by Briar, Robin
It’s bright inside. The walls have been painted cream and pink. There are images of animals too. That’s what I see a rocking horse in the room. Trent springs to his feet and walks into the next room.
“It’s safe to come inside,” he calls out a few seconds later.
I approach the door he went through and tentatively step inside. That’s when I see them. Trent is kneeling on the ground, still half-man, half-wolf, embracing a child who is hugging him back, completely at ease with his feral appearance.
The little girl turns and looks at me. That’s when I see her face for the first time, except I realize it isn’t the first time. I know her face all too well.
“Ms. Aberdeen!”
It’s Piper. Piper is Trent’s daughter.
2. Wolf as a Horse
Piper breaks out of Trent’s hug and runs over to me. I’m suddenly very aware of the dead bodies behind me, just outside the apartment. I step forward and kneel down as she comes running up to me, scooping her up in my arms.
“Hello, little urchin. It’s good to see you.”
She wraps her arms around me.
“I haven’t seen you in so long! But I’ve been painting this whole time!”
I look around the apartment. It’s filled with toys and decorated for a girl who likes pink. None of them look like they’ve been touched. There is, however, an easel and canvas that has seen a lot of use.
“Have you been here the whole time?” I ask her.
“Not the whole time. Daddy’s friends picked me up at the airport and brought me here.” Piper leans in close. “It’s a bit too baby girly if you ask me.”
Trent stands up, bolt alert. I can tell he hears something.
“What is it?” I ask him.
“People are coming. We have to get going.”
Piper turns around in my arms to face her father. Her eyes widen.
“Hey! You know Daddy’s a wolf! Does that mean I don’t have to keep it a secret anymore?”
Piper must be used to seeing him like this. It only just occurred to her just now that he’s been a half-man, half-wolf this whole time.
“No, you still have to keep it a secret, little cub, just not from Ms. Aberdeen.”
“What do you hear?” I ask him.
“There are stairs in the building, but they don’t have access to every floor, like this one. They have to cut their way in.”
“Is that what they’re doing now?”
“Yes,” Trent says, walking into the apartment.
The space is filled with children’s furniture and dolls. He starts looking around for something to grab.
“Piper, Daddy is going to make a lot of noise, but don’t be scared, okay? I’m not angry. I just need to break something.”
“Like you broke the door? Why? Where are we going?”
“Outside, but we’ll be using a shortcut,” Trent says as he grabs a desk. “Put your hands over your ears, okay?”
I put Piper down and she does as her father says.
“I don’t like this one bit,” she complains. “I hate it when you break things!”
“I know, little cub, I’m sorry, but this time it’s important.”
Trent speaks to his daughter with more gentleness than I thought possible for him, especially as a creature of claw and fur. That’s when he turns to me as well.
“You might want to do the same.”
I follow Piper’s example.
Trent lifts the wooden desk over his head, every muscle rippling with power, and then drives it into the window.
Nothing.
It’s a floor-to-ceiling window like in the apartment we left. Trent does it again. This time a crack forms. He drives the desk into the window two more times. The crack spreads, slowly spider-webbing outward in all directions.
Felix wasn’t kidding when he said these windows are shatterproof.
The desk is falling apart in Trent’s hands. I didn’t know a window could be made this strong. He keeps slamming the desk into the window until there is very little of the desk left to use as a bludgeon.
That’s when he drops the broken pieces, drives his hands into a small hole that he created, and starts to pull. The glass still doesn’t shatter, but the whole window shifts and starts to come out of the frame. It’s more like a flexible carpet of glass now.
Trent’s hands are bleeding, but that doesn’t stop him. He keeps pulling on it, making incremental progress. That’s when I hear something in the hallway.
“Wait here, Piper,” I tell his daughter.
I walk over to the door and look outside. The wall across from me has turned molten red. There’s a bright flame snaking a path through the surface. They must be using some kind of high-powered blowtorch. It’s moving faster than I would have thought possible.
“They’re cutting through the wall!” I yell back. “I don’t think it’s going to take them much longer!”
Piper still has both hands on her ears when I go back inside. I kneel down at her height and wrap my arms around her little body.
Trent yanks on the window one more time.
This time it comes out of the frame, cracked and crumpled, but otherwise in one piece. He tosses it aside. Suddenly we can clearly hear the city outside. There’s a building across the street. Maybe two stories down.
Trent walks toward Piper, breathing heavily. His forearms are covered in blood.
“Daddy! Your arms!” she screams.
“It’s okay, little cub. I’ll heal just like always, but I need you do something for me, and you have to promise me, okay?”
“I’m scared,” she says.
“I know, but there’s no reason to be. Not if you do exactly what I say, all right?”
She nods, tears welling in her eyes.
“You know how we go running in the forest sometimes? You hold on to my fur? Gripping me between your knees like I’m a horse?”
“Yes.”
“Well, I need you and Ms. Aberdeen to do that now.”
My eyes widen.
“You can’t mean—”
“It’s the only way,” Trent says. “They’re going to cut through the wall any second, and these men will be ready for me.”
