The Thing About Weres: A Mystwalker Novel Page 6

  Not all fairy tales ended happily.

  As witness Casperella’s final resting place—the edge of the bad part of St. Luke’s cemetery, surrounded by the crumbling ruins of a freakin’ stone wall.

  Goddess, is that where the pack buries Faes?

  “Wakey, wakey,” I said to the entity within me. She’d been feigning sleep, possibly tuning into the turn of my thoughts. But I’d felt her, dragon-ready, in my belly. Alert and interested. Pumped, as it were.

  “Go,” I said.

  Given release, she ran up my chest, gave my heart a big enough kick to make it skip a beat, and then surged to my shoulders and down my arms. A squeeze through the wrists and then she funneled a stream of Fae magic to the end of each of my fingers.

  Then she waited. Patently obedient. Wholly gleeful.

  I pointed my magic-hot hand to a broken branch that clung to the cliff. “Attach.” A line of green magic leaped from my fingertips, sizzled through the air, and landed with a soft kiss on a twisted branch. I raised my hand, and with that upward movement the piece of maple lifted, my magic a strong-armed extension for my will.

  My Fae talent could not be faulted. It did exactly what I asked, transporting the stick across the open water to where I pointed and then lowering it, so gently, so tenderly, onto the bank of the pond.

  She meekly waited for the final order.

  “Detach.” The cables of magic slipped free from their burden. They hovered, a fat fluorescent cable, faintly undulating, perhaps expecting me to call them back. I stared at the green light extruding from my fingertips, and then imagined a pair of scissors cutting each strand away, severing me from my talent. Snip, snip, snip, cut close to the quick. Hide all her traces. Make her disappear.

  “Cut,” I said.

  Instantly, the tether between me and my line of Fae magic broke. The floating string of magic rolled back on itself and formed a fat, green, translucent ball, bobbing slightly on a current of air. I watched, curious as to what it would do next, now that it had been given freedom.

  Nothing, apparently. It hovered there, glimmering in the moon’s silver light, unreal as Tinker Bell’s fairy wings, alive as the dragonfly that had just zipped past it.

  Busy as a hive. As inherently evil as … Oh hell. As me.

  “Disappear,” I said flatly.

  A moment of hesitation then poof, the ball of Fae-me broke apart into a starburst pattern of hundreds of brilliant bits of green. The sparks lingered in the air—dying remnants of a fire that refused to be quenched—before they slowly faded.

  They’d find their way back to me, each and every spark. That’s when the full measure of payback pain would come. Those of Fae blood can’t use magic in this world without expecting to pay the price. My fingers were already fat and swollen. Painless now, but that soon would change.

  A bit of a wind lifted the hair at the nape of my neck and sent shivers through the trees.

  The air above the pond was motionless.

  I had maybe fifteen minutes before the first wave of pain hit.

  * * *

  Of the trailer’s two bedrooms, mine was the one with the bunk beds and the washed-out teal curtains that vaguely coordinated with the pink, green, and blue floral print on the comforters. No pictures. Nothing shiny or bright. At some point in its history, some DIY enthusiast had inexpertly faux-painted the walls.

  I stood in front of my closet, puzzling over the state of my hand. My fingers should have been swollen, blister-red, and hurting like I’d slammed them in a car door. I’d been home puttering around the trailer for well over twenty minutes. But my mitts were feeling, on the whole, pretty close to normal. Maybe a little tender, but not too bad. I tilted them toward the light. Four straight fingers, a thumb with a hangnail, and a palm with a fate line that puzzled me. Normal. Pale flesh, completely unmarked by the fever blisters of payback pain.

  “I love your skin,” Trowbridge had said back in May.

