by Holly Rutan
"Don't bother. I'm done here," the woman said, when my bodyguards started to move forward. I was collapsed on the ground, trying to drag in air. I could feel pain from Charles and panicked, tried to shut my own responses down so I wouldn't make his situation worse. "You don't have the tools to kill me, so you might as well not throw away your short, puny lives trying," the woman said.
Roy and Terrence hesitated.
"What...the fuck...kind of strange snap...are you?" I gasped at last.
"We are the lost," she answered. "We are the outcaste, the damned, the feral, and the forbidden. There are some that call us demons. We’re coming home. What a pity we'll be on the opposite side of this little war. Once, you would have joined us. You may even want to consider it now—at least if you live through the next few days. I do believe my master has gone and shot your man. I am sorry. Remember, when it comes down to it, that I had no choice."
Her boot slammed into my face.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Charles was weakening. I could feel it in my bones, and I huddled on the hospital steps with my arms wrapped around my knees, shivering. It felt so cold without fur. Without Charles to keep me warm. He was cold. They needed to keep him warmer. They were treating him all wrong, like a human instead of a were.
Moira stood on the steps next to me, talking into her phone. Dimly, I realized she shouldn't be here, that she should be at home taking care of herself. She was still sick. I could hear the undertones of illness in her voice and smell it on her body, but I was glad she was with me. She was pack, and a girl needs her pack at a time like this.
"No, the situation hasn't changed. Hospital officials are refusing to allow her access. She and Charles aren't married. They could deny her on those grounds alone, but it's too obvious she's a were on the verge of falling apart," Moira said. "She isn't even allowed in the building."
A pause.
"He's too severely injured to risk transportation," Moira said.
The scene replayed itself in my mind.
Charles is collapsed on the pavement in a crowd of tactical agents. There are three smoking holes in his torso—hip, stomach, chest. So much blood. Two agents are applying pressure. A gun sits on the ground, etched with runes that glow sullenly with sick red light. A young man, barely out of the Academy, clutches his head and screams. "I didn't mean it! My arm! It did it on its own!"
"No, sir. I can't even get her to eat."
The boy suddenly stops screaming. He lets go of his head with steady hands and picks up the gun on the pavement, too quickly for anyone to react. His scent has changed; he smells like sulfur. His eyes are glowing, red as coals. The harsh blue light of the rift brings it all into focus and makes the fires of his eyes seem almost purple. He lifts the gun to his head and pulls the trigger. Blood and brains shower the man next to him.
There's fighting all over the place. I can't help. All that's important to me is that my mate is dying.
I pulled my knees tighter against my chest and squeezed my eyes shut, wishing I could cry.
Moira hung up the phone and sat next to me. I treasured the warmth of her body touching mine and breathed in her scent. She smelled like old illness and salt and water. Under that, she smelled like herself, the same comforting scent I'd become used to over the past four years.
"If I got you nice, raw sirloin and warmed it up for you, would you try to eat it?" Moira asked softly.
I shook my head, eyes still closed.
"It'd just come up again," I said.
She sighed, the breath rasping, and then coughed into a tissue.
"I'm sorry, Moira," I said miserably. "They're treating him all wrong in there. He's getting worse. It's making me sick, feeling it."
"What do you mean they're treating him wrong?" Moira asked.
"Like a human. They're treating him like a human. He's kin," I growled in reply.
"Werekin are human," Moira said, confused.
"Kin are not human," I corrected. "Kin are weres. They don't heal. They don't shift, but they're still weres."
"Oh no," Moira answered.
I lifted my head, my lips curled in an unhappy smile. "See my dilemma? I could cover for him. Lick his wounds and make him better. But they won't let me in, so I can't do that. Instead, I can pick between letting him die and keeping our secret, or tell them to treat him with heat and calories like a severely injured were and make kin targets for all the anti-nonhuman prejudice weres suffer from daily. Like not being allowed to visit their mates in the hospital or work without a human minder. I would not be thanked for that."
