Authors: Dean Murray
"I
think we understand each other quite well, Jasmin. That's the way
that I feel about Melody too. Can you find a way for us to capture
one of these guys?"
"I
think so. Let me make a couple of calls."
I
tried Alec first, but he didn't answer. I left a message asking him
to give me a call and then hung up feeling more than a little
betrayed by his failure to pick up. I debated among the remaining
options open to me and then dialed Isaac's last known number.
"Jasmin,
is that really you?"
"Hi,
Isaac."
"You
don't have any idea how good it is to hear your voice. Everyone else
has pretty much gone dark lately."
"I
was afraid of that, I just tried Alec and he didn't pick up. Are you,
Ash and Kristin all okay?"
He
cleared his throat and I could tell he was trying to decide whether
or not to lie to me.
"Tell
me the truth, Isaac."
"Things
are pretty bad here. Kristin got hurt and lost a lot of blood. I've
spent weeks now worrying that she was never going to wake up from her
coma. We got forced down to the territory claimed by Ash's old pack."
"What
the crap were you guys thinking? You have to get out of there right
now or Onyx and the others will kill you!"
His
breathing picked up as he struggled to keep control of himself. I'd
crossed a line and we both knew it. Back in the old days Isaac had
always been clearly dominant to me. I hadn't particularly liked that
fact, although he'd been better to me than James had been, but it had
been one of those hard realities that I hadn't been able to get away
from.
That
was all up in the air now. He and I hadn't faced off against each
other since I'd manifested my third shape. It was anyone's guess who
would win a fight right now. I had size and strength on my side for
the first time ever, but he had years of experience fighting as a
hybrid in his corner. My beast was eager for that fight, hungry to
prove herself the better fighter, but I shouldn't have let that push
me into treating him like he was subordinate to me.
"I'm
sorry, Isaac, that was out of line. I'm having a harder time keeping
control of stuff lately."
His
laugh was a bitter-sounding thing. "Join the club. It seems like
I want to rip the head off of anyone who even talks to me lately. The
truth is that it's too late. Onyx's people found us within a few
hours of us arriving. Ash tried to shoot his way out, but this new
guy just shrugged off all of the bullets and practically tore him in
two."
My
hands were shaking, but I couldn't have said whether it was rage or
fear causing it. "He'll be okay, though, right?"
"I'm
not sure. Normally I'd say yes, but you know Ash, he's not a very
fast healer."
It
was bad news on several levels. I'd always liked Ash. He was
competent in a quiet, no-nonsense way and he'd been part of the glue
that had held us all together when things had been at their worst,
back when I'd been pretty sure that Alec was only days or weeks away
from self-destructing and taking all of the rest of us down with him.
That
would have been enough to make me want him to pull through his injury
all by itself, but there was also the fact that with him and Kristin
both injured Isaac was all by himself down there. Isaac was big and
tough, but he wasn't going to be able to take on an entire pack all
by himself.
"I'm
sorry to hear that."
"Yeah,
me too. How's Ben?"
"Weaker
every day. I don't know how much longer he's going to make it, but
Rachel seems to finally be helping me rather than just leading me on
some kind of cross-continental wild goose chase. Have you heard from
any of the others?"
"Just
Andrew."
I
wasn't sure whether or not to pursue that particular line of
questioning. Andrew had practically adopted Isaac. The two of them
were close, but Andrew was also Jess's biological father. I couldn't
necessarily blame Jess for what she'd done over the last few months,
but talking about Jess was going to re-open some pretty deep wounds
for Isaac.
"He's
okay. We only had a minute to talk, but he told me that Jessica
phoned him. He said that she was being really evasive about where
they are, but that she's found some kind of big secret."
"I'm
not sure whether that's a good thing or a bad thing."
"I'm
pretty sure it's a bad thing. Whatever Wyatt is involved in it isn't
good."
Isaac
paused to give me a chance to respond but I wasn't quite sure what to
say about that either. He had an almost pathological hatred of Wyatt.
