Close Enemies

by Marc Daniel

  “A statue would be too much of an honor. A shaker seems more suitable for the likes of you.”

  For the first time since Sheila’s attack, Michael laughed as they passed under the large stone gate that had once been the park’s entrance.

  “So, what did we learn?” he asked, getting back to business.

  “That’s a liberal use of the word ‘we’, youngster! What I learned was that there were no chameleons in that room.”

  “Are you sure?” Michael could hear the disappointment in his own voice.

  “Obviously, I’m sure. Those whistles were made of pure cold iron. This alone would have made them nearly impossible to handle for the majority of faes. With the spell I had infused into them on top of it, a chameleon would have just about screamed in pain on contact. I looked everyone in the eyes as I handed them the whistles. Nobody flinched. There was no chameleon in the room.”

  This wasn’t what Michael had hoped for. Everyone he worked with, Helen, her five summer interns—including Olivia—and a dozen other rangers had been in the room. Had they identified the chameleon, they’d have been able to get some leverage and learn who his accomplices were—and, more importantly, who had hired them.

  “I guess I should be relieved that everyone is who they should be.”

  “I don’t know about that. All I can guarantee is that none of them is a chameleon in disguise. The other assassins could have been present. My test doesn’t work on werebeings. But you of all people should be able to identify those,” said Ez.

  “You would think… But I would need a reliable nose for that.”

  “Your sense of smell hasn’t gotten better yet?” Ez sounded concerned.

  “Not yet. It’s improved slightly, but it has a long way to go to get back to normal.”

  “How long has it been?”

  “Almost three weeks now. It got a bit better over the past week. But I seem to have hit a wall again. Ever since I got back, actually. It’s almost as if something in the park was impacting my recovery.”

  “Curious. You should follow up on that instinct, Michael. If something is hurting you, you need to figure out what. You need all your senses to fight these particular enemies. A Fida’I assassination squad isn’t to be taken lightly.”

  Michael knew that, but what could he do about it? “Even with my senses at peak performance, a weretiger could slip under my nose unnoticed. That’s what the Shadow Pack did in Houston.”

  “You’re thinking about the witch’s brew?”

  “Yes. Whatever that witch did to the concentrated wolfsbane extract effectively neutralized their werewolf smell. There’s no reason to think the same trick wouldn’t work on weretigers or werecougars.”

  “I know the witch is still alive, but I don’t think she’d dare coming after you again. And the chemist who was extracting the wolfsbane essence is dead if my memory serves me right,” said Ezekiel.

  “I’m sure he’s replaceable. And I wouldn’t trust that witch farther than I can throw her. But all that may be irrelevant anyway. Maybe the Shadow Pack has some leftover witch’s brew.”

  “Let’s assume for one second that you did not in fact destroy the Shadow Pack two years ago. That would mean the wolves are working hand in hand with the Fida’I. Why would they be doing that? Werewolves aren’t known to play nicely with other shifters.”

  “I don’t know why, Ez. It’s all conjectural at this point. All I’m saying is that there are ways for werebeings to move around unnoticed, if they are sufficiently motivated and have deep pockets.”

  They’d arrived at the edge of Gardiner and Michael parked his car in front of a local burger joint. “Do you care for a bite?”

  “It’s eight in the morning, Michael. The last thing I need is a burger. Anyway, I still think that bringing the wolves into the picture is a bit of a stretch at this point.”

  “One of the bears we found dead had been killed by a werewolf, Ez.”

  “Are you certain?”

  “No doubt about it.”

  Chapter 38

  “He gave you a whistle to fight off a tiger? The guy’s a looney! What was Michael thinking?” said Daka, stepping out of the car.

  “I don’t know. I suspect there was more to the guy’s presentation than met the eye,” replied Olivia, slamming the passenger’s door shut.

  They walked to the hospital’s main entrance and checked in at the reception before heading for Lucy’s room.

