, and it came to me. “A witch.”
“Four shifts.” Amazement wreathed his face. It had been a tough week. “And your reset?”
I flinched, but he kept waiting for an answer. This was part of his bargain, I realized, forcing me to talk about my sister, a thing I rarely did, a name no one spoke within my hearing at home. For a trickle of seconds, I wasn’t sure the deal was worth it.
The pearl bracelet glinted a reminder at me, and I shored up my resolve.
“I didn’t…” I croaked. “I didn’t need the reset.” The reset. Harsh as it was, I was grateful for the reprieve, glad he wasn’t calling her by name. “I initiated the change of my own free will.”
Mostly.
Hand extended to offer me comfort, he caught himself mid-step and turned the move into a widening of his stance. “Why would you?”
“That’s classified.” I almost found a smile to make light of those circumstances, but almost wouldn’t fool him.
Ever the puppeteer, Vause had pulled my strings and made me dance. I had shifted into Lori and used the memory of my sister to interrogate the only one of Charybdis’s victims to survive. Painful as it had been, the intel we had gained from the McKenna girl was worth the cost to me.
“Okay.” Letting the remark slide, he brought his hands together in front of him and cracked his knuckles. “I can respect that.”
Face quirked in an odd expression, Dell glanced between us, either attempting to read the tension thrumming between us or playing spymaster for Graeson, I wasn’t sure.
“I used seven donors this past week,” Isaac informed us without a hint of bravado.
No surprise there when he made a point to never use the same source twice, to always stretch the limits of his abilities by choosing the rarest or most difficult magics to imbibe. Oh the hearts those experiments had broken. As the lone man in our caravan, except for the rare occasions when Theo condescended to join us, he pushed himself hard to hone the edge of his skill.
“Do you want the honors,” he said, shaking out his hands, “or should I go first?”
“You can go first,” Dell chimed in.
He shot me a glance to see if I minded.
“Knock yourself out.” I wasn’t about to fight him for the privilege. His recalls were stunning.
“One.” Left arm extended, he coaxed the change forth until his skin turned a sunburned hue. The fingers of that hand stuck together, the thumb popping out of alignment as his melded digits flattened, curved. Bands of white striped his joints, and peculiar, bristly hairs sprung from his hardening carapace. In under thirty seconds, he wielded a giant crab pincher. A grunt of effort, and he spun into a flying kick that ended with him snapping his claw an inch from my nose. “Pagurus armatus.”
“Where did you run into a giant hermit crab?” Tennessee was a landlocked state.
Click-clacking his weapon, he shrugged. “She rented lot 4B.” The appendage dissolved in a ripple of magic and pink skin. “I noticed her species on her renter’s form and got curious.”
Maybe Dell was just biting her tongue to avoid cracking a really good joke about getting crabs from hooking up with a stranger in a trailer park, but the barely audible growl vibrating in the air around her at the mention of a previous lover reminded me of what curiosity did to the cat.
For his sake I hoped none of his recalls were feline.
The Three Ways from Sunday RV Park in Three Way, Tennessee had been our home for the past year. Aunt Dot enjoyed running parks, and she owned or had owned at least a dozen. The way she traded property with friends made tracking her properties impossible. I was glad that headache fell to Isaac. Keeping tabs on tenants was tough, too, but the steady arrivals and departures distracted her from getting too itchy to relocate. The influx of talent also kept Isaac occupied, though crablike fae had to be a first.
A spark of interest in Dell’s reaction lit his eyes before he veiled them. “Number two…”
The rest of his changes flowed faster, and each was as unique and distinct from the last as the pincher had contrasted his natural hand. The transition was so smooth from donor to reset to the next donor that, had I not known Isaac as well as I did, I might have mistaken his arrogant scowl while performing his impression of Theo for the real thing.
By the time he worked through all seven of his reserves, an impressive number even for him, a sheen of sweat dampened his shirt.
Wiping the back of his arm across his forehead, he gestured me forward. “All right. Let’s see what you’ve got.”
Hours had passed since I tasted Aisha’s blood. In theory, I should be able to summon her black pelt and claws, repeating my earlier performance. The reality was less impressive. I reached down deep, into the core of my magic, and stirred the dying embers. A tiny flicker took pity on me, and I sprouted patchy black fur down my right arm. Even that much effort left me shaking and sweaty.
“Not bad.” He bestowed a proud smile on me. “You did better than the last time we tried this.” That had been almost a year ago. “Your talents are like muscles. You have to isolate and exercise them to build strength.”
“That’s it?” Dell walked over, smoothed her hand down my arm, and the clumpy fur shed.
Innocent as her rebuke was, it still stung my pride. “It’s the best I can do.”
“For now,” Isaac corrected, cutting Dell a sour glare. “You’ll get better with practice.”
