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SKIN A Werekin Novel The Ark Trilogy: Book One By: Jesse Daro 1 Text copyright © 2014 Jesse Daro All Rights Reserved Second Edition Cover Photo by Josh Pesavento Used under Creative Commons license All Rights Reserved 2 Life is as dear to the mute creature as it is to a man. Just as one wants happiness and fears pain, just as one wants to live and not to die, so do other creatures. - His Holiness the Dalai Lama For Frank 3 Table of Contents Prologue 1: Flesh and Blood 2: Origin of the Species 3: Close Encounters 4: Pack Mentality 5: Traps 6: Ground Rules 7: A New Normal 8: Way of the Warrior 9: Kindred Spirits 10: Full Disclosure 11: Between the Lines 12: Snow Day 13: Pandora’s Box 14: The Missing Piece 15: Hostage Situation 16: Hail Mary 17: Failed Negotiations 18: Light and Dark 19: Aftershocks 20: Game Over 21: Treachery 22: Behind Enemy Lines 23: First Time 24: Friends and Enemies 25: Morituri te Salutant 26: Mortal Combat Epilogue 4 werekin: n. 1. An ancient race of alien shapeshifters with the ability to transform into animals; once inhabited the lost continent of Lemuria, before it sank beneath the sea. 2. Genetically re-engineered alien race having both a human and an animal skin, able to shift between the two at will. Engineered by Dr. Elijah Bishop and Dr. Ursula LeRoi, founders of Chimera Enterprises, using alien genetic material discovered inside Mt. Hokulani. 5 Prologue The bullet struck Naomi from behind, spraying blood onto the chipped blue-and-white tiles above the kitchen sink, thickest at the center and spackling upward in a thinning arc, like a Jackson Pollock painting. At the time, Seth was sitting on the counter, chasing stale Oreos with swigs of Mountain Dew. Naomi was at the sink, rinsing their soup mugs in rusty-smelling water from the tap. It was late, nearly midnight, but Seth had not yet changed out of his ratty jeans and old T-shirt; his hair was still damp from his evening swim, his bare feet smeared with the sort of thick, pasty mud you only find at the bottom of a river. “Seth Michael,” Naomi had sighed, after he had tracked dirt all over the carpet. Again. Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas” was playing on the radio. It looked as though it might be: As Seth had jogged home, the streets of South Philly had been dusted white, the roofs of the run-down row houses frosted like gingerbread houses, twinkling gumdrop lights outlining the porches. Seth and Naomi each had one package under their small tree. The larger one was for Seth. Experience told him it would be either clothes or books. Given Naomi’s fondness for pastels, he was hoping for the latter. Naomi’s gift, wrapped in green paper with a red bow, was a soapstone rosary. Ben had helped Seth pick it out from one of the craft stalls down by the Italian market. It happened as the song neared its end. Naomi’s rich gospel choir voice rose for the finale (“May your days be merry, and bright; and may all your Chris – ”) just as the living room window shattered, raining glass like hailstones onto the nubby green carpet. Naomi’s voice fizzled into a gurgle; blood sprayed, an arterial spurt; her elbows struck the sink’s edge, and she crumpled, a shudder rippling down her spine. Seth was already moving. The hunter’s second bullet grazed his ear – the silver burned like a lick of flame – and splintered the cabinet above his head as he slammed into Naomi, tackling her to the floor. A third shot blew apart the radio above the stove; a fourth ricocheted off the 6 Formica tabletop, and Seth rolled, his knees squeezed around Naomi’s broad hips to take her with him, and managed to wedge the two of them between the refrigerator and the wall – the best cover to be found in their small, sparsely-furnished kitchen. The shooting had stopped. For a moment Seth laid still, his heart a drum beating in his temples and his toes. They found us, he was thinking. How did they find us? Breath rattled up from Naomi’s torn throat. Seth looked down at her. Blood had soaked the front of Naomi’s pink nightgown, sinking into the cracks in the warped linoleum, coating the ends of her salt-and-pepper hair; her pupils spread to cover the whites of her eyes, her lips curling back from her teeth, showing sharp canines. The hand that scrabbled up to clench his was ice-cold, the nails now ending in spiked tips. Seth held on without wincing as they dug into his palm. Naomi spoke quickly then, on a single exhale of air: a name, a phone number, an address. The last words she ever spoke to him. The floorboards vibrated – boots, coming up the front steps. By the time the hunters kicked down the door, Seth was gone, leaving behind a bloody handprint on the linoleum, a bloody paw print on the windowsill. 7 Chapter One: Flesh and Blood Inside the three-story brick house at 706 Kings Lane, a party was underway. Every light in the house was burning, casting yellow squares onto the fresh white snow. Cars lined both sides of the circular drive. Porsches. BMWs. Cadillacs. Behind a bay window, men in tuxedos and women in cocktail dresses sipped wine, swaying to classic jazz. Perfect. Not only was he turning up on his mother’s doorstep after a sixteen – almost seventeen – year absence, he was, apparently, also gate-crashing. Sixteen-year-old Seth Michael Sullivan rested his forehead against the taxi’s window, breathing in the stale odor of cigarette smoke that clung to the cracked leather seat. For the hundredth time in five days, he asked himself why. Why Naomi’s dying wish had been for him to come here. Fairfax, Indiana. Anchored in a bend of the Ohio River, bordered by Illinois to the west and Kentucky to the south, former home of the Fort King military prison, population just under one hundred thousand. Proper cities had at least five times that many people. In Philadelphia, Seth had been one of thousands of misfit teenagers. Hadn’t rated a second glance on the train. In Fairfax, he was going to stick out like the proverbial sore thumb. The cabbie cleared his throat. “You sure this is the right address, son?” He sounded skeptical. Seth didn’t blame him. Seth wasn’t the kind of kid you expected to find living in a gated community like Castle Estates, with its stately homes and manicured lawns, home to doctors, lawyers, professors – even one candidate for the United States Senate. It wasn’t just his Goodwill jeans and frayed T-shirt, either. There was something about werekin, something less tangible even than a scent, that humans picked up on. It made them wary. Or maybe the cabbie just thought he was casing the joint. Seth did look like that kind of kid. Seth unfolded a twenty from his pocket – literally his last dime – and passed it over the seat. “Keep the change,” he said. 8 All of a buck. He grabbed his old gray backpack off the seat and climbed out, feeling the cabbie’s reproachful glare follow him up the drive. Overhead, stars shone like spilled jewels in the nighttime sky. More stars than had ever been visible in South Philly, or in Harlem, where Seth had lived with his dad years ago. They seemed to watch him as he threaded between the cars parked nose-to-fender along the drive. Last in line, in front of a garage that could have doubled as its own residence, was a canary yellow Hummer. Chrome wheels. Blacked-out windows. All-leather interior. Niiice. Out of habit, Seth peeked in at the top-of-the-line stereo equipment. The tinted glass threw his reflection back at him. Seth looked about as wrecked as he felt. His hair was sticking up in the back – he kept it short, dyed jet-black with bleached-white tips, but after three days of sleeping in an airport capped off by a red-eye New Year’s Eve flight, his cowlick was getting out of hand. Purple-black shadows were smeared under his eyes, making them seem even larger and rounder than they really were. Seth’s eyes were his most distinctive feature: metallic gold irises specked with blue. A werecat’s eyes. Naomi had flown into hysterics last year when he had come home with black rosette-shaped spots tattooed above the right one, sprinkled across his brow, curving around his temple to his cheekbone. “Why don’t you just paint a target on your forehead?” she had stormed, lecturing him at full volume while Seth had slumped on their battered sofa, picking threads out of his jeans and feeling misunderstood. “Do you think the rest of us hide because we’re cowards? Do you know what happens if the hunters find you?” Seth flinched now, remembering. He hadn’t known. Naomi Franklin and Ben Schofield had always looked out for Seth, and before them, his dad. Seth had thought he was a real cool cat, prowling the Underground while Naomi slept, sneaking out of his room at night to boost cars for the Coleman brothers. Naomi would have whipped his spots off if she’d found out – The house’s front door suddenly opened, releasing a burst of sound like a radio station coming into tune. Jarred from his reverie, Seth melted deeper into the shadows, out of sight. 9 A slender woman in a black dress had appeared on the porch. Closing the door with her foot, she glanced down the drive, toward the quiet street, almost like she was waiting for someone, then disappeared around the corner of the wraparound porch. Seth sighed. But, since he couldn’t very well hide out in the driveway all night, he threw one last, rueful look at his reflection and continued up the drive. His mother hadn’t exactly been thrilled to hear from him when he had called. Hi, Mom. It’s Seth. Seth Michael Sullivan. You might not remember me…Okay, he hadn’t really said that. He didn’t think. He had still been pretty out of it at that point, covered in Naomi’s blood and exhausted from running for nearly a day – Philadelphia to Cincinnati in sixteen hours. Once his legs had threatened to give out, he’d skinned back into a human, stopped at the first payphone he found, and dialed the number Naomi had whispered with her dying breath, asked to speak to Lydia Steward, formerly Lydia Sullivan. The end result of that brief, awkward conversation had been his plane ticket to Fairfax. There was a welcome mat at the top of the porch steps, monogrammed with a snake-like double S – proof, Seth thought, that rich people would spend money on anything, even a fancy rug to wipe your feet. Red and green lights twisted like electric vines around the white Doric columns. The window trim was white as well, pale bones against blood-red brick. This was not the house Seth’s dad had bought, back when Thomas and Lydia Sullivan were newlyweds with a future bright as a shiny penny. This was the house his mother lived in with her new family, whom Seth had never met. Whom he hadn’t known existed until five days ago. He reached for the knocker. “Seth?” Seth whipped around, forcibly suppressing the magic that rippled under his skin. Catching Seth off-guard was not easy to do. Like all werekin warrior breeds, werecats had excellent eyesight and even keener hearing – partly what made them so valuable to the scientists that bred them, and such difficult quarry for the hunters that stalked them. But the woman perched on the porch railing, a forgotten cigarette burning down to her manicured nails, was no hunter. A 10 hunter would not have said his name in that breathless, disbelieving way. This was his mother. Lydia Steward. Auburn hair was coiled into a chignon at the nape of her neck, allowing an unobstructed view of a porcelain-doll face presently blanched in shock. Seth looked nothing like her. He barely looked like his dad, aside from his sly smile and his fair hair (when it wasn’t dyed). Werekin resembled their Totem animals more than their human kin – a mystery the scientists at Chimera Enterprises had yet to unravel, and hopefully never would. “Seth?” Lydia said again. Seth nodded. Usually he was talkative (Ben said he needed to learn when to shut up, actually) but meeting his mother for the first time had tongue-tied him. Go figure. Lydia slid off the rail. “You didn’t have to take a taxi, honey. We would have picked you up from the airport.” Seth shrugged. Calling hadn’t occurred to him. Nobody he knew in the Philly Underground owned a car. They walked, or rode the train. “What about your things? Don’t you have any luggage?” Seth held up his backpack. Lydia’s lips parted. “That’s – all you brought?” Again, Seth just nodded. The backpack was all he had. Ben had salvaged it, and the toothbrush, boxers, and T-shirts inside of it, from his room after the hunters had taken Naomi’s body away. He had brought it to Seth in Cincinnati yesterday, driven all night to sit with him at the airport until Seth made it up the standby list for his flight to Fairfax. Wind lifted snow off the eaves, creating a glittering cloud around their heads. Lydia stubbed her cigarette out with her Prada heel and kicked the evidence into the shrubs. Seth liked that, that she had secrets, too. “Let’s get you inside, before you freeze,” she said. Seth didn’t tell her that wasn’t likely to happen. *** Miles Davis’ “Blue in Green” greeted them on the threshold of a cherry-stained foyer. Seth paused there, looking around. 11 A crystal chandelier hung above the staircase, warming the hardwood floors and paneled walls. A vase of star-shaped white flowers adorned a walnut sideboard next to an arched doorway, through which Seth could see a spacious kitchen. To his right, through a set of French doors, played out the scene he had glimpsed from the taxi: New Year’s revelers in suits and party dresses, the men balding and paunchy, the women Botoxed and spray-tanned. A few faces turned toward him, curious, almost hungry. Seth ducked his head, hoping Lydia didn’t plan on introducing him. He looked – and smelled – like his last bath had been two days ago, in an airport bathroom. “Your room is this way,” she said, to his relief, and started up the stairs. Photos marched along the landing, displaying a pictureperfect family: Lydia, youthful and pretty in every one; a handsome, dark-haired man with a trim mustache and goatee, slowly graying; and a red-haired, green-eyed girl who grew from a chubby-cheeked toddler to a gap-toothed tween between the first step and the last. Seth’s kid sister. Half-sister, to be precise. Still, it was weird. Seth had never had a friend his own age, let alone a sibling. She wouldn’t be werekin, he knew that much. That trait had been passed to Seth by his father, Thomas Sullivan. Lydia was no shapeshifter. Even werekin parents didn’t always pass along the gene. And just because your mom or your dad was a werefox or a werecrow or a werejackal didn’t mean that was what you would be. Skin (that was what werekin called their animal selves) depended on your mystical connection to the Totems, the werekin ancestors. Seth was a rare breed. At the top of the stairs, a corridor ran out at a round window. Snow was falling harder now, mixed with ice pellets that tapped the glass like impatient fingers. Lydia opened the door on the left, one of only two on this, the third floor. “I hope this is all right,” she said, anxiously. There were a lot of expensive rings on her fingers; she couldn’t seem to stop twisting them. “It used to be our guestroom, but Leigh just sort of…took over. I didn’t have time to straighten up, with the party and everything…” 12 “It’s fine, Mrs. Steward,” Seth said. Although really, his new digs looked like Social Activist Barbie had barfed on them. The bed was splashed with a neon-pink comforter that clashed spectacularly with the somber blue walls and dark oak furniture. From what he could see of the floor that wasn’t covered in skirts, tights, and dresses, the carpet was cream-colored Berber. Posters for Greenpeace and PETA were taped to the door of a walk-in closet from which, incredibly, spilled even more clothes. A Hello Kitty alarm clock, a bubblegum-pink phone, and a tube of lipstick shared the bedside table with a stack of vegetarian cookbooks and a pile of leaflets for something called, ominously, The Student Vegan Society. A small red Dachshund was napping on the picture window seat. He lifted his head as Seth approached the window, discarding his backpack on the bed. His new room faced the house across the drive, an equally posh brick branch; a swift mental calculation told Seth the drop from the window to the garage was ten, twelve feet at the most. No problem. He could make a jump like that with his hands tied behind his back. Escape routes were vital for werekin. You never knew when the hunters might come knocking. The Dachshund wagged his stubby tail. Seth scratched his back. (The whole dogs-hate-cats thing didn’t apply to werekin; werekin were pack alphas, and animals responded accordingly.) Lydia pursed her lips. “Captain Hook. How did you get in here?” The little dog barked. His back leg, Seth saw, was missing. “I get it,” he said. “Missing limb, Captain Hook…” “Oh.” Lydia was wandering around snatching up skirts and sweaters off the floor, so twitchy she made Seth, who was naturally restless, feel downright serene. “Leigh named him. She has a – literary imagination. You’re not allergic, are you?” A werekin, allergic to animal dander? Seth almost laughed. She doesn’t know, he reminded himself. Whatever story Thomas Sullivan had fobbed off on his wife when he had packed their infant son up and disappeared sixteen years ago, it would not have been the truth. The truth about werkein was too dangerous for humans to know. Even – perhaps especially – the humans you loved. 13 “If you want to clean up, the bathroom is through there.” Depositing the pile of clothes on the closet floor, Lydia gestured to a door across the room. “I can bring you up a tray for supper. We had filet mignon. I’m sure there’s some left – ” Steak. Seth’s stomach growled, reminding him his last meal had been a bag of pretzels on the plane. Captain Hook whined. Seth patted his head. He didn’t eat live meat – in his human skin. “Thanks, Mrs. Steward, but you don’t need to do that. I can fix myself a snack.” “Oh, it’s no – ” “Besides,” Seth soldiered on, “it’ll be midnight in like an hour. You don’t want to miss the ball dropping, do you?” He smiled. He was trying to show her how self-sufficient he was; Seth didn’t plan on being any trouble for these people. Yet Lydia hesitated. Worried he would be spotted by one of her hoity-toity guests and she would have to explain who he was? Oh, that’s just my juvenile delinquent son from my first marriage. We’re keeping him in the attic until we figure out how to get rid of him. “Well, all right,” she said, with obvious reluctance. “I’ll be sure the caterers don’t pack everything up.” Looking slightly deflated, she went out, with promises to check back later to see how he was settling in. Presumably Seth would have to meet Mr. Steward then, explain what he was doing here, where his dad was, and why he had called out of the blue to say he needed somewhere to stay. Seth intended to lie through his teeth, of course. So much to look forward to. Seth could hardly wait. The ultra-girly pink phone did at least have the bonus feature of an extra-long cord. Punching in the familiar digits, Seth carried the phone into the bathroom and rifled through the linen closet for soap and shampoo while the call connected. The voice that answered on the first ring, as though the man on the other end had been sitting by the phone, was thick with a Louisiana drawl. “Seth Michael?” “Bonjour, Papa Bear,” Seth said. There was an audible sigh of relief on Ben Schofield’s end of the line. Seth dumped a generous capful of bath oil under the Olympic-sized Jacuzzi’s jets, sinking into memories as he sank 14 into the warm suds: sipping instant cocoa in Ben’s messy kitchen, listening to stories of Lemuria, the werekin motherland. Ben told the best stories. He had been Underground for decades. He was a Gen-1 werekin, one of the first to escape Chimera Enterprises. Ben asked how Seth’s flight was (fine) and if he had run into any trouble (not yet). “Your mama,” he rumbled. “She was happy to see you?” “Yup,” said Seth. Freakin’ overjoyed. “Look, Papa Bear, I gotta go. I’ll call again when I can.” When he figured out what he was doing here, in Fairfax, Seth meant. He dropped the phone on the floor and slid down in the tub. Water lapped at his chin. Seth loved water. Most cats didn’t, but then, jaguars weren’t most cats. A jaguar was as deadly in the water as it was on dry ground, or in the treetops. Yaguara, the Mesoamericans called them. Kills with a single bound. Werekin didn’t do much killing, unless they were forced to it. Seth would rather have chowed down on a cheesesteak then fell a deer in the wild. Although if he could find the hunters that killed Naomi, he thought, slipping under the foamy surface, he would make an exception. What Seth couldn’t understand was why they had killed her. Naomi wasn’t Resistance. She was a threat to no one. Why kill her instead of collar her? A dead werekin was worthless to Chimera. Dead werekin couldn’t be bred to create more supersoldiers or trained up to be warriors or caged up like, well, like lab rats in the holy name of Science. The hunters who had come for Thomas Sullivan had taken him alive – shot him with a tranq and clamped a collar around his neck in the alley behind their ten-floor walk-up in Harlem, while Seth had hidden behind a dumpster reeking of Chinese takeout and dirty diapers. Seth had wanted to kill them, too, but he had only been a cub then. But he wasn’t a cub now. In five days, Seth would turn seventeen. All grown up for a werekin. *** 15 Someone was sitting on Seth’s bed when he emerged from the bath. A girl someone. Seth smelled her before he finished toweling off – the clean fragrance of soap, the bitter tang of roiled emotions. Having neglected to take a shirt into the bathroom, he stepped out in jeans and bare feet to meet his kid sister. The stairwell photos stopped at ten years. She was five years older than that now, dressed for the party in an apricot-colored dress with a chocolate-brown bow around the middle. The gap in her front teeth had been resolved, likely thanks to orthodontia; she had Lydia’s auburn hair layered around Lydia’s oval face, Lydia’s porcelain skin and tall, balletic build – almost as tall as Seth, who was only five-foot-nine, jaguars being the smallest of the big cat breeds: jaguars, lions, tigers, and leopards. They were also the rarest of the werecats. To Seth’s knowledge, he was the only werejaguar in existence. “Aren’t you cold?” his sister said. There was no concern in her voice, just a mild rebuke that he had chosen to present himself half-naked. Taking the hint, Seth unstuck from the doorway and slunk over to the desk (slinking was how Seth walked, catlike, hips sliding forward, spine curving) to select a clean T-shirt from his backpack. The backpack he distinctly recalled leaving on the bed, by the way. Baby sister must have moved it, after snooping through his stuff, no doubt. This sibling thing was going to suck. Captain Hook had vacated the premises. Napping in his place by the window was a one-eyed calico kitten. Three-legged dogs, one-eyed cats – Seth was sensing a pattern here. As she seemed friendlier than his sister, he joined the kitten on the window seat and teased her with a piece of string off one of the pillows. “I’m Seth,” he said. “I know.” Seth looked over at his sister. How much did she know? Had Lydia talked about him over the years, or had she only just found out she had a brother? Might account for the hostility, if that was the case. “I’m Adleigh. Leigh, for short. And that’s Poe,” Leigh added, of the kitten. “I found her outside yesterday. Can you believe somebody would dump her this time of year? It’s freezing outside!” 16 Seth shrugged. In his limited experience, most humans sucked. Poe, uncertain what to do with the string now that she had captured it, curled up by his leg. “Aren’t you missing your party?” Seth said. Leigh sniffed. “It’s not my party, okay? It’s my parents’ party, for all the people who are contributing to Daddy’s campaign, and it’s boring.” Daddy? Seth hadn’t known anyone over the age of six referred to their father as daddy. “Your dad’s running for the Senate, right?” “Uh-huh.” The pride in Leigh’s voice was obvious. “It’ll be his first term if he wins, but there’s already talk about him running for president in a few years. Right now he’s an attorney. Steward and Regent, the largest firm in the city.” Explained the swanky house and the luxury cars. Seth pictured his cozy row house in South Philly, peeling paint on the front porch where Naomi had liked to drink sweet tea on warm summer nights; insulation hanging out of the bathroom ceiling; walls so thin they could hear every word Ben said next door. Homesickness hit like a fist in the gut. Seth hugged his knees with both arms. “What about your father?” Leigh asked. “What does he do?” It was a kick when Seth was down, though Leigh couldn’t have known that. He nearly blurted out he’s gone, but remembered at the last second and said, “He’s an attorney, too. In Philadelphia.” Complete and utter fabrication, that. But Thomas Sullivan had been an attorney when Lydia had married him, and as far as she knew, he was alive and well and had raised Seth for the last sixteen years. “Well.” Leigh stood up, straightening the bow on her dress. “Mom said for me to take you downstairs when you were ready to eat.” Her expression said he should be ready. Seth followed her downstairs. Chaperoned by his little sister and her one-eyed kitten, he didn’t swipe any silver from the cupboards or plunder the family safe. He probably wouldn’t have anyway, but you never knew. The kitchen he had glimpsed 17 earlier was indeed spacious, and ultra-modern, all stainless steel and polished brass, and, at the moment, littered with party detritus – recycling bin by the back door jammed with empty wine bottles, bamboo dishes holding remnants of hors d’ouevres lined up on a teak island in the room’s center. A boy and a girl were seated there, perched across from one another on tall stools. They stopped talking when Seth and Leigh walked in. The girl was Leigh’s age, though several inches shorter, and considerably rounder. Her gray sweater dress had a crocheted carnation on the collar, as off-beat funky as the butterfly barrettes holding back her chin-length bob. The boy, despite being six-foot-two and possessed of a lithe runner’s physique, was obviously her brother. They shared ink-black hair, honey-toned skin, baby-blue eyes, and something else, something only a werekin might have picked up on, that marked them as kin. Leigh introduced the girl as Whitney Townsend. Her brother was Marshall. Whitney murmured a shy hello. Marshall shook Seth’s hand, and that, combined with his designer jeans and varsity letterman’s jacket, told Seth everything he needed to know about Marshall Townsend, Golden Boy. “Hey,” he said. “Hey,” said Marshall. “Whitney and Marshall live next door.” Smiling at Marshall, Leigh claimed the stool next to his, sitting close enough their elbows touched. “Dr. Townsend is one of Daddy’s biggest campaign contributors.” “You don’t say,” said Seth, into the fridge. The contents were not promising. Soy milk? Tofu? Goat cheese? He hoped the Castle Estates subdivision had a 7-Eleven. He might go into withdrawal without Mountain Dew and Oreos. And meat. Meat was a necessity. In the wild, jaguars could eat up to four pounds of meat a day. Seth wasn’t that bad, but his body burned off protein pretty quickly. He grabbed a foil-wrapped steak and a bottle of Perrier off the top shelf and hoisted onto the counter, stripping the foil off the filet and tearing into it with his teeth. Captain Hook took up residence at his feet and licked his chops imploringly. Seth shook his head. Sorry, buddy. This steak was his. 18 Marshall coughed. Seth looked up. Everyone was staring at him. “What?” Seth mushed, around a mouthful of cold steak. “Did you, uh, maybe want that…heated up?” Marshall said, glancing at Leigh. She looked furious. “Fastes wine ike ish.” Marshall frowned. “What?” “I said – ” Seth swallowed “ – I’m good, man, but thanks for offering.” “I wasn’t…” Marshall broke off, blushing. Seth winked at him. Now that he was clean and fed, his natural devilishness was making a comeback. In two more bites, the steak had disappeared. “There’s plenty of left-overs,” Whitney said, indicating the spread of cucumber sandwiches and cheese wedges on the catering trays. She alone seemed amused by Seth’s lack of table manners. “If you’re still hungry, I mean.” “You wouldn’t happen to have any Oreos, would you?” Seth asked, without any real hope. Cookies weren’t exactly in keeping with the health food in the fridge. “Are you kidding?” Whitney walked over to the cabinet above the stove, producing, after a short search, a familiar blueand-black package. Manna from heaven. “Leigh goes nowhere without her Oreos. She even took a bag on our field trip to the zoo in first grade. Remember that, Leigh, when you sat down and Mrs. Paddock thought you’d broken your tailbone because the cookies crunched…?” “No,” Leigh said. Baby sister didn’t like sharing his taste in cookies, apparently. Or possibly she didn’t want the cookiecrunching story repeated in front of Marshall. Seth scooped a handful of chocolate wafers out of the bag, unscrewing one to get at the filling. “You need milk,” declared Whitney. “Can’t have cookies without milk.” “You don’t have to wait on him, Whitney,” Leigh sniffed, as Whitney headed to the fridge. Whitney ignored her and poured a tall glass of soy milk for Seth. When she handed it to him, her eyes – as sapphire-bright as her brother’s – lingered for a moment on his face before she turned away. Leigh flipped her hair over her shoulder. Marshall frowned at Whitney as she returned to her stool, but Leigh laid her hand on 19 his arm, reclaiming his attention. “So Marshall, what do you think our chances are of making sectionals this year?” “Depends on how we do against Sacred Heart without Bryce,” Marshall said. And they were off, Leigh peppering him with questions about state championships and sectionals brackets, segueing from that right into the equally fascinating topic of who would be nominated for prom court. Seth listened without interjecting. It didn’t take long for him to work out that Marshall, Whitney, and Leigh all attended Fairfax High, the city’s largest public school, fed, as the result of either a zoning anomaly or a sadistic social experiment, by both the trust-fund Castle Estates crowd and the low-income housing district, Haven Heights. Whitney and Leigh were in tenth grade. Marshall was in twelfth. Captain of the basketball team. President of the Student Council. Probably rescued drowning puppies in his spare time. He kept glancing at Seth like he felt bad for leaving him out, but Seth was content to be ignored. If they started asking him about his life in Philly, where he had gone to school and who his friends were, he might slip up. He hadn’t fashioned those lies yet. He had been too focused on reaching Fairfax alive. Captain Hook continued to observe his every move, dark eyes pleading. Finally Seth relented; breaking off a chunk of wafer, he tossed the cookie onto the floor, where the little dog fell on it like a ravening wolf on a deer. Leigh shrieked. Seth hissed. “What?” he gasped. “Seth! Oh my God! Are you trying to kill him?” Leigh said. “Chocolate is toxic to dogs, don’t you know that?” Toxic? Really? Seth looked down at Captain Hook. He was sitting back on his haunches, ready for more cookie. “He looks okay to me,” Seth said. Leigh’s sigh was plosive. Marshall covered his mouth with his hand to hide a smile. “You don’t have to be such a – ” Leigh started, but before Seth could find out what he was being, they were interrupted by voices rising in unison from the living room: “Ten! Nine! Eight! Seven!” The countdown to midnight. Seth had completely forgotten it was New Year’s Eve. 20 Whitney jumped off her stool. “Come on, you guys! We’re missing it!” She raced for the door. Leigh, with great dignity, rose, tucking her arm through Marshall’s. “You can come, if you want,” she said, to Seth. Clearly hoping he wouldn’t. Suited Seth. Celebrating wasn’t high on his list of priorities at the moment. He shrugged, and Leigh, without another word, steered Marshall out of the kitchen. The kitchen had a back door. The moment Seth was alone, he went out it, Captain Hook on his heels. Ice silvered the limbs of the trees guarding the Stewards’ backyard. A wooden deck led out to an in-ground pool covered by a snow-dusted tarp. There was a shed for the lawn mower, a gazebo hung with ivy and roses, a brick privacy fence surrounding it all – everything neat and orderly and secure. Seth’s legs tingled with the desire to lope across that lawn, leap the fence, and escape into the wild. As much wild as could be found in Indiana, anyway. He arched his back, his spine curving as the magic in his blood heated up. Sometimes his human skin felt like a cage. But he couldn’t go running tonight. His mother and stepfather had questions that had to be dealt with sooner or later, if he planned on staying here. They would have even more if he stayed out all night in freezing temperatures, wearing just jeans and a T-shirt. Seth slunk around the house, fingering the narrow file in his back pocket. The yellow Hummer in the driveway called to him like a siren’s song. He trailed his fingers along the wheel well, humming tunelessly under his breath to drown out the little voice that whispered this was a bad idea. He blamed exhaustion for being snuck up on twice in one night. A split-second before boots crunched in the snow, the hair on the back of Seth’s arms stood up. Hissing, he sprang into the air, farther and faster than any human could have managed. A second later, he had touched down on the Hummer’s hood, balanced on his toes. Captain Hook rocketed back to the house. Seth saw him disappear under the shrubs around the porch. 21 “Easy, cub,” said a deep voice. The man who stepped out of the shadows was tall, big-boned and broad-shouldered. A bowler hat was pulled low over his bristly red hair, shadowing a red-and-white striped beard. Underneath his wool coat, his tailored black suit was obviously expensive. The clothes hardly mattered, though. Blood calls to blood, Ben had always said, and Seth’s blood recognized this man for what he was. Werekin. 22 Chapter Two: Origin of the Species Seth let his claws slide out, dagger-like points where his fingernails had been. “Who are you?” he demanded, hearing the hiss slide under the words. The werekin man pushed back his bowler hat. He was fortyish, with a flat face and a blunt, bearded jaw, in peak physical condition for a guy his age, not a scrap of flab anywhere on him. He looked Seth up and down like he was pretty sure he would need to kick his ass before this was all over, and was deciding the best way to go about it. “Regent,” he said. “Werner Regent.” Steward and Regent, Seth remembered Leigh saying, the largest firm in the city. This guy was a lawyer? He looked more like a hit man. “What do you want?” Seth demanded. He hoped Werner Regent couldn’t tell that his heart was pounding. Seth had been in fights – plenty of punks in South Philly eager to push around the short kid, until they found out the short kid could push back – but never against another werekin. Well, Ben a couple of times, but that had just been goofing around. Ben wouldn’t have ripped his throat out. Ben wouldn’t have handed him over to Chimera. “I was going home,” Regent said. He held up a hand; a set of car keys dangled between his thumb and index finger. “Problem is, that’s my car you’re getting scuff marks on.” “Sweet ride,” Seth said. He did not budge. He wasn’t giving up the high ground. Regent chuckled. “You got a name, cub?” Seth considered lying. But if Regent was his step-father’s business partner, he would find out his identity sooner or later. “I’m Seth,” he said. “Seth Sullivan.” “Tommy’s kid?” Regent took a step forward. Seth hissed again, a true cat hiss that showed his teeth. Regent backpedaled, hands lifted in appeasement. They were powerful hands, wide enough to span Seth’s skull, the knuckles like bolts under tufts of reddish-brown fur, but that wasn’t what made Seth go cold inside. Tattooed on Regent’s left palm were four numbers and a Greek letter – 157123 ɣ. A brand. At some point, Regent had belonged to Chimera, whether he had been born in captivity or collared later, in the Underground. Ben Schofield had been branded, too – born in captivity, eventually escaped into the Underground. Regent wasn’t wearing a collar now. Was he still Chimera property? It seemed doubtful he was Underground. Werekin in the Underground eked out an existence on the periphery of human society. They didn’t drive fancy cars and wear expensive suits. They weren’t Ivy League educated attorneys. Leaving open the possibility Regent was working for Seth’s enemies. “What do you want?” Seth asked again. Regent opened his mouth – just as the front door opened. “Werner? Have you seen – ” Faster than Seth could blink, Regent was between him and the porch, blocking Lydia’s view of the Hummer. Seth looked down at himself. His claws were curled in toward his palms, dark rosette-shaped spots blooming like bruises across his forearms…He hadn’t consciously decided to skin, yet here he was, halfway betwixt boy and jaguar. That hadn’t happened to him in years. He took a deep breath. The magic cooled; the rosettes faded, his claws retracting once more into short, ragged fingernails. “Seth?” Lydia peered over Regent’s shoulder. “Is that you?” “Yeah, Mrs. Steward. It’s me.” Terrific, Seth thought. Now his mother was in the middle of their little werekin spat. This was so not his night. “Honey, what are you doing outside without a coat? And…why are you on top of a car?” Seth looked to Regent for help. “You know boys and engines, Lydia,” Regent lied, smoothly. “Seth wanted to check out the horsepower.” He tapped his fingers on the Hummer’s hood, signaling Seth to get off the car – which Seth did, by executing a neat sideways jump. Regent shot him a withering look. Seth was ninety-nine percent certain Regent knew he had interrupted him boosting his ride. Leaving Seth beside the Hummer, Regent walked over to the porch. Lydia leaned on the railing, tendrils of hair escaping her 24 chignon and tumbling over her shoulder, Rapunzel at her window. Seth kicked the tires and listened, as Regent had to know he would. “Jack wants to talk to him,” Lydia said. Jack would be the husband, Senator-To-Be Jonathan Steward. Seth’s step-father. “Tell Jack I took him for a drive,” Regent said. Seth snorted. Yeah, right. He wasn’t going anywhere with a strange, branded werekin. Regent would have to collar him first. “He’s a scared kid, Lydia. Jack will interrogate him, and that’s not what he needs right now. Let me have a go first. See if I can find out what’s happened to him. Help him figure out his next move.” Words meant for Seth as much as for Lydia, and Seth wavered. The story Seth had to fob off on the Stewards was thinner than the crust of ice on Lydia’s rosebushes. He was looking for somewhere to crash after a major fight with his dad, Thomas Sullivan, Attorney at Law in Philadelphia. The usual teenage drama: Dad doesn’t understand me; he wants me to be someone I’m not; I couldn’t stay there another second. Cue the violins. Meanwhile, Ben had sworn to investigate Naomi’s murder, putting out feelers through the Underground to find out how the hunters had located her, and whether Chimera Enterprises knew about Seth, an unbranded werekin. A rare breed. One phone call to the Pennsylvania Bar Association and the jig was up. Thomas Sullivan had never practiced law in Philadelphia. He had never even lived in Philadelphia. He had taken Seth directly from Fairfax to New York, to hide among the extensive Underground network there, before Seth was six months old. New York was where they had met Naomi. She had been the one to spirit Seth off to Philly after Thomas was collared. Regent knew Seth was werekin. He was offering to help him. And honestly, Seth needed help. On the porch, Lydia was waffling, saying something about Jack and a “family sit-down.” Seth looked up at her. “I’d like to go with him, Mrs. Steward,” he said. “If that’s okay.” *** 25 The Hummer seemed too bulky to fit through the narrow path between the parked cars. Regent negotiated it expertly, reversing at full throttle with one hand on the wheel. He didn’t speak again until they were on the street, roaring past rows of houses still lit up with Christmas lights. “Seat belt,” he growled. Seth rolled his eyes but buckled up. “So you’re an attorney?” “We used to be Steward, Regent, and Sullivan,” Regent said. Three best friends in our pal Jackie’s hometown. Hung out our shingle straight out of Georgetown Law. Tommy and I thought it was a foolproof plan for our futures.” These were details of a past Thomas Sullivan had never had the chance to share with his son. Seth was fascinated. “Foolproof how?” “Tommy and I were born in captivity. Gen-3.” Regent flashed the brand on his palm again. It ended with the Greek gamma, three. “We always tested high on intelligence, so when we came of age, Chimera let us bypass the breeding program and paid for our education in the human world. They do that sometimes, with the ones they can trust – send you out into the world, warn you to keep your mouth shut and your nose clean, stay out of the Resistance and snap-to if they call on you. Once you’re out, you can even marry with the humans, have kids if you want, provided you register your offspring with Chimera. If they’re warrior breeds, Chimera keeps them. Otherwise, you and your family can lead a normal life. It’s the closest most werekin ever get to freedom, so it’s good incentive to behave yourself in training.” Regent braked for the stop sign at the end of Kings Lane. Aside from a snow plow moving ponderously along in the other lane, theirs was the only car on the road. “How did you meet Jack?” Seth asked. “At Georgetown. Tommy and I were number two and number three in our law school class from the beginning. Jackie was number one. When he suggested setting up shop in Fairfax, we thought it would be perfect. Fairfax is too small to have an Underground, and the Underground is where the Resistance recruits from. Jack’s old man, the first Senator Steward, had a firm here for decades. He keeled over from a heart attack our last 26 year at Georgetown. We had his client base, local connections, start-up capital…” “Foolproof,” Seth agreed. Regent nodded. They were on the highway now; the Hummer barreled north, windshield wipers swiping aside snowflakes the size of quarters. In the dashboard’s half-light, Seth studied Regent, trying to guess what his skin might be. All werekin had markings. With Seth it was his eyes, large, round, and golden – a jaguar’s eyes. With Naomi, it had been her hair, brindled like a jackal’s coat. With Ben it was his size, imposing as a grizzly. Regent had Ben’s size, but not his bulk. His eyes were marbled yellow-brown, the pupil’s oval-shaped; werecat, maybe? Not a jaguar, though. His eyes were the wrong shape and color. A tiger, possibly. Except weretigers were warrior breeds, and Seth couldn’t feature Chimera willingly releasing a warrior from captivity. Some werekin breeds, as Regent had said, were put to uses other than fighting; a werefox like Seth’s dad, for instance, would have been worth more to Chimera for his brains than his brawn. And there were other breeds, weremice for one, Chimera considered valuable only for breeding. Face it, you weren’t sending a mouse into battle. But a weretiger, pushing paper? It didn’t add up. Something else in Regent’s story struck a discordant note in Seth’s mind, a sharp when the music called for a flat. “You and my dad and Jack Steward,” he said. “You were all friends?” Regent didn’t take his eyes off the road. “Yup.” “Then…You’re saying my mom remarried to my dad’s best friend?” “Yup.” Seth did the sum in his head. Leigh was a year younger than him. That meant Lydia had tied the knot with Jack Steward inside two months of Thomas Sullivan bonvoyaging with their infant son. Nice to know she hadn’t wallowed in her grief. Several miles past the city limits, the Hummer left the highway and roared down a narrow country lane, rattling over a wooden bridge above an icy, swift-flowing creek. On the other side, the lane became a private drive winding through sycamores, 27 elms, and hickories. At last, a house loomed up in the headlight beams. Overlapping pines, wraparound porch, big windows, stone chimney. Like a hunting lodge. Odd choice of digs for a werekin. On the backside, rising ten feet above the pitched roof, was a glass dome, tinted so Seth couldn’t see inside. A greenhouse, maybe? Hard to picture Regent as the gardening type. Regent parked the Hummer by the garage, in front of a wellstocked woodpile. Seth hurried after him across the lawn, hanging back while Regent unlocked the door. On the threshold, he hesitated, taking in all he could of his surroundings in the dark. Straight ahead, a pine staircase climbed to a second floor balcony overlooking an enormous great room. A galley kitchen with a sunken bar was tucked into one corner; the countertops were spotless, dishes stacked neatly in the drainer. The east wall was shuttered floor-to-ceiling by metal blinds with long, vertical slats. In the center of the room, two leather couches faced one another across a pine coffee table, a slate stone hearth serving as a backdrop. Shapes were mounted on the walls; Seth squinted to make them out – He drew back in horror as an iron chandelier blazed to life. Dozens of pairs of glassy eyes stared down at him. Lynx. Grizzly. Coyote. Wolf. Raven. Hyena. Jackal. Whole bodies, not just heads, mounted on wooden plaques, like a macabre zoo. Above the mantle was a lioness, claws raised, mouth open to take a bite out of her prey. Werekin. They were all werekin. Even in death their blood called to Seth’s. He fumbled behind him for the doorknob. “What the hell is this?” “What the hell is what?” Seeing the look on Seth’s face, Regent glanced casually at the werekin corpses nailed to his walls. “Oh,” he said. “Those, cub, would be trophies.” Was he serious? Seth’s eyes strayed to the werejackal. He could see Naomi, blood-soaked on the kitchen floor…feel her paw folded in his hand as she breathed her last… He opened his eyes. He had closed them unwittingly, trying to block out the image. 28 Regent had placed a tea kettle on the stove and was taking two clay mugs from the cabinet. Seth leaned against the door, his hand on the knob in case he needed to make a run for it. “Did you kill them?” he demanded. “They were fair kills,” Regent said, evenly. “In the Arena. Believe me, they tried to kill me, too. Especially that lioness. Came damn near to tearing my heart out.” He pulled aside the collar of his suit jacket. Three jagged scars sliced his chest, shoulder to breastbone. Must have been a nasty wound to leave a scar like that, Seth thought. Werekin had amazing healing powers. In spite of himself, Seth was intrigued. “You fought in the Arena?” “Like I told you, I was born in captivity. I started combat training in the Scholae Bestiarii as soon as I skinned.” So he was a warrior breed. The Scholae Bestiarii was where werekin and hunters alike trained to be killers. The training was brutal; those who survived became soldiers in a top-secret private army, deployed on whatever missions their masters saw fit. It was the fate Seth’s dad had saved him from by taking him into hiding. The kettle whistled. “By the time I was your age,” Regent went on, pouring steaming water into the mugs, “I’d fought a dozen matches in the Arena. Won my freedom, eventually.” Ben had told Seth stories about the Arena matches – werekin versus werekin, forced to fight to the death. Once collared, Chimera controlled a werekin’s magic; you did their bidding, up to and including killing your own kind, or had your animus – your life-force – drained drop by excruciating drop, until you were dead. Spiritual exsanguination. If a werekin proved a particularly gifted warrior, the surviving founder of Chimera Enterprises, Ursula LeRoi, could reward him (or her) with freedom. It was a rare honor, though it explained how a weretiger had become an attorney with his creators’ blessing. Nevertheless… “How free is free?” Seth asked. “Afraid I’ll turn you in, cub?” 29 Regent’s smile revealed sharp, pointed white teeth. He held out one of the mugs of tea. Seth finally moved away from the door to accept it. They sat on spindle-backed stools at the sunken bar, backs to the great room. Regent doctored his tea with milk, honey, and sugar. Seth would have preferred coffee, but he sipped to be polite. “Whose ideas were those?” Regent asked, tapping his brow to indicate the jaguar-spot tattoos around Seth’s eye. “Mine.” Seth glanced at the werejackal. Do you know what happens if the hunters find you? “Bet Tommy loved that,” Regent said. “My dad is gone,” Seth said, flatly, and told about the scene in Harlem, the hunters collaring his dad. Ten years ago now. What had become of Thomas Sullivan after, Seth had no way of knowing. Chimera Enterprises ran dozens of facilities around the country, each location top-secret, each one as heavily guarded as a nuclear missile silo. Thomas could have been taken to any one of them. And even if Seth had known which one, his chances of rescuing his dad would have been about zip. Werekin sometimes managed to break out of Chimera. No one Seth had ever heard of had managed to break in. “What did you do then?” Regent asked. “We had a friend. Naomi.” Seth’s throat felt tight; he took a sip of the bitter tea to loosen it. “She was Underground, too. After Dad got collared, she took me to Philly. We stayed off the grid, like you do Underground – no I.D.s., no schools, jobs that paid cash under the table. Then, a few days ago, the hunters got her, too.” Unless Regent was an idiot, and Seth didn’t think he was, he had to know Seth was leaving as much unsaid. But Seth was not outing Ben to Regent. Werekin or not, Regent was a stranger, and in the Underground, survival depended on anonymity. Rather than press the point, Regent switched gears. “How much do you know about our history, cub?” Seth shrugged. “Everything.” “Of course you do.” Regent smiled indulgently. “You’re, what, fifteen?” “Almost seventeen,” Seth snapped. He hated when adults patronized him. 30 “Sixteen, then. I stand corrected.” Regent hooked an ankle around his stool leg. “Well? Go on, cub. Enlighten me, since you know everything.” Seth was tempted to tell Regent to screw himself, but he had come here for help, and Regent had knowledge about Chimera’s inner workings – knowledge that could keep Seth alive and out of chains, and possibly help him find Naomi’s killers. Seth might not have known why Naomi had sent him to Fairfax, to the mother he had been hidden from for sixteen years, but he did know why Ben had wanted him here: to keep him away from the Resistance. Philly had a strong Resistance movement. Until his rage cooled, Ben wanted Seth as far away from the werekin who fought Chimera’s rule as possible. Like Thomas, Naomi and Ben had steered clear of the Resistance. The point of being Underground was to avoid detection, and the Resistance wasn’t known for its subtlety. Naomi had made Seth promise a dozen times over the years he wouldn’t mix up with them. He thought she would rather have seen him boosting cars for the Colemans. Naomi wasn’t here to exact promises from him anymore, though. Seth stood. He was naturally restless – it was a cat thing, the urge to prowl, and sitting still with his nerves on edge was like dipping his feet in molten lead. He hopped onto the back of the couch and trotted along the edge, a gymnast on a balance beam, burning off the nervous energy he had been suppressing for days, first at the airport and then on the plane and then at the Stewards’. “Where should I start?” he asked. “I find the beginning usually works well,” Regent said. Okey-dokey, Seth thought. You asked for it. “Once upon a time, when the world was young and humans lived in caves and hunted with bows and arrows, there was a magical island paradise called Lemuria. A tribe of shamans lived there, and every night, they prayed to the animal gods living in the stars, the Totems, to come down to Earth and bless them with their magic. One night, the Totems answered. After that, the children born to the shamans weren’t human. They were werekin. Shapeshifters. Born with both a human and an animal skin, able to shift between the two at will. 31 “On Lemuria, werekin lived in Clans according to their Totem: the Jaguar Clan, the Rat Clan, the Serpent Clan, the Elephant Clan, and so on and so forth, hundreds of breeds, all ruled by their queen, the White Swan. Since they were kindred, the Clans lived in peace and harmony – the lion lay down with the lamb, the fox made nice with the hen, the tortoise shook hands with the hare, all that jazz. Until, one day, our werekin love-fest was crashed by,” here Seth paused dramatically, “humans. “At first, the werekin welcomed the newcomers to Lemuria. Showed them their magic, told them all their secrets, about the Totems, about their sensitivity to silver, everything. Sadly for the werekin, the humans decided, as humans tend to do, that Lemuria was such a nice place they’d like to have it for themselves, and while they were at it, they’d take the power of the Totems and harness that, too, enslaving the werekin as soldiers to help them conquer the rest of humankind. Understandably, the werekin said no thanks. So the humans called up their buddies back home, parked their war-ships all around Lemuria, and laid siege to the werekin motherland. “The war went on for years and years. Finally, when it seemed certain Lemuria would be conquered, the White Swan gathered all of the surviving werekin Clans together and called upon the Totems to sink the island beneath the sea, to keep their magic forever safe from human hands.” Having reached the end of the couch, Seth pirouetted, arms extended, and back-flipped onto the mantle. From this angle, the light glinted coldly in Regent’s eyes, bleaching them of color like his skull had been hollowed out. “How’m I doing so far?” “About like I expected,” Regent said, dryly. “Go on.” Storytime would be seen through to the bitter end, it seemed. Seth resumed his tightrope act. “Okay. Where was I? Oh. Right. Lemuria did its big splashy bye-bye, the humans sailed home empty-handed, and for the next gazillion years, the werekin and their motherland were thought to be just crazy old stories scribbled in ancient Egyptian tombs and Mayan pyramids. But some modern scholars, namely Elijah Bishop and Ursula LeRoi, were convinced Lemuria was a real place. 32 “1960s America. Vietnam. Flower children. Acid trips. Everyone who wasn’t a die-hard nerd was enjoying the free love, but Chimera Enterprises was trolling the oceans, hunting for the lost island of Lemuria. That’s how Bishop and LeRoi discovered Mt. Hokulani, a submerged volcano off the Hawaiian Islands. They were convinced it was part of Lemuria. Turns out they were right. When they sent their submersibles down to check it out, they found the Ark – a crystal containing the genetic material of the lost race of the werekin. The proverbial motherload. “Chimera Enterprises signed an above-top-secret deal with the U.S. government, establishing what would forever after be known as Project Ark. First, with Uncle Sam’s help, they sucked the werekin’s magical chromosomes out of the crystal. Then they tried injecting the alien DNA directly into test-tube embryos, but the results were something pretty close to the monster Chimera is named for, and the Gen-0s, as they called them, had to be destroyed. Next they implanted the werekin embryos in human surrogates, and wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am, nine months later, through the miracle of reproductive technology, Generation 1 was born. Chimera Enterprises had resurrected an alien race that went extinct before Rome was getting its Caesar on. “What baffled the good doctors at Chimera was how the werekin gene operated. They started breeding us as soon as the Gen-1s came of age, but breeding a werebat with a werebat didn’t necessarily produce another werebat, and sometimes, two werekin parents produced a human child, one with no animal skin at all. Meanwhile, trouble was brewing between Chimera’s founders. Dr. Bishop wanted to treat the werekin as equals; Dr. LeRoi wanted to use them as slaves. LeRoi’s position had the backing of Uncle Sam, and nothing Bishop could say would convince anyone that the werekin were a peaceful species and would not conquer humanity if allowed their freedom. Thus, not long after the Gen-2s were born, Bishop took matters into his own hands. He orchestrated a mass breakout of werekin from Chimera’s facilities. “The escapees scattered across the globe, doing their best to live under the radar, to blend in with humans – even intermarrying with them. But blood calls to blood. Those 33 werekin that could stuck together, and slowly, the Underground was formed. “Elijah Bishop was executed for treason, leaving Ursula LeRoi in charge of Chimera. She has never stopped hunting us, and because she never will, the Resistance was formed to bring down Chimera. End goal? Freedom from enslavement and persecution for every werekin on the planet. And that,” Seth turned a somersault into a perfect dismount that brought him back to the floor with a sweeping bow, “is how we all lived happily never after.” *** “Very amusing,” Regent said. He did not sound amused. “Did Tommy tell you that story?” “No.” What Seth knew of Project Ark had been related by Ben, the same story over and over, as familiar to him as the creases in Ben’s whiskery cheeks. “Why? Did I leave something out?” “A few things,” Regent said. “You ever hear of the Black Swan?” For a werekin, that was like asking if you’d ever heard of Santa Claus, but Seth dutifully recited the legend: “One day the Black Swan will be born, the first and only of her kind, a werekin whose blood, when joined with the blood of all other werekin breeds, will have the power to raise Lemuria from the depths, restoring the werekin to their motherland.” Ben had told him that one, too. Seth had asked if he could have some magic beans to go along with it. The Black Swan might have been the rallying symbol for the Resistance, but Seth suspected their belief in her was symbolic rather than literal. Lemuria was gone. No mythical savior was bringing it back. Regent tipped back on his stool. Seth slouched against the shuttered wall, hands in his pockets. “And why,” Regent pressed, “would the werekin want to raise Lemuria?” “Because it’s our home. The one place we could live in peace.” “So why would Chimera Enterprises want to raise Lemuria?” 34 Seth was sure this line of questioning was about something more than the history of their race, but he couldn’t for the life of him figure out what Regent was really getting at. “LeRoi wants the power of the Totems,” he said. “Same as the humans before her.” “And that power was?” What was this, a pop quiz? “Some kind of magic, I guess,” Seth said. Regent grunted, unsatisfied by Seth’s answer. Personally, Seth felt there were more urgent matters to discuss. “Am I allowed to ask a question now?” “Technically,” Regent said, “you just did.” Seth tapped the metal blinds. “What’s behind Door Number Two?” “Ah.” Regent walked over to a panel recessed into the wall – what Seth, with a thief’s practiced eye, had marked as a control pad for a security system. He punched in a code. 1-5-7-1. Same as his brand. With a whir a motor started up, and the slats retracted into the ceiling. Behind them was a wall made entirely of glass. Seth looked up. High overhead, metal girders supported a domed skylight. Moonlight filtered down to the ground far below – red earth overgrown with giant ferns, moss-covered rocks, green shrubs…A wide creek twisted between the tall, leafy trees, a tapestry of rubbery leaves and woody vines arcing over the creek, forty, fifty feet in the air. A big cat playground. Seth splayed his palms on the glass, aching with the desire to scale those trees, dive off those branches, sun himself on the slabs of sandstone protruding into the creek. He wanted to skin so badly the urge was almost painful. “This,” he pronounced, “is wicked. But – how do you explain it to people?” “I don’t get a lot of visitors,” Regent said. Seth couldn’t imagine why not, what with the charming décor of dead werekin. “C’mon. Let’s sit.” Regent left the blinds open and they went to sit on the couches, the coffee table separating them. “I can talk to Jack and Lydia for you,” Regent offered. “Convince them to buy whatever story you’re selling about why you’re here.” Loosening his tie, he draped his arms over the back of the couch. This somehow 35 made him appear even larger. “But I’m going to need something in return,” he said. Aha. Never a free lunch, as Naomi would have said. Seth plopped his heels on the coffee table. “My employment skills are a little lacking, to be honest. Unless you need a car hotwired. Or you have a mouse problem. I could probably handle that.”’ “I want to train you,” Regent said. “Train me?” Seth frowned. “You mean, like to fight?” “No, cub, to tap dance.” Regent sighed. “Yes, like to fight.” This was not the favor Seth had expected – because really, it was a favor to him. “Why would you do that?” he asked. “You won your freedom. If Chimera found out you were helping me, they’d collar you again.” “I was your age once,” Regent said. “A million years ago, it seems like, but I remember how it was to be young. I imagine you’ve been thinking about joining up with the Resistance ever since those hunters killed your friend.” Seth didn’t bother denying it. “I could try to talk you out of it. I could tell you the Resistance doesn’t stand a chance against an organization as powerful and connected as Chimera. I could tell you that, to the Resistance Commanders, you’ll be just another weapon to throw at Chimera, and when you’re dead, they won’t even waste time burying you. But you wouldn’t listen to me, would you?” “No,” Seth said. Joining the Resistance was his best chance of avenging Naomi. “Didn’t think so.” Regent sat back. “Tommy Sullivan was a friend of mine. I owe it to him to make sure his son stands a chance of surviving. But,” of course there was another but, “I’ll only train you on one condition: You don’t go looking for the Resistance until I say you’re ready.” “No. No way.” Seth shook his head, side to side. “I’ll train with you, I’ll work my tail off at whatever you give me to do, but as soon as I see my chance to get the bastards that killed Naomi, I’m out of here. Fairfax is just a – ” Regent skinned so fast Seth didn’t even see the telltale ripple down his spine. One second a buff forty-something dude in a suit and tie was sitting across from him; the next, a five-hundred pound Bengal tiger was leaping across the coffee table, claws aimed at Seth’s throat. 36 Seth’s reaction was instinctive: Pushing off with his toes, he somersaulted over the couch, skinning in mid-air; to anyone watching, it would have seemed he vanished, on a shimmer of displaced air, to be replaced by a jaguar that landed on four paws, fur bristling, roaring loud enough to rattle the windowpanes. Seth was small for a jaguar, five-and-a-half-feet long and thin enough you could see his spine when he ran. His fur was tawny with red undertones, spotted with black rosettes; his tail was long, banded with black. Only his eyes were the same, large, round, and golden – evidence that, at his core, he remained Seth Michael Sullivan. Regent’s eyes were the same, too, marbled brown, though Seth took little comfort in this as the tiger slammed into him, with all the gentleness of a freight train; the much smaller, much lighter jaguar crashed into the bar, cracking his wedge-shaped skull on the wooden lip. Everything went black, the suddenness of the blow overwriting the actual pain of it. Immediately, Seth slid back into his human skin. He came to on the floor, splintered bits of bar stool stuck to his jeans and T-shirt. Regent – a fully human Regent – was leaning against the bar, tie askew, glaring down at him. Seth fingered the goose-egg on his scalp. Luckily werkein healed quickly, or he would have had even more explaining to do to his mother and step-father. “What the hell was that for?” he snapped. “You,” Regent said, “are a spoiled brat. You think you’re tough because you can skin into a jaguar? You’re no warrior. You wouldn’t last ten seconds in the Arena. You’ve only gotten by this far hiding behind people older and wiser than you are.” “That’s your recruitment speech?” Seth sat up carefully; his skull felt like it had been split open along the suture. “It needs work, just so you know.” “You want me to give you a hug and tell you it’s all gonna be okay? Chimera has eyes and ears all over the Underground, cub. A werejaguar won’t stay secret forever. And if you knew as much about Chimera as you think you do, you’d know why they’re so eager to collar you.” “I know why they want to collar me,” Seth said. “Werejaguars are warrior breeds. Very rare. Very powerful.” 37 Yeah, he was a real powerhouse, having his tail kicked by a guy his dad’s age. Regent scratched his striped beard. He looked like he had given away too much, and was regretting it. “You have my offer,” he said, stiffly. “Stay here, stay out of the Resistance, and I can train you. I can make it so when the hunters come for you, you’ll be ready.” When, he said. Not if. Seth shook splinters out of his hair with as much defiance as he could muster. “Maybe I’ll come for them first.” Regent treated this with the derision it deserved. “How would you do that, exactly? Attack a Chimera laboratory? The hunters that killed your friend, at most there would have been four. Two pairs. Hunters always hunt in pairs,” Seth filed that away for future reference, “and each Chimera facility is guarded by dozens of pairs of hunters. The one I was held at had forty werekin warriors, too – forty warriors trained by General David Burke himself to fight just as well in human or animal skin. And that’s not to mention the delights Chimera’s scientists cook up. I’ve seen them pour silver powder into a werekin’s mouth, burn the tongue right out of his head. I’ve seen them hook werekin up to silver drips and stand around taking notes on how long they last before the poison kills them. I’ve seen them reach into someone’s mind,” Regent moved forward in a flash, caught Seth by the chin, and pressed his thumb, hard, into Seth’s temple, “and draw out their deepest, darkest secrets to torture them with. Sound like something you want to go up against, cub?” Seth didn’t answer. He didn’t need to. Regent mocked him with a smile. “But what am I thinking? You don’t need training. You already know everything.” Jerking his chin out of Regent’s grasp, Seth glared at him. From some adults, it would have been a motivational tactic – insult the hot-headed cub so he accepts your challenge just to spite you. Seth didn’t think that was Regent’s game. He meant every word. He thought Seth was worthless. Soft. Weak. Maybe Seth was those things. He had never seen battle, never fought in the Arena. When those hunters had killed Naomi, he had run away. He had certainly been scared when Regent was trying to rip his throat out. 38 One thing Seth knew: If he wanted to survive, he had a lot to learn. Like it or not, he wasn’t going to find a better teacher than Werner Regent. 39 Chapter Three: Close Encounters In the dream, he was back in Philly, standing in the living room of his row house. At first he thought it was snow swirling in the wind that howled through the shattered window; then he thought it was ash – powdery and gray, blanketing the nubby carpet, coating the bloodstained countertops. It wasn’t until the wind whipped across his cheeks, stinging his skin, that Seth tasted silver on his tongue, and realized what it was. Silver powder. Silver powder meant hunters. On cue, a resounding boom echoed through the house. The front door shuddered; Seth whirled toward the window, ready to make a run for it – but on the sill sat a small arctic fox, white coat tinged blue, muzzle flecked with gray. Seth froze. “Dad?” he whispered. The werefox lowered his head, gazing up at Seth with sad blue eyes. The silver rain fell harder. Seth’s skin began to blister and burn. Somewhere, a voice was singing, a soft, mournful melody that called to the magic in Seth’s blood. A dark shadow crept along the wall, in the shape of a jaguar. The front door splintered, and hands wrestled Seth to the ground, muffling his screams in the carpet. In his mind, he heard a voice whisper: “Save her, Seth. Save her, and she will save us all.” *** Seth woke, panting, to a cold, wet nose snuffling his ear. He groaned and rolled over, trying to pull the pillow over his head, but Captain Hook persisted, pawing at the blankets and barking. C’mon, soldier! Up and at ’em! “All right, all right,” Seth moaned. “I’m awake, buddy, I’m awake.” He sat up, palms flat on the mattress, and arched his spine. On the windowsill, Poe imitated him. Rosy evening light slanted across the bedroom floor. The Hello Kitty alarm clock told Seth 40 it was 4:16p.m. He looked over at Captain Hook. “Any ideas who ‘she’ might be?” The little Dachshund whined, like he was advising Seth to lay off the catnip. Someone had cleaned Seth’s room while he was asleep. The floor was no longer covered in clothes, and the nightstand had been cleared of books and pamphlets. The bare walls and empty closet made him feel like a guest in a hotel, just passing through. He trudged into the bathroom, raked a comb through his messy hai, splashed some cold water on his cheeks. Sufficiently groomed, he wandered out into the hall with the vague idea of hunting down some dinner. The door to the room across from his was open. It looked to be a psychedelic version of the former guestroom currently inhabited by Seth: hot pink throw rugs on the same white carpet, same oak furniture (bed, desk, dresser, vanity), chocolate-brown walls sponge-painted pink and purple, matching the polka dot bedspread and curtains. The mirror on the vanity was practically papered over with photographs. Marshall Townsend featured prominently, in his blue-and-gold Fairfax High Knights basketball jersey. Leigh was sitting on the canopy bed, surrounded by poster board, markers, and stencils. Her party dress had been replaced by extra-comfy yoga pants and a long T-shirt that proclaimed Animals Are People, Too. Ah, the irony. She glanced up from her stenciling at Seth, loitering in her doorway, and said, “It’s because you’re a boy.” Seth looked down at his sleep-wrinkled jeans and T-shirt. “What is?” “If I crawled into the house at dawn, Daddy would ground me for life. But not you. You don’t even get a talking-to.” Leigh recapped her Caribbean Green marker and traded it for the Razzle Dazzle Rose. “Parents treat boys differently. I see it all the time with Marshall and Whitney.” Seth could not see Marshall Townsend crawling into the house at dawn, period. “No,” he said, “it’s because your parents knew where I was. I was with your dad’s business partner.” “Werner?” Leigh’s tone made Seth think she wasn’t a fan of his new weretiger guru. “But I thought you – ” 41 Her cheeks colored the same shade as her marker. Slinking over to the desk, Seth spun the chair around and lowered onto it backwards. “You thought I was out slashing tires and smoking dope and generally gang-banging?” He said all of this with a smile, to show he wasn’t offended. It was what people assumed, given the dyed hair and tattoos and the weird werekin vibe. Combing her hair over her shoulder, Leigh went back to her stenciling. Seth thought she was fighting a smile. “Good luck finding a gang to bang with in Fairfax,” she said. “I forgot, we’re in Hicksville. What do you have here, posses?” “You live here now too, you know,” Leigh said, mildly. “So what did Werner want?” “To straighten me out,” Seth said. “Is that something you need? Straightening out?” Probably, though Seth doubted it would take. Ben and Naomi had been trying to straighten him out for years. “Regent thinks so,” he said. “He’s giving me karate lessons.” Technically this was not a lie. Regent had agreed to train Seth as he had been trained in the Scholae Bestiarii – in weaponry and martial arts. Seth had begged Ben to train him for years, but Ben had refused, on the grounds that Thomas Sullivan had sacrificed his life to keep Seth from being turned into a killer. Apparently Regent had no such qualms. Seth tipped back in his chair. “You must know Regent pretty well. What’s his deal?” “You’ve been to his house. He slaughters beautiful, innocent animals, stuffs them, and hangs them on his walls like a Monet. Some of those are endangered species.” Remembering the slaughtered werekin on Regent’s walls turned Seth’s stomach, fair kills or not. Time for a new topic. “What’s the poster for?” he asked. Leigh displayed it for him. Student Vegan Society: Peace, Love, Vegan was spelled out in rainbow letters above a cartoonish drawing of the Fairfax High Knights’ mascot flashing a peace sign. “I’m club president,” Leigh explained, proudly. “Whitney and I started it this fall. We’re setting up a booth at the basketball game to recruit more members.” 42 She waved a fat stack of brochures. Every Hamburger Has a Face. If You Love Animals, Don’t Eat Them. Seth’s stomach growled; he hadn’t eaten since the steak and Oreos the night before. Which begged the question: “Didn’t your parents serve filet mignon at their party?” “Do not get me started on that,” said Leigh. “I wanted to go with this delicious vegan lasagna – no cheese, it’s all spinach and broccoli and tomato sauce – but Daddy says he won’t give up meat even if they start making tofu-flavored cows.” Seth laughed. Leigh stuck her tongue out at him, just like a real kid sister. *** Lydia was already in the kitchen making dinner when Seth turned up in search of food. The Stewards took their meals in the dining room, at a long mahogany table built to seat a dozen. Jack Steward came in while Seth, anxious to prove himself the good son, was setting the table. He couldn’t remember if the spoon went beside the fork or the knife. Naomi had worked long hours keeping house for a family in the Chestnut Hill neighborhood; sit-down dinners in the Franklin-Sullivan household had been rare. Usually it had just been Seth at the kitchen counter, alone, shoveling down whatever Naomi had put by for him in the fridge. “Seth.” Jack offered his hand. Seth’s step-father was familiar from the pictures on the stairs, a handsome, athletic man with distinguished streaks of gray in his dark hair, a thin mustache, and a neat goatee. He was dressed casually, in jeans and a Georgetown sweatshirt, but the diamond ring on his pinkie finger said he could buy and sell a punk like Seth. “I hope you’re settling in all right?” “Thanks for letting me stay here, Mr. Steward,” Seth said, displaying those manners Naomi had tried so hard to teach him. “Of course. As long as you need.” The words were right, yet they did nothing to warm Jack’s cold gray eyes. Seth wasn’t foreseeing a lot of father-son outings in their future. 