I held out my hands, talking in a soothing tone despite my anger. “Claire! It’s me—gah!”
She hit me with hands outstretched, grabbing hold of the towel I had wrapped around my head, yanking it down and to the side where her knee was waiting to say hello to my face. I slapped my palms down to block the strike and immediately counter-punched her in the hoo-ha, really putting my shoulders into it.
She gasped in both pain and astonishment, hopping on both feet for a moment.
I elbowed her in the ribs to get some distance. Then I jumped, spun in the air and flung out a back-kick as hard as I could, focusing more on the speed of my spin than the aerial nature to deliver the most force. It struck her hard enough to double her over before she flew into my television.
She went through my television—as in her ass got stuck in the center, momentarily trapping her long enough for me to get a breath of fresh air. I wheezed, feeling slightly light-headed because the living room was one thick cloud of noxious smoke as if the building was on fire.
Bubble-bubble-bubble…
“Starlight!” I snapped. “Quit toking and start helping! She’s fucking feral or something!”
He didn’t answer, but the bubbling did cease as he removed the bowl and took another giant puff. He finally glanced up at me with his eyelids partially closed as he held his breath for a few seconds, and then he finally let it out in another thick, noxious cloud that obstructed my view of him. He didn’t cough. Not even once. Like a champ.
I could sense him staring at me through the smoke, still not saying a word. But he did paw at the smoke in a playful manner.
“I don’t know who the fuck you think you are, bitch,” Claire snarled from behind me, finally extricating herself from my television, “but I’m going to rip the skin from your bones and make a rug for my cave.”
I spun in disbelief—what the hell had she been smoking to not recognize me in my own apartment? She was scratched up and bloody, and I noticed several pieces of glass or plastic from my television embedded in her flesh. Her body was heavily corded with dense muscle, but not enough to look like a powerlifter or CrossFit junkie—just enough for other elite athletes to take notice and deliver a respectful nod.
I’d busted up her nose at some point and it was a bleeder, fanning down across her full lips and chest, shining in the minimal moonlight that pierced the cracks between the partially closed wooden blinds covering the window. She looked more pissed than I had ever seen her, and that was saying something.
I yanked off the towel on my head and pointed at my white hair. “It’s me, you moron!”
She took slow, deliberate steps my way, baring her teeth at me. “And who, the fuck, is me?” she spat, not seeming to care one way or the other.
I rapidly rolled up the towel, ready to whip the nipples right off her tits if she didn’t calm the fuck down.
Cain coughed out a surprised sound and we both spun to see him standing in the doorway with two cups of steaming coffee in his hands. “Um…what did I miss?” he asked lamely. “Hi, Claire.”
Claire took the moment of confusion as an opportunity and lunged at me again. I jumped laterally and whipped her knuckles with my wet towel, then again on the ass as she barreled past me. She yelped in both surprise and anger as I hit her right at the bottom of her ridiculously fit ass where it met her thigh, already producing a red welt.
She snarled, spinning and grabbing at her ass for a second. Then she dove at me again, this time a full-bodied swing with her right fist as if hoping to end the world with a single punch.
I dropped the towel and rode the punch, rolling my shoulders and twisting slightly so that her fist sailed past my head. Then I pivoted, wrapped my arm around her waist, and flung her up and over me to slam into the dresser in a hip toss. I used every ounce of strength I had, knowing she was a shifter. The only way I was going to knock any sense into her was to literally knock her out or incapacitate her. Shifters could take a beating.
The dresser splintered but didn’t break entirely.
So I picked up a vase, lifted it over my head, and began hammering it into her back, breaking the dresser further with each blow.
I heard Cain creep past us like one would at a baseball game when returning to one’s seat—not wanting to knock over the drinks of the people sitting next to him that he had to pass on his journey.
“Hey, Starlight. What, um, exactly is going on? And why are they both naked?” he asked, sounding baffled.