I agreed that there was something off about Wyatt, Carson and
Grayson, but that didn't necessarily mean that they were the villains
of the piece.
"I'm
serious, Jasmin. I'm starting to feel like I'm playing the wrong
game, like I thought we were playing checkers and now it turns out
that everyone is playing three-dimensional chess only I don't know
the rules. Onyx has a new guy here, someone I've never heard of
before, and he fights like Wyatt used to fight."
"That
weird grappling style?"
"Yeah,
that alone would pretty much make him unstoppable for the rest of us
who don't know that kind of fighting, but that isn't all. Ash shot
him, several times, and in all of the right places, but it didn't
even slow him down. I saw bullets ricochet off of him after hitting
places where I've been cut before. There shouldn't have been bone
there, but there was."
I
felt like throwing up. I could tell that Isaac was half convinced
that he'd been seeing things, but I knew that he wasn't, only this
wasn't just my secret to tell.
"Does
he have blue eyes?"
"I
don't remember for sure, but I don't think so. Why, how does that
matter?"
"You
need to do everything you can to stay clear of this guy, Isaac. You
weren't imagining things. I can't explain, but your suspicions are
correct, whoever he is he's going to be faster, stronger, and harder
to kill than any hybrid has a right to be."
"Like
Alec."
It
wasn't a question, and I knew then that I'd just confirmed suspicions
that he'd had for a while now.
"Yes,
like Alec. If you could get around behind him and manage a good
clinch you could still kill this guy, but otherwise it will be like
fighting someone in armor."
"Where
are his weak points?"
"I
don't know, Isaac, I swear. I don't…I don't have it. Donovan
might be able to tell you, but I'm not sure he'll be willing to give
away Alec's secrets like that. Just stay clear of this guy, do
whatever it takes."
"I
understand, but I don't think that's going to be possible, Jasmin.
Thanks for warning me though."
His
voice was different. His words were fine, but the way that he was
saying them made me want to cry. He hadn't given up, not exactly, but
he sounded resigned. He was going to go down fighting, but he didn't
expect to win.
Thanatas,
the ancient king who'd been the last to rule as monarch over all of
the wolves, had been a storied warrior, but very few people even
suspected that his abilities had been more than just raw skill and
the innate strength and speed of his hybrid body. I only knew because
I was a direct descendant of one of his sons.
Thanatas
had possessed the ability to mold his body, making it stronger and
faster, but he hadn't stopped there. He'd gone on to reinforce many
of the weak points that other hybrids attacked out of habit. Major
blood vessels had been rerouted to be further away from the surface
of the body and the shape of certain bones had been altered to
provide additional protection for the vital organs.
All
of that would have been astonishing enough by itself, but those
changes had been passed on to Thanatas' sons. The rest of the
moonborn at large didn't know why certain of our kind seemed to hit
harder and move with blinding speed, but those of us who were the
descendants of the monarchy knew it was because either our hybrid or
our wolf form were blessed with the fruits of all of the tinkering
that the old king had done.
Not
every descendant manifested those special gifts, what we called the
royal attributes, and nobody other than Thanatas had ever been both a
royal wolf and a royal hybrid, but a royal wolf was nearly the equal
of a normal hybrid and a royal hybrid had a decided edge over any
normal hybrid. I'd been a royal wolf up until now, but it appeared
that my manifestation of a third shape had robbed me of my royal
attributes as a wolf without bestowing equivalent gifts on me as a
hybrid.
Isaac
was up against a fight he couldn't possibly win and there wasn't
anything I could do to help him, not without at least temporarily
abandoning my quest to save Ben.
"What
if I came down there, Isaac? I could be down in New Orleans in a day
or so."
"No,
it's not worth it, Jas. There's no telling when I'll get backed into
fighting this creep. You could arrive down here, and find me dead,
and end up in the same position I'm looking at right now. Besides, I
couldn't ask you to watch Ben die. You said it yourself. He doesn't
have much time left."