43 Dinner was homemade spaghetti and meatballs – golfballsize, mouthwateringly juicy meatballs. Lydia dished him up two dipperfuls, and Seth gave his attention wholly over to the food, letting the dinner table talk roll by him. Most of it concerned Jack’s job. Yawn. The Steward and Regent Law Firm represented corporate clients. No splashy murder trials with innocent defendants facing the electric chair. Not even a sleazy divorcee hiding secret love children. Leigh picked at her salad, watching Seth switch from forking pasta into his mouth double-time to devouring a second helping of brownie a la mode. “You eat like a pig,” she observed. “How do you stay so skinny?” “High metabolism,” Seth said. “And I’m not skinny. I’m toned.” “Is that like saying you’re not ‘short,’ you’re ‘vertically challenged’?” “Leigh,” Lydia said. “Don’t tease your brother.” Seth offered Leigh a chocolate-smeared grin. Take that, baby sister. “So, Seth.” Jack leaned forward, twirling his coffee spoon. He hadn’t eaten much, Seth had noticed. “You’ve been awfully quiet. Tell us about yourself.” Oh joy. At least Regent seemed to have kept up his end of their deal, Seth thought, since he wasn’t getting the third degree about turning up on the Stewards’ doorstep out of the blue. “There’s really not much to tell,” he said. “I’m sure that’s not true.” Jack’s smile glittered like frost on a windowpane. Yeah, Seth thought, he hates me. Lydia broke in. “Werner told us you were homeschooled?” Seth nodded, sticking to the story he and Regent had concocted the night before. “Dad wasn’t – isn’t – around much, so I had a tutor. Naomi.” Her name caught in Seth’s throat. He faked a cough into his water glass. “What about friends? Sports? Extracurriculars?” Jack wanted to know. “What did you do for fun there in Philadelphia?” Oh, you know, Jack. Grand theft auto. Felony B&E. A little recreational shoplifting. Out loud, Seth said, “I like to read.” 44 Not even Lydia looked as though she believed this, though it was true. Seth had spent countless hours in the Charles Santore Public Library, devouring books on everything from chemistry to archaeology. Read widely and voraciously, Thomas Sullivan had liked to say; in their teeny-tiny apartment in Harlem, books had teetered on windowsills, spilled across countertops, lined the backs of the steam radiators. He had passed that love of language onto his son. Seth could quote Nietzsche and Whitman and Homer – in Russian, French, Spanish, or Italian. “I like to swim, too,” he added, as everyone seemed to be waiting for more. “But that’s wonderful!” Lydia beamed like Seth had just said he enjoyed feeding starving orphans. “Fairfax High has a swim team. They won state last year, didn’t they, Leigh?” “Who cares?” Leigh stabbed moodily at the remnants of her brownie. “Swimming is lame.” Had Marshall Townsend been a swimmer, Seth didn’t think it would have been lame. But he kept that to himself. The phone began to ring. Lydia hurried into the living room to answer it. Jack once again nailed Seth down with his iceman gaze. “So, Seth, any plans for the future?” His phrasing was barbed, like he doubted Seth had a future to plan. Giving up on the good son routine, Seth assumed his best slacker smile. “You know how it is. I just try to be Zen about things. Why make a plan?” “Hmm.” Jack reached over, covering Leigh’s hand with his. Leigh practically glowed under his smile. “Leigh’s had her sights set on Georgetown from the cradle, haven’t you, baby?” “I’m going to practice animal rights law,” Leigh announced. Seth choked. “Jack?” That was Lydia, in the doorway, carrying the cordless phone. “It’s Werner. He says it’s urgent. About a client.” What could be so urgent about a corporate client on New Year’s Day was a mystery to Seth, but Jack immediately dropped his napkin in his plate and went out, phone pressed to his ear. Seth jumped up to help Lydia clear the table. “I can talk to the swim coach about signing you up for the team, if you like,” she offered, leading him into the kitchen. “I know it’s mid-year, but 45 I’m sure they’ll make an exception for a new student. And speaking of,” she said, “we should pick up your school supplies tomorrow. And some clothes. It’s too cold for just T-shirts.” Whoa doggies. Were they talking about what Seth thought they were talking about? “Mom!” Leigh shunted Seth out of the way before he could get his voice working. “You’re taking me shopping tomorrow, remember? Me and Whitney, for my birthday. It’s tradition.” Seth froze beside the sink. “Your birthday is tomorrow?” “Yeah.” Leigh narrowed her eyes. “So?” “Nothing.” Seth deposited his armload of cups in the sink, studiously avoiding his mother’s gaze. Leigh’s birthday was January second. His was January fifth. Two kids, exactly one year apart, by two different fathers. “Any-way,” Leigh went on, “Seth doesn’t want to hang out with us at the mall.” She kicked Seth in the ankle, giving him to understand that if he contradicted this, he would need to sleep with one eye open. Lydia sighed. “He doesn’t have to hang out with us, Leigh. Seth is old enough to do his own shopping. We’ll all just ride together.” While Seth rated shopping right up there with vivisection, the more pressing matter, to his mind, was school. For most teenagers, moving to a new city would automatically mean starting a new school, but it had honestly never occurred to Seth. Seth didn’t do school. School meant birth certificates, Social Security numbers, immunization records. A paper trail for the hunters to find. Registering at Fairfax High would also require transcripts, which Seth did not have. Unless Regent could fake some up for him. “Can’t you just homeschool me?” he said. Leigh coughed. It sounded like lameness. “Adleigh Jean,” Lydia said, sharply. She smiled at Seth, mistaking his reluctance for nerves. “You’ll like Fairfax High, honey. And Leigh will be with you. I know she’s in tenth grade, but you can eat lunch together – ” Leigh looked mortified “ – and you already know Whitney and Marshall. I’m sure you’ll fit in just fine.” 46 Yeah, Seth could just see Marshall Townsend introducing him to his varsity all-star buddies. Hey guys, this is my new friend Seth! Nobody flush his head in a toilet! But bullies were the least of Seth’s worries. “Maybe you could wait to enroll me,” he said. “Just for a couple weeks. Give me a chance to adjust. Spend some time with you.” Hide from the hunters. Live to see seventeen. “Honey, you need to make friends here,” Lydia said. And though Seth did not have much experience with mothers, he understood the subject to be closed. *** Shopping, it seemed, was an all-day event that required rising at dawn. Being, like all cats, nocturnal, Seth was accustomed to staying out until sunrise, sleeping past noon; thus he stumbled bleary-eyed into the driveway the next morning, his hair a nest of flyaways and cowlicks. Jack was backing his Beamer out of the drive, headed off to his standing Sunday morning brunch at the country club. He tooted the horn at Lydia as she started up the Escalade. Leigh was still inside, doing her hair. Shopping also apparently required massive amounts of primping. Seth thanked the Totems he had been born male. The brick fence around the Stewards’ backyard ended at the corner of their three-car garage. Only a short border of winterbare shrubs separated their driveway from the Townsends’. Marshall was outside, shooting hoops at a goal mounted on the side of his three-car garage. He was wearing dark jeans and a white V-necked sweater that made his hair look black as ink, ridiculously bright-eyed for so early in the day. Seeing Seth, he wandered over, still dribbling the ball. “Where’s the birthday girl?” “Inside,” said Seth, slouching against the Escalade’s fender. “Getting fab-u-licious.” “Mom!” Seth and Marshall looked up. Leigh, still in her bathrobe, had stuck her head out the front door. “Have you seen my pink barrettes?” 47 Lydia sighed and marched up the porch steps. Marshall looked at Seth. “This could take a while,” he warned. “Leigh is very particular about her hair.” Terrific. Maybe he could curl up in the backseat and take a nap. Seth nodded at the basketball. “What position do you play?” “Center.” Marshall seemed surprised by his interest. “You play?” Seth shook his head. “Some pickup games in Philly. Never on a team or anything.” “Well?” Marshall held out the ball. “C’mon, Philadelphia. Show us what you got.” There was a challenge in those baby blues. If there was one thing Seth had never been able to resist, it was a challenge. Even when he should. In one graceful bound, he hopped the shrub-fence, shouldered past Marshall’s block, and tossed the ball up – perfect three-pointer. Marshall’s mouth fell open. Seth scooped the ball up and passed it back to him. “Well?” he said. “Let’s see what you’ve got, Indiana.” Marshall’s mouth snapped into a grin. Golden Boy had moves, Seth had to give him that: He was as light on his feet as any cat, and just as nimble. Seth, however, was faster. Way faster. In his human skin, he retained his best jaguar qualities: speed, strength, agility. No mere mortal could have bested him. When Marshall ducked by him to execute a layup, Seth stole the ball right out of his hands, sprang off his tiptoes, and dunked, rattling the backboard. “Wow, Philadelphia.” Marshall picked up the ball and held onto it, studying Seth. “You were putting me on about not playing, right?” “Nope,” Seth said. “But don’t sweat it, Indiana. I’m just naturally athletic. Complements my astonishing good looks.” Marshall laughed. He seemed startled by the sound, and broke off with his lower lip caught in his teeth; about that time, the Townsends’ back door opened. “Marshall, Mom wants to know if you took out the tra…” Whitney froze in the process of tugging on a wool stocking cap – the kind with ear flaps and a fuzzy ball on top. Seeing Seth, she turned bright pink. 48 On her heels was a supermodel-thin woman with blonde hair and brown eyes, whom Seth correctly guessed was Mrs. Townsend. She called Seth “sweetie” and insisted he call her Meredith. “It’s so great to see you again, sweetie,” she gushed. “I remember when you were born, you and – ” “Ready!” Leigh sang out; she had appeared on the porch, this time in jeans and a lacey black sweater, with pink barrettes in her hair. Seth flipped the ball to Marshall off his fingertips. “Let me know if you want a rematch,” he said. “You’re going with them?” Marshall looked surprised, either that Seth enjoyed shopping (which he didn’t) or that Leigh had consented for him to go (which she hadn’t). Seth explained that it was basically a hostage situation, with his mother as the heavy. Leigh leaned out the Escalade’s back window. “You could come, too, Marshall,” she said, brightly. “Keep Seth from being the odd man out.” Like she cared whether Seth had to skulk around the mall on his own. Not that he planned to. Seth wasn’t picky about his wardrobe; as long as it wasn’t frilly or pastel or spandex, he would wear it. He intended to complete his shopping in an under an hour, leaving him plenty of time before Leigh’s birthday lunch to prowl his new city. In his human skin, of course. Marshall let the ball roll up against the porch. “Sure,” he said. “Why not?” Yes, Seth thought, why not? Because what this day really needed was the chance to entertain his sister’s crush. *** It was a ten-mile drive from Castle Estates to downtown Fairfax, if you employed the term “downtown” loosely: a few high-rise offices, some newly-remodeled condos overlooking the river, an array of strip malls and chain restaurants. A big Barnes and Noble across the street from the mall looked promising, at least. Seth and Marshall bid goodbye to the girls at the food court, with plans to meet at someplace called MoJo’s for lunch. The mall was crowded. Seth, as expected, attracted more than a few stares, what with his dyed hair and golden eyes and jaguar 49 tattoos. Marshall attracted his own brand of attention from the roving packs of girls, though he didn’t seem to notice. They bypassed stores advertising Seven jeans and Lucky Brand shirts before finally happening onto a storefront with a nondescript mannequin dressed in a Black Sabbath T-shirt. RE-SPIN, read the lettering across the window. GENTLY USED BOOKS, MUSIC, AND CLOTHING. This was more like it. Seth started for the door. “You’re going in there?” Marshall had pulled up short. Seth looked back at him. “What’s the matter?” he said. “Not Abercrombie enough for you?” Marshall rolled his eyes. “No. It’s just – this place has a…reputation.” “A reputation? For what?” They were in a mall, for Pete’s sake. Seth doubted Re-Spin was selling stolen goods out of the back. Although perhaps he could get in on that action… “For – you know. For weed and stuff.” “Well, I’m not planning to buy any weed,” Seth said. Still, Marshall hesitated. “If my father hears I went in here, he’ll freak,” he said. “Is your dad a cop or something?” “No.” Marshall looked startled. “He’s Chief of Surgery at Fairfax Memorial. Why?” “Then how is he going to know?” Seth backed into the store, beckoning with a crooked finger. “Come on, Indiana. Live a little.” Marshall sighed but followed him in. The store was roomier than it had looked from the outside. Bins of used CDs lined one wall; at the back, bookshelves sagging with paperbacks were labeled Mystery, Horror, Poetry, Classics, Sci-Fi; in the center, racks of secondhand clothes – mostly jeans, rocker T-shirts, and hoodies – were grouped around a bank of floor-length mirrors. The walls were painted black, adorned with grindhouse posters for movies like Switchblade Sisters and Jesse James Meets Frankenstein’s Daughter. Metal shelves displayed packaged incense and Tarot cards, accounting for the spicy hint of patchouli that greeted Seth’s sensitive werekin nose. 50 A boy about his age was manning the cash register, thumbing through a copy of Rolling Stone. He looked like your average teenage hippie: “Save the Earth or Die” T-shirt, strawberryblonde hair tied back in a ponytail, silver St. Francis medal around his neck. He was also tall, rail-thin, and pale, like an albino scarecrow. A pair of overlarge ears stuck out from the sides of his head, the tips as pink as his small nose. He looked up, saw Seth, and twitched. There was no other word for it; his whole face spasmed, even his big ears. Seth glanced down at himself, checking that he hadn’t unwittingly sprouted claws or fur, and Marshall bumped into him from behind. “Ow,” Seth complained, rubbing his shoulder. “Sorry,” Marshall mumbled. When Seth looked back around, the clerk had gotten his face under control, though his pupils were still extremely dilated. Could be a bad trip, Seth mused. He had read marijuana made people paranoid. “Hi,” he said, in what he hoped was a calming tone. Nice kitty. Not gonna hurt ya. “Right,” the clerk squeaked. “I mean hi. Uh, hey, Marshall.” “Hey, Emery.” Hurrying around Seth, Marshall concealed himself behind a rack of concert tees. Good grief, did he think his father had spies at the mall? “Emery, this is Seth Sullivan. Leigh Steward’s brother.” Marshall lifted a shoulder, as if to say, Don’t ask. “Seth, this is Emery Little. We’re in the same class at school. Seth just moved here, from Philadelphia,” Marshall explained. “Ph-Philadelphia?” The tips of Emery Little’s ears turned even redder; he looked like he was about to say something more, then changed his mind. “So…uh…you guys in the market for anything special?” “Seth needs new threads,” Marshall said. Seth’s eyebrows shot up. Threads? Were they, like, all so groovy now, man? While he rifled through clothes, Marshall and Emery commiserated about the science teacher they both hated, Dr. Gideon. They seemed friendly, despite Emery not being a jock, or, from what Seth could see, rich. He must have been one of the Haven Heights kids, Seth thought. 51 In ten minutes flat, Seth had snapped up some jeans, a couple of sweatshirts, and a super-cool camouflage jacket with a 101st Airborne patch on the arm. The jacket he slipped on; the rest Emery bagged. Altogether his purchases barely made a dent in the wad of cash Lydia had pressed on him, yet Seth still felt awkward forking over his mother’s money. When he noticed a “help wanted” sign by the register, he asked for an application, and filled it out at the counter, Marshall standing close enough to read over his shoulder. Emery’s smile as he slid it into an envelope of other applications looked rather pained. Seth had a feeling Re-Spin would not be calling him for an interview. From the mall, as they still had lots of time to kill before lunch and Seth was in need of a serious sugar-and-caffeine fix, he and Marshall hiked across the street to the bright and spacious Barnes and Noble and ordered coffees and muffins in the café. Seth paid. He figured Marshall was doing Leigh a favor by hanging out with her delinquent brother. Shouldn’t cost him money, too. “Don’t look now, Philadelphia,” Marshall said, as they sat down at a table in the back. “You’re being checked out.” “Huh?” Seth turned. A girl of maybe seventeen, more striking than pretty, was browsing the magazine section behind him. She had on skintight jeans and a black leather jacket that showed off her incredible muscle tone, like Action Hero Barbie, right down to the maple-brown hair razor-cut to her scalp. Sure enough, she glanced his way. Their eyes met, hers wintry blue, tinted silver in the bookstore’s bright lights. For some reason, Seth touched the jaguar spots tattooed around his eye. Save her, he heard the voice from his dream say. Save her, and she will save us all. Except this girl did not fit the damsel-in-distress bill. More like the damsel who stomps you into gooey paste and grinds her spike-heeled boot into your face afterwards, just ’cause. Seth turned back around, peeling the paper off his blueberry muffin. Marshall was watching him. “You should ask for her number,” he advised. “Why don’t you ask her?” Seth said. 52 “One, she wasn’t ogling me. Two, she’s not my type.” Marshall curled his hands around his coffee cup. He had long, slender fingers, like a pianist’s. “Isn’t she yours?” Seth shrugged. He wasn’t sure what his type was, actually. Living Underground was lonely. Hard to make friends when you couldn’t tell people anything about yourself. Even harder to woo somebody. Not that he had met anybody he really wanted to woo. Over the summer, Seth had finally had his first kiss, with a girl named Andrea. She was from Flagstaff or Albuquerque or someplace – blonde, petite, suntanned. She had been in Philly visiting her grandmother, and had courted Seth with the determination of a girl who wants a summer fling to tell her friends about. He had escorted her to the fireworks in the park on the Fourth of July, and she had kissed him, lying on a blanket under the stars. It had been all right. They had kissed a few more times after that, in the swing on her grandmother’s porch, in the dark movie theater that showed cheap weekday matinees. She probably would have gone farther, but it had never felt right to Seth. In August, she had moved back to Arizona or wherever. They hadn’t kept in touch. Seth wondered what Marshall’s type was. And if it was redheaded and named Adleigh. “Have you always lived next door to the Stewards?” he asked. “Pretty much. Dad was assigned to the medical team at Fort King, before the government shut the prison down. He took the job at Fairfax Memorial not long after I was born.” Marshall sipped his coffee. “How about you? Always lived in Philly?” “Pretty much,” Seth said. “You don’t have an accent. Aren’t you supposed to say ‘lieberry’ and ‘everyfink’?” “Not bad, Indiana. You almost sound native.” Seth paused. He didn’t enjoy lying, even if it was for Marshall’s own good. “I was homeschooled. Guess I never picked up the dialect.” “Your father must have been strict with you.” Marshall sounded sympathetic. Imagining the worst, no doubt – Seth chained up in a basement for the last sixteen years. And Seth couldn’t tell him it hadn’t been like that, that, all things 53 considered, his life had been a happy one, when he was supposedly in Fairfax because he hated his dad. Instead, he worked up a grin. “Aren’t all fathers strict?” “My father is,” Marshall said. “He has a lot of…expectations.” He ran a hand through his hair, looking away. Seth leaned back in his chair. “Go on.” “It’s nothing,” Marshall said, quickly. “It’s just…well…it’s like, med school, you see? He wants me to go to Harvard, like he did. And – you know. Basketball and…stuff.” Marshall stared harder into his coffee cup. The tops of his cheeks were red. “I thought you liked basketball,” Seth said. Marshall had seemed to that morning, in his driveway… “Sure I do,” Marshall said. “When it’s just for fun.” “When isn’t it fun?” Seth was completely bewildered now. “It’s a game, isn’t it?” “Yeah, unless you’ve got college scouts hounding you, and everybody expecting you to bring home a state title, and – you know what? Never mind.” Abruptly, Marshall pushed back from the table. “We should pick out a present for Leigh while we’re here,” he said. “Surprise her at lunch.” Seth nodded, unable to drum up much enthusiasm. He knew it wasn’t Leigh’s fault their mother had whisked Jack Steward down the aisle two seconds after Thomas Sullivan was gone, but the fact that their birthdays were so close together still stung. The ultimate reminder of how easily Seth had been replaced. As they left the café, he looked around for the girl. His admirer. She was nowhere to be seen. 54 Chapter Four: Pack Mentality MoJo’s was a brewery pub catering to Fairfax’s upscale crowd, serving, in addition to what Marshall swore was the most delicious deep-dish veggie pizza ever invented, twelve original varieties of beer. Kind of a strange place for a Sweet Sixteen, but it had a cool atmosphere – exposed brick walls lined with wooden booths imported from an old London pub, a real fire roaring cheerily in a stone hearth opposite the polished bar. By the time Seth and Marshall arrived, Jack had joined the party, fresh from his champagne brunch at the country club. He was accompanied by Dr. Townsend, Marshall’s father. Wesley Townsend was a tall man with wavy black hair and honey-toned skin, wearing a suit of Italian silk perfectly tailored to his lean frame. Easy to see where Marshall came by his cleancut good looks. In fact, the resemblance between them was almost uncanny. Jack made the introductions. Seth shook the doctor’s hand, wincing when the diamond ring on Dr. Townsend’s pinkie finger, a twin of the one Jack wore, pinched his skin. “You must take after your father,” Dr. Townsend observed, looking from Seth to Lydia, like he couldn’t imagine a woman like her sharing DNA with a punk like Seth. “In most ways,” Seth agreed, with a straight face. Their party had a reserved booth near the fireplace. Seth ended up scrunched against the brick wall, across from Whitney, who hunched over a moleskin notebook, scribbling poems. Dr. Townsend hardly seemed aware of her. His full attention was devoted to Marshall, who sat up straight. Smiling but never laughing. Leigh wanted to open gifts right away. From Whitney there was hand-knitted wool scarf that matched Leigh’s Burberry coat. Jack and Lydia presented her with a Coach purse she had specialrequested; inside was a special gift from Jack: a pair of heartshaped earrings studded with diamonds and Leigh’s birthstone, garnets. Just by looking Seth could tell the gems were real. 55 Leigh squealed as she ripped the paper off. “Daddy, oh my God, they’re gorgeous!” “Jack.” Lydia, exasperated, watched her display the earrings for Whitney and Meredith. “I thought we agreed those were too expensive.” Jack shrugged. “My baby girl only turns sixteen once. Let me spoil her.” Let me show off how rich I am, more like. Seth wondered what would happen if he put a Ferrari on his birthday wish list. For the boys’ gift, Marshall had selected the latest album from Gogol Bordello, a gypsy punk bank Leigh adored. Her reaction to it was only fractionally less ecstatic than her reaction to the earrings. “Marshall, I’ve been dying to listen to this! Thank you so much!” She kissed Marshall’s cheek, holding his eyes as she sat back. Seth made a gag me face at Whitney, who smirked into her Coke. “It’s from Seth, too,” Marshall protested, blushing hotly. Leigh swiveled toward her brother, green eyes bright. “You helped pick out my present?” “Absolutely,” Seth said. “The pink bow? Totally my idea. Matches your barrettes.” Leigh flicked him with soda off her straw. After pizza (which was as delicious as Marshall had predicted) came the cake, red velvet, compliments of MoJo’s. They all sang Happy Birthday while Leigh squeezed her eyes shut tight and blew out her candles. Seth had a feeling he knew what she was thinking. Oh fairy godmother, I wish for Marshall to ask me to be his girlfriend, forever and ever! Dr. Townsend seemed to have other ideas. “I hope you wished for the Knights to win state,” he said, holding up his cup for their server to pour his coffee. Lydia was slicing the cake. “Hey now, Wes,” Jack said. Marshall had sat up straight in his chair, like he had been poked with something sharp. “The Knights don’t need wishes to win. Not with Marshall on the team. That’s one talented boy you’ve got there.” “Hear that, son?” Dr. Townsend nudged Marshall. “Hope you’ve been practicing.” 56 Everyone laughed, even Marshall. Although Seth wondered if he was the only one who noticed that Marshall had put his fork down, leaving his cake untouched. *** The party broke up soon after, Dr. Townsend and Meredith heading home, Jack heading back to the office. “Darling, do you have to?” Lydia sighed, catching Jack’s hand as he rose. “I thought we could spend some time together this afternoon. As a family.” Meaningful glance at Seth. “Sorry, babe. The campaign trail never sleeps.” Jack smiled coldly at Seth over the top of Lydia’s head. Yeah, it really broke Seth’s heart that his step-father didn’t want to spend time with him. “Oh, I almost forgot.” From his briefcase, Jack produced a manila envelope. “Werner had these faxed to the office this morning. Seth’s homeschool records.” This was total crap, obviously, as Seth had no homeschool records. Seth stared at Jack. How had Regent falsified his transcripts so quickly? The brand on Regent’s palm flashed across Seth’s mind. Chimera Enterprises had connections at the highest levels of government. Faking up high school transcripts would have been a cinch for them. As it probably would have been for a highpowered attorney, Seth’s less cynical side reasoned. “All that’s missing is the birth certificate,” Jack was saying, as Lydia stowed the envelope in her bag. “I assume we have a copy?” “Of course,” Lydia murmured. Her eyes darted to Seth, the look on her face almost pained. Saying something about taking care of the check, she climbed quickly out of the booth. By the door, she sidestepped four guys in Fairfax High letterman’s jackets who had just strolled through it. One, a stocky boy with sleepy green eyes, was hobbling on crutches, his left leg encased in plaster up to the knee; a muscled-up blonde poked him playfully in the back, trying to make him lose his balance. Leigh came instantly to attention. “Look, Marshall, it’s Cam!” 57 “Who’s Cam?” Seth asked. He was already sick of meeting people, and he hadn’t even started school yet. “Cameron Foss.” Marshall tipped his chair back. “He plays ball with me. All these guys do.” “They’re the starting lineup of the varsity team, he means.” Leigh sounded supremely impressed. Whitney caught Seth’s eye, like, here we go, and slid down in her seat. “’Sup, dawg?” The guy called Cam greeted Marshall with a fist-bump. He was bulked up like a pro wrestler, all granite pectorals and rock-hard thighs, dishwater blonde hair tousled into an artful bedhead style, so heavily gelled it could have doubled as a helmet. He jerked his chin at the remnants of cake and wrapping paper. “You throw a party and not invite your friends?” “It’s my birthday,” Leigh announced, pertly. She had this flirting thing down, Seth was not thrilled to see. “That so? Well, happy birthday, beautiful.” Cupping Leigh’s chin, Cam leaned down and kissed her, on the lips. His friends hooted and whistled. Whitney slid further down in her seat, like she wanted to slide under it. Seth did not consider himself a violent person. There was a reason Chimera had to collar werekin to make them into killers: At bottom, werekin were a peaceful race. But seeing Cam Foss slobber all over his sister gave him a powerful urge to claw something. Like Cam’s face. He released a breath through his teeth. It came out more like a hiss. Cam let go of Leigh; she sat back, deeply flushed. Seth didn’t think she had wanted Cam to kiss her, but she kicked him under the table, her eyes mutely begging him not to start anything with these guys. A narrow smirk tugged at the corners of Cam’s mouth. “Who’s this?” Marshall made the introductions. Cam, Cameron Foss, played guard for the Knights; Topher Simmons, a lanky black kid with close-cropped curly hair, and Gabe Cochran, a brunette beanpole, were forwards; Bryce Heilsdale, the boy in the cast, usually played point guard, but had been sidelined by a skiing accident over Christmas. “Hence the crutches,” he said, waving one. 58 Every pack had a leader. Seth knew a little something about pack mentality; as he watched Marshall’s teammates crowd into the booth, putting Marshall at the center, it wasn’t difficult to figure out who their alpha was. Entering a pack’s territory also meant earning your place. High school or the jungle, it was all the same, really. So Seth wasn’t surprised when Cam scooted in beside him, crowding him against the brick wall. “Those are really pretty tattoos you got there, Seth. What are you supposed to be, some kind of kittycat?” “Yup,” said Seth. “Aw, that’s so cute. Don’t you guys think that’s cute?” Cam looked around at his pack brothers. They all looked at Marshall, waiting for him to laugh. He didn’t. He twirled his straw, rattling the ice cubes in his glass. “Cam, lay off.” “It’s cool, Indiana,” Seth said. “I am cute.” Whitney’s eyes widened, like she wasn’t used to seeing someone stand up to Cam. Apparently neither was Cam. His smirk ticked up a notch. “You know,” he said, “Leigh wore this sexy kitty costume for Halloween. It had a tail and whiskers and everything.” He leaned over, mouth-breathing in Seth’s ear. “Bet she’d let you borrow it sometime.” “Cam.” Marshall’s voice was razor-edged. “I said lay off, all right?” “Okay, okay, Townsend. Don’t get your panties in a bunch.” Cam sat back. The sideways look he slid Seth let him know they weren’t finished yet. Seth ignored him. Seth could have shredded Cam Foss, in either skin, but he wouldn’t. Cam posed no threat to him. Cam wasn’t werekin. He wasn’t a hunter. He was just a musclehead cretin. These guys were all about the game, Seth soon discovered. Topher immediately began bemoaning the odds of Fairfax High making it to the state tournament sans Bryce. “We’re like the Dream Team,” he said, snagging a pizza crust off Leigh’s plate. “One of us goes down, we lose our magic. Burke’ll walk right over us.” 59 The name, vaguely familiar, eluded Seth. “Who’s Burke?” he asked. Like he cared about basketball. “Connor Burke,” Marshall said. “He’s captain of the Sacred Heart team. They’re our biggest rivals. They sent us home from sectionals last year. And they won state.” “I heard Burke is being recruited by the NBA,” Gabe put in. He had attempted to snag Topher’s stolen crust, and Leigh was now using her napkin to mop off the pizza sauce Topher had smeared on his cheek. Cam tssk’ed that aside. “Burke’s a pussy.” “Bro, his dad’s a five-star general,” Topher said. “I don’t care if his dad is the frickin’ president of the United States. Doesn’t mean the kid knows dick about basketball.” Cam blew a spit wad at Bryce. “I can’t believe you busted your ankle, dipshit.” “Me either,” Bryce groaned. “If we lose on Friday, we’ve got zero chance of making it to the playoffs.” “Then we’d better not lose,” Marshall said. “I promised my father a state trophy this year.” Yeah, but no pressure or anything, Seth thought. A server stopped by then to see if the new arrivals wanted anything. A round of Cokes was ordered, and a deep-dish supreme to go. Lydia was still flitting around the restaurant, talking to people she knew, which seemed to be everybody. Cam returned his attention to Seth. “Leigh never mentioned a brother. What planet did you say you were from?” Seth couldn’t help himself. Really, the guy walked right into it. “Uranus,” he said. Cam blinked. Then the joke clicked, and he flushed so furiously Seth thought his hair might catch fire. “You – ” Marshall burst out laughing. Straightaway, the rest of the pack joined in. Cam fired a filthy look at Marshall. Fleeting, but Seth saw it. Marshall didn’t seem to. He tipped back further in his chair, smiling at Seth in a way that popped out the dimple in his cheek. “You guys should see this kid’s jump shot. He wiped the court with me this morning. If we can convince Coach to let him try out, we might still make the playoffs.” 60 There it was. The alpha’s seal of approval. Marshall had just inducted Seth into his pack. Seth was speechless. Marshall must have really been into his sister. Topher, Gabe, and Bryce all wanted to hear about Seth’s prowess on the court. Could he dunk? What was his free throw average? How about rebounds and steals? Seth insisted he didn’t have any experience beyond neighborhood pickup games, but Marshall talked him up like the second coming of Michael Jordan. When the pack’s to-go pizza arrived, Bryce reached for his crutches. “We were headed over to Cam’s,” he said. “He got this sweet gaming system for Christmas. You guys should come check it out.” “Especially you, birthday girl.” Cam blew Leigh a kiss. Seth envisioned crushing his skull between his teeth – a jaguar’s preferred killing style. Leigh, naturally, was all about hanging with the older incrowd. Whitney, with far less enthusiasm, agreed to go, if Leigh was. Seth wasn’t sure the invitation included him, until Marshall turned from helping Leigh into her coat and said, “How about it, Philadelphia? You in?” Cam’s eyes glittered. “Check it out, guys. Townsend has a new pet.” Marshall stumbled back a step. His expression – it was the same one he had worn when his father had criticized his playing, stark with an intensity of self-loathing that drained the light from his eyes, making them as pale as a river seen through ice. Seth slid out of the booth, in a lazy manner all the more predatory for being unrushed. If Cam had made a gay joke at his expense – which he basically already had, with the sexy kitty costume remark – he would have let it go. But this wasn’t about Seth. Seth got what Cam was up to. Cam was beta to Marshall’s alpha, and he wanted things to be the other way around. Only way to oust a pack leader was through combat. Lacking the courage for an actual throw-down, Cam would fight with rumors and innuendo, a knife behind his back while he smiled to your face. Werekin protected their own. Call it animal instinct, pack mentality, whatever – when werekin befriended someone, they watched out for them. Seth hadn’t expected to be friends with 61 Marshall Townsend, but it seemed he was, and so he planted himself squarely in Cam’s personal bubble. They were near enough the same height for Seth to see himself reflected in Cam’s pupils. The metallic sheen of his eyes was like polished brass. Not so cute now, was he? The table had gone quiet. Cam roughed a laugh. “Relax, Sullivan,” he said. “It was a joke.” “Ha ha,” Seth said. “Jesus, you two.” Suddenly Marshall was between them, elbowing Seth aside. He play-punched Cam in the gut, and Cam mimed doubling over. “You both need to lighten up. Let’s go zap some aliens, all right?” Seth wasn’t prepared for the furious glare Marshall swung around on him then, like Seth was the one acting like a jerk. Okaaay. Obviously he had been too quick on the whole friendship theory. Holding up his hands, he backed away. “Not really my thing,” he said. “But you guys have fun.” Marshall’s jaw tightened. But, “Whatever,” he said. “See you at school, Philadelphia.” He linked his fingers through Leigh’s, the look on his face almost challenging Seth to call him on something. Whitney hurried after them, throwing an apologetic look back at Seth. Cam’s rattlesnake smirk had returned full-force. “Yeah, kittycat,” he purred, shoulder-checking Seth as he passed by. “See you at school.” 62 Chapter Five: Traps Being alone with him made his mother nervous, Seth could tell. As they pulled out of MoJo’s parking lot, just the two of them, she fished a pack of Marlboros out from under the Escalade’s seat and lit one up, inhaling like a drowning woman coming up for oxygen. Seth raised an eyebrow. Lydia looked over at him and smiled guiltily. “Don’t tell Leigh, okay? I promised her I’d quit.” “You could tell her they’re vegan cigarettes, made from onehundred-and-ten-percent recycled tobacco,” Seth suggested. Lydia laughed. She had a fabulous laugh, warm as the sun-heated stones Seth liked to nap on in the summer, along the Schuylkill River. “Seriously, I won’t tell,” he said. But my silence will cost you.” “Oh yeah?” “Definitely. A month’s supply of Mountain Dew and Oreos.” “You drive a hard bargain, Seth Michael Sullivan,” Lydia smiled. “Guess we’ll have to swing by the supermarket.” The Fairfax supermarket was ultra-clean, ultra-bright, and ultra-spacious. Lydia navigated it with determined purpose. In her gray sweater, faded jeans, and high-heeled boots, she was Supermom Goddess on a mission – like she could wiggle her nose and dishes would be washed, supper cooked, children bathed and house cleaned. Everyone they met seemed to know her. The Stewards sat on a dozen different boards in Fairfax: the park board, the library board, the neighborhood watch board. Lydia introduced Seth as her son like she wasn’t ashamed to claim him, which was cool. Seth pushed the cart. Lydia shopped. For the human household there were cans of organic pasta sauce and cuts of free-range meat; for Poe and Captain Hook, bags of kibble and packages of treats. Seth, who knew next to nothing about his mother – Thomas had rarely spoken of her, and Naomi had claimed to be as in the dark about her as Seth was – took the opportunity to indulge his natural curiosity. “Have you always lived in Fairfax?” he asked. 63 “Oh, no.” Lydia plunked a bag of frozen peas into the cart. “I didn’t move here until I was…Well, let’s see, I was in eleventh grade, so I would have been sixteen. My dad, your granddad, was a four-star general. We lived all over the world – Germany, Japan, South Korea.” His mother the army brat. Seth couldn’t picture it. Lydia was too fragile, nowhere near sturdy enough to trek around the globe in the shadow of a four-star general. “How’d you end up in Fairfax?” “Dad got stationed here. There used to be a military base outside of town. Fort King. It was decommissioned years ago.” Lydia added a package of hummus to the cart. “I was furious, of course. I wanted to keep jetting around the world. But Fairfax turned out all right,” she added, with a wistful smile. Seth wondered which husband she was thinking of meeting, Thomas Sullivan or Jack Steward. “I didn’t know that then, though. I swore I was leaving Fairfax the day I turned eighteen.” “Where did you want to go?” “Everywhere. Anywhere. I had this plan to start in L.A. and go from there. I was going to be a famous rock star.” Seth couldn’t picture that, either. “Which instrument?” “Therein lay the problem. I can’t carry a tune in a bucket,” Lydia said. Seth laughed. “You know, you should decide what kind of birthday cake you want, since we’re here.” Seth, who had been coasting more than steering, stopped. “Birthday cake?” he said. “Did you want to go out instead? Wednesday will be a school night, but we could manage it, I suppose…Maybe Werner could come…” Lydia looked back at him, so much hope in her expression. Willing him to play along with the fiction that they were a normal, happy family. Seth’s birthday cake had been the same since he was five years old. Chocolate with vanilla icing. He would have three slices, with strawberry ice cream and a tall glass of milk, and then he would open his gifts, in order: Ben’s, then Naomi’s. No matter how tight money was, he had two presents on his birthday. No matter how scary life was, he had two people who 64 loved him. That was his family. They hadn’t been normal, but they had been happy. It hit him then, as it had to sometime. Naomi was dead. Life as he had known it was over. Through force of will, Seth kept his voice from breaking. “If it’s okay, Mrs. Steward, I’d rather not have a cake this year. Things are just too…messed up right now.” By “things,” Seth meant himself; but the light in Lydia’s eyes dimmed, visible as a switch being flipped. “Of course, honey,” she said, softly. “Whatever you want.” *** Alone in his room, Seth started to feel the walls closing in. He tried to distract himself. First he folded his new clothes and stacked them in his dresser. (Everything fit in one drawer.) Then he stocked his new backpack with the pens, pencils, and erasers Lydia had picked up for him and placed the backpack beside his tennis shoes, where he wouldn’t forget it in the morning. His first day of high school. Now there was a panicinducing prospect. Chores complete, he tried to settle down with a book – a copy of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, pilfered from the shelves in Jack’s office – but the hideously pink bedspread disrupted his concentration. Finally he hauled it off the mattress, stuffed it in the back of his closet, and fetched a plain brown blanket from the linen closet to throw over his sheets. Leigh’s door remained closed. Seth assumed she was over at Cam’s, fulfilling her birthday wish of becoming Marshall’s girlfriend. Strangely, that did not improve his mood. Poe, having claimed her favorite spot on Seth’s windowsill, meowed a protest when he shifted her to the floor so he could stretch out there. Pins and needles were racing along his spine; he shuddered with the effort of holding on to his human skin. Skinning used to take Seth by surprise. He would go to sleep a boy, wake up a jaguar. It was how Thomas Sullivan had realized his son was a werejaguar: He had walked into Seth’s nursery, and a jaguar cub had been asleep in his cradle. Chimera policy dictated that he immediately hand his werekin child over 65 to Project Ark for testing and training. Instead, within the week, he and Seth had left Fairfax for the Underground of New York. Over the years, Seth had learned control. Mostly it was a natural process; the older he got, the more conscious he was of the magic, able to choose which skin to be in, human or animal. Ben had worked with him as well, teaching him deep breathing exercise that helped channel and, if needed, suppress the magic. Anymore the only times Seth skinned without meaning to were when his emotions ran away with him. Like with Regent in the drive, when he had been so shocked to find another werekin living in Fairfax. Or right now, with the grief he had been staving off for a week clawing at his insides. Seth had not stopped moving since that hunter’s bullet had shattered their window in Philadelphia. He had run from Philly to Cincinnati, stayed on the run, figuratively if not literally, all the way to Fairfax. Since the plane had touched down, he had been consumed by guarding his secret, adjusting to life outside the Underground. Now that he wasn’t moving, his tough outer shell threatened to crack, letting the grief pour in. Naomi Franklin had come into Seth’s life when he was still in diapers – a pretty young black woman from Savannah, barely twenty at the time, living in the Harlem Underground. Her parents had been some of the founding members of the Resistance, but they had been collared years ago. Thomas had hired her to watch Seth overnight so he could work the eleven-toseven shift for a gypsy cab company that paid off the books. Naomi had often said Seth became her cub on sight – crawled across the living room rug, lifted his chubby baby arms to her, and skinned into a jaguar the moment she picked him up. The night the hunters collared Thomas, she had rocked Seth to sleep in the back of the Greyhound bus that had taken them from New York to Pennsylvania. He could still her hear singing: Smile, though your heart is aching; smile, even though it’s breaking; you’ll find life is still worthwhile, if you just smile… Naomi had been the only mother Seth had ever known. And she had died in his arms. He sank his claws into the windowsill, struggling against sobs born of guilt as much as grief. Regent had said Chimera 66 would discover the existence of a werejaguar sooner or later. What if they already had? What if Naomi was dead because of him? Seth could think of no other reason the hunters would have killed her. Naomi had been a threat to no one. You’ve only gotten by this far hiding behind people older and wiser than you are. Seth sat up, swiping at his cheeks. He couldn’t stay in this room another second. Being alone with his thoughts was like wallowing in silver powder. But he didn’t want to go downstairs and play house with his new family, either. He wanted to run. The window eased open without a sound. Seth swung a leg over the sill. Silently, he stepped out onto the roof. A gust of wind froze the tears on his lashes. Twilight painted the world in gunmetal blues. Next door, lights were on at the Townsends’; wondering idly which room was Marshall’s, which Whitney’s, Seth slid the sash down and crept to the edge of the roof, stepping as lightly as only a cat could. His gaze swept the corners of the backyard. No one around to see but a small brown falcon, perched on a low branch…Seth bent his knees, took a breath, and jumped, from the roof to the garage, from the garage to the lawn – landing on his feet (of course) and kicking up a little poof of snow. The Stewards’ privacy fence was six feet tall. Seth sprang effortlessly on top of it. Go back. The voice was so real, so present, that Seth, crouched on top of the fence on all fours, looked around to see who had spoken. No one was there. Unless you counted the falcon, he was quite alone. Branches rustled in the wind, creaking like old bones. Through the living room window, Seth could see his mother sitting on the couch, shoes off, a book open on her lap. She would flip if she found out he had snuck out his window. But the prospect of returning to his room was just too depressing. He would make it a short run, Seth decided, and be back before anyone knew he was gone. *** 67 Fairfax was one of those small Midwestern cities where the countryside and the cityscape bled together around the edges. Castle Estates was bounded by a wood that began a stone’s throw from the Stewards’ backyard, extending for miles in all directions. Seth jumped off the wall, and before he touched down on the other side, had skinned into a jaguar. Jaguars were built to hunt. Show Seth a tree and he could climb it; show him a river and he could swim it, in either skin. As a jaguar, he moved like a shadow; prey wouldn’t see him coming until he pounced. His weapons were his claws and his teeth. Jaguars could take down boar, alligators, hippos, even anacondas. They were stronger than lions, the kings of the jungle. Werekin weren’t exactly like their animal kin, obviously. A real jaguar would have been shivering his spots off in this snowy forest, whereas Seth felt right at home. And even in his jaguar skin he was still Seth Michael Sullivan, and therefore much friendlier than any jaguar you would meet in the wild. Unless you were a hunter. Or a jerk named Cam Foss. Not that Seth would have eaten Cam, had he run across him in the woods. Seth loped north in his jaguar skin, making for King’s Creek, a tributary of the Ohio River that snaked around Fairfax, feeding the corn and bean fields. Tree limbs swayed overhead, encased in ice; powdery snow covered briar patches and woody shrubs in sparkling glitter. A perfectly peaceful night for a run, yet the more miles that fell away under his paws, the less peaceful Seth felt. The creek, when he reached it, was swollen with snowmelt, foamy white waves churning up chunks of ice and broken branches. Seth waded out until the water washed over his flanks, the magic in his blood making him immune to the cold. His keen eyes pierced the shadows under the trees. He was certain now that he was being tracked. Hunted. Go back, the voice whispered again. Something crashed, in the woods. Seth spun around, hissing – but it was only an ice-coated limb, snapped off by the wind and plummeting through the canopy to thump into the snow. 68 A second too late, Seth realized the real danger was behind him. The shot came from the opposite shore. The report scattered a flock of geese roosting further up the bank; they took to the air, squawking, as Seth dove – if he could get out of sight, he was thinking, he could swim downstream, head back into the woods, hightail it home – a jaguar could outrun any hunter – He might have made it, too, if the tranq hadn’t grazed his shoulder as he went under, slicing through fur and skin. Instantly, Seth’s muscles locked up, like someone had found all the pressure points in his body and pushed down on them at once, transforming his nerves into live wires. He slid back into his human skin, gulping down a lungful of icy water as he screamed. Hunters’ tranqs were not some humane sedative like zookeepers and veterinarians used. They were concocted by Chimera, infused with silver and mercury, both poisonous to werekin. They weren’t mean to be fatal – hunters carried the antidote with them – but the poison was still more than sufficient to trap werekin in their human skins, in too much agony to fight back. Good old-fashioned, bowel-loosening terror got Seth’s arms and legs scissoring through the water. The hunters would even now be on their way to bag him. Once he was collared, a tranq was just a taste of the misery that awaited him in a Chimera lab. Trying to stay out of sight, he stayed underwater until spots of light dancing before his eyes warned that he was close to blacking out. Then he planted his feet on the creek bed and rocketed upward in a swirl of silt, gasping as icy air assaulted his lungs. Just breathing hurt. He tried to swim, but his arms were lead pipes dragging through the water; after a few strokes he gave up and floated on his back, staring up at the patchwork of stars. How had the hunters found him? He had been in Fairfax less than forty-eight hours. Could they have known he was coming here, been lying in wait? Did they know his name, his mother’s address? But how could they? Even Seth hadn’t known where Lydia lived until Naomi had told him… 69 Seth pushed sopping hair out of his eyes, trying to focus, to think around the pain. He was fifteen miles from home. In his present condition, it might as well have been a hundred. He would never make it back to Castle Estates on foot. He had no phone, no means to call for help. He couldn’t skin. He couldn’t fight. Hiding in the woods wasn’t an option. Once the hunters had your scent, they would find you, eventually. Anyway, without the antidote, he would die from the poison in the tranq. A shadow passed over Seth’s face – not the shadow of death, thankfully: He was floating underneath a wooden bridge. A very familiar wooden bridge. Hope sparked in Seth’s chest. He knew the direction he had been running in; this had to be the bridge that led back to Regent’s house. And if he could get to Regent, Seth thought, Regent could drive him to the Stewards’, or better yet, straight out of town. Back into the Underground. Seth swam. Every moment a symphony of pain, every breath a new brand of torture, he set his jaw and persevered. By the time he climbed out on the bank he was shaking head to toe, too weak to do more than haul himself up the hillside on his hands and knees, gashing his palms on rocks and sticks as he dug for handholds. At the top of the rise, he vomited into a patch of brown weeds, spewing pizza and birthday cake into the snow. He was cold, colder than he had ever thought he could be, yet his skin was scalding to the touch. When he tried to stand, his knees gave out. He crawled, propelled by his elbows because his hands were stuck halfway between claws and fingers. How much time had passed? Ten minutes? An hour? It seemed an eternity before the pine lodge finally came into view. The Hummer wasn’t parked out front, and Seth suffered a fleeting spasm of terror that Regent wasn’t home, that he had simply crawled here to die, before his fogged brain registered that the windows were alive with warm yellow light. Seth swallowed. His throat was blisteringly dry. “Help!” he croaked. “Mr. Regent, help – ” A footfall crunched in the snow. Seth rolled over – just in time to take a boot to the jaw. He fell over sideways, dazed, gagging on his own blood. 70 “Are you lost, pussycat?” The hunter loomed above him, a tall shadow against the rising moon. He wore snow camouflage, explaining how Seth’s jaguar eyes had missed him back at the creek. The cheeks beneath his white goggles were scarred and wind-chapped, making it hard to guess his age. A tranq gun, a sort of air rifle, was slung over his shoulder. Snowman freed a whip from his belt. It was made of braided rope, longer than Seth was tall, and studded with silver barbs. Snowman planted a boot on Seth’s chest, flattening him on the ground. “Teach you to run away from me, pussycat,” he said. With a flick of his wrist, he brought the whip down. There was a zip sound as it cut through Seth’s half-frozen T-shirt. The silver barbs gouged his skin, tearing away chunks of flesh, and Seth screamed. Regent must have heard that scream. Dead people in Russia probably heard that scream. But there were no racing footsteps inside the house, no roars of werekin rage as the weretiger rushed to his defense. Seth didn’t blame him. Training him on the sly was one thing. Interfering directly with Chimera’s business was another. Regent could stay in his house, peeking around the curtain while Seth was collared and carted off, then go right on with his nice life as a well-to-do attorney. The whip came down a second time. Braced for it, Seth gritted his teeth and managed to absorb the pain with a whimper. A shudder rippled down his spine, but the tranq did its job, preventing him from skinning. Snowman coiled his whip back onto his belt and tapped his earpiece, an über hi-tech device that fit invisibly inside his ear canal. “Bagged it,” he said. Seth hissed at being called an “it,” and Snowman pushed down harder with his boot, practically crushing his ribcage. Man, Seth wanted to bite through this asshole’s skull and crunch. “Meet me at the rendezvous point in ten. Have the antidote ready.” Hunters always work in pairs, Seth remembered Regent saying. Meaning if, by some miracle, he escaped this hunter, his partner would be waiting to track him down. Grabbing Seth by the shirtfront, Snowman half-carried, halfdrug him over to the garage, where he threw him down against 71 the woodpile. Seth’s chin slumped onto his chest. “Hold still, pussycat,” Snowman said. “I’ll get this collar on you, and as soon as you’re nice and tame, we’ll get you out of here and get you the antidote. How’s that sound?” Like he was offering Seth a treat. Here, let me enslave you to mad scientists for the rest of your life, but afterwards I’ll take care of the excruciating pain I’ve put you in! Seth lifted his head. Snowman was holding up a silver torc, a sort of necklace scrolled with ancient glyphs. A collar. Once it was in place, Seth knew, he was really and truly caught. “How’s this sound?” he spit out, and raked claw-tipped nails across the hunter’s face. Snowman cursed. Blood spattered the snow. The hunter staggered back. Seth groped behind him; his hands touched metal – the axe Regent kept propped against the woodpile. Seth’s hands were still mostly claws. Willing himself fully into his human skin so he could grip the handle, Seth used all of his remaining strength to struggle to his knees; take aim at Snowman’s back; and hurl the axe, end-over-end. He heard Snowman scream again, but the momentum of the throw had pitched Seth forward, onto his chest. He couldn’t seem to sit up again. His cheek rested against the snow; Seth imagined he could hear it sizzle against his baking skin. His eyesight dimmed as the fever spiked, making him drowsy…so deliciously, irresistibly drowsy… He felt a twinge of regret that his mother and his sister would never know what had happened to him. They would probably think he had just run away, without even saying goodbye… “Oh no you don’t. You’re gonna be awake for this, you savage little brat.” A boot connected with Seth’s ribs, flipping him onto his back. Blearily, he saw Snowman looking down at him. He had removed his goggles. Where his left eye should have been, an ugly black hole was bored into the side of his face, webbed with scars. Seth’s heart sank. Anybody who could survive a wound like that would not be taken out by a half-conscious cub. Then it happened. Snowman froze. “What the – ” For a split-second, as the spots in front of his eyes turned into stripes, Seth thought he was dreaming. Then he saw Snowman’s 72 jaw drop, his scarred face draining of color; he scrambled for the pistol on his belt, but before he could free it, the Bengal tiger had leapt over the woodpile and crashed into his chest, sending man and beast rolling across the snow, the hunter shouting, the weretiger roaring. Seth could have kissed Regent’s furry snout. Seth had neither the energy nor the inclination to turn his head to witness Snowman’s death. There was a sickening series of tears, like cloth being ripped, only fleshier, ended on a gurgling scream. By then, Seth’s pulse had slowed to a painful throb. Distantly, he realized this was a bad sign, although really, it was hard to care…He just needed to sleep… Hands shook him. “Damn you, cub, stay awake,” someone growled. It was Regent. The weretiger was kneeling beside him, blood matting his striped beard. “Shoulder,” Seth managed. “No – no antidote…” Regent yanked his T-shirt down, saw the graze on Seth’s collarbone, and cursed again. Seth was lifted. Head lolled back, he watched the stars morph into the iron chandelier suspended above Regent’s great room. There he was deposited, none too gently, on the couch. Regent stomped out of his eye line, keeping up his litany of curses. Something about Seth needing his brains knocked out for running through the woods alone. Did he think there weren’t hunters outside of Philadelphia? Did he want to be collared? And so on and so forth. Actually, Seth had considered Fairfax a safe haven. Beneath Chimera’s notice because it was too small to have an Underground. He thought about the voice he had heard, warning him to go back inside his house. Note to self, he thought. Next time, listen to the voice. A stinging pain in his wrist made him hiss. Looking down, Seth watched Regent draw a razor blade across his skin, tracing his veins to the crook of his elbow. Blood welled up in the cut, a crimson river laced with silver drops. Seth whined low in his throat. Why? 73 “Have to get the poison out,” Regent grunted. The razor bit deeper. Seth whined again, loud and sharp. “Don’t look, cub,” Regent ordered, gruffly. Obediently, Seth shut his eyes. Within seconds he was swimming again, into darkness. 74 Chapter Six: Ground Rules At first, Seth plunged so deep into the dark he didn’t dream, too separate from his body to notice its suffering. Eventually he roused into a kind of waking delirium, unable to distinguish reality from hallucination. He was lying on the stone hearth in Regent’s great room. The werekin on the walls came to life, writhing on their plaques. The jackal taunted him in Naomi’s voice: “Soon you’ll join us, Seth Michael, and you’ll scream for eternity…” He woke, soaked in sweat, on a soft mattress in a bedroom with pine floors, square-paned windows overlooking a snowy forest. For a moment he thought it was Ben, then realized it was Regent bathing his forehead with a cold cloth. “Sleep, cub,” Regent growled. “They’re only nightmares.” Seth slipped away again. The blue-eyed girl from the bookstore, his admirer, flitted across his dreams. Once Seth was sure he saw her at his window – impossible, since he was on the second floor. He tried to sit up, but found he was too weak. He heard his mother talking in low tones somewhere close by. “We have to get him help, Werner. Professional help. There are clinics – ” “A professional wouldn’t know what to make of a kid like Seth, Lydia. I’ve been where he is. I understand him, better than you think.” Regent’s voice was soft, a persuasive purr. “Trust me. I can help him.” Tears thickened Lydia’s voice. “I can’t lose him, too…” There was no clock in Seth’s sickroom, no way to tell how many days and nights were passing. He knew it was black as the bottom of the ocean when, sometime later, he heard Jack and Regent arguing heatedly. “This is unacceptable! How could you let this happen?” “Oh no you don’t. You aren’t putting this on me, Jackie. He’s living under your roof, remember?” “I can’t protect him like you can! Regent, he could have died. I’m responsible for him…” Seth decided he must have been dreaming. No way would Jack have ever sounded that concerned for his well-being. 75 The closer he swam to the surface of consciousness, the more Seth became aware of his body. This was not a happy development. The lash marks on his stomach burned as they knit back together, a seam of fire across his hipbones; every brush of the sheets across his fevered skin was like sandpaper scraping a wound. Glassy-eyed, he submitted meekly to the spoonfuls of bitter green liquid Regent tipped down his throat at regular intervals. “What is that?” he asked on the first dose, gagging as he swallowed. “Old werekin remedy,” Regent said. “To purge you.” Seth purged all right. Until his throat was raw. When it was over, Regent would rinse his mouth with clear water, and settle him back on the pillows. Werekin remedies must have been pretty psychedelic stuff. After each dose, Seth would hallucinate. He saw Leigh sitting by his bed, twisting a leather cord in her hands. A pewter jaguar charm dangled from it. She sang to him, in a lovely soprano: “Smile, though your heart is aching; smile, even though it’s breaking…” Naomi’s gospel choir alto chimed in, perfectly on pitch: “You’ll find life is still worthwhile, if you just smile.” Seth opened up to the grief, too weak to run from it, and cried himself into hiccups. He was in the jungle, sunning on a rock in his human skin, gazing up at a triangle of blue sky visible between the fronds of a bowl-shaped tree. His admirer lounged beside him, wearing a dress woven from jungle vines. She traced numbers on his palm with her index finger. A black jaguar paced the branches overhead, measuring Seth with golden eyes uncannily like his own. Seth strained to sit up, afraid the black jaguar would attack, but the sheets tangled around him like chains. The voice from the woods whispered. “Save her, Seth. Save her, and she will save us all.” “Who are you?” Seth tried to say. Marshall appeared then, stretched out on the bed, slender fingers wrapped tight around Seth’s. “Hang on, Philadelphia. You’ll wake up soon.” “Indiana?” Seth whispered. “Are you really here?” 76 Marshall dissolved into mist. It was a relief to open his eyes the next time and know, for certain, he was awake. Getting out of bed and down the stairs was a feat akin to running a triathalon, after having your bones crushed to powder and your insides mixed up in a blender. Regent was sipping tea at the sunken bar when Seth stumbled in and flung himself down on the couch, wearing only boxers – the rest of his clothes had been ruined in the fight. “Morning,” Regent said, cheerfully. He was dressed for work in a suit and tie, yet Seth couldn’t stop picturing him with Snowman’s blood dripping from his beard. “Hope you feel better than you look.” How Seth looked was awful. His hair was oily from days of fever-sweat, the skin under his eyes puffy, stained pinkish-gray. He wasn’t even getting into how he smelled. “How long was I out?” Regent handed him a steaming mug of chai tea. “This is Friday,” he said. Seth almost choked. “But – I was attacked on Sunday! I’ve been asleep for five days?” He had been thinking along the lines of a day, two at the most. He had missed his first week of school. Slept right through his seventeenth birthday. “What the hell did they shoot me with,” he grumbled, “nuclear-strength silver?” “Wasn’t a regular dose,” Regent agreed. “Hunters don’t take chances with werecats. We’re too vicious.” There was some gratification in that, at least. Seth laid his head back on the sofa, watching Regent move around the kitchen, putting a frying pan on the stove, taking a package of bacon from the fridge. “I didn’t know you could do that,” he said. “Bleed out silver poison.” “Most of the time you can’t. Not without bleeding somebody dry.” Regent sounded grudgingly impressed. “You’re tougher than I thought, cub.” Seth grinned. Regent cooked breakfast. Slabs of hickory-smoked bacon. Cheese and spinach omelets. Biscuits with honey. Seth wolfed it all down so fast Regent dryly requested he not devour the silverware, too. Hunger abated, he tugged a quilt off the back of the couch and wormed into it, revived enough to feel self77 conscious sitting around in his underwear. “Mr. Regent, I hate to ask,” he said, “but could I borrow some cash? I’ll pay you back. I just need to get out of town.” This was the conclusion Seth had come to over the last twenty-four hours, as his brain had started waking up. The hunters had found him. Fairfax wasn’t safe anymore. He had decided to go back to Philly, join the Resistance. Forget Fairfax. Forget a family he didn’t know, who wouldn’t want him if they learned the truth about him. Forget training with Regent. Even though the weretiger had saved his hide, Seth still didn’t like him. Still, leaving felt wrong. With her last words, Naomi had told Seth how to find his mother – a secret hidden from him for more than a decade. Naomi had sent him to Fairfax. Seth wanted to stay here until he figured out why, and now, he couldn’t. “I don’t think you have to leave,” Regent surprised him by saying. He was sitting on the other couch, tie loosened, jacket off. “You’ve been sacked out upstairs for going on a week now and no hunters have busted down my door. Tells me they don’t know who you are.” Seth snuck a hand out of the quilt to lift his tea mug. The spicily bitter brew was growing on him. “Then how did they find me?” “Hunters hunt, cub. It’s what they do. They probably got a tip there was a new werekin in these parts, and you blundered right into their trap, like the numbskull cub you are.” Now probably wasn’t the time to remind Regent he wasn’t a cub anymore. Seth was officially seventeen. “Bit of a gamble, don’t you think? I go home, play housecat, hope the hunters don’t whisk me off in the middle of the night?” “No more of a gamble than an untrained cub joining the Resistance,” Regent said. Pointed reminder that Seth had just had his tail handed to him by a single hunter. “What about my parents? How do I explain where I’ve been hiding out for the last week?” “They know where you’ve been. I called them Sunday. Lydia and Adleigh have been here every day to check on you.” So Seth hadn’t hallucinated that. “What did you tell them?” he asked. 78 Part of him was hoping Regent would say, The truth. Seth might have spent his life hiding his true identity from the world, but at home, he had always been able to be himself. His whole self, boy and jaguar. Life in Fairfax might have been more bearable if he didn’t have to hide who he was around his family. Another part of him, though, panicked. How would Lydia react to having birthed a werecat? Would she be repulsed? Would Future Senator Jack Steward even allow him back on the property? Hell, Seth thought, Jack would probably call Chimera himself to come collect him. He could see Leigh being okay with it. Especially once she heard how the werekin were oppressed. Seemed like her brand of crusade. She might orchestrate a march. “Mr. Regent?” Seth said, realizing Regent hadn’t answered. “What did you tell them?” “I told them you decided to run away,” Regent said, “but you changed your mind and came here instead.” He smoothed a crease out of his jacket, avoiding Seth’s gaze. “And?” Seth prompted. There had to be more. Lydia would have demanded some explanation for how her son had ended up at death’s door. “And, I told them you were drying out,” Regent said. Okay. Seth had misheard. “You told them I was what?” “Getting clean. Kicking the habit. Going straight. Whatever you kids call it these days. I’m not hip to the lingo.” Gathering up Seth’s dishes, Regent headed for the kitchen. Seth gaped at his broad back. “I – you – I…You told my mother I’m on drugs?” he spluttered. “I had to tell them something,” Regent shrugged. For a moment, Seth was speechless. Then he exploded. “How about that I came down with a rare strain of the bird flu? Or that I slit my wrists? Or, I don’t know, that I was attacked by rabid wolves? Great. Just great.” Fury overcoming modesty, he threw off the quilt, hopped onto the back of the couch, and began pacing, heel-toe like a tightrope walker. “Now I’m a cokehead. Jack will have my bags packed – ” “Trust me,” Regent said, “he doesn’t.” Seth glared at the back of his head. “Did I wrong you in another life or something, man? Why would you do this to me?” 79 “Think about it.” Regent turned and leaned against the counter, arms folded. “If I’d said you were hurt or sick, they would have taken you to the hospital. How would you have explained fractures that healed overnight, or mercury in your bloodstream?” He had a point there. Doctors and werekin did not mix. Seth had never been to a doctor. “Anyway, human medicine wouldn’t have saved you from the poison in that tranq. The fever would have boiled your brain. Quickly, too, small as yours is.” “Yeah,” Seth said, refusing to be mollified, “but drugs?” “Didn’t take much for them to buy it, cub. Not once they heard the record I dredged up on you from Philly. The Coleman brothers, wasn’t it?” Seth froze. Since he had never been arrested, Regent couldn’t be referring to his criminal record. “How do you know about that?” he demanded. “I have contacts Underground. All I had to do was drop the name Seth Sullivan, and I got an earful about your exploits.” Regent shook his head. “It’s a miracle Chimera didn’t find you years ago.” Reckless, Naomi had called his stunts. Showing off playing pickup games, making impossible jump shots. Loping along the Schuylkill River Trail in his jaguar skin. The final straw: his tattoos. And those were only the infractions she had known about. So it was true. He had led the hunters right to them. He had gotten Naomi killed. Seth sank back down on the cushions. “What now?” he asked dully, since Regent seemed to have it all figured out. “Now,” Regent said, “you’ll do what we talked about. Train to be a warrior.” And stay on a shorter leash, which Seth suspected was the real reason Regent had devised the addict story and blabbed his sordid past to Jack and Lydia. Regent didn’t trust him to keep his nose clean without hardcore supervision. Well, he had done a fine job of making sure Seth would get that, Seth thought. He might be under house arrest now that his new family knew about his crimes, real and fictitious. “First things first, though.” Regent motioned Seth to his feet. “See if you can still skin.” 80 Seth stared at him. “Of course I can still skin. Why wouldn’t I be able to skin?” “That silver was in your bloodstream a while. I’ve seen tranqs do permanent damage – ” Before he could finish, Seth had skinned. The jaguar turned in a circle between the couch and the coffee table, checking his reflection in the polished wood floor. His tail looked the same, long and banded with black; all of his spots were there, same razor-sharp claws – Wait a second. Seth had never heard of silver poisoning stopping a werekin from skinning. He looked up, baring his teeth. Regent chuckled. “Cubs,” he said. “So gullible.” *** More snow had fallen during the week, covering over the signs of the scuffle in Regent’s yard. The axe was propped against the woodpile, its blade wiped clean. “What did you do with the hunter’s body?” Seth asked, hurrying after Regent to the garage. Regent snapped his jaws. Seth hoped he was joking. Werekin didn’t eat people. That was just gross. “Any sign of his partner?” “Not yet,” Regent said. He climbed behind the Hummer’s wheel. Seth slid into the passenger’s seat. After a long soak in the tub, he had donned the jeans, T-shirt, and camouflage jacket Lydia had thoughtfully dropped off on one of her visits. He felt human again, or as human as a werekin ever felt. Regent lived several miles beyond the city limits, down a country road flanked by snow-covered fields. Gentle hills rose up from the flat farm ground like ocean swells; at the top of one, lazed over by a hazy afternoon sun, was a black bunker-style building made of liquid-looking stone, its rooftop populated by rusted satellite dishes. Iced-over evergreen trees circled the hillside, ringing a chain-link fence topped by razor wire. “What’s that?” Seth asked, tapping a knuckle on the glass. Regent glanced out the window. “Fort King. Used to be a military prison, but the army closed it down a long time ago.” 81 As they left the highway for the expressway, Regent laid down the ground rules for Seth’s thrice-weekly training. His pathetic performance against Snowman had proven just how much Seth had to learn; his natural speed and strength would not suffice against the highly-trained hunters, or other werekin. Much as Seth hated the idea of killing his kin, if Chimera sent a collared werekin warrior after him, it would be kill or be killed. “I’ll teach you what I was taught in the Scholae Bestiarii,” Regent said. “Martials arts and weaponry. But you have to build up your stamina. I want you running five miles a day, rain or shine.” Five miles was nothing. Seth had run that far in Philly all the time. He saluted. “You got it, chief.” “In your human skin, cub.” Seth groaned. That was a different story. Regent smiled darkly. “And don’t call me ‘chief,’” he said. He had other rules, too. Monday through Friday, Seth’s tail was to be parked in a classroom from eight-thirty to three. Truancy, fighting, mouthing off to teachers, practical jokes, or other means of drawing attention to himself were to be avoided. Sneaking out of the house for any reason was strictly forbidden, as were forays into the wild, in either skin. “Anything else?’ Seth groused. “You want me to take a vow of silence, or renounce all my worldly possessions?” “You’re joining the basketball team.” Seth laughed. Regent did not, and he groaned, again. “Oh, come on, man! You expect me to hang out with a bunch of jocks and not punch somebody’s face in?” He was thinking of Cam, obviously. “I expect you to learn discipline,” Regent growled. “Playing on a team is good for that.” Regent turned into the Stewards’ drive and threw the Hummer into park. Seth looked up at the big brick house. He kind of doubted there would be a Welcome Home from Rehab, Seth banner over the stairs. “This sucks,” he announced. Meaning his life, basically. “Those are the rules, cub. Do as you’re told or you’re on your own. Up to you.” 82 Seth wouldn’t make it a mile outside the city with hunters on his tail, and Regent knew it. He cut a sideways glance at his guru. “The ball team wasn’t your idea, was it?” “No,” Regent admitted. Seth knew it; Regent wouldn’t want him showing off his physical prowess to the entire student body. “It was your mother’s. They randomly drug test student athletes.” Right. Seth had forgotten he was a junkie now. “What’s my poison, anyway? Heroine? Cocaine? Or am I your standard pothead?” “I kept it simple. Prescriptions you swiped from your dad’s medicine cabinet. Pain pills.” He wasn’t even cool enough to score smack on the street, then. Seth wanted to call Regent a thousand names, each one more hateful than the last. But Seth knew he owed Regent more than his life. He owed him his freedom. Asinine as they were, Regent’s rules would be far easier to endure than life in a cage. “Mr. Regent,” Seth said, quietly, “I know I put you in danger the other night, coming to your house with those hunters on me. You didn’t have to help me, but you did anyway, so I wanted to say…thanks.” Seth thought they might have a moment. Old tiger, young cub. Apparently, Regent didn’t do moments. His top lip curled. “Feel better?” Should have kept his mouth shut. “I was just saying thanks,” Seth mumbled. “I don’t want your thanks,” Regent sneered. “You dragged your sorry tail up to my door knowing full well you were leading hunters to me, and you did it because you assumed I would want to save you.” Seth flushed. That was exactly what he had thought. “I know your type,” Regent said, coldly. “You’re used to everybody loving you because of this pretty face.” He caught Seth’s chin, forcing his head around, and drug a sharp nail down Seth’s cheekbone. Seth recoiled. There was a buzzing like angry wasps in his ears. “Well, I don’t love you, cub, and I won’t save you again. I’ll teach you to save yourself. If that’s not enough, you’ll die in a cage. You’re not worth my skin.” Regent shoved him away. Cheeks burning, Seth shouldered open the door. Almost before his shoes hit the pavement, Regent 83 was reversing down the drive, leaving Seth to face his family on his own. *** Jack did the talking. Dressed for court in a black suit and blue tie, he stood in front of the fireplace to deliver Seth’s sentence: curfew of nine o’clock; no phone; no Internet, except for homework; zero outings that did not involve school, basketball, or karate lessons at Regent’s. Duration? “Until you earn our trust back,” he said. Seth acted all abject, but really, he didn’t care. You needed a social life for grounding to sting. Lydia was sitting on the sofa across from where Seth was slouched in Jack’s recliner. Seth wished she would be mad, or at least icily disapproving like Jack – anything besides heartrendingly concerned. “Honey, I just wish you would have talked to us,” she said, raising red-rimmed eyes to his. “We would have gotten you help.” Help for a problem he didn’t have, and the problems he did have, she couldn’t touch. Seth swallowed hard. “Mrs. Steward, Mr. Steward, I’m really, really sorry,” he said, glad he could be truthful about this much. “I didn’t come here to screw up your lives.” Jack’s mouth stretched taut below his mustache. “Seth, no one is saying that.” No, Seth thought, you’re just thinking it really, really loudly. “Of course we’re not saying that!” Lydia looked stricken. “We love you, honey. We’re worried about you, can’t you see that?” She was crying again. Blaming herself for Seth turning out to be a junkie who boosted cars to finance his habit. Seth hated that, not only because it wasn’t true (the junkie part, anyway), but because Lydia was not to blame for splitting up their family. Seth saw that now. One run-in with a hunter had finally shown him what it was his dad had been running from. He reached out a hand to his mother. Lydia stared at it, then at his face; and something, some door, slammed shut behind her eyes. She stood, abruptly. 84 “Dinner will be ready in an hour,” she announced, and rushed out. Jack looked at Seth. For a moment, as their eyes met, there was a look on Jack’s face Seth couldn’t understand. He almost looked – guilty. Quickly, he turned and followed Lydia into the kitchen. Seth let his hand fall back to his side. No one wants you here, he was thinking. Unfortunately, he had nowhere else to go. *** After dinner, one of the most uncomfortably silent meals Seth had ever been forced to endure, he dutifully carried out the trash. (He had chores now, to go with his grounding.) Leigh had retreated to the Townsends’ for the weekend – an epic sleepover with Whitney, fortuitously coinciding with Seth’s homecoming. Whatever chances he and his sister might have had for a relationship, Seth’s alleged drug habit seemed to have ruined them. The evening was surprisingly mild for January. Marshall was outside, shooting hoops in his driveway, wearing a blue-and-gold Fairfax High Knights sweatshirt and sweatpants with ragged cuffs. He dribbled in for a layup, spotted Seth sorting the recyclables, and almost missed his rebound. “Hey,” he called out. “You’re back.” “Nope,” Seth said. “This is my ghost you’re seeing.” “Yeah? Well, kudos. You’re completely corporeal.” Grinning, Marshall balanced the ball on his hip. Seth ambled over to the shrub-fence, hands in his pockets. He wasn’t quite sure what to say. He and Marshall hadn’t exactly parted on the best of terms at Leigh’s birthday lunch. “Heard you were sick,” Marshall said. Seth bet that was what he’d heard. “I’m recovered,” he said. “Glad to hear it.” Marshall bounced the ball to him; Seth bounced it back, and he frowned. “You promised me a rematch, remember? I’m calling you out.” “No can do, Indiana. I’m grounded.” “Oh.” Marshall scratched his head. “That sucks.” 