Lili St Crow - Betrayals

The thought was gone as soon as it showed up; I shoved it hastily away. I was doing a lot of that lately. As a coping mechanism, it sucked.

His arms tightened around me. “There’s something outside.”

I tilted my head a little, trying to listen. My heart was making too much noise for me to really hear.

I gulped in another deep breath and tried to calm down. “What does it sound like?”

There was a sharp creak from the door. As if someone leaning against it had shifted his weight.

Christophe hadn’t said a single word when Graves followed me up the stairs.

Which was probably a good thing.

“Like it’s trying to be quiet. But I can hear it. Breathing, kind of.” Graves shifted again, a little uncomfortably. I tried to let go of him, but he still kept holding onto me. My heartbeat started to slow down a little. I was sweating. The thin blue lines of warding in the walls glowed soft and reassuring, not sparking or running together in quick distressed lunges.

Gran would be proud of me. That’s quite a few times I’ve done wards without her rowan wand.

I swallowed the lump of pain in my throat. The dream lingered inside my head, screams and the burning somehow just as real as Graves’ arms around me and the sound of my breathing, quick and hoarse. “Shoes.”

“What?” He cocked his head.

“Get your shoes on. And give me mine.” I squirmed away from him and found my boots right where I’d put them, right against the mattress. A quick double yank had my feet inside them, and I grabbed for my bag, slid the strap over my head. The gun was still inside. The clicks were very loud as I checked the clip, racked it back in, and slid the safety off.

Graves shrugged into his coat. I let out a soft breath and knee-walked over to the window. My back ached, but not as bad as it could have. Maybe I was healing.

The warm-oil feeling of the aspect smoothed down over me, and the locket pulsed reassuringly.

The room got brighter. I almost glanced up to see if the light had turned on. I knew it hadn’t, though.

I was just seeing better.

I made it to the wall next to the blinds, cautiously inched myself up, and decided I could peer out there. The room was dark, and nobody would see me looking out, or I hoped they wouldn’t.

I peered out and realized what was wrong. There was no taste of wax oranges and danger on my tongue. Whatever was out there wasn’t suckers.

So it could be something else. Or it could be, you know, all of us in a strange house and nervous.

Be quiet, Dru. The silent imperative nailed me in place, my eyes focused on the narrow slice of roof and tree branches I could see, then, something moved, pouring up over the edge of the roof with scary silent grace.

I let out a soft, wondering breath. The shape was long and lean, fluid with hair. A streak of white moved smoothly on its narrow head.

It was Ash.

He paused on the roof, three paws down and one up in an eerie imitation of the way a cat will stop in mid-stride when something catches its attention. The orange gleams of his eyes shuttered themselves for a moment, and his whole body slumped on three legs.

“What is it?” Graves whispered. I didn’t look at him, but I could tell he knew I’d seen something.

Maybe it was my face. It certainly felt funny, bones under twitching skin as I froze, peeking out between the slats of the blinds.

The hall outside the bedroom door was deathly quiet. If Christophe was moving, I couldn’t hear him.

“Dru?” Graves stepped forward. A floorboard groaned under his feet.

Ash’s narrow canine head jerked up and swung around. He stared right at me for what seemed like an endless moment, and the sure voice of instinct spoke inside my head. I took two steps to the side and grabbed the cord, yanking the blinds up with a sound that ripped through the sleeping quiet.

“Dru!” This time it was Christophe sweeping the door open, but I already had the window unlatched. I tugged on it, and wonder of wonders, it wasn’t painted shut. It hove up with a screech just as Graves yelled and Christophe swore.

Ash tumbled through the window. He left dark prints on the roof and the sash. Blood looks black at night, and he was covered in it. The liquid length of him hit the floor with a wet thud. The same nameless certainty made me kneel down beside him. Chill night air poured through the window.

Ash made a soft canine sound when I touched his furry head. A half-growling yip that went down at the end, like he was too tired to finish it.

“Dru.” Christophe, with the careful tone of an adult telling a kid not to pet the nice foaming-rabid pooch. “Dru, malutka, little one, move away.” There was a click, and I didn’t have to look at him to know he had a gun out. Maybe it was even the shotgun he’d driven Ash off with once before.

What the hell am I doing? But Ash had saved my life twice. It didn’t feel right to let Christophe shoot him. Just like it hadn’t felt right to leave Graves behind once he’d been bitten. “He’s hurt.”

The wulfen made another tired sound, and turned his head slightly toward me. He sighed. And the uncomfortable thought rose up in me, what if I had left Graves behind?

How many times had he saved me, too?

Christophe swallowed, audibly. “Dru, moja ksi aniczko, please. Move away from him.”

The hair was amazingly silky where it wasn’t matted with water and blood and filth. I touched the white streak and Ash made a sharp, quivering noise. “He’s hurt. He saved my life the other—”

“He’s dangerous, just like any Broken. And he’s probably led them straight to you. Move away, and I will end his suffering.”

I leaned forward over Ash’s head. “Goddammit, Christophe, listen to me. We’ve got to help him. He saved my life, and—”

“He could have done that for any number of reasons—”

“So could you.” I looked up. His eyes were all but glowing, winter sky. Graves had his hands up and stood to one side, staring fixedly at Christophe’s profile and the shotgun. It was the shotgun, the same one he’d had before.

And it was pointed right at me. A thin river of prickling fear ran down my spine. The end of a gun looks very big and very black when it’s staring you in the face.

“Christophe,” Graves said, very quietly. A growl rattled under the words. “Put that fucking shotgun down.”

“What are you going to do? Jump me?” Christophe snorted. “Shut up, dogboy, and let the adults talk. Dru, kochana, please. I beg you, move away from the animal and let me dispatch him.” The spaces between his words got odder, and I wondered again, inconsequentially, how goddamn old he was.

“I’m not going to. We’re going to help him.” I stared at the shotgun’s oiled barrel, its deadly snout. My teeth tingled, turning sharply sensitive. “And I think we’d better do it fast.”

The thrumming growl in the room wasn’t coming from Ash. A crackle of bones shifting their shape and density brushed the air like the soft sound of a bird’s wings.

And the taste of wax oranges bloomed on the back of my tongue. Christophe looked up, a quick birdlike movement, and dropped the shotgun’s muzzle toward the floor. “Time to go. He’s led them here. God and Hell both damn it.” He turned sharply on one heel. “Robert! Samuel! Wake up!”

It was amazing to hear him bellow. Even more amazing was Graves hunching his shoulders, his eyes glittering green. “Dru?” My name came out half-mangled, because his jaw was changing.

“Come over here.” I tried not to sound scared half to death, crouching over a broken, bleeding werwulf. “Help me. He’s pretty beat up.”