Starlight grunted. “I think it’s a friend thing. Then again, it could be because she doesn’t look like Callie.”
Chapter 9
I flinched, glancing back at Starlight sharply. “What—”
Claire kicked me in the stomach, knocking me on my ass and causing me to drop the somehow still unbroken vase directly onto my shinbone in a Fatality Move.
My vision flared white as God Himself stabbed my soul in the region that my shin encased. I’m sure everyone has experienced a solid shin strike before—on a coffee table at three in the morning when trying to get a drink of water or use the restroom.
In that moment, it felt like the most painful thing I had ever experienced, but it rapidly dulled to merely a fiery throb and I scrambled backwards on my ass, ignoring the shards of glass and wooden splinters decorating my carpet—and now slicing into my flesh. Claire stormed closer, twisting her neck from left to right and cracking the bones as if just warming up.
“What have you done to my friend, demon?” she snarled. “I will rip that black hair right out of your scalp so hard you’ll feel it in your toes. I knew one of your kind would eventually come here. You didn’t even sense the alarm I set up…” she growled smugly.
“Did you pick up anything to eat, Piglet?” I heard Starlight ask Cain. I couldn’t quite make out Cain’s response as I continued scooting back away from Claire. “Oh, bother. I’m starving.”
“This is like Pay-Per-View material,” Cain murmured conversationally. “Why can’t she see it’s Callie?”
I saw Claire hesitate, momentarily picking up on the conversation behind her, but she didn’t let up her pursuit of me. I finally scrambled back to my feet, picking up the only immediately available weapon. A magazine. I rolled it up like I was drawing a sword for a duel, narrowing my eyes at Claire.
“Claire’s been rather…on edge lately,” Starlight explained. “Savage is probably accurate. And she doesn’t look like Callie. Either that, or I’m way higher than I thought.” They were silent for a few moments before Starlight spoke again. “I’m glad Callie made it out of the Doors.”
“How did you know about that?” Cain asked in disbelief—as if it was the most interesting thing happening in the room. Not the two naked chicks wildly fighting to the death in a Listed Sisters behind the scenes episode.
But for whatever reason, Claire had halted, and I could tell the majority of her attention was on the conversation behind her. She kept her eyes locked on me with an intensity that let me know if I moved even one step from where I stood, she would do everything in her power to end me. That look was a warning. And since I didn’t want to use magic on my friend, I waited to see how this played out. Was Starlight doing this on purpose? Kind of like that whisper game—that people will try harder to hear a whisper than they would a shout?
And in the middle of a fight, shouting was only so much white noise.
I was also damned interested and surprised to hear Starlight mention the Doors, because I hadn’t been entirely sure that seeing him inside them had been real. Some of the visions I had gone through had been real, others more like a dream of the future. A possibility.
“I showed her some things there,” Starlight said.
“Some things I would like to hear and some things I would not,” I said softly, using his exact phrasing from when we had spoken within the Doors.
Starlight—for the first time—shot me a look that was more personal than observing. A look that acknowledged me, even though I was conf
ident he had recognized me from the start, letting Claire go beast on me for whatever damned reason he had. Maybe he knew she had needed to get whatever it was out of her system.
I lowered my magazine very slowly and relaxed my shoulders.
Claire narrowed her eyes suspiciously but didn’t attack.
“You were actually there?” Cain asked, still sounding confused.
Claire and I were both staring at Starlight now, but I knew Claire had me locked firmly in her peripheral vision in the event I tried to attack her.
Starlight nodded, holding his breath for a moment. “Sure I was,” he said in a tight voice, slowly exhaling more thick smoke. “You just need to know where to place your feet. What to smoke. How much. You can get anywhere on a cloud,” he explained with a chuckle that sounded frighteningly similar to that dryer sheet teddy bear in the Snuggle television commercials. He locked eyes with me, suddenly looking entirely serious. “I’m glad she snapped out of it. She was a force to be reckoned with over there. Almost no humanity left at all.”