85 Seth nodded. It did suck. Silence fell. Seth wasn’t sure how to fill it. He needed to ask a favor, something that didn’t come easily to him, on top of which, he couldn’t get his fever dream out of his mind: Marshall, stretching out beside him on the bed, promising he would be better soon. Looking at him now, damp strands of hair falling across his forehead like spilled ink, Seth felt a peculiar heat creep across his skin, unrelated to the magic in his blood. He cleared his throat. “So, listen. Did you mean what you said, about asking your coach to put me on the team?” “Yeah,” Marshall said. “I mean, I did.” Stress on the past tense. Seth turned to go, frustrated at the obstacles Regent’s tall tale had created in his life. Of course Golden Boy Marshall wasn’t going to want a cokehead for a teammate. “Seth. Wait.” Marshall reached out, his hand falling just short of Seth’s wrist. Seth looked up at him. “I mean I still will, if you want me to. I just figured, you know, with you being sick, you might have changed your mind, or something.” Marshall blushed. “I want you to,” Seth lied. Yes, please, sign him up for more quality time with Cam! “Thanks.” “We should be thanking you. We could really use your moves out there.” Marshall extended the ball hopefully, but Seth shook his head. Grounded or not, he was too tired for basketball. Teetering on the brink of death for five days really took it out of a guy. “Rain check,” he said. “’Night, Indiana.” “’Night, Philadelphia.” Upstairs, Seth changed into sweats and a T-shirt. Captain Hook bounded onto the bed, his whole body wagging when Seth scratched his belly. At least someone was glad to have him home, Seth thought. He considered calling Ben, to ask if he had found out anything about Naomi’s killers, but he was grounded from phone privileges, too. And, all right, maybe he was a little annoyed that Ben hadn’t called to check on him. He decided to just go to sleep, hope tomorrow would be a better day. 86 As he reached to switch off his bedside lamp, he noticed a small box beside his alarm clock, wrapped in hot-pink paper. Inside was a pewter jaguar charm, dangling from a black leather cord. Seth knew who it was from, despite the absence of a card. It was the same necklace Leigh had been holding in his dream. A birthday present from his kid sister. Feeling marginally less lonely, Seth tied the cord around his neck – wondering, as sleep overtook him, just how much of his dream had been a dream at all. 87 Chapter Seven: A New Normal Sunday afternoon, Lydia presented Seth with his requested bottle of hair dye from the drugstore. Perched on the edge of the Jacuzzi, she watched as he slimed his hair with his favorite shade of Starry Night. He was haphazard about it, ending up with white-blonde streaks in addition to the bleached tips. For the weekend, Seth had retreated to his bedroom. Remembering not to do anything too catlike around his new family was taxing. It wasn’t like he would have climbed the living room drapes or used Poe’s litter box or anything like that; it was small stuff, innate to Seth, like his tendency to slink when he walked, to arch his spine when he stretched, to draw his laugh into a purr. Still, it worried him. His parents already thought he was a drug-addicted felon. What would happen if they found out he was a werecat? Avoiding the situation had seemed like the best strategy, for now. Jack and Lydia had assumed he was sulking and let him be. Truthfully, Seth was exhausted. Regent’s running regimen would have to wait. He could barely climb steps without his knees trembling. He had cried some more. Felt better for it. If there was a silver lining to being tranqed, it was being forced to sit still with his grief long enough to feel it. “I wish you’d stay with your natural color,” Lydia lamented now, as Seth sat back to wait for the dye to set. “Dyed hair is edgier,” he told her. “I was thinking of piercing my tongue, too. What do you think?” Lydia smiled. “I think you’re going to drive the girls crazy.” Seth recalled the flash-burn of desire he’d felt in the driveway, with Marshall. “About that,” he said. “Do you think it’s possible to have a crush on somebody you just met?” “Absolutely I think it’s possible,” Lydia said, with conviction. “Attraction is a powerful force. But you need to take time to get to know the person. Be sure they’re right for you.” She paused. “Is there a particular someone you’re thinking of?” “Yeah,” Seth said. His mother didn’t press for a name, which made him wonder if she suspected what he was starting to 88 suspect about himself, and if she would mind. “How do you tell if the person is right for you?” “Well…” Lydia scooped up Poe. The little calico had snuck into the bathroom and was rubbing against her ankles. “It helps if you’re compatible. If you share common interests. Although I think the best relationships also open you up to new things. And you want someone you can be honest with. Someone you don’t have to pretend for.” Problem, since Seth’s life was essentially one giant pretense. “Is that how it was with you and my dad?” he blurted out. Way too serious of a question to ask with his hair gommed up in sticky spikes and the bathroom reeking of ammonia. “Forget it,” Seth said, feeling idiotic. “It’s none of my business.” “Honey, of course it’s your business.” Lydia, seeming to unfreeze, went back to stroking the cat. “Seth, your father – Thomas is a kind, brilliant, gentle man,” Lydia said, softly. “We loved each other very much. When we were together, he made me very happy.” Leave it alone, Sullivan, Seth thought. But he had to ask. “Does Jack make you happy?” The look in Lydia’s green eyes was unfathomable. Frightened. Regretful. Yearning. A little angry. Seth stared at her, momentarily out of breath; but then Lydia smiled, and she was just beautiful again. Supermom Goddess. “I’m happy you’re home,” she said. “Now, come here and let me rinse your hair.” *** Leigh materialized the next morning, Seth’s first day of school, dolled up in a forest-green sweater dress and brown suede boots, auburn hair rolled into a messy bun – ready for the catwalk or the classroom. Seth was sitting on one of the tall stools at the teak island in the kitchen, inhaling a double stack of Lydia’s blueberry-and-banana pancakes. Leigh poured herself a bowl of Cornflakes and joined him. “Do you know how many carbs are in those?” she snipped. Seth speared a bite of pancake, deliberately folded it into his mouth, and savored it with his eyes closed. “I hope you get fat,” Leigh said. Seth smirked. Not likely. “Where’s Mom?” 89 “Yoga class,” Seth said. “With Meredith.” Leigh nodded and returned her attention to her cereal. Seth saw her looking at him from under her lashes, though, eyes widening when she saw the pewter jaguar charm around his neck. “So the birthday faerie visited me,” he said. “She left me this awesome necklace.” Leigh’s lips twitched. “Clearly she has good taste. Maybe she can take you clothes shopping.” Seth flicked crumbs at her, leading to a mini-crumb fight that ended when a horn honked in the drive. Seth grabbed his new backpack off the couch and sprinted out the front door, ignoring Leigh’s cry of, “Shotgun!” as he vaulted off the porch and into the front seat of Marshall’s car – a silver Audi TT coupe with a custom sound system, a sun roof, and all-black leather interior. “Indiana, your car rocks,” Seth said. “Hi, Whitney.” “Hi, Seth,” came the shy reply from the backseat. “Better hide your car keys,” grumbled Leigh, crawling into the back. Oh, so it was like that, was it? “As if that would stop me,” Seth scoffed. “I could hotwire this puppy in two seconds.” “Good to know,” Marshall said. Being a golden boy neighbor, Marshall drove Leigh to school every morning. (He was also the only eighteen-year-old on the planet to drive his sports car under the speed limit and brake for little old ladies crossing the street.) Weezer blared from the speakers, drowning out the girl chatter in the back. Marshall drove one-handed, shaking back the sleeve of his letterman’s jacket and tapping his fingers to the beat on the wheel. “Hope you brought you’re A-game, Philadelphia,” he said. “I called Coach last night. He wants to check out your moves in Gym.” “Bring it,” Seth said. He had woken up feeling good as new, the aftereffects of the silver poisoning having fully faded. The drive to Fairfax High was a short one. Marshall parked in the student lot, south of a black-and-white stone edifice that resembled nothing so much as a medieval castle, complete with turrets on the corners. Stone paths led past picnic tables and modern art sculptures in the vein of Marcel Duchamp. A twentyfoot-tall metal knight in medieval armor guarded the front door, preparing to slay – Seth’s heart did a weird sideways skitter – a 90 three-headed monster with serpentine necks, the body of a lion, and a scorpion-stinger tail. A chimera. Coincidence, Seth told himself firmly. It had to be. High schools had all kinds of mythology-inspired mascots. This was Fairfax. Fairfax had nothing to do with Chimera Enterprises. The Audi joined a flock of Volvos, BMWs, Acuras, and Porsches in the upper portion of the lot, where the Castle Estates students parked. Everyone Seth saw was wearing designer jeans and neutral-toned sweaters, not a single Goth or skater or punk in the bunch. It was like heading off to a GAP photo shoot. The lower lot was a different story. Kids in ripped jeans and worn-out hoodies slouched against dented fenders, reclined on rusted hoods. One boy, a six-foot-six stack of muscle with beaded dreads hanging down the back of his Chicago Bulls jersey, sneered in Seth’s direction, the gold hoop shoved through the cartilage of his nose catching the light. “Who’s that?” Seth asked. “Angelo Alfaro.” Marshall’s tone was without judgment. “He’s got a hell of a temper. My father says his whole family is bad news, but he doesn’t mess with people as long as they leave him alone.” Though Seth had dressed tamely, in a plain white T-shirt and faded jeans, somewhere between the Castle kids and the Haven kids, he attracted stares as they headed for the main doors. Seth had resigned himself to standing out. Clothes couldn’t hide the magic in his blood. A werekin would never fit in among humans. Marshall’s pack met them in the main hallway. Bryce, Topher, and Gabe greeted Seth like an old friend. Cam had his arm around a petite black girl Marshall introduced as Shanti Bruce, head cheerleader. Cam, Seth thought, was a walking cliché of high school jockdom. “’Sup, kitty-cat?” he drawled. “Rumor has it you’ve been sick. Swallow a hairball?” Seth glanced at Leigh. She was inspecting her French manicure in a decidedly nonchalant manner. Decent of her not to blab his alleged drug habit to the entire school. Then again, she probably didn’t want to be known as the girl with the junkie brother. “I’m all better now,” he said, silkily, and turned to Marshall. “I have to register before classes, so…” “I’ll walk you,” Whitney volunteered. 91 Marshall looked as startled as Seth. Whitney was so quiet you could practically forget she was there. “Uh – okay.” Marshall sounded reluctant. “See you at lunch, Philadelphia.” Seth nodded, though frankly, he anticipated being bounced before then. The manila envelope of fake transcripts was weighting down his backpack like an armload of bricks. He still had to pass himself off as legit to the administration, and he didn’t like his chances. Adults never trusted Seth. Away from the others, Whitney became talkative, naming the classrooms they passed: the Bio lab, the study hall, the library. A dog-eared copy of The Bell Jar peeked out of her canvas tote. She was wearing a sloppy-looking boys’ cardigan over her denim skirt and chunky brown clogs, signature butterfly barrettes holding back her sleek bob – slightly off-beat, like Seth. He found it incredibly easy to be himself around her. “Leigh was worried about you last week,” she said, apropos of nothing, as they descended a flight of steps outside the gym. “I think the phrase you’re looking for is ‘ticked off at me,’” Seth said. “She was mad because she was worried,” Whitney said. Seeing Seth’s expression, she patted his arm. “Girls are complex creatures, Seth. Don’t bother trying to figure us out. Anyway,” she stopped, outside a set of glass double doors labeled Main Office – Ms. Ingrid McLain, Principal, “I’m glad you’re better.” She looked Seth right in the eye as she said it, her message clear: Leigh had told Whitney Seth was a druggie, and Whitney didn’t buy it. He probably should have felt threatened, but instinct told him whatever Whitney Townsend suspected, she wouldn’t tell anyone. “Thanks, Whitney,” he said, loading the word with meaning. She smiled at him as she skipped off. The first bell rang as Seth entered the office. A long chrome counter bisected the room, separating a waiting area from a receptionist’s desk and the teachers’ mailboxes. The slight, fortyish receptionist looked up at him, starting a bit as she took in his dyed hair and golden eyes and camouflage jacket. “Can I help you?” “I’m Seth Sullivan,” Seth said. “I’m new here.” Obviously. 92 “Seth! Hello!” To Seth’s surprise, the receptionist jumped up, beaming, and rushed around the counter to shake his hand. “I’m Ms. McLain.” The principal? Seth’s preconceived notion of a high school principal was a middle-aged bachelor with bad breath and armpit stains, whose greatest joy in life was handing out detention. Ms. McLain looked more likely to serve you a batch of homemade cookies than to suspend you. She was tiny, almost bird-like, with curly black hair frizzing around a wide blue headband and practical white tennis shoes accompanying her pinstripe suit. Seth liked her immediately. Weirdly, she seemed to like him, too. The receptionist, she explained, was out sick, “But I can sign you up for classes,” she said. “Follow me.” She led him into her office, which was just as medieval as the rest of the school: The black walls and white carpet gave the impression they were meeting atop a life-sized chessboard. Seth sank into a chair in front of the desk and handed over his envelope of forged documents, doing his best to appear innocent. Would he go to prison as an accomplice if Regent’s faked-up documents didn’t pass muster? On the corner of the desk was a photograph of a handsome young man in desert fatigues, posed in front of a tank. Seth looked from the soldier’s dark hair and coffee-colored eyes to Ms. McLain’s. “Your son?” he said. “Hmm?” Ms. McLain glanced up from the papers. “Oh, no. My nephew. Will. I raised him and my niece after my brother passed. Now. About these.” She laid her palms down on his transcripts; Seth held his breath. “These are first-rate marks, Mr. Sullivan. Not that I would have expected anything less, knowing your family.” Seth assumed she meant Leigh, his brainiac Georgetown wannabe baby sister. “I think we’ll put you on the advanced track. Honors classes.” Outwardly, Seth smiled. Inwardly, he groaned. Why couldn’t Regent have made him a mediocre student? Seth looked like an underachiever. That part he knew how to play. Also, it involved less homework. “Did you want to continue with French?” Ms. McLain asked, consulting the doctored transcript. 93 Seth frowned. Had Regent known he could speak French? He couldn’t have, Seth decided. Regent had forged the transcripts the day after they met. Not enough time to check up on him. Besides, only Ben and Naomi knew Seth was a polyglot. “Je préfère l’espagnol, s’il vous plait,” he said. Ms. McLain gaped at him. Smirking, Seth translated, “I’d prefer Spanish, please. Unless you offer Mandarin,” he added, thoughtfully. “I’ve always wanted to learn Mandarin.” “Sorry, no Mandarin. But Señor Vasquez will love you.” Ms. McLain hit the print key. As the laser printer started shooting out pages, she leaned toward Seth, her expression earnest. “Seth, academically, you’re more than prepared for Fairfax High – ” bet she would rethink that if she knew his education came from the public library stacks “ – but I’ve seen students in your situation before. Homeschooling can create certain…gaps, in one’s development. Socially.” “I already know some people,” Seth said. “And I’m planning to try out for the basketball team.” Under duress. “Oh.” Ms. McLain relaxed. “Well, wonderful.” Persuaded he wasn’t a hopeless introvert, she walked Seth out to the main office and retrieved his schedule from the printer. Seth scanned it. Biology, English, American History, Geometry, Spanish…Everything had an H after it, for Honors. The only classes he wasn’t dreading were Gym and study hall. “I just need to copy your birth certificate,” Ms. McLain said, “and then we can – hold on.” She pulled a sheet out of the envelope and frowned at it. “This isn’t right.” Seth’s insides turned to water. “What’s wrong?” “Your birth certificate. It’s a facsimile. A copy,” Ms. McLain said. “We need the original, and we copy it here.” Seth had no idea if the birth certificate Ms. McLain was holding was real, but he knew the Fairfax courthouse would have one on file. He had been born here, at Fairfax Memorial. He offered to go pick up the original, but Ms. McLain shook her head. “No leaving school grounds,” she reminded him. So many rules. Seth was used to coming and going as he pleased. “Just have Lydia send the original with you tomorrow, okay?” Seth started. He hadn’t expected Ms. McLain to know his mother’s first name. “You know Mrs. Steward?” 94 “Oh yes. Very well. Or I used to. Lydia and I went to school together. I threw the baby shower for you and – ” Ms. McLain stopped her mouth with a quick, airy little laugh that didn’t quite come off. “Well, never mind. Ancient history. You’d best be getting to second period…Oh, Mr. Little, for heaven’s sake. Tardy again?” The tall, skinny boy who had just walked into the office ducked his head. Seth recognized him at once: Emery Little, the clerk from Re-Spin, at the mall. “Sorry, Ms. McLain, I missed the bus and Mom – ” Spotting Seth, Emery broke off, giving a little hop of surprise. Ms. McLain looked alarmed. “Emery, good gracious, are you all right?” “F-fine.” Emery’s oversized ears twitched. “Uh, hi, Seth.” “Hi, Emery.” Seth smiled – no teeth. What was with this guy? Humans were put-off by the werekin vibe. They weren’t mortally terrified by it. Ms. McLain wrote Emery out a hall pass, warning him that a third tardy would land him in detention. “Now, be a dear and show Seth to his locker, won’t you?” she said. Emery nodded, looking less than thrilled. The principal stuck her hand out to Seth again. “Good luck, Mr. Sullivan,” she said. Seth had a feeling he was going to need it. *** Good gracious. What a way to start the week. Fingering the small brass key in her pocket, Ingrid McLain watched the two boys ascend the staircase outside her office. As soon as they disappeared, she turned, marched into her office, and locked the door. Taking the key from her pocket, she fit it into the lock on the bottom drawer of her desk. Inside was a box of red file folders. She labeled one Seth Michael Sullivan and slipped the transcripts into it, thinking it had been some time since she had seen documents so expertly forged. It had also been some time since she had enrolled an Underground werekin at Fairfax High without the Resistance forewarning her of their arrival. But no one in the Resistance – 95 no one in the Underground – no one, period, was supposed to know who, or what, Seth Sullivan was. Ingrid had helped see to that sixteen years ago, when the hunters had come for Thomas Sullivan and his family. With a pang she thought of Lydia, her stomach round with pregnancy, green eyes shining with happiness. It’s for the best, she told herself, as she did every time she was confronted with the cruel deception that had been foisted onto her old friend. Ingrid added Seth’s file to the small but growing collection inside the drawer, locked it, and returned the key to her pocket. Plenty of registered werekin lived peaceably in Fairfax, with Ursula LeRoi’s blessing, but in the decade and a half that Ingrid had been principal of Fairfax High, she had seen more and more werekin enter the city’s Underground. Soon they would be populous enough to attract the Partners’ attention. Werekin recognized one another on sight – blood calls to blood, the saying went. Ingrid was one of the few humans who could recognize them, too. Her nephew, Will, described it as a blurred image, like a photo double-exposed, as had Ingrid’s mother. For Ingrid, the magic appeared as a nimbus of light, like a halo, as beautiful as it was alien. She had never met a werekin like Seth. Of that Ingrid was certain. Logging on to her computer, Ingrid bypassed the school email program and signed in to her private account, typing in her password when prompted: blackswan. If the Resistance hadn’t contacted her about Seth, she had to assume they remained ignorant of his identity. Best to keep it that way. Seth was in grave danger as it was – graver even than he realized, given whose house he was living in. Before she acted, Ingrid needed advice. She needed to talk to Ben Schofield. She worded the message carefully, aware that Chimera had many means of securing information, and double-, then triplechecked it for clues that could lead back to Seth. Satisfied there were none, she hit send. *** 96 Seth’s locker popped open cooperatively with the combination Ms. McLain had given him. Emery leaned against the wall next to it, fiddling with his St. Francis medal as Seth shelved his new stack of textbooks. “I called your house last week,” he said. “Your dad told me you were sick.” “Jack isn’t my dad,” Seth said, overlooking the implied question of what had been wrong with him. “Why were you calling me?” “For an interview,” Emery said. “At Re-Spin, remember?” “Right.” Seth’s near-death experience had driven part-time employment right out of his mind. “Are you still hiring?” Emery said they were. His mother, Melody, owned the store. Emery, it turned out, was the assistant manager. “You could come by today,” he offered, leading Seth down the hall toward his English class. He wore Birkenstock sandals with his tattered jeans and a T-shirt that said GET HIP TO HEMP, as underdressed for the January weather as Seth. “I can’t today,” Seth said. Today was his first training session with Regent. “How about tomorrow?” “Sure. Just whenever. We’re a pretty laidback operation.” Emery stopped outside a classroom with a poster of Emily Dickinson taped to the door. “Watch out for Miss Janowitz,” he warned. “She gives killer pop quizzes.” Flashing Seth a peace sign, he jogged off down the hall. Seth watched him go, baffled as to why someone who winced every time he smiled would be so anxious to have him for a co-worker. Miss Janowitz was young, brunette, and pretty. She also single-handedly quashed Seth’s hopes that all of his teachers would share Ms.McLain’s confidence in his scholarly potential: She looked him up and down with her owlish eyes, signed his registration slip, and banished him to the back row. Seth slouched down in his desk, practicing invisibility, and reviewed the reading list while the rest of the class discussed Robert Frost’s uses of symbolism. The novels he had read, but he would have to slog through the poetry. Maybe he would ask Whitney if she wanted to study together. After English was American History with Mr. Talbot, a tweed-and-bow-tied British expatriate who earned Seth’s undying admiration by singing their class the opening bars of the 97 musical 1776 to introduce their unit on the Revolutionary War. Then it was Geometry with ancient, half-blind and stone-deaf Mrs. Clark. Seth’s Honors classmates were all nerdy chess club types, openly awed by his bad boy coolness. He learned a few names: Brendan Brighton, Kellen Newman, Yena Lee, Janon Susott. There was just one boy from Haven Heights, a black boy with glossy dark hair tumbling in his quick, dark eyes. The Haven status was obvious in both his off-kilter thrift shop clothes – pinstripe pants held up by lime-green suspenders, a newsboy cap askew on his head – and his name, Andre Alfaro, presumably making him the younger brother of Angelo, though Dre, as everyone called him, was so small and skinny it was hard to imagine he shared genes with the giant Seth had seen in the parking lot. He hunched over a beat-up MacBook in every class, hands fluttering incessantly over the keys. Bryce Heilsdale was in his classes, too, following in Marshall’s footsteps of being a brainy jock. As he was still crutch-bound, Seth helped him carry his books down to lunch. “The orthopedist is making me sit out the rest of the season,” Bryce lamented. His cast was inked all over with his classmates’ names. Leigh’s had a little heart above the i. “Dad went ballistic. He says riding the bench will hurt my chances at an athletic scholarship.” Did all the parents at Fairfax High have their kids’ futures planned from the cradle? Seth wondered. “I don’t want to take your spot, man,” he said. Seth didn’t care about basketball. Or college. “It’s cool,” Bryce said, perfectly sincere. “I want us to win state.” Whitney, Seth’s self-appointed tour guide, was waiting to escort him through the lunch line. Seth sat between her and Bryce at the ballplayers’ table, scarfing down a slice of pizza that tasted like the cardboard tray it came on. Leigh claimed the seat beside Marshall, the better to flirt with him. Invisible lines divided the cafeteria, not just between cliques, as Seth had expected, but between Castle and Haven. Emery Little sat at a table that included Angelo Alfaro. Alfaro appeared quite popular with his set. A pack alpha. His little brother Dre 98 and a sport-o type girl in fleece athletic pants kept glancing at Seth. The girl had long, coppery hair and so many freckles sprinkled across her vulpine features she looked suntanned. Dre’s glances were curious, but Miss Vixen’s were almost sly, as though she knew a secret Seth didn’t. He asked Whitney who she was. Marshall answered. “That’s Quinn O’Shea. She’s captain of the girls’ basketball team.” “Planning to make a move, Philly?” Topher teased. Seth just grinned, but Cam leaned over to his cheerleader girlfriend Shanti and whispered something that cracked her up. Seth wasn’t sure if they were laughing at him, or Quinn. After lunch Seth had study hall, in a large, windowless room tiled in white and outfitted with long black desks, the sort of place you expected to be strapped down and dissected. Seth scooted in with Topher just ahead of the bell. “Beware of Dr. Evil,” Topher whispered, jerking his chin at the teacher’s desk. Behind it, on a podium overlooking the student tables, sat a pudgy, balding man in his late thirties. A plastic nametag was pinned to his lapel, like a clerk in a copy store: “Dr. Aaron Gideon,” it read. His bulbous eyes were the color of weak tea behind thick, square-framed glasses. He took Seth’s registration slip between his thumb and forefinger, holding it up for inspection. He wore a diamond ring on his pinkie finger, the flesh around it humped up like it had been sized for a thinner man. “It says here you were supposed to be in my first-period Biology class,” he said. “It took forever to make my schedule,” Seth explained. “I see.” Dr. Gideon removed his glasses and cleaned them on the hem of his shirt, taking his time while Seth stood there, feeling conspicuous. A few kids had glanced up from their books, scenting trouble. “You think it’s acceptable to miss your first day of class, Mr. Sullivan?” “Uh…no?” Seth guessed. “No indeed.” Gideon settled his glasses back on his nose. “I suppose that’s a lesson mommy and daddy didn’t teach you in homeschool.” His voice carried like he was shouting into a bullhorn. Seth snatched his registration slip back and hurried to his assigned seat, cheeks slightly pinker than usual. 99 So this was why people hated high school. *** Seth’s final class of the day was Gym. Ms. McLain had called it “athletic phys ed,” which, Whitney had explained, meant it was reserved for student athletes. It would be Seth’s only class with Marshall. And Cam. He sat in the bleachers with cast-bound Bryce while Coach Evans, a former Marine with a shiny bald spot, a hint of a paunch above the waistband of his sweatpants, and a drill sergeant’s bubbly sense of humor, started the class running wind sprints. Marshall slipped Seth a thumb’s up on his way down the court. Coach propped a foot on the bleacher beside Bryce. “Townsend swears you’re a heckuva ball handler, Sullivan,” he said, dubiously. Hard to imagine that, underneath the slight build and delicate features, Seth was all animal. “With Heilsdale here out, we’re a point guard down, and to be honest, I don’t like our chances for the post-season with the douchebags on my bench.” He passed a ball to Seth. “Okay. Let’s see your stuff.” Seth dribbled out to the opposite end of the court from where the class was now doing calisthenics, led by Marshall, the team captain. Though not, as far as Seth knew, an athlete, Alfaro was among the group. His gym shirt stretched tight across his back, threatening to split at the seams. He wasn’t just cut, like Cam. He was massive. Seth was curious how much he could bench. Two of him, easy. Cam whistled. “Don’t miss the hole, kitty-cat!” “Shut your yap, Foss, or you’ll be running laps,” Coach yelled. He nodded to Seth. “Go on, Sullivan.” He sounded eager to end Seth’s humiliation. Seth flexed his fingers. He was going to enjoy this, way more than he should have. From the free throw line, the top of the key, halfway down the court, he sank basket after basket – nothin’ but net every time. One by one, his classmates drifted over to watch. After several minutes of this, Coach motioned to Alfaro. “Let’s see how you do under pressure, Sullivan,” he said. 100 Marshall moved in front of Alfaro. Probably thinking what Seth was: He hadn’t signed on for David versus Goliath. “Coach, maybe you should let – ” “Not now, Captain,” Coach said, firmly. Marshall closed his mouth on a frown. Alfaro lumbered across the court, shaking back his dreads. The beads threaded through them were gold, like the hoop in his nose. Not the real stuff, but still an impressive dose of bling. “C’mon, buttercup,” he drawled, when Seth hesitated. “Take the shot. If you can.” All righty then. Seth drove at the basket. Alfaro threw his arms up. It was like running at a wall, and Seth heard Bryce yelp – right before he dodged, went in for a layup, and dunked, leaping off his toes. Gasps from his audience. Wow! The short kid can dunk! Seth rebounded, his grin daring Alfaro to come and get him. Grinning right back, Alfaro did – charged at him like a bull, sneaking in a street ball trick that really should have been a foul, tucking his shoulder in and slamming Seth sideways; but street ball was the only kind of ball Seth had ever played, and with catlike grace, he pivoted, reverse-stepping to stay in-bounds as he whipped the ball sideways to maintain possession. The move made him dizzy, which was not normal for him – like all werekin, Seth had an excellent sense of balance – but he ignored it and fired off the shot mid-spin. The ball glanced off the backboard. Seth came down hard, turning his ankle. He saw Alfaro reach toward him… He came to on the sidelines, a towel folded under his head. Marshall was kneeling beside him, checking his pulse. His eyes were a very dark shade of blue. “What happened?” Seth moaned. “What do you think?” Marshall glared at Alfaro, who mugged a gap-toothed grin for him. “It wasn’t his fault,” Seth said quickly. It must have looked that way, after that cheap shot Alfaro had taken, but he hadn’t hit Seth full-force, or Seth was pretty sure he would have landed in the bleachers. And Alfaro had tried to catch him when he tripped. “I think – I think maybe I fainted.” 101 “Fainted?” Coach appeared over Marshall’s shoulder. The afternoon light leaking through the gym’s skylights frosted his bald spot. “Any medical conditions I should know about?” Well, you see, Coach, I can skin into a jaguar, and last week I was tranqed by hunters… “I’ve been sick,” Seth muttered, remembering the junkie story and avoiding Marshall’s eyes. “You should have said if you didn’t feel well,” Marshall admonished. He helped Seth up, sliding an arm around his waist when he wobbled. “Maybe you should sit,” he said. Seth nodded. Marshall shuffled him over to the bleachers and knelt in front of him, hands resting lightly on Seth’s knees. Seth concentrated on taking slow, deep breaths through his mouth, willing the world to stop spinning. “Simmons, go get the nurse,” Coach ordered. “I’m fine,” Seth protested. He didn’t know what would show up on his lab results if they sent him to the ER, but he had a feeling it would be funky enough to warrant a call to his mother. He shot Marshall a pleading look. Help me out here, man. Flushing, Marshall looked down. “Seth did have a bad flu last week, Coach.” For future reference, Seth noted that Marshall Townsend could not lie to save his life, but Coach just sighed. “Okay, okay. Sullivan, park it, and don’t puke on my bleachers unless you want to make friends with a mop. The rest of you, ten laps, then showers. Now, ladies!” Their classmates jogged off, Cam smirking in Seth’s direction. Marshall put one finger under Seth’s chin and tilted his face up, scrutinizing him with a furrowed brow. “Seth, I think you should see the nurse. You don’t seem well. Your eyes – ” Seth looked down at his sneakers. His eyes were his giveaway. He needed to change the subject, fast. “I don’t mean to undersell myself here, Indiana, but if you’re looking for talent, why isn’t Alfaro on the team?” “Other than the fact that he’s a menace?” Marshall muttered. Across the court, Alfaro was easily pulling ahead of the others on laps. “The Haven kids almost never join the school teams. They don’t like us very much.” “Us?” Seth said. 102 “Rich people.” Marshall almost sounded embarrassed, like he was to blame for his parents having money. “Townsend!” Marshall jumped; Coach was at half-court, glaring up at them. “Laps! That means you, princess.” “On it, Coach.” Marshall stood, backing away from Seth. The flush had not quite faded from his cheeks. “Look, Philadelphia, whatever is going on with you, if you don’t want help, that’s your business. But don’t ask me to lie for you again, because I won’t.” He jogged off then. Seth wanted to tell Marshall it wasn’t what he thought. He wasn’t high or coming down off a high or going through withdrawals. But, since he couldn’t, he didn’t bother saying anything at all. 103 Chapter Eight: Way of the Warrior By the time Regent picked him up from school, Seth was feeling good as new. He opted not to mention the fainting spell, on the off-chance his weretiger guru might display some heretofore unknown concern for his well-being and postpone their lesson. Seth was anxious to start his training. Being taken down by Snowman had more than scared him. It had galled his pride. Seth wanted to be a lethal force, taking the fight to Chimera, not hiding in Fairfax with his tail between his legs. Regent didn’t waste time asking if Seth had liked his classes or whether he had made any new friends. Maneuvering the Hummer into the late-afternoon traffic on the expressway, he launched right into an explanation of how Seth’s training regimen would work. “Werekin fight in both skins. Right now your best chance, and I’m not saying it would be much of one, would be to fight as a jaguar,” he said. “You found out the hard way all a hunter has to do is tranq you, stop you from skinning, and you’re helpless as a kitten.” Seth groaned at the pun. Regent smirked. “In the Scholae Bestarii, werekin and hunters train together. Hunters are the offspring of werekin parents – the ones the magic skips, for reasons Chimera still doesn’t understand. Genetically hunters are human, but physically, they’re superior to humans – faster, stronger, smarter. They start their training as children, same as werekin warriors. Easier to mold a child than to break an adult. “Every hunter child is paired with a werekin child. Partners live together, eat together, fight together, day in and day out, until werekin come of breeding age at fourteen. It’s how the hunters get so good at tracking and killing us. They know us. How we move. How we think. What we fear. What we love. “Each hunter is given the key to his werekin partner’s collar – literally, the key to his life. With it, he has absolute control over his partner. He can order her to slice her own flesh, to starve herself, to kill her dearest friend. If the hunter doesn’t do those things, if he shows mercy, the trainers force his werekin partner to torture him.” 104 Regent made it sound like the hunters weren’t to blame for collaring werekin. Seth thought of Naomi, bleeding her life out on their kitchen floor. “Hunters aren’t collared,” he said. “Even if a werekin runs away, Chimera can still use his collar to drain his animus, as long as they have the key. Hunters are free to leave. They choose to stay.” “Not all of them,” Regent said. The Hummer was sailing past the remains of Fort King; sunlight rippled over the hillside, the snow sparkling like it was made of crushed diamonds. “Some hunters do run away. Then they spend their lives being hunted, same as werekin in the Underground. But most of the time, once they’re old enough to escape, they’re too brainwashed to want to.” Whatever. Seth wasn’t feeling sorry for hunters. The slaughtered werekin on Regent’s walls surveyed him with glassy eyes as Regent tapped his security code into the panel by the shuttered wall. The metal blinds retracted into the ceiling, revealing the jungle enclosure, but that wasn’t their destination today; Regent turned a dial and a panel in the floor slid back, along the fireplace. Seth peered down a narrow staircase into darkness. “What’s this,” he said, “your Bat Cave?” “Just get moving, cub,” Regent growled. The staircase ended in a state-of-the-art workout studio-slasharmory. A white rubber mat covered the floor wall-to-wall, like in a dojo; three of the walls were paneled in mirrors, while on the fourth, hanging from iron pegs, were weapons. Crossbows. Ninja throwing stars. Mesh nets threaded with silver. Romanesque bronze-tipped spears. Seth pitied the hunter who broke in here anticipating an easy collar. He took down one of the curved samurai swords. The deadly silver sickle hissed when he freed it from its sheath, executing a backhanded slice as he admired himself in the mirror. He looked seriously badass, like Teenage Mutant Ninja Werecat. “Man, I could do some damage with this puppy,” he said. “When do I get a sword?” “When you convince me you won’t chop your own arm off.” Regent plucked the sword out of Seth’s hands and returned it to its sheath. “And its proper name is a katana.” Seth rolled his eyes. 105 He was given a pair of white pajamas to change into – his karate gi. Regent’s gi was black, and made him seem more massive than he already was. To begin, he positioned Seth in the center of the mat, weaponless, and tied a strip of cloth around his eyes to serve as a blindfold. “Is this necessary?” Seth complained, every instinct crying out at being so incapacitated. “My house, my rules,” Regent said. “You’re free to leave anytime.” He circled Seth on the mat, the swish of his footsteps in the dark causing Seth to tense. Regent growled at him to stand still. “You fidget, cub. Constantly. Tap your fingers. Dance your feet.” “I’m hyperactive,” Seth said. “So sue me.” “You need to stop wasting that energy. You have to focus it, bring it to bear on a target. Warriors call it mudana no waza – eliminating all unnecessary movement.” Okay, so, standing still was his first lesson. Not as glamorous as swordplay, but Seth gave it his best: let his arms hang loose in their sockets, and concentrated on Regent’s words, shutting out his movements. “You have to learn control. Control of pain. Control of fear. The other night, you nearly skinned at the sight of me. The magic can’t control you. You have to control it.” He would teach Seth control, Regent promised. Discipline of body and mind, in both skins. Seth had never been into martial arts. Never played Mortal Kombat, never watched The Karate Kid. Ben had one of those swords, a katana, but Seth had never known it was the weapon Chimera had trained him to use. Blindfolded, focused on standing still, he listened closely as Regent waxed philosophical about balance, honor, courage, and discipline. Always, discipline. Physically, Seth was confident he could rise to whatever challenges Regent presented. The discipline thing, though, that worried him. Discipline had never been Seth’s strong suit. “Werekin train for years in the Scholae Bestiarii,” Regent said. “You don’t have years to prepare, so you’re going to have to work hard. Harder than your soft cub hide has ever worked, I’d wager.” He whipped the blindfold off, leaving Seth blinking 106 in the sudden rush of light. “We’ll meet three times a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays after school, and Saturdays. You’ll practice on your own the other days, and keep up your running – five miles a day, for now.” Great. And Seth would sleep and eat and have a life when? He had ball practice Mondays and Wednesdays, games Fridays, and if he wanted to stop depending on Jack Steward’s handouts, he needed to get a job. But he didn’t complain. Regent was giving him what he wanted. The means to fight back. They started with the basics: punches, kicks, and blocks. Seth wanted to jump straight into knuckle jabs and knife-hand slashes, kick boxer jujitsu stuff, but Regent insisted on a methodical approach. They didn’t even spar. They did floor exercises, Regent demonstrating how he wanted Seth to freeze his limbs in different stances, then showing him how to flow through them, like a dance. Normally Seth’s natural grace was a boon to him, but Regent harangued him for being too fluid. “You’re like a wet noodle,” he said, standing off to the side critiquing. “Spine straight. Stomach in. Control your body, don’t just fling yourself around! Now, again.” Two words Seth would come to hate: Now, again. Back to the starting line, do not pass Go, do not collect two hundred dollars, reset and repeat. As tedious as it was onerous. After two hours, he was sweat-soaked and bone-weary. Regent noticed. As Seth slipped back into his street clothes, he pitched him a towel, marbled eyes narrow. “Have you been running like I told you?” Somehow Seth knew Regent would catch him if he lied. “I was recovering,” he said, meekly. “Tomorrow, cub,” Regent growled. “Five miles. Or don’t bother coming back Thursday.” He started up the stairs. Seth jogged after him. “But tomorrow is Tuesday,” he said, jumping the last step. Regent was at the security panel, already twisting the dial to close the floor panel. “Didn’t you say we’d practice Tuesdays and Thursdays?” “I’m giving you a day off,” Regent said. “Ah, boss, is that concern I detect? For moi?” 107 Regent grunted. “You’re no good to me dead. And don’t call me ‘boss.’” He made to close the metal blinds. Seth held up a hand, casting an appealing glance at the jungle enclosure. “Would you mind? I can’t skin in the house. There’s no privacy, Leigh just barges into my room whenever she wants. And I can’t run outside anymore, because of the hunters…” Regent sighed, making sure Seth knew what a pain in the tail he was. “Knock yourself out,” he said. *** The big cat playground was, in a word, spectacular. In his jaguar skin, Seth climbed trees, dove off branches, paddled in the creek, which was stocked with small, colorful fish. Seth didn’t eat them; he didn’t need to hunt to eat, and the fish were beautiful, like live gemstones. They darted in and out between his paws, recognizing, as Poe and Captain Hook did, that the jaguar meant them no harm. Over a week had passed since Seth had skinned – the longest he had ever gone. Standing on a flat stone slab, shaking water from his fur, he roared for the sheer pleasure of being alive. When he at last picked his way up the branches and leapt through the opening into the great room, tracking muddy paw prints across the hardwood, Regent was at the bar, looking lawerly in a sweater and slacks, files stacked around him. He quickly closed the one he had been leafing through. “Have a nice romp, cub?” Seth fell over on his side, swishing his tail. In cat language, this meant: I had fun! Now I’m tired and hungry, please take me home! Regent chuckled. “Come on. I’ve got a surprise for you.” Reluctantly returned to his human skin, Seth trailed him to the garage. He found himself peering into the dark stands of trees around the house, shivering a little as he remembered that, somewhere out there, Snowman’s partner could still be searching for him. The garage was a repository of lawn equipment, mothballed for the winter. Stacked in one corner were a half-dozen padlocked chests. “What’s in those?” Seth asked. 108 “Personal effects.” Yanking the tarp off of something Seth thought was another lawnmower, Regent gave him a look. “And don’t get any ideas, cub. Remember, curiosity killed the cat.” But satisfaction brought him back, Seth thought. The tarp had kicked up a spray of dust. Seth coughed – and blinked. Underneath it was a Yamaha FZ1. As motorcycles went, this one was a beauty – sleek as a panther, all black and silver, with ramped-up fuel injectors and custom-fit handlebars. “You like her?” Regent asked. Seth practically whimpered. Yes he liked. It was possible he loved. “Thought you might,” Regent grinned. He pitched him a set of keys. Seth’s jaw dropped. “Oh, no way! You’re giving this to me?” “Loaning, cub,” Regent stressed. “Just loaning. I’ve got better things to do than carpool your tail all over the city.” Loaning, giving – semantics. Seth ran his hand over the lightweight aluminum frame, absolutely in love with his new motorcycle. Just one problem. “I don’t have a driver’s license,” he felt compelled to confess. “Actually,” Regent said, “you do.” From his wallet he produced a world-class fake I.D. naming Seth Michael Sullivan a licensed driver in the state of Indiana. “You have a BMV file and everything,” Regent said. “But if you get caught speeding, I’ll have your hide. Got it?” Seth nodded absently, frowning down at the square of shiny plastic. Forged transcripts, falsified government records…exactly what kind of lawyer was Regent? He thought again of the brand on Regent’s palm, his story of winning his freedom in the Arena. But if Regent was working for Chimera, why help Seth? Why save him from Snowman when he had been as good as collared? Wasn’t it just as likely that Regent, never married and childless, had money to throw around? And money, Seth knew, could buy just about anything. Let Regent blow his disposable income on Seth if he wanted to. He settled in at the handlebars. The engine purred. So did Seth. “My mother will flip,” he predicted. Regent’s smile was not without satisfaction. “Yes,” he said. “I expect she will.” 109 *** It took Seth two hours to get home from Regent’s. He cruised his new baby up and down the expressway, all through the warren of downtown streets, even out to Haven Heights, a collection of crumbling tenements centered by a rundown park, bordered by a railroad track. Marshall was shooting hoops in his driveway when Seth finally turned in. He stared at the bike as Seth parked it beside the Stewards’ garage. “Your parents will flip,” he said. “I know.” Climbing off the bike, Seth scuffed his shoe on the concrete. After that scene in Gym, he wasn’t sure where their friendship stood. All of a sudden Marshall smiled, popping out his dimple. “It’s totally going to be worth it,” he said. “I know,” Seth said again. He had to remind himself they were talking about the bike. Marshall passed him the ball. They scrimmaged for a while, until eventually Seth’s stomach growled so loudly Marshall heard it. “We have cold pizza in the fridge,” he offered. “Lead the way,” said Seth. The Townsends’ kitchen was as spacious and modern as the Stewards’, but with walnut cabinets and granite countertops. A set of Magnetic Poetry shared the fridge with basketball schedules and takeout menus. Someone, probably Whitney, had put together a line from Keruoac: Stare deep into the world before you as if it were the void; all the atoms emitting light inside wavehood. Marshall fished two sodas out of the fridge – Coke for him, Mountain Dew for Seth – and they carried the pizza, left-over deep-dish supreme from MoJo’s, up to his room. “Where is everybody?” Seth asked. “Monday is Mom’s night at the Lady’s Auxiliary,” Marshall said. Seth nodded like he had a clue what that was. “Whitney is over at your house, studying with Leigh.” “What about your dad?” “He never makes it home from the hospital before ten, if we’re lucky.” “He’s a surgeon right?” Seth said. Marshall nodded. “What about your mom?” “She paints a little,” Marshall said. “Mostly she’s just mom.” 110 He opened the door to his room, and Seth stepped around him. Marshall’s bedroom was the size of a studio apartment. The walls were painted Harvard crimson (Dr. Townsend was an alum) and papered in posters of the greats: Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant. A glass shelf above the window displayed trophies for basketball championships, merit badges for Boy Scouts, ribbons for science fairs. A flat-screen TV was mounted on the wall opposite a king-sized bed, above an entertainment center boasting every gaming console known to man. Other than some basketball gear spilling out of a duffel bag inside the walk-in closet, the room was spotless. Seth, like all cats a neat-freak, appreciated that. They took seats on bean bag chairs, the pizza box on the floor between them. Marshall ate two slices to Seth’s five. Lightweight. “Coach asked me a lot of questions about you after practice,” he said, prying the tab off his soda can. “Oh yeah?” Seth kept his tone casual. “What’d you say?” The tab snapped off; Marshall walked it across his knuckles. Seth stared at his fingers, intrigued by the ripple of bone beneath skin. “I told him I don’t really know you all that well,” Marshall said, “so if he wanted your life story, he’d have to ask you.” He raised his eyes to Seth’s. Kept them leveled there, laserpoint, as Seth sat his soda can on the floor and leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Something happened, in Philly,” he began. “Look, Seth.” Marshall caught the pop tab in his palm, folding his fingers tightly around it. “I’m not trying to get in your business, okay? You don’t owe me any explanations.” Don’t I? Seth thought. “Indiana, just – just let me get this out, all right?” Marshall nodded, looking almost wary. Seth took a breath, and started again. “In Philly, there was this lady who looked after me. Naomi. She’d been with me – with us, I mean, my dad and me – since I was a baby. I loved her. Christmas Eve, something…something bad happened, and…she died.” The more he talked, the tighter Seth’s throat felt. He paused, biting his lip. Marshall sat forward, gently resting a hand over his. “Seth, I’m – Jesus, I’m so sorry. I had no idea.” Nodding, Seth hurried on. “Anyway, after…I had to get away. I just ran. I ended up in Cincinnati. I didn’t know what 111 else to do, so I called my mom. I couldn’t go back to Philly, and Fairfax was the only place I could think of to go. The only place that seemed – right.” The pad of Marshall’s thumb was stroking Seth’s knuckles, raising gooseflesh on Seth’s arm. They both seemed to become aware of this at the same time. Marshall pulled his hand away and sat back, folding his arms across his chest so tightly his fists dug into his ribs; Seth laced his fingers behind his head, aiming for a chipper smile. “So that’s it,” he said. “The saga of how I became such a complete and utter screwed-up mess right now.” Not the whole truth. Not even in the ballpark of full disclosure. But it was more than Seth had shared with anyone, besides Regent, about his reasons for coming to Fairfax. Why risk taking Marshall even this far into his confidence? He was thinking of what Lydia had said. You want someone you can be honest with. Being completely honest with Marshall was out of the question. Complete honesty could have gotten them both killed. As much as he could, though, Seth wanted to be honest with Marshall. As much as he could, he wanted Marshall to know him. Marshall was quiet for a long time, staring out the window. Seth’s newfound determination to practice stillness was stretched to the limit before Marshall finally said, “Is that why you started taking drugs?” Seth decided he hated Regent for making him live that particular lie. “I don’t know why I do half the crap I do, Indiana. You want to armchair psychology me? I have abandonment issues. Self-destructive tendencies. Sometimes I want to run so far away no one will ever find me. Sometimes I want to crawl out of my own skin.” Marshall looked up at him. “You’re not the only one who feels that way,” he said, softly. There was a beat in which they simply stared at one another – a beat in which Seth had the most insane urge to tell Marshall everything, every one of his secrets. He had never been tempted to do that before, with anyone. He managed to grate out a laugh, breaking the tension. “What’d you do, man, put truth serum in my soda?” he said. 112 “I think you needed to say all that to somebody,” Marshall said, simply. He kicked back in his chair, wiping the intensity from his expression like an eraser moving across a chalkboard. “You really freaked me out in Gym today,” he said. “I thought you were dead when you fainted.” “Sorry,” Seth murmured. Secretly elated that Marshall had been worried. “You should know Coach randomly drug tests us.” Maybe he couldn’t erase that lie, Seth decided, but he could start over on a new page. “Indiana, I swear to you, I am not on drugs.” His vehemence seemed to take Marshall aback. He frowned. “You mean now, or – ” “Marshall?” The boys started. Seth, rather sheepishly, realized he had been too focused on Marshall to even hear the front door open. Whitney Townsend’s sleek bob appeared in the doorway. “Marshall, Leigh wants to know if – oh.” She pulled up short, looking from her brother to Seth. Seth supposed there was a weird vibe in the room, from all the sharing. “Sorry,” she said, ducking back out. “I didn’t mean to interrupt…” “You didn’t,” Marshall said, at the same time Seth said, “I should get going anyway.” Whitney bit her lip, like she was fighting a smile. Marshall, coloring a little, looked at Seth. “Do you really have to go?” Seth nodded. “I am still grounded, you know.” They gathered up pizza crusts and soda cans, and Seth followed Marshall downstairs. At the back door, Marshall stood on the stoop, bare toes curled up against the cold. Seth loitered on the top step, more reluctant to say good night than he should have been. “Are you riding your bike to school tomorrow?” Marshall asked. Seth shook his head. “That’s just for getting to Regent’s.” “Well,” Marshall stepped back inside, “then I’ll see you in the morning, Philadelphia.” There was a spring in Seth’s step as he jumped the last stair. On his way past the hoop, he scooped up the ball and popped off 113 a three-pointer. The shot swished; Seth mimed the roar of a crowd, then froze, the skin on the back of his neck tingling. He spun around, his gaze sweeping down the drive to the deserted street. No one was there, but Seth was sure he hadn’t imagined the feeling… His gaze was drawn up, to Marshall’s bedroom window. The room was dark, but Seth could have sworn he saw the curtain move. As though someone was standing behind it, watching him. 114 Chapter Nine: Kindred Spirits The dream began as it always did, with his dad shaking him awake. In the bluish glow of the city lights filtering through the plastic blinds, Thomas Sullivan’s vulpine features were gray with care. “Seth Michael,” he said, a habit Naomi would pick up from him. “We have to leave, now. They’ve found us.” Seth dug a fist into his eye. At five years old, he had only the vaguest notion who “they” were. Hunters. Bad guys. Thomas carried him, Snoopy blanket and all, down a dingy staircase, past their apartment building’s laundry room, into a snow-packed alley. A reeking dumpster overflowed with days’ old garbage. Seth buried his face in his dad’s shirt. Naomi came hurrying toward them from the end of the alley. Her brindled hair was plaited into one long braid; Seth, accustomed to her sensible pageboy, had forgotten she used to wear it like that. “Thomas, they’re already here,” she said. “Go back!” Thomas shook his head. “Chimera knows I’m here. You’ll have to hide him.” “Thomas, no.” Naomi held out her hands, imploring. “This can’t be the way. I can still fix this. Let me call – ” “No.” Thomas’ voice was firm. “I know what you’re going to say, and the answer is no. We can’t risk it. It’s done. You have to take him to Ben. Promise me, Naomi. Promise me you’ll keep him safe. I can’t lose him, too…” Naomi nodded, the movement spilling tears. Thomas set Seth down behind the dumpster. Seth was starting to get scared. This had seemed like a game at first, hide-and-seek in the dark, but now, Naomi was crying. Thomas cupped his face in his hands. “Seth, listen to me. I need you to be brave now, all right? The hunters are here, and they’re going to take me away. If they see you, they’ll take you too, and we can’t let that happen. You’re far too important.” All Seth heard was ‘going to take me away.’ “Daddy, I want to go with you!” he cried. “I know you do. But you can’t.” Thomas hugged him close, then handed him off to Naomi. Seth hid his face in her neck, 115 refusing to look at Thomas. He didn’t want his dad to go without him. It wasn’t fair. “I love you, Seth Michael,” Thomas said. “Now, stay here, both of you, and don’t make a sound.” Thomas Sullivan was a tall man. The two figures filling the alleyway’s entrance, backlit by street lights, were taller. One held something round and shiny – a collar, though Seth didn’t know it at the time. A ripple moved under Thomas’ skin. The next second, a small arctic fox, his white fur tinged with blue, was streaking past the hunters, leading them away from where Seth crouched with Naomi, helpless, in the shadows… The dream shifted. Seth was standing beneath the bowl-shaped tree in the patch of jungle he had seen once before, in his fever-dream. The same black jaguar observed him from the branches. On instinct, Seth tried to skin. Found, to his horror, he couldn’t. The black jaguar leapt to the fern-covered ground. Instantly, he skinned. At first, it was like looking in a mirror. The werekin boy had Seth’s big, round, golden eyes, minutely flecked with blue; his arched cheekbones, sloping down to a wedge-shaped chin; his lazy, feline smile. He lacked Seth’s tattoos, though, and his hair – neater than Seth’s, clipped military-short – was its natural golden blonde, streaked with butterscotch and caramel. The boys were the same height, the same narrow build, but clearly this kid spent more time at the weight bench than Seth did. Muscles bunched in hard knots under his black T-shirt and camo pants. His right palm was branded. Four numbers and a Greek letter: 4331-ζ. Gen-7. Was Seth looking at himself, if Thomas hadn’t succeeded in hiding him from the hunters all those years ago? Was this what Seth would have become in the Scholae Bestiarii – this coldly watchful version of himself? “Who are you?” Seth hissed. The boy slid a bone-handled dagger from his belt. The blade was etched with archaic glyphs that echoed in Seth’s mind. He held up his hands. “I don’t want to fight you,” he said. Seth’s doppelganger laughed. “No,” he said, “you really don’t.” Then his smirk vanished, and he flipped the dagger 116 around, extending it, hilt-first, to Seth. “But you may have to someday, so take this.” *** Seth’s Hello Kitty alarm clock pulled him from the dream. Roundly cursing Regent and his Mr. Miyagi discipline crap, he kicked off the covers, suffering a reproachful meow from Poe, nested on his window ledge, when he yanked his Gym uniform out from under her. A light glazing of ice coated the sidewalks of Castle Estates. The houses Seth jogged past were just waking up, lights burning in kitchens, moms packing lunches while dads loaded racquetball gear in the backs of SUVs. The sun was a pink smear on the horizon, stars twinkling in the graying light. The rhythm of Seth’s footfalls was unexpectedly peaceful. He would still rather have been in bed. Running five miles would have been nothing for Seth in his jaguar skin. But just as he couldn’t bite through an alligator’s skull in his human skin, as a boy he could never run as far or as a fast as he could as a jaguar. Which was why he had never bothered trying, before now. Whiling away the miles, he sorted through his dream. For months after Thomas’ capture, Seth had revisited the horror in nightmares that had reduced him to terrified sobs. Naomi had been there each time, rocking him, singing him back to sleep, until eventually the dreams had faded, replaced by the aching everyday misery of missing his dad. Naomi’s murder had torn open those old wounds. Seth supposed it was only natural for the nightmare to return to him now. Still, the clarity of the memory amazed him. In the intervening decade he had completely forgotten his dad mentioning Ben. How would Thomas Sullivan have known Ben Schofield? Ben was just another werekin in the Philly Underground, a bartender at a seedy South Philly bar, a haunt of Resistance fighters recruiting for their cause. For that very reason, Naomi had forbidden Seth to ever set foot inside the place. 117 Go back, she had warned Thomas. Just as the voice had warned Seth to “go back,” not to run in the woods, the night Snowman had nearly collared him. And then there was the black jaguar. His doppelganger. He couldn’t have been Seth; as a jaguar, Seth’s fur was tawny with black rosette-shaped spots. Not even Chimera could change a werekin’s skin. Nothing changed a werekin’s skin. They were born with it, their mystical connection to the Totems – magical DNA. If he wasn’t seeing himself through a glass darkly, then who was the jaguar boy, and why did he look so much like Seth? Seth couldn’t shake the feeling that this dream had something to do with the voice telling him to save “her.” It all seemed linked somehow, like those connect-the-dots puzzles he had loved as kid, when you drew the last line and saw the picture that had been there all along, waiting for you to make sense of it. Spurred by these thoughts, Seth had run faster than he would have believed possible, clocking six-minute miles easy. He walked the last quarter-mile, pleased that he didn’t feel faint. Marshall was unlacing his sneakers on the Townsends’ back step as Seth trotted up the Stewards’ drive. Sweaty hair hanging in his eyes, a damp circle staining his shirt between his shoulder blades – he had been for a run, too. Seth waved. Marshall waved back. Though his bed beckoned with the promise of another twenty minutes’ sleep, Seth, exercising superb discipline, practiced his karate stances before indulging in a searing hot shower. He toweled off quickly and pulled on jeans and a Flogging Molly Tshirt, swiping a comb through his damp hair. Then he locked his bedroom door and dialed Ben’s number. This was fudging on his grounding from phone privileges, but his dream had given Seth an overpowering urge to talk to Ben, to ask how he had known Thomas. It rang a dozen times before Seth hung up. *** Lydia was at the stove when Seth came downstairs. As predicted, she had freaked about the motorcycle. She still seemed 118 to be fuming as she spatulaed pancakes onto Seth’s plate. He hopped up on the counter, eating with his fingers, too ravenous to waste time on a fork. “Werner can’t be serious.” Lydia was seething. “A seventeen-year-old with a motorcycle? He didn’t even give you a helmet!” Because Seth would absolutely not have worn one, he didn’t say. “No. It’s out of the question.” “What’s out of the question?” Jack breezed into the kitchen, briefcase in hand. “Seth,” he said, “the counter is not for sitting.” Seth jumped down. “That motorcycle,” Lydia said. She was scrubbing so viciously at the skillet she sloshed soapsuds down the front of her yoga pants. (So far as Seth could tell, all the moms in Castle Estates kept very tight schedules that revolved around maintaining their figures and shopping for new clothes.) “I’m calling Werner right now and telling him to take it back.” Oh no. That bike was Seth’s baby. “Mrs. Steward, it’s really out of Mr. Regent’s way to pick me up from school and drive me home after my lessons,” he said. “I promise to be careful. I won’t even drive the bike to school. I can ride with Marshall.” Huge sacrifice, that. As he had last night, Jack sided with Seth. “It’s up to you, babe, but I say if Seth can pay to fill the tank, let him borrow the motorcycle,” he said. No doubt hoping Seth would wrap the Yamaha around a tree and be permanently removed from his life. “I’ll be home late tonight,” he added, like that was unusual. Jack lived at his office. “I’ve got to go by the Club, finish up details for the campaign fundraiser next week.” He kissed Lydia on the cheek. As the back door closed behind him, Seth turned to his mother, unleashing his big, round eyes on her. “Please, Mrs. Steward?” Lydia sighed. “Oh, all right. You can borrow the bike. But just for your karate lessons,” she said, sternly, when Seth pumped his fist in the air. “And for work,” he said. If he got the job. He planned to drop by Re-Spin for his interview after school. “And for work,” Lydia agreed. Drying her hands on a dishtowel, she came over and dropped a light kiss on Seth’s temple. Seth felt a smile stretch across his face, even as he 119 wondered, not for the first time, why it was his mother so rarely touched him. *** After Lydia left, Seth carried a bag of Oreos into the living room, curling up on the couch to review the chapter on vertebrate anatomy for Bio. Bryce had warned him Dr. Gideon – who hated all ballplayers, apparently, having been the weasel-faced kid who got depantsed by jocks in junior high – was fond of pop quizzes. After their tiff in study hall, Seth refused to give Gideon the satisfaction of failing him. The chapter had a full-color anatomical chart of the human body, a torso view with the organs drawn in and labeled. Shame Gideon was his teacher. Bio could have been interesting. Leigh didn’t come down until almost seven-thirty, as usual dolled up like prom night in a pencil skirt and tight pink sweater. She flopped down on the couch and stole an Oreo from Seth’s bag. “What are you reading?” Seth held up the textbook. Leigh wrinkled her nose. “Gross! How can you eat while you look at that?” Seth shrugged. He could pretty much eat regardless. “Started to think you were playing hooky,” he said. “I was up late cramming for World History. I hate that class. Who cares who won the Trojan War? It was, like, six millions years ago.” Leigh smiled as she noticed the jaguar charm peeking out from under his collar. Seth never took the necklace off, even to sleep. “Are you feeling okay? Marshall said you fainted in Gym.” Marshall, Seth thought, needed a refresher on the bro code: What happens at ball practice stays at ball practice. “Low blood sugar,” he said. “Nothing to worry about.” “Well, good,” Leigh said. “Because we’ve got a big game this week, and I hear you’re a hotshot ballplayer now.” Seth smirked. “Hotshot, huh?” “So Whitney says. You should hear her talk about you.” And Leigh trilled, in an exaggerated falsetto that sounded nothing like Whitney: “Oh my God, Seth is so gorgeous! He’s so funny, he has the prettiest eyes, and oooh, have you seen his body?” 120 Seth shoved her over sideways. “Shut up.” Leigh watched him stow his textbook in his backpack. “So?” she said. “So, what?” “So, do you like Whitney?” Why did Seth have a feeling this conversation would later be analyzed, in excruciating detail, by Leigh and Whitney? “I like her,” he said, carefully. “I’m just not interested in a girlfriend.” He tried not to emphasize the girlfriend overly much. The thing with Marshall could have been a fluke. Seth had only kissed the one girl, Andrea from Arizona or wherever. Wasn’t enough to draw a definite conclusion, was it? Maybe there was some other girl out there who could make his pulse flutter and his stomach tighten and his knees weak, like Marshall did… Yeah, he was in denial. “I told her you were a player.” Leigh scowled at Seth. “Just promise me you won’t date any skank-whore cheerleaders.” “Deal,” said Seth. “As long as you promise not to date Cam Foss, ever.” Leigh tipped her head to the side. “Like, ever-ever? What if killer robots from the future blow up the world, and Cam and I are the only two left to carry on the species? Can I date him then?” “Not even then,” Seth said. They shook on it. *** Seth claimed shotgun again on the drive to school. Marshall turned the music down – Vampire Weekend today – so the girls could review for their exam. “I didn’t know you were a runner, Philadelphia,” he said. “Indiana, I could write a book on all the things you don’t know about me,” Seth said. Whitney giggled. Seth grinned at her in the rearview mirror – and immediately regretted it. He didn’t want to hurt Whitney by encouraging her crush. Obliquely, he explained about Regent’s running regimen. “You guys should run together,” Whitney piped up. “Dad and Marshall used to run together every morning, before he got so busy at the hospital.” 121 “I don’t know, Whitney,” Seth said. “That might be a bad idea.” Marshall glanced sharply at him. “Why’s that?” “Because I’m not sure you could keep up,” Seth said, and laughed as he dodged Marshall’s half-hearted punch. Seth’s first class of the day was Bio. The way the morning light turned the tops of the tall black tables into sparkling lakes, glinting off the stainless steel shelves bracketed to the whitewashed walls, gave the room a Gothic vibe, like Frankenstein’s laboratory. Seth and Bryce arrived after the first bell, slowed down by Bryce’s crutches; Gideon wasn’t in the room yet, missing a prime opportunity to make a crack about Seth’s punctuality. Seth’s lab partner was Yena Lee, a tiny Asian girl with red streaks dyed into her jet-black hair. Bryce’s partner was Dre Alfaro. Seth said hi to him as he sat down at their four-person table; Dre swiped his bangs out of his eyes with a nod, his beaky nose so close to his MacBook his breath fogged the screen. Seth stuck on his pair of safety goggles, Yena stuck on hers, and they made bug-eyes at one another. Seth decided she would be a cool lab partner. Basketball was the topic on Bryce’s mind, naturally. “Whipping Sacred Heart this week will be a cinch,” he predicted confidently. Sacred Heart was Fairfax’s Catholic high school. “Then it’s on to sectionals. Before you came, I’d have said we didn’t stand a chance against Connor Burke. I don’t care what Cam says, he is seriously good. Now?” Bryce curved his wrist, miming a perfect shot at an invisible hoop. “Slam dunk, baby.” “You guys were a good team before me,” Seth protested. He wasn’t sure how he felt to have his teammates counting on him. Seth had never had friends to let down before. “Sure we were,” Bryce agreed. “We went to sectionals last year. Got our butts handed to us by Sacred Heart, but we went.” Seth laughed. “Coach says Marshall could go pro if he wanted. And Topher and Gabe are good, too.” “What about Cam?” Seth picked up the pair of tweezers on the metal tray in the center of their table, amusing himself by using them to pluck lint off his shirt. “Yeah, Cam is good, too.” 122 Seth noted a distinct lack of enthusiasm. “You don’t like Cam?” “He just isn’t a team player, you know?” Bryce watched Seth dissect the piece of lint with the scalpel off his tray. “He cost us two games this season trying to make three-pointers from way outside the key, even though Marshall was wide open. He’s a ball hog.” Seth could have supplied another name for Cam. “Have he and Marshall always been friends?” he asked. The scene at MoJo’s, Marshall blowing up at him for calling Cam on acting like a jerk, still gnawed at him. The more he got to know Marshall, the less Seth understood his dynamic with Cam. Cam was a bully. Marshall wasn’t. “I think they used to be,” Bryce said. “Real friends, I mean. Dr. Townsend and Dr. Foss are golfing buddies. They’ve known each other forever. But this year, things are…different. Cam acts all friendly to Marshall’s face, but behind his back, the stuff he says – it’s ugly.” “Like what kind of stuff?” “Like that Coach only chose Marshall as team captain because his dad is on the school board.” Seth snorted. Anyone with half a brain could have seen Marshall deserved to be captain. “Don’t worry,” Bryce was quick to say. “Nobody listens to him. You couldn’t find anyone at Fairfax High who doesn’t like Marshall. He’s nice to everybody.” “Plus he’s hot,” Yena put in. Seth nodded. There was that. About that time the classroom door opened and Dr. Gideon appeared, wheeling a metal cart laden with plastic bags. A sickening chemical smell, like rotted fruit blended into an ammonia smoothie, filled the room. Kids groaned. The hair on Seth’s arms stood straight up. “Gloves on, people,” Gideon commanded, in his nasally bark. “Safety glasses, too. Pronto, if you please.” “Oh, crap.” Bryce had whitened to the lips. “I forgot we were starting this today.” “What?” Seth demanded. “What are we starting?” “Dissection,” Yena said, smiling sympathetically at Bryce, who was turning a moldy shade of green. 123 Looking around, Seth saw what he had missed before: the metal trays on every table, holding scalpels, tweezers, scissors and latex gloves. Dissection kits. Gideon wheeled his cart between the tables, thumping plastic bags down on them. Each one landed with a meaty slap. The chemical reek was now strong enough to make Seth’s eyes water. He gripped the table edge, fingernails digging half-moons into the smooth top as his claws slid out. A sense of wrongness was coursing through him. “What are we dissecting?” he asked. “Cats,” Yena said. Cats. “Once you have your specimen,” Gideon was saying, “open the bag – carefully, people, don’t spill formaldehyde everywhere – and place your specimen on your dissection tray. Do not start cutting. I will demonstrate how to make the incision.” The cart rattled up to their table. Bryce shut his eyes. Dre’s fluttering hands stilled on his keyboard. Gideon slapped a plastic bag down in front of them, another in front of Seth and Yena. Inside the shrink-wrap, a small, furry body was coated in syrupy liquid. Seth released a long breath through his mouth. Seth was a realist. He knew human life had a different value than animal life. If his house was on fire and he had to choose between saving his family and saving his pets, he would have saved Lydia and Leigh – then burned up saving Poe and Captain Hook. Werekin knew how it felt to be inside an animal’s skin. They knew that animals feared, loved, hated, hoped, and yearned. The creature inside this bag had valued her life as much as Seth valued his. Now Gideon wanted him to slice her up? Plastic ripped. Yena, looking a little green herself, held their bag out to Seth. “Seth, can you…?” Reaching a gloved hand inside, Seth grasped their cat by the scruff of her neck, lifted her out, and placed her gently on the metal tray, stroking down her spine to her limp tail. Embalming fluid had stained her once-yellow fur the color of molding putty. Small white teeth and a small gray tongue were visible behind her retracted lips, as though she had died in a grimace of pain. As he made to dump the bag in the trashcan – carefully, as Gideon had said, trying not to slop chemicals on his jeans – Seth noticed a symbol stamped inside the plastic, like a company 124 logo. A monster with the body of a lion, a tail that ended in a scorpion stinger, and three serpentine heads. A chimera. A shiver ran down Seth’s back. He looked up; Dre quickly looked down, hunching over so the tips of his shoulder blades pressed against his T-shirt like wing bones. His dark skin was ashy. Seth couldn’t be sure it was only the formaldehyde stench, even as Bryce moaned, “Jesus Christ, the smell.” “Ask to be excused,” Yena said. “Can’t.” Bryce’s voice was muffled by the hand clamped over his nose. “Gideon never excuses anybody from dissection. If you ask, he gives you detention.” “Listen up, people!” At the front of the room, Gideon clapped his gloved hands. “Position your specimen on its back and secure one paw to your dissection tray, like so.” He demonstrated with his own cat, tying a blue string around the right front paw and attaching it to a hook at the top of the tray. All Seth could see were the werekin on Regent’s walls – creatures reared in captivity, lives ended for no reason. They weren’t curing cancer here. They were an eleventh-grade biology class. He raised his hand. “Now, once you have the specimen in place, take your scalpel and – yes, Mr. Sullivan?” Gideon said, impatiently. “You have a question?” The legs on Seth’s stool squawked as he stood up. “They aren’t specimens,” he said. “They’re cats.” Gideon glared at him, pupils hugely magnified by his thick glasses. “They are vertebrate mammals, Mr. Sullivan. For the purposes of this classroom, that is all that matters.” “How did they die?” “How did what die?” “The cats.” Seth gestured at the dozen corpses around the room. “How did they die? Lethal injection? Old age? How?” “That is not the point,” Gideon bit out. A few students shifted uneasily, eyeing the cats like they were seeing their beloved household pets strapped down for evisceration. Yena raised her hand, and Gideon’s scowl relaxed. “Yes, Miss Lee? You have a relevant question?” 