"And it might not even matter," Moira said. "He's in bad shape, hun. You know that."
"I know," I said, feeling like a rock sat in my stomach.
"The boss is trying to get a court order to allow you access, but no dice so far," Moira said. "Right now the only people who can force the issue are Charles's family. His mother's on a flight from San Diego."
I got up and paced, the old, familiar motion soothing. Five steps, turn, five steps, turn. Moira watched me anxiously. I could smell her uncertainty, but my mind was working. It was a welcome change from just waiting. Waiting wouldn't help Charles. Only action would.
"Irwin's in there, right?" I asked. "With the medmages."
Moira nodded.
"If we can get Charles's core temperature up, he'll have more energy to fight with, so he can hang on long enough for his mother to arrive. His temperature should be hovering around one hundred one, maybe one hundred two if he runs a little hot. Even if Irwin and Pyggie don't know his secret, I bet they'll hear a suggestion from a friend."
"I'll go talk to Irwin right now, if I can get someone to fetch him," Moira said, pushing herself to her feet. "They won't let me into the treatment area, since I'm still sick."
"If the doctors think he's running a temperature, they might try to lower it," I cautioned. "His body will eat antibiotics like candy. It needs heat and fuel more than anything else."
"Teach your momma to suck eggs," Moira answered, and hurried inside.
My boots were becoming very familiar with the hospital steps. Five steps, turn. Five more steps, and turn again. A security guard watched me from the main entrance. His gun would be useless against me; it was loaded with copper rounds. I clenched my fists and took the thought out of my mind.
Five steps. Turn.
Had I really progressed past that caged creature I once was? It seemed as though the walls of my cage were still there, pressing against me when I tried to reach too far. They were invisible, impossible to fight, and pervasive. What the hospital officials were doing was wrong, but the only people who seemed to care were the people who knew me personally. Otherwise, I was just another were. Not human. Not to be trusted.
Twenty minutes later I felt like I might have worn a rut in the concrete. The knot of Charles's chill slowly loosened in my stomach. I tilted my face to the sky in relief and sighed, feeling my shoulders relax.
"He's still deteriorating, but not nearly as fast," I reported, hearing Moira approach behind me. "We've got time. Not long, God help us, but more than we had."
She sat down heavily with a grunt and coughed, hard and long into a fistful of napkins. Catching sight of my morose expression, she shook her head.
"I'll be fine," she croaked when she could speak. "Trust me, this is better than it was."
"You shouldn't be here. You should be resting," I said.
"And you should be chowing down on raw meat to keep your strength up. Your shirt is hanging off you like a tent. It looks like neither one of us is going to get what we want, doesn't it?" Moira retorted.
I growled and paced, my boots clomping on the concrete.
"Irwin was already overseeing his treatment personally. He knew Charles wasn't doing as well as he should have been, but not why. He was more than happy to take any advice I could give him, and he won't talk," Moira reported, dropping the subject.
I huffed a breath through my nostrils.
; "'Course he won't, unless he forgets. I don't think he will, but he's as close to lost as you can get and still be able to sing a melody. Risky, but better than nothing," I said. "Can't be helped. How bad is it in there?"
Moira sighed. "We've lost three more since dawn," she answered. "Too many good men went down last night. We lost Valerio completely. Did anyone tell you that?"
I stopped walking. Despair disappeared in a wash of rage. My eyes widened in fury, and I clenched my teeth, fighting jaws that suddenly wanted to take on a different shape and fangs that wanted to grow long enough to tear out a heart.
"What?" I said, my own voice sounding dangerous and foreign.
Fear-smell suddenly added itself to Moira's personal scent.
"Valerio...it's been taken," she repeated, voice hesitant. "We just couldn't hurt the demons, and every time they took one of our men down, he'd get back up and fight on their side. We had to retreat to the city barrier. Necromancy, the mages are saying, and mind-magic."