I nodded soberly—both aware of Claire’s tension and Starlight’s warning.
“Did you want some?” Starlight asked, angling his bong towards Cain with his tiny, soft paws.
Cain eyed it warily. “Where will it take me?”
Starlight glanced down at his bong thoughtfully. “No idea, man. I haven’t left yet. This mixture is experimental. Sometimes you gain things, sometimes you lose things.” He looked up at Cain again, a fiery twinkle in his eyes. “You can’t ride the cosmos without a little risk, right? Want to go on a fucking adventure, or what?” he asked almost aggressively excited.
Cain leaned away quickly. “No, thanks. I need to help Callie figure some stuff out.”
Then the two of them looked directly at me.
“Oh, look. They stopped fighting,” Starlight mused, lightly clapping his soft paws as he hugged the bong to his chest.
Claire was quivering as if in the process of being electrocuted. She slowly turned to me, narrowing her eyes doubtfully.
I didn’t understand exactly what was going on, but Starlight was obviously right about something. Claire couldn’t see me. Couldn’t sense me. Even now, when her mind and her friends were telling her the truth. Whatever she saw before her was not her best friend, Callie Penrose. I needed to prove myself somehow.
And I knew I had a very small window in which to convince her.
I thought back, shuffling through memories, trying to think of something that would stand out as entirely unique and private. Recalling events from the alley only an hour ago, I looked up at her, my smile gentle and soft.
“I molested some vampires in an alley tonight. Because they were trying to molest my friend. An old cat lady…” I said, hoping she would get the reference to Phix—because I didn’t want to name drop. “They…hurt her, and when she was lying in a puddle of her own blood, they…took liberties with their hands, and promised to do much, much worse…I took their hands. Among other things.”
I said this very gently, very softly, my voice hoarse.
“What…” Claire began in a dry rasp, then cleared her throat. “What did you do to them?” Her fingers were clenched in tight, shaking fists at her sides.
Because Claire and I had experienced a very similar assault the first night we had met Roland. A group of vampires had thought they could take us in an alley, and they had seemed more than willing to sample more than just our blood when Claire had lost her top in the skirmish.
She hadn’t been a shifter then, and I hadn’t been a wizard. Just two frightened teenaged girls riding our bicycles after a day of swimming and tanning.
“I did what I wished I could have done that night years ago after we went swimming. Because…” I trailed off, my eyes growing misty at a new thought. “I didn’t have a Shepherd to help me this time, and my friend was hurting. In fact, I’m pretty sure the Shepherd was the bad guy this time…” I said, letting out a pained sob, even though I had tried to keep it locked down.
Because that night so long ago, Roland had saved us from the vampires. It had been the first night I accidentally used magic to harm another life, even though I had no knowledge of how. I had seen them circling Claire like a pack of predators and I had reacted. Without Roland’s intervention, the remaining vampires might have even done worse to us—extracting vengeance in addition to their other desires.
Except…now Roland was apparently leading the monsters. The same kind of monsters he used to fight. The same kind of monsters he had once saved two innocent little girls from.
Tears brimmed up from Claire’s eyes, streaking down her cheeks and parting the blood coating her face like Moses splitting the Red Sea. And then my best friend crashed down to her knees, her shoulders hunched as she wept.
I felt a flash of heat on my scalp and almost jumped out of my skin. I patted my head anxiously, wondering if we had accidentally started a fire in our fight and a spark had hit my hair. If that was the case, friendship or not, Claire had to die. It was in the rulebook.
But I felt nothing else. It hadn’t exactly been pain, just a sharp, noticeable sensation of heat. Claire was staring up at me, now, her eyes as wide as teacups.
“Callie?” she whispered, looking at me in startled disbelief.
I nodded, raising up my arms to welcome her into a hug. She sat entirely motionless, staring up at me. “Get over here, Clairebear,” I pressed. “Before I tell Kenai you’re being a bitch.”