125 “I’ve read that biological supply companies use gas chambers to euthanize the cats.” “Ah.” Gideon beamed. “There you have it, Mr. Sullivan. The cats are humanely euthanized.” “Being gassed is humane?” somebody whispered. But Yena wasn’t finished. “I’ve also read that some companies only claim that to be their practice, though. Really they inject the cats with embalming fluid while they’re still alive.” “That’s sick,” a girl named Kelsey gasped. “I am going to puke,” Bryce moaned. Dre hastily scooted his stool to the side. “And,” Yena went on, really on a roll now, “I’ve even read that some companies claim to take animals from shelters that were supposed to be put down anyway, but really, they pick up strays off the streets.” Some of the boys shoved back from their tables, wearing hello no, we won’t go expressions. “Miss Lee,” Gideon snapped, “I will thank you not to repeat ridiculous urban legends in my classroom. Now.” He placed his palms on his desk, glowering at the class, with special attention reserved for Seth. “Animal dissection is an approved curriculum for eleventh-grade Biology. Problems with the curriculum can be presented to the school board. However, as this will be on your final exam, in the meantime, I suggest you all get started.” “I’d like to be excused,” Seth said. “Seth, no!” Bryce was shaking his head frantically back and forth. “Detention! Coach will bench you!” Gideon smiled like he had just been told Christmas was coming twice this year. “Have a soft spot for cats, do you, Mr. Sullivan? Perhaps you think this specimen might be a relative of yours?” He tapped the side of his face, indicating Seth’s tattoos. “They’re all my kindred,” Seth shot back, “if by that you mean cats are living creatures deserving of compassion and respect.” If looks could have killed, Seth would have joined his cat on her dissection tray. “How touching,” Gideon sneered. “Now, take your seat. All right, people. Start your incisions.” No one moved. 126 Seth had not meant to instigate a coup, but clearly he had the popular support in the room. Every eye was fastened on him, waiting to see how far he was willing to take this little rebellion. Seth thought of his teammates. Marshall had gone out on a limb to bring him into his pack; if Seth got benched, Cam would use it as ammunition against him. Not to mention this was exactly what Regent had ordered him not to do – make trouble, draw attention. But Seth could not dissect this cat. He wouldn’t. “I’d still like to be excused,” he said. Dre Alfaro stood up as well. “So would I.” His voice was very soft, like a chirp. Bryce and Yena gawked at him like they had never heard him speak before. Their teachers never seemed to call on him, Seth had noticed. Gideon straightened up, beckoning them from his desk. One by one, Seth peeled off his gloves, grabbed his backpack, and strode to the front of the room, waiting silently beside Dre while Gideon wrote out a hall pass. “Take this to the principal’s office,” he commanded. Seth took it, and turned to go. “Not so fast,” Gideon said. Yeah. Seth had known it couldn’t be that easy. He turned back. Gideon was holding up something else – a detention slip. Bryce groaned. “From what I understand, Coach Evans benches player who receive detention. Too bad. Everyone had such high hopes for defeating Sacred Heart this weekend.” Gideon slapped one detention slip into Seth’s palm, the other into Dre’s, smiling with acid glee. Deep breaths, Seth told himself; deep breaths. “See you in study hall, Mr. Sullivan.” 127 Chapter Ten: Full Disclosure No one, it seemed, ever stood up to Dr. Gideon. By lunch, Seth’s rebellion in Bio was on its way to becoming Fairfax High legend. Regent was going to pulverize him. At the ballplayers’ table, Bryce, still mossy green and avoiding solid foods, dramatized the scene, making out like Seth was Henry V rallying the British troops at Agincourt. “And then Gideon was all, ‘Take your seat, Mr. Sullivan,’ and Seth goes, ‘I still want to be excused.’ I’m telling you guys, it was epic.” Topher sighed wistfully. YYeah, and then he epically got detention,” Cam sneered. “Way to go, kitty-cat. Lot of good you’ll do us from the bench.” Seth stopped spinning the cap off his Mountain Dew bottle and looked across the table at Marshall, who had yet to chime in. Marshall had promised his father a state title. Seth knew he represented the Knights’ best chance of realizing that dream. “I’m sorry, Indiana,” he said. Marshall pushed his untouched tray aside. “What did Ms. McLain say?” “She said Dr. Gideon had every right to put me in detention, but if I agreed to make up the lab, she would talk to Coach about letting me play.” “And?” Bryce said, eagerly. Seth kept his eyes on Marshall’s. “And I said no thanks.” There was a general groan from the varsity team. Seth looked down at the table, feeling doubly like a heel. But, “It’s cool,” Marshall said, as their alpha effectively closing the issue. “We’ll just have to beat Sacred Heart on our own. As long we have you for the playoffs, we’ll be fine.” “The whole thing is completely unfair,” burst out Leigh. She was perched on the edge of her chair; Seth was amazed she had contained her righteous indignation this long. “How can they punish you for standing on your principles? Dissection is cruel and sadistic. Not to mention unnecessary. You can get the same educational benefits from a computerized 3-D model of vertebrate anatomy. I’m talking to Daddy,” she declared. “We’ll 128 petition the school board to ban animal dissection at Fairfax High.” Seth was alarmed. Dr. Gideon would be over-the-top furious if Leigh took her crusade to the school board. “Uh, sis, don’t you think that’s going a bit overboard?” he said. “Seth, do you know what they do to those poor animals? The fetal pigs are drowned, and the frogs – ” “Leigh,” Bryce said, “please, please stop.” “Well.” Leigh sniffed. “Anyway, it’s about time Fairfax High got out of the Dark Ages.” Everyone started talking at once then, congratulating Seth on getting under Gideon’s ice-cold skin. At the far end of the table, Cam leaned over to Shanti, smirking in Seth’s direction. Seth distinctly heard the word “pussy.” Marshall heard it, too. He caught Seth’s eye, one corner of his mouth lifting in an apologetic grin. Seth shrugged. Cam’s snide comments didn’t faze him – as long as they were directed at him. What he couldn’t understand was why Marshall wanted to hang out with Cam to begin with. Couldn’t he see they weren’t really friends? *** Coach Evans did not share Marshall’s rosy outlook on the Knights’ chances for winning against Sacred Heart without his newest point guard. “You want to be a conscientious objector, Sullivan?” he shouted, reaming Seth out on the sidelines in Gym while the rest of the class shuffled their feet at half-court. “I’ll give you something to object to. Laps, Goldilocks. Now!” So Seth ran laps. The whole fifty minutes. Cam blew him kisses as he ran up and down the court, sinking three-pointers. It wasn’t very team-spirited of Seth to wish he would break his ankle. On the ride home, sweaty and exhausted, Seth glared out the window, trying to tune out Leigh’s diatribe on the evils of animal testing. As soon as Marshall killed the Audi’s engine, Seth hopped out, climbed onto his motorcycle, and gunned the Yamaha out of the drive. 129 There was nothing quite like a brand-new motorcycle and a stretch of open road, even if the open road happened to be an expressway with a sixty-mile-per-hour speed limit, to put a smile back on your face. By the time Seth reached the mall, he had remembered he didn’t actually care about basketball, or high school. Seth didn’t know if Re-Spin sold weed, as Marshall claimed, but he was pretty sure the blonde twenty-something clerk manning the cash register smoked it. “I’m looking for Emery Little,” Seth said, stepping up to the counter. The clerk – Chaz, his nametag read – scratched his cornrows. “Boss is in the back, man.” He pronounced it mon, Jamaica-style. Party on, dude. “The back” turned out to be a windowless space combining a stockroom, employee lounge, and office. Emery Little was seated at a cluttered desk, conferring over invoices with a tiny woman whose waist-length, mousy brown hair was trapped in a thick braid. He did one of those funny hops when Seth knocked. “Seth! Wh-what are you doing here?” Seth frowned. Had he misunderstood about the interview? “Uh, you said to come by? About the job?” “Right!” Emery laughed, shrilly. “I just didn’t realize you were coming by today, that’s all.” He darted a glance at his companion, the only woman over the age of thirty Seth had ever seen wearing a Green Day T-shirt and ripped jeans. She was staring at him with her mouth ajar and her small pink nose wrinkled, as though on the verge of a scream. What was with these people? Were they all on drugs? “I can come back, if it’s a bad time,” Seth offered. “No, no.” The woman’s voice was extremely high-pitched, practically a squeak. “I’m Melody Little. Emery’s mother. Please, have a seat.” She motioned one tiny hand at the chair Emery had just vacated. Seth sank slowly into it, while Emery went to retrieve his application. When he came back, Melody scanned it. “You’re from Philadelphia?” she asked. Seth nodded. Emery was chewing on the end of his ponytail, hopping from one foot to the other behind his mother. “And your father was – Thomas Sullivan?” 130 “Uh, yeah. He is.” Seth emphasized the present tense, finding it odd that Melody had used the past. Everyone in Fairfax was supposed to believe Thomas Sullivan was alive and well. The interview was brief. Seth worried he wasn’t making a good impression; he didn’t have a work history that didn’t involve confessing to felonies, plus basketball and training limited his availability. But, after ten minutes, Melody announced that he was hired. Seth was ecstatic. So it was a crappy minimum wage mall job. Everybody had to start somewhere, right? “Can you be here tomorrow?” Emery asked, consulting the schedule. “Sure,” Seth said. “I have basketball practice, but I can be here by five. Is it okay if I bring a snack?” “Yes!” the Littles said, in unison. Melody trilled a laugh. “Wouldn’t want you to get hungry,” she said. Something was definitely off here. Emery and Melody’s behavior – it was how animals acted around a predator. And there were the twitchy ears and funny hops and squeaky voices…Seth stared at them. Could they be werekin? But why wouldn’t he have recognized them as his kin? Blood called to blood, just like Ben had always said… Seth was still puzzling on that question as he left the mall. He considered driving out to Regent’s, to ask his opinion, but nagging doubts about the weretiger stopped him. Regent might have saved him from hunters, he might have been training Seth to fight, but Seth still didn’t trust him. It was the trophies on his walls, he thought. Seth couldn’t bring himself to dissect a dead cat. Regent chose to live surrounded by the werekin he had killed – werekin who had been enslaved by Chimera, same as he had been. More and more Fairfax was starting to feel like a warzone Seth had been unwittingly dropped into. Until he figured out who his enemies were, he was better off keeping his suspicions to himself. Street lights were winking on as Seth crossed the parking lot. Parked beside his Yamaha was a bullet-gray Toyota Tundra with a gun rack in the rear window. Seth sized up the truck’s anti-theft system as he approached, mentally calculating what the 131 Colemans would have paid for those woofers and tweeters. The sound system was jacked. Absorbed in scoping the truck, he almost missed the girl standing by his bike. Razor-cut, maple-brown hair. Ice-chip blue eyes. Femme fatale body. His admirer. With the critical eye of a connoisseur, the girl was trailing her fingers over the Yamaha’s silver chassis. She wore a white parka with a fur-trimmed hood, skintight jeans, and spike-heeled boots. Seth cleared his throat. The girl glanced up, her look of surprise not quite genuine. She had heard him coming. Seth was impressed. Usually he could sneak up on anybody. “Is this your bike?” she asked. Her voice was soft and throaty, intriguing to Seth’s welltuned ears. “It’s on loan,” he said. “From a friend.” “Must be some friend. If this sweetheart was mine, I’d never let her out of my sight.” Seth slouched against the Toyota’s fender. The girl ran her eyes up and down the length of him, and Seth understood that he was now being checked out along with his bike. “She’s a twentyvalve, right?” Seth nodded. “How’s the throttle response?” “She’s got some punch,” Seth said. “Ever race her?” “Nope. Like I said, she’s on loan.” An elderly couple hurried past, frowning – at Seth, the bike, or the girl, it was hard to say. The girl was definitely edgy, Seth looked like a street punk, and most adults were suspicious of teenagers with motorcycles. Seth and his admirer shared a mutual outcast grin. “I’m Cleo,” she said. “Seth,” said Seth. “Seth.” Cleo repeated the name like it pleased her. “Well, Seth,” she swung onto the bike, patting the seat in front of her. “Wanna take me for a spin?” Seth waited for lightning to strike, choirs of angels to sing, or something, some teenage boy response to a smoking-hot girl essentially inviting him to have sex, on his motorcycle. Nothing. No fluttering pulse, no weak knees. He sighed. So much for the fluke theory. 132 “Maybe some other time,” he said. “I’m grounded.” “Grounded, but at the mall?” Cleo dished up a sultry smile that was entirely wasted on Seth. “Did you get time off for good behavior or something?” “Hardly,” Seth said. “I’m here for work.” “Where do you work?” Seth hesitated. A lifetime of anonymity told him to lie, but he wasn’t Underground anymore. He had a driver’s license, transcripts, a public record, even if it was fake. What did it matter if this girl knew where he worked? “Re-Spin,” he said. Cleo climbed off the bike, popped the Toyota’s tailgate down, and sat, motioning Seth to join her. He hadn’t realized the truck was hers. “I’ll have to visit you sometime,” she said. “Or here. I’ve got a better idea.” She produced a pen from her coat pocket and handed it to him, turning her hand over, palm up. Her fingers were callused. Unusual for a suburban hottie. “Write down your number. I’ll call you sometime, when you’re not grounded.” Again, Seth hesitated. “I don’t have a cell phone.” “So give me your home number,” Cleo said. “You live around here, don’t you?” “Seth! Hey, Seth!” Cleo and Seth both turned. Emery Little was hurrying toward them, holding Seth’s camouflage jacket. “You forgot your – ” Seeing Cleo, he seemed to choke on his words. Cleo raised an eyebrow at Seth. “Friend of yours?” she said. “Cleo, Emery. Emery, Cleo.” Seth held out his hand for his jacket. “You didn’t have to chase me down, Em. We’ll see each other at school tomorrow.” “Right. Sure.” Emery did not relinquish the jacket. As a matter of fact, he clutched it to his chest, like a shield. “You see, the thing is, you, uh, you forgot to sign something. One of the, uh, tax forms.” “Can’t I sign it tomorrow?” Seth said. “No.” Emery was adamant. “We have to process everything at the same time or your paycheck gets screwed up. Sorry.” “Okaaaay.” Seth climbed off the tailgate, handing Cleo back her pen. “See you around, Cleo.” 133 Cleo nodded, but her ice-chip eyes were fixed on Emery, who had paled milky-white. “Count on it, sweetheart,” she said. *** The next morning, Seth’s Hello Kitty alarm clock went off at five-thirty on the dot. He groaned, called Regent a name that made Captain Hook whine, and crawled out of bed. Marshall met him in the driveway, bundled up in a Harvard sweatshirt and light-weight knit gloves, jogging in place to keep warm. He shook his head at Seth’s shorts and T-shirt. “Ever heard of frostbite, Philadelphia?” “Please,” scoffed Seth. “Like you corn-fed hicks know from cold. It’s, what, ten degrees out here? In Philly, we call that a heat wave.” Marshall laughed. They followed Marshall’s route: east down Kings Lane, cut across Princess Street, cross into Castle Park, loop south on the paved running trails. Now that he wasn’t wrapped up in his own head, Seth appreciated the stark beauty of the ice-glazed trees, the clean quality of the light on the dark asphalt. His breath mingled with Marshall’s, white vapor that dissipated slowly, like smoke. Talking to Marshall was easy, Seth soon discovered. Books, movies, bands, they had more in common than he would have imagined. Marshall was curious about his life in Philadelphia. Editing significantly while trying to avoid outright lying, Seth told him about afternoons in the Charles Santore library, outdoor concerts at Temple University, walks on the Schuylkill River Trail. They talked about Fairfax, too. Their teachers. (Marshall called Gideon some names that made Seth rethink his Golden Boy sainthood.) Leigh and Whitney’s Vegan Society. (Marshall wasn’t a member, either.) Basketball, of course. “I really am sorry about the game this week,” Seth said, as they started their cool down. “Don’t apologize. It’s cool you stood up for what you believe in.” Marshall pulled off his skullcap. His hair was sweaty, sticking straight up in the back. “Leigh is the same way, 134 you know. Principled. I’ve never known anybody who champions the underdog like she does.” If only she knew the odds Seth was up against. “I still feel bad,” he insisted. “You vouched for me with everybody, and then I screwed up.” “Is this about Cam?” Marshall leaned against the Townsends’ mailbox, peeling off his gloves. “I heard what he said at lunch yesterday. The pussy comment. I can talk to him, if you want.” “I don’t need a bodyguard, Indiana.” “Whoa, Philadelphia. Chill. Not what I meant.” “Sorry.” Seth bit his lip. Hey, he was a cat. It was his nature to be temperamental. Hopping onto the low brick fence around the Townsends’ yard, he began traversing it on his tip-toes. “I appreciate the thought,” he said, “but don’t put yourself out. I couldn’t care less what Cam says about me.” Marshall looked as though not caring what Cameron Foss thought was simply inconceivable. “You mean it doesn’t bother you if people say…” A deep flush spread across his cheeks. Seeing where this was headed, and finding it impossible to stand still, Seth continued his tightrope act. “If people say what?” “You know,” Marshall said. “No, actually I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking.” Marshall shuffled his feet. “Nothing. Never mind.” Seth rolled his eyes. “Indiana, don’t make me beat it out of you.” “Like you could,” Marshall retorted. He was quiet then, watching Seth continue his tightrope walk, working up the courage to ask the question. Seth was surprised by how much he wanted Marshall to ask it. Because of all the secrets he had to keep from Marshall Townsend, he thought, maybe this was one he didn’t. “That stuff Cam was saying, at Leigh’s birthday party,” Marshall finally said. “You don’t care if people think you’re…gay?” Having reached the end of the fence, Seth pivoted, spinning back toward Marshall. He found him with his hands tucked 135 inside his sweatshirt, baby blues fastened on the cracks in the sidewalk. “Nope,” Seth said. “It doesn’t bother me.” Marshall looked up at Seth through his lashes. They were long and dark and thick, the eyes they shaded incredibly blue. “So…are you?” “I think so.” Seth sat down on the fence, kicking his heels against the brick. “I mean, I’ve never kissed a guy or anything. But I’m pretty sure I’m not into girls.” “And you’re okay with it? Not that you shouldn’t be,” Marshall added, quickly. “Yeah,” Seth said. “I’m okay with it.” And he was. How he felt when he looked at Marshall, that was as much a part of him as the magic in his blood. A part Seth was only beginning to explore, yet a part he instinctively recognized was too essential to his makeup to deny. Marshall studied him. Seth sat very still. It wasn’t a conscious choice, the being still. It was as though he was paralyzed, waiting for Marshall to say…He wasn’t sure what, exactly. Seth had seen Marshall hold hands with Leigh. Had witnessed her goopy smiles, her incessant flirting. And yet, other than his sister, Seth had not seen Marshall, the heartthrob basketball god of Fairfax High, give any girl a second glance – and yet, he and Leigh were not dating. Definitely not incontrovertible proof, but Seth wasn’t sure he could feel this strongly about someone who felt nothing for him in return. “You keep a lot of secrets,” Marshall said, suddenly, “don’t you, Philadelphia?” Seth grinned. “Shockingly, Indiana, that’s not even my biggest one.” “I won’t tell anybody.” Marshall said. “You know that, right?” “I know,” Seth said. Stepping down from the fence, he backed toward his house, holding Marshall’s gaze the whole way. “Why do you think I told you?” 136 Chapter Eleven: Between the Lines Detention at Fairfax High was held in a basement classroom near the boiler room, supervised by an old battle-axe Navy nurse named Ms. Krughman. Seth spent an hour after school there on Wednesday. It wasn’t so bad. Fairfax High’s delinquent element consisted of two ninth-graders caught writing their boyfriends’ names on the bathroom wall and a twelfth-grader busted for smoking outside the gym. Ms. Krughman retreated behind a magazine to let them do their homework in peace. The girls whipped out their cell phones and began texting. Seth had deliberately chosen the desk next to Dre Alfaro’s, in the back row. Dre’s suspenders were striped today, his gray polo untucked over his pinstripe pants. He looked too young to be an eleventh-grader. “Sorry about this,” Seth whispered, holding up his English Lit book so Ms. Krughman wouldn’t see his lips move. Dre closed his MacBook lid. He seemed surprised Seth was talking to him. “Don’t be,” he whispered back. “Angelo said it’s about time somebody put Gideon back a step.” “Angelo is your brother?” Dre swiped at his bangs – a nervous habit. One of many. Regent had said Seth fidgeted? He should have seen this kid. “He’s adopted.” Explained a lot. “Do you mind if I ask why he isn’t on the basketball team?” “Most of us just try to fly under the radar here,” Dre said. Seth was noticing that about the Haven kids. They didn’t start clubs, didn’t campaign for Student Council, didn’t play on ball teams. From what he had seen, they didn’t even talk in class. Quinn O’Shea was a notable exception. Miss Vixen walked the halls of Fairfax High like she owned them, copper hair bright as a battle flag. During study hall, Seth had pulled out some of the library’s old yearbook copies. Quinn O’Shea’s freckled face had been inescapable in every one, a standout ballplayer – volleyball, basketball, softball – since ninth grade. She was in eleventh now, like Seth, and stood a good chance of being elected prom queen next year, in Leigh’s estimation. 137 Every time Seth passed her in the hallway, she slid him one of those sly smiles. Topher had confided, in what he probably considered a helpful aside, that she only dated jocks. There was a rustle as Ms. Krughman traded her Newsweek for Time. Seth waited for her to disappear behind it before he spoke again. “What do you do on this thing all the time?” He tapped the MacBook. Dre shrugged. “Keep up with the news. Surf around. I do special projects for people, sometimes…” “Special projects? Like hacking?” Dre bobbed his head. Seth didn’t judge. He had his own felonious past with the Coleman brothers. “How much would you charge to hack into Gideon’s email and send him a pornogram?” Dre cackled a laugh. Ms. Krughman scowled at him; he ducked his head, like a bird tucking its beak under its wing, nearly upsetting his newsboy cap – and all of a sudden, Seth was struck by something deeper than recognition. He stared at Dre, the edges of his mind crinkling like paper in a furnace. “Seth Sullivan?” Seth spun around. Ms. Krughman had risen at her desk. About that time, the bell rang, announcing the end of detention; there was a scuffle of chairs as the released prisoners bolted for the door, Dre leading the pack, vanishing as he ducked around the corner. Seth stared after him for a long moment before walking up the aisle. “From Ms. McLain,” Ms. Krughman said, and handed Seth a note. It was a reminder that she needed his birth certificate. Seth tucked it in his pocket, making a mental note to pass it on to Leigh. Being the more responsible sibling, she might remember to tell Lydia. He dropped by Dre’s locker before he left. As he had expected, Dre was nowhere to be found. All day long Seth had kept an eye on Emery Little. In the hallway between classes, in the cafeteria at lunch. He hung around with the other Haven kids, wore the same faded jeans and grungy T-shirts as they did, hippie chic with his strawberryblonde ponytail and St. Francis medal. Like them, it wouldn’t have mattered if he had dressed in Armani every day, he would 138 not have fit in at Fairfax High. It was a vibe the Haven kids exuded. A not-entirely-human vibe. Seth intended to continue his surveillance during his first shift at Re-Spin that night, but Emery wasn’t at the store when he arrived. Nor was Melody. Seth’s training was to be left in the hands of Re-Spin’s only full-time employee, Charles Bonaparte, a.k.a. Chaz. “Nothing to it, mon,” Chaz assured him, as they shared a bag of Oreos at the counter. Seth hadn’t eaten since noon, and Chaz, predictably, had the munchies. “If a customer comes up and asks about a CD or a book, you just check the inventory chart to see if we’ve got a copy.” Trade-ins were more complicated. Re-Spin was a secondhand shop; for clothes, they paid cash, but for books and CDs, they swapped, haggling over trade-in value. Just how many copies of Phil Collins’ Greatest Hits did equal the latest album from JayZ? Bartering decisions were noted in a ledger by the cash register. Seth thought it sounded like fun. They had a rush around seven, a bunch of teenage regulars looking to switch out CDs. Chaz grooved his way through the transaction with surprising finesse while Seth, the dutiful trainee, observed, weighing in once with the opinion that Alice in Chains was worth at least as much as Soul Asylum. The rest of the night he sat on a stool beside the register, drafting an essay on the Articles of Confederation for American History. Chaz helped by supplying deep thoughts on the nature of democracy in a time of corporate fascism. Seth wondered if Mr. Talbot would ask to see his sources if he quoted a Charles Bonaparte. Chaz seemed to know the Littles well, and as Emery and Melody weren’t around to be spied on directly, Seth decided to pump him for info. “How long have you worked for Melody?” he asked. “Since high school. Great gig, mon. Gives me time to work on my music.” Chaz pointed to a flyer in the window, advertising a coffeehouse concert by his band, Listening Korn. Chaz played bass. Ah, the life of the small town stoner. “Where’s Mr. Little?” Seth asked. 139 “Dead.” Chaz shook his head, giving Seth to understand this was a deep, personal tragedy for him. “Killed in a hunting accident a long time ago. Emery never even knew him.” A hunting accident? Even if Seth had believed in coincidences, which, coincidentally, he did not, that would have stretched credulity. But if there were other werekin in Fairfax, Seth asked himself once again, why didn’t he recognize them? *** As Seth drove out to Regent’s for his second training session the next afternoon, a powdery mist, half-snow, half-sleet, was already falling. Fairfax High had been buzzing with excitement that day over the winter storm predicted to drop as much as a foot of snow on Fairfax by morning. Everyone was rooting for a snow day – everyone except Marshall, who reasoned that would also cancel their game against Sacred Heart. “Any day but game day,” he had said, glaring out the cafeteria window at the congregating clouds, like he could stave off a blizzard by force of will. Seth’s mood was also grim, though it had nothing to do with basketball. He had tried calling Ben again before and after school. There had still been no answer. He couldn’t decide if he was worried about his old Papa Bear, or hurt that Ben hadn’t called to check on him. Karate was an excellent cure for frustration. Regent put Seth through three grueling hours of floor exercises; by the time he called a halt, Seth’s gi was soaked, and muscles he hadn’t even known existed were complaining in his legs and back. He gratefully accepted the bottle of water Regent pitched him and sat down cross-legged on the floor of the Bat Cave, catching his breath. Regent leaned against the weapons wall, a dark mountain in his black gi. “Heard you had some trouble at school,” he said. Seth choked on his water. Damn Jack Steward and his big mouth. “I – ” “Save it, cub,” Regent growled. “You back-talked a teacher, started a revolt in your classroom, and ended up in the principal’s 140 office – basically, you did exactly what I told you not to do and made a spectacle of yourself.” “It wasn’t like that,” Seth protested. “I wasn’t showing off. You think I like getting into trouble?” “Is that a rhetorical question?” Seth glared at him. What did Regent know about high school? He had been raised in the Scholae Bestiarii. As an adult, he kept himself cloistered, in his law office or his enormous house. He had no clue what it was like to hide in plain sight among humans, lying to everybody in your life about who and what you were. Following rules you didn’t understand. “Look, I didn’t mean to tangle with Gideon, all right?” he said. “If it’s any consolation, I’m sure he’ll make my life hell the rest of the year.” Gideon had already started that morning, in fact, with jibes about Fairfax High’s impending slaughter by Sacred Heart. “Don’t worry. I won’t mouth off or egg his house or slash his tires. But I’m not desecrating a corpse just to pass eleventh grade. I don’t even want to be in school,” Seth said. He knew he needed to shut up, but it was like the flood gates had opened. Words just poured out of him. “My classes are a waste of time. I should be here training with you. How is calculating the circumference of a circle going to help me fight hunters, huh?” “Waste of time, is it?” Regent’s voice was deadly soft. “Oh, that’s right. I forgot. You already know everything.” Sure, rub the cub’s nose in his idiot remark. Seth rolled his empty water bottle back and forth on the white mat. “I don’t know everything,” he mumbled. Regent cupped a hand around his ear. “Sorry. What was that?” Mangy, flea-bitten old tiger. “I said,” Seth enunciated crisply, “I don’t know everything. Sometimes I feel like I don’t know anything.” “You know, cub, that might be the first intelligent thing I’ve ever heard you say.” Was he trying to piss Seth off? Because he was doing a fabulous job. Seth smashed the water bottle between his palms and tossed it onto his neatly-folded pile of street clothes in the corner. “Whatever. Doesn’t change the fact that I should be learning how to – ” 141 Regent moved so fast he was a red-and-black bur. Not tiger stripes; that was just the contrast of his ginger hair against his black gi. Seth rolled to the side. Regent’s foot swept the air where his head had been – a kick that would have knocked Seth senseless if he hadn’t dodged. He sprang to his feet, sidestepping as Regent attempted to hook a foot around his ankle – slipped in a swift punch to Regent’s flank, a move they had just spent ten minutes practicing in slow motion; Regent grunted and grabbed his wrist, landing two rib-bruising jabs before Seth managed to elbow him in the jaw and slide away. Was this a friendly sparring session or a fight to the death? Those distinctions weren’t always easy to draw with Regent. It was all Seth could do to block the worst of his blows, putting into play the punches, strikes, and kicks Regent had taught him, but Regent was better. Much better. He turned every defensive counter into an offensive strike. Finally, Seth threw an arm out to block a kick; Regent’s heel connected with the thin bone of his wrist, spiking pain into his shoulder; and instinctively, Seth skinned. Before his paws touched the mat, Regent had skinned as well. He pounced, toppling Seth head-over-tail; tiger and jaguar crashed into the wall, cracking one of the long mirrors down the middle. Regent came in snarling. Seth swiped his claws across the tiger’s nose, getting a terrifyingly close-up view of razor-sharp teeth as Regent flung all of his weight into him – five hundred pounds – and pinned him on the mat. Claws raked Seth’s snowy chest. The pain was searing, almost too hot to be felt, like it had cauterized his nerve endings. Seth tried to twist free, but Regent clamped his teeth around his throat. Instantly the jaguar stilled. All Regent had to do was bite down, and he would sever Seth’s windpipe. Seth whined, softly. Nice tiger. Please don’t kill me and stick me up on your wall… The pressure on his neck eased. The tiger sat back on his haunches, regarding Seth with emotionless marbled eyes. Seth skinned back into a human, hands flying to his throat. Four shallow puncture wounds marked the placement of the 142 tiger’s teeth. His white gi was sticky with blood on the side. Seth gingerly pulled the cloth away from his skin, sucking in a breath at the three claw marks running diagonally across his chest. New blood welled up in them with each shuddering pulse. Seth stood, turning his back on the tiger so Regent wouldn’t see him grimace. “How bad, cub?” In the mirror, Seth watched Regent, returned to his human skin, straighten his gi. All he had to show for their tussle was a scratch on the nose. “I’m fine,” Seth said. He could feel the skin knitting back together; by morning, he wouldn’t even have a scar. It hurt, a lot, but he found he could tolerate it. He was getting tougher. “Let me see,” Regent said. He turned Seth around. Seth stared at the rafters, mentally naming all thirty-one flavors of Baskin Robbins ice cream to distract himself from the pain. “You’ll live,” Regent pronounced. “But we should probably clean you up.” Seth assumed that was Regent’s version of an apology. He led Seth upstairs and positioned him on the sink in the master bath. Taking down a first-aid kit, he set about taping gauze over the wounds. “Was I supposed to learn something from that,” Seth asked, “or do you just enjoy kicking my tail?” “It is a perk,” Regent smirked. “I already told you, though I’m not surprised it didn’t sink in through that thick skull of yours: Werekin have to fight in either skin. You couldn’t beat me as a human, so you skinned into a jaguar. That won’t save you against a hunter, or a trained werekin fighter. What we learn about fighting as a human we take into our animal skins. Equally deadly as man or beast.” He snapped the first-aid kit closed, turning his back as Seth slid his arms through his T-shirt. Seth thought about the artful precision of the tiger’s lunge, how Regent had put him on the mat with a single, brutal onslaught: mudana no waza, no wasted movement. Regent had a tiger’s speed and strength, but he didn’t fight like a tiger in the wild. He fought like a warrior. Trained to go beyond instinct. His eyes met Regent’s in the mirror. “I want to learn that,” he said. 143 “You will,” said Regent. “But first, you had to understand it.” “Okay, Yoda.” Regent frowned; Seth sighed. “Yeah, yeah, I know, I know. Don’t call you ‘Yoda.’” “What do you know,” said Regent. “He can be taught. Now, come on. I’ve got something for you.” *** “Gee, Mr. Regent, you shouldn’t have,” Seth said. They were back downstairs. Regent had poured them each a mug of tea, then placed a leather-bound book, like a journal, on the bar in front of Seth. Seth ran his fingertips over the spine. He had sort of been hoping for a sword, to complement his motorcycle. “You said you wanted to learn about Chimera. That,” Regent, who was leaning against the counter near the stove, pointed at the book, “is the journal of Dr. Elijah Bishop, co-founder of Chimera Enterprises.” “Seriously?” Seth looked up in surprise. “See for yourself,” Regent said. Seth opened the book. It was bound in cracked leather, the cover stamped with a familiar design – the three-headed chimera. He thumbed through the pages. The parchment was yellowed, each page hand-stitched into the binding and filled with tidy, masculine script. The dates of the first entries began in the early 1960s, when Elijah Bishop had been a brilliant up-and-coming geneticist at Harvard, and ended in the early 1980s, when he was executed for treason, after orchestrating the mass breakout of the Gen-1 werekin. Almost all of the entries were annotated with complex equations and scientific symbols Seth didn’t understand. There were phrases that jumped out at him. Lemuria. Black Swan. Totems. Project Ark. Gen-0. Something called the Ovid Experiment he thought he remembered Ben mentioning once, though he couldn’t recall the details. In the margins of several pages were hand-drawn glyphs, like the ones on the collar Snowman had tried to put on him. Seth ran his fingers over them. “What language is this?” 144 “Lemurian.” Regent was looking out the window, at the thickening snow. “Those symbols were found in ancient Lemurian texts recovered from Mt. Hokulani, the submerged volcano where they found the Ark. Do you know what they say?” “Sorry,” Seth said. “My Lemurian is a little rusty.” “Look at the words, cub.” “I am looking at the words,” said Seth. “And if the words were French or English or Italian or Spanish, I could tell you what they say. But, you see, these aren’t words. These are glyphs. I don’t read glyph.” “Just look,” Regent insisted. “Without trying to understand.” More wax-on, wax-off b.s. Too tired to argue, Seth picked the journal up, leaned in close, and moved his eyes across the page, bottom to top and left to right, fooling his brain so it wouldn’t try to process the glyphs as anything more than meaningless squiggles. It worked. Words resonated inside Seth’s head, as though they were being whispered to him. The dead shall wake and consume the living; I shall call up the dead to feast on your souls. Cheery sentiment. Weren’t the Lemurians supposed to be the good guys, into peace and love and all that Kumbaya-and-tofu stuff? Seth looked up from the journal. Regent’s gaze was on him now, steady as a pulse. “How can I read a language I’ve never learned?” Seth demanded. “You’re a magical being, cub,” Regent said. “And Lemurian is a magical language.” Wicked. Seth flipped through the journal, silently translating glyphs. Regent picked up his empty mug and carried it over to the sink. “That journal contains everything Elijah Bishop learned, and a good deal he simply theorized, about the origin of the werekin, the history of Lemuria, and the legend of the Black Swan,” he said. “Everything you could ever want to know about Chimera Enterprises is in there. Their plan for genetically reengineering the werekin race from the raw material inside the Ark. Their 145 breeding strategies to produce more warriors. Their understanding of werekin magic. Every – ” Seth yelped. Affixed to the journal’s back cover was a full-color photograph of the most hideous creature Seth had ever envisioned. It was humanoid, ten foot tall and slender, dressed in a white garment like a hospital gown. Its skin was hairless, mottled blue and gray, like the stones quarried in the Pennsylvania hills; its eyes were onyx-black with no whites, like an insect’s, its features feral: meaty lips, sharp nose, pointed chin, slanted eyes. Seth couldn’t tell if it was male or female. From its back protruded four pairs of jointed, hairy spider legs, like a tarantula’s. Seth imagined those legs moving, scuttling across the floor – He slapped the book shut. “What was that?” “That, cub, was a Gen-0. The first werekin batch Chimera cooked up in their labs, when they tried using test tubes for gestation instead of actual wombs.” Regent leaned back against the counter. “I’m sure you can see why they were put down. Against Bishop’s protests, I might add.” “You mean – Dr. Bishop wanted to keep them around?” “Elijah Bishop had some strange ideas about the sanctity of life,” Regent said, drolly. Seth plucked at his T-shirt. Icy sweat had collected on his collarbones. He was all for respecting the sanctity of life, but spider-people? Uh-uh. You had to draw the line somewhere. A thought occurred to him then. He looked over at Regent, frowning. “How’d you get your hands on this, anyway?” “Swiped it from Chimera, before Dr. LeRoi granted me my freedom.” “You stole this? Mr. Regent.” Seth feigned horror. “Aren’t you supposed to be setting an example for me?” “Something tells me you’re past corrupting,” Regent said, but he was grinning. “Anyhow, that’s top-secret intel you’ve got there, so don’t go leaving it in your locker at school, got me?” “Yes sir.” Seth wedged the journal into his backpack, between his geometry homework and his history textbook. “Are you going to start giving me pop quizzes now?” 146 “Read it or don’t read it, cub,” Regent growled. “Makes no difference to me.” They both knew Seth would read it. He brushed his hair out of his eyes as he sat up. Seeing those glyphs, hearing Regent talk about werekin magic, had gotten him thinking. “Mr. Regent, can I ask you something?” “You mean there’s something you don’t know?” “If werekin are magical beings, does that mean we can perform magic?” Regent had been drying his hands on a dishtowel. He paused now, glancing sidelong at Seth. “Some werekin are born with magical gifts above and beyond what all of our kin possess. Some are telepaths, able to communicate through thoughts, particularly dreams. Some are prescient, able to see the future. They say the werekin queen, the White Swan, could speak any language in existence. You can develop those gifts through training, but they can’t be learned if you don’t already possess them. They’re gifts from the Totems, either in your blood, or not.” “But there are other kinds of magic, aren’t there?” Seth pressed. He could tell Regent was holding back. In his experience, the questions people didn’t want to answer were the ones most worth asking. “There are things we can learn. Like spells.” Ben had alluded to such things a few times, things he had witnessed in the New Orleans Underground. Juju, he had called it, in his thick-as-molasses drawl. “There are things you could call ‘spells’ in the glyphs they’ve deciphered from Lemuria. But don’t go getting any ideas,” Regent said, sternly. “Spells require training to cast, and you don’t have the training.” “Let’s say I had been trained. What could I do? Walk through walls? Turn invisible?” Regent grunted. “You’ve seen too many movies, cub.” “Okay.” Seth draped his arms over the back of his stool – an empty vessel waiting to be filled with knowledge. “Then explain it to me, O Wise One.” Regent chose to answer, mainly, Seth thought, to shut him up. “We can’t turn invisible. But it is possible to hide the magic in your blood from others of our kind. It’s called a glamour. It 147 can give you some protection from being spotted by hunters, too.” “Does it – the glamour, I mean – does it work in both skins, human and animal?” Regent nodded. “For how long? Could you be, like, permanently glamoured?” “The spell is connected to an item. Something you have to keep on you, like a piece of jewelry. Duration would depend on the ability of its caster, but it wouldn’t be permanent, no.” A handy skill nonetheless. Seth thought of Melody and Emery Little, Angelo and Andre Alfaro – of the possibility that a werekin could hide, really hide, from Chimera, not have to worry every minute of every day that he would be marked, collared, and bagged. He sat forward. “Will you teach me?” The softness around Regent’s marbled eyes suggested he understood exactly how Seth was feeling. “All in good time, cub,” he said. “All in good time.” 148 Chapter Twelve: Snow Day Fairfax woke the next day, Friday, to a record-breaking eleven inches of snow. Businesses closed. School was canceled. The Fairfax High Knights got a reprieve from being trounced by Sacred Heart, and Seth got a reprieve from running five miles, as Lydia refused to let him out for a jog with the streets all but impassable, and more snow still falling in powdery waves. Seth didn’t argue. Being clawed by a tiger wasn’t an injury his body could forget overnight, even if the gashes had faded to three white lines across his chest. Jack braved the roads to get to the office. For a corporate attorney, he had a lot of life-and-death cases. After a scrumptious breakfast of waffles, eggs, and bacon, courtesy of Lydia, Leigh headed next door to bake cookies with Whitney. The Student Vegan Society was starting a petition drive to ban animal dissection at Fairfax High, with cookies as thank-you for supporters – in other words, baby sister was bribing students for their signatures with chocolate chips. Seth thought Leigh would make an excellent attorney. Seth retreated to his room, hauled Dr. Elijah Bishop’s journal out of his backpack, and settled in under the covers to enter the mind of a mad scientist. What Seth knew about Chimera Enterprises had been gleaned piecemeal over the years from Naomi and Ben, neither of whom had been eager to dwell on the subject. Elijah Bishop and Ursula LeRoi had belonged to a minority of scholars who believed the lost island of Lemuria could actually have existed, home to an alien race. They had discovered the Ark inside Mt. Hokulani in the mid-1960s, and from the Ark, they had reengineered the werekin race. What Seth hadn’t known was that Elijah Bishop was a principled man, convinced that to find Lemuria would be to find the key to saving humankind from itself. His earliest journal entries, from when he was still a student at Harvard, read like the diary of a religious convert, describing a quest for the Holy Grail of scientific discoveries: 149 If we could only reconnect with the civilization described in these ancient manuscripts, humanity could learn so much about living in peace with one another! Imagine it: Hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of werekin breeds existing in perfect harmony on a single small island. The werekin never knew war until humans brought it to Lemuria. I believe, I must believe, that we would not make the same mistake twice – that having witnessed the atrocities of two World Wars and facing the threat of nuclear annihilation in a third, humankind would choose to learn from the werekin how to be a better people. Yeah, Seth thought, ’cause that had worked out. Read in order, the journal also provided a chronological history of Chimera Enterprises, growing from Bishop and LeRoi’s humble brainchild before the discovery of Mt. Hokulani to a vast underground network of government-supported scientists and soldiers, known as Project Ark. Dozens of topsecret Chimera facilities were built around the U.S. in the 1970s, some for breeding werekin, some for training them, some for experimenting on them. Bishop focused exclusively on the genetics aspect of the project, trying to ascertain how the werekin gene passed from parent to child – and why it sometimes did not. Seth got the impression that, in the beginning, Bishop wasn’t even aware of the uses LeRoi was putting his creations to. He wrote about genetics in a kind of scientific poetry. Every chromosome is its own universe, every living creature the result of an amazing cosmic accident: that these chromosomes came together to form this creature, with this consciousness, is a miracle we will never replicate, even through cloning. Seth thought of the quote on the Townsends’ fridge, written in Magnetic Poetry: “All the atoms emitting light inside wavehood.” He wondered if Elijah Bishop had been a Keruoac fan. It wasn’t all sweetness and light, though. In the texts recovered along with the Ark, Bishop uncovered Lemurian necromantic rituals for communicating with and even raising the 150 dead, alchemical recipes for distilling herbs and metals into elixirs that could heal, strengthen, and renew right alongside recipes for poisons like those used in tranqs. The texts made no distinction between black magic and white. The more he learned about Lemuria, the more Bishop seemed to realize he had been naïve to paint the island as a utopia. And the more success he had with breeding werekin, the more he seemed to realize he had started something that was no longer in his control. By the end of the journal, there was less and less science, more and more rants about using collars to control werekin’s magic, diatribes against Ursula LeRoi for taking werekin children away from their parents to be trained in the Scholae Bestiarii. Bishop took the failure of the Gen-0s particularly hard. He lobbied for his creations to be spared, but Seth could have told him to save his breath. No one in their right mind would have permitted those monstrous hybrids to live, let alone breed. The journal entries changed after that. Bishop became obsessed with perfecting the breeding of werekin, puzzling out why their skin seemed wholly unrelated to the skin of their werekin parents. The entries became terse, interspersed with Lemurian glyphs that related back to the legend of the Black Swan and something called the Source, interrupted by ramblings about the interference of the military with Project Ark. Bishop waffled between wanting to see Chimera Enterprises succeed at all costs, and wanting to see his life’s work go up in flames. In the next-to-last entry, he wrote: If anyone finds these pages, know that I do not ask for absolution. There is no absolution for the horrors that have been wrought on these innocent creatures in my name. I wasted my life in the pursuit of an unattainable goal. Not to raise Lemuria; that is Ursula’s obsession. If the Black Swan is meant to be born, she will be. If I understand anything about the Ark, it is that its magic does not answer to us. My goal was to give new life to a beautiful, peaceful civilization. That aim has been polluted beyond recovery. Now, all I can try to do is save 151 as many werekin as I can. I was young and foolish to believe Project Ark was ever anything other than a design to finish what Lemuria’s invaders began millennia ago: to conquer the werekin and harness the power of the Totems for humanity’s dark purposes. That power, placed in the hands of a species that created the nuclear bomb, a weapon capable of destroying our planet twice over? If Ursula succeeds, may the gods have mercy on us all. The last entry was chillingly laconic. Faith is not wanting to know what is true. Closing the journal, Seth fell back on his pillows. This was what he was really up against. Not hunters. Their creators. Which was about as much nihilism as he could take for one day. Stowing the journal underneath his mattress, where it would hopefully be safe from his snoopy kid sister, Seth threw on jeans and a sweatshirt and went to tell his mother he was headed next door. Ice had collected on the downstairs windowpanes, refracting the watery sunlight into lacelike patterns on the rugs. Seth found Lydia in the basement, still in her gray silk bathrobe, sitting at her sewing table with a cigarette dangling from her fingertips. He paused at the bottom of the steps. “Mrs. Steward?” “Seth!” Lydia jerked around, hand pressed over her heart. “Goodness, you’re so quiet! You’re like a cat.” Seth couldn’t even be amused by the irony. His mother’s eyes were spider-webbed with grief, shoulders slumped like she had fallen in on herself. He crossed the room and sank down at her feet on the carpet. The basement was unfinished, home to Lydia’s sewing things, the washer and dryer, and shelves for storing Christmas decorations. It smelled like fabric softener. “What’s wrong?’ Seth asked, softly. “Nothing, honey.” Lydia managed a wavering smile. “I’m just being sentimental. Mothers can be sentimental, can’t we?” Her voice cracked. She turned away, covering her mouth like she was smothering a sob. 152 A cedar keepsake box was open on the table in front of her, packed with baby blankets, rattles, Onesies. Everything was blue. Hollowness spread through Seth. These had to be his things, from when he was a baby, before Thomas had spirited him away. His birth certificate was lying in Lydia’s lap. Looked like Leigh had relayed Ms. McLain’s message about his paperwork. Something came back to him then, and he said, “Ms. McLain threw my baby shower.” Lydia whirled on him. “She told you that? What did she tell you? What did she say?” “N-nothing,” Seth stammered, completely taken aback. There was something almost dangerous in Lydia’s expression. “She just – she sort of mentioned it, in passing. She said you went to school together.” “Oh.” Lydia seemed to come back to herself. “Yes, I suppose Ingrid and I were friends, back then.” She said “back then” like it was another lifetime entirely. Seth watched her carefully return everything to the box, close it up, and lock it with a small brass key, which she dropped into the pocket of her robe. He made a note of which shelf she placed it on. Cats and curiosity – a deadly combination. That flimsy lock would be no match for him. *** When Seth knocked on the Townsends’ back door a few minutes later, the kitchen looked like it had been obliterated by a chocolate chip cookie dough tornado. Leigh, wearing Meredith’s Kiss the Cook apron (subtle, his sister), was breaking eggs into a bowl while Whitney scraped cookie-shaped briquettes off a baking sheet. Marshall, standing on a chair, was fanning burnt cookie fumes away from the smoke detector. Leigh brandished her sticky spoon at Seth. “Not a word, Seth Michael.” “Or you’ll what?” challenged Seth. “Force-feed me your cookies?” Marshall laughed. 153 Dr. Townsend was at the hospital. Meredith was in Florida, visiting her elderly parents. An afternoon of unsupervised possibilities stretched before them, but unfortunately, it was too cold to play basketball, they couldn’t drive anywhere in a blizzard, the girls didn’t like videogames, and Marshall flatly refused to break into his father’s liquor cabinet. Once the fresh batch of cookies was in the oven, it was finally agreed they would watch a movie. Proving that she had absolutely no cinematic taste, from the Townsends’ extensive film collection Leigh settled on a B-movie slasher, Co-Ed Chainsaw Nightmare 7 or something like that – all sex and gore, no plot. She scrunched up on the Townsends’ enormous sectional sofa next to Marshall. Seth stretched out at the opposite end and dropped his feet into her lap. Leigh protested. “Get your stinky feet off me.” “So move,” Seth said. Leigh rolled her eyes and motioned to Whitney, who had curled up in a recliner beside the fireplace. “Come sit with us,” she urged, shooting a meaningful look at Seth. Seth shot her a look in response. Back off, baby sis. “I’ll sit up,” he said. “That’s okay,” Whitney said, quickly. She motioned Seth to lift as his head as she shifted over to the couch, squished up against the armrest. Leigh was glammed up in stonewashed jeans and a red cashmere sweater. Whitney had yet to change out of her Fred Flinstone p.j.s. What made Whitney cool, Seth thought, was that she didn’t try to be cool. “You can lay your head here, if you want,” she said. She patted her leg. Seth hesitated. Putting his head in Whitney’s lap seemed a little too boyfriend-girlfriend, but how to refuse without being rude? “Okay,” he said, uncertainly, and laid his head down on her knee. As the opening credits rolled, Whitney began to stroke his hair off his forehead. Seth tensed – but the vibe she was giving off was more sisterly than flirty. Gradually, he started to relax. That felt nice, actually. Really, really nice, in a safe, entirely platonic way. In fact, it was so soothing he had to be careful not to purr. 154 Marshall and Leigh snuck glances at them. Leigh looked smug. Marshall looked…strained. Seth tried not to read into it. His kid sister was petting his best friend. Would have been weird for any guy. The movie was ridiculous. Leigh spent most of it hiding her face in Marshall’s shoulder – which Seth guessed was more or less the point. Whitney was made of sterner stuff. She giggled at the campy effects, buckets of blood and rubbery-looking entrails. To Leigh’s annoyance, she and Seth ended up cheering for the psycho killer. They were down to two survivors, the starcrossed lovers, when the oven timer beeped. “Root for chainsaw dude,” Whitney called to Seth, as she sprinted after Leigh into the kitchen. On the screen, the buxom heroine was fleeing through a nighttime forest. Rolling onto his back, Seth halfway closed his eyes, peering at Marshall under his lashes. There was an appealing asymmetry to Marshall’s features: cheekbones just a tad too angular, straight nose slightly off-center. The incongruity was what made him so good-looking. Well, that, and the thick dark hair ruffled up around his head, the dimple that appeared by the corner of his mouth when he smiled, those stunning baby blues…And, okay, he was ogling. Seth turned back over on his side – so swiftly a jolt of pain in his recently-slashed ribs made him gasp. Somehow Marshall heard it over the roaring chainsaw on the TV and the giggling girls in the kitchen. “You okay, Philadelphia?” “Regent clocked me pretty good last night at karate,” Seth said. “You need an icepack?” “Thanks, Indiana. I’ll live.” He smiled. Marshall smiled back, and went back to watching the movie. Seth almost jumped out of his skin when fingertips grazed his ankle. Granted, his feet were sticking in Marshall’s personal space; could have been an accident, Seth reasoned. He cut his eyes toward the other boy. Marshall’s right arm was draped over the back of the couch, his left hand curled, casually, around Seth’s 155 ankle, his thumb inside the frayed cuff of Seth’s jeans, circling the bony knob on the side of his foot. Seth’s entire body went into tingle-mode. Marshall’s eyes stayed fastened on the screen, where the madman was now being dismembered by his own chainsaw. Was it possible Marshall didn’t realize what he was doing? Should Seth say something, or just keep still, or what? Marshall’s thumb inched onto Seth’s calf – Seth bit his lip – “All right, boys, we need taste testers!” Marshall snatched his hand back, so quickly his thumbnail scratched Seth’s ankle. Leigh bounced into the room, holding a chocolate chip cookie still meltingly delicious from the oven, and plopped down on Marshall’s knee. “Leigh,” he protested, darting a glance at Seth. Leigh smiled sweetly. Oh, don’t mind Seth, her expression said. She held the cookie up for Marshall to bite into, staring at his lips as he licked crumbs off of them. Yup, Seth thought. This was going to get complicated. *** Around five, Dr. Townsend called to say he was pulling a double shift at the hospital, and Leigh invited Whitney and Marshall to the Stewards for dinner. Lydia broiled steaks. (For the vegans, there was fried eggplant.) Jack was home by then. He let them take out the good china, and just for fun, they turned off all the lights and dined by candlelight at the long mahogany table. Whatever had upset her earlier, Lydia seemed over it. While everyone was helping themselves to seconds, she entertained them with stories of her childhood abroad with her father the army general. Leigh must have heard them all before; she kept bursting in with, “Oh, tell about the time Granddad…” Lydia told them about riding the train from Nuremberg to Ansbach, touring the Baroque-era Castle of the Margraves. About attending the Soyo Maple Festival in Donducheon and eating hotteok, sugary dough filled with sesame seeds, peanuts, honey and brown sugar. Again Seth tried to square the 156 adventurous girl in his mother’s stories with the spun-glass woman before him now, likely to shatter at any moment. What had happened to change her so drastically? “Why did Fort King close?” he asked, out of simple curiosity. Jack gasped: His hand had jerked, sloshing coffee onto his tie. “Oh, darling, your good shirt!” Lydia leapt up. “Let me get you a towel…” She rushed out. Jack picked up his napkin and began blotting at his tie. The flickering candles picked out spots of color on his suddenly pale cheeks. “I think the prison was decommissioned as part of routine military spending cuts, wasn’t it, babe?” “Well.” Lydia returned to the table with a towel she passed to Jack. “That was the official story. But I remember when the prison was closing, Daddy was upset about some allegations of prisoner abuse there.” Marshall laid his fork down. Seth remembered that his father had been a member of the medical team at Fort King. “What kind of abuse?” he asked. Jack cleared his throat. “Boys, I’m not sure this is appropriate dinner table conversation.” “Oh, Daddy.” Leigh rolled her eyes. “Like we don’t all know what happens in prison?” “I don’t think it was anything like that,” Lydia said, quickly. “Don’t you remember, Jack? It would have been during your father’s last term in the Senate. There was something about experiments…on…on prisoners…” A shadow passed over Lydia’s features. For a moment, she seemed confused, as though on the verge of remembering something she hadn’t known was there to be forgotten; then she laughed, rather shrilly, and waved a hand. “All just some conspiracy theorist craziness, I’m sure. Probably dreamed up by those same people who say the moon landing was filmed on a Hollywood back lot.” Jack raised his hand, fingers split in the Vulcan sign for live long and prosper. “I want to believe,” he intoned. Everybody – everybody except Seth, that was – cracked up. *** 157 After dinner, Jack insisted on clearing the table, and Whitney and Leigh hauled Lydia upstairs for a mani-pedi party in Leigh’s room. Glittery nail polish, Kelly Clarkson on the stereo, Captain Hook in a pink feather boa – way too much estrogen for Seth. He and Marshall escaped next door to play NBA2K on Marshall’s Xbox. “Your mom is great,” Marshall said, as they crossed the drive. That small brown falcon Seth had seen before was pecking for seeds around the garage, leaving triangle-shaped prints in the snow. Seth nodded. Lydia was great. She was Supermom Goddess. “I worry about her, though,” he said. “Does she seem a little unstable to you?” “Maybe a little,” Marshall conceded. “But she’s happy you’re here,” he said, holding the back door open for Seth. “You can tell. She never stops looking at you.” Seth had noticed that, too. Yet the sight of his baby clothes had practically caused her a breakdown. Not for the first time, he wished he knew what Lydia was thinking when she looked at him. They carried sodas and Oreos up to Marshall’s room and sacked out on his bean bags chairs in front of the flat-screen. Turned out Seth was as lethal on the virtual court as he was on the real thing. “I don’t believe you never played ball in Philly,” Marshall fumed, on his sixth straight loss. “Believe it. This,” Seth spread his arms, “is all raw talent, baby.” Marshall tossed his controller down. “I give up.” He leaned back, fingers laced behind his head. His T-shirt bore a faded Red Cross logo on the front, naming him a blood donor; the threadbare cotton showed the muscles in his stomach and chest, and Seth found himself thinking, as he had been all day, about their moment on the couch. Every time he did, heat spread through him from the inside out. If he had felt like this with Whitney, he would have kissed her already. With Marshall… Seth didn’t want it to be different, but it was. “You think Coach will still bench me on Friday?” he asked, aiming for normalcy. 158 “He can’t.” Marshall was adamant. “If we lose to Sacred Heart, we’re done for sectionals, and my father will kill me.” “Indiana, don’t get mad at me for asking this, but why does your father care so much about high school basketball?” “It’s not about basketball, Philadelphia,” Marshall said, philosophically. “It’s about my future. I’m hoping for an athletic scholarship.” He pointed to a stack of college catalogs on the bedside table. Duke. John Hopkins. Stanford. UCLA. “I thought you were a Harvard man,” Seth said. “For med school, definitely. Those are pre-med programs. The best in the nation.” “In that case, I vote for UCLA,” Seth volunteered. “Movie stars, palm trees…” Marshall laughed. “It’s college, man, not a rap video. If I had to choose, I’d choose Duke. You know how cool it would be to play ball for the Blue Devils?” He plucked at the seam in the bean bag chair. “What about you? Which law schools will you apply to?” Seth snorted. “You’re kidding me, right?” Marshall shrugged, but Seth got the sense he hadn’t been, which was flattering. Most people’s first thought when they saw him wasn’t, Wow, he would make an excellent attorney! “So what do you want to do?” Now it was Seth’s turn to shrug. College wasn’t even on his radar. In the Underground, he had never thought further ahead than waking up the next morning. “Right now, I want to survive high school,” he said. Another masterful half-truth. Seth was getting good at crafting those for Marshall. “And I want to get some sleep,” he added, rising from his bean bag chair and stretching his arms up over his head, spine curved so that he popped up on his toes. “As I recall, we have a six a.m. run scheduled tomorrow.” Marshall rose, too, and joined him at the window. Together they looked down at his shadow-strewn yard. The darkness outside turned the pane into a mirror, throwing back the reflection of two boys, one tall and dark, one slight and fair. “It stopped snowing,” Seth said. His voice sounded too soft, too much like a purr. 159 Without taking his eyes off the window, Marshall said, “You could stay over.” Okay, Seth had been hoping he would say that – and hoping he wouldn’t. Because now, he had to parse out what Marshall meant. Was Seth staying over as his friend, the older brother of the girl he had a crush on? Or was he staying over in a wholly different sense? “That might be difficult, Indiana,” he said. The Marshall reflected in the windowpane frowned. “Why?” Did he really not know? “Because,” Seth said, and turned toward him. His heart was skipping and fluttering, but his mind was made up. This was what he wanted. He took a single step forward. Marshall retreated, bumping into the window. He stayed there, hands at his sides, eyelids drifting down as Seth stretched up – Marshall was a solid five inches taller than he was – and kissed him. Marshall’s mouth tasted cold and sweet, like the Coke he had been drinking. He made a noise in his throat, like a moan, as Seth’s lips touched his. For a second, Seth thought Marshall would shove him away, but then Marshall’s resistance seemed to melt, all at once, and he grabbed Seth’s waist, hauling him closer as he deepened the kiss. Seth’s hands came up to Marshall’s shoulders. Cold air seeped in around the window frame, smelling of snow and stars, but Seth’s senses were too full of Marshall to register it – Marshall’s taste, Marshall’s scent, the feel of Marshall’s lean body, which he crushed Seth against, clasping him by the hips. Seth felt like they were lifting off. He had never known anything could feel so absolutely, perfectly right. That was until Marshall pushed him away, so roughly Seth would have fallen over had it not been for his feline grace. Marshall’s face was beet-red. “Jesus, Philadelphia. I’m not – I’m not like that, okay?” Like that, he said. Seth felt his own face heat up, right along with his temper. “Not like what? Not like a faggot? Not like a queer? Not like a – ” “Stop it.” Marshall hugged his arms across his chest. “I don’t use words like that. Not wanting to kiss a guy doesn’t make me a bigot.” 160 Was he saying Seth had come on to him? After that scene on the couch? After that kiss? Seth wanted to hurt him, suddenly. To make Marshall feel as hollowed-out horrible as he felt. “You’re a coward,” he spit out, hearing the hiss slide under the words. “I think you are ‘like that.’ I think you’re exactly like that. You just won’t admit it to yourself.” “Oh yeah? Well, screw you, Sullivan.” Placing two fingers on Seth’s chest, Marshall pushed him out of his way. It took everything Seth had not to push back. “Where do you get off, kissing me and then saying – acting like I started it? You don’t know me, okay?” Marshall kicked one of the bean bag chairs. “You don’t. You don’t know anything about me.” Pins and needles were racing down Seth’s spine, the transformation threatening to overtake him. Discipline, cub, he heard Regent growl. “You’re right,” he said, tightly. “I did kiss you. But you sure as hell didn’t seem to mind it.” Marshall’s blush faded as he paled. From beside his bed, he looked up at Seth, with a desperate kind of anguish; and stupidly, nonsensically, Seth wanted to comfort him. “Seth, can’t…can’t we just forget this? We’re friends, right?” Friends. Right. Seth started for the door. He had to get out of there before he did something totally idiotic, like throw a punch. “You want to forget this ever happened? Fine.” Gladly. “But here’s a ‘friendly’ piece of advice, Indiana. Stop stringing my sister along so you don’t have to face up to who it is you really want to be kissing. You and I both know Leigh deserves better than that.” Before Marshall could say anything, Seth yanked open the bedroom door, kicked it shut behind him, and fled down the stairs. 161 Chapter Thirteen: Pandora’s Box As the moon ride higher, Seth paced his bedroom, plotting escape. Forget skinning. He had the Yamaha. He could be in Philly by this time tomorrow, if he drove straight through. So he would never know why Naomi had sent him to Fairfax. He had given it a go, hadn’t he? Tried to lead a normal life? He wasn’t cut out for basketball and homework and curfews. He wasn’t human. He didn’t know how to be human. Or maybe he was too human, maybe that was the problem. Seth threw himself down on the windowsill, staring across the driveway at Marshall’s bedroom window – feeling extremely human as he relived the pressure of Marshall’s mouth covering his, the warmth of Marshall’s hands as he had pulled him closer. What he hated most was that look on Marshall’s face as he had stormed out. Desperate. Hunted. Trapped. Seth pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes until he saw stars, trying to banish the image. He tried to practice stillness, seek harmony, all that Way of the Warrior crap Regent preached. Nothing doing. Finally, Seth crept down to the basement, the rest of the house sleeping above him. The keepsake box was right where Lydia had left it, on the shelf above her sewing table. Seth lugged it over to the worktable beside the washer, where Lydia folded clothes. Poe twined around his ankles, meowing. “Technically, it’s my stuff,” Seth told her. Unconvinced, the little calico stuck her tail in the air and stalked upstairs. Cats, Seth thought. So persnickety. He slapped the narrow metal file against his palm – a holdover from his days boosting cars for the Colemans. This was a serious invasion of his mother’s privacy, which, under normal circumstances, Seth wouldn’t have even considered; even his curiosity had limits. But Jack’s reaction to his innocuous question about Fort King had started Seth wondering. Instinct told him this box might have answers to questions he hadn’t even 162 known, until now, he needed to ask. Answers about his past, that could help him understand what was happening in the present. The file slid neatly into the lock. Seth twisted, and snick, open-saysame. Aromas of talcum powder and baby oil touched Seth’s nose, stirring something in him, more primal than memory. A feeling, of being secure. Safe in a way he never had been Underground. Seth took everything out of the box and lined the contents up on the worktable. The inventory went like so. Two baby blankets, blue wool, embroidered with yellow crescent moons. Two stuffed bears, brown, wearing blue scarves. Two rattles, white plastic with blue ducks. Two bibs, blue, stitched with yellow letting: Mama’s Little Star and Daddy’s Little Star. Two pairs of blue booties. Two of everything, right down to the two locks of golden hair inside one silver locket. There was a myth Seth had read once, from the ancient Mayans, about a yellow jaguar sun god who turned into a black jaguar when the sun dipped below the rim of the world, stalking the Underworld in his nighttime skin to slay demons. Seth thought about his dream, the black jaguar skinning into his doppelganger. A boy Seth’s own age, ferocious, cunning, branded. Two locks of hair in a silver locket. Upstairs, the back door closed. Seth threw everything back in the keepsake box, rammed it back on its shelf, and sprinted up the steps in time to see Jack’s Beamer backing out of the drive. Half-past midnight on a Friday night, Fairfax buried under a historic blizzard? Seth kind of doubted his step-father was popping down to the market for a pint of ice cream. Only one way to find out where he was headed. Tiny, sparkling snowflakes clung to Seth’s lashes as he walked the Yamaha to the end of the drive. He pushed the bike halfway down the block, out of his mother’s earshot, before firing her up. The icy wind howling through the trees had created knee-high drifts in the streets; Seth dodged them, weaving across 163 lanes. At the gated entrance to Castle Estates, he just glimpsed the BMW as it turned left, toward the highway, The bike’s headlight carved a narrow tunnel through the dark. Visibility was all but nil with the wind whipping snow across his cheeks; had it not been for the magic in his blood, Seth would have frozen to the seat in his light jacket and tennis shoes. He hunched over the handlebars, squinting to keep the BMW’s taillights in sight – Seth jammed on the brakes; his high beams had glinted on something in the road.. The bike went into a skid; Seth caught a glimpse of red eyes, white fur, and a fluffy tail as he turned into the slide, managing to bring the bike to a halt on the gravel shoulder, where he roundly cursed suicidal bunnies everywhere. He had come heart-stoppingly close to laying the bike down. Some injuries not even werekin could recover from. Keep going, a voice said. You don’t want to stop here. It was the voice. The voice from the woods. Seth looked around. “Here,” he saw with a start, was the entrance to Fort King. He had stopped the bike at the beginning of a long, paved drive that wound up the hill to the bunker-like prison, past orderly ranks of snow-covered pines. The bike’s headlight illuminated the nearest trees, their needles encased in ice like the forest of a frost giant. There, burrowed into a snow bank, perfectly camouflaged except for his pink nose and red-tinted eyes, was the bunny. He gave a funny sideways hop, his big ears twitched, and just like that, Seth knew. In a flash, the rabbit had bounded up the hillside. Seth leapt off the bike and bounded after him, skinning on the fly. Fortunately there was no traffic. Anyone passing by would have gotten an eyeful of a jaguar streaking through the evergreen trees, ears laid back, teeth bared. At the hill’s summit, the paved drive circled a massive stone fountain of a now-familiar creature in Fairfax: the three-headed chimera. Water spewed from all three of its serpentine heads; its scorpion tail was poised to sting. Not quite the flag-waving statue of Uncle Sam one would have expected to find on a military base. 164 From the road, the prison looked like a black jewel crowning the hill. Up close, it was a labyrinthine collection of long, low buildings with barred windows, each wing connected to the other by skywalks, like the tentacles of a giant black squid. Its roof was guarded by gun turrets and satellite dishes, the whole structure circled by a chain link fence topped with rolls of razorwire. There was a disturbing organicness to it all, as though the prison had grown out of the hillside, sprouting guard towers like malignant tumors. The black stone glistened like a scorpion’s shell even in the dark. Seth couldn’t imagine how it would look in the daylight. It was the sort of place you expected to disappear with the dawn. Hideous as it was, he felt a strange draw to the prison. As though something inside was calling to the magic in his blood. The main doors were corrugated steel, like the doors of a warehouse. Jack Steward’s BMW was parked in front of them. Yeah, that boded well. Seth’s tail swished across the snow, his nose pressed to the fence. What would a corporate attorney be doing at a closed-down military prison in the middle of the night? Nothing good, Seth thought, and was about to lope back down the hill, heeding the voice’s warning that he didn’t want to be here, when he saw him. The bunny, hunkered down beside the BMW’s front tire. His red eyes were trained on the steel doors, like he was waiting for someone to come out. Silent as shadow, the jaguar scaled the nearest tree – climbed out onto a high branch – and leapt over the fence, paws landing soundlessly in the carpet of snow. He tensed for alarms to blare or spotlights to seek him out or ranks of soldiers to come marching out the doors, but nothing happened. Inch by inch, he slunk along the ground, nose skimming the snow until he was even with the trunk of the car. With one powerful spring, he leapt over it, landing next to the front tire so swiftly the rabbit didn’t even have time to jump at his shadow. In one gulp, Seth had him in his mouth. The rabbit squealed, thumping his back legs, but no bunny was a match for a jaguar’s jaws: Seth leapt back over the fence, padded down the hillside, and, locating the tallest evergreen, climbed it, all the while holding the rabbit gingerly between his 165 teeth. He paced out to the end of a sturdy branch, deposited his captive on it, and sat back, giving him some space. The rabbit’s nose twitched, but he didn’t dare jump. At this height, that really would have been suicide. A ripple moved under the jaguar’s fur. Seth, back in his human skin, straddled the branch, swiping snowflakes off his cheeks with the sleeve of his camouflage jacket. “It’s okay,” he said. “I won’t hurt you.” The rabbit’s nose twitched again. In the next blink, he had skinned as well. The boys were quiet a moment, listening to the eerie chorus of the wind. “So,” Seth finally said. The other boy nodded. “So.” “So you’re a rabbit,” Seth said. Emery Little shrugged. “We can’t all be cats.” *** The Littles lived in Haven Heights, on the fourth floor of a ten-story tenement that shared the block with a seedy strip club named The Pony and a liquor store advertising Wild Turkey on special – about as far from Castle Estates as you could get in the same zip code. Seth parked the Yamaha in the alley, and Emery led him up a side staircase lit by a bare, flickering bulb. The apartment reminded Seth of his row house in Philly, shabby but clean. The carpet was brown shag, circa 1970, as was the sofa crouched like a green lizard between the wooden rocking chair and the brown recliner. He followed Emery into the kitchen, where he was directed to a seat at the table, watching as Emery took down glasses and poured chocolate milk for both of them. “It’s just us,” Emery assured him, tossing his denim jacket over the back of his chair. His St. Francis medal was nestled in the hollow of his throat. “Mom got called out of town yesterday. Something is going down with the Resistance. Something big.” “Your mom is werekin, too?” Seth asked. Emery nodded. Seth sipped his milk, remembering Melody Little’s tiny stature, her squeaky voice. “Is she a weremouse?” 