"I
want to tell you that you're wrong, but I can't seem to force myself
to say the words."
"I
know. It's because I'm right and you know it. Have you found this
Geoffrey character yet?"
"Yes,
it turns out he's a vampire and I'm going to have to help him before
he'll save Ben for me."
Isaac
considered what I'd just said for several seconds before responding.
"I don't like the sound of that, Jas. Bloodsuckers can't be
trusted. Everything I've ever read says that they are all cunning and
amoral in ways that sometimes even the Coun'hij can't equal."
"I
know, but Rachel says it's the only way."
"What
do you need from me?"
I
didn't want to say the words, but I forced them out. "We need
the location of Puppeteer and the rest of the Coun'hij. You've spent
time thinking about where you'd go if you had to leave because of the
way things have been going with Jessica. I need a pack with ties to
the Coun'hij that is small enough I have a chance of taking it over."
"You
knew that? You knew I was looking at leaving the pack and making a
run for it?"
"Yeah.
I didn't have any evidence, but it's what I would have been doing in
your place. I don't blame you."
Isaac
sighed. "I figured if you all found out that you'd feel like I
was betraying you."
"Like
I said, I understand why you wanted out. Can you think of a pack that
might fit the bill?"
"I'm
not sure. I mostly was looking for packs that were more independent
than that, since the Coun'hij tends to take a dim view of people
coming in and deposing leaders who have an established history of
toeing the line."
Isaac
considered the problem for a few more heartbeats before going on.
"You know, in some ways that could make things easier. The
Coun'hij tends to scrape off the cream of the crop out of their
allied packs, so there doesn't tend to be as much talent there as
what you see in the independent packs."
"Right,
a lot of the time they end up being on the smaller side too."
"I
think your best bet is Duluth then. Between the cold and the snow
it's one of the less desirable territories, so they haven't had
anyone challenge up there for a couple of decades. You'll still be up
against some stiff competition though. The alpha there isn't anything
too special, but he's still got more than two hundred years of
fighting under his belt. Your biggest problem is going to be a guy
named Branson. He's practically an honorary enforcer for the
Coun'hij. He's big and fast, not as big and fast as you, but he's
good and you haven't been in very many fights as a hybrid yet."
"Yeah,
I know. If you've got a better idea for finding the Coun'hij I'm all
ears."
"Sorry,
nothing comes to mind. I guess we've both got some impossible fights
ahead of us."
"Yeah,
I guess we do. I'll see you on the other side."
Geoffrey
United Medical Implements and Supply
Toledo, Ohio
Geoffrey
watched Jasmin disappear into the medical supply shop and wondered
once again why he'd agreed to such a risky plan. Actually that wasn't
fair, he knew exactly why he'd agreed. He couldn't bring himself to
give up on Melody while there was even a slight chance that she was
still alive and in need of his help. She never would have ended up in
trouble if not for him. He owed her that much and more.
Even
so, it felt very much like they were risking everything on a single
throw of the dice. Jasmin had explained enough about shape shifter
challenge law for him to understand that she couldn't just stroll up
and challenge the leader of another pack to single combat. She was
going to have to make her way through each and every member of the
pack who was willing to fight her first.
Jasmin
was confident that she'd be back up to full strength by the time they
made it up to Minnesota, but Geoffrey wasn't stupid. By the time
she'd fought two or three of her own kind she was probably going to
be even weaker than she was now.
The
entire plan was madness but Geoffrey didn't have a better one to
offer up. They couldn't just hang around the other pack's territory
hoping that someone from the Coun'hij would swing by for a visit.
Jasmin was confident that the other pack would smell Geoffrey sooner
or later and come after him, and even if that wasn't the case there
was still the fact that Ben was getting weaker by the hour and there
was no telling what kind of privations Melody was suffering through.
They
needed the location of the Coun'hij soon and this seemed like the
only way to get what they needed.