  “I’ll have to ask Michael about this. Everyone left the room half bewildered, carrying their little whistles. On the other hand, Michael commands such respect among the rangers that he could have brought in a clown and still nobody would have dared say a thing.”

  Olivia knocked on the door and entered without waiting for an answer. The room was empty, as was the small private bathroom.

  “Where can she be?” asked Daka.

  “I don’t know. This is the first time it’s happened. She never leaves her room.”

  They walked to the nurses’ station at the end of the hallway and were told that Lucy was taking a stroll through the park with one of the nurses.

  “A stroll?” repeated Olivia.

  “Well, your sister is in a wheelchair, of course, but the nurse is pushing her at a casual pace… That kind of a stroll. You’re welcome to join them.”

  “OK. I think we will,” said Olivia, already heading for the stairwell and dragging Daka behind her.

  The park turned out to be a lot larger than Olivia had imagined. It sprawled over at least two acres of woods and was crisscrossed by small wheelchair-friendly blacktop alleys. Benches lined the paths at regular intervals.

  “It could take us a while to find her,” remarked Daka, staring at the three different paths leading from the terrace where they stood.

  “Do you have something better to do?” asked Olivia,

  “I guess not.”

  They randomly picked the center footpath and started looking for Lucy.

  Few patients—and even fewer visitors—were visible along the trail. Mornings were probably not the most popular time for visits.

  “It could be a good sign if Lucy’s getting out of her room,” said Daka. “She may be more—”

  The scream pierced the muffled silence of the park. A scream Olivia could have identified in her sleep: Lucy’s.

  Without a word, Olivia sprinted towards the origin of the sound, with Daka close behind her. They didn’t bother with the trails, making a beeline for Lucy instead.

  The scream had come from very close, as confirmed by the surreal scene they stumbled into an instant later.

  A man was straddling a struggling Lucy while a motionless nurse lay across the path. Her head was turned in a direction that looked suspiciously incompatible with life.

  The man’s skin tone was similar to that of Raj’s, but the resemblance stopped there. The man had a good forty pounds on the Indian intern.

  The aggressor’s right hand was pushed on Lucy’s mouth and the other was wrapped around her throat.

  Daka’s wolf was on him before Olivia had a chance to think about morphing. His jaws clenched onto the man’s throat like those of a mongoose on a cobra.

  The man released Lucy and got back to his feet. He grabbed Daka by the neck and ripped him away from his throat.

  “Run, Lucy! The car’s in the parking lot,” yelled Olivia as she initiated her own morphing. The man was clearly not human and, whatever he was, she had the feeling she wouldn’t stand a chance against him in her human form.

  Lucy had obeyed her order and was now running towards the parking lot. Being nearly strangled to death had had a positive effect on her catatonia.

  Daka wasn’t pretty to watch by the time Olivia’s wolf joined the fight. Despite retaining his human form, the man clearly had the advantage over the skinwalker. His throat had already healed from the wolf’s bite, and he seemed both stronger and faster than Daka.

  Not knowing what else to do, Olivia went for the first t
hing that crossed her mind: the guy’s balls.

  Sneaking between the man’s legs from behind, she locked her jaws onto the assassin’s three-piece set and she shook her head as hard as she could. The shriek of pain that came out of the man’s mouth left no doubt as to the efficacy of her approach.

  From the corner of her eye, Olivia saw hospital security running towards them. One of them had already drawn his gun. This was a great time for an exit.

  Releasing the still-screaming assassin, she took off. running towards the parking lot, only slowing down to gather her clothes in her jaws on her way out. She knew Daka would follow her lead.

  They made it to the parking lot in record time. Lucy was already there. Daka turned back into his human self and, thanking all that’s holy for his habit of leaving his car keys in the ignition, gunned the engine as Lucy and Olivia’s wolf jumped into the vehicle. He was pretty banged up, but the cuts and bright red bruises visible all over his body didn’t impair his driving skills.