He means they’ll be ready for a werewolf, with silver bullets. Trent turns back to Piper.
“Can you do that for me, little cub? It’s very important that you don’t let go, but it has to be right now.”
Piper wipes her eyes and turns to look at me. “And you’re going to be with me the whole time, Ms. Aberdeen?”
I look from Piper to Trent. He’s completely serious, and it’s not like I have a better idea at the moment. I look back at Piper.
“Yes. The whole time,” I say, stroking the side of her face.
“Okay then. I’m ready,” she says, more resolutely than an eight-year-old has a right to sound in this situation.
Trent doesn’t waste time after that. He falls onto his hands and knees and starts the change; bones rearrange and muscles stretch. The last shreds of his clothes tear away from his body as he grows even larger than his half-man, half-wolf shape.
His nose elongates into a snout and his hands and feet become massive paws. Fur thickens into a coat with gray streaks. I’ve seen him like this before, before we met, when he appeared to me a vision. A gigantic dire wolf.
Trent looks back at us over his shoulders when the transformation is complete. He gestures with his head to climb on his back. He really has mastered his inner wolf, both the hybrid and this larger shape.
It’s now or never.
I lift Piper on his back and she grabs fistfuls of his fur. They’ve obviously done this before. I do the same, but keep Piper beneath me. Trent walks back a few steps, moving as far from the open window frame as possible until he comes up against the wall. His wolf lungs seems to inflate with one deep breath, and then he gallops forward like a racehorse charging out of the gate.
“Close your eyes, Piper,” I whisper.
I don
’t know if she does, but my eyes are wide open. I even turn around to look back at the door Trent shouldered open. Men with guns and body armor come running into the apartment. They’re caught off guard by what they see, but then that is all left behind.
Trent vaults off the window ledge and the three of us are airborne, flying over four lanes of busy downtown traffic. It’s probably sixty feet across to the next building, including the two sidewalks.
The building across the street is flat-roofed, but twenty feet down. I can already feel our descent. Piper is still holding on with both hands, but her knees lose their grip. Now I have to hold on for us both.
I dig into Trent’s side with my sneakers. The building rooftop we’re heading to rushes up toward us. I can’t tell if we’re going to make it, but refuse to close my eyes. I need to see my fate coming.
Trent lands on the building ledge, breaking chunks of rubble off, and springs forward with our momentum. His dire wolf legs absorb the shock of landing, but he still has too much speed to stop moving. He has to keep running across the rooftop.
Trent leaps over the building ledge on the other side. Flying again, but not for as long this time.
Trent lands easily and puts on the brakes. He has more control now, but the rooftop is covered in gravel, causing us to slide. Muscle can’t slow us down now, but claws can. He digs them into the surface and brings us to a complete stop.
I look back at The Vault, which is only two buildings away. The soldiers can see us clearly and are taking aim with their guns. Trent sees what they’re doing too, and starts moving again. I only have a second to react. I turn my back to the soldiers and smother Piper.
“Sustento in Carne.”
Maintain the Flesh.
I say the words like an instinct and hope they work.
Bullets ricochet off my body.
Thank the powers my magic is back. The Vault must somehow suppress any magic that Felix doesn’t allow.
Trent runs us behind the elevator room on top of this building. It’s large enough for us all to hide behind. A line of bullets follows our movement until they strike the structure instead.
It’s such a bold daylight attack, firing automatic weapons at us over the city, but their guns aren’t making a sound. They only make noise when a bullet whizzes by or strikes the rooftop around us.
I look down at Trent beneath me. He’s been hit. Dammit, that’s not good. I still don’t know how to heal somebody other than myself, but even if I did, his damn tattoo would probably make him immune.
To make matters worse, the protection offered from my spell is almost done. Those few bullets were enough to make short work of the barrier protecting me. It’s really not made to stop high-velocity projectiles.
Maintain the Flesh can protect me from an amorous werewolf, but using it to protect me from bullets is quite another thing. Regardless, I cast the spell again for good measure. It’s all I’ve got.
“Stay with your father,” I tell Piper, and slide off Trent’s back.
I look around the corner to see what the soldiers are doing. The moment I do, the soldiers respond with a hail of bullets. I duck back down immediately after they bounce off my head.
Holy fuck! I just poked my head around the corner! I refresh Maintain the Flesh. That’s three castings in less than a minute. They really don’t want me to see them. If I could, there’s at least two spells I could cast. These snipers must know that.
These soldiers are expert marksmen with orders to kill us. To make matters worse, we’re pinned down behind this elevator box. With my brief glance back the soldiers I counted two men taking aim at us with rifles, but it was hard to see them with bullets bouncing off my face.
If nothing else, Candice and Saffron will sense that I’m casting spells again. They won’t know where I am, but they will know what I’m casting and how frequently. That will set off alarms. They may even start looking for me with divination magic. After that, it’s just a matter of time.
If they figure out where I am, Saffron at the very least can teleport. It’s a huge expense to the quicksilver pool, but this is an emergency. Even so, I’m imagining a best-case scenario here. It might take my coven a lot longer to get here than we can afford.