The sentiment reminded me of one Magistrate Vause had shared not too long ago, preaching how I could only get better with dedication while ignoring the reason I let these “muscles” atrophy.
“I should have gone first.” I shook out the tingles of lingering magic. “It’s impossible to follow up Isaac.”
“You’ll be kicking his ass in no time.” Ever the supportive girlfriend, she slung her arm around my shoulders. “With my grade-A warg juice pumping through your veins, how could you not?”
“Are you strong enough
to continue?” Isaac intruded on my vigorous eye-rolling. “I don’t want you to overexert yourself.”
“I’m good.” To my surprise, it was the truth. The past week had limbered me up, making me flexible in ways I hadn’t been in years. “Let’s keep going.”
“All right.” A brief grin split his cheeks. “Say the word, and we stop.”
My few minutes of exertion were nothing compared to his, but the burn felt good. “Okay, Grade A, this is where you and your juice come in.”
“I want to see transformation to the elbow. Full transformation. Not a single hair past.” Isaac dragged his finger across the crease in my arm like I’d failed basic anatomy. “Hold it for sixty seconds and then release it.”
I puffed out my cheeks with a sharp exhale. “Okay.”
My most extensive transformations had been fueled by adrenaline. Shifting cold was harder, which was the point of the exercise. That didn’t make me any more eager for the attempt.
I stuck out my arm, and Dell clasped hands with me. The nail on my right hand’s middle finger wiggled loose, pushed free by the emergence of my spur. Quick as a flash, I pierced the back of her hand and tasted her rich blood in the back of my throat.
Golden fur sprouted down my arm, and Dell squeaked with glee as the now-familiar static trickled into my head. My fingers extended, the nails lengthening and sharpening. My vision wavered, caught between what I saw and what my mind perceived. I saw nothing when I looked at Isaac, but Dell… She glowed with subtle light, her resonance as distinctive to me as her voice.
“Hiya.”
The greeting pinged around in my skull.
I felt my lips curving upward and couldn’t have stopped the smile from blossoming if I’d tried. “Hi.”
Between one heartbeat and the next, Dell vanished, ducking underneath the giant claw Isaac brandished. His swing went over her head and almost gutted me. I swiped my nails over his carapace, and the screech made my back teeth ache.
“What are you…” I ducked another swing, “…doing?”
“This isn’t a game, Cammie.” He sucked in a hiss when I sliced his shirt to ribbons, drawing thin lines of blood from the shallow cuts. “It’s not enough to summon the aspects. You must learn how to wield them to your advantage.”
A vicious snarl quivered on Dell’s lips. The quality of her light shifted, altered. She was changing. Oh crap.
“Dell,” I snapped. “No.” I winced when his pincher snipped off two of my claws like he wielded a pair of overgrown nail clippers. “Let me handle this.”
Her glow pulsed once and then leveled, but the snarl kept coming, a steady reminder she was there to help if I needed her. The show of support bolstered me, and even as my arm muscles trembled with the strain of holding the magic to my skin, I tensed for another blow. Isaac aimed for my soft middle again, not holding back, but blood was rushing in my ears, and I was ready for him. My shaggy forearm batted away his claw, the sound like nails raking a chalkboard, yet somehow over the screech I heard a single word, a thought, really.
“Ellis?”
I shook my head, but the tendril remained. “Graeson?”
The blinding white light I associated with his mental presence splashed red.
Spine stiffening, I spoke aloud. “Graeson?”
“Watch out,” Dell cried.
Too late to duck the blow I hadn’t seen Isaac launch, I grunted when his punch landed, and my teeth clacked together. At least his pinchers had been closed. Knocked backward, I hit the dirt on my butt and brought the tail of my shirt up to wipe my lip. Sparring match or not, he wouldn’t hit me while I was down.
I winced at my tender nose, searching out Dell. “Can you sense Graeson?”
A short pause lapsed while she dug her toes in the dirt. “Yes.”
“What’s wrong with him?” I spat blood. “His light—aura—whatever—it’s wrong. It’s not as bright as it used to be. Was he injured in the hunt?”
Dell shifted her weight onto her heels before slapping the balls of her feet to the ground. “I can’t.”
“Can’t what?” The tug of fear caused the magic to slip away from me, and the pack bond evaporated in a whirl of crimson voices. I pushed to my feet. “What’s going on, Dell?”
“Let it go. Please.” She peered through her lashes at me. “You can’t help him.” Her gaze latched on to Isaac as if he might side with her, but he was Switzerland. “Let’s keep practicing. Or maybe go try some of that soup you were making earlier.”
Things were bad if she was suggesting we all go eat mushy vegetables together.
“Show me,” was all I had to say.
A quiver ran through her. “Screw it,” she muttered, then bolted for the trees.