  A moment later, their car was flying towards Yellowstone.

  Chapter 39

  Michael rolled up his sleeves as he hiked the gentle slope of Indian Creek trail. The day was unseasonably warm. Too warm for his liking. But at least it wasn’t the humid heat of Houston. He once again wondered how people could live down there fulltime. Sheila complained about it—just like everyone else in the city, it seemed—but moving away from the swampy atmosphere didn’t seem high on her list of priorities. Where would she go anyway? She wasn’t the type of person able to live in Yellowstone. The park’s harsh and long winters combined with its remote wilderness made it a great tourist destination, but it took a special state of mind to enjoy living in it fulltime. And since Michael wasn’t about to leave Yellowstone, the prospect of them living closer to each other in the near future was unlikely.

  And now he was back thinking about Sheila… Gweven had called him with good news. She was improving quickly, and the healer suspected she’d come out of her coma within the next few days. A part of Michael wanted to be next to her when she woke up, but he simply couldn’t afford to idly wait at her bedside when so much remained unresolved.

  Michael was still ignorant of the identity and motivations of his true enemy. Who had hired the Fida’I assassins? And why had they gone after Sheila in St. Lucia? Ezekiel was certain the team had been brought in to execute Michael, so why had they passed on the opportunity and attacked Sheila instead? It made no sense. Unless the St. Lucia attack hadn’t been carried out by the Fida’I. This would imply that two separate groups of praeternatural killers were involved. What were the odds of such a thing? Too small to even calculate. There had to be a simpler explanation.

  He reached the point where the trail started to loop back to the parking lot and decided to continue off trail. He would follow Indian Creek all the way to its source. The hike would take him all day, but he didn’t have a better idea. He needed to find signs of the tiger and this was the closest water source to the point where the dead grizzly had been found.

  In the unlikely scenario that they were dealing with a real tiger, the animal would likely have left some signs of his presence in the soft ground of the river banks. If there were tracks to be found, Michael would find them.

  He spent the next four hours searching the ground around the creek and found plenty of tracks. Wolves, coyotes, elk, deer, bears, and even a wolverine had been drinking from the creek in recent days. But no sign of any cat, let alone a tiger. This tended to support the more likely hypothesis that the grizzly’s killer had indeed been a praeternatural. And what were the odds this weretiger wasn’t the same as the one who’d attacked Sheila in the St. Lucian jungle? Slim to none!

  The gunshot resonated like thunder in the dead of night. This wasn’t normal. Firing a gun in Yellowstone was illegal. Simply carrying a gun in the park, although technically legal nowadays, was barely tolerated by the park’s rangers. Michael couldn’t recall the last time he’d heard a gunshot in Yellowstone.

  He started running in the direction of the shot while looking for a good spot to hide his clothes and morph into his bear alter ego, a much faster runner.

  Instead Michael spotted a green dot growing in his peripheral vision. A man was running on the other side of the creek, converging on its source at roughly the same speed Michael was. A couple minutes later the man was close enough for Michael to realize his mistake. This was a woman. And the green she wore belonged to an interpretive ranger uniform.

  Michael’s and Helen’s paths met halfway up a mid-sized hill overlooking the valley.

  “Did you hear the gun shot?” asked Helen.

  Michael nodded. “It seemed to come from the other side of that hill.”

  Helen agreed with his assessment.

  The two of them continued their ascent at a brisk pace. Helen was in great shape, barely sweating. In her hiking shorts, even Michael couldn’t help but notice the woman’s slim but muscular legs.

  “What were you doing here?” he asked.

  “I was looking for signs of big cat activity. Something really bugs me about this whole business,” replied Helen. “What about you?”

  “I was doing the same thing,” confessed Michael, smiling.

  They made it to the top of the hill about fifteen minutes after the gun had been fired. The landscape on the other side was that of a peaceful valley trapped between the hill they stood on and a much larger mountain range.