"Antonio, Ricardo, their grandmothers?" I asked.
"Alive," Moira reassured me, answering almost before the words left my mouth.
"How are we holding them off at the barrier?" I asked.
"Flamethrowers and incendiary rounds," Moira said, the fear smell retreating as quickly as it came. "Seems the risen dead don't like fire much. The necromancer can reattach body parts, but not if there's nothing left to sew back on. Unfortunately, flesh burns real slow and they don't seem to be able to feel pain."
I grunted, thinking. "Zombies were a pretty common weapon during the Wars of Discord. They’re hard to stop, and even harder to destroy. If we can find the mage controlling them and kill him, they'll drop like puppets with their strings cut."
"What's on your mind?" Moira asked.
I looked at her, and I knew my eyes were gleaming yellow and inhuman in my fury. "They have sickened my partner, injured my mate, and driven my pack from its territory. They trample on what is mine. Mine," I snarled. "I will tear them to pieces."
"You aren't being rational," Moira said, meeting my eyes. "If you decide to handle this on your own, the DMA will kill you for going rogue even if you somehow manage to succeed. Any chance Charles will recover will disappear because you will be dead and he will die with you. You won't be able to hold your territory because you will be dead. Slow down and think it through."
My mind leaped and skittered, caught between the primal need to fight for my territory and cold, hard reality. Moira's gaze didn't leave mine, forcing me to hold still, trapped in a conflict of wills. My nails bit into my palms until they dripped blood. The stinging pain cleared my mind some, enough that I finally let out an explosive sigh.
"I am no good to anyone dead," I conceded. "You're right. Sniper rounds are hard to dodge."
Moira snorted. "You mean impossible. And what's all this about your territory? Been branching out?"
I shook myself, skin tingling from the sudden release of tension, and invisible fur settled down along my spine. Moira frowned at me, sensing delay on my part.
"I became Antonio's blood sister to give me authority to boss his people around during the evacuation. There must have been some strange magic at work—God knows that family's been drenched in the current long enough to have had some changes—because it seems to have stuck. I'm reacting like they're core pack. Family, I suppose."
"Oh, Lord," Moira said.
I sat down on the hospital steps with a thud. "I'm too close to all this. Too close to the weres, with a hunter for my mate, ties to his pack, and the Coalition wanting to use me as some kind of poster child. Did you hear about that? Much too close to Valerio and its people. I don't even know how all this happened."
"I let you out of my sights for five days," Moira said drily.
"How long until Charles's mother is here? What's her name, anyway? I never asked," I said.
Moira pulled out her phone and checked the display. "Her flight should touch down any minute, and her name's Emily Smith. That's all I know."
"Burbank airport?" I asked.
"Yeah," she answered.
"Talk to me, Moira. I don't want to have time to think."
* * * *
Charles's mother did not arrive for another hour. By that point, my conversation with Moira had devolved to a few terse words here and there, and pacing. Lots of pacing, burning off the nervous energy of waiting, of being afraid, of fearing that every lurch of my gut was Charles's life slipping away. We had a few false starts, moments where one or the other of us would catch a glimpse of a visitor who was the right age and female, but we were invariably met with disappointment.
When Emily finally arrived, she was unmistakable. Even if she hadn't been flanked by two black-clad DMA agents, I'd have known her. She wore power like a heavy jacket and smelled like an alpha bitch.
Her iron-colored hair hung straight down her back in a tightly woven braid as thick as my wrist, and it swayed gently as she turned, asking one of her escorting agents a question. The fellow nodded. I noted that the escorts were Roy and Terrence, and I was relieved to see they'd both survived the carnage of the previous evening.
Her question answered, she walked toward me. Her steps were hurried, but her shoulders were straight and confident. This was not a woman prone to wasting time.
"Ma'am," I said as she approached.
Unexpectedly, she folded me into her arms, surrounding me with musky, spicy scent. I tensed, not knowing what to do, but she stepped back before I could make a decision. She held me tightly by the shoulders and examined me with golden eyes before letting go.