Claire leapt to her feet in one smooth motion and grabbed onto me like a life preserver, squeezing every inch of her body as close to mine as she could possibly get, even tucking her chin into and around my neck as she squeezed tight enough to almost cause pain.
She was sobbing inconsolably, unable to even speak. Her hands ran repeatedly down my hair in shaking, desperate motions as if trying to calm me down or convince herself I was real.
I cried back just as hard, having no idea what was going on, but the sensation of that much love hitting you at one time was powerful enough to break anyone.
I had my best friend back. And my brother.
And that distant stoner friend who always seemed to linger on the edges of social groups.
“I’m going to need another shower, thunder-twat,” I muttered.
Her body shook with laughter and I heard her whisper something back in a very fragile voice. “I thought…I lost you,” she sobbed. “Don’t ever do that to me again…” It sounded like she had a lot more to say, but then she was shoving me away, back in the direction of the bedroom. “Hurry up. You’re a mess.”
I smiled, wiping at my eyes and readied myself for another shower.
I chose to grab a fresh towel rather than shake the glass out of the one I had just worn.
Chapter 10
I sat on my couch, having shoved some of the detritus aside to make room for everyone. While I had been showering, Cain had left to get another coffee for Claire and some pastries for Starlight—which he had instantly devoured, complaining that Cain hadn’t bothered to buy any Cheetos. The tiny bear seemed genuinely upset about the lack of chips, clutching his bong lovingly and muttering about needing both salty and sweet to truly ride his high out.
I’d caught them up on my trip through the Doors and meeting my ancestor, King Solomon, knowing I wouldn’t be able to get anything useful out of Claire until she knew all the pertinent details of my absence. Then I told her about the welcome party outside Roland’s church and how Phix was injured but hopefully okay. Claire had grunted at that part, but still seemed awed about my trip through the Doors. She’d also punched Starlight in the muzzle upon hearing he had seen and spoken with me inside the Doors. He hadn’t told her, apparently. In all fairness, he’d been gobbling mushrooms like they were skittles, so it wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility that he had thought it was a hallucination at first.
Claire stared off at nothing, shaking her head at my story, struggling to process it all.
“I don’t un
derstand why you look different, though. If this Le Boner guy zapped you, why would his next plan of action be to send his vampire goons after you? Kind of a waste of effort, isn’t it?” I was smirking at her moniker for the French vampire, but I didn’t have an answer to her question as I stared down at my hands hanging over my knees. “And if the zombie wizard vampire boner hit both of you with this magic, why doesn’t he look different?” Claire asked, jerking her chin towards Cain.
He shot me a silent look, as if asking if I’d come to any conclusion on the matter. I shook my head and he sighed, obviously frustrated. “No idea. Maybe Le Bone had nothing to do with…” he trailed off, waving a hand in my general direction, “whatever it is you think you sense on Callie. But we haven’t run into anyone else, so it’s an educated guess.”
Claire narrowed her eyes challengingly. “You think I’m imagining this? Look at her! She’s taller, fuller, and has black hair!”
Cain smirked mischievously. “To be honest, men don’t often notice such subtle changes like that in a woman. We are crude, aloof creatures.”
Claire didn’t appreciate his teasing, jumping to her feet in frustration. Cain made a grumbling sound of appreciation, not bothering to hide his interest in the display Claire had given him. Because Claire, as usual, seemed allergic to clothing, and had chosen to remain naked for our conversation—dismissing my offer of a robe because “it looked itchy.” The shards of glass and splinters on the couch hadn’t seemed to bother her, though.
She walked over to the door where she had apparently left her belongings before preparing to ambush me as I came out of the shower. She squatted down to dig through the pile, and I found myself wondering about the ward she had mentioned placing around my apartment—the one we had unwittingly set off.
“She’s right, you know,” Starlight murmured, polishing his bong absently. “You look and feel different. Except for that white streak appearing after Claire recognized you.”
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