More importantly, Candice and Saffron have no idea that I’m facing Felix’s men. I would really want them to know that beforehand. He adds a whole new dynamic to the equation.
I look around at the adjoining buildings. Some are taller, some shorter, but they’re all closer to each other than the four-lane thoroughfare we just leapt over.
I look back at Trent. I realize now that he’s been hit twice. Once in the arm and once in the leg. My first-aid training tells me that neither wound is immediately life-threatening, which is fortunate, but they aren’t healing. Trent said they would be ready for a werewolf. That must be using silver bullets.
“Is Daddy going to be okay?”
“Don’t worry, Piper. Your daddy is tough. In fact, he’s so tough that he’s going to jump with us on his back again. And he’s going to keep jumping from building to building until we are very far away. It will seem like we’re flying, and we kind of will be, but he won’t start until I leap onto his back with you.”
I stare into Trent’s crimson wolf eyes.
“That’s the cue, understand?”
He nods his massive head. I look back to Piper.
“Okay, hold on tight, Piper. This is going to happen fast.”
I step out from behind the elevator box and make myself a clear target.
The bullets pepper my head instantly, blinding me from seeing clearly. They churn through the protection my spell offers.
“Sustento in Carne. Sustento in Carne. Sustento in Carne.”
I keep casting it over and over again. The bullets grind through the spell at the same speed that I can say the words.
Until they stop.
Now.
I leap onto Trent’s back and he starts running immediately. I grab his fur in just enough time as he make the first leap. He lands on the adjoining building and keeps going, tearing across the rooftops.
Trent leaps from one building to the next with ease. I can see bullets striking around us, but the gunmen are shooting wildly. My gambit paid off.
They might be expert marksmen, but they had to reload eventually. That means range-finding us through a scope again. It’s not easy to do quickly, especially if your target is moving.
I thought about casting Remove the Flesh on them when they reloaded, or even Stop Motion, but there’s no telling how many more soldiers would show up afterward. My first priority has to be getting Piper to safety.
Trent pours it on, crisscrossing over the rooftops where he can, creating even more space between us and the marksmen.
At this point, they would have to make an extraordinarily lucky shot to hit me. So instead of casting Maintain the Flesh again, I call up a different spell. One that will enshroud my body in a cloak of sorts. The effect will include Piper, so long as she stays close to me.
“Celare ex Praecantatio.”
Hide from Magic.
Felix won’t be able to track us using divination spells, but unfortunately that also means Candice and Saffron won’t be able to either.
And, of course, that’s when a bullet zips through my shoulder.
3. Cutting through the Fog
I’m in shock at first, staring at the hole in my shoulder. It doesn’t look real. I’ve never been shot before. I actually thought it would hurt more than this.
Then the pain catches up with brain.
It’s like a spear has been driven through my flesh. The bullet went in one side and out the other. My right arm goes limp.
I can’t grip Trent’s fur anymore. I have to hold on using only my knees and left hand. Neither of my two companions know what happened yet. At least the bullet didn’t hit Piper.
I can heal this, but I need a safe place to cast the spell when we’re not moving and I can focus on the w
ound properly. A place where I can think straight. I’m already faint. If I let go now, I’ll fall.
Trent looks back at me. Maybe he’s wondering why I let go of him. I can tell he sees the bullet wound, but then he looks forward again. He leaps through the air to the next building. Landing is going to hurt.
Sure enough, the pain explodes in my shoulder. It would seem bullet wounds don’t like being jostled.
I look back at where The Vault is located. It feels like there are too many obstacles between us and the marksmen now. The Vault is a much taller building than the apartment blocks we’re leaping across. If the shooters go to a higher floor, they’ll be able to see us again.
“Take us someplace place out of their sight,” I tell Trent. “Any place with protective cover will do. I need to stop for a second.”
Trent looks around and adjusts his direction. He leaps to a building that’s one story shorter. Trent absorbs most of the shock with his powerful legs, but not all. The landing hurts even more this time, like a burning-hot poker in my shoulder.
My legs and core muscles have to do more of the work now. The same muscles that Mason has been giving a workout in the last two weeks.
Mason. You are still back in the country with Candice and Saffron, probably wondering what happened to me. So much has happened in such a short period of time. Too much to think about right now.
My thoughts are fuzzy and becoming even less distinct by the moment. The world is beginning to blur as Trent gallops beneath me. Piper has no problem holding on to her father. Me, not so much.
“I can take one more jump like that and then I’m done. If I pass out, the spell hiding Piper will also stop. I need to stay conscious and she needs to be close.”
Trent heads for another building. It’s even lower than the building he’s running across now. A three-story. There’s a laundry line of clothes stretched across it.
He bounds across the space between buildings. I almost black out when his feet collide with the rooftop. The pain in my shoulder feels like daggers beneath my skin. Trent slides across the surface and comes to a stop. That’s when I slip off his back.
It’s not quite a fall. It’s not quite a dismount. My feet touch the ground and then my body crumples, flopping onto my back.