166 Emery said she was. “And you’re what,” Seth said, “Underground?” “No. We’re registered.” Hiking up his T-shirt, Emery displayed the brand above his navel: 2671-ζ. Gen-7. “Most of the werekin in Fairfax are registered. It’s not like a weremouse and a wererabbit are much use to Chimera. They didn’t even select us for their breeding program. They pretty much leave us alone, as long as we don’t make trouble.” Meaning as long as they didn’t join the Resistance, as it seemed they had. In Fairfax. The Resistance had a cell in Fairfax. Seth scraped his fingers through his hair, trying to wrap his mind around this turn of events. “Were you doing something for the Resistance out at Fort King?” “Not exactly, no.” “Then what were you doing? Enjoying the lovely weather?” “Well…” Emery shifted on his chair, big ears twitching. “I was – sort of – spying.” “On?” Emery lowered his eyes. “Jack Steward.” Seth took a breath. “Maybe we should start at the beginning,” he said. He went first. Started with his earliest memories: the Harlem Underground, his dad, the hunters who had collared him. Moved on to Philly, to Ben and Naomi, life in the Underground. Concluded with the events of the past month in Fairfax. Emery already knew Regent was werekin, so Seth wasn’t betraying any confidences when he explained about their training regimen, his intention to join the Resistance as soon as his weretiger guru gave the okay. Abbey Road switched over on the CD player while he talked. Then it was Emery’s turn. Melody Little was a Gen-6 werekin, born in a Chimera lab but permitted to live in the human world, like the handful of breeds Chimera considered harmless (and useless). She had enjoyed an uneventful youth in Fairfax with her adoptive parents, both werekin, until a nineteen-year-old werewolf named Aidan McDonagh had shown up, on assignment for the Resistance, and sixteen-year-old Melody had been swept off her feet. “Your dad was killed?” Seth prompted, gently. 167 Emery leaned forward, chin cupped in his hand. “Mom didn’t even know she was pregnant yet when it happened. Dad was born in the Underground, never registered, like you. He made Mom keep their relationship a secret. He was afraid Chimera would target her to get to him. They would meet out in the woods, at this old cabin near the river. One afternoon Mom was on her way there when she saw smoke. The cabin was on fire. She hid in the trees, watched the hunters drag him outside and execute him. Silver bullet,” Emery said, “right through the heart.” How Naomi had been killed. Seth traced the beads of moisture on the outside of his empty glass. “What did your mom do?” “Joined the Resistance. Told them she wanted revenge.” Seth whistled. “Beware the wrath of the mighty weremouse.” “You should see her when I forget to take out the trash.” Emery was chewing on the end of his ponytail again, but Seth thought it was habit more than fear; Emery seemed at ease with him now. “The Resistance isn’t picky about their membership. Any werekin can join, regardless of breed. They were glad to have Mom’s help. She stayed here in Fairfax, had me, opened her store – just went on pretending to be a tame little weremouse, while she secretly picked up Dad’s assignment where he left off.” Now they were getting to it. “And that assignment was?” “To find out if the Ark was being housed at Fort King.” There was a beat in which Seth only blinked. Then he said, “Seriously?” Emery nodded. “Dad came to Fairfax to see if the rumors were true, that Chimera Enterprises had built Fort King specifically to house the Ark. He never found out, but it didn’t take long for him to realize the prison was really a Chimera facility. Its government liaison was an up-and-coming young senator from Fairfax, a long-time family friend of the LeRois.” “I’m going to take a wild guess here and say the senator was someone named Steward.” “Gavin Steward,” Emery nodded. “Your step-father’s father. The Stewards have had a law firm in Fairfax for over a century. Used to be a small operation, but a little over fifty years ago, they 168 started representing major corporate clients from all over the world. Biotech companies, primarily. They built a brand-new office downtown, and Gavin Steward got elected to the United States Senate. When Dad poked around a little, he found out all of Gavin Steward’s corporate clients could be traced back to one umbrella corporation.” “Chimera Enterprises,” Seth said. “Right again,” Emery approved. “Gavin Steward was still in office when Fort King was supposedly decommissioned.” “Yeah, why was it decommissioned?” “No one really knows. It was shut down before you or I were born, but the Resistance has never believed for a second Chimera stopped operating there. My mom thinks it’s a hub.” “A hub?” Seth had never heard the term applied in the context of Chimera. “Hubs are magically-warded locations for securing werekin captives until they can be transported to another Chimera facility. When the hunters collar you, they take you to a hub, and you’re held there until they decide where to ship you.” Seth pictured the Philadelphia port, crowded with shipping containers, barges, and railcars. Only instead of cocoa beans and car parts, it was his kindred being stowed and shipped. “You said most of the werekin in Fairfax are registered. How many of us are there?” “Rough estimate? A couple hundred,” Emery said. “You’ve probably figured out most of us live here, in Haven Heights. Of course not all of us are born werekin. There are a lot of mixed families – werekin parents with human children and werekin children. And sometimes werekin parents adopt a werekin child who isn’t a warrior breed, like my mom’s parents adopted her.” “Chimera doesn’t take the human offspring to train as hunters?” Emery shook his head. “LeRoi wants us to breed, even outside captivity. She knows we wouldn’t if we didn’t believe there was at least a chance our children could live free.” Seth tipped back in his chair, struggling to assemble the pieces of this story into a coherent whole. The clock on the battered green stove read 2:33a.m. He was so tired he was sure 169 he was missing something vital. “If Jack is working for Chimera,” he said, “why hasn’t he turned me over already?” “We don’t know that Jack Steward is working for Chimera,” Emery said. “Gavin Steward died of a heart attack while his son was still in law school. When Jack came back to Fairfax, he set up shop with two registered werekin: Thomas Sullivan and Werner Regent. But he never gave any indication that he knew they were werekin, or that werekin even existed. And he never showed any interest in politics, until now. Tonight is the first night, as far as I know, that he has ever made a trip out to the old prison. The Resistance didn’t know what to think about him, from what Mom has told me, so they’ve kept an eye on him, but otherwise, they’ve left him alone. “Anyway, things have been quiet in Fairfax since your dad disappeared. Chimera has always had a presence here, because of Fort King, but it wasn’t until you showed up that the city started crawling with hunters.” Seth supposed it was gratifying to know he had rattled Chimera’s cage. “Why didn’t you want me to know you were werekin?” Emery ducked his head. “Yeah, sorry about that. That first day, when you and Marshall came into the store, I was already glamoured.” He held up his St. Francis medal. Almost unconsciously, Seth touched the pewter jaguar charm Leigh had given him. “Ms. McLain insists we use glamours at school, just in case, but that day, we knew there were more hunters in town than usual, so staying off the radar seemed like a wise idea. The Underground was buzzing about a powerful werekin coming to Fairfax – ” Seth sat forward so fast his chair legs slammed into the floor. Emery jumped. “How is that possible? Nobody but Ben knew I was coming to Fairfax, and he wouldn’t have told anyone.” “Word travels fast in the Underground,” Emery said, soothingly. “Mom heard about Naomi Franklin’s death the day after she was killed. Rumor was she had been protecting a werekin cub, someone Chimera was very interested in, and the cub had connections in Fairfax.” 170 It made sense, but it still freaked Seth out to know the hunters had been forewarned of his arrival. He folded his arms over his chest. “Go on,” he said. “So, like I was saying, I recognized you as werekin right away.” Emery leaned back, hooking his ankles around the legs of his chair. “You probably don’t know it, but you give off the most intense aura. I had never seen anything like it. Mom says it’s because werecats are the strongest of the warrior breeds. I knew you had to be the one the hunters were after – ” so much for being incognito, Seth thought “ – and I was about to drag you in the back, call my mom, and get you out of Fairfax, but then Marshall said you were Leigh Steward’s brother, Jack Steward’s step-son, and…I thought you were a spy. A plant, sent by Chimera to infiltrate the Resistance.” Seth made an impatient noise. “Emery, how could I be working for Chimera? I’m not collared.” He pointed at his bare neck for proof. “Collaring isn’t the only way to force a werekin’s cooperation. Chimera could have been holding your mother or your sister hostage. Or…” “Or?” “Or you could have wanted to help them.” Seth was indignant. “I’m werekin, Emery. How could I want to help Chimera? They torture us. Hunt us. Enslave us.” “Seth, nobody knew what happened to you after your dad took you away.” Emery had very light green eyes, the color of new spring leaves; they peered at Seth through a fringe of coppery lashes. “For all I knew, you had been captured by Chimera as a baby, raised in the Scholae Bestiarii. If you had been brought up by Chimera, if you had never been told anything other than whatever lies they filled your head with, how would you know you were fighting for the bad guys?” I would have known, Seth thought. He would still have been Seth Michael Sullivan, no matter what Chimera had done to him. Wouldn’t he? Getting to his feet, Seth began to pace. The black jaguar, his doppelganger, flitted across his mind; he shut that train of thought down until he was alone, where he could deal with it. “Does Werner Regent work for Chimera?” 171 “I don’t know, Seth. To be honest, there’s a lot I don’t know.” Emery had gotten up to pour himself another glass of milk. He held the carton out to Seth. Seth shook his head. For once, he had no appetite. “Mom keeps me out of her work as much as she can. She won’t let me join the Resistance until I graduate.” “Why not? You’re of age.” “Being of age doesn’t make you ready to fight a war,” Emery pointed out. “I’m ready,” Seth said. “Sign me up.” Emery laughed. A thought struck Seth then, and he tipped his head to the side. “Wait. If you aren’t Resistance, why were you spying on Jack?” “Well, don’t tell my mom this, because she’d have my hide, but I’ve been worried about you.” Emery hopped up on the counter, holding his glass between both of his bony hands. “You’ve been living under the Stewards’ roof, and I could tell you didn’t have any idea who Jack Steward might really be. Dre volunteered to keep an eye on your house – ” “Dre Alfaro?” Emery nodded. “He’s registered, like me. A werefalcon.” Seth knew it. “And then, after we met that hunter girl, I started following your step-father. I thought, if I could catch him meeting up with her, that would be proof he was working for Chimera, and the Resistance could – ” “Hang on,” Seth broke in again. “What hunter girl?” “Cleo,” Emery said, like it was obvious. “Wasn’t that her name?” Wanna take me for a spin? Seth whirled around, gripping the edge of the counter. How could he have been so clueless? The first time he had seen Cleo, admiring him in the bookstore, was the same day he had been tracked down and nearly collared by Snowman. The second time he had seen her, at the mall, she had been so curious about where he worked, where he lived. He swallowed hard. “How do you know she’s a hunter?” “I could just tell. You learn to spot them after a while.” And she had seen Emery. Because of Seth, she had seen Emery, hanging out with an unregistered werekin. What if she decided to take a harder look at the Littles and discovered they 172 were Resistance? He should come with a skull-and-crossbones label, like cans of poison, Seth thought bleakly. First his dad, then Naomi, now the Littles. How many werekin were going to end up dead or collared because of him? He turned back around. “Em, I’m so sorry, for all of this. I don’t want to cause trouble for you or your mom. I’m grateful for you looking out for me, but it would be safer if you stayed away from me.” “It would be safer for you to go back Underground,” Emery said, “but you’re not going to, are you?” Seth shook his head. “That’s different.” “Why? Because you’re a jaguar and I’m a rabbit?” Well…yes. But it sounded so conceited when Emery put it that way, Seth didn’t want to admit it. Emery smiled. “I know I’m not a warrior, Seth. I’ll never be as dangerous to Chimera as you are. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want to help you. Even if the hunters hadn’t killed my dad, I would still want to help you. We’re blood. It’s as simple as that.” He extended his hand. Seth looked at it, the bony fingers and the blue veins, then up, at Emery’s face: the pink nose, the big ears, the pale hair. An understanding passed between them, blood calling to blood. Seth reached out, and they grasped arms, just below the elbow. A gladiator handshake. When they stepped back, Seth’s eyes were bright. “About that glamour you mentioned,” he said. “Can you show me how it works?” “Sure.” Emery held up his St. Francis medal; Lemurian glyphs were scratched into the back. They whispered in Seth’s mind, speaking of concealment and protection. “It’s a pretty simple spell.” Seth took off his necklace. “Can you use this?” Emery said he didn’t see why not. Seth slipped the jaguar charm off its leather cord and handed it to him. Emery placed it on the counter, took a pocket knife from his jeans, and went to work. A minute later, he handed the charm back to Seth, who knotted the cord around his neck. Warmth trickled down him, from the crown of his head to the soles of his feet – like being dunked upside down in a summer stream. Seth ran his fingertips over his face, knowing, 173 beyond any doubt, that the glamour had worked. He was hidden inside his own skin. 174 Chapter Fourteen: The Missing Piece As soon as Whitney Townsend saw Seth, she knew something was up. Normally, Seth was surrounded by a brilliant whorl of colors, like photos of the rings around Saturn. It was the same with that attorney Werner Regent, and Emery Little and Andre and Angelo Alfaro and a lot of the kids from Haven Heights, and a handful of other people she saw around Fairfax from time to time, though the colors around Seth were more pronounced. Whitney didn’t know what the colors meant. She just knew they existed, and most people couldn’t see them. When she was very young and had pointed out the people with the pretty colors, her father had sent her for a CAT scan. After that, Marshall had pulled her aside and instructed her not to mention them. Today, the halos around both Seth and Emery had for some reason diminished to shimmering veils. Whitney, bracing her elbows on Re-Spin’s counter, narrowed her eyes at Seth. “You look different,” she accused. “It’s my hair,” Seth joked. “I combed it.” Emery’s laugh was an octave too high; Seth shot him a look, and he shut up. “Where’s Leigh?” “At home, I guess.” Whitney wasn’t surprised, or offended, that Seth had expected Leigh to be with her. Their whole lives it had been this way, Leigh Steward and Whitney Townsend, never one without the other. Cake and Ice Cream, Marshall used to call them. Although now they were in high school, Leigh seemed to be leaving Whitney behind for the popular crowd. In a sack hooked over Whitney’s wrist was the greater portion of her CD collection – her cover story for visiting ReSpin this morning, to talk to Seth about Marshall before the situation spiraled any more out of control. She had tried his house first, but Mrs. Steward had said the roads were clear enough for the mall to open, so here she was. “I want to make a trade,” Whitney announced, plunking the bag on the counter. Seth rubbed his hands together greedily. “Show us what you got.” 175 While the boys sorted through the albums, Whitney feigned interest in the packages of incense Re-Spin sold, studying the two of them on the sly. She wished they hadn’t dampened whatever force it was that painted them in colors of light, though she had to say, it was easier to see them, as people, without the halos. Emery Little was actually quite good-looking. Seth was too, gorgeous even, but Seth was small and delicate. Whitney was more into boys like Emery, tall and lanky, with strong features. He glanced up, caught Whitney staring at him, and blushed as hotly as she did. He held up a P!nk album. “Angry chick rocker phase?” “I’m into folk now,” Whitney said. Emery hooked her up with Blood or Whiskey, The Gaslight Anthem, and that staple of all folk rock, The Byrds. Seth rang her up. “I was going across the street to do homework at the bookstore,” Whitney said, “if you want to come.” Seth turned to Emery. “What do you say, boss? Am I free?” “Might as well. The rush should be over for today. Most people are still snowed in.” Emery handed Whitney back her bag, now bulging with new CDs. “Remember, you can trade in whatever you don’t want to keep,” he said. Whitney hoped that was an invitation to come back. *** Homework and fun were not two words Seth usually placed in the same sentence, but studying with Whitney Townsend proved to be a surprisingly good time. They nabbed a corner table in the Barnes and Noble café, outlined Whitney’s essay on Julius Caesar for Miss Janowitz, then reviewed the chapter on the circulatory system for Seth’s upcoming Bio exam, treating themselves to double-chocolate mochas and blueberry scones for the occasion. At last, Whitney closed Seth’s Bio textbook with a satisfying slap. “Poor Dr. Gideon. He is so hoping to fail you, and you are going to ace this exam. He’ll be apoplectic.” Seth popped a stray blueberry in his mouth. “I hope not. I’d like to fly under the radar from here on out.” 176 Whitney raised an eyebrow. “Yeah. Good luck with that.” “What? You don’t think I blend in?” “I think you’re trying to,” Whitney said, pointedly. Seth lowered his gaze. Way too observant, this girl. “Actually, Seth, I asked you here to talk to you. About Marshall.” Like he hadn’t seen that one coming. Seth hooked his thumbs through his belt loops and tipped back in his chair. He had still been awake when his alarm had buzzed at five-thirty, struggling to process everything he had learned from Emery. It seemed his whole world had turned upside down in a single day – and not just the magical side, either. All the way downstairs, his stomach had been tied in knots, but Marshall had not been waiting on him in the driveway for their run. Seth knew it was stupid to have even thought he might be. He let his chair fall forward. “Not much to talk about, according to your brother.” Oh no, he didn’t sound bitter. Not at all. “Seth, please don’t be mad at him,” Whitney begged. Hope flickered in Seth’s chest. “Did he ask you to talk to me?” “God no.” Whitney looked appalled. “Are you kidding? He would freak if he thought I had the slightest clue about you two.” Snuff. The flicker of hope went out. Seth curled his hands around his coffee cup. “How do you know?” “Sisters know things,” Whitney said, airily. Seth didn’t think that applied to all sisters. Unless Leigh just hadn’t had enough practice yet. “Anyway, it’s not like I needed ESP to notice the sparks flying between you two yesterday. I thought the couch might ignite.” She was grinning. Seth felt like he was seeing Whitney Townsend through new eyes. Hadn’t she been the one to suggest he and Marshall be running buddies? And yesterday, asking him to lay his head in her lap, had she been trying to make Marshall jealous? “But Leigh said you had a crush on me,” he blurted out, and blushed. Whitney blushed, too. “She wants me to. She has it all figured out – her and Marshall, me and you. She even has our couples’ wedding planned. I hope you like Barbados, because 177 that’s where we’re honeymooning.” Seth laughed. Whitney smiled again. “Leigh and I have been friends since we were in strollers. Marshall was always there, in the background, but he was older. He had his own friends. Then we started high school last year, and all of a sudden, Leigh wanted to date him. I think she worries I feel like a third wheel now. Then you came along, and, well, you were an easy solution.” And he would have been, Seth thought, except for the minor detail that he was gay. “So you don’t have a crush on me?” “I like you, Seth,” Whitney said. “Just not like that.” Seth was relieved. He hadn’t wanted to hurt Whitney. They dumped their trash and wandered around the store, gravitating toward Whitney’s favorite section – poetry. Seth pulled a copy of Ariel off the shelf and flipped through it idly. “Is he okay?” he asked. Whitney did not need an explanation of who “he” was. “He wasn’t talking this morning, and he wouldn’t eat. I don’t think he slept last night. Whatever happened between you guys, he’s miserable over it.” Seth shoved the book back on the shelf with unnecessary force. “I don’t get it. If he likes me the way I like him, why does it have to be so complicated? You’re cool with it. I think Bryce would be cool with it, and Topher and Gabe. Is it Cam?” “It’s not Cam.” Whitney pronounced Cam with a curl of her lip that conveyed precisely what she thought of Cam Foss. “It’s our father. He’s so tough on Marshall, Seth. Grades, sports, clothes, friends – everything about Marshall has to be perfect, all the time. And Dad decides what ‘perfect’ is.” Seth thought about the stacks of college catalogs on Marshall’s bedside table. The spotless room. The fancy sports car. Marshall’s fear of being seen inside Re-Spin, a store his father disapproved of. Dr. Townsend’s expectations. “I’m guessing your dad wouldn’t be marching in any gay pride parades?” “I can’t imagine what Dad would do if he found out Marshall was gay,” Whitney said. She shuddered, though, like she could imagine, and just didn’t want to. “But Marshall won’t let that happen. He would never disappoint Dad.” 178 She glanced around, as though checking no one was listening. “Ninth grade, right? The Knights had a game against Sacred Heart. Last quarter, under a minute to play, we’re down by one point, and Marshall gets fouled. He misses both free throws, and we end up losing the game. The whole drive home, Dad screamed at him. ‘What kind of amateur can’t make a free throw? You might as well quit the team if you can’t play better than that!’ I wanted to throw up.” Seth wanted to throw up, and he was hearing the story secondhand. “Marshall never said a word. When we got home, he wouldn’t come inside. Wouldn’t take a shower or eat a snack. It was ten degrees outside, and he practiced free throws in our driveway for three hours. Three hours, Seth. He hasn’t missed a free throw in a game since.” “But Marshall idolizes your father,” Seth said, wanting to understand. If Dr. Townsend was such a monster, why did Marshall care so much about his approval? “He wants to go to Harvard, be a doctor, like your father.” “Those are Dad’s dreams,” Whitney said. “I don’t know what Marshall wants. I’m not sure Marshall knows what Marshall wants.” Seth disagreed. He thought Marshall knew exactly what he wanted. He just wouldn’t let himself have it. Didn’t leave him much to work with. “Seth.” Whitney took Seth’s hand in both of hers. Her eyes were as blue as Marshall’s, and equally kind. “I know you have a lot going on in your life. It’s okay if you can’t talk to me about it,” she said quickly, cutting off Seth’s feeble protest. “I just mean that I don’t want to see you get hurt, either. But don’t be too angry with Marshall, okay? However much you hate him right now, I promise you, he hates himself even more.” *** The house at 706 Kings Lane was dark and silent as the grave when Seth made it home. Captain Hook met him at the back door with an urgent bark, shooting Seth meaningful, Lassie-type looks as he raced up the stairs: This way! Hurry! Fighting a growing unease, Seth trailed him upstairs to Leigh’s room. All the lights were off up here, too, yet there was 179 an unmistakable mound underneath the covers. Seth stopped in the doorway, claws pricking his palms. “Leigh?” “Go away,” came a muffled voice from the region of the pillows. Seth slunk into the room. “What’s wrong?” Leigh heaved a sigh but sat up, combing her hair back from her damp cheeks. She was wearing her extra-comfy yoga pants and a long-sleeved T-shirt of Seth’s, a half-empty pint of Chunky Monkey melting on the bedside table. That was how Seth knew it was serious. Leigh did not blow her diet lightly. “Did something happen?” he asked, sinking down on the mattress. “Marshall came over this morning.” Leigh’s voice sounded like she had a bad head cold. “I thought he was going to ask me to prom. But he said…he said he was sorry if he’d given me the wrong impression, and he…he just wants to be friends.” She all but whispered that last. Seth winced. He had told Marshall to break things off with Leigh, and now, she was devastated. Knowing what he knew about Marshall, of course, it was inevitable her heart would have been broken someday, but that didn’t make it easy to see his little sister cry. Leigh drew her knees up, circling them with her arms. “I’m so stupid, Seth! It’s not like he ever even kissed me. But…I thought he liked me…” She dissolved again. Seth put his arm around her, patting her shoulders while she cried herself into hiccups. It took some coaxing, but eventually Seth got her down to the kitchen, where he positioned her at the island while he whipped up a batch of hot chocolate – the good stuff, with real milk and Hershey’s syrup and marshmallows on top, like Naomi used to make when he had a crummy day. A bag of Oreos and a box of Kleenex later, Leigh was laughing again, entertained by Seth’s antics with Captain Hook: “Sit!” he commanded, holding up a Snausage for motivation. Captain Hook rolled over. “Stay!” The Dachshund cocked his head and barked. “Obedience school dropout,” Seth chided, but tossed him the treat anyway. Leigh reached out, tracing the tattoos around his eye with her index finger. “What do those mean?” “That I’m an idiot,” Seth replied, archly. 180 “No arguments here,” said Leigh. Seth pushed her playfully, and she grinned. “Please? I’m asking in all seriousness.” “I like jaguars,” Seth said, cautiously. Aware that Leigh’s father was likely working for Chimera Enterprises, and unsure whether that made Leigh his enemy, much as he cared for her. “But now I wish I hadn’t gotten them.” “I like them,” Leigh said. “They’re you.” Buried in those two sentences was another, unspoken: Leigh liked him. Seth smiled at her. “You know, you’re not how I imagined,” she said. Lydia must have talked about him, then. Seth leaned back against the island. “How did you imagine me?” “Like the guys on the ball team, I guess,” Leigh said. Like Marshall, she meant, but she wasn’t saying his name. “I pictured you going to prep school back East. Suit and tie. Polo on the weekends. Living in a condo on Ninety-Sixth Street.” Ninety-Sixth Street? Curious detail. “You knew we lived in New York?” “Daddy said that was where your father went when he left.” Seth was glad Leigh said this into her hot chocolate, or she would have seen a flash of something unmistakably non-human in his golden eyes – for it took all of Seth’s self-control not to skin right then and there, race into downtown Fairfax, and maul Jack Steward at his desk. Thomas Sullivan had been a sly fox in every sense of the word. He would not have told anyone, even his best friend, where he was taking Seth. But Jack was Leigh’s father. Seth couldn’t rip him to shreds without proof that he had been the one to track down Thomas and betray him to Chimera. If he found proof, that would be another story. Seth slid off his stool. “When will your parents be home?” “Our parents,” said Leigh, “are at a dinner party at Dr. Foss’. They’ll be gone half the night. Why?” Seth held out a hand to her. “I want to show you something.” Leigh allowed Seth to lead her down to the basement. She perched on Lydia’s sewing chair, spinning in slow circles as he took down the keepsake box, placed it on the table, and used the metal file to pop the lock. “Where’d you learn to do that?” she asked. 181 “Choir practice,” Seth said. “Where do you think?” “Well, excuse me. I forgot you’re a felon.” Leigh peered over his shoulder. “What am I looking at?” Reaching into the box, Seth took out the teddy bears, the bibs, the booties, and placed it all on the table. “Oh,” Leigh said, softly. “I didn’t know Mom still had this stuff.” Seth’s heart stilled in his chest. “You know what this is?” “Sure I do.” Leigh picked up one of the teddy bears and hugged it to her chest. Her expression was wan. “Mom and I visit his grave all the time.” Seth imagined a blade, the sharpest blade he had ever seen, driving into his chest, skewering his heart. “Whose grave?” he whispered. “You mean you don’t know? Your dad never told you?” Leigh looked astonished. Seth shook his head. No, Thomas had never told him. Apparently, Thomas had never told him much of anything. And Naomi and Ben hadn’t seen fit to, either. Pins and needles stabbed his spine. Before Leigh could reach out to him, Seth spun away and ran up the stairs, straight out the back door and onto the Stewards’ back porch. He was on the verge of skinning, which he absolutely could not do in front of Leigh. A clear, cold twilight had fallen. Seth gripped the porch railing with both hands, staring unseeingly across the Stewards’ backyard. Two jaguars, one light, one dark. A box of baby clothes, everything double. Two locks of hair in a silver locket. I can’t lose him, too, Lydia had said to Regent, as the silver poison had burned through Seth. The same words Thomas had said to Naomi, the night the hunters had come for Seth in New York. He heard a step, but did not turn. Leigh’s arms slid around his waist, her cheek resting against his spine. Seth took a deep breath. The magic in his blood receded, his sister’s warmth, her solidness, soothing him. “Will you tell me?” he asked, forcing his lips to move. They felt frozen. “You were babies.” Leigh’s voice was soft. “Mom was sick after you were born. Depressed. She wasn’t thinking clearly. She put J.J. in the bathtub, the phone rang, she went to answer it, and…he drowned.” 182 J.J. Seth closed his eyes, seeing a ribbon of river threading through the jungle, a black jaguar ghosting through the vibrant canopy. His doppelganger. His twin. He had a name. J.J. Seth got it now – the way his mother looked at him, like she wanted to squeeze him tight and never let him go, even as she never allowed herself to touch him. He finally understood what Lydia was thinking when she looked at him. She was thinking of J.J., the son she had lost. Except something didn’t add up. Because in Seth’s dreams, J.J. wasn’t dead. He was as alive as Seth. Seventeen years old. Seventeen and branded. *** Ten miles south of Castle Estates, climbing a hillside above a well-maintained county road, Seth found it. Royal Acres Cemetery. An arched iron gate, locked for the night, stretched between two brick posts, centering a brick wall topped with diamondshaped iron spikes. Seth parked the Yamaha beside the gate and hopped the fence, his paws leaving soft impressions on the snow as he padded to the lot Leigh had marked for him on her handdrawn map. He recognized the gravestone from her description – a childsized concrete angel, hands folded in prayer, beside a bowlshaped tree rising up from a tangle of thorny rose bushes. The tree was the same tree the black jaguar had watched Seth from in his dreams. With his paw, Seth cleared snow off the headstone. Jeremy Jonathan Sullivan, read the inscription, above an age (two months) and a benediction: Sleeping with the Stars. A fluttering in the rose bushes caught Seth’s eye. Snagged on one of the thorns was a scrap of gray and white cloth – snow camouflage. A hunter had been here, and recently. A hunter at his brother’s grave. Chimera was closing in on him. Seth was pretty sure he knew who the hunter was, and why she had been “admiring” him in the bookstore that day. Seth and J.J. were twins. Anyone who had seen one would be sure to 183 recognize the other. Stood to reason their animal skins might be the same. Seth was convinced, beyond any doubt, that his twin was not buried in this grave. He didn’t know how Thomas had done it, or why, but he had convinced Lydia her son was dead, and she was to blame. “You tried to warn me, didn’t you?” Seth wasn’t aware of having returned to his human skin until he spoke aloud. Snow was soaking through the knees of his jeans; kneeling before his brother’s headstone, he reached out, tracing the letters on the stone: the J in Jeremy, the J in Jonathan. “It’s your voice in my head, isn’t it? Regent said some werekin have more magic in their blood than others. That we can be telepathic. And you are. You’ve been watching over me. Warning me.” Wind stirred the trees, a whispering voice. This time, Seth listened. “I know why Naomi sent me to Fairfax,” he said. “To find you. She knew you were alive. I won’t stop looking, J.J. I’ll bring you home. I promise.” Before the hunter at his back could strike, Seth had leapt aside, sweeping out a foot that cut her legs from under her. She landed on her back in the snow, striking her temple against the sharp edge of the gravestone; almost at once, she had rolled to her feet, dagger in hand, facing him with cold determination in her ice-chip eyes. Blood leaked down her cheek from the cut on her brow, but her smile was as feral as a cat’s. “Hello, sweetheart,” Cleo said. 184 Chapter Fifteen: Hostage Situation Seth lunged. Cleo spun to the side, dodging the attack so deftly they might have choreographed it. Something split the air, a centimeter from Seth’s cheek; from the corner of his eye, he saw moonlight strike off a sharpened blade. He smelled the carmelized tang of silver powder on the dagger’s tip as he rounded for a second attack. The poisoned dagger came perilously close to nicking his ribs, but Seth seized Cleo’s wrist, twisted it, and swung her around, face-first into the concrete angel atop J.J.’s headstone. The dagger thumped into the snow. Over her shoulder, Cleo glared at Seth, breathing hard in the frosted night air. She must have been expecting an untrained cub, Seth thought. Otherwise she would have tranqed him from across the cemetery. “Someone been teaching you new tricks, sweetheart?” She kicked out, catching Seth in the side of the knee with the spiked heel of her boot. Pain drove like nails through his leg, and Seth crumpled. “Hi-YAH!” Cleo chopped the edge of her hand down toward his neck – a knife-hand strike that would have rendered him unconscious, had Seth not thrown an arm up to block her. Batting him aside, Cleo dove sideways – for the dagger. Oh no. If she got her hands on that again, Seth was pretty sure he was done for. Gritting his teeth against the agony of a dislocated knee, he leapt off the ground, tackling the hunter into the snow. They wrestled, rolling around on top of J.J.’s empty grave. Cleo got in a punch that sent Seth reeling; while he was still shaking the stars out of his eyes, she hooked a leg around his waist, thrust her hips off the ground, and levered him onto his back. In a breath she had him pinned, one arm folded beneath him at an excruciating angle, the other flattened to the ground in her powerful grip. If she hadn’t been trying to kill him, Seth would have been impressed by that move. They stared at one another, noses inches apart. Blood dripped off Cleo’s chin onto Seth’s cheek. With the hand that wasn’t 185 holding his wrist, she wiped it away, trailing her fingertips up to brush his hair back. Seth showed her his teeth. Cleo smirked, but the fact that she hadn’t picked her dagger up and plunged it through his heart yet was as puzzling to Seth as the sudden dilation of her pupils, black pools in the center of her ice-chip eyes. “Love the tattoos, by the way,” she said. “They’ll go great with your new collar.” Collar this, sweetheart, Seth thought. And skinned. Cleo let go of him. Really, when one found oneself wrestling a jaguar, it was the only thing to do. Seth’s claws raked her shoulder. She choked back a scream as she staggered to her feet, stumbling into the concrete angel – which toppled from its pedestal, crashing through the rose bushes at the base of the bowl-shaped tree. On her knees, Cleo threw an arm out to shield her face. In that instant, she was stripped of fury, terrified and young. As young as Seth was. He might still have been able to go through with killing her, if he hadn’t heard that voice, J.J.’s voice, clear as a bell in his mind. Save her, Seth. Save Cleo? J.J. wanted him to save a hunter? Was he insane? Cleo would collar his compassionate tail and hand him over to her masters. Ah well, Seth thought. What was life without a little risk? When Seth skinned back into a human, Cleo’s mouth rounded in surprise. Seth took grim pleasure from that as he snatched the dagger up off the ground. He raised it over his head – and knocked her out, with a perfectly-placed elbow to the temple. *** Cleo had parked her Toyota Tundra on an access road near the caretaker’s shed. By tracking her boot prints through the snow, Seth found it, drove it around to the main entrance, loaded the Yamaha in the back (no way was he leaving his baby behind), and followed the paved road back to J.J.’s grave. The unconscious hunter was slumped against the headstone, right where Seth had left her. His first order of business was to 186 bind her wrists and ankles with a length of rope he had found in the shed. (Seth did not take chances with hunters, even knockedout hunters.) Ignoring the ground-up glass that seemed to have been packed inside his injured knee, he hefted her into the truck bed. Cleo did not stir. Her skin was clammy, her lips bluish. Blood soaked her white parka on one side. Seth’s claws, he saw when he eased the coat off her arms, had torn her shoulder open all the way to the bone. There were other wounds, too, across her chest and back – old wounds, faded to scars. Seth remembered Regent saying hunters began their training as children, just like werekin. Just like werekin, they were taken from their parents, caged, tortured. Broken down to be remade. Inside the cab of the pickup he found a duffel bag stocked with clothes, ammo, food, and a pouch of glass phials in a rich palette of colors, from burgundy to chartreuse, each stoppered with wax and labeled with a glyph. Seth selected a Bordeauxesque magenta labeled healing and crawled into the truck bed, supporting Cleo’s shoulders as he tipped a few drops into her mouth. Her eyelids flickered, her gaze focusing dazedly on his face. Her lips parted. “J.J.?” “Nope,” Seth said. “This would be Seth. The good-looking twin.” Cleo made a choking sound. Could have been a cough. Could have been a laugh. She sat up, shrugging off Seth’s attempt to help her. He scooted back against the wheel well opposite her and waved the phial of healing potion. “Can I drink this, or will it melt my insides?” “It’ll melt your insides,” Cleo said. “But by all means, drink it.” Keeping his eyes on hers, Seth calmly tipped the remaining potion down his throat. Spoiled milk would have tasted better, but a pleasant, tickling coolness spread through him, reducing the fire in his knee to a bearable burn. He smacked his lips. “Mmmmmm good.” 187 Cleo left off openly testing the knots in her ropes and looked at him. “How did you know it wouldn’t kill you?” “Educated guess. Chimera wants me alive, right?” Cleo just sniffed. Seth stretched his legs out. The dagger he had taken from her was in plain view, tucked through a belt loop. He had cleaned the silver powder off in the snow. The bone handle was familiar, as were the glyphs etched into the blade: This was the dagger J.J. had given him, in his dream. Cleo didn’t seem fazed by it. “Let’s start with how you found me,” Seth said. “Did you come after me in Philly? Did you track me to Fairfax?” Translation: Had Cleo killed Naomi? Stiffly, Cleo said, “I don’t answer to animals.” “I hate to break it to you, sweetheart, but you just dropped to the bottom of the food chain.” Drawing the dagger, Seth waved it, pointedly. Cleo said nothing. She had really expressive eyes, though. At the moment, they were telling him where he could stick his dagger. Looked like they were doing this the hard way. “Lie down,” Seth ordered her. “You forgot the magic word,” Cleo said, sweetly. “All right. Please lie down, so I don’t have to knock you out again.” Glaring at him, Cleo obeyed, curling up on her side near the back window. Seth tucked her parka around her. “Comfy?” Cleo’s answer was to call him a creative name involving pussycats and male anatomy. Grinning, Seth jumped down from the truck bed, and climbed behind the wheel. *** Fortunately, Regent was not armed when he answered the door. Seth stood on the porch with Cleo, bound hand and foot beside him, waiting patiently while Regent cursed him for being a soft-hearted, numbskulled cub, threatened to skin him alive and wear him as a fur coat, and finally directed him to take the hunter upstairs. Seth carried her. Cleo was dignified about it, holding onto his neck with her gaze averted from his face. Seth tried not to jostle 188 her. Even with the healing potion, she wouldn’t heal as fast as he did. On the second floor, Regent pulled down a trapdoor that led into the attic. Seth hesitated, peering up the accordion steps. “You want me to put her up there?” He had been thinking more along the lines off the guestroom where he had convalesced. “Won’t it be cold?” “Does it look like I’m running a hotel for hunters?” Regent growled. “You want me to baby-sit, she stays in the attic. Chained up,” he added, tersely. Okay, so this had been a bad idea. But what else could Seth do? Keeping Cleo alive had complicated his life by a factor of about a thousand. He couldn’t very well take her home and introduce her to his parents. Jack, Lydia, meet Cleo. She wants to kill me. I’ll just by tying her up in my room for the foreseeable future… Letting her go was equally impossible. Cleo knew who, and what, Seth was now; if he let her go, she would be back, with a posse of hunters this time, to collar him. There were the Littles, but if Seth turned a hunter over to the Resistance, he knew what they would do to her. Maybe Cleo had earned some torture, but whatever happened to her now was on Seth’s head, and he wasn’t sure he could live with that. Cleo was still a human being. Which left him with one option Seth could see. Regent. “Hold on tight,” he said. Cleo locked her arms around his neck as he climbed the steep, narrow steps. Seth heard Regent stomp back downstairs. He hoped he wasn’t going after a sword. The attic wasn’t cold. It was freezing. And filthy. The wooden floor was carpeted in dust bunnies, the single tiny oval window grimed with decades of dust. For reasons Seth didn’t care to speculate on, a pair of silver manacles were already threaded through a bolt in the floor. The chain was long enough to allow a prisoner to pace the length of the room. He put Cleo down gingerly. She stood to one side while he rooted through a chest for musty-smelling sheets, pillows, and as many blankets as he could find. He piled everything on an air mattress beneath the window. There was no sink, no shower, no 189 toilet. The best he could do was a bucket to serve as a chamber pot. Why anyone would want to hold another living creature prisoner was beyond Seth. Confining Cleo to this frigid, lightless space, even though, had their positions been reversed, she would have done the same, and worse, to him, made him sick. His captive continued to study him thoughtfully as he clamped the manacles around her wrists. Only then did he cut her ropes. “Sit,” he commanded. Cleo sat, on the air mattress. Using the first-aid kit from Regent’s bathroom, Seth dressed her wounds properly, cleaning the gashes with peroxide and taping bandages in place. Cleo never flinched. He wished she would stop looking at him. “Are you hungry?” he asked. “Or thirsty?” “A little thirsty,” Cleo said. “I’ll bring you up something to eat,” Seth promised. He doubted the Geneva Convention applied to hunters, but Regent had to feed her, at least. “He was my partner, you know,” Cleo said. Seth looked up at her. Were they talking about the hunter Regent had killed – Snowman? Him Seth did not feel sorry for. “Who?” he demanded. “Your brother. J.J. In the Scholae Bestiarii.” Drawing her knees up on the mattress, Cleo lay down carefully on her side. “He was my partner.” Every hunter is given the key to his werekin partner’s collar. The key to his life. He can order him to do anything. To slice his own flesh. To starve himself. If Cleo had survived her training, that meant she had done as the trainers instructed. She had tortured his brother. Seth stood up straight. “Is he still there? J.J., is he still in captivity?” “Yes.” Cleo’s voice was flat, emotionless. “And you know where? Which facility?” Something passed across the hunter’s face, too fleeting to be read. “Yes.” Seth leveled the dagger at her. His hand was steady. “I’m going to rescue him,” he said. “And you’re going to help me.” 190 “I’m shaking in my boots, sweetheart, I really am.” Cleo considered Seth with those ice-chip eyes. “Although, I have to say, I wouldn’t mind being there for your reunion.” “Yeah?” Seth hoped she couldn’t tell how dry his mouth was. “Why’s that?” “Because you have no idea who you’re dealing with.” Cleo’s smile was more poisonous than silver powder. “J.J. will carve out your beating heart and laugh while he watches you die.” *** Regent was sitting on the couch, ankle resting on his knee. When Seth came downstairs, he tossed the book he had been reading aside. “Did you get the hunter all settled in, cub? Does she need some warm milk? Should I bake some cookies?” Seth pitched Cleo’s duffel bag over by the fireplace. He had already rooted through it for a change of clothes for his prisoner, carried them up along with a bottle of water and a box of granola bars. He had left it all at the top of the stairs. She could pick it up or leave it there. Seth wasn’t feeling especially charitable toward his hostage at the moment. The metal blinds were open onto the jungle enclosure. Seth walked over and leaned his forehead against the glass, staring down at the creek. “Tell me about my brother,” he said. Regent didn’t miss a beat. “What about him?” So he had known about J.J. Real sporting of him to volunteer that information. “Why didn’t my dad tell me I had a twin?” “I can’t really answer that, now can I?” Seth made a face at his reflection in the glass. He hated when Regent got all logical on him. “Then tell me what you do know. Tell me how my mother can believe J.J. is dead, how he can have a grave, when he’s still alive.” Regent sighed. “Sit down, cub.” “I don’t want to sit down. I want you to answer the question.” “Cub.” For once, Regent sounded more tired than irritated. “Sit.” As insolently as possible, Seth slunk over to the couch and fell backwards onto it, propping his feet on the coffee table – a 191 habit he knew rankled his guru. He had to suppress a grimace. Even with the healing potion, his knee was still tender. Regent linked his arms behind his head. He must have been enjoying a quiet evening at home when Seth had shown up; he was wearing sweats and a Georgetown T-shirt. The clothes looked awkward on him. Someone as massive as Regent should have been in armor full-time. The stuffed lioness above the mantle looked like a kitten by comparison. “Tommy met your mother the summer before our last year of law school,” Regent said. This was not the answer Seth had expected, and he sat up straighter, losing the scowl he had fastened in place. “We were in Fairfax, clerking in Jackie’s old man’s law office. Lydia was a senior in high school, waiting tables at that pizza joint, MoJo’s. We went there for lunch every day. Hard to say which of us was more smitten with her, but she only had eyes for Tommy. “That last year at Georgetown, they called each other all the time. Tommy agonized over proposing. Lydia was young, she wanted kids. Tommy had never planned on having a family. He got lucky enough to be excused from Chimera’s breeding program, and he didn’t want to bring a child into this world only to have it enslaved. Of course he couldn’t explain that to her without violating the confidentiality agreement he had made with Chimera, when he was released from captivity.” “What changed?” Seth asked, with genuine curiosity. “He fell in love.” Regent made love sound like a disease. One that might be catching. “Started thinking with his heart instead of his head. They married right after he graduated, got pregnant on their honeymoon. Tommy held out hope the child wouldn’t be werekin. No one can predict how the magic will pass from parent to offspring, or if it even will. But once the sickness started, he knew. “Carrying a werekin child is hard on a human mother. The magic in the baby’s blood draws on her life-force. Makes her weak. The doctors called it a rough pregnancy – Lydia’s first, and twins to boot. But Tommy and I knew better. At least one of the babies would be werekin, maybe both. Twin werekin, now, that would have been unusual, to say the least. LeRoi was monitoring the situation closely. Tommy was under orders to contact Chimera the moment either of his children skinned. So he 192 started making preparations, in case either of you were warrior breeds.” “What kinds of preparations?” “He contacted the Resistance.” Seth sucked in a sharp breath. “No. My dad wanted nothing to do with the Resistance. Naomi told me. He was Underground.” “Use your head for something besides a hat rack, cub. You think he got Underground with a werejaguar all on his own?” Of course he was right. So right Seth couldn’t believe he had never questioned the story Naomi had fed him all those years. Thomas Sullivan hadn’t been Underground. He had been a Resistance fighter. What about Naomi? And Ben, was he in on the ruse? Had anything the three of them ever told him been the truth? Did Seth actually know a single person in his life? Losing his fight to practice stillness, he stood and started to pace. “What went wrong, then? If he was so prepared, how did Chimera Enterprises end up with J.J.?” “Because he wouldn’t leave your mother,” Regent said. “Lydia had the babies. She was weak afterwards. Listless. Tommy took her home, stayed by her side, waited for one of you to skin. He didn’t have to wait long, just a couple of months. You both skinned at the same time. Twin werejaguars. That was more of a prize than even LeRoi had dared dream of, but Tommy didn’t contact Chimera as instructed. He tried to run. And when he did, the hunters pounced.” Seth pictured the scene as Regent described it. The rambling farmhouse in the country, quiet and secluded. The dead of night, the heart of winter. Lydia asleep upstairs, Thomas toting two bundles out to the car, already packed for the getaway. Resistance fighters waiting for him, to spirit him and his sons, two rare breeds, Underground. Suddenly, the hunters burst in. Thomas escapes, with one baby. Seth. “Chimera cleaned up the mess.” Regent had his hands clasped over his knee. “Got rid of the bodies, hunter and werekin. They would have killed Lydia, too, but Jack stepped in.” 193 The shock that registered on Seth’s face then was real. It was one thing to suspect his step-father was part of Chimera’s plot. It was something else entirely to have it confirmed. And to know Regent had known, but had said nothing…“What did Chimera do to my mother?” Seth demanded. “Tampered with her memory.” Again Regent’s answer was automatic, the brutality of his honesty unblunted by any concern for how Seth might be taking all of this. “It was Jack’s idea. They brought in a telepath, one of their most gifted, and rewired her brain.” “But why that? Why that J.J. was dead, because of her?” “Have you met the woman, cub? If she had believed for a second she could find you or save your brother, she would never have given up. She had to believe she didn’t deserve you, or Thomas. She had to believe you were lost to her forever. Because the fact is,” Regent said, “you were.” He sat back then, as if to say the story was finished. It was a neatly packaged story, too. All tied up with a pretty little bow. Perhaps, Seth thought, a little too neat. The dagger hissed when it slid free of his belt loop. Regent remained seated, eyeing him dispassionately as Seth stopped pacing and turned to face him. “You’re saying Jack Steward sent Chimera to my parents’ house that night,” Seth said. “That’s right.” “Jack Steward,” Seth repeated. “Not you.” “That’s what I said.” Seth flipped the dagger around, the tip pointed at Regent’s chest. “I don’t believe you.” “Then believe this.” Regent sat forward. The firelight threw sparks into his marbled eyes. “The only reason you aren’t collared right now is because my old pal Jackie trusts me to train you up, turn you into a tame housecat, and hand you over to his masters at Chimera. He’s been waiting for this day for seventeen years. He married Lydia for the sole purpose of someday getting his hands on you, because he knew, sooner or later, you’d come looking for her. Blood calls to blood: It’s the one thing they can count on with us. In return, Chimera has given him everything he ever wanted. Money. Privilege. Power. You think he’s worried about getting elected? Ursula LeRoi makes one phone call, and 194 Jack Steward is the next United States Senator from Indiana. It doesn’t matter what the voters want. That’s the kind of pull Chimera has. You can’t believe how far this thing goes, cub. I’m talking all the way to the top.” Regent said those last words slowly, walking his fingers up an imaginary staircase. “The night you showed up in Fairfax, the hunters were waiting at Fort King to take you in. I saved you from that. I convinced Jack they would never break you. They’d have to kill you. And you’re no good to them dead.” Regent had said that to him before, Seth remembered. That he was no good to him dead. He gestured at the macabre trophies on the walls. “So that story, about winning your freedom in the Arena, that was a lie?” “Do you see a collar on me, cub? Do you see me bowing down to hunters, begging for my life?” Regent rose. Seth danced back, brandishing the dagger. Regent sneered at him. “Stick that thing in me or put it away, before I stick it in you.” Seth told himself he could kill Regent, if he had to. He told himself he didn’t care. “You knew,” he fairly spit at him. “You knew Jack was working for Chimera, and you never even warned my dad, did you?” “Yes, I knew, and no, I didn’t warn him.” Regent was wholly unapologetic about it. “I like being free, and ratting out Jack would have gone against the terms of my release. Tommy made his choices. Choices I counseled him not to make, I might add.” “You didn’t give him all the information! He could have run away with my mother, taken us – ” “I told him to do that. Soon as Lydia found out she was pregnant, I told him to tell her the truth and get the hell out of Dodge. He didn’t. He didn’t trust her.” Seth shook his head. “No. You’re twisting it. He wanted to protect her. If you’d ever loved anybody, you’d get that.” “He left her, cub. He left her with Jack Steward, and he never even told you how to find her. You know why? Because she isn’t kin. Just like Adleigh. You haven’t told your sister your secret either, have you? They aren’t blood.” Regent passed a hand in front of him, erasing Lydia and Leigh from the narrative of Seth’s life. “They can’t be trusted.” 195 “They can’t be trusted? You lied to my dad, like you’ve been lying to me, pretending to help me when you’re really planning to hand me over to Chimera, and they can’t be trusted?” Seth’s control snapped. Magic scalded him from the inside out, and Seth jumped over the coffee table, skinning in midair. He knew Regent was better than him, he knew Regent would hurt him, but right then, he didn’t care. The dagger clattered to the floor, skidding underneath the couch. Before Regent could do more than stumble back a step, Seth sank his teeth into his shoulder. There was a roar, a human roar of rage and pain. Seth was seized around the middle, and thrown – a fully-grown jaguar – clear across the room, into the glass wall. His head slammed into it, fracturing the glass down one side. The world went black. The next thing Seth knew, he was being hauled upright. “How many times do we have to have this conversation, cub? You can’t beat me in a fight.” Seth struggled, trying to put his feet down, then realized Regent was carrying him. “Put me down,” he protested, thickly. “I can walk, put me – ummmph!” Regent dropped him on the couch so hard he bounced. Seth glared up at him, rubbing the goose-egg on the back of his skull. “Now listen,” Regent growled. Seth, sprawled on the cushions, donned his most so-not-listening face. The front of Regent’s shirt was soaked in blood. He had gotten his teeth into the old bastard, anyway. “You know the legend of the Black Swan. Here’s what you don’t know. Chimera wants to raise Lemuria. Ursula LeRoi wants to harness the power of the Totems for herself, and she believes that power still exists on Lemuria, somewhere far, far beneath the sea. Once she has it, she will do what only Rome in the entire history of humankind has ever come close to doing: conquer the world.” Seth was forcibly reminded of Elijah Bishop’s journal, warning of the apocalypse if Ursula LeRoi ever succeeded in raising Lemuria. He sat up. Being petulant felt kind of stupid when they were discussing the fate of humanity. “Is that why Chimera is so focused on breeding us? They’re trying to breed a Black Swan?” 196 “Partly.” Regent sat down on the coffee table, grimacing as the wounds in his shoulder pulled. A tiny prick of remorse stabbed at Seth’s heart. “The legend says the Black Swan’s blood must be joined with the blood of all other werekin breeds in order to call Lemuria up from the depths. That is what the Ark was intended to do – to collect the blood of all werekin breeds.” “But I thought the Ark already contained the genetic material of all werekin breeds,” Seth said, confused. “The Ark only contains the seed,” Regent said. “The essence of our magic. When joined with the blood of humans, as it was when the Totems first came down and blessed the human shamans on Lemuria, that seed has the potential to grow into a werekin, but only the potential. No one controls how the magic passes from parent to child. “You see this?” Holding up his right hand, Regent displayed the brand on his palm. “This isn’t just a serial number. It’s how Chimera extracts our blood. They need to collect the blood of every werekin breed that ever existed on Lemuria and return it to the Ark. That’s why they’re so determined to breed us, to acquire at least one of every Clan. Then, someday, the Black Swan will be born, LeRoi can add her blood to the Ark, Lemuria will rise from her watery grave, and the power of the Totems will be hers. Elijah Bishop was the one to figure it out, not long before he helped the Gen-1 werekin escape. Some might say that’s why he helped them escape – to stop LeRoi.” “But he didn’t stop her,” Seth said, quietly. “Nothing can stop Chimera. I’ve told you that from the beginning. Chimera Enterprises is too big to be defeated. Even Elijah Bishop couldn’t stop what he had started. Thanks to his genius, Chimera has the blood of all of our kind, collected over the last half-century – the essence of the Totem of every werekin breed, save one: the light jaguar.” Seth supposed he should have seen that coming. But he hadn’t, and it was as if his body had been frozen inside a block of ice. Unable to move, or speak, he simply stared, horrorstruck, at Regent. Chimera was hunting him. They had almost collared him twice in less than a month. They already had J.J., the black jaguar. If they caught Seth, they would be a breath away from having everything they needed to raise Lemuria. 197 Regent’s expression softened slightly. “I told you, cub. They will come for you. Whether Jack calls them in or someone like your girlfriend upstairs simply shows up, Chimera will come for you. Your days have been numbered since that bullet shattered your window in Philadelphia. I can’t stop them. The Resistance can’t stop them. What I did was buy you time. Time to train. Time to learn how to fight. But that’s it. That’s the best I can do.” Regent stood up. Seth looked down at his hands, folded tightly in his lap, his knuckles like chips of ivory under the skin. He didn’t know what to believe. Was Regent protecting him, in his own way, by teaching him to protect himself? Was he training him up to be handed over to Chimera when the time was right? Or did he have another agenda entirely? “You could have sent me back Underground,” he said. “I don’t have the resources to send you Underground. I’m not Resistance. But if you want to run,” Regent said, “there’s the door. I won’t stop you.” Yes, Seth could run. Save himself, like he had his whole life. But locked upstairs in Regent’s attic was his best chance, probably his only chance, of freeing his brother. Knowing Chimera had him wasn’t enough. Seth needed someone to tell him which facility J.J. was being held at, and then to help him bypass the security. He needed someone on the inside. Someone like Cleo. Running now meant abandoning J.J. And J.J. hadn’t abandoned Seth. He had reached across the very ether to protect him. Then there was the problem of his mother and his sister. Who would protect them if he ran? Chimera knew who Seth was. They could use Lydia and Leigh to get to him. Seth didn’t trust Jack Steward to protect them, not knowing what he knew now. Save his own skin, or save his family. Wasn’t much of a choice, honestly. Seth stood. His head was aching fit to burst, his knee still felt like it might give at any second, but he didn’t stagger. “I’ll be back tomorrow,” he said. “For training, and to talk to Cleo. She knows J.J. She can help me get him out.” 198 “You won’t break a hunter with milk and cookies, you know. Now this she might listen to.” Regent had retrieved the dagger from under the couch. He offered it, hilt-first, to Seth. Seth turned it over in his hands. “I didn’t bring her here to be tortured,” he said. “You want to be merciful? Slit her throat. Makes my life easier. But if you want to save your brother,” Regent said, “leave her to me. I’ll find out what you need to know.” This was wrong. Seth could feel it, in his soul. He shook his head. “No. There has to be another way.” He didn’t quite know what to do when Regent reached out, touching Seth’s cheek, gently, with the back of his hand. “Go home, cub,” he said. “I’ll call you when it’s over.” 199 Chapter Sixteen: Hail Mary Leigh, no more eager than Seth to carpool with the boy next door, lobbied hard for their mother to allow Seth to drive them to school on his Yamaha. At first, Lydia flatly refused, but Sunday night, on the heels of a truly spectacular baby sister tantrum, Jack intervened. “I’ve seen Seth drive the motorcycle, babe,” he said, folding the Sunday Times over his knee. Leigh had her arms crossed on the couch, glaring in the opposite direction from a thin-lipped Lydia. “He’s very cautious.” Seth nodded. He was, very cautious. Unless he was popping wheelies and spinning doughnuts on the country roads around Regent’s house. He wouldn’t have driven like that with Leigh on the bike, of course. It was late. Jack was in his recliner, a Heineken at hand, being observed with one-eyed suspicion by Poe, who was curled up on the hearth. Seth was standing against the wall. Seemed like a safe distance from the couch, and Leigh. It was also a safe distance from Jack, whom Seth had a strong desire to claw to pieces. Pretending to be oblivious about his step-father’s true allegiances, when every time he looked at his mother, at her smile that trembled like a dew drop on a rose, he wanted to spill the whole story, was taxing Seth’s self-discipline to the limit. He held back, for Lydia’s sake. Magic potent enough to make her remember burying a son who hadn’t died was nothing to toy with; Seth didn’t know if she would believe the truth if she heard it, or if the illusion would overpower reality. He could have skinned for her, but if her son suddenly turned into a jaguar, would she decide she was hallucinating and check herself into the nearest psych ward? He hadn’t told Leigh, either, for reasons less magical and more personal. Revealing that their brother was alive, revealing that they were both werekin, would mean revealing that her father was working for the enemy. Forced to choose, Seth wondered, would she side with the father she had always adored, or the alien brother she had known for a month? 200 “Jack, this isn’t about Seth’s driving,” Lydia said. Emphasis on driving, meaning this was either about Seth’s criminal record or his alleged drug habit. Thanks, Regent. Jack went back to his paper. “Well, if you ask me, Seth’s behavior has been above reproach lately. I’d say he’s earned a little trust.” No matter how much he analyzed that statement, Seth couldn’t find anything nefarious about it. *** The Yamaha caused quite a stir at Fairfax High the next morning. Seth parked in the upper lot; Bryce hobbled over on his crutches, accompanied by Topher and Gabe and most of Seth’s Honors classmates, to marvel at the bad boy coolness of being allowed to drive a motorcycle, to school. Yena Lee started going on about mass distribution, forward speed, and frame flex, thereby making her the sexiest nerd ever. Even Whitney skipped over to have a look. Seth saw Marshall glance his way, slam the door of the Audi, and hurry inside, shoulders hunched against the drizzling rain. The tiny sprout of happiness that had bloomed in Seth’s chest withered and died. The day dragged by endlessly. At lunch, Whitney and Leigh were stationed outside the cafeteria, collecting signatures for their animal dissection petition. Seth stood in line to sign his name (he got two chocolate chip cookies and a kiss on the cheek – big brother privileges), then followed the hobbling Bryce into the cafeteria, loading up a tray with cheeseburgers, fries, and sodas for them both. Over at the ballplayers’ table, Cam was making enginerevving noises. “He’s just jealous,” Bryce said, following Seth’s gaze. He sounded sympathetic, but Cam was not who Seth was looking at. Marshall was sitting beside him, wearing that look Seth hated so much. In that moment, Seth made a decision. “I’m sitting over here today,” he said, jerking his chin toward Emery Little’s table. To Bryce’s credit, his hesitation was only momentary. “You know,” he said, “I could use a change of scenery too.” 201 The noise level in the cafeteria dropped a decibel as people picked up on the mini-drama of two ballplayers foregoing the Castle Estates’ primo real estate to slum it with the Haven kids – the first time in Fairfax history such a thing had happened. Seth put his tray down next to Emery. “Is anyone sitting here?” “N-no,” Emery stammered. Quinn O’Shea lifted her coppery eyebrows at him; she looked ready to object, but Angelo Alfaro pulled Bryce’s chair out for him, and she closed her mouth. “Thanks,” Bryce murmured. There was a moment of awkward silence as the Haven kids stared at the newcomers. Then Alfaro leaned around Emery. “Was that your bike I saw in the parking lot?” he asked. “Sure was,” Seth said. “Did you boost it, too?” Alfaro was grinning. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Seth said, innocently. He casually slid the metal file from his pocket and spun it between his thumb and forefinger. Dre, perched on the chair next to Quinn’s, cackled a laugh, and that pretty well sealed it. Everyone started talking again. It was sitting there, discussing frontal suspension and shock absorbers with a freckled guitarist named Ozzie, that Seth finally understood why it was werekin gravitated to one another in the Underground, when they would arguably have been safer folding seamlessly into human society. Seth had never felt so in tune, so utterly accepted. In Philly, Naomi had kept him apart from others of his own kind; he understood why now that he knew just how valuable he was to LeRoi – all it would have taken was one spy to spot Seth, and Chimera Enterprises would have been on the brink of winning their war – but Seth had never realized just how lonely his life up to now had been. The Haven kids knew he was werekin, of course. As he hadn’t been glamoured before today, they would have known the instant they saw him. There were a million questions Seth wanted to ask them, like who was Underground, who was registered, and who was Resistance, but he couldn’t, with Bryce there. This didn’t stop him from studying them, trying to guess their skins. Emery had said Dre was a werefalcon. No surprise there: He was tiny as a bird, and he had those quick, dark eyes he was 202 always pushing his glossy hair out of. Between Alfaro’s size, temperament, and bellowing laugh, not to mention the bull-ring through his nose, it wasn’t hard to guess what his Totem was. Ozzie had a distinctive high-pitched laugh and orange freckles spotted on his forehead and cheeks – a werehyena. And there was a small boy with bushy brown hair and buck teeth called, affectionately, Squirrel; Zoe, a slender olive-skinned girl with sleek black hair like an otter’s; Serena, a whip-thin brunette with cold gray eyes and a serpentine smile; and Vixen O’Shea, the very definition of foxy, although something about her didn’t quite fit with the others. Wonderful as it was to be surrounded by his kin, Seth’s eyes kept being drawn across the room, to Marshall. Each time, he got the feeling Marshall had just looked away from him. Alfaro followed his gaze. “Is Townsend worried about the game Friday night?” “I hear Connor Burke is pretty good,” Seth said, ducking the need to explain that he was no longer on speaking terms with the Knights’ captain. “He is.” Alfaro’s neutral tone made Seth wonder what he wasn’t telling him. And if he would have, had it not been for Bryce. “I got a feeling you can take him, though.” “I have a feeling you could, too,” Seth said. “Why don’t you go out for the team?” Alfaro shrugged his broad shoulders. Quinn said, slyly, “Angelo isn’t cut out for team sports. He doesn’t know how to play by the rules.” “I guess that means you do,” Seth quipped, with a pointed look at her Lady Knights’ hoodie. Ozzie and Bryce both whooped. “Careful, mate,” Ozzie cautioned, in a definite British accent, with hints of Manchester. “You don’t want a piece of that, trust me.” “What Ozzie means,” Quinn said, “is that not everything comes down to brute force. Some of us know how to outthink our opponents.” Her cornflower-blue eyes sparkled. Seth tipped his chair back. “Meaning?” 203 “Meaning, if you’d been trying out against me, I wouldn’t have needed to knock you out to make you a miss shot.” Now that was definitely a challenge. Seth spread his arms. “Wanna put your money where your mouth is, O’Shea?” The Haven kids looked like they were dying to lay bets on this match-up, but Quinn said, “Easy, player. We’re on the same team, remember? I’m only saying you won’t always be the biggest or the fastest or the best trained. Sometimes, if you want to win, you have to use your head.” She twitched her fiery hair over one shoulder, exactly like a fox twitching its tail. Seth was pretty sure they weren’t talking about basketball anymore. “Just something to keep in mind when you’re outmatched,” she said. *** Coach allowed Seth to dress for practice that evening, which Seth took to mean he wasn’t benched anymore. After laps, the team huddled up around the bench. Seth stood between Topher and Gabe, avoiding eye contact with Marshall. “Listen up, ladies,” Coach said. “You all know Sacred Heart won state last year. Who can tell me why they brought home the title?” “Burke?” Topher suggested. Gabe grinned. “Basketball is a team sport, Simmons,” Coach growled. “Anybody? What makes Sacred Heart a championship team?” “Fundamentals, Coach,” Marshall said. “That’s right, Captain. Fundamentals. Layups. Rebounds. They run the ball down the court, put it in the hoop, and stop their opponents from doing the same.” Coach glared at his team like they were to blame for Sacred Heart being so good at fundamentals. He handed his clipboard off to Marshall and their alpha assumed the floor, swiping sweat off his brow with the hem of his blue-and-gold jersey. “Coach and I have been going over our tapes from this season, and we have got to step it up if we want a shot at state,” Marshall said. “Cam, your defense is awesome, but you’re no good to us if you foul out, so tone it down a notch. Burke loves to put his guys on man-to-man, so we’re all going to have to score under pressure. We’ll start by pressing and get on 204 the board early. But if we want to beat them,” he said, “we have to stop them at the basket. Especially Burke.” “That means defense, ladies,” Coach broke in. “Say it with me.” “DEFENSE!” the team shouted, their voices echoing off the bleachers like a ghostly cheerleading squad was haunting the stands. Topher ruffled Seth’s hair. “Don’t sweat it, Coach. We got our secret weapon right here.” The look on Coach’s face sent Seth’s heart plummeting into his new Nikes. “Sullivan is still benched,” he said. *** The locker room – usually a rowdy place, filled with crude jokes and raucous laughter – was bleak as they stripped down for showers an hour later. Practice had not been pretty. Seth’s replacement, a gawky boy named Nate, had managed to trip over his own feet and foul one of his teammates, twice. “This is crap,” Gabe pronounced, throwing his shoes, one at a time, into his locker. “We’d have Sacred Heart crying for their mamas if Seth was in. Gideon is a jerk, and our team pays for it – how is that fair?” “You mean Sullivan is a pussy and our team pays for it,” Cam said. Marshall shut his locker with a bang. Though he hadn’t showered yet, he was already in his street clothes, his dark hair hanging lank and sweaty across his brow. “Cam, lay off.” “Townsend, I’m just saying – ” “I mean it, Cam. You call him that again, and you and I are gonna have a problem.” The gray specks in Marshall’s baby blues were like molten silver. No one moved. It seemed certain this was it, the moment the beta finally challenged their alpha; Seth saw Topher and Gabe shift closer to Marshall, but Cam laughed it off. “Sure, dawg. Whatever you say. Faggot.” He whispered the last word under his breath. The others didn’t hear him. Seth wouldn’t have heard him, if not for his acute werekin hearing. Slamming his own locker shut, he 205 marched into the shower room, cranked the faucet to scalding, and stood under the spray until everyone else was gone. *** As soon as he got home, Seth checked the answering machine. Regent had not called. *** “She must have talked by now,” Seth said. He was sitting behind the counter at Re-Spin, watching Emery sort invoices. It had been one of the longest weeks of Seth’s life. Through Jack, Regent had cancelled his “karate lessons” on the excuse that he was down with the flu, which Seth knew was a lie, but without training as a cover story, he couldn’t think of a reason to check things out at his guru’s. Every time the phone rang, he jumped up to answer it, hoping it would be Regent calling with news on J.J. It never was. “I mean, it’s been almost a week. How long could she hold out?” “Depends,” Emery said, absently. “Maybe he’s trying to starve her into submission.” “Real comforting, Em. I feel so much better now.” Emery shrugged without looking up. He did not share Seth’s concern for Cleo. What werekin lost sleep over the fate of a hunter? But Cleo was not just a hunter. Seth had chained her up, left her at Regent’s mercy, and he had not heard J.J.’s voice since. Hadn’t encountered the black jaguar in a single dream. J.J., it seemed, was giving his twin the psychic silent treatment. Who was Cleo to J.J.? Why had he wanted Seth to spare her? Seth kept thinking back to how Cleo had breathed his name, J.J., as she had roused up in the graveyard. Of the fierce pride in her ice-chip eyes when she had bragged on what a cold-blooded killer he was. Like she knew him better than anyone. Like she cared for him. Hunters did not care about werekin. Werekin were nothing to them, less than animals. Seth rubbed his stomach, feeling again 206 the bite of Snowman’s whip. That was Cleo’s partner now. J.J. remained a slave while she walked free. “I just wish I knew what to do,” he said. “Do you think I should get her out of there?” Like he could just waltz into Regent’s house and demand his captive back. Regent had whipped him in every fight to date. “Who?” Emery looked baffled. Seth sighed. “Could you at least pretend to care about my problems?” Setting the invoices aside, Emery hopped up on the counter, tapping his heels to The Doors. The nice thing about working at Re-Spin? They were so rarely bothered by pesky customers. “I do care about your problems, Seth. Like I’ve been telling you, I think the next time my mom calls, you should let me tell her what’s going on. Let the Resistance handle it.” “And how would they ‘handle’ it, Emery?” “They’d kill Cleo,” Emery admitted, reluctantly. “Regent too, if he got in the way.” “If they kill Cleo, I’ve lost my best chance of finding my brother.” Seth extended a hand. “I want your word you won’t say anything to your mom about this when she calls.” Emery twisted his St. Francis medal, his hesitation confirming that this was indeed what he had been planning to do. “Seth – ” “Your word, Emery,” Seth said, firmly. Resignedly, Emery clasped Seth’s arm below the elbow, a gladiator handshake that sealed their pact of silence. More fine drizzle was falling from the gray winter sky when Seth parked beside his garage later that evening. Marshall was shooting hoops in his driveway. He did not acknowledge Seth’s existence with so much as a wave. There was a note from Lydia on the counter saying she and Jack were out to dinner with his campaign manager. Popping the tab on a Mountain Dew, Seth stood at his kitchen sink and watched Marshall through the window. The grace of his movements as he fired off three-pointers. The curve of his spine beneath his rain-damp shirt as he dribbled in for a layup. They had not spoken a word to one another all week; Seth had been driving his bike to school, eating lunch with the Haven kids. The 207 silent treatment was getting old. Seth liked Marshall. Obviously he liked Marshall, but he liked him in ways other than wanting to kiss him until his eyes crossed. Marshall was the first friend Seth had made in Fairfax. The first friend he had made, anywhere. He missed hanging out. He missed him. Seth looked down at Captain Hook. “What do you think?” The little Dachshund barked. “Yeah,” Seth said, “I think so too.” Marshall had just sunk another three-pointer when Seth hopped over the shrub-fence. “Nice,” Seth said, grinning. “You’re saving some of that magic for Sacred Heart tomorrow night, though, right?” “I guess.” Marshall’s tone was cool. He looked past Seth, at the hoop, to measure his next shot. It swished, and Seth rebounded for him. “What’s up with you wimping out on me, Indiana?” he said. Color crept up Marshall’s neck. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” “It means,” said Seth, “that I’ve been running all week while your lazy butt has still been in bed. Ergo,” Seth bounced the ball back to him, “I’m assuming you’ve wimped out on me.” A smile spread, slowly, across Marshall’s face. It filled Seth up inside, that smile, like the sun was rising behind his eyes. For it seemed his instincts had been right. Marshall had missed him, too. He fired the ball back at Seth. “I’ll show you wimping out, Philadelphia. Bring it.” *** An incredible storm lashed Fairfax that night – crashes of thunder that rattled the windows, flashes of lightning bright enough to switch off the automatic street lights, fooling the sensors into believing it was dawn. The storm crept into Seth’s dreams. From the depths of the turquoise ocean the pristine island arose, the mountain at its center piercing the blue panel of the sky. Rolling hills of green trees – the tallest trees Seth had ever 208 seen, taller than any trees on Earth – undulated down from it, to a beach of sparkling white sand. It was there the werekin were arrayed. They formed a circle that seemed to stretch around the entire island, one of every breed, in their animal skins. From amongst them stepped a young girl in a long black robe, her skin fair as ivory, her hair black as midnight. Toes sinking in the sand, she raised her arms. Her wrists were shackled with silver. A hush fell over the jungle. The Black Swan began to sing, in a voice like silver bells. Far out to sea, the ocean began to roil. Suddenly, Seth was no longer on the beach, amongst his kin; he was somewhere up above, in the stars maybe, looking down on an island anchored like an emerald in a sapphire pool. The ocean changed colors in rings around it, bright blue-green close to shore, blue-black a league away; out there, in the depths, something was bubbling, beneath the surface, as though some ancient god of the sea was stoking his forges, setting the ocean herself to boil. Tremors moved under the sand. Even as high up as he was, Seth could see what was happening on the beach in perfect, minute detail. His kin began to howl and hiss; the Black Swan’s song rose to a crescendo, the tremors building with it; on the last, dying note, the mountain at the island’s center exploded, spewing flames hundreds of feet into the air, as something large and dark, like a living shadow, rose slowly, steadily into the air… Howls became screams. Golden lava raced through the jungle, swallowing trees. The werekin on the beach huddled together, a single, terrified mass, as the ocean at their backs rose up, as if to meet the fiery flood. But the water was no longer blue, it was red, red as blood, churning, boiling, carrying on its foamcapped waves – Seth almost gagged – the charred bones of the werekin ancestors, who had given their lives to sink Lemuria beneath the sea. To protect humanity from the power of the Totems. Standing alone on the beach, one boy turned, tipping his face up to the stars. His blonde locks were streaming with rainwater; his golden eyes glowed with every streak of lightning, as though 209 the storm Seth could still hear, in the waking world, originated from inside of him. J.J.’s smile was more feral than any cat’s. “This is how it ends,” he said. *** By tipoff that night, the Fairfax High gym was a sea of blue and gold on the home team’s side, red and black on the visiting Sacred Heart Warriors’. Seth, dutifully suited up to ride the bench, jogged out of the locker room with his teammates to the Knights’ fight song. Leigh and Whitney had cornered seats near the Pep Band. The Haven kids had their own section, directly behind Ms. McLain, who was sitting with a tall, dark-haired young man in jeans and a faded gray T-shirt. “Who’s that?” Seth asked Marshall. Something about the young man was familiar. He was twirling a chain around his neck. Seth might have thought he was werekin, and glamoured, if the chain hadn’t been silver. “That’s Ms. McLain’s nephew. He was a legend when he played ball here. I heard he joined the Marines and got stationed overseas somewhere.” Marshall sounded distracted. Seth turned from the stands to find him staring across the court. “Right now,” he said, “who we need to be worried about is him.” “Him” was the kid walking toward them from the Sacred Heart sidelines – a slim-hipped boy with longish dirty-blonde hair. He was wearing a Warriors jersey, but his hazel eyes were so warm and open Seth was taken aback when Marshall said, “Hey, Connor.” Seth’s eyebrows shot up. This easy-going kid was Connor Burke, the Knights’ Public Enemy Number One? “Hey, Marshall.” Connor Burke stuck out a hand, which Marshall shook. He had a slight Southern drawl, more Texas than Alabama. “I just wanted to say good luck.” “Thanks, man. You too.” Connor glanced at Seth, noted his dyed hair and tattoos, and offered a quick, easy smile before wandering over to commiserate with Bryce about his busted ankle. “He’s nice,” Seth said. 210 “Yeah, Connie’s all right.” Marshall seemed perplexed by the surprise in Seth’s voice. “Did you think he wouldn’t be?” Seth shrugged. “Not to us anyway. We are enemies.” “We’re not enemies, Philadelphia. We’re rivals. There’s a difference. And he won’t seem so nice when he’s wiping the court with us,” Marshall added, bumping his fist against Seth’s; the ref had just blown the whistle to call the teams onto the court. “Keep the bench warm for me,” he said. Seth called him a name that made Marshall grin as he turned away. Seth started for the bench. “Aw, no kiss for luck, kitty-cat?” Seth looked up. Cam was smirking down at him. “Only if you really want one, big boy,” Seth said. Cam flushed dark red. In the next second, he had grabbed Seth by the jersey. “What did you say to me?” “Let go of him.” Startled, though no more so than Cam, Seth turned his head. Connor Burke had suddenly appeared beside him. His voice was even, but the set of his jaw was a reminder, as Topher had said, that his father was a five-star general. Before Seth could say he had this, thanks, Cam released him with a little shove and thrust his face close to Connor’s. Connor did not back up. “What’s your problem, Connie? You play on his team?” “I think we all know you’re the one with the problem, Cam,” Connor said, evenly. “Yeah? You want to make something out of it, Connie?” “Foss!” Cam jerked around. Coach was glaring at him. “Feel like joining us, princess?” All at once becoming aware of the silence in the gym, Cam looked out at the court. The other players were already assembled, staring at their little scene. Marshall was frozen at the top of the key, like he had been about to come to Seth’s aid when Connor had beaten him to it. Firing a killing look at Connor, Cam, red-faced, trotted onto the court. Seth figured this did not bode well for Connor Burke’s chances of making it off the court in one piece, but Connor just grinned and rolled his eyes, as if to say, What an idiot. Seth 211 shook his head as he watched him face off with Marshall at halfcourt. Two Golden Boys in one town. What were the odds? The Knights won the tipoff, but things went downhill from there. Marshall fanned his pack out in zone defense, but they might as well have been animated bits of straw: Connor zipped right by them, nailing every shot he put up. He wasn’t any better than Marshall, but his teammates had deduced that Marshall was the biggest threat to them, so he had two defenders in his face every time he went down the court. It got physical fast. Marshall spent more time at the free throw line than in actual game play, and pretty soon Cam was in foul trouble. To make matters worse, Seth’s replacement, Nate, tripped over his own feet every two seconds. In one exceptionally klutzy move, he managed to knock Marshall down just as he went up for a three-pointer. The ball hit the rim and bounced into the stands. The crowd groaned. Seth sat on the bench next to Bryce, fists clenched in frustration, feigning blindness to Gideon’s self-satisfied smirk from the faculty section. Seth had never cared about basketball. To be honest, he still didn’t, but he did care about his team, and his team, especially their captain, cared desperately about this game. At halftime, Coach assembled them on the locker room’s concrete floor, the vein in his forehead standing out as he lectured them about fundamentals. Why was nobody rebounding? Had they just decided stealing the ball was too much work? Regent, Seth thought, would have approved. He glanced over his shoulder. Marshall had his head tipped back against his locker, sweat drying on his flushed cheeks. He looked exhausted. Seth knew he was seeing the state title he had promised his father slip through his fingers. If he just hadn’t gotten detention, Seth thought, they would have been running circles around Sacred Heart’s defense. He didn’t regret refusing to dissect that cat, but it still wasn’t fair. A lot about high school wasn’t fair, Seth was discovering. Leaning back on his palms, he touched the tip of his pinkie finger to the end of Marshall’s thumb. From the corner of his eye, he saw Marshall’s mouth twitch into a grin. 212 A pleasant buzz started up in Seth’s ears. He didn’t hear another word of Coach’s speech. *** Quinn O’Shea was sitting on the bleacher behind the Knights’ bench when they emerged for the second half, to the earsplitting crescendo of the cheerleaders’ dance routine. Seth flopped down beside Bryce again and leaned back so he could whisper to her. “What’s up?” “Don’t sound so chipper, Sullivan. Have you not noticed you’re down sixty-five to eighty-seven?” “No, O’Shea, I hadn’t noticed that,” Seth said, sarcastically. “Did you come all the way down here just to rub it in?” Quinn produced a pen from the pocket of her athletic pants. “Give me your hand.” “Why?” Seth asked, as he gave her his hand. Rather than answer, Quinn bent over his palm, her coppery hair falling forward and tickling his wrist, as the pen tickled his palm. Biting his lip, Seth watched Connor Burke pop up for a three-pointer, and Cam jab an elbow into his ribs. Whistles blew. Coach looked at Cam in disgust. “Last warning, Foss!” he shouted, over the booing Warriors’ fans. “The next timeout, show this to your captain.” Quinn sat back, releasing Seth’s wrist. He looked down at his palm. A play was diagrammed on it – a rather clever play, Seth had to admit. Then again, Quinn seemed the type to always have a strategy. “Where’s Alfaro?” he asked. Dre was perched beside Emery, wearing two-toned suspenders for the occasion – one blue, one gold – but his big brother was conspicuously absent. “We don’t let him out for sporting events. He has temper issues. Now listen.” Quinn slid to the edge of the bleacher, speaking into Seth’s ear to be heard over the band. “Don’t go showing off out there.” Since he was benched, Seth didn’t see how this would be a problem. “I’ll try to resist the urge,” he said. 213 “I’m serious, Sullivan. Gideon has no idea the favor he did you by getting you benched tonight. You don’t want to draw attention to yourself with this crowd.” Seth laughed. That was rich, coming from Vixen O’Shea. “Are you seriously lecturing me about blending in, Miss AllState Girls’ Basketball MVP Two Years Running?” Quinn pursed her lips. “I’m not like you.” “Yeah, I know, I’m a werejaguar, big – ” “You don’t get it.” For the first time, as her eyes fell from his to her Skechers, Seth saw a chink in Quinn’s relentless arrogance. “I’m not – ” She was interrupted by the shrill pierce of a whistle. Timeout had been called. Getting to her feet, Quinn swished her hair back, so coolly confident Seth wondered if he had imagined her momentary vulnerability. “I call that play the Pinball. And have Townsend tell that idiot Foss to back off before he puts somebody in the hospital.” With that, she turned on her heel and marched up into the bleachers. Coach looked surprised when Seth shouldered into the huddle, displaying his palm for Marshall. “Sullivan, you’re benched, in case you hadn’t noticed – ” “Wait, Coach.” Marshall had taken Seth’s wrist in his slender fingers and was studying the play inked onto his palm. A smile slowly formed on his lips, bringing out that dimple in his cheek. Seth drew his hand back before Marshall could feel his pulse flutter. “Will it work?” he asked. Marshall nodded. “Oh yeah. It’ll work.” Moments later, the Knights rushed back onto the court, a bounce back in their step. Seth turned to give Quinn a thumb’s up – but his gaze was caught by another pair of blue eyes, remarkably like Marshall’s, trained on him with unmistakable malevolence. Dr. Wesley Townsend was sitting with Jack and the other basketball dads, next to a broad-shouldered man with iron gray hair and a military-style bearing. Seth swung back around, heart beating hard. He could think of only one reason Dr. Townsend would have to look at him with such loathing. Marshall. 214 Somehow he had figured out how Seth felt about Marshall. Did he suspect Marshall might feel the same? How miserable would he make Marshall’s life if he did? Worrying about Dr. Townsend would have to wait. Pretty soon Seth found himself jumping off the bench right along with everyone else when the Knights managed to score – a more and more frequent occurrence, as Marshall put Quinn’s play to good use, zigzagging past the Warriors’ killer defense. The score crept up: 71 to 89; 75 to 91; 82 to 93; 87 to 93…The roar of the crowd was deafening, the clock ticking down second by second: 2:00…1:38…1:15… Finally, Connor Burke went up for a jump shot, and Cam blocked him – by clocking him in the jaw with his elbow. Connor hit the court flat on his back with a sickening smack and lay there, stunned, staring up at the gym’s skylight. Coach slammed his clipboard down on the bench, shouting at Cam to get off the court. Whistles were blowing like crazy. Refs had started waving their arms. “That’s it!” one of them yelled. “You’re done!” “Park it, Foss!” Coach barked. Cam stalked over to the bench and flopped down, refusing to look at anyone. Marshall was helping Connor to his feet. Even Seth couldn’t hear what he was saying over the booing fans, but Connor nodded goodnaturedly as he dusted himself off, cuffing blood off his chin. The scoreboard glared like a red eye in Seth’s peripheral vision. HOME: 99. VISITORS: 99. If Connor made both of his free throws – and he hadn’t missed a single one all night – the Knights would be down by two points with sixteen seconds on the clock. This was it. If the Knights lost, the season was over. Seth kept his eyes straight ahead as Coach consulted his clipboard. Bryce had his fingers crossed and his eyes closed, praying to the basketball gods. Marshall had his hands on his knees, trying to catch his breath. His gaze kept flitting to Seth, who felt it like a fingertip brushing his skin. When Coach sighed, it sounded resigned. “All right, Sullivan. Get in there.” From three bleachers down, Seth heard Dre Alfaro cackle. 215 The Knights’ bench went crazy as Seth took Cam’s place under the basket. The Sacred Heart fans were exchanging bewildered looks. Oh, they’re putting in the smallest kid on the team? Brilliant strategy! Swish. Connor’s first free throw dropped through the net. Seth cut his eyes at the stands, looking for Lydia and Leigh, catching a glimpse of Ms. McLain’s nephew on his feet, hands cupped around his mouth as he joined in the noise the crowd was making. Ignoring the uproar, Connor dribbled, measuring his shot…Seth squinted, trying to make out the charm dangling from the young soldier’s silver chain…It almost looked like a – but no, it couldn’t be, Seth thought; a Marine wouldn’t wear a swan charm… Burke. Seth did not know why that piece of the puzzle snapped into place just then, why he suddenly heard Regent say, forty warriors trained by General David Burke himself to fight just as well in human or animal skin, as he had driven home to Seth the impossibility of one untrained cub taking down Project Ark. A joint venture between Chimera Enterprises and Uncle Sam, overseen by the U.S. military. Seth looked toward Dr. Townsend, searching for, and finding, the iron-haired man he had noticed earlier. His eyes were the same green-flecked hazel as Connor Burke’s, minus the warmth. “Sullivan!” Seth, startled, spun around. Coach was pointing to the scoreboard. 101 to 99. Connor had made both free throws; Nate was waiting to pass the ball in to Seth. Keenly aware of the seconds ticking down – nine, eight, seven – and the promise Marshall had made his father to take the Knights to state, Seth caught it, and turned; saw a flash of white gold – Connor Burke’s hair, as he sidestepped Topher, making to snag the ball from Seth’s hands; Seth pivoted – you don’t want to draw attention to yourself with this crowd – dodged another defender – six, five, four – poured on a burst of speed – everything about Marshall has to be perfect, all the time, and Dad decides what ‘perfect’ is – crossed the half-court line – three, two, one – you know what happens if the hunters find you – 216 But the hunters had already found him, hadn’t they? Jack Steward worked for Ursula LeRoi. He knew who and what Seth was. There was no point in holding back anymore, no point in trying to hide. As the final buzzer sounded, Seth jumped, higher than any teenage punk from South Philly should have been able to jump, and fired off the shot. He did not see the ball drop through the net. He just heard the shouts of Phill-Y, Phill-Y give way to ecstatic screams. “You did it, Philadelphia, you did it!” Someone slammed into him from behind. Seth staggered; Marshall grabbed his waist, grinning zanily as he threw his arms around him. His baby blues were the color of a midday sky. A second later the rest of the team descended on them. Seth was crushed against Marshall in the celebratory press, holding tight to his shoulders as they fought to keep their feet. And in spite of everything, in spite of the danger closing in and the intrigue all around, he was human enough to be happy. 217 Chapter Seventeen: Failed Negotiations Regent’s Hummer was not in the drive when Seth parked his Yamaha beside the woodpile. The dawn sky was clean as a fresh canvas; wind shook the trees dotting the muddy yard, pelting the top of Seth’s head with cast-off raindrops as he stole onto the porch. He tapped, sharply, on the front door. “Mr. Regent? Are you home?” No answer. Seth slipped the narrow metal file out of his back pocket. He wasn’t entirely sure why he had brought it along – habit, he supposed. Nor was he sure when he had made up his mind to drive out here. He had come downstairs, prepared to head off for his morning run, and instead, had snagged his keys off the peg by the back door and climbed on his bike. He had expected Regent to be home – where else would he be just after sunrise? – but, seeing as he was already here… Seth fit the file into the keyhole. As soon as he twisted it, the door popped open. Immediately, a warning beep-beep-beeeeep sounded from across the room. In two seconds flat, Seth had sprinted over to the shuttered wall and tapped Regent’s code – 1571 – into the keypad. The blinking red light on the security alarm changed over to a steady, friendly green. Seth smirked. Nice to know he hadn’t lost his touch. Outside, the sun was shining merrily on a crisp winter morn. Inside, gloomy twilight reigned. The dead werekin on the walls tracked Seth with their eyes as he mounted the stairs in the dark. How did Regent sleep at night? Seth would have been lying awake, listening for paws padding down the hall. A blast of cold air, more frigid than he remembered, greeted him at the top of the attic stairs. He paused, listening, but the only sound was the ticking of a clock somewhere below. Shadows lay across the wooden floor, thick as paint; a yellowed curtain had been pulled across the only window, and the overhead bulb did not respond when he flipped the switch. Seth edged along the wall, hand on the hilt of the dagger tucked into the waistband of his sweats. 218 “Cleo?” he called, softly. The lump on the air mattress stirred. Seth released a breath he had hardly been aware of holding. She was alive, at least. Alive, but not well. Regent had stripped her of the warm clothes Seth had given her, leaving her in a thin white camisole and cotton shorts. Her lips were actually blue with cold. Bruises decorated her ribs, her back, her legs, and those were just the injuries Seth could see. He shrugged out of his camouflage jacket and draped it around her shoulders. Her skin was like ice to the touch. Curled up on her side, Cleo watched him without expression. When he reached for her hands, though, she drew them back. “Cleo, it’s me,” Seth said, gently. He wasn’t sure how much she was processing in her half-frozen state. “I need your hands so I can get these chains off of you.” Slowly, Cleo extended her wrists. The fingers on her right hand were black and swollen, the small bones bent into unnatural angles. Gently as he could, Seth worked the file into the keyhole on the manacles. The instant the lock sprang open, Cleo lunged. This was not wholly unlooked-for. Seth tackled her back onto the mattress, restraining her with an elbow against her windpipe. “Easy, tiger,” he said. Cleo smiled up at him, an acid smile of undiluted loathing. Blood seeped into the cracks around her parched lips. “You should have killed me while I was still chained up, sweetheart.” Tucking her shoulder into his, she tried to flip Seth onto his back, groping for the dagger with her uninjured hand. Christ, this girl did not give up. “Listen, sweetheart,” Seth hissed, in her ear, “a little cooperation would go a long way in helping me rescue you, all right?” Cleo stilled like he had hit her with a freeze-ray. Seth stared down into those ice-chip eyes, watching her struggle with the decision to trust him. Deep inside of Seth, a small but persistent voice, which sounded rather like Emery Little’s, was screaming that he was insane. Cleo was a hunter. He couldn’t honestly be thinking of letting her go, could he? That was not why he had come here. He 219 had come to talk to Regent, to find out what Cleo had told him about J.J. Uh-huh, the Emery-voice sneered. Is that why you brought your lock-pick along? Why you didn’t call to tell Regent you were on your way? Seth made a face. Okay, so maybe this had been a rescue mission all along. What mattered now was getting Cleo out of here before Regent came home and skinned them both. Cleo jerked her chin at the dagger. “How’s this,” she said. “Give me back my knife, and I’ll rescue myself.” Yeah, that was happening. Seth stood up. “Can you walk?” “Of course I can walk,” Cleo snapped. In the end, she didn’t walk so much as shuffle, leaning heavily on Seth. He guided her downstairs, onto the couch – keeping his dagger close at hand, in case she decided to forego their truce – and fetched her duffel bag from beside the fireplace. Cleo directed him to a side pocket, where a phial of healing potion was sewn into the lining. Seth tore it out with his claws. Her color started to return as soon as she downed it. There was also a change of clothes in the bag. Cleo slipped into jeans and a sweater and her trademark spike-heeled boots, surreptitiously cradling her injured hand, while Seth shoved supplies into the bag. Just the essentials. Bottled water. Bandages. Snickers. As he was zipping the bag, the floorboards vibrated. “We have to go,” he said. “Now.” Cleo was a step ahead of him out the front door. They raced across the lawn, leaving a trail a blind man could have followed; at the woodpile, Cleo stumbled, and Seth swung her up in his arms, ignoring her protest, and deposited her on the Yamaha. The Hummer hadn’t reached the end of the drive yet, but from the way Regent was grinding gears, it would any second. Either the house had a secondary alarm he had missed, or Regent was in a serious hurry to get home to his Saturday morning cartoons. “Hold on,” Seth yelled over the growl of the bike’s engine. Cleo wrapped her arms around his waist, Seth opened up the throttle, and they rocketed away, into the trees. *** 220 Regent’s house was smack in the middle of a miles-long stretch of woods that bordered Fort King – a lot of ground to cover, even for a tiger with keen werekin senses. A few miles south, Seth came upon a road (more of a track, really) that paralleled the Ohio River, skirting a rocky gorge that separated Indiana from Kentucky. For some time, they roared past snowcovered fields and scrubby pastures where herds of black-andwhite cows grazed behind barbwire fences. At last, the dirt changed over to gravel, the road soon after ending at an abandoned barn on the back forty of some nameless farmer’s property. Seth drove the Yamaha inside and cut the engine. Only the bones of stalls and a rusted ’57 Chevy with a busted axle, divested of tires and spattered with bird droppings, remained inside. Seth laid a half-conscious Cleo down on the dirt floor and started a fire with a lighter he found in the duffel bag, fed by rotted wood broken off the stalls. The smoke curled up through a hole in the slatted roof. Seth prayed to the Totems the farmer wouldn’t come out to see if his old barn was burning down, but it was a risk he had to take. Healing potion would take care of Cleo’s bruises and broken bones. Hypothermia was a different story. He lay down next to the fire, as close to the flames as he could stand, and arranged Cleo beside him, his jacket covering them both. She tucked her head under his chin, burrowing into him for warmth. A square of aquamarine sky was visible through the roof, pierced by rafters like splintered bones. While Cleo slept, Seth stared up at the drifting clouds, racking his brain for what to do next. Handing Cleo over to the Resistance was out. Seth would not be the cause of further torture. In all likelihood Cleo had tortured J.J. In all likelihood she had helped kill Naomi, possibly even fired the bullet that had ended her life. If it came to a fight, Seth could have killed her. But he didn’t have the stomach to hurt her more than she already had been. Werekin were essentially peaceful creatures. Although, Seth thought, darkly, Regent seemed to be an exception to that rule. Maybe the gentleness Elijah Bishop had 221 worshipped about werekin was like any instinct: With concerted effort, you could overcome it. On that cheerful note, Seth closed his eyes, and practiced stillness. The sun was falling from afternoon to evening when Cleo came around. She stretched, making a luxuriating “mmm” noise as she nuzzled her nose against Seth’s neck. If he had been another kind of guy, that would have been a real turn-on. “Welcome back, sweetheart,” he said. Realizing who she was cuddling up to, Cleo yanked away and wrapped Seth’s camouflage jacket tighter around herself. “You,” she said, viciously. “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t kill you right now.” “The fact that I just saved your life doesn’t count?” The look she gave him said it did not. Seth fished the bag of Snickers and a bottle of water out of the duffel bag. Cleo sat across the fire from him as she ate, watchful as a cornered wolf. Seth reclined on his elbows, toes toward the fire. The dagger was still in his waistband, covered over by his T-shirt. He hoped they were past the killing one another phase of their acquaintance, but he wasn’t betting his life on it. “How’s the hand?” he asked. Cleo flexed her fingers. Thanks to the potion, the fractures had healed during her nap. “Good as new,” she said. “Where are we?” “Middle of Nowhere, Indiana.” Seth tossed a piece of hay at the fire. “How did we get here?” Seth pointed at the Yamaha. Cleo looked from it, to the barn door, then back at Seth. “Should we be expecting company?” “I don’t think so,” Seth said. If Regent had tracked them to the road, he probably thought Cleo and her accomplice had headed for the highway. Of course Regent would suspect Seth had rescued Cleo. Regent wasn’t stupid. Losing his guru’s trust was just another consequence of this decision Seth would have to live with. 222 He was almost certain he would also be grounded. He had left the house before sunrise without so much as a note to explain where he had gone. Lydia was no doubt frantic by now. “Tell me about Chimera,” he said. Cleo glanced at him across the fire. “What about it?” “Do you know someone named David Burke?” “Not personally,” Cleo said. “He’s the military liaison assigned to Project Ark.” “And he lives in Fairfax?” “Project Ark has a presence here,” Cleo said, vaguely. Seeming to decide this was sufficient sharing, she stood, wiping chocolate-sticky fingers on her jeans. “Well, thanks for the memories, sweetheart. Now, hand over the keys, and I’ll be on my way.” “Uh, no,” Seth said. “Don’t think so.” The firelight hollowed out Cleo’s cheeks. Her eyes were a purplish shade of silver, almost lupine. “If you wanted to keep me prisoner, you shouldn’t have untied me.” “I told you,” Seth said. “I’m going to rescue my brother, and you’re going to help me.” “Maybe you’re not clear on how this works,” Cleo said, coldly. “You are an animal. I am a hunter. You do what I say. And I said, give me the keys.” “I’m not an animal,” Seth retorted. “I’m werekin. And since I’m not collared, sweetheart, I don’t take orders, from you or anyone else.” “We can change that,” Cleo assured him. “Actually, you can’t. Regent nicked the collar you had in your bag.” Cleo cursed. Seth smirked. Poor Cleo. She really was having a bad week. “Anyway, collaring me didn’t work out for you so well, remember? Maybe you should try a different approach.” “Such as?” “Such as working with me.” Cleo laughed. “Might want to ease up on the catnip. It’s clouded your mind.” “Think about it.” Seth sat up, losing the smirk. Dirt and straw were stuck to his elbows; he brushed them off. “You’re stranded, with nothing but the clothes on your back – no 223 weapons, no phone, no vehicle. And there is a very good chance one seriously unhappy weretiger is combing these woods for you even as we speak. I, on the other hand, have a dagger and a motorcycle, and I am happy to use both of them to get you out of here, if you agree to take me to my brother.” “I have a better idea,” Cleo said. “I slit your throat with that dagger, drive out of here on your motorcycle, and if your tiger buddy ever finds you, he can make a meal out of your corpse.” Seth lay back down, arms crooked behind his head. “Go ahead. You can probably beat me. I haven’t had much training.” Cleo hesitated, and that told Seth what he needed to know. Hurting him wouldn’t be so easy for her now, either. “J.J. told me to save you,” he said. Cleo could not have looked more shocked if he had announced he was really the Tooth Fairy in disguise as a werejaguar. “He said that to you? When? When did you talk to him?” Seth gave her a bare bones version of his dreams, the voice that had spoken to him several times in the last few weeks. Cleo sat down on the Chevy’s rusted hood, face hidden in her hands. “Is that something he can do?” Seth asked. “Is he…telepathic?” Cleo’s head bobbed. Her voice was muffled by her hands. “Prescient, too. Very powerful. Dr. LeRoi had Xanthe train him.” “Xanthe?” “Another telepath.” “Is that usual?” Seth worked very, very hard to sound casual. “I mean, does Chimera usually train werekin to use their telepathic powers?” “No,” Cleo said. “But J.J. isn’t – usual.” Oh that wasn’t ominous. Not at all. “But he’s a slave, right?” Seth said. “What he does, they make him do. Right?” In the back of his mind, he was hearing Emery. If you had been raised by Chimera, if you’d never been told anything other than whatever lies they filled your head with, how would you know you were fighting for the bad guys? There must have been an edge to his voice, much as he tried to keep it smooth. Lifting her head from her hands, Cleo taunted him with a smirk. “Is that what’s bothering you, sweetheart? I 224 told you. J.J. is vicious. Feral, really. Keeping him collared is the only way to control him.” She was lying, Seth decided. She wanted to upset him, and he refused to be goaded into a fight. He needed her help too badly. “If J.J. can see the future, and he says you’re going to save us, that must mean you are. It must mean you and me were meant to work together.” “Seeing the future is an imprecise art. I don’t know why J.J. would think I would help you, or any werekin, for that matter.” Maybe because he knows you better than you know him, Seth wanted to say. Except he was a little afraid Cleo might kill him just to prove her ruthlessness. “Maybe he knew if I saved you, we would have this conversation, and afterwards we might not hate each other so much.” “It’s not working,” Cleo said. Sliding off the hood, she crossed to the wide doorway. Darkness was spreading across the treetops like ink spilled onto paper. Seth looked down at the dagger. The polished blade showed a sliver of his reflection, tattoos bruise-black across his cheek, golden eyes tinged bronze by the dying fire. Had it been just last night he was celebrating the Knights’ victory at MoJo’s with the rest of the team, like any normal teenager? That was what made life in Fairfax so discombobulating, he thought. From basketball to break-ins in under twenty-four hours. “You should have killed me,” Cleo said. Seth raised his eyes to hers. Backlit by the sunset, her face was too shadowed for him to make out her expression. “I don’t want to kill you,” he said. It was the truth, whether it made sense or not. Cleo sounded tired. “It doesn’t matter what you want. Saving me doesn’t change things between us. You’re werekin. I’m a hunter. That won’t ever change.” “Cleo,” Seth said, softly, for she had begun backing away. One spike-heeled boot crossed the threshold. She tensed, waiting to see what Seth would do. Nothing, was what he did. Seth didn’t want to hurt Cleo, and he understood she would make him, before she would let herself be captured again. 225 “I’ll be back for you, Seth,” she warned. “If I can’t collar you, I’ll kill you. If you want to survive, don’t let me find you again.” 226 Chapter Eighteen: Light and Dark Seth went home. Common sense said he should run, but the fact of the matter was, he didn’t believe Cleo would make good on her threat. If she really intended to capture him, why warn him she would be back? Plus, she was still wearing his coat. Sooner or later, she would realize that, and she wouldn’t be able to deny what it meant. Seth had saved her. Like it or not, they had a connection now. Seth was under the covers when Lydia came into his room later that night, to pass on the message that Seth’s karate lesson was on for the next day. Regent had called, to say he was recovered from his “flu.” In other words, Seth’s guru wanted an explanation for where the hunter in his attic had disappeared to. Seth wondered if he should write out his last will and testament before he went, in case he didn’t come home. Lydia sat on the edge of his bed, tucking her silk robe between her knees. Seth had not been grounded. Turned out Lydia had called Re-Spin looking for him, and Emery, either because he had guessed what Seth was really up to or because he was just that good of a friend, had lied and said Seth was pulling a double-shift that day. Lydia smelled wonderful, a mom-smell of lemon dish liquid and lavender soap. They recounted the Knights’ death-defying, come-from-behind victory for the umpteenth time, Seth laughing until his sides ached when she did a pitch-perfect imitation of Dr. Gideon stomping out of the gym, eyes bulging with fury that Coach had pulled Seth off the bench. “He’ll probably flunk me now,” Seth warned, wiping his eyes. “Let him try,” Lydia said. Her green eyes flashed. For the first time, Seth saw that mama-cat instinct Regent had spoken of in her. He smiled, a little shyly. “Thanks, Mrs. Steward.” Lydia cocked her head at him. “What for, honey?” “For letting me stay here. And, you know. For putting up with me.” 227 Lydia smiled. “You’re not so bad.” She reached out, as though to touch his cheek, but stopped with her hand halfway there. Seth no longer felt rejected. He understood now, why Lydia never touched him. It was her penance, for failing J.J. Reaching up, he caught her hand and tugged her down so she was lying beside him on the pillow. Tentatively, with just the tips of her fingers, Lydia traced his cheekbones, his eyebrows, his jaw. Seth closed his eyes, not wanting to interrupt whatever she was feeling in that moment. “You’re so still now,” Lydia said, softly. “When you first came to us, you moved all the time. Like you were on the verge of racing out the door any second.” Memories of that last night in Philly assaulted Seth. Naomi’s gospel choir alto raised in song. Two presents under the cheap artificial tree. Blood spackling the kitchen wall. The grief that always simmered under the surface rose to the top. Behind their lids, Seth’s eyes stung with tears. Some of the grief was for Ben, too. Seth had tried every day that week to reach his old Papa Bear. There was never any answer. Ben would not have cut Seth out of his life without even a goodbye. They were more than blood. They were family. Seth was starting to believe the hunters had taken every one he loved. “Regent is teaching me stillness,” he managed to say, roughly. “How do you teach someone stillness?” “It’s a karate thing.” Seth cracked open an eye, checking his mother’s expression. “Are you really interested in this?” “I’m interested in everything you do,” Lydia said, simply. So Seth told her. About inasu, turning blocks into strikes, flowing seamlessly from defending to attacking; about zanshin, ceaseless attention to your surroundings, right down to the currents of air; about mudana no waza, no wasted movements. He paused then, a little embarrassed by his own earnestness. “Pretty fruity, huh?” “I don’t think so. I’m glad you and Werner found one another. He’s been alone too long.” Lydia’s smile melted into the 228 lines around her mouth. “I wish you and Jack could connect like that.” The only connection Seth wanted to make with Jack Steward was his fist against Jack’s face. “We get along,” he hedged. “He does try, honey. Having a boy in the house is difficult for him. He’s only used to us girls. But I know he cares about you…” She was leading up to something. Seth sat up. “Did I do something wrong?” “No, honey, of course not.” Lydia sat up, too, seeming exasperated with herself. “You know we have the fundraiser tomorrow night, at the country club. For Jack’s campaign.” Seth nodded. Dinner table conversation had revolved around little else for two weeks. “Jack didn’t want me to ask – he said it would put you on the spot – but we would really love for our family to be there. Our whole family,” she stressed, to be sure Seth didn’t miss the point. Seth Sullivan at a country club cotillion. Now there was a concept. Even if Jack hadn’t been the government liaison in Ursula LeRoi’s pocket, he could not have seen that happening. “I have a lot of homework to catch up on tomorrow,” he said. It was true. Mr. Talbot had assigned them two chapters in American History, he had a set of proofs still to work for Geometry, and if he wanted to survive the pop quiz Gideon was sure to spring on them as retaliation for the Knights’ victory, he needed to review this week’s Biology chapter. “But tell Jack I’ll be rooting for him.” To be eaten by rats. “Marshall will be there, you know,” Lydia said. Seth grinned. Lydia had his number, all right. “Will Dr. Townsend be there?” “I’m sure he will. Wesley and Meredith are big supporters of Jack’s campaign.” “Then Marshall might be more comfortable if I stayed home.” Seth peered sideways at her, making sure she got it. Lydia glanced out his window, at the house across the drive. Her smile was a little bit sad. “You’re very brave, Seth,” she said. 229 *** “So you killed her,” Regent repeated, deadpan. Seth’s guru was leaning against one of the mirrored walls in the Bat Cave, sipping bottled water while Seth traded his gi for jeans and a T-shirt. Their training session that morning had been grueling, even by Regent standards. He was teaching Seth kicks – roundhouse kicks, scissor kicks, flying kicks. This in addition to their regular floor exercises. The soles of Seth’s feet were numb from striking the heavy bag, his leg muscles screaming for mercy. Still, he was improving. A month ago, he would have collapsed within the first half-hour. He forced himself to meet Regent’s gaze. “Yes. I killed her,” he said, sticking to the lie he had decided, sometime around dawn, to tell. A lie Regent would suspect was a lie, but would be hard-pressed to prove was not the truth. “You told me if I wanted to be merciful, I should slit her throat, remember?” Regent grunted. Sweat had pooled under his black gi; he looked almost as spent as Seth. “What happened to finding your brother?” “Did she tell you anything about J.J.?” Regent made a noncommittal noise Seth decided to interpret as a no. “I saw what you did to her, all right? If she hadn’t talked after all that, she wasn’t going to talk. And I couldn’t just let you keep torturing her. It’s not who I am. But it would have been stupid to let her go, so…I killed her.” Regent studied Seth for a long minute. Seth held his breath. With seventeen years of practice, he could lie impressively when he needed to, never more so than when his life was on the line, but Regent was not an easy man to fool. Finally, Regent pushed off the wall. “Well then. Your first kill. I say this calls for a celebration.” He motioned at the mat. “Have a seat. I’ll be right back.” Seth hesitated. Although if Regent wanted to kill him, he reasoned, he wouldn’t need to be sneaky about it; he could just grab something off the weapons wall and chop him into jaguarbits. “I take my whiskey straight,” he called up the stairs, as he sat down, cross-legged, on the mat. 230 Regent returned a minute later and took a seat facing him. He was holding something behind his back, something Seth couldn’t see even when he craned his neck. “You like mythology, cub?” Regent asked. Seth shrugged. “I’ve read Homer. Personally, I prefer The Iliad to The Odyssey.” “Not that kind of mythology. I mean animal mythology. Ancient cultures revered animals. Did you know every Mayan god had a jaguar form?” “Darn skippy,” said Seth. “Jaguar worship. We need to bring that action back.” Regent gave him a look. Seth cleared his throat. “Sorry. You were saying…?” “Abraham Bishop, Elijah Bishop’s father, was an anthropologist. He spent years trekking through South American rainforests collecting myths from the Maya. Some say he died there. Some say he met the Tortoise Clan, the most ancient werekin Clan, the only one to survive the sinking of Lemuria, and is still there somewhere, deep, deep in the Amazon, but that’s a story for another day. The myth we’re concerned with claims the world of the living and the world of the dead were ruled by two jaguars – one light, one dark. The black jaguar ruled the world of the dead. The pale jaguar ruled the world of the living.” Night and day, light and dark. Typical mythological themes, yet this particular myth sent a shiver of unease down Seth’s spine. “So the black jaguar was evil, and the pale jaguar was good?” “The Mayans didn’t associate light with purity and dark with evil, like we do. Neither god was good or evil. Both were simply powerful.” Regent brought his hands around in front of him. Balanced between them was one of those samurai swords Seth had admired his first day of training – a katana, Regent had called it. Twenty-five inches of curved steel soldered to a long, cylindrical handle fitted with a leather grip. Regent offered it to Seth off his fingertips. Seth took it. The sword was heavier than he had expected – the curve was so graceful, like an unfurled ribbon, he had thought it would be feather-light. Etched into each side of the blade was a jaguar: one 231 dark, with hints of pale spots; one golden, with black rosettes. The metalwork was so fine you could almost believe the engraving had been breathed into the steel as it was smelted. Seth looked up at Regent. Regent’s marbled eyes were inscrutable. “You’re trying to tell me something, aren’t you?” Seth said. “Something about J.J.” “Actually, cub,” Regent said, “I’m trying to tell you something about you.” Of course he didn’t offer to explain. And if Seth pressed him, he would just give him some shogun baloney about finding his own truth, yada yada, blah blah blah. Oh well. At least he hadn’t impaled him with the sword for springing Cleo. Seth offered the sword back to Regent, off his fingertips because he figured that was a samurai etiquette thing, but Regent shook his head. “Keep it. I had it made for you.” Seth’s jaw dropped. “You – made me a sword?” “I did promise you could have one when you convinced me you wouldn’t chop your own arm off,” Regent reminded him. “But if you don’t want it, I can – ” “I want it.” Seth hugged the katana against his chest. Hell yes he wanted it. His sword was in-credible. “But…” He glanced sidelong at Regent, suspicious when what he wanted to feel was grateful. “Why now?” “Because you’ve earned it,” Regent said, gruffly. “I had my doubts about you, cub, but you’ve worked as hard as I asked you to. You haven’t even whined too much.” Why did Regent have to pick today of all days, the first day Seth had ever lied to his face, to dole out a whopping dose of his rare praise? Softly, Seth said, “Thanks, Mr. Regent.” “Might want to hold off on the gratitude. Sword training is no picnic. I want you to bring that with you from now on.” Regent pointed at the katana. “I’ll teach you the basic techniques, and you’ll need to practice them, every day. And I want you adding another two miles to your morning runs, too. Got to put some meat on those bones if you want to be a swordsman.” Seth saluted. “Yes, General.” At that, Regent almost smiled. *** 232 Kings Lane was deserted, Lydia’s Escalade missing from the garage, by the time Seth made it home. Next door, the Townsends’ house was dark as well. Looked like everyone in Castle Estates had decided Jack’s country club fundraiser was the place to be tonight. On the kitchen counter, Seth found fifty dollars and a Chinese takeout menu his mother had thoughtfully put by for him. He ordered sweet and sour pork, kung pao beef, fried dumplings and wonton soup, and showered while he waited for the food to arrive. His new katana he placed in a position of honor on top of his dresser. The phone rang as he was toweling off. Seth let the machine pick up. Whoever it was didn’t leave a message. He had just thrown on his favorite holey T-shirt and an old pair of sweats when the doorbell buzzed. As there was no one home to see, he bounded from the second floor landing to the entryway, skidded barefoot across the hardwood to the front door, and yanked it open. “Sorry, I was in the – “Indiana?” Seth pulled back, blinking. “Why aren’t you at the country club?” Marshall Townsend shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans, the porch light silvering his inky curls. He was dressed more casually than usual, in faded jeans and a washed-out Nike T-shirt. His smile struck Seth as more relaxed, too. “I have the flu,” he announced. “Well, quarantine yourself next door,” Seth said. “I don’t want it.” “Philadelphia!” Marshall stuck his foot out, blocking the door before Seth could close it. “I don’t really have the flu. I’m playing hooky.” And he smiled, brilliantly. Seth lounged against the doorframe, studying him. Every time he thought he had him pegged, Marshall subverted his Golden Boy theory. “You fooled your father? Isn’t he a doctor?” “Surgeon,” Marshall corrected. “He doesn’t see a lot of cases of flu in the O.R.” He paused, looking a bit unsure of himself, suddenly. “Well? Are you going to invite me in?” 233 “I don’t know, Indiana,” Seth said, solemnly. “I’m not sure I should encourage this behavior. You think it’s just the one little white lie, but the next thing you know, you’re staying up past your bedtime. From there, it’s just a short jump to snorting coke in the bathroom.” “I hear you’re the man to see about that,” Marshall quipped, as he slid by him. The takeout arrived five minutes later. Luckily Seth had ordered enough for two. The boys ate in the kitchen, sitting across from one another at the island, dissecting every play Sacred Heart had made in Friday’s game. The Knights were likely to face them again in the lead-up to sectionals in a couple of weeks. Casually as he could, Seth asked about Connor Burke’s background. “His father is military,” Marshall said, peeling off a scrap of marinated beef and tossing it to Captain Hook. Poe was on top of the refrigerator, one of her favorite napping spots, her one eye fixed on Seth. “He moved here our ninth grade year. I think before that they lived in New Mexico.” “Why come here?” Seth asked. “Fort King is closed down, isn’t it?” “Beats me. That’s really all I know about him, aside from his free throw average.” Using his chopsticks, Marshall speared a dumpling off Seth’s plate. “Why? You’re not thinking of going out with him, are you?” Seth blinked. “Is he gay?” “I don’t know. Couldn’t you tell, if he was?” Marshall sounded genuinely curious. Seth shook his head. “Seriously, Indiana? It’s not like gay people have a rainbow aura or something. You can’t just spot them in a crowd.” He pushed a few noodles around his plate. “He is kind of cute, I guess. But I don’t date the enemy.” Marshall laughed. There was something different about Marshall tonight, Seth thought. The way he smiled, warm and open. The way he let his gaze linger on Seth, like Seth knew his gaze always lingered on him. The inhibitions that usually held him back seemed to have evaporated, and in compensation, Seth found himself more subdued than usual. They had just gotten back on speaking 234 terms. He didn’t want to cross one of Marshall’s invisible lines and wreck things again. The phone rang again as they were rinsing their dishes. “Aren’t you going to answer that?” Marshall asked. Seth shook his head. Marshall looked over at him. “You’re quiet tonight, Philadelphia. Everything okay?” “I’m just tired,” Seth said. Again, not a lie. Karate wore him out. “What’s that, on your neck?” Catching Seth by the shoulder, Marshall turned him around. His eyes widened. “Jesus, Seth, what happened to you?” Seth looked down to see what had Marshall so upset. A purple-black mark discolored his collarbone, clearly visible through his thin T-shirt. Dammit. He had forgotten how battered sparring with Regent left him. The bruises always faded by morning, and Seth was careful to wear a sweatshirt over his p.j.s on karate days so Lydia wouldn’t flip out; tonight, though, he hadn’t bothered, as he’d been expecting to have the house to himself. “It’s nothing,” he said, pulling the collar of his T-shirt over the bruise. “Karate is a contact sport, you know.” “Regent did that to you?” Marshall was indignant. “He’s ten times your size!” “Relax, Indiana. It’s just sparring.” Was Seth the only one who noticed how close they were standing? He pressed back against the sink, trying to put some distance between them. “I’m fine. Really.” “If it was more than that, you could tell me,” Marshall said, roughly. “If someone was hurting you, if you needed help, Seth, you could tell me.” His fingers brushed the bruise, along the slope of Seth’s collarbone. Seth gripped the edge of the sink. “No one is hurting me. I swear.” It came out a little breathlessly, a fact that wasn’t lost on Marshall, whose breathing was somewhat uneven, too. His baby blues turned black as smoke. “I should…I should go home,” he said, staring into Seth’s face like he was searching for some kind of answer there. “Before my parents come back…” “Okay,” Seth said, trying his best to sound normal. 235 But Marshall made no move to leave. His hand ran down Seth’s arm, shoulder to elbow, elbow to wrist. Seth felt himself go into tingle-mode again. “Listen, Seth, about…about the other night. When you – when we – ” Seth couldn’t stop himself from looking at Marshall’s mouth then, or from noticing how Marshall’s pupils dilated when he did. It made him dizzy. “I’ve been thinking, about what you said, and – ” A split-second before the window at his back shattered, Seth heard the rifle report. This time, unlike in Philly, he moved fast enough: Flinging himself forward, he tackled Marshall to the floor, curving his arms over his head as glass sprayed his back. Marshall cried out. A curly-q of blood appeared on the sleeve of his T-shirt. Seth smelled the trail of silver the bullet had left behind. Captain Hook tore off into the living room, Poe on his heels, a calico streak. Boots were thumping across the drive. A shadow appeared at the back door, just as another pair of boots stomped up the porch steps – both exits blocked. Seth cursed himself inwardly. It seemed Cleo had kept her word after all. The hunters had come for him. *** Seth rolled off of Marshall, into a crouch, eyes on the door. Marshall was saying something about the police. Seth cut him off. “Marshall, listen to me.” His voice was already a hiss; rage pumped into his bloodstream, splendid in its potency. “Go upstairs to my room, climb out the window, and get back to your house. Stay there. Don’t call the cops. I can handle this.” “Are you nuts?” Marshall’s whisper was urgent. The door knob jiggled; it was locked, but locks, Seth knew, would not stop hunters. “These guys have guns. I don’t know what you were into in Philly, but you can’t seriously mean to…” He trailed off, staring, as Seth turned toward him. His fingernails had already lengthened into claws, the hair on the backs of his arms thickening into tawny fur; black rosettes darkened his cheeks, blooming outward from the tattoos around his eye. “Seth?” Marshall whispered. 236 “Yeah, Indiana,” Seth said. “It’s still me. Now, run!” And then, as the back door splintered off its frame, he skinned. He heard Marshall gasp, but there was no time to worry about that now. The jaguar launched off the kitchen floor, swiping his claws across the face of the hunter who had just stepped inside. She screamed, staggering backwards. She was in her midtwenties, dark-skinned and butch-looking, wearing leather pants and a leather jacket – not Cleo. Seth registered that in the moment before they crashed onto the wooden planks of the porch, the jaguar on top. The hunter’s rifle sailed into Lydia’s rosebushes; she reached to draw the knife from her belt, but Seth sank his teeth into the back of her neck and bit down, puncturing her skull. Blood, cloyingly sweet, flooded the jaguar’s mouth. The hunter went limp. A strangled cry behind him brought Seth around. Filling the kitchen doorway was a gorilla-like man, his neck so thick his brutish face flowed right into it, sans chin. Boulder-sized muscles bulged beneath his leather jacket. A whip like Snowman’s was hooked to his belt, alongside the kind of long hunting knife Ben would have called a Texas toothpick, and an ammo pouch with extra silver bullets for the Glock .9 millimeter clutched in one powerful hand. Forget hunters. This dude was Rambo. Seth snarled – a hair-raising sound that sent every dog in the neighborhood into hysterics. Had Kings Lane not been emptied out for the Stewards’ fundraiser bash, animal control would have received some panicked calls. Rambo raised his eyes from his dead partner. Hatred was written all over his ugly face. Muzzle-flash dazzled Seth’s eyes; he heard a phht noise as the bullet exited the barrel – the Glock was equipped with a silencer – but he was already dodging, spine curving as he rolled in midair, the bullet passing so close to his neck it ruffled his fur. Seth skinned as he landed, executing a cartwheel that brought him within striking range of Rambo’s chest. He kicked out, a judo-kick Regent had taught him just that afternoon, but it was 237 like kicking a solid wall: Rambo just grinned, like, Thanks for playing, and brought the pistol up again. Ducking under his arm, Seth seized the collar of Rambo’s leather jacket, jerked him forward, and slammed his forehead into the bigger man’s nose. That move he hadn’t learned in karate. That was a lesson from the streets of South Philly, Seth’s urban jungle. Blinded by tears, Rambo stumbled into the porch railing, blood gushing from both nostrils. Seth sprinted into the kitchen. Upstairs, on his dresser, was the katana – which he didn’t actually know how to use yet, but hey, it was a sword. It was better than nothing. Captain Hook was raising an unholy racket in the living room, answered by the frantic braying of the neighborhood dogs. The kitchen was empty; Seth hoped that meant Marshall had made it safely next door. For all he knew, the yard was swarming with hunters. If anything happened to Marshall, because of him – There was a whistling noise from the doorway. Seth, hissing, ducked behind the island. Rambo’s bullet grazed the top of his ear. Crouched there, heart pounding, Seth shut his eyes. Stupid, stupid, stupid! He had just gotten himself pinned down. He should have kept running. Now he would never make it to the stairs without being shot in the back. “Here, kitty-kitty.” Splintered wood and broken glass crunched – Rambo had stepped over the back door. The toes of a pair of black combat boots appeared beside the island. Screw it, Seth thought. If he was going out, he was going out fighting. He tucked his chin into his chest, rolled out from his hiding place, and back-flipped on top of the island. Rambo cursed; before he could bring the gun up, Seth had kicked it out of his hand. It bounced onto the counter, discharging a bullet that destroyed the toaster. Seth dove for the gun. Rambo dove for Seth. Hands gripped the back of his T-shirt. A second later, Seth was flying – then crashing, into the cabinets above the sink. The impact expelled the air from his lungs. He must have blacked out, for when he came to, he was lying belly-down amidst the fragments of glass from the broken window. 238 A boot hooked under his hip, flipping him onto his back. Seth moaned. A sliver of gray rib bone poked out of his right side, through his torn shirt. He was too dazed to appreciate the pain, but he was certain that part was coming. Rambo cocked the pistol. “Night-night, kitty,” he said. All Seth could think about was his mother, coming home and finding his body in a pool of blood next to the stove. He closed his eyes. Rambo’s finger touched the trigger – There was a shrill bark, followed by a sharp cry of pain; the bullet that had been intended for Seth’s brain pan pinged off the stove. Seth opened his eyes. Captain Hook was there, teeth clamped onto Rambo’s ankle, just above his boot. The dog’s sleek little body was quivering with rage. Come into my house, will ya? he seemed to be saying. “Get off, you stupid mutt!” Rambo hopped to the side, shaking his foot. Captain Hppl held on, growling like a Rottweiler. Seth shouted for him to run, but Captain Hook didn’t listen. Rambo stopped hopping and brought the Glock around. Seth screamed. The gun fired. Blood misted the floor. “NO!” Fury let loose inside of Seth then. Forgetting the pain in his broken ribs, forgetting the natural abhorrence he felt for killing, he leapt at Rambo, tackling his knees. The pistol slid under the refrigerator as Rambo hit the floor. He choked; Seth had closed his hands around his throat, begun to squeeze. Vicious snarls were ripping out of him, though he was in his human skin. Rambo’s eyes bulged. Seth squeezed harder. Rambo twisted, managing to jab him in the gut, sending shockwaves of agony through Seth’s broken ribs. He fell over, too slow to duck this time, and took the full force of Rambo’s punch right on the jaw. Arms curled around his middle, Seth turned, to see Rambo unsheathing his long knife. He touched his lips to the blade. Seth had thought only bad guys in movies did that. Did he have a name for it, too, like Lady Killer or Soul Biter, and sleep with it under his pillow? “Forget the gun,” Rambo said. “There’s more than one way to skin a cat.” 239 His mouth opened around a laugh, but something was wrong. The knife slipped from his grasp. The hunter looked at his empty hand in complete confusion. Seth flattened himself against the counter, still not understanding what was happening, even as blood bubbled over Rambo’s lips and he collapsed, facedown, at Seth’s feet. Buried to its hilt between his shoulder blades was a familiar bone-handled dagger. Seth looked up. Marshall was coming toward him, saying his name. For a second, Seth just gaped at him. Where in the name of the stars had Marshall Townsend learned to throw a knife with such deadly precision? Then he spotted the two figures in the doorway, one chewing frantically on the end of his strawberry-blonde ponytail, the other, still wearing the camouflage jacket Seth had wrapped her in yesterday, smirking down at her kill with deep satisfaction. “Skin that, bitch,” Cleo said. 240 Chapter Nineteen: Aftershocks Broken dishes littered the kitchen floor. The back door was kindling, the window above the sink in pieces; snow-swirled air whistled in around the frame, rustling the grocery lists and basketball schedules on the fridge. On top of that, there were the two dead hunters. Seemed like a situation ripe for adult intervention. Seth called Regent. “Stay put,” he growled. He was on his cell phone; Seth heard the Hummer roar to life. “I’m on my way.” “Yes sir.” Seth wasn’t sure he could have gone anywhere just then anyway. He was lying on the sofa, where Marshall had deposited him before rushing off to retrieve the first-aid kit. “But the Stewards will be home soon, so…” “I’ll call Jackie,” Regent said. “He can keep your mother and sister out a bit longer. And cub?” “Yeah?” “Don’t say a word to anybody, even Jack, until we get your story straight.” Lawerly advice if Seth had ever heard it. He returned the receiver to its cradle and turned over on his side. Cleo was in the kitchen, pilfering the bodies for spoils of war. Emery was at the window, peering around the curtain at the dark, quiet street. Poe climbed into Seth’s lap, meowing. Seth thought of Captain Hook, his limp little body crumpled up beside the stove, and buried his face in the couch cushions. “Seth? Are you okay?” Fan-tastic, Seth thought. He made himself sit up. Emery was looking at him with kindly green eyes. “Why were you bringing Cleo to my house again?” Seth asked. “I wasn’t. I mean, I didn’t mean to.” Emery studied his bony hands, abashed. His T-shirt said SILLY RABBIT, TRIX ARE FOR KIDS. “Mom called this afternoon. I tried to call you, but nobody answered.” Seth thought of the phone ringing off and on throughout the evening. Only now did he notice the answering machine light blinking with a dozen missed calls. “Finally I just 241 drove out here. When I pulled in, Cleo pulled in behind me. I led her right to you. Like an idiot.” Jaw jutting at an irritated angle, Emery scuffed his shoes on the carpet. Seth sighed. “Em, don’t. Don’t beat yourself up. I’d be dead right now if it wasn’t for her.” Emery shrugged, unconvinced. Seth, too weary to argue, let it go. “What did your mom say?” “You know she got called out of town because something big was going down with the Resistance?” Seth nodded. “Well, it’s the Black Swan. Chimera found her.” Seth’s jaw dropped. Save her, he heard J.J. say. Save her, and she will save us all. What if he hadn’t been talking about Cleo after all? What if he had been talking about the Black Swan? But how did he expect Seth to save her when he didn’t know who – or where – she was? Seth suddenly felt like clawing something. Why did his twin have to be so cryptic, anyway? Was that a psychic thing, speaking in riddles? That’s how dreams work, the more rational side of his brain reasoned. Through images and symbols. If that was all J.J. had to work with, a psychic link to his numbskull twin brother’s dreams, how much more frustrating must this all have been for him? Wearily, Seth stroked down Poe’s back. Chimera Enterprises had the Black Swan. Marshall had seen him skin. LeRoi was sending her hunters into his house to kill him. All Seth really wanted was to go to sleep and wake up to discover this entire day had been a bad dream. “Did your mom know where the Black Swan is being held?” Emery shook his head. “The Resistance doesn’t have a complete list of all Chimera facilities. They’re scrambling, trying to put the pieces together, but – ” “Found it!” Marshall had appeared in the doorway, holding up the firstaid kit. Emery stopped talking. Marshall sat down on the couch. With calm, steady hands, he cleaned the cuts across Seth’s back, tweezing out shards of glass. Seth’s broken ribs were already knitting back together, but the skin above his hip was split where the bone had poked through. Marshall taped a square of gauze over the gash. 242 The blood on his sleeve was a chilling reminder of the hunter’s near-miss. Silver poison had no effect on humans, but a bullet was still a bullet. “Is your arm all right?” Seth asked. “Huh?” Marshall glanced at his bicep. “Oh. Yeah. It’s a scratch. I’m worried about you,” he said. “You could have internal bleeding.” “I heal fast,” Seth said. “All werekin do.” Marshall glanced up at that. “There are others, like you?” Seth nodded, careful not to let his eyes stray to Emery. Someone else’s skin was not his secret to share. “What were you doing coming back here, Indiana? I thought I told you to go home and stay there.” “Right. I was leaving you to face two armed…whoever those people were on your own.” Marshall snapped the first-aid kit closed. “My father keeps a .38 by his bed. I knew where it was, so I got it, and started back, but Emery and that girl were already on their way in your front door…” For some reason, when Marshall said that girl, Seth remembered that before the hunters had burst in, Marshall had been about to tell him something. Would he still want to, after seeing Seth skin into a jaguar? “Indiana?” he said. “Yeah?” Baby blue eyes met his, and Seth lost his nerve. “You’ll make a good doctor,” he said, lamely. “Strictly speaking,” Marshall said, “this may qualify as veterinary work.” Seth laughed – and yelped, crossing his arms over his ribs. “Don’t make me laugh,” he groaned. “Sorry.” Marshall put the first-aid kit down on the floor. When he turned back to Seth, all traces of teasing were gone. “Are you safe, now that those people are…?” The word “dead” stuck in his throat. Seth could see how scared he was, but scared for him, not of him. Begged the question of just how much of this Marshall had already suspected. “Unfortunately,” Seth said, “it’s a little more complicated than that.” “Try a lot more complicated.” Emery closed the curtain and leaned back against the window. His nose and ears were very 243 red. “Seth, you need to get out of here, tonight. Chimera knows where you live. If they’ve decided to send hunters after you – ” “Au contraire, Bunny Bread,” said Cleo. “Those hunters were not Chimera.” She sauntered into the living room, Seth’s bone-handled dagger sheathed at her hip, and threw her huntress self into Jack’s recliner. “Feeling better, sweetheart?” “Good as new,” said Seth. Marshall had draped his arm across the back of the sofa – casually, but a little proprietarily, too. Once this life-and-death crisis abated, Seth would have to analyze that. “What did you mean, they aren’t Chimera?” “I found these on them.” Cleo tossed two silver cuffs onto the sofa. Marshall picked one up. It was carved into the shape of a swan, the symbol of the Resistance. Emery had gone white as bone. Seth knew they were thinking the same thing. Chimera had the Black Swan. Now all they needed was the blood of the Jaguar Clan, Seth’s blood, to complete the Ark, and they could raise Lemuria. Was it possible the Resistance had decided to spill that blood before LeRoi could take it? “Are they, Em?” he asked, quietly. “Are they Resistance?” “The cuffs are.” Emery looked like he had swallowed something vile. “But, Seth, the Resistance wouldn’t send hunters after you. The Resistance doesn’t work with hunters. This has to be some trick of Chimera’s.” He looked pointedly at Cleo as he said it. Marshall was looking between them all, mouth slightly ajar. “Okay, what is a chimera, and what are you resisting?” “It’s not impossible for a hunter to join the Resistance,” Cleo said, addressing Seth as if Marshall hadn’t spoken. “Sometimes hunters go rogue, run away and join the Underground. Who’s to say the Resistance hasn’t started recruiting them?” “I say,” Emery said, hotly. “And I also say the Resistance doesn’t want Seth dead.” “How would you know, Bunny Bread? Are you a Resistance fighter? Because, correct me if I’m wrong, I thought you were a clerk at the mall.” Emery’s nose wiggled. He looked so angry Seth thought he might skin, which Seth would actually have paid money to see, 244 but he took a deep breath and said, “I think Jack Steward is behind this.” Marshall made a startled noise. Cleo dismissively flicked her wrist. “Steward is Seth’s guardian. He wouldn’t risk killing him unless LeRoi ordered it. And if Chimera had ordered this hit, there would have been more than two hunters here tonight.” “Maybe they weren’t supposed to kill him,” Emery said. “Maybe they were supposed to collar him.” “Then where are the collars? I searched them myself. All they had on them were silver bullets. Bullets, not tranqs. What does that tell you?” Cleo leaned back, satisfied that Emery had no answer. Seth did. Whoever had sent Rambo and his partner, they had wanted him planted under J.J.’s concrete angel. He leaned forward. “You called Jack my ‘guardian.’ I heard him tell Regent he was ‘responsible’ for me,” he said, questioningly. “He is,” Cleo said. “Responsible for handing you over to Chimera in one piece. If he doesn’t…” She drew a finger across her throat. “Hold on.” Marshall’s face had paled grayish-white, like the soupy fog that sometimes crept over Philly. “Mr. Steward is involved with people who want to kill Seth?” Emery threw Seth a sympathetic glance. There wasn’t time to explain things to Marshall like Seth wanted to. Regent would be here any minute, and Seth’s rescue party needed to clear out beforehand. He couldn’t very well have Regent discover Cleo in his living room, after he had claimed to have deep-sixed her. And he didn’t want Emery or Marshall coming to Regent’s attention. He was still too uncertain of his guru’s loyalties. “Emery,” he said, “upstairs, in my room, there’s a book hidden under my mattress. A journal. I want you to get it and bring it down here to Marshall. Then I want both of you to go home, and I want you to promise me, not a word to your mom about what happened here tonight until we figure out who wants me dead.” “Seth, you can trust the Resistance,” Emery said. “Just because she says – ” 245 “She just saved my life,” Seth reminded him. Emery blushed. Seth sighed. He hadn’t meant to snap, but this was all happening so fast. “Please, Em, could you just…?” Mutely, Emery nodded. As he hurried up the stairs to Seth’s room, Marshall leaned back on the couch and looked hard at Seth. “What are you going to do?” Seth shrugged. “Stay here. Regent should be here any minute.” “Is that safe? Are you safe here?” “No,” said Cleo, at the same time Emery, hopping back down the stairs, said, “No.” Seth glared at them both. Being ganged up on wasn’t helping his temper. “I’m not safe anywhere. I’ve been hunted my whole life, okay? So everybody can stop talking to me like this is my first day.” “Then stop acting like it,” Cleo said. “What do you want me to do, Cleo? Run? What happens to my mother and sister if I do? Can you honestly tell me Chimera wouldn’t use them to make me surrender?” Emery looked like he wished he had never put that idea into Seth’s head. “The Resistance can send your family Underground, too,” he said. “Please,” Cleo said, witheringly. “Chimera has hundreds of spies in the Underground. You send two humans and a werejaguar Underground, you might as well take out a front-page ad that says ‘collar me.’” “Have you got a better idea?” Emery challenged. “Yes, actually. He disappears.” Cleo swung her unnervingly silver gaze onto Seth. “Forget the Underground. Forget the Resistance. Just run. Get your head down, and don’t ever poke it back up.” “Is that what you’re going to do?” Seth asked. The ice in Cleo’s eyes suddenly melted. Seth understood, as he hadn’t before, that she was terrified. “We’d stand a better chance with two of us,” she said. Marshall shifted uncomfortably. Emery was bouncing on the balls of his feet, shaking his head frantically at Seth. Part of Seth, the part of him that had spent his life being protected by others, first by Thomas, then by Naomi and Ben, 246 was tempted to accept her offer, to hide from the fight he knew was coming if he stayed in Fairfax. How could he hope to win against Chimera? Even after all his training, he had nearly been killed by a single hunter. But he couldn’t save himself and hope Chimera didn’t come after his family. He couldn’t go back on his promise to bring J.J. home. “I’m staying,” he said. Cold light seeped back into Cleo’s eyes, freezing them once more into glass. She stood; walked over to the couch; and offered the bone-handled dagger to Seth, hilt-first. “Do yourself a favor, sweetheart,” she said. “When the hunters come for you, use that on yourself.” *** Midnight was long past when the last police car drove away from the Stewards’. Regent’s Hummer had turned into the drive as the back door (or what was left of it) had closed behind Emery and Marshall. Regent had sent Seth to clean up while he took care of the mess downstairs. Seth had brushed his teeth twice, rinsing the lingering taste of the hunter’s blood from his mouth, stuffed his bloody clothes into a plastic gym bag, and pulled on his Gym uniform. Then he had curled up on his windowsill, holding Captain Hook’s body, while Regent had packed the hunters’ corpses into his Hummer. Regent liked his steaks rare, and Seth wasn’t having his dog end up dessert. An hour must have passed as Seth sat there, gazing unseeingly at the stars. When the flashing red-and-blue lights had attracted his attention, Regent had called for him to come downstairs. No trace of blood had remained in the kitchen or on the back porch. Seth didn’t know how Regent had managed that. Like the forged transcripts and falsified government records, it seemed beyond the means of a small-time attorney. Seth wanted to believe Regent. Wanted him to be on his side. But he thought of those locked trunks in Regent’s garage, and wondered if it was time to indulge his natural curiosity. 