  It took Michael a while to spot the anomaly in the landscape. “Over there,” he said, pointing at a darker spot lost in a sea of green.

  Helen pulled her binoculars out of their holster. “It’s a wolf. It’s not moving.”

  Michael grabbed his own pair and started searching the valley for signs of any human activity. It was Helen who first spotted the men. Two of them, each carrying a rifle on their back. They were heading out of the valley and had at least a mile head start on Michael and Helen.

  “Poachers?” asked Helen.

  “Probably.” Michael wasn’t convinced, however. Poachers weren’t common in Yellowstone and certainly wouldn’t abandon their kill without even removing its pelt. It was more likely they’d stumbled upon those responsible for the recent wolf killings inside the park. Likely a couple of pissed-off ranchers blaming the wolves for some cattle lost to a pack of stray dogs.

  “I’ll go after them. Call for backup,” said Michael. But Helen would have none of it.

  “The radios are out of range and my cell has no signal. We’re on our own and you’re not getting rid of me, Mr Biörn.”

  Michael capitulated. There was no time to waste with arguments.

  They started running down the slope. Carried by their momentum, they quickly picked up speed and didn’t slow down once they reached the bottom of the hill. Instead, they headed straight for the armed men, barely visible in the distance.

  “If they turn around for any reason, they’ll see us and start running and then we’ll lose all chance of catching them,” said Michael.

  “What do you propose?”

  “I’ll circle around them along this tree line,” he said, pointing at the wooded area at the base of the mountains on the other side of the valley. “You keep coming at them from this direction but be discreet. If they turn around, duck.”

  Helen nodded in understanding. “You want to come at them from both directions.”

  “Yes. Take my gun.”

  “You need it, Michael.”

  “You need it more. Your bear spray may not be enough against two rifles…”

  She took the gun reluctantly and they parted. Heading at top speed towards the tree line would allow Michael to overtake the men without being seen.

  He wished Helen hadn’t showed up. Alone, he would have been able to handle the problem a lot more efficiently than the two of them would. But she was here, and he had no choice but to play with the cards he’d been dealt.

  It took him nearly ten minutes to reach the men’s level and an additiona
l five to be far enough ahead of them that he could come out of the woods without being immediately spotted. He moved low among the tall grass and positioned himself on the path the poachers would cross in the next two or three minutes. Once he reached the ideal location, he lay in the grass, biding his time.

  The men were no more than thirty feet away when he sprang to his feet, a fist-sized stone in each hand.

  “Police! Stop where you are!” he said authoritatively. The two men looked at each other in surprise, but then the tallest one reached for the rifle he carried on his shoulder.

  Before he had a chance to aim the gun at Michael, one of the rocks hit him square in the chest and he fell to the ground.

  “Put your hands in the air.” The voice belonged to Helen who was a hundred feet behind them. Her gun was trained in their general direction.

  The man still standing obeyed and Michael disarmed him. His emotions were mixed. On one hand, he was disappointed with how easy the arrest had been. The men had offered much too little resistance to be anything other than what they appeared to be: human poachers. But on the other hand, he still wasn’t operating at peak capacity and a confrontation with two praeternaturals could have proven problematic. Especially with Helen as a witness.

  Chapter 40

  Michael knew something was wrong the minute his cabin appeared in the beam of his headlights. Half a dozen vehicles were parked haphazardly around the house. He was pretty sure this was some type of record.

  The dozen men and women he could see patrolling the grounds did nothing to ease his sense of dread. What was going on?

  He parked his patrol car next to a topless jeep and got out ready for a fight. He relaxed a moment later when he recognized Cameahwait’s skinwalkers in the individuals surrounding his cabin. These were Daka’s packmates.

  “What’s going on?” he asked the closest woman. But before she had a chance to voice a reply, the cabin’s front door opened and Olivia barged out of the house.

  “Michael! I’ve been trying to reach you for hours.”