Vicki Pettersson - The Scent of Shadows

“I think I’m going to be sick.”

Olivia joined me next to the body. “You’d be dead if Luna hadn’t leapt when she did.”

But why would a cat attack a human? A man, no less, whom it was obviously afraid of? I turned to ask Olivia this just in time to see her eyes go wide with shock. The heroic feline was unceremoniously dumped on the bed. “Jo! You’re injured!”

I looked down and saw the blood seeping through the left shoulder of my blouse. Part of me was surprised I hadn’t felt the injury before. Another part knew it was a bad sign I hadn’t. “It’s okay,” I told her, knowing it wasn’t. “It doesn’t hurt.”

“Lie down. Let me get something to staunch the wound, and we’ll call an ambulance.”

I was in no shape to argue. Perhaps it was only psychosomatic, but I was feeling a bit dizzy all of a sudden. Luna hissed as I plopped down among the pillows, then leapt from the bed, over the corpse, and streaked away. I closed my eyes.

I must have drifted off because when I came to again Olivia was seated next to me, pressing a clean towel to my wound. I winced as fresh pain coursed through me, and was about to tell her she shouldn’t have used the good towels when the first tear fell.

“Hey,” I said, reaching up to wipe it away. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m going to be fine.”

“I know,” she said. Her face crumpled anyway. “I just keep seeing that monster—he really looked like a monster!—and he wouldn’t stop staring at you.” She shook her head side to side, as if to dislodge the memory. “I thought for sure I was going to lose you. Again.”

I tried to make my smile reassuring. “Well, you didn’t lose me, and you won’t ever lose me. It’s just a little scratch. See? The bleeding has already stopped.”

She sniffled. “I guess.”

We sat in silence, Olivia’s cell phone clasped on her lap, though she made no move to open it. Chaos would resume as soon as that call was made, and even though it was a false sense of normalcy surrounding us now—there was a dead man on the bedroom floor—I think we both felt once we made that call, our lives would never be the same.

“Gawd,” Olivia sniffled, and lifted the edge of the towel to see if the bleeding had stopped. “I just have the worst luck with guys.”

We looked at each other and for a moment neither of us spoke. Then we began to laugh, that crazed, hysterical laughter you see in people who’ve drank too much, or who’ve forgotten their lines on their wedding day. The laughter tore at my shoulder, probably starting the bleeding again, but it felt so good, much more acute than the pain, and I didn’t want to stop. Our bodies shook with it and tears rolled unheeded down our faces.

We were both gasping, dizzy, and breathless, when I felt Olivia jerk and inhale sharply. Opening my teary eyes, I too froze. There was a beefy arm across her throat, and her fingers clawed at it, her eyes wide and instantly somber. Butch wasn’t exactly choking her, but he wasn’t being gentle either. Hauling her to her feet, he squared himself behind her body in a position that made it impossible for Olivia to defend or escape the hold, even if she knew how.

“You’re dead,” I said dumbly, though all evidence pointed to the contrary. I’d killed him. Yet there he stood, blood staining his clothing out of a wound that no longer existed. How could that be? In fact, the only ill effect he still showed was the scoring about his eyes and a blind and total reliance on his other senses. Especially, I noted, his sense of smell.

“Not quite,” he said. “Not yet.”

The words fast healer burst through my brain, images of a wrist popping back into place on a dusty desert road, a crumpled body coming back to life. I knew then it was possible. Blindly, Butch backed away from me, dragging Olivia with him, his nostrils flaring widely with every breath. He was moving closer and closer to the blade I’d dropped. I had to do something quickly before it was too late to do anything at all.

“Let her go,” I said, pitching my voice to the right of the bed before easing myself up and to the left. “Y-You want me, fine. But leave her out of this.” My arm throbbed and the bedroom wavered as I stood, but I forced myself steady. I didn’t know how long I could stand, but passing out wasn’t an option. I’d save Olivia or I’d die trying.

“How’d you do that?” Butch asked, head tilted into the middle of the room.

“Do what?”

“Kill me. You’re supposed to be immobile during metamorphosis. How’d you move?”

Like I knew? Instead of answering, I advanced.

“One more step and you’ll watch your sister die.” He’d stilled and was focused on me despite his blindness. For emphasis, he tightened his grip. Olivia’s eyes bulged. “Now step back.”

Death rode his brow. I stepped back. Think, Joanna. Think!

Okay, so Butch’s sight was gone, but his other senses were flawlessly acute. It made me wonder at this transformation he’d talked about. It obviously meant something to him. He’d waited until then to try and kill me, and in that time all my senses had been shut down. But now that they were back, what about that “sixth sense” he’d spoken of? Was that what he was using to track me now?

As much as I hated to take my eyes from Butch and Olivia, I had to close them in order to transfer focus to my other senses. I did, and the difference was immediately discernable. Colors flashed behind my eyelids, accompanying scent and sound. By simply casting my mind in the direction of the objects I last remembered seeing, I could smell them.

On myself I smelled blood, Ben, and the faint scent of the soap I showered with. I turned to the dresser beside me where a bevy of beauty products rested—mint, eucalyptus, wax, powder, and a perfume that reminded me unerringly of Olivia. Turning my attention to her, I inhaled deeply, and caught lingering tendrils of that scent, as well as something sharp, which I instinctively identified as fear.

As for Butch, I didn’t dare cast my mind in his direction. His scent was already overwhelming me, like being locked in a room with a pustulant corpse. I was already more sensitized to him than anything else in the room.

Except the blade on the floor between us.

My eyes flew open in time to see Butch’s head jerk, then jerk again when I inhaled sharply. We scented it at the same time, or scented each other scenting it. He was closer than I. I lunged, he snarled, and we reached it at the same time.

I came up with the tip burrowed beneath my chin, Butch’s laughter hot in my face. Olivia’s squeal was choked off in a warning tug. “Don’t fucking move. You don’t think I know what you’re doing? What you’re thinking?” He flicked the blade, a swift motion that made me wince in anticipation, but no pain came. Yet. My necklace, however, dropped soundlessly to the carpet. My jaw clenched reflexively, but otherwise I didn’t move. Butch laughed humorlessly. “I can detect your thoughts before you even form them. Remember, I’ve been at it longer, Archer, and I’ve never been an innocent.”

That I could believe.

“Just tell me what you want,” I said, fighting to keep my voice even. “Anything you want. Me for her? Give the word and I’ll do it.”

“Oh, now you’re making deals, are you? Isn’t that noble, sacrificing everything for your sister. But you’ve done that before, haven’t you, Jo?” He grinned that corrosive smile. “Time to do it again.”

“No!” Olivia struggled against his iron grip. He just held on until she’d worn herself out. If it had been me, I could have bent forward until his weight was on my back, flipping him, or swept a leg, or scraped his shin on the way to breaking bones in his foot. But it wasn’t me. It was my sweet, harmless, innocent sister, and she could only stand there and weep. And choke.