247 Still, he had been grateful for Regent’s presence as he had given his bogus statement to the cops. They had gone with the most straightforward story: Seth had been home alone, heard a noise downstairs, and gone to investigate, surprising burglars; his dog had barked, and they had shot him (Seth had cried real tears at that point, and a kindly sergeant had patted his back); in teenage panic, he had called his step-father’s friend Werner Regent, who had rushed over to check on him, calling the cops on the way. No mention of dead bodies, and no dead bodies in sight to arouse suspicions. Seth had described the hunters in detail, and APBs had been issued for them. His family had arrived in the middle of this. Jack, tie askew, had drawn the sergeant off to the side, deep in sober conversation. Lydia and Leigh had flanked Seth on the couch, each holding one of his hands while a paramedic had shined a light in his eyes, felt of his pulse, standard post-traumatic stress kind of stuff. Seth had kept repeating, “I’m fine, really,” in this wooden voice that had been slightly worrisome even to him, until his mother had at last helped him upstairs to bed, hovering until Jack managed to convince her what they all really needed was some sleep. Seth rolled over now, pulling his blankets up around his chin. His teeth were chattering – delayed shock. He had added a sweatshirt and a heavy pair of wool socks to his Gym clothes, but still couldn’t get warm. Finally, he threw the covers off, eased open his window, and crawled outside to bury Captain Hook. The ground was so frozen he had to dig the hole with his claws, using all of his jaguar strength. He chose a spot in the backyard near the fence, visible from his bedroom window. In the spring, if he wasn’t pushing up daisies himself, he would ask Lydia if he could plant a rosebush there. His eyes were red when he finished. Seth wiped his cheeks with his sleeve, smearing dirt into his tears. Only then did he acknowledge the figure in the shadows, watching him. “I thought you were running,” he said. Cleo shrugged. “I decided I wanted my knife back.” 248 *** They climbed the rose trellis up to Seth’s room. Cleo plopped down on the bed and fell over backwards like she had been sawed in half at the waist. Mud and straw were packed into the treads of her boots, suggesting she had spent the previous night in a cornfield. “I hope you like sleeping on the floor,” she said, “because I am staying right here.” Dream on, sister. Seth’s ribs felt like they had been massaged by a jackhammer. No way he was giving up his big, comfy bed. “I’m wounded,” he said. “You take the floor.” Cleo popped up on an elbow. “Share?” Sharing his bed with a hunter. Emery would have declared him certifiable. Seth nodded. “Share.” He scavenged up a T-shirt for Cleo to wear as pajamas, then ducked into the bathroom to discard his muddy Gym clothes while she changed. Stripped to his boxers, Seth emerged, to find Cleo sitting in Poe’s usual spot on his windowsill, thumbing aimlessly through the copy of Othello Miss Janowitz had assigned them. Seth’s T-shirt stopped at her waist. Under it she wore a pair of red panties. Seth crawled under the covers. Minus the skintight clothes and spike-heeled boots, Cleo looked like a regular teenage girl, someone you would expect to find playing softball and griping about Calculus homework. Complete illusion, of course. Cleo was a trained killer. The first time Gideon assigned her detention, she would stab him in the eye with a pencil. Although, to be fair, a month ago Seth couldn’t have seen himself walking the halls of Fairfax High, posing for yearbook photos, joining the basketball team. Fretting over the chapters he still needed to read for American History. “Okay, Cleo,” he said. “Hit me. What’s our next move?” Cleo put the book down. “Depends on your endgame. In the Scholae Bestiarii, they teach us to know your ends before you decide on your means.” Sounded like some kung fu nonsense Regent would spout, Seth thought. “But here’s where things stand. Chimera knows who you are and how to find you. They haven’t collared you yet, because they want your tiger buddy to secure your cooperation – ” 249 “Question,” Seth broke in. “Why does Chimera need my cooperation? Isn’t the whole point of being collared that they can force you to do whatever they want?” “The collar doesn’t control your mind,” Cleo said. “It controls your magic. If you were collared, and I had the key, you couldn’t skin unless I allowed you to. But if I told you to walk backwards and quack like a duck, you could refuse. I could use the collar to drain your life-force – an excruciating way to die, but if you could withstand the pain, I couldn’t force you to obey.” “Are there werekin who choose to die rather than follow orders?” Cleo stood. Seth tracked her with his eyes as she picked his katana up off his dresser and admired the jaguar etchings on the blade. “For most werekin disobedience is unthinkable,” she said. “Most werekin are raised in captivity. From the time they’re old enough to walk, every time they disobey their masters, no matter how slight the infraction, they’re given a demonstration of the collar’s power. Just the memory of the pain is powerful motivation to obey.” “Chimera tortures little kids? That’s…” Seth didn’t actually have a word for what that was. His dad had gone through that, he realized. No wonder Thomas had considered never having children. “But in your case,” Cleo went on, returning the katana to Seth’s dresser, “you know what freedom is. Real freedom, no strings attached. It’s hard to break a spirit that prefers death to enslavement. Chimera could collar you and extract your blood for the Ark, but if they want to make a warrior out of you, their best chance is to persuade you to serve them willingly.” “Okay,” Seth said. Thus far, everything Cleo had said tracked with what Regent had told him about Chimera’s plans for him. But he still didn’t understand one thing. “Then, if Chimera didn’t send hunters to bring me in, why did Snowman try to collar me out at the creek?” “Stefan,” Cleo said. Seth blinked. “What?” “Stefan. The hunter your tiger buddy killed. His name was Stefan.” Cleo sat down on the foot of Seth’s bed. “He wasn’t 250 hunting you. He was guarding the perimeter. The creek runs right along the edge of that old military base – Chimera territory. You just blundered into one of their traps.” This reminded Seth. “Emery told me the Resistance thinks Chimera moved the Ark from Mt. Hokulani to Fort King,” he said. “Is that true?” “I don’t know. There’s a lot they don’t tell us. Hunters aren’t that much better than werekin in Dr. LeRoi’s estimation. She doesn’t really trust us. I know the fort is used as a hub – ” “That’s it!” Seth sat up, so suddenly Cleo jumped. “The Black Swan! Cleo, Emery said Chimera has the Black Swan, but the Resistance doesn’t know where they’re taking her. What about the hub?” Cleo looked doubtful. “If Chimera has the Black Swan, I can’t see them bringing her through a hub. They’ll take her right to wherever the Ark is. That will be the most heavily-guarded facility they have. And I don’t know where it is,” she added, “so don’t bother asking.” “But it’s a place to start, right?” Seth insisted, warming to his inspiration. J.J. had asked him to save the Black Swan. Seth was sure of the dream’s meaning now. As sure as he was that saving the Black Swan could be his first step to saving J.J., if he played it right. “If Fort King is a hub, Chimera ships things from there to its other facilities. There could be a list of Chimera properties at the fort. If we could find a list like that, we could – ” “Seth? Are you awake?” The voice was soft, and came from the other side of Seth’s door. Seth froze. Damn his baby sister. Had she never heard of privacy? He looked frantically at Cleo, whose eyes were wide. If Jack found her here, she was in serious trouble; she was on the lam from Chimera now, too, same as any werekin in the Underground. Could she make it to the closet before Leigh saw her? Could Seth get across the room to intercept Leigh before she stepped inside? The answer to both was, simply, no, and Seth was about to panic when an idea struck him. Three o’clock in the morning. A 251 half-naked girl in his room. There was one explanation Leigh might buy for that. He raised his eyebrows at Cleo. She sighed, but she vaulted forward, tackling Seth backward onto the pillows, and kissed him. Kissed him like she meant it, lips burning against his, hand sliding behind his neck, into his hair. “Work with me, sweetheart,” she growled. Right. Seth, who had been too startled to react, parted his lips, kissing back with all the passion he could muster. “Oh! Oh my God, I’m sorry!” Leigh shrank back in the doorway, shading her eyes with one hand, like seeing her big brother mid-make-out session might permanently damage her eyesight. She was wearing a hot pink robe over her pajamas. “Leigh,” Seth gasped, out of breath from being kiss-attacked. He had to wrench away from Cleo. “Did you, uh, need something?” Leigh peeked through her fingers. “I was just checking to see if you were okay,” she said. “Yup,” said Seth, trying to ignore Cleo, who was now nibbling on his earlobe. “I’m okay.” “Is this your little sister?” Cleo sat up, walking her fingers down Seth’s stomach. As in, all the way down. He sucked in his gut. “She is so adorable! Sweet pea, would you mind shutting the door?” On your way out, she didn’t have to add. Leigh backpedaled into the hall. “You might want to lock this,” she snapped at Seth, and closed his door with an indignant click. What followed would thereafter be known as The Most Awkward Silence, Ever. Neither Seth nor Cleo moved, her eyes on the headboard, his eyes on the ceiling, until they heard bed springs squeak across the hall. Then Cleo looked down at him. “You didn’t lock the door?” she said, through her teeth. “I forgot,” Seth said, meekly. Cleo rolled off of him. Seth tiptoed to the door, peered into the hallway, just to be sure, and flipped the lock for good measure. When he crept back to the bed, Cleo had pulled the 252 covers up to her chin and was glaring at the ceiling. “Will she tell your parents?” she asked, stiffly. “Not a chance,” said Seth. If Leigh told Jack or Lydia, it would hamper the repressing of this episode from their collective sibling memories. Cleo glanced over at him. She was still very flushed, but she didn’t seem angry anymore. “You know Jack Steward is a threat to you, right? He can send hunters after you anytime, and he has access to your mother and sister.” “What do you want me to do?” Seth said. “Kill him?” “Don’t tell me it hasn’t occurred to you.” Oh, it had occurred to Seth, all right. In many a morbid fantasy. Think rats. Lots and lots of rats, with sharp, pointy little teeth. But Jack was Leigh’s father. “I’d like to do this without killing,” he said. “Seth.” Cleo’s voice was sharp. “This is war. Survival of the fittest. Get used to it.” “I said I’d like to avoid killing. I didn’t say I won’t kill if I have to.” The hunter woman’s face flashed across Seth’s mind. “I think I proved that tonight,” he added, softly. He heard Cleo take a breath. She rolled onto her side, facing him. The ice in her eyes had thawed the tiniest bit. “How are the ribs?” “Better,” Seth said. “Or they were, until this madwoman ravished me…” Cleo’s smile vanished. “It was grosser for me than it was for you, sweetheart.” “I didn’t say it was gross,” Seth protested. Kissing Cleo hadn’t grossed him out. He just hadn’t felt like you were supposed to feel when you kissed someone – shivery inside, and ticklish all over, and – wait. He sat up. “Kissing me was gross for you?” “Of course it was,” Cleo said. “You think I get off on kissing animals?” “Cleo, we’ve been over this. I’m not an animal. I’m werekin. I’m both, a man and – ” Cleo looked pointedly at his bare chest. “Let’s try a boy.” 253 Seth ignored her. “I’m a man, and I’m a cat. You wouldn’t lie down next to a real jaguar, would you? It would claw you to pieces.” “So you’re more housecat than jungle cat.” Cleo shrugged. “Same principle.” Let it go, Seth told himself. He turned over, putting his back to Cleo, breathing deeply as he searched for that inner bliss, allis-one harmony Regent preached at him. It didn’t work. Hunters did not feel remorse for the werekin lives they destroyed; werekin were just prey to them, to be whipped, collared, enslaved, or killed, as the situation called for. Cleo wasn’t like that. “Sweetheart” might not have been a term of endearment for her, but she hadn’t nicknamed him pussycat, and Seth found that significant. Even Emery wasn’t rabbit. He was Bunny Bread. Why did it matter so much? He didn’t know. He just knew it did. He wanted Cleo to admit she didn’t think of werekin as animals. “That day in the bookstore,” he said. “The day you first saw me. Were you hunting for me? Did you know who I was?” “No.” Cleo spoke shortly. “I was just out hunting. Fairfax has a growing Underground, and I was hoping to get lucky.” “But you knew who I was when you saw me, right? You knew I had to be J.J.’s twin. Why didn’t you bring me in?” “Actually,” Cleo said, acidly, “recognizing werekin on sight is not one of my many talents. So you look like J.J. and you have jaguar tattoos. Didn’t mean you were werekin. I thought I’d get my facts straight before I raised the alarm and bagged some clueless human.” “And what would Chimera have done,” Seth asked, “if they found out you hadn’t reported the possible sighting of a werejaguar the second you saw me in the bookstore?” Cleo didn’t answer. She didn’t need to. “Big risk to take,” Seth said, “to protect a worthless animal.” Cleo sucked in a breath. Seth smirked at the wall. Score: werekin – one; hunter – zilch. Seth was on to Cleo. How she spoke about his twin, so possessively. How she formed his name, J.J., on a whisper of air, as though she might give herself away if she were to say it out 254 loud. How she had kissed Seth tonight, as if she had been dying to kiss him for years. As if she never wanted to stop. She had said it herself. He looked just like J.J. Nothing more was said between them after that. Gradually, Seth’s seething frustration receded into an aching hollowness – aftershocks of the evening’s fight, shaking him to the core. He hugged his knees to his chest, crying hot, silent tears for Captain Hook. Some of the tears were for himself as well. Seth had taken a life tonight. For all of his blustering about revenge, he hadn’t wanted to kill that hunter. Had she surrendered, had she showed the slightest hesitation to kill him, he wouldn’t have. If Cleo noticed his shoulders shaking, she had the decency to pretend she didn’t. 255 Chapter Twenty: Game Over Mrs. Townsend (Meredith, Seth remembered to call her) answered her front door the next evening wearing her Kiss the Cook Apron and holding a goblet of merlot. “Hi, sweetie,” she gushed, motioning him inside. Seth was pretty sure she didn’t remember his name. “Come in, come in, out of the cold! Lots of excitement around here last night, huh?” “Yeah,” Seth nodded. “Exciting. Is Marshall home?” Sarcasm didn’t seem to penetrate Meredith’s Prozac haze. “He’s in his room,” she said. “Go on up.” Marshall was indeed in his room. He and Emery were playing Halo on his Xbox, answering Seth’s question about who the clunker van in the Townsends’ driveway belonged to. Emery waved. “Hey, Seth.” “Hey, Em,” said Seth, crossing to the window. “Hey, Indiana.” “Yes!” Marshall slapped Emery a high five. “We are owning this level. Hey, Philadelphia.” With barely a glance at Seth, he went back to destroying aliens. Seth’s insides clenched up. He hadn’t seen Marshall since last night – no one had even suggested he go to school that day – and he wondered if, after reading Elijah Bishop’s journal, Marshall had decided a werekin pal was too freaky for his golden boy lifestyle. Or, Seth thought, noting the Smurf Band-Aid taped over the bullet-graze on his bicep, had Marshall just wised up to how dangerous associating with Seth could be? He opened the window, and Cleo climbed over the sill. “Take your time, sweetheart,” she said. “It’s not cold outside or anything.” Like it was Seth’s fault she couldn’t come through the front door? They couldn’t risk Meredith mentioning his cute new girlfriend to Jack, and Jack somehow connecting those dots back to Cleo. Seth fell back in the bean bag chair Emery had just vacated. Emery had scooted onto the foot of Marshall’s bed with Cleo, a safe distance between them. Marshall tossed his controller down, suddenly all business. “So,” he said. “What’s the plan?” Everyone looked at Seth, who took a deep breath. 256 All day, while Jack was at the office and Leigh was at school and Lydia was puttering around downstairs, occasionally popping into Seth’s room to see if he was okay (at which point Cleo would hide in his closet), he had turned Cleo’s question over in his mind. What was his endgame? Originally, his goal had been to join the Resistance, find the hunters responsible for Naomi’s death, and exact his revenge. At the time, Seth hadn’t realized what a tangled web he was snared in. A brother held captive by his enemies. A mother deceived into marriage by the man who had betrayed his father and his brother. An immensely powerful corporation, backed by the full might of the United States military, breathing down his neck, determined to see him captured or killed. After last night’s attack, he couldn’t even risk signing up with the Resistance. It was entirely possible they wanted him dead, too. Protecting Lydia and Leigh, freeing J.J., those were Seth’s long-rage goals. Both hinged on him evading capture. But J.J. had given him a job to do. Save the Black Swan. To do that, Seth first had to figure out where she was. He laid all of that out for his war council, then said, “I think the place to start looking is Fort King.” “The hub?” Emery’s nose twitched. “Do you really think they’d risk taking her through there?” “Seems like I’ve heard that before,” Cleo said, to the ceiling. Seth glared at her. Marshall cleared his throat. He was sitting on the bean bag chair next to Seth’s, limbs carefully contained, allowing for no touching tonight, accidental or otherwise. “Forgive me for being the ignorant non-magical being in the room, but what is a hub?” Seth explained about Fort King, where Chimera stowed captured werekin for transport to other facilities. “Therefore,” he concluded, with a dark look at Cleo, “even if the Black Swan isn’t at Fort King, we could find something inside the hub that would help us find out where she is.” “You’re talking about a paper trail,” Marshall said. Emery nodded eagerly. He seemed to be warming to Seth’s plan. “When Chimera ships a captive, they use private cargo jets or shipping freighters, but they have to file flight plans and navigation routes just like anybody else. Those records have to 257 be stored somewhere. It makes sense for them to be at the hub. I mean, guys,” he looked around at them all, green eyes wide, “with that kind of intel, the Resistance could do more than rescue the Black Swan. They could mount a full-scale invasion of Chimera facilities.” “Keep your shorts on, Bunny Bread,” Cleo said. “You have to get into the hub first. I’ve been to Fort King. You won’t be able to just knock on the front door.” “Fortunately,” said Seth, “I have some experience with breaking and entering.” “This isn’t swiping a car stereo, sweetheart. I’m talking about top-of-the-line surveillance and a lethal response system. Not to mention magical wards that prevent werekin from skinning.” She leaned back on her elbows, shaking her head. She had swiped a sweater of Leigh’s, pink cashmere with a crocheted heart on the back. Not even it made her look less bad-ass. “If you do this, Seth, you might as well put the collar on yourself.” “I don’t know.” Emery was chewing thoughtfully on his ponytail. “Seth and I made it inside the perimeter the other evening, and nobody came out to collar us. Which, now that I think about it,” he said, “is a little weird, isn’t it?” More than a little, in Seth’s opinion. But it was the best plan they had. Besides, doing nothing was just as dangerous. Chimera could decide to collar him any day. Or whoever had sent Rambo and Rambo-ette after him could decide to take another shot. There was just one more thing Seth needed to be sure about before making his move against Chimera. For that, he needed a little more time. Thus they agreed to put the plan into action the day after tomorrow. In the meantime, Emery volunteered to help Cleo do as much recon on the fort as they could. “We could use some backup,” Emery said, meaningfully. Seth shook his head. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust the Haven kids. If they got caught, the consequences would not be detention with Ms. Krughman. Bad enough he was putting Emery in harm’s way. He didn’t want to see little Dre collared, or Quinn, or Ozzie, or Squirrel. Alfaro especially concerned him. If Seth was right about his skin, Alfaro was a warrior breed. He should have been in the Scholae Bestiarii, unless he was Underground. Seth hadn’t forgotten Dre saying his brother was adopted, or 258 Alfaro’s conspicuous absence from the big game the rest of his friends had attended, right under General David Burke’s nose. “A small strike force is better,” he said, and Emery, though he didn’t look thrilled, nodded to show he understood. “But it would be nice if you had some place Cleo could crash. It’s just tempting fate for her to stay under Jack’s roof.” “I’ll talk to Chaz,” Emery said. “He won’t ask questions. Half of his friends are couch surfers. Let me run it by him tonight, and I can pick her up tomorrow.” “Who is Chaz?” Cleo asked suspiciously. “You’ll love him,” Seth promised her. “He’s totally groovy, mon.” Emery snickered. Down the hall, “Mr. Tambourine Man” was playing on Whitney’s stereo. Seth saw Emery glance in that direction as he opened the window for Cleo. She climbed over the sill. Seth leaned out after her. “Oh, and Cleo?” “Yeah?” Seth dropped his voice to a whisper. “Don’t wait up.” Cleo looked from him to Marshall, whom, Seth felt, was looking especially delicious in his oldest sweats and rattiest Tshirt, his hair a tangled mess from air-drying after ball practice. Seth saw understanding dawn on Cleo. Gotcha, she mouthed. From Marshall’s window, Seth watched Cleo clamber up the rose trellis into his room. She waved before she closed the curtains, signaling all was well. Emery mumbled some excuse and slipped off to say hello to Whitney - Seth had hopes for that pairing - and Marshall and Seth bebopped down to the kitchen for sodas and fresh-baked oatmeal cookies. Meredith was on the phone in the living room. She waved to them. “Night, Marshall. Night, sweetie.” Yeah, Seth thought, she had no clue who he was. “Where’s your dad?” he asked. “He left for a conference this morning,” Marshall said, opening his bedroom door with his hip. “He’ll be gone all week.” The moon was riding high outside, gauzed by a screen of rainclouds. Seth and Marshall sacked back out in the bean bag chairs. Marshall put on Halo, and they blasted aliens in multiplayer mode, snagging cookies off the same plate. 259 “So. Indiana.” Seth switched from his shotgun to his flamethrower for close-range alien combat. “On a scale of one to ten, one being you just found out there’s sentient life on Mars, ten being you just found out the world is actually a snow globe, how freaked out are you right now?” “This morning it was probably a four. Now it’s down to like a two.” Marshall dual-wielded his magnums, mowing down a line of enemies. “Beats you being a junkie. That was like a nine.” “Are you mad I didn’t tell you sooner?” “How do you start that conversation, exactly?” Seth laughed. Marshall smiled faintly in his direction. “I get it. You barely know – watch out, that’s an ambush!” Seth was momentarily distracted by executing a melee attack. Owing to his superb werekin reflexes, he survived the alien onslaught. “That’s not why I didn’t tell you,” he said. “I wanted to tell you. I just didn’t want to drag you into all of this.” Marshall hit pause, and the screen froze. He turned toward Seth, legs crossed at the ankle. Seth tapped his controller against his knee, resisting the urge to wrap his fingers up in Marshall’s messy hair and pull his mouth against his, like Cleo had done to him last night. “The woman you told me about,” Marshall said. “Naomi. Emery said the hunters killed her?” A bucket of ice water poured over his head could not more effectively have killed Seth’s mood. He concentrated harder on his tapping. “Yup.” “And you saw it happen?” Crimson ribbons on the linoleum. Fingers clutching his. “Yup.” “So your dad, he’s been…gone, for a while?” “More than ten years.” Tap. Tap. Tap. The stitched seam in Seth’s bean bag chair was blurring into a single white line before his eyes. Marshall was quiet for a minute. Seth didn’t dare look at him. The smallest movement would send the tears spilling over. “Do you want to talk about this?” Marshall asked, suddenly. “Not really,” Seth said, with relief. “Okay.” Marshall took the game off pause. 260 They played through Level Eight, ignoring the fact that Marshall’s bedside clock now read 12:07, that Whitney’s stereo had been shut off for thirty minutes, and that Emery’s van had departed over an hour ago. Lydia had not called to tell Seth to come home. It was doubtful Meredith even remembered he was in the house. Looked like Seth was sleeping over. “So Cleo seems kind of into you,” Marshall commented, out of nowhere. Zap! Alien down. Seth glanced sideways at Marshall, but he was focused on the game. “Oh yeah?” “Yeah. Definitely.” Marshall swiped another cookie off the plate. “Leigh said you guys had an interesting night. After the nearly dying part, I mean.” There was a manic light in Marshall’s baby blues, drops of turquoise paint on a cobalt background. Optimistically, Seth wanted to interpret this as jealousy – insane jealousy, of the murderous variety, as that would have meant Marshall wanted him as badly as Seth wanted him. But he didn’t think that was it. “I didn’t realize Leigh was talking to you again,” he said. “She isn’t. I overheard her telling Bryce about it at lunch – how embarrassing it was to catch you practically ‘in the act.’” “That was just for show, Indiana. I wasn’t making out with Cleo. Leigh came barging into my room, and we had to improvise.” “Come on, Philadelphia. We’re both guys.” Marshall said guys with all of the usual connotations. Guys who played football. Guys who liked girls. “You’re telling me Cleo spent the night with you, in your bed, and nothing happened? I mean,” Marshall laughed, but it was all wrong, hollow and gray, “she’s completely hot, man.” “And if I wasn’t gay,” Seth said, “I might care about that.” He laid his controller down, sacrificing his avatar to aliens. Slowly, Marshall did the same. Wrapped the controller cord around his pinkie finger, turning the tip white as the circulation was cut off, pink again as the capillaries refilled. “I talked to my father before he left this morning,” he said. “About this.” 261 This included the space between their bodies, molecules of air charged like the aftermath of a lightning strike. Seth nearly choked. “You told your father you’re gay?” “No!” Marshall’s face paled, then reddened, like the cord was now wrapped around his neck. “Actually, he talked to me. Dr. Foss told him some stuff Cam has been saying about you, and Dad was worried, because you and I are friends.” His no-killing policy did not extend to Cam, Seth decided. Cam could be carved up into tiger-sized chunks and fed to Regent. He was playing seriously dirty now, going after Marshall through his father. “Well, I hope you told your dad Cam is a supreme ass-wipe,” he said. Marshall smiled wanly. “Of course I did. But Dad was still worried. He thought I might be…confused.” Seth was not so naïve as to misunderstand what was happening here. He tucked his hands under his knees and looked at Marshall, silently waiting for him to get it over with. Marshall’s throat jumped when he swallowed. “He told me lots of guys our age go through this phase. Girls are so hard to figure out, sometimes swearing them off sounds like a good idea, you know? But if you don’t act on the impulse, he said it goes away.” Well, there you had it. Being gay was like a rash. Don’t scratch, and it clears up on its own. “Let me be sure I’m getting this,” Seth said. “You’ve been confused, thinking you might prefer guys, and now, you’re all over it?” Lifting his chin, Marshall looked Seth squarely in the eye. “It was a phase. I’m over it.” Something black and icy washed up from the depths of Seth, breaking over him in waves. He gripped the sides of his chair, determined not to be pulled under. “Okay,” he said. He even sounded friendly. “Thanks for telling me.” “Do you think it could be like that for you, too?” Marshall asked. “A phase?” His hands were clenched around his knees. Seth could see how Marshall wanted this to play out. For Seth to say, I see it now! I’m straight! Then they would retreat from this precipice they were on, go back to being best friends shooting hoops in Marshall’s driveway, and someday, in the not-so-distant future, 262 barbecuing on the Fourth of July with their wives and kids (or cubs, in Seth’s case) in the backyard. It was Leigh’s fantasy: Marshall would take her, Seth would take Whitney, and if they ever talked about that one time when they were seventeen and kissed in Marshall’s bedroom, the kiss Seth considered his first real kiss, and the most important one he would ever have, it would only be to laugh about their gay phase. You want someone you can be honest with, Lydia had said. Someone you don’t have to pretend for. Lydia, who had called him brave. “It’s not like that for me,” Seth said, simply. Marshall nodded. “Right,” he said. “Okay.” He picked his controller back up then, Seth hit reset on the console, and they started a new game. 263 Chapter Twenty-One: Treachery Three days of drizzly rain had washed away the remnants of the blizzard, creating a soupy mess of mud and dead leaves around the trees that sheltered the long drive back to Regent’s house. Seth’s breath turned to vapor as he crossed the lawn, hands in the pockets of his jeans. School that day had passed in a haze; Seth had gone, mainly because he couldn’t stand another day at home alone with his thoughts, but his mind had been on his mission, not academics. People had assumed he was traumatized by the “burglary” and left him alone. Even Cam had backed off razzing him in Gym. Now, T-minus twenty-four hours and counting to the big break-in at the hub, rain softened the hard angles of Regent’s imposing house. The jungle enclosure rose above the roof like a crystal chimney, the glass smoke-colored in the dark. Lights were burning behind the closed curtains; keeping to the shadows, Seth slid the metal file from his pocket. Within seconds, he had the garage’s side door unlocked. He stood for a moment in front of the wooden trunks stacked in the corner, warring with himself. Once you knew a thing, you couldn’t un-know it, couldn’t go on pretending things were the way they had been before. Sometimes that was a good thing, like with Marshall knowing he was werekin, or Seth knowing he had a brother. But sometimes, was it better not to know? You can do this. Seth took a breath. There you are, he thought. “I really hate this,” he said, aloud, in case their psychic link was two-way, and J.J. could hear him. Alert for the sound of the front door opening, he worked his brand of magic on the padlocks. Raindrops slipped off the bleached tips of his hair, spattering the lid of the topmost trunk as he opened it. Personal effects, Regent had said, when Seth had asked what was inside. He hadn’t lied. The effects just weren’t his. Inside the first trunk were clothes, neatly folded. Jeans, slacks, dresses, coats. On top were two leather jackets, belonging to Rambo and his partner. Every piece was bloodstained. 264 The other trunks held more mundane items – briefcases, watches, hats, earrings, purses. No I.D.s or credit cards, nothing to hint who any of it had belonged to. Seth found what he was looking for – what he had hoped he wouldn’t find – inside the very last trunk. He slipped it into his pocket before closing and locking the lid. He doubted Regent would miss it. Judging from the layer of dust around the trunks, he only added to his collection. He didn’t sort through it. Seth didn’t look back as he walked away from the house. Recovering his bike from the patch of weeds where he had hidden it, he drove into the city, down to the riverfront, and left the bike in a public parking garage as he walked down to the water. The shops and restaurants along the riverfront were lit up like jewels, but no one was out for a stroll on such a cold, rainy night. Seth found a seat on a bench and watched a tugboat push a barge around a spur of rocky beach in the middle of the river, heedless of the damp sinking through his jeans. A long time passed before he took the box out of his pocket. It was small, wrapped in green paper with a red bow. Seth held it carefully in one cupped palm. Leigh had put the idea in his head, when she had mentioned Jack Steward knowing Thomas Sullivan had lived in New York. After J.J.’s abduction, the Resistance would have told Thomas what Regent had neglected to – that Gavin Steward had worked for Chimera, and they suspected his son might as well. Thomas would never have contacted Jack with his whereabouts. But what about an old werekin friend, someone Thomas had trusted to watch over Lydia? Someone he hadn’t realized was a blackhearted traitor, willing to betray his kindred to save his own hide? Seth peeled away the wrapping. Inside, nestled on a bed of white tissue, was a rosary, the crucifix carved from pink soapstone, the beads pearlescent glass. Seth remembered the day he and Ben had spotted it amongst the craft stalls at the Italian Market in Philly. They had agreed it would be perfect for Naomi, who never missed Mass. The saleslady had wrapped it up, in green paper with a red bow. At home, Seth had written out the tag: Merry Christmas, Naomi! Your cub, Seth Michael. 265 The present had still been under their tree, wrapped, the night Naomi was murdered. The hunters that had collared Thomas Sullivan in New York had been searching for his son. Seth had escaped, thanks to Naomi, but there had been a trail, albeit a difficult one to find, leading from that alley in Harlem to their row house in South Philly. Werner Regent had followed it, though it had taken him a decade to do. *** Someone had restored the concrete angel to its pedestal on J.J.’s grave. Cleo knelt in front of the headstone, clearing leaves and mud from the base while Seth paced. Gray winter fog seeped amongst the headstones. Rain was still falling, a misty curtain. “I have been so stupid,” Seth declared. “Nobody can forge transcripts overnight. Regent knew I was coming to Fairfax. He had time between Christmas and New Year’s to get ready for me. And of course he knew all about my past in Philly! He was the one who tracked me down in the Underground. How could I have trusted him?” He kicked the base of the bowl-shaped tree. “He’s a skilled liar, sweetheart.” Cleo went on staring at J.J. headstone like he was really buried beneath it. Seth had picked her up from Chaz’s shoebox-sized apartment behind the mall. For some reason, she had been the first person he had thought of when he had needed someone to share the burden of Regent’s betrayal. “And he did save your life. What reason did you have to question the help he was giving you?” “Let’s see,” said Seth. “The houseful of dead werekin, maybe?” Seth was not in the mood to be pacified. He was in the mood to maul himself a tiger. “He didn’t kill those werekin in the Arena, did he?” “Doubtful. Chimera studies the bodies of all fallen warriors to learn more about werekin anatomy. Regent wouldn’t have been allowed to keep them.” Seth stopped kicking the tree. “Who do you think they were?” “Resistance, most likely. Your tiger buddy – ” 266 “Stop calling him that, all right? He’s not my buddy.” Tight-lipped, Cleo said, “Fine. Regent has probably been capturing Resistance fighters, chaining them up in his cozy little torture chamber attic, and interrogating them for information on your whereabouts ever since he missed out on collaring you in New York.” Wonderful. Seth had the blood of who knew how many Resistance fighters on his hands. And for what? So Regent could be the one to collar him? “I don’t get it,” he said. “Why would Regent want to hunt me down? What did I ever do to him?” Cleo sat back on her heels. Her jeans and sweater were absolutely drenched, as drenched as Seth’s jeans and camouflage jacket, but she didn’t seem to care. “I think he told you he won his freedom in the Arena because it wasn’t too far from the truth. I think LeRoi gave him the chance to earn his freedom – true freedom, no strings attached – if he brings you to her. Alive, preferably, but dead if there’s no other way.” The full extent of the awful truth was finally sinking in. Seth fisted his hands inside his pockets. “You’re saying Regent sent those hunters after me the other night?” “I think it’s possible. If he didn’t believe your story about killing me, he might have thought you were planning to run. Better to hand you over in a body bag than let you slip through his fingers, or worse yet, join the Resistance. LeRoi would have had his head for that.” “But why go to the trouble of having someone else kill me? He could have done it himself, anytime he felt like it. He could have done it the other night, when I called him to come to my house.” Cleo finally looked up at him. Her eyes were bleached of color, like sunlight on snow. “Could he?” “Are you kidding?” Seth laughed. “Regent could snap me like a twig.” “No, sweetheart, I mean could he? Could he look you in the eye and kill you?” Cleo put the question to him softly. Seth stared at her for a minute before sliding down to the wet grass, shoulders braced against the angel, face tipped up to the icy drizzle. He closed his eyes. Raindrops beaded on the lids, streaming down his cheeks 267 like tears. He doesn’t care about you, Seth told himself. Regent must have had some other reason for sending proxies to kill him. It wasn’t because he cared. Finding proof of Regent’s betrayal spelled the beginning of the end for Seth’s time in Fairfax. Today had most likely been his last day of relative normalcy – waking up to his Hello Kitty alarm clock, eating breakfast with Leigh, carpooling to school with Marshall and Whitney. Tomorrow night, he was breaking into Fort King to begin the search for the Black Swan, officially taking up the mission J.J. had handed him. Once he made his move against Chimera, they would know there was no taming him. LeRoi would send her hunters to collar him. Seth would have to run, even if he had to take Lydia and Leigh with him Underground. Staying in Fairfax had never been the plan. Seth had washed up here, shipwrecked on the rocks of life; from the moment the plane had touched down, he had been prepared to hate this place. To be the outcast freak, the unwanted son. Four weeks later, he had found a life here. A mother who loved him, possibly even understood him. A sister he cared for, even if she was a nosy brat sometimes. Friends he liked: Topher and Gabe and Bryce, the kids in his Honors classes, Whitney and Emery, the Alfaros, even Quinn. And, of course, there was Marshall. Somewhere along the way, Philly had stopped being home. The brick house with the white trim and the Doric columns and the enormous yard was Seth’s house. The guestroom, with its white carpet and blue walls and window that looked across to Marshall’s, was his room. Fairfax was home. Seth wanted to stay here. Wanted it more than he had ever wanted anything. Wanted it enough to fight for it. Fingers brushed his hair off his forehead. “Don’t open your eyes,” Cleo said. “Why?” Seth asked, with his eyes closed – a testament to how much he trusted her not to slit his throat. “Because I want to show you something.” “In that case, shouldn’t my eyes be open?” Cleo didn’t answer. She cupped Seth’s cheek; her palm was warm against his rain-cold skin. He battled the temptation to 268 peek, especially when a match flared nearby, glowing orange behind his eyelids. “Please don’t immolate me,” he said. “Fraidy cat,” Cleo teased. Her voice was soft. She flipped Seth’s palm over and began tracing it with her fingertips. Her fingers were sticky, like she had dipped them in paint. Seth sniffed. He smelled incense. Patchouli. “Found Chaz’s stash, did you?” “Charles,” Cleo deliberately used Chaz’s full name, “has enough grass hidden under his couch cushions to seed the state of Kentucky,” Seth laughed, “and when he smokes his way through it, his few remaining brain cells will be permanently baked. Now, hold still.” “Yes ma’am,” Seth said. Cleo’s forehead rested against his. Her hands covered his, weighing them down into the mud of his brother’s empty grave. The incense tickled Seth’s nose, making him lightheaded. He breathed out shakily. “Cleo, what are we doing?” “Listen.” Her voice was inflected with unexpected gravity. Cleo was all snarky comebacks and clever insults. “I know you want to rescue J.J. I know you’re planning to look for clues about where he’s being held when we break into that hub tomorrow night.” “How did you know?” Seth’s voice sounded far away, like he was speaking into a tube. “You’re not that hard to read, sweetheart,” Cleo said. “But Seth, you can’t rescue J.J.” “I can if you help me,” Seth tried to say. Except his tongue was so thick, the sentence slurred into meaningless mush. He was sleepy. Why was he so sleepy? And then he understood. Magic. Forcing his eyelids open, Seth looked down at his hands. Glyphs were painted on them, in blood. His fogged brain struggled to translate the symbols: dream, spirit, share, reveal. Enough to understand Cleo wasn’t FedExing him to Chimera, or frying him up for a jaguar steak. “Close your eyes,” she whispered. Seth closed his eyes. Lips touched his eyelids, cool and soft. White light like the implosion of a star burst inside his mind, and the graveyard disappeared. 269 *** Seth’s first thought was: This has to be a dream. But dreams, even at their most vivid, were projections – holographs, lacking tactility. Seth could feel the grittiness of the cold black marble under his feet, smell the wood smoke from the fire in the stone hearth, hear the rustle of wings as birds swooped past the arched windows, beyond which a fireball sun was sinking into a molten horizon. He wasn’t dreaming. He was here. Here was a library. Three floors of wooden bookshelves, the ceiling so high overhead even his keen jaguar eyes couldn’t make it out. Carved into the floor with swirling strokes, like the flow of water through cracks in a rock, was the three-headed monster from which Chimera Enterprises took its name. Seth extended a hand to the nearest bookshelf (the titles were all written in Lemurian glyphs) and watched his fingers pass right through the wood. Wicked. He was a ghost-cat. Spiral staircases to his left and right climbed to the upper floors. The stairs were iron, the railings gilt, twined with metal vines; Seth backed slowly up one, looking down at the main level. Low-backed sofas formed a semi-circle around the hearth. Silver inlaid double doors at the far end were guarded by gargoyles, perched as if to swoop. Seth generally liked libraries, but this place gave him the creeps. The second and third floors were more bookshelves and sofas, more arched windows offering panoramic views of manicured lawns. The library looked to be part of a large manor house, perhaps somewhere in New England; dense woodland ringed the surrounding hillsides, and whenever this was, past or future, it was summer: The trees were in bloom, ivy and roses climbing the gargoyles in the courtyard, as though nature was trying to disguise the grotesque figures. The courtyard itself, paved in black volcanic rock, was dominated by a reflecting pool filled with oily water, like thin tar. Seth was starting to wonder what he was doing here, when he rounded a corner, and there he was. His doppelganger. His twin. “J.J.!” Seth cried. 270 J.J. did not look up. Right, Seth thought. J.J. couldn’t hear him. He was a ghost-cat. His twin was balanced on the back of one of the long sofas, the soles of his black combat boots planted on the leather seat. His blonde head was bent over a yellowed scroll, lips moving like he was muttering the words under his breath. He was still a cub, fourteen, possibly fifteen. As in Seth’s dreams, he wore a black T-shirt and black camo pants. An ornate silver torc, scrolled with glyphs, circled his throat. The sight of his brother, collared, sickened Seth. In his dreams, in J.J.’s projection of himself, he was not collared. He could skin at will. Cleo, more Action Hero Barbie than ever in skintight jeans and a black leather jacket, leaned against the railing that overlooked the main level. Ostensibly she was polishing her bone-handled dagger, but her eyes kept straying to the boy on the sofa, absorbed in his studying. Below, the doors opened. J.J.’s head came up. “Is it Xanthe?” Glancing behind her, Cleo shook her head. “It’s Dr. LeRoi.” “Well, that can’t be good,” J.J. said, mildly. “She was supposed to be in D.C. all week, meeting with the Partners.” He laid his book down and uncoiled from the sofa (did he move like that, Seth wondered, so predatory?), coming to stand with Cleo at the rail. Seth drifted over to join them. Ursula LeRoi was younger than he would have thought, tall and slender, her dark hair woven into a thick plait down the center of her back, gray eyes watchful as a hawk’s. She didn’t walk so much as glide, one hand in the pocket of the white lab coat she wore over her smart black suit. A small silver key was nestled in the hollow of her throat, affixed to a delicate chain. Following her was a familiar face: Snowman. Seeing him alive, although Seth had already worked out that this was the past, came as an unpleasant shock. He wore a leather jacket like Cleo’s, his whip hooked to his belt, missing eye covered by a black patch. LeRoi looked up, saw J.J., and crooked a finger. J.J. stepped over the rail, dropping three floors to the main level like he was stepping down from the bottom rung of a ladder. He landed lightly on the balls of his feet, and Seth rolled his eyes. Show-off. 271 Apparently LeRoi thought so too, for she laughed. “Lovely,” she said. Cleo, having taken the stairs three at a time, winged breathlessly to J.J.’s wide. “Ma’am,” she said, stiffly, like a Marine corporal addressing a general. Seth was surprised she didn’t salute. Taking in this tableau from above, he was struck by three things. One, Snowman was maintaining a healthy distance from J.J., as though he had seen Seth’s twin eviscerate enough hunters to be wary. Two, Cleo was cringing like she was terrified the good doctor would pounce on her and claw her eyes out. Three, Ursula LeRoi was regarding J.J. with a softness of expression that bordered on fondness. She reached out, running her fingers through J.J.’s closeshorn hair, sifting the caramel and butterscotch threads like individual strands of silk. “Hello, Mother,” J.J. said. Hold the phone. Had J.J. just called LeRoi his mother? “Is everything all right?” J.J. asked. “I’m afraid not, my pet.” LeRoi linked her arm through his. “Come with me. Cleopatra, accompany us, please.” “Yes, ma’am.” Cleo darted an anxious glance at J.J. His cool gaze barely brushed across her as he fell into step beside LeRoi… Seth suddenly found himself in the courtyard he had seen from the window, reeling from the abrupt shift in locale. The sun was fully set; nighttime shrouded the grounds in sinister gloom, battled by torches mounted on iron spikes around the reflecting pool. The light danced on the surface of the water without penetrating it. The courtyard, empty before, was now packed with men and women in a variety of designer suits and military uniforms. Arranged in a line at the edge of the pool, guarded by a dozen pairs of hunters, were werekin – each one collared, each one a warrior breed, each one in animal skin: a silver-backed gorilla; grizzlies; polar bears; an orangutan; coyotes; hyenas; a pair of crocodiles; a raven. The hunters kept high-powered rifles trained on them. Front and center was a small arctic fox. 272 His tail hung crookedly, as though it had been broken recently, but he held his chin high over his collar as he watched LeRoi, now flanked by Cleo and Snowman, take her place on a raised dais at the head of the reflecting pool. J.J. was anchored at the doctor’s elbow, his face blank as a fresh canvas. Seth couldn’t breathe. Though he had last seen him when he was five years old, he would have known that fox anywhere. Thomas Sullivan, alive, ten years after the hunters had collared him. The assembly had the air of a trial – with LeRoi as judge, jury, and executioner. She nodded to Snowman. Snowman produced a much-creased letter from his pocket and, in a ringing voice that carried to the corners of the courtyard, read out: “Dearest Ben. I know contacting you in this way is a risk, but our usual channels are being watched, and we cannot risk our courier being discovered. We have the location of the Ark. You must convince the Resistance to strike immediately. Chimera now has almost everything they need to raise Lemuria. You of all people know we cannot allow LeRoi to control the power of the Totems. The werekin here have sworn allegiance to our cause. We are prepared to die; we will fight on the side of the Black Swan. Send word to me as soon as you can. I will make sure all is ready on our end for the attack. Yours in peace, Thomas.” Snowman stepped back. Seth stared at the letter in his hand. It was a death warrant for every werekin in that courtyard, and his father had signed it. LeRoi’s audience had begun murmuring to one another. An iron-haired man wearing the bars of a four-star general stepped forward from the ranks, trailed by a younger, dark-haired man with a captain’s bars pinned to his desert fatigues. Seth recognized them both at once: General David Burke, and Ingrid McLain’s nephew. It was the tilt of Captain McLain’s head as he stared at Thomas Sullivan that wrenched the memory into place for Seth. Sitting in the chessboard office of Fairfax High’s principal, pointing at the photograph of the soldier on her desk and asking, Your son? My nephew, Ms. McLain had said. Will. 273 “I think we’ve had enough pageantry, Doctor,” General Burke said. He spoke with a Texas drawl, like his son Connor’s. “I’m sure we’re all impressed by this medieval trial you’ve set up, but executing a handful of traitors is too little, too late. The Partners have agreed. This experiment of yours has been nothing short of a disaster. You and Dr. Bishop created a race of superpowered alien warriors which you obviously cannot control. First Bishop goes off the res and opens the front doors for them, and now the ones still under your roof are plotting to overthrow you?” He shook his head. His audience was nodding their agreement, some eyeing LeRoi like they had been waiting a long time to see her knocked off her pedestal. “As we discussed in Washington, the Partners plan to issue Project Ark its cease and desist orders within the hour. You will hand the Ark over to Captain McLain and his team, and every werekin in Chimera’s possession will be terminated.” The general’s eyes zeroed in on J.J. J.J. smiled at him, a cold, feral smile. Come and get me, it said. “I am aware of the Partners’ intentions, General.” LeRoi’s smile was pleasant, but her eyes glittered like a snake’s. “However, as I told you in Washington, you greatly overestimate the wherewithal of this so-called ‘Resistance.’ Even as we speak, I have hunters tracking down the escapees and their offspring. It will take time, but we will find them all, and if we can’t collar them, we will kill them. As for this grand plot you refer to, this,” she jerked her chin at the three dozen werekin, “is the extent of it. Less than fifty specimens. A few bad apples shouldn’t spoil the bunch – isn’t that a saying of yours in Texas?” “You must be thinking of California,” Burke said, dryly. “In Texas, we say kill ’em all and lot God sort ’em out.” A few nervous twitters moved through the audience. LeRoi pressed her lips together. “I assure you, this little coup never had any hope of succeeding. My spies intercepted that letter before it ever reached Ben Schofield, or any Commander in the Resistance. The Ark’s location remains secret, the Ark itself too well-guarded to ever be taken.” There was just a hint, Seth thought, of a threat in the way LeRoi said that. The lines around Burke’s mouth deepened. “Dr. 274 LeRoi, you do not want to countermand the orders of the United States government.” “David, do I look like a fool?” LeRoi smiled, pleasantly. “I simply want the Partners to have all the facts before they pull the plug on the endeavor that will make ours the most powerful nation on this planet,” she paused, “or any other we might choose to conquer.” The effect of this was undeniable. The murmuring started up again, with a different tenor now. Power was a persuasive argument to this crowd. Burke appeared unmoved. “Seems to me you’ve grown too attached to your pets, Doctor.” “You refer to my son, I presume?” LeRoi rested a proprietary hand on J.J.’s shoulder. Seth felt sick. Why was J.J. just standing there, like it was the most natural thing in the world for Ursula LeRoi to call him her son, when their father, collared, was about to be executed before his very eyes? Was it possible he didn’t know who Thomas was? “I know you have doubts about the werekins’ loyalty, General. That is why we have assembled.” Cleo whitened to the color of chalk. LeRoi gently turned J.J. around to face her. “Jeremy,” she said, “have you spent much time with this specimen?” She inclined her head toward the fox. J.J. glanced at him. His eyes were flat as brass coins. “Some,” he said, dismissively. “Did he speak to you of this plot? Of his intentions to betray Chimera?” “No, Mother. I swear.” LeRoi studied J.J.’s eyes for a long moment, then released him and turned to Burke. “Well? Does that satisfy you, General?” Burke sneered. “No, Ursula, that does not ‘satisfy’ us. It seems to me your obsession with this specimen has blinded you to its true nature. It is an animal. Its loyalty is to its own kind. You may feed it from your hand as long as it wears that collar, but remove it, and it will bite.” Something in LeRoi’s triumphant smile made Seth think she had been hoping Burke would say that. “Very well,” she said. “We shall see.” From under the collar of her lab coat, she drew 275 out the small silver key on its delicate chain. “Stefan, get Thomas Sullivan into his human skin. Cleopatra, if you would, please remove my son’s collar.” A collective gasp rolled through the courtyard. Even J.J.’s eyes flickered with surprise. Seth had been standing at the end of the reflecting pool, a spot that allowed him a view of the entire courtyard. As Cleo fitted the key into the back of his brother’s collar, he moved closer. He knew he couldn’t help, couldn’t affect the outcome of this in any way – whatever happened next had already happened. He just wanted to be close enough to see his dad’s face when he skinned. A ripple moved under the fox’s blue-tinged fur. In the next blink, a man stood there, older than Seth remembered, and not only in years; there were new lines around Thomas’ pale eyes, and his fair hair, cut in lank strips, was silvered with gray. Yet he was so much the same Seth could almost believe no time at all had passed since he had hugged him goodbye in that alley. “Dad,” he whispered. At LeRoi’s command, Cleo passed her bone-handled dagger to J.J. She was the only person in the courtyard not to back away as the collar slipped from around his neck. J.J. shook himself, like he was shaking out a cramp. Seth tensed, ready for him to skin and rip LeRoi’s throat out – but he took a breath, and remained a teenage boy. Captain McLain’s coffee-black eyes jumped from J.J. to Thomas. “Sir,” he began, but Burke said, sharply, “Not now.” The captain subsided. “Now,” LeRoi said, “we will see whether the werekin can be trusted to serve. We will see where my son’s loyalty lies: to his creator, or to his kindred.” No. This was not happening. This could not be how it had happened. Seth’s mind did not want to accept what he was seeing. He saw it anyway. Saw J.J. palm the dagger and approach their father, as Thomas stood motionless, eyes sparkling with tears. “I love you, Jeremy Jonathan,” he said. 276 J.J. struck him, hard, with his open hand, the claw-tipped ends of his nails slicing across Thomas’ cheek. Seth hissed. “Don’t speak to me, slave,” J.J. said, coldly. Thomas’ lips moved once more. Seth didn’t catch the words; he might have been pleading, or praying. Gripping the dagger in one hand, J.J. closed the other around their father’s shoulder, holding him in place. He closed his eyes, and plunged the blade in, straight through Thomas Sullivan’s heart. 277 Chapter Twenty-Two: Behind Enemy Lines “Emery,” Seth said, “if I ever plan a bank-heist, you will be my right-hand rabbit.” Emery Little offered a tremulous smile that stretched into a wide yawn. During study hall, he had put his role-playing skills to good use and drawn maps, to scale, even, of Fort King. The night before (the whole night, apparently, given the way he was yawning) he had scouted the prison’s layout. The maps were spread in front of Seth on Re-Spin’s counter now, weighted down by a bag of Oreos. According to Cleo, the easiest way into Fort King was a side entrance used by hunters. She had the passcode for that, though she couldn’t guarantee the entrance wouldn’t be warded or surveilled. Once in, they would head for the records room in the south wing. Cleo knew the room’s location, but didn’t have clearance to access it. Assuming Seth could pick the lock, and assuming they hadn’t been spotted and collared by then, they would grab as much intel as they could and hightail it back to their getaway car, parked on an access road Emery had marked about a mile east of the fort. Seth snuck an Oreo out of the bag. “And you didn’t see any guards at all last night?” “Not a soul. The place is like a ghost town.” Emery yawned again, so hugely his nose wiggled. “Could be Cleo is wrong about how much security they have there.” Could have been. But Seth doubted it. He suspected something else was going on here, and that whatever it was, his twin was behind it. Was that a good thing or a bad thing? Leaving Emery dozing at the counter, Seth set about updating the store’s inventory list, pacing the CD aisles with clipboard in hand. (Inexplicably, Re-Spin possessed six copies of the soundtrack to Glitter. Probably every copy ever sold.) Unfortunately, this task was too mindless to distract Seth from everything he didn’t want to think about. Regent. His dad. J.J. Most of all, J.J. Seth’s twin had been silent since his spirit-walk down Cleo’s memory lane. It wasn’t like they had carried on psychic chats 278 before, but this silence was more profound, as though a door had slammed in Seth’s mind, shutting J.J. out. He didn’t know which one of them had closed it. He didn’t know how to open it again. When Seth had come to from his spirit-walk, he had been kneeling in the mud beside J.J.’s headstone, stomach heaving, threatening to bring up whatever remained of his dinner. J.J. will carve out your beating heart and laugh while he watches you die. Raking wet hair out of his eyes, he had managed a mirthless smile. “Well, I guess you warned me,” he had said. “I didn’t want to show you that.” Cleo had been kneeling next to him, both of them soaked to the skin, fog wrapped around them like ribbons. “But I had to make you understand. Seth, you can’t rescue J.J. He isn’t a prisoner. He’s a prince. If wanted me to save you, it wasn’t so you could be free. It was so Ursula LeRoi could have you.” Seth had wanted to tell her she was wrong. He wanted to believe there was another explanation for what J.J. had done in that courtyard. But he had trusted Regent, and Regent had betrayed him. Could he afford to be wrong about his twin, too? “Sleeping on the job, Bunny Bread?” Seth looked up from his clipboard. Cleo was strolling in. Emery jerked awake at the counter, swiping drool off his chin with the back of his hand. Cleo hopped up on the stool beside his and pulled the maps toward her. With her was their getaway driver. Marshall Townsend. Hands in the pockets of his letterman’s jacket, Marshall slouched over to Seth. Seth saluted, Vulcan-style. “Hola, Indiana. Join me in the Sci-Fi section?” “Thought we were already there,” Marshall said. Seth grinned. They took up residence on the floor among the secondhand bookshelves, side-by-side with their backs against a row of Frank Herbert novels. Once again, Seth tried to talk Marshall out of coming along. “Indiana, me, Emery, Cleo, we’re caught up in this whether we like it or not,” he insisted. “You don’t have to be.” “I read Elijah Bishop’s journal, remember? Ursula LeRoi is plotting to take over the world. I’d say that concerns me.” 279 Seth picked at a frayed spot in the carpet. Possibly he shouldn’t have been quite so honest with Marshall about the werekin’s plight. “I still think it’s too dangerous,” he said. “Oh, like it’s safe for you?” “No.” Seth poked his pinkie finger through the hole in the carpet, watching the foam pad underneath spring back into form. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.” Marshall looked away. His hand was resting palm-down on the floor, very close to Seth’s. Marshall had beautiful hands, slim and elegant. Seth sometimes wondered if it was possible to be in love with something as simple as a person’s hands. “Philadelphia, I think you should tell Leigh what’s going on. Just hear me out,” Marshall persisted, when Seth opened his mouth to argue. “I’ve known Leigh her whole life. She may act flaky, but she isn’t. She doesn’t switch causes like she switches nail polish. She’s one of the most loyal people I know.” “I know,” Seth said. “It’s not a question of trusting her.” “Then what is it? She’s already in danger. Would telling her the truth make that any worse?” “No,” Seth grumbled. Being told to do what he knew he should do but didn’t want to do made him grouchy. Marshall lowered his gaze, blessedly removing the pressure of those baby blues from Seth. “I’m going to say this, in case you don’t know it. Leigh loves you.” “Yeah, but….” Gray carpet fibers were stuck under Seth’s nails like tiny bird feathers; he focused on freeing them, one by one. “She loves her dad, too.” “She does,” Marshall agreed, evenly. “But she doesn’t know the real him. If she did, I think she would feel differently.” Aye, there’s the rub, Seth thought. “She doesn’t know the real me either, you know. What if I tell her the truth, and she feels differently about me?” “I don’t think she would. I think she’d be glad to get to know you. All of you. I think, if she knew what you’ve been through, everything you’ve lost, she’d want to protect you, as much as she could. Carry some of this,” Marshall waved a hand, indicating the whole of the crazy mess that was Seth’s life, “for you.” Seth peeked up at him through his lashes. “You really think so?” 280 He was no longer sure they were talking about Leigh. Marshall looked away. “That’s how it works,” he said, “when you love somebody.” *** The numbers on the Audi’s dashboard clock were ticking down to midnight when Marshall turned down the gravel road that edged the fort’s eastern perimeter. The light rain that had fallen all evening had changed over to a mixture of sleet and snow; it was freezing on the windshield faster than the wipers could keep up with. So far as Lydia knew, Seth and Marshall were staying over at Emery Little’s for an all-night midterm cramming session. Dr. Townsend probably would have said no, but he was out of town for his medical conference, and Jack wasn’t around enough these days to know what either of his children were up to. Seth hadn’t seen him since the night of the so-called burglary. “It’s just here,” Emery said, leaning around the front seat. A ROAD CLOSED sign appeared in the Audi’s headlights. Marshall brought the car to a stop, nose pointed at a partiallycollapsed wooden bridge. Below, King’s Creek babbled noisily on its way into the woods. To their right, waist-high weeds rustled in the night wind; to their left, evergreen trees spread out in a dark maze up the hillside. At the top, the prison sprouted from the ground like a cancerous growth, liquid black and oozing malevolence. They got out and Cleo spread the map on the Audi’s trunk, the boys crowded in behind her for a look. They had all donned black sweatshirts (Emery’s had a Metallica logo on the back) so they looked tough, at least. Seth’s katana was strapped to his back, in easy reach to be drawn over his shoulder. The bonehandled dagger he had given back to Cleo. It felt wrong to carry the weapon he knew had killed his father. “Okay,” Cleo said. “The entrance is just off of Cellblock J, here.” She tapped a circle Emery had drawn on the map. “If we keep to the trees, we should be able to make it to the fence without being seen. Once we’re in, if we get separated, we’ll 281 meet back here at the bridge.” Folding the map, she passed it to Marshall. Thanks to the days of rain and several inches of melted snow, the hillside was more swamp than forest. At the fence, they stopped, looking through the chain link at the prison. “Like a ghost town, huh, Bunny Bread?” Cleo said, acidly. Emery shuffled his large feet. “It wasn’t like this last night,” he protested. Circling the three-headed chimera fountain in the main drive were dozens of vehicles. Cadillacs. Porsches. Mercedes. One canary-yellow Hummer. “Think it’s another Steward campaign fundraiser?” Seth said. Emery turned a snicker into a sneeze. Cleo glared at them both. “We’re leaving,” she said. “Let’s go.” It was, of course, the only sensible thing to do. Honestly, sensible wasn’t a word Seth would have used to describe himself. Besides, he had come too far to turn back now. He skinned. “Seth Michael Sullivan!” Cleo hissed. Ignoring her, the jaguar climbed swiftly up the nearest evergreen, pranced out to the end of a low-hanging branch, and leapt off, easily clearing the razor-wire on top of the fence. He heard Emery pleading for him to come back as he slunk across the open expanse of muddy ground, making nary a sound as he padded up to a bank of ground-floor windows. The glass was yellowed with dirt, barred by a mesh grill. Placing his paws on the ledge, Seth peered over the sill. He was looking into a rotunda that rose up three stories to a vaulted ceiling made, like the floors and walls, of midnight-black stone. Dead center was a domed cage, fashioned from checkered panes of glass in alternating white and black; inside it, standing very tall and very straight, was a slender girl with skin like pale cream. Glossy raven hair feathered down her back. She couldn’t have been older than twelve. She had been dressed in a simple white shift, and appeared to be shivering. One look, and Seth knew she was werekin. Dozens of tables were ranged around the cage, covered in white cloths. The overhead lights were off, the only illumination the track lighting on the second- and third-story balconies, which 282 looked like walkways for upper-level cellblocks. The highbacked wooden chairs were filled with men and women dressed as though for a cocktail party. Seth didn’t know their names, but he had seen their faces before, at the Stewards’ New Year’s Eve party. Maybe Regent hadn’t been lying about saving his skin that night, even if he had done it for his own purposes. Which, clearly, he had. At a table in the center, seated side by side, were Werner Regent and Jack Steward. Across from them, resplendent in a gown of blood-red silk, was Ursula LeRoi. Behind them all, stretched out on a raised dais like he was sunning himself on a river rock, was a black jaguar. Even at a distance Seth could tell they would be the same size; that the wedge shape of their heads would be the same; that their golden eyes would refract the light in the same diamond pattern. His heart gave a single, painful throb. J.J. Blood calls to blood, Ben had always said. But this was different, this was more, more connected than Seth had ever felt, to anyone or anything. An echo of a dream came back to him then, so real it might have been a memory. I don’t want to fight you, he had said, and J.J. had handed him the bone-handled dagger, the dagger he had used to kill their father, and said, You might have to someday, so take this. The black jaguar’s gaze suddenly flicked to the window, like he had been called by Seth’s thoughts. He rose, muscles working beneath his inky fur. Pale spots, clustered thickest along his spine, glowed faintly in the moonlight. Seth dropped below the ledge. Had J.J. seen him? Would he raise the alarm? Snow crunched. Seth whirled, teeth bared, and Cleo bopped him on the snout. Seth whined. Hey! “Well, don’t growl at me,” Cleo said, calmly, as she crouched beside him. Right beside him, like he was a tabby cat instead of a jaguar. Growing up among werekin, Seth supposed she had become accustomed to their animal skins, but still. Most people showed some aversion to apex predators. “I sent Bunny Bread back to the car to wait on us. Anything interesting happening in there?” Seth turned back to the window, as if to say, See for yourself. 