  It was a damn good thing he’d fixated on that, as the rest of me wasn’t going to win any rhinestone crowns. My hair had grown to the middle of my shoulder blades and then, for no particular reason, had refused to sprout another inch. In terms of color, volume, and texture, it is, respectively, brown with a hint of chestnut highlights, depressingly limp, and baby fine. My full upper lip earned more than one or two speculative glances from the male members of the pack, but that thread of sexual desire usually died as soon as their gaze traveled upward. In the comfort of their furry worldview, there are only two appropriate eye-color choices: amber-brown or blue. Mine are a clear, light green, as pale as the sunlit crest on one of those big, rolling ocean waves that hurtle toward the shore. For the record—and I am so fond of debunking myths—my irises aren’t translucent. A Werewolf might notice that if they studied them, but few had ever demonstrated the courage to outstare me, and so they missed the flecks of blue and yellow swimming in that peridot sea.

  See? It’s surprisingly easy to give a Were the willies. Pale eyes instead of predictable brown or blue. Pale skin instead of sun-kissed tones. A little bit of magic and a Fae pendant, and you’ve got the hair on the nape of their necks standing at attention like some dumbass sentry outside the gates of Buckingham Palace.

  With a sigh that would have made Cordelia proud, I walked into the bathroom and turned on the taps. I stared at my reflection as I waited for the water to run cold. Gad, what a sight. The whites of my eyes were pink. What had stalker-ghost looked like before she turned into stalker-ghost? I wet the facecloth under the weak stream of water dribbling out of the faucet and pressed it against my aching lids.

  Better.

  Blindly, I felt my way back into my bedroom. Questions swirled. Had the wolves killed Casperella? Perhaps they’d met a strange Fae wandering in their world, gone all wolf-territorial, and then buried the body to hide the crime? Is that why her grave is surrounded by a stone wall?

  I dropped the facecloth into the laundry basket then stood naked by my narrow bed, contemplating my pillow. Tonight requires more comfort than the nightie Biggs brought back from Barrie. Trowbridge’s scent teased my nostrils and pebbled my nipples as I smoothed his age-soft T-shirt down over my hips.

  Or had Casperella lived among them and somehow managed to offend the wrong person?

  My stomach let out a gurgle. Stress did that to me. All the nausea meds in the world couldn’t fix my gut turmoil as well as a hit of pure sugar did.

  Screw it. I went for my stash. Two Cherry Blossoms (three if I counted the one I’d left on the kitchen counter), two Kit Kats, and a bag of stale M&M’s. A moment later, the Kit Kat lay nested in my palm, wrapped in its cheery red paper, promising me the sweet crunch of satisfaction, a twelve-second sugar high, and a prompt collapse into sleep.

  Good enough.

  * * *

  Wake up.

  You’ve been dream-napped.

  Wake up.

  “I never took part in treason,” hissed the girl with the long blond hair. She stood by a window set in an arched framework of stone. Past her shoulder, the view could best be summed up as pastoral. Merenwyn’s fields were impossibly green, dotted with a small herd of shaggy cows with really wide, long curved horns. Pretty. In the distance, the silhouettes of two trees so close together that their trunks seemed to be one.

  How can Mad-one tug me into her dreams?

  She didn’t live in my world. She didn’t share a bedroom wall with me. I’d reviewed every moment of my visit to Threall, and I’m sure we’d never exchanged anything that could serve as an anchor, or a talisman. And yet, increasingly, I found myself being tugged back to this small cluttered room that screamed wizard’s snuggery.

  I would have thought Mad-one too proud to let me witness her final hour in Merenwyn.

  The Mystwalker looked very much the way she did in Threall—the same long nose, the same blue gown. But to my eyes, there were a few distinct differences. Her expression was tense. Her fingers were twisting at her waist in agitation.

&nb
sp; Animated and anxious: two words I wouldn’t have used for the Mystwalker.

  “I am blameless,” she told the old man in a low urgent voice. “I should not be asked to bear your punishment as my own. I knew nothing of your daughter’s love affair. I was ignorant of the potion you created for—”

  The fraying sleeve of the old man’s robe slid to his elbow as he held up a single gnarled finger in a timeless shut-thee-up. Frowning fiercely, he funneled all his attention on the tome in front of him while Mad-one worried the tasseled end of her belt. After another string of words he lifted his head in satisfaction to watch sparks dance above the leather-bound manuscript. Then, I heard a distinct hiss—sounding awfully like a tire going flat—and as I watched the bright glitters of light faded, one by one.

