Patricia Briggs: Moon Called

I could feel a song surging into my throat, but like my wild brethren, I knew better than to sing with the wolves.

When Adam called a third time, Darryl and David both dropped their weapons and began to change. The moon's call sang through the trees and I could feel it catch the rest of the wolves and force them into their wolf form. I could hear cries of agony from those who fought it and groans from those who didn't.

Adam stood in the moonlight, which seemed somehow brighter than it had been moments ago. He opened his eyes and looked at the moon's face. This time he used words.

"Come," he said.

He didn't speak loudly, but somehow his voice, like his song, spread through the abandoned tree-farm like a roll of thunder, powerful and unavoidable. And the wolves came.

They came by ones or twos. Some came with joyful dancing steps, others with feet dragging and tails low. Some were still changing, their bodies stretched and hunched unnaturally.

The warehouse door banged open and a man staggered out, one hand clutched to his chest. It was the guard Shawn had shot. Too weak to change, he still answered the power of Adam's call.

I wasn't immune. I took a step forward without watching the ground and stumbled over a stick. I caught my balance, but the jerky move set off the pain in my arm-and the pain cleared my head like a dose of ammonia. I wiped my watering eyes with the back of my wrist and felt the unmistakable surge of witchcraft.

Heedless of Adam's magic and my arm, I started running, because, in the night air, thick with power, I felt the spell gathering death and it bore Adam's name.

I couldn't take the time to find the witch; the spell was already set in motion. All I could do was throw myself in front of the spell, just as Ben had thrown himself in front of the dart.

I don't know why it worked. Someone told me later that it shouldn't have. Once a spell is given a name, it's sort of like a guided missile rather than a laser beam. It should have moved around me and still hit Adam.

It hit me, brushed through me like a stream of feathers, making me shiver and gasp. Then it paused, and, as if it were a river of molten iron and I a magnet, all the magic flowed back into me. It was death-magic and it whispered to me, Adam Hauptman.

It held a voice. Not Elizaveta's voice, but it was someone I knew: a man. The witch wasn't Elizaveta at all-it was her grandson Robert.

My knees bowed under the weight of Robert's voice and under the stress of taking upon myself Adam's name so that the magic stopped with me. My lungs felt as if I were breathing fire and I knew that my interference couldn't last for long.

"Sam," I whispered. And as if my voice had conjured him from thin air he was suddenly in front of me. I'd expected him to be in wolf form like everyone else, but he wasn't.

He cupped my hot face in his hands. "What's wrong, Mercy?"

"Witch," I said and I saw comprehension in his eyes.

"Where is she?"

I shook my head and panted. "Robert. It's Robert."

"Where?" he asked again.

I thought I was going to tell him I didn't know, but my arm raised up and pointed at the rooftop of the boarded-up house. "There."

Samuel was gone.

As if my gesture had somehow done something, the flow of magic increased fivefold. I collapsed completely, pressing my face against the cold dirt in hopes of keeping the fire burning inside of me from consuming my skin. I closed my eyes and I could see Robert, crouched on the roof.

He'd lost something of his handsomeness, his face twisted with effort and his skin mottled with reddish splotches.

"Mercedes." He breathed my name to his spell and I could feel it change like a bloodhound given a different handkerchief to sniff. "Mercedes Thompson."

Mercedes, whispered the spell, satisfied. He'd given death my name.

I screamed as pain rushed through me, making the earlier agony from my arm pale in comparison. Even in the consuming fire, though, I heard a song. I realized there was a rhythm to Robert's spell, and I found myself moving with it, humming the tune softly. The music filled my lungs, then my head, banking the fire for a moment while I waited.

And then Samuel stopped the magic for me.

I think I passed out for a little while because suddenly I was in Samuel's arms.

"They're all here, but for one," he said.

"Yes." Adam's voice still held the moon's power.

I struggled and Samuel set me down. I still had to lean against him, but I was on my feet. Samuel, Adam, and I were the only ones on our feet.

There couldn't have been as many as it looked like. The Columbia Basin Pack is not that big, and Gerry's pack was much smaller-but all of them were sitting on the ground like a platoon of Sphinxes awaiting Adam's order.

"Two of the lone wolves, older and more dominant, ran when you first called," Samuel said. "The rest answered. They're yours now. All you have to do is call Gerry."

"He won't come," Adam said. "He can't leave. That much I can do. But he's not a lone wolf. He belongs to the Marrok."

"Will you let me help?"

The moon caught Adam's eyes and, although he was still human, his eyes were all wolf. I could smell his reaction to Samuel's question. A low growl rose over the waiting werewolves as they smelled it, too. Wolves are territorial.

Adam stretched his neck and I heard it pop. "I would appreciate it," he said mildly.

Samuel reached out his hand and Adam took it. He straightened and lifted his face to the moon once more. "Gerry Wallace of the Marrok Pack, I call you to come and face your accusers."

He must have been very close, because it didn't take him long. Like Samuel, he had stayed in human form. He paused at the edge of the wolves.

"Gerry, old friend," said Samuel. "It's time. Come here."

The gentle words didn't hide their power from me-or from Gerry. He dropped to his hands and knees and crawled through the motionless wolves, his head down submissively. He wasn't fighting anymore.

He stopped when he neared us. I thought he'd be angry-as I would have been if someone had forced me against my will. Or maybe frightened. But I'm not a werewolf. The only emotion I could catch was resignation. He'd lost and he knew it.

Adam crouched until he sat on his heels and put his hand on Gerry's shoulder.

"Why?"

"It was my father," Gerry said. His face was calm and his voice dreamy, firmly held in the moon's call. "He was dying. Cancer, they said. I talked and talked. I begged and pleaded. Please, Papa, being a wolf is a wonderful thing. I think he was just tired of me when he agreed. Bran did it-because I couldn't bear it. And at first it was perfect. The cancer went away, and he could run."

"I heard," Adam said. "He couldn't control the wolf."

"Wouldn't." It was eerie hearing that peaceful tone while tears slid down Gerry's face. "Wouldn't. He had been a vegetarian, and suddenly he craved raw meat. He tried to set a bird's wing, and it died of fear of the thing he'd become. Bran said being a werewolf was breaking my father's heart. He couldn't-wouldn't-embrace what he was because he didn't want to be a predator. He didn't want to be like me."

Adam frowned at him. "I thought you were trying to keep Bran from exposing us to the humans."

Gerry wiped his face. "Bran said if my father was not so dominant, he would not have been able to resist the wolf. But the more he resists, the less control he has. He almost killed my sister."

"Gerry." Samuel's voice was firm. "What does this have to do with Adam?"

Gerry lifted his head. He couldn't meet Samuel's eyes, or Adam's, so he looked at me. "When you fight," he said, "the wolf and the man become one. It would only take once. Just once and my father would be whole."

"He didn't want Adam to fight Bran," I said suddenly. "Did you, Gerry? That's why you weren't concerned with all the silver your men were pumping into him. Did you want to kill him?"