"Call me Emma, love, and you must be Samantha. And your partner?" she asked. Her voice was husky and low. It suited her perfectly.
"Moira," my partner answered, lifting her hand.
"Excellent. Ladies, gentlemen, shall we? A were must be with her mate, and I'll not do my new daughter the disservice of delay. Come."
"Yes, ma'am," we all answered in ragged unison, and followed her in a wedge formation. We had to; even the humans felt compelled by the sheer force of her personality, and I sensed an unaccustomed, delighted glow at her immediate acceptance.
But still...
"Daughter?" I asked warily.
She gave me a sidelong glance, her golden eyes gleaming in the afternoon sun. "You are the mate of my son, are you not?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Then you are mine."
Emma strode slightly ahead of the rest of the group, and I exchanged an anxious look with Moira behind her back. My friend and partner lifted her shoulders in a wordless shrug. As we approached the door, she slipped a white mask over her nose and mouth and drifted closer to me.
"Look," Moira murmured. "Don't worry about it. We can sit down and untangle this mess when there's time to think."
"The rest of Voneshi's hair is going to turn white because of me," I muttered, eying Emma. She was in intense conversation with the security guard, who had blocked the doorway.
The corners of Moira's mouth turned up, and she nodded.
"Then fetch your supervisor, and quickly," Emma was saying to the security guard. "If my boy dies during this delay, I will hold you—and your supervisors—personally responsible."
The security guard stationed in front of the hospital's main entrance held his radio in trembling hands as he called for help. Behind him, the glass double doors slid open and closed, triggered by our approach. I could see human figures through the glass, their heads turned toward us, but no one seemed inclined to interfere.
While the guard spoke in hushed tones, Emma pulled a bright red cellphone from her purse and dialed, apparently from memory.
"Bruce? Ah, there you are. Excellent. Would you believe I am being prevented from visiting my own son at the hospital? I did think you would be interested, yes. Come join us, love. Yes, I am aware you are feeling...out of sorts. A nonhuman-interest story will be just the thing to help you feel yourself again, and I do believe you are close to our location."
&
nbsp; After rattling off the address, Emma shut her phone and slipped it back in her purse, narrowing her eyes in satisfaction. The guard's personal scent began to sour with fear. I couldn't make myself feel much in the way of sympathy for him; my lips curled off my teeth in what could only charitably be called a smile.
"You can come on in, ma'am," the guard said, lowering his radio. "I'm afraid everyone else will have to wait outside."
"Unacceptable," Emma said.
"Look, ma'am," the guard said. "I have my orders. No meat-eating nonhumans are currently allowed in the medical facilities, unless they are direct family members. That means no weres."
"And, young man, what is the worst that happens to you if you violate that order?" Emma said, her tone almost gentle.
"I lose my job, and if someone gets hurt because of it, they sue me for everything I have," the guard said.
"If young Miss Davis there is kept from her mate—my son—who is currently in very real danger of death, she will not be able to calm herself enough to eat. She needs the reassurance that he still lives and breathes. Do you know how long it takes for a were to starve herself?" Emma asked, expression implacable.
"No, ma'am," the guard said weakly.
"Three days. No more." Emma turned to me. "How long has it been since you last ate?" she asked, tone gentling.
I flinched and looked at the ground, not answering.
"Nothing today," Moira said. "And knowing my partner, she probably ate her dinner on the run yesterday, since Charles was separated from her and wouldn't have been able to remind her to eat. She's always been lousy about eating when things get crazy."
Roy and Terrence whispered to each other, making me twitch. I'd almost forgotten the two of them were even with us, they'd been so quiet. Roy cleared his throat.
"She didn't eat much of anything when she was with us, ma'am," he said, voice tight. "Didn't think anything of it, since we didn't eat, either. I'm sorry, ma'am, the two of us work in a heavily human district and didn't know she'd need watching."