  “I have set the wards,” he said grimly, closing the book.

  “Master,” she began again.

  “It was rash to interrupt me, Tyrean.”

  “I must speak before it is too late to do so.” Her voice was placating but anger had flushed her cheeks. “I have been your obedient servant since the day I was brought to the castle. Never have I shirked my duties. I have never pleaded fear when asked to travel to Threall—even when I was sick with worry that I would not succeed in finding my way home. And this is my reward? What you ask of me—” A look of desperation tightened her patrician features. “To stay in Threall forever? To guard your soul forever? Why am I being punished so? Within the space of three suns, I won’t remember how to return to Merenwyn.”

  “I am sorry, child.” But he looked more hard willed than sympathetic.

  “I beg of you,” Mad-one whispered. “Do not do this. Do not demand this of me. I am—”

  “Your service will not be forever, Tyrean.”

  Her control broke and the next stream of words came out rushed and shrill. “I am not a knave. Your sentence will be the Sleep of Forever!”

  The Old Mage aligned the book’s edges so that it sat centered on the lectern before he slid off his stool. “Fate will deliver to me a nalera,” he said. “Once she has pledged her fealty, you will be released from service.”

  “Admit that it is over,” she cried. “Let me finish my life here.”

  He shook his head and this time his expression was genuinely sad. “You should never have allowed your feelings for Simeon to grow—it has made you so vulnerable to attack. Your foolish heart has made it impossible for me to leave you here, a weapon that can be used against me.” The Old Mage’s mouth tightened. “Before you judge me as heartless, consider carefully the fact that I could kill you now and remove that threat forever.”

  “You won’t,” she said coldly. “Because you need a protector in Threall.”

  He studied her for a beat. “True.”

  “What will stop Helzekiel from destroying your body? While you slumber, it is as defenseless against—”

  “I have friends among the Inner Circle who will ensure that no unnatural harm will befall my sleeping body should it come to that.” He fiddled with the quill lying beside the heavy tome. “Child, it has taken me this much loss to understand the damage I have done. I cannot take back the conjure that tore the sun out of the Pool of Life, any more than I can undo the war that followed. But as long as I live, both in soul and body, my wards will last. It will be a testament to our endurance. We must hold in Threall until the next true Mage of Merenwyn is born … It is he who should benefit from my Book of Spells, not a man with questionable skills and unlimited ambition. Helzekiel’s lust for power is not tempered by compassion. Ruin will follow when there are no more constraints against his greed for magic.”

  Mad-one’s eyes filled, but she did not cry.

  “You know I speak the truth. You know he already demands to be known as the Black Mage among his circle.” The wizard walked to the door, then paused to say quietly, “Simeon has vowed to take your body to a place of safety and guard it at the price of his own.”

  It was the arrow of pain she never saw sailing toward her. “You asked my lover to watch over my body as it slowly decays?” she said in quiet horror. “To pass milk-sopped bread between my slack lips?”

  The Old Mage’s expression softened into true regret. “We have all suffered and will continue to suffer. Would it help to remember that your sacrifice will protect the world in which your lover lives?”

  Not a whole lot, judging from the pain on Mad-one’s face.

  He heaved a sigh and ran his hands through his thinning white hair. “Now, I must leave you to face my jury.”

  “It is not a jury, Old Mage,” Mad-one hissed. “You will walk through those doors and never return.”

  He turned to give her a hard look. “And you have five minutes with your lover before you must return to Threall.”

  Wake up now.

  Wake up before Simeon enters the room.

  Chapter Five

  “What?” called Cordelia.

  “I didn’t say anything,” I mumbled. The rest of my sleep had been uninterrupted by dreams but filled with anxiety. I’d woken up every couple of hours, heart pounding, a growing conviction in my Fae bones that I was on the brink of something. I’d felt anxious and off balance all day—my fretfulness made worse by the fact that the pack always needed a day to recover from their moon run. That included Cordelia. Being quiet as a mouse in a house just so she could get her beauty rest had left me feeling a tad peeved.