Dell sailed through the forest as though she were an extension of it. Limbs glided over her skin to rake mine. Leaves that held their silence in her passing crackled under my feet. Insects chirped as if saying hello, greetings cut short by my passage. The earth and its children were her domain, her presence welcome here. Me, the woods seemed eager to betray with noise and injury.
Lost to the duck low, leap high, dodge left—no right!—obstacle course that was our flight through the woods, I was paying attention to my feet and not Dell when she flung out her arm. The difference in our heights meant she nearly clotheslined me.
Panting hard, I leaned back against rough bark and gained my bearings. Something about this place set my hairs on end, the intense sensation requiring me to rub my arms to ease the prickling awareness. This spot was familiar, but not, the memory wispy like a forgotten photo glimpsed upside down that would come into focus when righted.
I smelled water before I saw it. The earthy scents of decomposition and mold, decaying fish and leaves dissolving into a new layer of silt, burned my sinuses. Above us, the towering longleaf pines leaned forward as if admiring their reflections.
Acid splashed the back of my throat, and I almost toppled sideways when the puzzle of our location solved itself in my head.
This was Pilcher’s Pond.
Marie Graeson’s body had been found here. I had first met Graeson in this spot, too, the grieving brother who searched for his sibling until locating her remains, who had joined in the hunt for Charybdis to avenge her. This was…the last place I expected to find him. Unless…
Whisper-soft, unsure why the quiet felt so absolute, I asked her, “Has his grief rebounded?”
The selfish hope that I was wrong, that he was still fit to help me work the case, warred with a tremulous fear that the desperate man I had first met would reemerge and that I would have no way to haul him back from the precipice, to teach him how to balance the same edge I walked daily.
Dell lifted a finger to her lips.
Those concerns flittered away to be replaced with new ones once the thunderous rush of blood in my ears receded.
Snapping teeth. Yelps. A short howl muffled.
Those sounds led me in a clockwise circle, until the full breadth of the lake revealed itself step by step. What I saw at the water’s edge chilled me to my marrow. The wolf I recognized as Graeson was ringed by four others whose colors and patterns were vaguely familiar. Two more lay on their sides, panting heavily, their flanks slick with what the moon revealed as blood.
Dell hooked her arm through mine at the same time I stepped forward, and she clamped her hand over my mouth. I hadn’t realized I was about to speak, but the words burned up my throat now.
Graeson needed our help. He was outnumbered. Aisha must have tricked him into coming out here and then sicced the other wolves on him. I summoned the dregs of magic still in my system, managing to sprout a layer of fine golden hair down my arms. The renewed strength allowed me to pry Dell’s hand away, but it fizzled before the pack bond rushed me.
Disappointment sifted through me. No. Not disappointment. Relief. I was grateful to be spared that intimacy twice in one night, right? That thrum of belonging, the warm feedback that hummed in the back of my mind like a lullaby
sung to me as a child.
Fingers tight on Dell’s wrist, I was about to light into her when Graeson charged, his form a blur to my eyes as he attacked one of the wolves. The wrongness of it left me holding on to Dell for different reasons. This wasn’t right, wasn’t fair, wasn’t Graeson.
The four remaining wargs made no move to engage him. Unless they were blasting mental threats at him, the vicious attacks were unprovoked. A thin, brown wolf with ribs exposed hung limp from Graeson’s jaws, yet he didn’t twitch a paw in retribution. He took it, everything Graeson dished out, without a whimper to betray the gruesome damage inflicted upon him.
Fight, damn you, I willed the wolf, but the words bounced in my skull. I wasn’t pack. The bond didn’t hum for me without a fresh drop of their kin’s blood in my system.
Tired of his prey not giving him the fight he clearly hungered for, Graeson spat out the brown wolf and turned an eye to the next warg. This time when I strained against Dell’s hold, the effort was feebler. A final shake of her head was as good as a confession. There was no panic to rush in and help, only grim acceptance and stone-cold resolve not to interfere. She had known this was happening, and she hadn’t told me. For her to be so calm, Graeson must have known what he was walking into and prepared her for what might spill over the bond. No wonder she had jumped right in and distracted me with practice.
As the outsider, viewing the spectacle without being able to sift through Graeson’s head to find a reason for this calculated brutality, I tired of the scene quickly. The precise cruelty of his attacks disabled his opponents—or was that victims?—and watching him embrace his role as beta soured my stomach. I had seen enough.
Turning on my heel, I picked my way back home, not caring if Dell followed.
Isaac leaned against my trailer, sharpening a pocketknife against a whetstone, and glanced behind me with a frown pinching his brow when I returned alone. “Well?”
“I’m turning in early.” I breezed past him before he got a chance to respond. “Night.”
Slumping against the door, I locked myself inside, just like Graeson had wanted.
Head Above Water (Gemini: A Black Dog #2) Page 5