  Now it was late afternoon. I needed something more substantial to eat than a few Kit Kats.

  “It’s those bloody motorcycles, they’re playing bloody havoc with my hearing,” she complained. “I can’t wait for fall to be over. All those stupid tourists with their loud bikes. Idiots. Reliving their childhoods.”

  I couldn’t hear a thing.

  “The shower’s yours now if you want it,” she said. A drawer opened and closed in her bedroom. “I called Harry. He and Biggs should be here soon for our usual premoon-run strategizing. Sign those papers for Harry, will you? And eat something. Something that will carry you longer than two hours. Oh, and the pack leader from Kenora is insisting on a private audience with you. Which means—”

  “Dodge him.” I flipped the document over to the SIGN HERE flag and did just that.

  Our fridge had milk, eggs, the remains of Cordelia’s hunk of roast beef in a plastic container—so raw it said “moo”—a thick block of cheddar cheese, and a leg of lamb waiting to be undercooked. I went down on one knee and looked at the bottom shelf. Cold cuts in yet another plastic container. Butter. A loaf of bread. Inside the vegetable crisper were some root vegetables. There was nothing decent to eat.

  Blood had pooled at the bottom of the plate of meat. For a second I just stood there, letting the fridge air chill my bare feet, thinking, Predators, each and every one of them. In the door were a liter of Diet Coke, Cordelia’s supply of hormones, and an unopened silver tin of Ralph’s maple syrup. Numbly, I picked up the can and used my hip to close the door.

  It would serve for an early supper.

  The movement of the refrigerator door had stirred the air.

  My nostrils flared. Stranger danger. I followed the current of Were perfume to the doorway, where a draft of air constantly leaked between the insulation and doorjamb. A deep inhale. Uh-huh. That’s an unfamiliar scent signature.

  I twisted to look through the dinette area’s window.

  A strange guy was sitting in one of our white plastic garden chairs, gaze fixed on our twenty-seven-foot trailer. He’d taken sitting into a whole new slumped category, folding his arms over his chest, and balancing his butt on the very edge of his seat. Around thirty. Wiry. A study in black, from his neatly trimmed hair to his dark graphic T-shirt. Wearing a hooded sweatshirt, unzipped, under a battered leather jacket. A leather belt with a silver-toned buckle. Black-rimmed glasses—on a Were?—very übercool and NYC ugly. And then, there was that thing on top of his head.

  A fedora.

  In Creemore.

  Something about the way h
e lolled in the chair made me think of a rattler sunning itself, waiting for some bare ankle to pass by. I called to Cordelia, “What was the name of that guy from Kenora?”

  She cleared her throat. “What?”

  “The pack leader from Kenora behind on his tithes—the guy you said wanted to speak with me. What’s his name?” I tucked my hair behind my ear as I bent to give the Were in Black another thorough inspection through the dust-specked window. I don’t know what I expected from a Kenora wolf, but I knew it wasn’t urban chic. More like plaids, and white T-shirts, and maybe jeans with rips that had been earned versus designed.

  Were in Black crossed his arms and lifted his chin in my direction. Not in a slow “hey” manner, more in a “yeah, I see you looking at me” way.

  She paused brushing her wig to think, then said, “It was a stupid name. It reminded me of the drink my dear mama used to get blotto on it. Gin and … Collins. Tom Collins.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him. “Well, it’s cocktail hour on the patio. Tom Collins is sitting in one of our chairs, watching our front door.” I brought the blinds down, and then, for good measure, swiveled the wand until the slats were closed.

  Try ogling me through that, Fur-boy.

  “Damn,” said Cordelia. A drawer opened and shut in the master bedroom as I used a can opener to pierce a hole in the top of the syrup tin. I found a saucer. And a napkin—Cordelia had managed to instill some table manners. I poured a good measure of syrup into the saucer as I sat down at the banquette.