283 Ursula LeRoi had risen from her seat, tapping her fork against her goblet. Clink clink clink. The chatter faded to reverent silence. “My dear friends.” LeRoi smiled around the room, taking in each and every face. Seth had the impression she was memorizing them for later. “How long it has been since Chimera Enterprises set out with nothing more than a dream: to find the lost continent of Lemuria and reclaim the power plunged beneath the seas when she sank. Tonight, my friends, my dear, dear Partners, thanks in no small part to your generosity and dedication and, I know, your many sacrifices, that dream becomes reality. Tonight we celebrate the beginning of a new era. Our most industrious warrior,” here she beamed at Regent, “has captured the Black Swan. Soon the Ark will be complete, the power of the stars themselves will be ours to command, and you will reign with me for eternity in our Kingdom of Earth!” Shouts of “Hail, Lemuria!” and thunderous applause. The black jaguar threw his head back, roaring his approval. The werekin girl lifted her chin higher. Regent swirled the wine in his goblet, tiger-eyes inscrutable. Jack’s hand trembled as he lifted his glass, taking a tiny sip. The shadows under his eyes made him look troubled and weary, though that could have been a trick of the wavering light. Lifting a hand, LeRoi once again called for silence. “My only sadness is that Elijah Bishop could not be here to see this day. I will always regret that he lost faith before the end, but I know he would be proud to see his life’s work finally realized.” There was a smattering of polite applause. Seth thought of the last entry in Bishop’s journal. Faith is not wanting to know what is true. “Seth.” Cleo touched his paw. She had become very pale. “We need to get out of – ” “Good evening.” The voice was soft, and directly behind them. Seth and Cleo whirled, Seth ready to pounce, Cleo with her dagger already in hand; then a figure separated from the shadows, and they both froze. The creature was huge, eleven, twelve feet tall, at least. Membranous wings, like a moth’s – if moths had grown to be the 284 size of trees – stirred the air behind it, ruffling the silk train of its long black robe. Its hairless skin was mottled blue-and-gray; insectile antennae curled up from the temples of its bald head, probing the air, moving independently of one another. Seth remembered something they had read for Bio about antennae being part of an insect’s olfactory system. Was the creature sniffing them? Mothman tilted his head to the side, onyx eyes blinking slowly once, then twice. He seemed – not menacing – curious. Logic screamed for Seth to attack, but some instinct, deeper than logic, held him back. Blood calling to blood. And that was how Seth knew. Mothman was no monster. Like the spiderwoman pictured in Elijah Bishop’s journal, he was werekin. Generation Zero, one of Chimera’s first, and unsuccessful, attempts to reengineer the werekin race. Didn’t explain how he was still alive. Every story Seth had ever heard said Chimera had destroyed every Gen-0 in existence. “Please.” Mothman spoke in a deep baritone. “If you would come with me, there is someone who would speak with you.” Cleo looked at Seth. What choice did they have? One shout would bring every hunter in the building running. On the offchance they made it back to the car, Chimera would still know Seth had been snooping around its hub with a rogue hunter. His tail would be collared by dawn. They followed Mothman. He glided around the back of the prison, his long, scaly feet barely denting the surface of the mud that sucked at Seth’s paws. White veins pulsed under the mottled skin of his arms. If he sank his teeth into him, Seth wondered, what color would Mothman bleed? Now and again he flicked his tapered fingers, murmuring spells that dissolved the wards meant to prevent werekin from skinning. Seth felt the magic part around them like an invisible curtain. At a side door, Mothman tapped a sequence into a keypad. The keys were printed with Lemurian glyphs in place of numbers. “Please,” Mothman said. “After you.” Seth peered around him. Away from them stretched a floor made of the same black stone as the rest of the prison, latticed 285 with striped shadows like the moonlight was shining through slatted walls. Cautiously, he placed one paw over the threshold – Pressure built along his vertebrae, so intense his spine threatened to snap. Seth doubled over, his shrill whine becoming a cry as he was forced back into his human skin. He was shoved forward, face-first into the wall, dimly aware of Cleo shielding him with her body. “What did you do to him?” she demanded, fiercely. “Wards.” Mothman sounded apologetic. “They suppress the magic in his blood. I cannot remove them here.” “Why not? You were doing just fine outside!” “Cleo.” Seth’s voice was hoarse. “Cleo, look.” Cleo turned around. Iron bars lined the corridor on both sides, cordoning off a dozen cells. Inside each one, fenced in by metal and magic, was a prisoner. They ranged in age from five to fifty, all in human skin, all filthy, some bloody. They had been laid out on steel mattresses, eyes closed, collars circling their necks. “Are they…dead?” Seth managed. “Sedated.” Cleo spoke tersely. “To sleep off the effects of the tranqs.” She would know, Seth thought. She had captured his kin, sent them to places just like this. He gripped the bars, staring helplessly down at the man in the cell in front of him – a bear of a man with bushy salt-and-pepper hair. His flannel shirt was crusted with dried blood, creased cheeks so bruised Seth almost, almost didn’t recognize him. “Ben,” he whispered. There was no question how Chimera had found him. The night Seth had arrived in Fairfax, he had called Ben Schofield from Jack Steward’s house. At the time, he had had no idea Jack worked for Chimera. No reason to suspect Chimera might be tracing calls made to and from his phone line. After that night, Seth had not spoken to Ben again. “We can’t help them, sweetheart.” Cleo’s hand covered Seth’s. “They’re collared. We don’t have the keys.” She was right. As long as the collars were in place, Chimera could drain their captives’ life-forces, even from afar. Seth still wanted to draw his sword, slice through the locks on the cells, 286 whisk every one of the captives away to freedom. Leaving Ben here, collared in a Chimera cell, was almost more than he could bear. “We must not linger,” Mothman said. “We will be discovered.” Save her, Seth. Save her, and she will save us all. Regardless of his allegiance, Seth thought, J.J. had a point. The only way for Seth to help Ben now was to rescue the Black Swan. One finger at a time, he peeled his hands off the bars and marched down the corridor after Mothman. Cleo walked beside him, ice-chip eyes frozen solid. “Where are the guards?” she demanded of Mothman’s back. “I sent them to search for you.” Seth and Cleo stopped walking at the same time. Mothman glanced back at them. His right antennae was standing straight up, the left one curled in toward his temple, giving the impression that he was raising an eyebrow. “The fountain,” he explained. “It informed me of your approach. I told the guards you were in the forest to the south. No cause for alarm. They are searching for you in the wrong direction.” Personally, Seth felt there was plenty of cause for alarm. “The chimera fountain can talk?” “After a fashion. It is animated by the souls of the dead.” “And…you can talk to the dead?” Mothman inclined his head. “My name is Agathon. I am a necromancer, belonging to the Alpha Clan.” What had the glyphs in Bishop’s journal said? The motto of the necromancers? The dead shall wake and consume the living; I shall call up the dead to feast on your souls. Lovely. They couldn’t have been greeted by the florist belonging to the Alpha Clan? At the end of the corridor, Mothman – Agathon – ushered them into what looked like a regular office in any hyper-modern corporate building: black desk with a day-by-day calendar and telephone; leather chairs; metal filing cabinets; chrome bookshelves crowded with medical journals. A bank of state-ofthe-art computers lined one wall. In the corner, a silver birdcage contained a taxidermy nightingale, her feet glued to a wooden swing. Seth looked away. 287 The nightingale was werekin. Agathon touched a switch. The desk lamp sprang to life. His black insectile eyes flared with hints of scarlet, like blood drops, in the sudden glow. “He told me you would come,” he said. “Who told you?” Seth asked, though he already knew the answer. “The black jaguar,” Agathon said. “Your brother.” Trust him. J.J.’s voice was softer than a whisper in Seth’s mind. He stiffened. Tall order, he thought, when I don’t even trust you. If J.J. could hear him, he had no answer to that. Cleo put her shoulders back. “You said we were meeting someone?” Right on cue, the door opened, and a soldier walked in. Seth’s immediate reaction was to skin. But he had forgotten about the wards: Pain gouged the synapses of his brain, the magic slamming him back into his human skin; he grabbed his head and doubled over, retching. His brain felt melted, like a plastic cup tossed into a fire. “Seth.” A hand cupped his elbow, keeping him on his feet. Seth shuddered. Agathon’s skin was like the skin of a rotted apple, unpleasantly damp and creased. “I apologize,” Agathon said. “I should have warned you Captain McLain was arriving.” Seth straightened up. The soldier was tall, dark-haired, and dressed in desert fatigues. Will McLain, Ms. McLain’s nephew, who had stood by with General David Burke while Thomas Sullivan was executed, by his own son. Cleo snapped to attention, hands folded in the small of her back. “Sir,” she said, crisply. “Cleo.” McLain nodded to her. His skin was deeply tanned, his eyes a rich mocha-brown; he was in his early twenties, if that. “Seth. We haven’t been formally introduced. I’m Will McLain.” He extended a hand. Ignoring it, Seth turned to Cleo. “You two know each other?” “Captain McLain’s unit helped with our training in the Scholae Bestiarii,” Cleo said, still standing at attention. Seth wondered what she would do if he poked her in the belly. McLain sat on the edge of the desk, perfectly relaxed, as though a closed-door meeting with a moth-man, a rogue hunter, 288 and a werejaguar was just a run-of-the-mill weeknight for him. A silver charm hung around his neck. A swan. “My unit is a black ops division,” he said, “under the command of General David Burke. Our missions are classified above top-secret. Officially, we don’t exist. Officially, none of this exists – not this lab, not werekin, not Lemuria.” “And yet,” said Seth, “here we are.” McLain smiled thinly. “Ben told me you were a real smartass.” “Was that before or after you collared him?” Cleo cleared her throat. McLain waved a hand at her. “I’ve known Ben Schofield all my life. My father was a soldier, too, and a close friend of Elijah Bishop. He helped him orchestrate the escape of the Gen-1. My family helped establish the Underground.” Easy claim to make, when there was no way for Seth to ask Ben if it was true. “Somebody needs to explain to me what Captain America here has to do with rescuing the Black Swan. He works for Chimera,” Seth said. “I don’t ‘work’ for Chimera, kid.” There was an edge to McLain’s voice now. “I’m a Marine. My unit just happens to be assigned to Project Ark. As for what I’m doing here, I’m trying to stop Ursula LeRoi from unleashing Armageddon with alien technology nothing on Earth could stand up against.” “Right,” Seth said. “Exterminating the werekin, wasn’t that your boss’s plan?” “General Burke is a good man,” McLain said, stiffly. “I’m proud to serve under him. But on the issue of your kindred, we…differ.” “So you think we should be tortured and enslaved, but not killed?” Now Agathon cleared his throat, a sound like dry leaves crunching underfoot. “Seth, Captain McLain is a friend to us.” Well sure, Seth thought, as long he’s got the endorsement of the necromancer. “So you’re saying what?” he challenged McLain. “That you’re here against General Burke’s orders? Risking court martial and the brig and all that fun stuff?” “That would be what I’m saying.” “And where does Ms. McLain fit into all of this?” 289 “Aunt Ingrid and I both have a gift. We can see werekin, even though we’re human. My grandmother had it, too.” “So you’re, like, a spy, inside Chimera?” “I’m like a Marine,” McLain said, “who just happens to have grown up knowing werekin exist, and who just happens to believe Ursula LeRoi might be the most evil woman alive, and who would like to see her stopped before she manages to conquer this planet, and any others that might be out there with sentient life. Now.” McLain stood, snagging a remote control off the desk and pressing a button that brought the bank of computers on the wall to life. “If we’re done debating my credentials, should we get down to business?” He certainly looked like a Marine just then, and a pissed-off one at that. Seth decided there was no disadvantage to hearing him out. He flopped down in one of the leather chairs. “Hit me,” he said. McLain tapped the remote. A 3-D model of the prison’s rotunda appeared, blown up so it stretched across multiple screens. “The Black Swan is here.” With a laser-pointer, McLain indicated the center of the rotunda, the glass cage with the werekin girl inside. “It’s inside what we’re calling the Birdcage. Security around this thing is beyond tight. Up on the catwalks you’ve got snipers with silver bullets positioned at all four compass points. And you see this, this vent in the ceiling?” He directed the laser-pointer to the top of the CG model. “It’s designed to release a concentrated cloud of silver powder. Mustard gas for werekin. Any werekin who get within ten feet of that cage will be sitting ducks.” Cleo leaned her elbows on the back of Seth’s chair. “Can’t you just tell your men to stand down, sir?” “I could, except they won’t be my men. LeRoi insisted on using her own security.” “Hunters,” Cleo said, darkly. “Hunters,” McLain confirmed. “And trust me, this place is teeming with them. If Agathon hadn’t let you in, you would both be in cages right now. Your friends out by the creek, too.” “What about the Birdcage?” Seth asked. “Assuming we could get to it, how do we open it?” 290 “There’s a keypad, on the side.” McLain tapped another button. A full-scale schematic of the domed cage replaced the rotunda blueprint. “To open it, you need the access code, which we don’t have. Only LeRoi does, and she would die before she would give it up.” No padlock. Unfortunate. The lock had not yet been made that Seth couldn’t pick. “How about a crowbar?” Cleo suggested. “All due respect, Captain, it is made of glass.” “Specially tempered glass,” McLain said, “magically reinforced, and damn near unbreakable. You would need a tremendous amount of force to shatter it.” He glanced at Agathon. “Yes,” Agathon rumbled, “I can break it. But I am not immune to silver powder, or to silver bullets.” “What about her collar?” Cleo said. “Won’t we need the key?” “She isn’t collared,” McLain said – the best news Seth had heard all day. “I convinced LeRoi that the cage would be enough. It’s warded to prevent her from skinning, and LeRoi doesn’t intend to let her out until she’s ready to bleed her dry into the Ark. What we need is enough firepower to get her out, and then we need to get her somewhere Chimera will never find her again.” “How did Chimera find her in the first place?” Seth asked. “We don’t really know. Ben Schofield could have told them, under torture – ” fat chance; Ben was not the breaking type “ – or Chimera could have a spy in the Resistance. Or…” Seth linked his arms behind his head, waiting for it. “Or?” McLain shrugged. “Or your brother located her. He is a powerful telepath.” In his drum-like voice, Agathon said, “J.J. would not do that.” Seth was careful not to meet Cleo’s eyes. But he saw her exchange a look with McLain, a look that reminded him all too keenly that they had both witnessed Thomas Sullivan’s death, while Agathon had not. 291 “There’s something else,” McLain said. “Fort King is more than just a hub. It is the location of the Ark. That’s why so many werekin are drawn to Fairfax, to the Underground.” “You’re certain?” Cleo sounded breathless. “Beyond a shadow of a doubt.” McLain was grim. Seth cocked an eyebrow. “If you’re such a fan of the Resistance, why haven’t you told the Commanders this already?” “Well, I know you’ll find this hard to believe, but werekin tend to be suspicious of humans they perceive to be in league with Chimera,” McLain said. And he had called Seth a smartass? “What I need is someone who can take this intel to the Resistance Commanders, and tell them that if they do this, if they rescue the Black Swan and take Fort King from LeRoi, the werekin will have everything they need to raise Lemuria. You could go home.” This is how it ends. In Seth’s mind there was a clear picture of a pristine white beach, an ocean turned to blood, a mountain deep in the primordial jungle exploding in gouts of golden flame. “The power of the Totems,” he said. “What is it? Do you know?” “It is the power that brought the Totems to Earth.” That was Agathon. He flicked his tapered fingers. The screens blinked; a satellite image of the ocean appeared on them. The picture zoomed in, tighter and tighter until a dark mass was visible at the very bottom of the ocean. Another flick of Agathon’s wrist, and a ghostly outline appeared, buried within the mass, picked out in tiny digital green dots. The shape was unmistakable. “A ship?” Seth and Cleo said, together. Cleo’s knuckles whitened on the back of Seth’s chair. “The power of the Totems is a spaceship?” she said, incredulously. “LeRoi’s theory – Bishop’s theory, really – was that, in the legend of Lemuria, the Totems ‘coming down from the stars’ meant just that. Bishop theorized that the Totems left a means for the werekin to return to the stars, if they ever needed to. A transportation device that could carve a hole in time and space. The texts recovered from Mt. Hokulani say before Lemuria sank, the White Swan sent one Clan, the Tortoise Clan, away from the 292 island with the Source.” McLain pressed a button; a glyph appeared on one of the screens, overlain with more meaning than that word, source, but roughly translatable as such. “We don’t know what the Source is, precisely, but we know it is the means to activate the power of the Totems.” “I thought that’s what the Ark was for,” Cleo said. “You need the Ark to raise Lemuria. You need the Source to operate whatever is hidden inside that island.” McLain nodded at the satellite image. “LeRoi is still searching for the Source, but Burke wants your kind destroyed before the Ark is completed and she gets her hands on whatever it is.” “And what do you want?” Seth asked. “I want what Elijah Bishop wanted,” McLain said, simply. “I want our races to live in peace. But if that isn’t possible, I want you to do what he believed the Totems meant for you to do: leave this planet, and find somewhere you can live without being hunted.” Seth stared at him, wishing, suddenly, that he was telepathic. Was the captain telling the truth? Or was he dangling the proverbial Holy Grail – the Ark – in front of Seth, using him to lure the Resistance into an ambush that would secure Chimera’s victory over them, once and for all? Seth took a breath, the weight of this decision, the most important one he had ever been asked to make, bearing down on him like he was Atlas holding up the sky. He had never felt so utterly alone in his life. Of the two people whose advice he automatically wished for, one was a traitor, and one was in captivity. Putting aside for the moment the question of whether Seth trusted Agathon or McLain, there was always the possibility that J.J., who had essentially arranged this meet-and-greet, was lying to both of them, too. It came down to this. Did Seth trust J.J., or didn’t he? “All right,” Seth said. “I can’t speak on behalf of the Resistance, but I do have a way to contact them. I’ll deliver your message, and I’ll let you know what they decide.” McLain touched his silver swan charm. He looked as weighted down with worry as Seth felt. “Just tell them to hurry,” he said. 293 Chapter Twenty-Three: First Time Though the stars were still out when the Audi pulled into the Townsends’ drive, a gray band around the horizon promised dawn was on its way. Marshall followed Seth around to the Stewards’ back door, tiptoeing after him through the kitchen and up the stairs. From the fort, they had driven to an all-night diner, one of those cheesy 1950s Americana places with a working jukebox, and sipped instant cappuccino while Seth and Cleo had related everything they had seen inside the fort and everything McLain and Agathon had told them. It had taken some doing, but finally, Emery had agreed to call his mother, to ask if the Resistance was willing to go to war with Chimera. He had promised to call as soon as he had their answer. Marshall had stared across the parking lot the entire time, a million miles away. He had said a grand total of two words – good night – since they had left the diner, dropping Cleo off at Chaz’s. Seth couldn’t figure it out. Brooding didn’t fit with Marshall’s golden boy personality. He also didn’t know what to make of Marshall’s wordless decision to sleep over. A week ago, that would have awoken butterflies of possibility in his stomach. Now he had no idea how to act. Could they share a bed? Would that be a come-on? When he turned from closing his bedroom door, Marshall had his back to him, head bowed as though in prayer. Seth dropped his katana on the floor. “Man, I am wiped. You take the bed. I’ll crash on the – ” Very deliberately, Marshall raised a fist and punched the dresser. Like really wailed on it, with such force it rocked back into the wall. Hissing in surprise, Seth yanked open the door; he expected Leigh to come barging out of her room, but five seconds passed, then ten, then twenty, and he released the breath he had been holding. Seemed baby sister had decided against investigating late-night banging in his room. Seth closed the door. Marshall was standing by the dresser, fists clenched like he wasn’t done punching things. 294 “What the hell, Indiana?” Seth said. “Sorry.” Marshall glanced at the gouge the dresser had made in the wall. “I’ll paint over that for you.” “Forget the wall.” Seth didn’t care about the stupid wall. He took Marshall’s hand in his and turned it over, examining the split skin across his knuckles. “Did you break your hand?” “I’m fine, okay? Jesus.” Marshall jerked away. “You don’t have to be so…” “What?” Seth’s throat was tight. “What am I being?” Marshall looked out the window. Leaning back against the wall, Seth studied him. From the side, the angles of Marshall’s cheekbones were sharp as razorblades, silky lashes hooding his incredibly blue eyes. “Help me out here, Indiana,” Seth said. “What is going on with you?” “Nothing,” Marshall said. “Nothing is going on with me.” “Yeah, you’re totally cool. Me, I go around pummeling furniture all the time. In fact, there’s this dining room chair that’s really been getting on my nerves lately. Let’s go stomp on it.” Marshall’s jaw worked like he was holding back a scream. Seth laid a hand on his back – felt the taut muscles tighten even further, like a spring about to snap, at the contact. “Marshall,” he said, softly. “Come on. Talk to me.” “Seth, don’t you get it? I can’t.” With that, Marshall sagged forward, the fight bleeding right out of him. Seth would have preferred being punched. At least then they could have slugged it out. That simple admission – I can’t – left him nothing to fight. He stepped back. “Wait here,” he said. “I’ll get ice for your hand.” The kitchen was quiet but for the hum of the refrigerator. Poe, meowing morosely, observed from atop it as Seth dumped ice cubes into a dishtowel. He could tell she was missing Captain Hook – for a cat and a dog, they had gotten on pretty well. That made him want to cry even more. Marshall was standing right where Seth had left him, still wearing his jacket and shoes. Seth shut the bedroom door and held out the makeshift icepack; their fingers brushed as Marshall took it from him. Turning away, Seth grabbed a pair of sweat pants and a T-shirt out of his drawer. “Uh, would you mind…?” 295 “Huh?” Marshall looked up from his bruised hand, saw Seth holding his pajamas, and blushed. “Yeah. Yeah, sure, of course…” He hastily turned his back. Seth shucked out of his jeans and into the sweat pants as fast as he could. “You can have the bed,” he offered, since he wasn’t sure Marshall had been listening before. “I’ll sack out on the windowsill. Cats can sleep anywhere, you know. Anyway, we have to be up for school in like two – ” “Stop.” Seth looked up, T-shirt dangling off his wrists. Marshall was looking at him. Blue eyes raked down him, sizzling like a flash fire: eyes, mouth, throat, stomach. Back up, slowly. Seth was paralyzed. It was possible he stopped breathing. He had never been more aware of his own skin than he was in that moment. They stepped forward at the same time, Seth dropping his Tshirt to the floor, Marshall wrapping an arm around his waist to draw him closer. He buried his nose in Seth’s hair and breathed deep, like he wanted to inhale him. “Philadelphia, I need to ask you something,” he whispered. Seth hoped this wasn’t going to be a difficult question. His brain wasn’t working at top form just then. “Are you ever scared?” Seth laughed. Marshall winced, thinking he was laughing at him, but Seth wasn’t. He understood why Marshall was frightened. What he had to lose. “Indiana,” he said, “I am scared all the time. I’m just not scared of this.” “This scares me to death,” Marshall admitted. And then he kissed him. Timidly, at first. One arm still around Seth’s waist, holding him flush against him, he skimmed his bruised knuckles along the underside of Seth’s jaw, mouth grazing shyly over his. Seth made a sound, half-purr, half-growl. Blood was coursing thick as honey through his veins. Going up on tiptoe, he curled his hand behind Marshall’s neck, sealing his lips firmly to his, and was answered by a hitch in Marshall’s breathing that stirred a shiver right down to his toes. 296 Here were all the sparks that had been missing from Seth’s other kisses. Here was what, and who, could make his pulse skitter and his head swim. Marshall’s fingers walked up Seth’s bare spine, doing unbelievable things to Seth’s nerve endings. They stopped kissing long enough for him to drag Marshall’s letterman’s jacket off his shoulders, push it down his arms, and toss it onto the windowsill; then Seth’s mouth was crushed against his again, fingers wound tightly in those soft, inky curls. They ended up on the bed, pillows scattered on the floor, Marshall pressing Seth down into the mattress as he dusted kisses down his neck, onto his chest. Seth clutched at the sheets. He felt like he was unraveling, spooling into delicious darkness. Marshall sat up suddenly, dragging a hand through his hair, making it stick out every which way. Seth loved when he did that. “I just – I need a sec,” he said, raggedly. Seth nodded. Marshall fell back alongside him. For a moment, the only sound was their mutually labored breathing. Marshall’s bottom lip was bruised where Seth had nipped him. Seth saw him touch it, and smirked. “You’re thinking of calling me an animal, aren’t you?” he said. Marshall hit him with a pillow. *** Charles Bonaparte lived in Haven Heights above a pawn shop hocking guns, jewelry, and guitars. Chaz called it a studio. Cleo called it a dump. Roaches skittered across the linoleum in the tiny kitchen, hiding in the cracks between the pressboard cabinets. Mice had gnawed the molding in the living room. The bathroom was so narrow the toilet was wedged up against the shower. Last night, her first night in residence, a many-legged bug had crawled out of the drain and slithered over the top of Cleo’s foot. Fortunately Cleo was not the kind of girl who required fourstar accommodations. In the Scholae Bestiarii, hunters shared a stone cell with their werekin partners, one cot and one blanket in each, and guess who got those? Not the slave. Not unless the 297 hunter cared to take thirty lashes as punishment for being an animal lover. It would have been nice, however, for the hot water in Chaz’s shower to last long enough for her to lather up. By the time she rinsed the shampoo from her hair, the spray was ice-cold. Knotting a towel around herself, Cleo climbed out of the shower and swiped condensation off the mirror above the sink. Her eyes were smudged with blue, evidence that she had not yet been to bed; she had just been too wired after that scene at Fort King. Will McLain on the side of the werekin. She found that strangely easy to believe. She knew Thomas Sullivan had always liked him, and McLain had been different than the others trainers, never one to go in for torture. The Gen-0 was a different story. J.J.’s telepath tutor Xanthe was a Gen-0, and Cleo had never been comfortable around him. And there was J.J. himself. She couldn’t believe Seth would trust him, knowing what he knew about his twin. “He’s out of his mind,” she informed her reflection. Chaz was munching down on Cocoa Puffs when Cleo came into the kitchen, a flannel shirt she had borrowed from her new roommate tied over her skintight jeans. Chaz’s gray robe was unbelted over his boxers, revealing a chest so scrawny the bones looked like a ladder. Cleo wasn’t sure if he was just getting up, or just going to bed. He nodded formally to her. “Cleopatra.” “Charles.” Cleo fished a clean bowl from the cabinet. Dishes tended to collect in Chaz’s sink, sprouting yellow and green mold like tree fungus. She took a seat at the scarred wooden table and robotically spooned cereal into her mouth, starting when the phone rang. “For you,” Chaz said, offering the cordless to her. It was Emery. “They went for it!” His voice actually squeaked with excitement. “The Resistance went for it. The Commanders are on their way to Fairfax right now. I tried to reach Seth, but the line has been busy for an hour – do you think something could be wrong?” Considering whose roof Seth was living under, yes, Cleo very much thought something could be wrong. “I’ll pick you up 298 in five,” she said, and pitched the phone into Chaz’s lap. “Charles, I need to borrow your van.” The sun was edging over the horizon, leaking purple fire into the clouds. Cleo exited Chaz’s building by the back stairs, into an alley between the pawn shop and the seedy bar next door. At the far end, a chain link fence screened a construction site, steel bones surrounded by orange barrels like garish mushrooms. Beyond that was a row of warehouses, and beyond those, the river. She was almost to the mouth of the alley when a figure appeared there, casting a long shadow in the streetlight that had yet to wink out. Cleo would have known that shadow anywhere. She did not stop to think. Did not even bother to scream. She simply ran. Down the alley, toward the fence – wedging her fingers into the chain links, hauling herself up and over – careening through the construction site, never once looking back, imagining every second she could hear the soft fall of paws behind her – the last sound she would ever hear – Ahead of her spread the river, murky brown waves topped with white foam. Jaguars could swim as well as they could run; the water afforded no escape. What she needed was wheels. Too bad she had fled into a warren of streets hemmed in by warehouses, everything still closed up for the night, not a single car on the street. Slowing to a brisk walk, Cleo contemplated her options, trying to breathe around the stitch in her side. She could circle back to the van. J.J. wouldn’t expect her to retrace her steps, and he wouldn’t expect her to have access to a vehicle, which might give her a tactical advantage. Time to get to Seth, anyway, before Chimera did. At the next street, she turned east, weaving back in the general direction of Chaz’s street, glancing repeatedly over her shoulder. Sweat had collected under her flannel shirt. When a pigeon squawked up from behind a dumpster, Cleo nearly screamed. She rounded the next corner and walked straight into him. Before the boy could move, Cleo landed an uppercut to his jaw that put him on the ground. She yanked the dagger from her belt, but a foot hooked her ankle, and she crashed to the 299 sidewalk. Rolling over almost before she landed, Cleo slammed into the boy, shoving him against the brick wall of a boarded-up appliance shop. Straddling his legs, Cleo could feel his heart beating through his T-shirt. He was thin, but strong, dressed in black camouflage, thick-soled combat boots laced over his feet. The gear made him seem older than seventeen. A knife was strapped to his belt, a quiver of arrows slung across his back. In a fight, Cleo knew, he would prefer the knife. She wondered, fleetingly, why he hadn’t simply shot her as she had fled from him in the alley. Thin, scarred hands balanced on the pavement. Golden eyes gazed calmly into hers. Even now Cleo could appreciate that he was beautiful, beautiful and deadly, this boy their masters had sent to kill her. “You shouldn’t have come after me,” she said, harshly. “I didn’t want to kill you.” “You won’t kill me,” the boy said, with confidence. Cleo pressed the edge of her dagger tighter against his throat. It fit perfectly beneath his ornate silver collar. “I will, if it means saving Seth.” His smile was thin as a blade, and Cleo suddenly felt as though the dagger was pressed to her throat. “I’m afraid,” J.J. said, “you’re too late for that.” *** Screeeech! Seth jolted awake, lurching over the side of the bed for his sword. This disturbed Marshall, who murmured drowsily in his sleep. Screeech! Poe’s sharp nails raked down the windowpane again. “Stop that,” Seth scolded, in a whisper. “How’d you get in here, anyway?” He distinctly recalled locking his bedroom door. Poe meowed. Who, me? Blue skies reigned outside – a gorgeous late winter morning. Seth checked his Hello Kitty alarm clock. 8:30. Why hadn’t Lydia or Leigh woken him for school? Then he remembered: He 300 wasn’t supposed to be home. He had told his mother he was staying at Emery’s. Seth knew he should get up, call Lydia before the school did to report his truancy, but he didn’t want to leave his room just yet. He wanted to stay right here, in his happy little bubble, watching Marshall sleep. Marshall lay on his back, one arm flung across his eyes, the other resting on his stomach. They really should have kept the icepack on, Seth thought. Marshall’s knuckles were swollen and bruised. Dark hair was ruffled around his face, honey-toned skin warmed by the flush of sleep. No use denying it. Seth had it bad for the boy next door. Leaving Marshall to dream, he padded into the bathroom and ran the water in the Jacuzzi all the way to the top. Soap suds collected on the surface like foamy lily pads. Seth trailed his fingers through them, wishing Emery would call already, end the suspense of whether the Resistance had decided to move on Fort King. They had to say yes. Ben was in that hub. Seth couldn’t just leave him there. If the Resistance wouldn’t help him, Seth would have to find a way to rescue him himself. Him and J.J. Not for the first time, Seth asked himself why he trusted his twin. He didn’t have an answer. He just kept coming back to that myth Regent had told him. Two jaguars, one light, one dark, neither good nor evil. Both very powerful. Two locks of hair in a silver locket. Marshall was awake when Seth returned to the bedroom. Poe, having switched from the window to the bed in his absence, was purring in his lap. Lucky cat. “Hey,” Marshall said. “Hey,” Seth said, and started grabbing clothes almost at random from his dresser: jeans, long-sleeved T-shirt, socks. Marshall kicked the covers aside and leaned against the headboard, T-shirt and boxer-clad. Nobody had a right to make rumpled look that sexy, but Seth controlled his hormones, trying to decipher Marshall’s mood. Would he want to pretend last night had never happened? Vow to never again “act on the impulse”? “Shower is all yours,” he said, zipping up his jeans. “In a hurry to get rid of me, Philadelphia?” 301 Seth looked up. Marshall’s dimple was in plain sight, no trace of brooding or regret. A weight of dread he hadn’t even been aware of lifted off of Seth. “Maybe I’m just in a hurry to get your clothes off,” he said. “Yeah? ’Cause from where I’m sitting, it seems like you’re in a hurry to put yours on.” Did Seth detect a challenge? Kicking the drawer shut, he slunk over to the bed, leaned in, and outlined Marshall’s lips with one finger. “Vous ềtes si belle,” he murmured. “I don’t speak French,” Marshall said; but rather than wait for a translation, he captured Seth’s wrist and pulled him down on the pillows. Being kissed by Marshall was like floating in a pool of sunlight, suspended high above the ground, all heat and weightlessness. Long fingers slid under Seth’s shirt, feathering his ribs until Marshall’s hands were splayed on his back. “You’re warm,” he said, against Seth’s mouth. “Hot bath,” Seth managed. Marshall began to kiss the jaguar spot tattoos around his eye, murmuring softly under his breath, words Seth couldn’t really make out, as he was rapidly losing the capacity for coherent thought – which he didn’t mind, but, as he had discovered last night, Marshall had, shall we say, boundaries. “Going to need a cold shower if you don’t stop,” he warned. “Sorry.” Kissing him once more, Marshall crawled off the bed. Seth scowled. He would have to wear down the golden boy virtuousness. Propped on an elbow, he watched Marshall rummage through the pile of clothes on the floor for his jeans. “You’re leaving?” “Have to.” Marshall sat down on the windowsill to lace up his tennis shoes. “I’ve got a Chem. midterm after lunch, remember? Anyway, my father comes back from his conference today. I’m picking him up from the airport after school.” Just what their morning after didn’t need – quality time for Marshall and his father. Seth sat up, bumping his chin on his knee. Their happy bubble was dissolving. Time to face reality. “Were you planning to tell him about this?” he asked. He didn’t say “us,” in case that would seem presumptuous. Did two make302 out sessions, even knee-weakening, pulse-pounding make-out sessions, qualify them as a couple? Marshall had frozen halfway through tying his shoelace. “Because if you wanted to keep it private for now,” Seth added quickly, “we can.” For a moment, Marshall remained frozen. Then, slowly, he returned to his shoelaces. “How would that work, exactly?” His tone gave nothing away. “It would work like it’s been working,” Seth said. “We’re friends. We hang out. Watch movies, play video games. I kick your butt at basketball…” “I think we’re a little more than just friends.” Marshall straightened up, shaking hair back from his eyes. “Would you really be okay with that? Keeping us a secret?” His casual use of the plural pronoun was not lost on Seth, whose heart started doing the mamba in his chest. “Well, I will be disappointed I can’t write ‘Seth loves Marshall’ all over my notebooks.” Marshall sighed. “Do you think I could I get a straight answer here, please?” Seth took a breath. “Yeah, Indiana. I’m okay with it.” And he was. Sort of. Seth worried Marshall still thought he was abnormal for liking guys, queer in the ugliest sense of the word, while he, Seth, was prepared to snog him in the middle of the cafeteria, but Marshall had protected his secret. Now, Seth would protect his. Marshall picked up his jacket. “I’m not – ” But Seth never got to find out what Marshall wasn’t, for at that moment, from outside echoed a terrible, blood-curdling scream. 303 Chapter Twenty-Four: Friends and Enemies Whitney Townsend’s favorite writing spot was her attic. Before Marshall was born, their mother had renovated it into a painter’s studio. The space was ideal: diamond-shaped windows set into the east and west walls like portholes in a ship, allowing for generous doses of sunshine. Though Meredith hadn’t painted in years, an easel was propped in the corner, waiting patiently for one of the canvases gathering dust beside it; on a butcher’s table were lined up jars of oil paints, their contents dried to chalk, and pouches of brushes with bristles gone stiff from age. This morning, the poem Whitney wanted to write simply wouldn’t come. Glaring at the blank page, she tucked her feet under her in the Papasan chair, spreading her long velvet skirt over her knees. If only she could layer her thoughts onto paper like a painter laying oil onto canvas. Painting pictures with words was much harder, in Whitney’s opinion. For two weeks, Whitney had been trying to describe the halo of light that surrounded Emery Little. Emery was the sun – wait, Shakespeare had snapped that one up, to describe Juliet. Emery was a silver moonbeam shining on white snow, light giving back light; he was a whirlwind of gold, azure, rose…And here her pencil slowed as Whitney came up against the same wall she always did. There were not words to name the colors that haloed Emery, sifting together like grains of sand. It was the same with Seth, and most of the kids from Haven Heights. There were no words to describe how they exuded light, though the light didn’t come from them; it was drawn to them, like metal shavings to a magnet, particles of air enlivened to color. Maybe Emery would have the words, if she ever worked up the nerve to ask him what the light meant. Whitney flipped her hand over, studying the phone number he had written on her palm after the Sacred Heart game. The number was mostly washed off, but she had already memorized it. Whitney could imagine calling Emery. Right up to the point where he said hello. Their conversations tended to involve a lot of blushing and smiling, neither much use over the phone. 304 Whitney set her notebook aside. It was nearly nine o’clock; she needed to call Marshall, find out why he wasn’t home from Emery’s to pick her up yet. Marshall never skipped school. And, speaking of, wasn’t it a little strange that Leigh hadn’t called to see if she needed a ride…? Whitney blinked. Movement in the trees had caught her attention. She rubbed her eyes, and looked again. It was still there. An enormous tiger, leaping from branch to branch through the woods, headed away from the Stewards’ backyard. That would have been quite odd enough, but Whitney knew this was no regular tiger. A regular tiger would not have been surrounded by a halo of light. Whitney tore down the stairs to her bedroom and grabbed the phone off her bedside table. No dial tone; the phone was dead. Tossing it onto her bedspread, she dug her cell phone out of her canvas tote, dialing again as she raced toward the front door. “Hello?” “Emery!” Whitney practically shouted. “I need to speak to Seth!” “Seth? Why would Seth be – ” Emery coughed. “I mean, uh, he left already, for school…Is this Whitney?” “Emery, listen to me, I need you to tell me where Seth is.” Whitney had just registered that Marshall’s Audi was in their driveway, parked under the basketball hoop. She skirted it, almost slipping in something sticky beside the rear tire. “Never mind, I – ” And she screamed. Leigh was lying in the grass beside the Stewards’ garage, auburn hair spilled around her like flame. Her hot pink pajamas were soaked with dew, her lips blue. For one awful second Whitney thought she was dead. When Leigh’s chest rose and fell, she almost screamed again, from relief. “Whitney!” Emery was yelling into the phone. “Whitney, where are you? What’s wrong?” “I’m at home,” Whitney heard herself say, numbly, as she turned, looking back at the path she had taken across the drive. Her footprints were visible on the concrete, outlined in something red. A larger pool of the red stuff, beginning to congeal, had collected next to Marshall’s car. She didn’t think 305 the blood was his, though. She recognized the gray silk robe caught in the bushes, shredded at the hem. It belonged to Mrs. Steward. “Emery, I think – ” A footstep at her back killed the words on her lips. Whitney made to turn, but she never got that far; she caught a glimpse of a black leather jacket, a scarred face with a patch covering a missing eye; then something sharp struck her in the neck, causing her to gasp. The light and color bled from the world, and the phone slipped from her grasp as the ground rose up to meet her. *** Seth outstripped Marshall on the stairs, leaping straight from the landing to the entryway. Leigh’s books were spread across the island in the kitchen, but Leigh was nowhere in sight. Nor was Lydia. A bowl of pancake mix was on the counter, a cold skillet waiting on the stove. The keys to Seth’s Yamaha hung on a peg by the back door. He snatched them up as he sprinted outside, Marshall on his heels. Whitney was lying in the Stewards’ driveway. Marshall dropped beside her, saying her name over and over. Whitney did not respond. Her breathing was shallow. Seth’s golden eyes swept the lawn. A small, circular bruise discolored Whitney’s neck – evidence of a tranq dart, except this one must have contained an actual tranquilizer instead of silver and mercury. He was looking for the shooter, but his eyes fell on the girl lying beside the garage, and the world tilted like the driveway was the deck of a ship in a hurricane. Leigh. Sliding his arms under her, Seth carried her over to Marshall. She was unconscious but alive; he laid her down next to Whitney, brushed her hair back from her face. Leigh had the same small, round bruise on her neck. Her skin was ice-cold. Seth felt sick, thinking of her lying out here on the ground, halfdressed, while he was upstairs, oblivious in his happy little bubble. “Jesus. She’s frozen.” Marshall stripped his letterman’s jacket off and draped it over Leigh, as if by habit checking her 306 pulse. Only then did he seem to notice Seth climbing on his motorcycle. He jumped up. “Philadelphia, wait! Where are you going?” “Regent’s.” Seth stuck the key in the ignition as he turned, to the small brown falcon hopping along the shrub fence. “Go to Emery’s,” he said. “Tell him to get Cleo and meet me there.” The falcon soared away, cackling. Marshall was staring at Seth like he had lost his mind. “Seth, I don’t understand – ” “He has my mother. If I don’t go, he’ll kill her.” “Seth, come on. This is insane.” Marshall was pale. “Mrs. Steward is probably just at yoga class with my mom. You don’t know Regent has her.” “Yes,” Seth said, “I do.” He pointed. Marshall followed his gaze, to the paw prints in the mud around Lydia’s rosebushes – tiger tracks – and the gray robe fluttering in the weeds, the shredded hem soaked in blood. Seth heard him draw a sharp breath. Marshall looked back at him. “You know he’ll be waiting for you,” he said, softly. “You know this is a trap.” “It doesn’t matter,” Seth said. He would not let his mother die to save his skin. “Then take this.” Marshall reached into the pocket of his jacket, glanced around to be sure no neighbors were outside, and produced a pistol – his father’s Colt .38. Seth gaped at it. “Christ, Indiana, you’re packing heat now?” Marshall shrugged. “You were breaking into a building full of hunters last night. If you didn’t make it out, I was coming in to get you.” “Do you have any idea how completely stupid that would have been?” Seth snatched the pistol out of Marshall’s hand and flung it, with all his might, over the brick privacy fence. “You think Chimera wouldn’t kill you just because you’re human?” Marshall shrugged. “Why do you think I brought the gun?” Oh, very funny. Glaring, Seth cranked the ignition. “Find Emery,” he repeated, over the engine’s roar. “And don’t think we aren’t talking about this later!” *** 307 The Yamaha tore through four red lights on the expressway, jumped a curb to avoid a soccer mom minivan, and zigzagged around a garbage truck before hitting the highway north of town. Yeah baby. This was how a motorcycle was meant to be driven. Cold wind blew Seth’s still-damp hair back, flattened his shirt to his chest. He could hear nothing over the roar of the engine and the scream of the wind – and unfortunately, he did not see the panther-black Kawasaki Ninja bearing down on him until the other bike was suddenly in his lane. Seth jerked the handlebars, veering over the center line. The Ninja shot into position beside him, crowding him further into the other lane, into the path of an oncoming semi. The big rig driver blared his horn; Seth cranked the throttle, managing to whip back into his lane just in time to avoid becoming a hood ornament. The Ninja driver grinned at Seth. Eye patch. Leather jacket. Silver-studded whip. Snowman. Goddamn Regent. So much for his big story about chowing down on the hunter. Seth should have known he hadn’t really killed him. They were on the same side. Snowman swerved, trying to clip the Yamaha’s back tire. Seth nudged the speedometer above a hundred miles an hour, but the Ninja had a decent engine, too; Snowman gained on him, forcing Seth to weave back and forth between lanes, skirting oncoming traffic. A deadly game of cat and mouse, and for once, Seth wasn’t the cat. Something glinted in Snowman’s hand. A tranq gun. He raised it, and Seth jerked the wheel again, onto the shoulder this time. The bike’s wheels crunched over gravel, and Seth fought to keep her vertical. At this speed, a wipeout would leave him shredded on the pavement. To his right, across a deep ditch, a dirt road fronted a cornfield, paralleling the highway. Seth cranked the throttle as wide as she would go – shot ahead of the Ninja, throwing gravel like a hail of bullets into Snowman’s face – and jumped the ditch. The Yamaha defied gravity for ten full seconds of hang-time. When she landed, she bounced so hard her back tire came off the 308 ground. By some miracle of the Totems, Seth managed to right her. Pacing him on the highway, Snowman lifted his tranq gun again. Seth saw him frown as he tried to read Seth’s lips. Behind you. Snowman turned – just as the canary-yellow Hummer overtook him from behind. It was like watching a freight train run down a bicycle. The Hummer’s grill nudged the Ninja’s back tire; the gun fell from Snowman’s grasp, disappearing under the assault vehicle’s undercarriage, kicking up sparks. The bike flipped, its headlight kissing the pavement; it tipped onto its side with an explosive crash, and Seth instinctively looked away as the Hummer rolled right over the top of it, and Snowman. Through the tinted glass, he glimpsed the driver. Not Regent. Jack. The Hummer kept barreling along, a bear chewing up the Ninja’s bones, but the Yamaha was lighter, and faster: Seth waved to Jack, swerved back onto the highway, and screamed off at fighter-jet speed. He had no clue why his step-father had just saved him. Right now, he didn’t care. All he cared about was Lydia. Seth nearly laid the bike down again turning onto the road that led back to Regent’s. At the end of the twisting drive, he hit the brakes, locking up the back tire and sending a plume of rainwater into the air. Almost before the bike slewed to a stop, he was sprinting for the front door. Save her. Save her. Save her. J.J.’s voice pounded in Seth’s ears. Terror flooded him – that Regent had already killed his mother, that he had already failed. He didn’t know if the terror belonged to him, or J.J., or both of them. He reached for the knob – The front door opened, onto a blaze of red-and-orange fur. Seth rolled. Claws swiped his scalp, tearing a jagged line from the crown of his head to the nape of his neck. Coming up on all fours just inside the doorway, Seth crouched, every lesson Regent had ever taught him flashing through his mind. Stay alert. Anticipate strikes. Be equally deadly in either skin. Be equally deadly in either skin. 309 Seth leapt onto the bar. As his feet touched down, he skinned. The tiger sprang at him –and the jaguar leapt again, onto Regent’s back, clamping his teeth down on the tiger’s shoulder. He had been aiming for the neck, actually, to snap it, but Regent had taught him that move, and he twisted away just in time. Seth dug his claws into Regent’s sides, hardly aware that the deep-throated snarls rending the air were coming from him. For the first time he understood what it was to be a wild thing, fueled solely by the desire to kill. Regent arched his spine, whipping his shoulders back and forth. Seth was flung free; he crashed into the glass wall around the jungle enclosure – which fractured. For a stomach-dropping second, Seth was freefalling. He crashed into a limb and managed to sink his claws into the soft bark. The tiger landed on the limb above his. If tigers could smirk, Regent was. Seth forced himself to look up, to the lip of the enclosure. There stood Jack Steward, rifle pressed to his shoulder. From where he crouched, Seth could smell the silver powder. It was a tranq gun. So this was it, then. There was nothing to do, nowhere to run. Jack would tranq him, Seth would wake up in a Chimera cell, collared, and his blood would be used to complete the Ark. The Black Swan would be sacrificed, Lemuria would rise from the depths, and Ursula LeRoi would have everything she ever wanted. Seth skinned. He wasn’t sure why. Mostly he just wanted Jack to have to look into his eyes, his human eyes, as he condemned him to a choice between death and enslavement. But Jack was not looking at Seth. He was looking at Regent. More precisely, he was aiming at Regent, who looked as stunned as tiger can look. Jerking the diamond ring off his pinkie finger, Jack threw it at Regent’s snout. It missed, glanced off the tree, and fell into the creek far below, still glittering. “This is for Tommy,” Jack said, and just as the tiger lunged for him, squeezed the trigger. It happened too fast for Seth to have helped Regent, even if he wanted to. There was a human scream, and an animal roar; 310 something warm and wet sprayed Seth’s face; he saw Regent, forced back into his human skin, stumble, yanking the tranq dart from his neck, crushing the slender glass tube to powder in his massive fist. “Cub,” he groaned, as he fell, backward, into the jungle enclosure, crashing through branches on his way to the creek. He landed in a heap on a slab of rock and lay there, facedown, unmoving. Jack had stumbled out of sight. Seth stood up on his branch. Searing pain shot through his head; groping along his scalp, he felt folds of skin separate under his fingers. Claw marks. Regent had gotten him good. Now that his adrenaline was receding, the pain began to register. There would be time to lick his wounds later. Up above, someone was sobbing. Seth crawled up the branches and hoisted himself out onto the floor of the great room. Lydia, wrists and ankles bound with duct tape, was kneeling beside Jack. She wore black cotton pants and a thin tank-top; Regent must have surprised her on her way to yoga class. Tears were pouring down her face. It took a moment for the crimson stain spreading across Jack’s suit jacket to register for Seth. He crawled to them. “Seth?” Lydia blinked like she expected him to disappear. It was how she had looked at Seth the night he had arrived in Fairfax. The enchantments Chimera had placed her under were warring with the reality before her eyes, and Seth was more than a little worried her mind might not be able to handle the shock. “It’s okay, Mrs. Steward,” he said, gently. “Let me get you untied, all right?” He tore the duct tape away with his sharp nails. As soon as her hands were free, Lydia threw her arms around his neck. Seth patted her back. Blood – Regent’s – was crusted around his fingernails, more blood – his own – matting his hair. “Seth, honey, what on Earth – ” “Lydia?” Seth started. He had honestly thought his step-father was dead. Jack’s voice was a weak rasp. Blood from his mangled arm was leeching into the hardwood; the wound was grisly, his right arm connected to his chest only by thin strips of gray tissue. 311 “Lydia,” he said again, with more authority. “There’s a first-aid kit upstairs in the bathroom. Get it for me, please.” “Of course, darling.” Lydia scrambled to her feet, kicking tape away from her ankles, and dashed upstairs. Seth didn’t think any of this was really sinking in for her. She seemed shellshocked. Jack drug himself into a sitting position against the couch, cradling his elbow in his hand. Seth made to pull his T-shirt off, to hold pressure on the wound, but Jack shook his head. His gray eyes were sunk deep into their sockets. “Seth, you need to get out of here. Regent contacted LeRoi. He told her you’re in league with a rogue hunter and likely working for the Resistance. She ordered him to bring you in.” “You know, Jack,” Seth said, “I’d sort of figured that out already.” “But you don’t know – you don’t know who she’s sending for – ” Pain rocked Jack; he grimaced, his face going over from white to gray. Instinctively Seth moved to him, but Jack pushed him away. “I didn’t mean to help you,” he said, harshly. “I told myself I would do anything to save my family. Tell any lie. Commit any crime. Hand over an innocent boy to be tortured and enslaved. I thought – I thought it would be easy. And why shouldn’t it have been? You aren’t anyone to me. You aren’t my child.” He said my child in a whisper, almost to himself. Without wanting to, Seth heard Regent’s words, from what seemed a million years ago. You assumed I would want to save you. You’re used to everybody loving you because of that pretty face. “Then why?” he said, and the hurt in his voice surprised even Seth. Why should he care whether Jack Steward thought of him as his child? Seth had a dad. A dad who had loved him enough to die for him. “Why help me, if I’m no one to you?” “Because I told myself it has to stop. There are things,” Jack’s voice dropped even lower, so that even Seth, with his superb werekin hearing, had to strain to hear, “there are things I won’t do.” About that time the front door flew open, and Marshall stepped inside. This was so unexpected Seth hissed. 312 A step behind Marshall were Emery and Cleo. Emery cried out, but Marshall took one look at the blood pool around Jack and strode over to the sink, where he began scrubbing his hands. “I’ll need gauze to pack the wound,” he said, very matter-of-fact. “Emery, find some.” Emery started for the stairs, staring at Jack over his shoulder. “My mom’s up there,” Seth called after him. “See if she can help.” “Seth.” Cleo had continued toward him, spike heels clicking on the floor. The bone-handled dagger was strapped to her thigh. “Regent,” she said. “Where is he?” Seth pointed to the jungle enclosure. Cleo marched over to the edge and peered down. “Leigh.” Jack shut his eyes. “Marshall, is she – ” “She’s fine.” Marshall knelt beside him and began peeling his suit jacket off. “She’s at my house, with Whitney.” “Seth.” Seth looked up. Cleo was holding a hand out to him. He went to her, somehow already knowing what he would see. What he did not see was Regent. Where he had been lying moments before, seemingly out cold, a thin trail of scarlet drops led away from the creek, across the rocks to an open door in a corner of the jungle enclosure. A door Seth hadn’t even known was there. Regent had pulled the tranq dart out. He probably hadn’t gotten a full dose. The night Snowman had tranqed Seth, he had managed to swim and then crawl nearly six miles, and Regent was ten times tougher than Seth was. Cutting across country, it wasn’t that far to Fort King and its stash of antidote. Seth was sure Regent could make it. Regent had killed Naomi, and someday, Seth planned to pay him back for that. But revenge would have to wait. He had more pressing matters to tend to at the moment. Like saving the Black Swan. And if possible, not dying. For several minutes now, Seth had been aware of distant sounds in the forest around Regent’s house. Cleo looked over at him, her ice-chip eyes silvery-purple. You don’t know who she’s sending, Jack had said. But Seth did. “Stay here,” he ordered Marshall. 313 He followed Cleo out of the house. In the side yard she stopped, her arm pressed against the length of his, eyes fastened on the trees. At first they were only shadows. Then the shadows became shapes, and the shapes became animals: a hyena; two coyotes; a lynx; an otter; a python, slithering through the tall grass; a squirrel; a small brown falcon that lighted, cackling, on the roof; even one enormous bull with velvet-black hide and a gold ring shoved through his nose. Leading the charge was a black jaguar, proud neck circled by an ornate silver collar. “Seth, honey, what are you – ” Lydia had stepped onto the porch. She froze there, staring, as the black jaguar leapt from the nearest sycamore. He skinned as his paws touched the ground. On a shimmer of air the jaguar disappeared, and a seventeen-year-old boy with golden hair clipped short around his ears, golden eyes that dominated his wedge-shaped face, was walking toward them. He wore black camo pants and a black T-shirt, a torc around his neck, and a crooked, feral smirk. Lydia gasped. Clutching a towel soaked in Jack Steward’s blood, she stumbled to the railing, her lips moving soundlessly around two letters. J.J. The sight of Seth’s twin, alive, punched a hole right through the glass cage Chimera had erected around Lydia Steward. If J.J. was alive, he couldn’t be dead, and every lie Jack had pushed on her for the last seventeen years, about himself, about his work, about Thomas Sullivan, was based on that original deception. Cracks spiraled outward from that initial blow. Seth could only watch as the enchantment fractured. He thought his mother would fracture with it, shatter like one of the crystal vases in their living room. Instead, she hardened. Fury melted down the broken pieces of her life, the ways glaziers superheat glass, softening it to be twisted into new shapes; those pieces coalesced into a steel core, and Seth’s mother, Supermom Goddess, lifted her chin, eyes blazing, and stalked back into the house, flinging the bloody towel into Jack’s face with an impressive string of curses. Seth turned back around. 314 The Haven Heights kids had skinned at the tree line, where they stopped, grouping up behind Alfaro. J.J. kept walking. Seth heard an engine cut off, heard footsteps pounding across the yard in his direction, but he didn’t take his eyes off his twin as Quinn O’Shea slid to a stop beside him. “It’s okay, Sullivan,” she said, breathlessly. “He’s with us. Resistance. Ms. McLain just called me. She has it on the authority of Ben Schofield himself.” Seth looked at J.J. “Is that true? Are you Resistance?” J.J. tilted his head to one side, his smirk sliding with it. It was like looking into a mirror. “What,” he said, “no hug?” 315 Chapter Twenty-Five: Morituri te Salutant “Are you a Healer?” J.J. asked. “First responder training,” Marshall replied, tersely. “I’m an Eagle Scout.” Of course, Seth thought. In the backseat of the Audi, Seth was sandwiched between J.J. and Cleo, who was trying not to crowd Marshall as he strapped Jack’s mangled arm against his side to stabilize it. Emery had found a stash of healing potion in Regent’s bedroom; the bleeding had slowed considerably since Marshall had tipped it down Jack’s throat, although Seth’s step-father was still rigid with pain. Emery had taken the wheel. Perched in the passenger’s seat, knees drawn up under his chin, was Dre Alfaro, tapping away furiously on his old MacBook. The Audi was racing south, following the sunset toward Fort King. The rest of their comrades had divided up between Quinn’s battered Jeep and Regent’s Hummer – driven, to Seth’s amusement, by Lydia. Dre slapped his MacBook closed. “Captain McLain is on site,” he announced. “The Resistance is ready to storm the fort.” J.J. braced his boots against the seatback. Cleo seemed to be avoiding eye contact with him. Seth was a little worried about her. She looked…the only word that came to mind was unmoored, and he couldn’t figure out why. J.J. being on their side was a positive development, wasn’t it? “Did he say how many hunters LeRoi has inside?” she asked. “A lot,” said Dre. Emery’s knuckles were white on the wheel. “Not that it matters. Once we’re inside, we won’t be able to skin, because of the wards.” J.J. laid his head back on the seat, smirking at Cleo around Seth’s shoulder. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” “Paris,” they said together. A smile touched Cleo’s lips, flitting away before it could take hold. “J.J. – ” “I know.” J.J. looked out the window again, at the telephone poles flying by so fast they blurred. Cleo’s lips sealed into a frown. 316 Seth was rooting for those two crazy kids, he really was, but seeing as how they were on the brink of a battle… “Can’t Agathon take down the wards?” he asked. “Oh, that’s right.” J.J. turned back to him. “You met Agathon. What did you think of him?” “He was okay. I like his antennae.” Seth made wiggly antennae fingers at his temples. J.J. grinned. Cleo smashed her lips together, ready to burst with whatever she wasn’t saying. “This is it!” Dre suddenly chirped, and Emery swerved, narrowly making the turn onto the gravel access road he had almost flown right by. “Easy, Bunny Bread,” Cleo snapped, as Jack groaned, and Seth was thrown sideways, into J.J. Hands gripped his arms. A shock passed through Seth’s body, like he had grabbed a live wire. We’ll get Ben back. I promise. Seth blinked. In the front seat, Emery was still talking – J.J. hadn’t spoken aloud. Seth rubbed his tingling arm. Twin telepathy. Wicked. Everything was happening so fast. Seth felt dazed, unable to really process that they were on their way to a war zone. A grassy field whizzed by on their right, hazed by the dust the Audi was kicking up. Marshall finished tying off the bandage on Jack’s arm and sat back. “I hate to be the one to say it,” he said, “but if Chimera knows you’re planning to attack, won’t they just kill the Black Swan to keep you from freeing her and using her blood to raise Lemuria? It seems to me she’s a pretty big threat to them.” “Sure she is,” J.J. said, evenly. He seemed unfazed by all of the action. Seth was curious how many battles J.J. had seen. “Every werekin alive is a threat to them, but they still try to collar us if they can. Our power is only dangerous if LeRoi can’t control it. It’s why she kept Agathon and the other Gen-0s alive, against the Partners’ orders to destroy them. It’s why she keeps me alive, and Seth, and the Black Swan is more valuable than either of us. If LeRoi kills her, another may never be born. And without the Black Swan, there is no way to raise Lemuria. LeRoi won’t give up on that dream easily. Harnessing the power of the Totems is her obsession. Anyway,” he said, “she still believes 317 I’m on her side. A spy for Chimera, leading the Resistance into a death trap.” He fingered the runes on his collar. Seth, who couldn’t seem to stop cataloguing these small details about his twin, noticed that his right palm was branded, the backs of both of his hands scarred with faded, lacelike patterns, as though someone had pressed them into broken glass. Glass wouldn’t have scarred a werekin, though. Their injuries healed completely, unless made by silver. Marshall kept looking at J.J., too. The blue of his eyes matched the blue of the sky Seth could see through the windshield. Something in them made Seth uneasy. “J.J., how did you know Regent had kidnapped Lydia?” Seth asked. “Did LeRoi tell you he was going to?” “No,” J.J. said. “The cat told me.” At first Seth thought he was making a joke, like, A little bird told me. Then he realized J.J. was serious. “What cat?” he asked, bewildered. “Your cat. Poe, I think Adleigh named her.” Seth stared at him. “You’ve been talking to my cat?” “She’s not just a cat,” J.J. said. “She’s a familiar. I sent her to keep tabs on you in Fairfax. I knew Adleigh would take her in. She can’t resist strays.” Seth’s lips parted. “You – you used my cat to spy on me?” “I’m not a twenty-four hour psychic channel,” J.J. said, in his defense. “Sometimes I have to sleep. I needed eyes and ears on the outside.” Seth tried to remember if he had done anything embarrassing in front of Poe, like picking his nose. She had witnessed his make-out session with Marshall that morning. He snuck a glance at Marshall. His scarlet cheeks suggested he was thinking the same thing. J.J. winked at him. Looked like coming out to his twin wouldn’t be necessary. “We’re here,” Emery announced. The Audi slowed. Up ahead, cars were pulled off to either side of the gravel road, offering a clear view of a collapsed bridge blocked by a ROAD CLOSED sign. To their left, Fort King gazed down malevolently on the Resistance convoy. Emery looked at J.J. “The Gen-0s will help us, won’t they?” 318 “Sure.” J.J.’s smile was brittle. “As much as they can.” *** In Philly, the Resistance had recruited from the Underground in rundown pubs and back alleys. Seth had stayed away from the fighters – one of the only edicts Naomi had issued that he had actually obeyed. He had observed them from afar nonetheless, impressed by their commitment to what most considered a hopeless cause. They had carried about them a mystique, like comic book superheroes battling the forces of darkness. So he had thought then. Now he saw a group of men and women battered by a lifetime of war. Their vehicles were jalopies: a bucket-of-rust Camaro with bald tires and a peeling paint job; a yellow van with a faded Lucky Dragon Chinese Restaurant logo on the side; a primer-painted Ford Ranger. Their clothes were secondhand and travel-stained. One woman, tall, with a mane of black hair, wore mismatched shoes, as though she had lost one somewhere and picked another up at random to replace it. Underground, werekin lived off the grid, eking by on the fringes of human society. Seth knew what it meant to go to bed hungry, to read by candlelight because they couldn’t pay the electric bill. Even so, those in the Underground had it easier than Resistance fighters. The Resistance had no headquarters, no home base – they were guerilla fighters, constantly on the move, relentlessly hunted. The Littles, with their apartment and their store, were anomalies, because Chimera didn’t know they were Resistance. Small wonder Naomi and Ben had tried to keep Seth from joining up. They had wanted more for him than this. Seth was sitting with J.J. on the hood of Quinn’s Jeep, swinging his legs and munching on the candy bars Dre had thoughtfully provided. Marshall had insisted on cleaning the claw marks on Seth’s scalp, despite Seth’s assurances that they would heal on their own; he knelt behind him, swiping an antiseptic-soaked cotton ball through his hair and growling at him to hold still. Emery was pacing, shooting anxious glances at Melody and McLain, who were conferring near the bridge with a 319 group of Resistance fighters that now appeared to include Seth’s mother. Afternoon shadows swayed beneath the evergreens. Dusk was coming up fast; the sun was a brilliant orange disc in the west, sinking steadily into the horizon. Resistance fighters scrambled around, passing one another weapons that had been stashed in trunks or hidden under seats. Mixed in with the nightsticks, switchblades, and brass knuckles were crossbows, battle axes, throwing stars, tomahawks, even samurai swords. No guns. Werekin preferred to fight with their hands. Shoot a deer in the woods, she can’t shoot back, the logic went. Melody Little wore a bomber jacket over her faded bell bottoms, her long hair braided down the center of her back. Never before or since had there been a more hardcore weremouse. Seth had seen her stick a pair of brass knuckles in her pocket, and the handle of a long knife poked out of her boot. She and McLain were arguing with a rangy young man in old jeans and a much-worn flannel shirt. He would have been handsome if not for the swirling scars masking his cheeks. Silver powder burns. Melody’s voice rose to a high-pitched squeak. Emery’s nose wiggled. He looked queasy. “How can you eat right now?” he demanded. Seth shrugged. He could always eat. J.J. popped the last of his candy bar in his mouth, smearing chocolate across his bottom lip. It was the first thing he had done that made him look like a teenager. It was the first thing he had done that made him look human. “I wish they’d hurry up,” Emery muttered. “Don’t skin, Bunny Bread,” Cleo said. She was stretched out on the ground, head pillowed on Seth’s jacket. “What? Oh.” Emery realized tufts of white fur were sticking out of his ears and drew in a deep, calming breath. “Finished,” Marshall declared. Snapping the first-aid kit closed, he sat down on the hood beside Seth. “What’s that about?” he asked. He nodded his chin at the brewing argument between Melody, McLain, and the wolfish man. Even Jack had limped over to join in, bandaged arm cradled to his chest. “They don’t want to fight,” J.J. said. He didn’t sound surprised. 320 Emery stopped pacing. “Of course they’ll fight. That’s why they came here.” “No,” J.J. said. “They came here to decide if they would fight, or if they can justify running away, like usual.” His bland contempt for the Resistance was obvious. Emery’s ears twitched. “What would you know about it?” he said. “More than you, I expect.” J.J. leaned back on his elbows, his expression, like his tone, unruffled. The Haven kids, scattered around the Jeep, had almost unconsciously placed him at their center – their pack alpha. Even Angelo Alfaro was listening to him, one huge arm draped around Dre’s shoulders. Quinn O’Shea, sitting cross-legged next to their werehyena Ozzie Harris, had yet to take those sly blue eyes off of him. “The Resistance nibbles at Chimera. But every time they have a chance to take a big bite, they back off. Play it safe.” Like the letter Thomas had written to Ben, begging the Resistance to come after the Ark. Seth surveyed the fighters apprehensively. Here they were, poised to assault, cooling their heels as they awaited the outcome of the Commanders’ debate. Ben was inside that fort. Seth was not leaving him to be tortured and killed. He would go in alone, if he had to, but he was going in. A hand touched his arm. You won’t be alone. I promised you. We’ll get him back. Seth swung around, gaping at J.J. “You can read my mind?” He had no idea why he said that out loud. “No need. You’re not that hard to read, little brother,” J.J. said. Cleo muttered what sounded like “told you so,” to the sky. Seth made a face at her. “Well,” J.J. leapt lightly off the hood, smoothing wrinkles out of his T-shirt, “if you’ll excuse me, I have to go start a war.” *** The wolfish man’s name was Derek Childers. Emery said he was one of the newest Commanders, a decorated fighter infamous for especially brutal interrogation techniques. From what Seth could overhear, his opposition to storming the fort was, essentially, that their plan relied on McLain keeping his 321 word that Agathon would remove the wards. If Agathon didn’t, and the wards remained in place, the werekin would not be able to skin, nor would they be able to access the preternatural speed, strength, and agility that made them such fierce warriors, even in their human skins. “How else do you propose we rescue the Black Swan,” Melody stormed, “if we don’t go in there and take her by force? Do you think Chimera is going to be so terrified of us they’ll simply hand her over?” Derek leaned back against the rusted Camaro, arms crossed. “It’s a trap, Mel. Chimera is luring us in, and once we’re in there, helpless, unable to skin, they’ll send their hunters in, along with his men,” he jerked his head in McLain’s direction, “and collar us.” “Derek is right,” seconded a petite, copper-haired woman who could only have been Quinn’s mother. “If Captain McLain really is on our side, why doesn’t he just order his men to bring the Black Swan out here to us?” “Because Ursula LeRoi is inside that fort, and she will kill any living soul who tries to take the Black Swan from her.” The chatter quieted as the assembled werekin, nearly a hundred strong, turned to stare at the boy who had spoken. J.J. jumped up on the ROAD CLOSED sign. Outlined by the fiery sunset, he looked like a wild thing, muscles tensed as though he might spring at the slightest provocation. “McLain and his men will help us. So will the Gen-0. But they won’t make it past LeRoi’s hunters with the Black Swan on their own. This is our fight. Either the werekin stand up to Chimera, or we crawl back home and accept being slaves. And I am telling you, if you walk away now, the Resistance will never have another chance like this to take down LeRoi and seize control of the Ark.” J.J. was good, Seth thought. Resistance fighters were trading glances with one another, nodding in agreement. Derek Childers stepped forward. “I don’t know what chance you think we have,” he said, scathingly. “We don’t exactly have the element of surprise here.” “You don’t need the element of surprise,” J.J. said, very patiently, like he was explaining something extremely simple to 322 a small child. “LeRoi may know we’re here, but she can’t do anything about it. She can’t spirit the Ark or the Black Swan away while we have her cornered. She doesn’t have time to call in reinforcements. If we act, here and now, we can crush her, once and for all.” He closed his fist around empty air, as though squeezing the life out of Chimera. Seth looked around. There was a gleam in the eyes of his kindred. Stronger than fear was their desire to land a death-blow to Chimera. Derek opened his mouth again, but Marshall stood up on the hood. Amidst the battered fighters, he looked terrifically out of place in his letterman’s jacket. “Or it could be that you’re bringing Ursula LeRoi everything she wants – the Resistance, the Black Swan, and the blood of the Jaguar Clan,” he said. “What proof do we have that you aren’t still working for Chimera?” “Marshall,” Seth hissed, mortified. He glanced at Cleo, expecting her to leap to J.J.’s defense. But Cleo was still stretched out on the grass, eyes closed, her complexion puttycolored. He wasn’t even sure she was awake. Looked like it was up to Seth. Nervously, he rose. “I trust J.J.,” he said. “I don’t need any proof.” Ostensibly he was talking to the Resistance, but he needed Marshall to understand this, too. J.J. was Seth’s blood. His other half. Seth believed in him, completely. He realized it made no sense. Seth didn’t know J.J. Couldn’t have told you his favorite flavor of ice cream, or what books he had read, or if he even read books. Their connection was deeper than that. Under the skin. It had always been there. Seth was just beginning to understand that now. He simply hadn’t known what it meant, this tether, for he hadn’t known until now that J.J. existed to be tethered to. Marshall turned on him, exasperated. “Seth, he’s collared. How can he fight against Chimera collared? Won’t LeRoi just kill him?” We are prepared to die. We will fight on the side of the Black Swan. 323 Slowly, Seth looked from Marshall to J.J. Horror was lapping at his insides, rising steadily from his toes to his heart, which seemed to have stopped. Most of the Resistance fighters looked at the ground. Dre tucked his head against his shoulder like he was tucking it under his wing. Even the pallor of Lydia’s cheeks said she understood. J.J. held his chin high above the silver torc. “LeRoi trusts me. She won’t use the collar against me until she sees my betrayal with her own eyes. I should be able to help you free the Black Swan before then, if we hurry.” His voice did not quaver. He might have been discussing a stranger’s death. Cleo had opened her eyes. They were empty, unseeing. Seth understood now, why she had been so devastated by J.J.’s shift in allegiance. They couldn’t remove his collar; they didn’t have the key. Ursula LeRoi would drain his life away, and nothing any of them could do would stop her. *** “J.J., this can’t be the only way,” Seth said. “It’s not,” J.J. agreed. He was strapping throwing stars to his belt; all around them, fighters were making final preparations for the assault, selecting weapons, buckling on armor. Quinn offered him the bow he had laid down beside the Jeep, but J.J. motioned for her to take it, patting the knife sheathed at his hip. “The other way is that I fight against you, on Chimera’s side, and either you kill me, or I kill you, and LeRoi’s hunters will slaughter every other werekin here while we’re having at one another.” “Jesus,” Marshall muttered. J.J. rolled his eyes. “Don’t worry, Doc. I already have a tombstone. That should simplify things.” He laid his hands on Seth’s shoulders. “Look, Seth, a lot of us are going to die here tonight. This is war. I’ve accepted it. If you’re coming with us, you need to accept that you could die, too.” He backed away, holding up a hand with his fingers spread. “We go in five. Be ready.” How did you get ready for a battle? Seth just wanted to get it over with. 324 McLain was suiting up at the back of the Camaro, doublechecking that his assault rifle was locked and loaded. Lydia and Jack were sitting on the hood of the Hummer, talking to one another in low tones. (Seth hoped his mother wasn’t armed.) Alfaro huddled up with J.J. and Cleo over by the bridge; his beaded dreads swung as they turned, together, to look up the hill. J.J. gestured with his hands, miming a battering ram striking a wall. Alfaro nodded. “Angelo is always our muscle.” Seth looked over at Quinn. She had discarded her Lady Knights hoodie. J.J.’s bow and quiver of arrows were strapped across the back of her tank top, her fleece athletic pants tucked into her Skechers. Her hair was the brightest thing in the gathering dark. “You’re not werekin, are you?” Seth said. Quinn shook her head. It had taken Seth until today to work it out – why Quinn didn’t quite fit with the other Haven kids. None of them had bothered glamouring themselves for the battle. Their blood called to Seth’s. Quinn’s didn’t. She pointed at the redheaded Commander. “That’s my mom. Josephine. She was a Gen-3, born in captivity. Chimera paid for her education, let her live in the human world. Then I was born. Human.” Seth didn’t know what to say. I’m sorry didn’t seem right; how could he be sorry that Quinn hadn’t been raised in a cage, trained to kill her own kind, bred like a prize cow? But he could tell she was sorry. He had never considered before how it would feel to not be chosen by the Totems. “What about Angelo and Dre?” he asked. “Dre’s parents are registered. So is he. Angelo’s mother was registered, but she went Underground to hide him, like your dad did with you, when he was born a warrior breed. After she died, the Alfaros took him in. Ms. McLain set the adoption up, helped keep him off the grid.” “That’s why he didn’t come to the Sacred Heart game,” Seth said, “isn’t it?” Quinn nodded. “We couldn’t risk General Burke seeing him. Angelo is like you. Not very good at flying under the radar.” “It’s a warrior thing,” Seth said. 325 “It’s a boy thing,” Quinn said. “All brawn and no brains. And on that note,” she pushed off the side of the Jeep, “I think I’ll go see if I can’t figure out a way to save your brother’s life.” She sauntered off through the tangle of cars and fighters, toward Emery and Dre. True dark had set in now. Marshall’s skin looked gray in the starlight. He was standing nearby, having listened quietly to Quinn and Seth’s exchange. He held out a hand, and Seth let him draw him in until his forehead rested against his shoulder. “Promise me you’ll stay outside, Indiana,” he said. “Promise me you’ll come back out,” Marshall retorted. Seth sighed. Melody whistled – their signal to form up. There were many things Seth wanted to say, to Marshall, to Lydia, to J.J., but there was no time. He bumped his fist against Marshall’s, blew his mother a kiss, and trotted over to the others. J.J. grinned at him. He looked amped, golden eyes the color of syrup, and exceptionally round. “Homo homini lupus,” he said. “Man is a wolf to man,” Seth translated. “Really? We’re marching to our doom and you’re quoting Dr. Zhivago?” “Actually,” J.J. said, “I was quoting Plautus.” “How about this,” chirped a small voice. Seth glanced over. Dre was planted at J.J.’s elbow, his fringe of bangs hanging over his eyes under his newsboy cap. He looked about twelve. “Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus.” J.J. wrinkled his nose. “Never tickle a sleeping dragon?” “It is the motto of Hogwarts,” Ozzie Harris volunteered. “I’ve got one,” Cleo said. “Morituri te salutant.” We who are about to die, salute you. Melody whistled again. Seth looked back once more at Marshall. Their eyes met for a fraction of a second. Then, as one, the werekin army plunged into the trees, and marched up the hill. 326 Chapter Twenty-Six: Mortal Combat If a bird had been circling above Fort King in the crisp twilight (as one probably was, had anybody bothered to take note) this is what it would have seen. A hundred men and women, raggedly dressed in frayed jeans and patched coats, streaming out of the trees, charging straight at the bristling line of hunters in black leather arrayed before the fort’s front entrance. The hunters were armed with knives and whips and pistols. They should have used rifles, or better yet manned the gun turrets on the roof, picking off the Resistance fighters as they crested the hill. But Ursula LeRoi, who, like a bird in the sky, was watching the scene unfold from behind the bullet-proof glass of one of the prison’s tallest towers, trusted her wards to keep the werekin helpless, trapped in their human skins. She trusted the warrior she had shot like an arrow into their hearts. Nothing she saw in the Resistance’s front line made her question that. “Go!” McLain yelled. “Now! Go!” J.J. Sullivan poured on a burst of speed, outpacing his twin by half a step. Still, Seth was right beside him as their ranks parted, clearing a path for them. The monstrous fountain loomed up, and at the same instant, as though they had rehearsed it, the brothers skinned. The man beside LeRoi shifted his weight. He was a pudgy, balding man with an almost comical overbite. LeRoi found his company distasteful, but like all men of mediocre talent and tremendous ambition, Aaron Gideon had his uses. “Shall I call General Burke, madam?” he simpered. “No.” LeRoi’s voice cut like a blade of ice. Gideon swallowed loudly, his muddy-brown eyes bulging behind his thick, square glasses. LeRoi turned from the window. The small, silver key nestled in the hollow of her throat seemed to pulse. “No need to disturb the Partners, Dr. Gideon. I can handle this myself.” *** 327 As the jaguars cleared the fountain, the momentary confusion on the hunters’ faces morphed into stark horror, realization sinking in – the wards had failed. Surrounded by his kin, Seth streaked after them as they fled back inside the prison, his roars adding to the chorus of growls and snarls, howls and screams. Some of the hunters split off, up the staircases to the prison’s upper levels. Most were forced straight back, toward the rotunda. Seth barely had time to take in the liquid-black walls, the harsh amber lights; an alarm had begun to blare, and he caught a glimpse of the Birdcage inside the rotunda – right before a set of steel doors slammed shut, sealing it off. “Caroline!” McLain shouted, racing headlong at the doors like he meant to shoulder them open. At the last second, he was forced to duck down behind an unmanned guard station as the hunters on the balconies opened fire. More hunters were appearing on the catwalks, funneling down the stairs into the wide, high-ceilinged corridor. A gorillasized man rushed Seth, slashing a serrated dagger at his midsection. Seth sucked his stomach into his spine – the blade nicked his belt loop – and pivoted, slashing his claw-tipped nails across the hunter’s throat. Gigantor fell, adding to the blood spackling the floor. “Nice,” J.J. grinned. He and Emery were on either side of Seth, Emery bashing heads with a quarterstaff, J.J. fighting with whatever came to hand. He had already loosed all of his throwing stars and traded a morning star-style mace for a pair of nun chucks that whistled around his blonde head, felling any hunter insane enough to charge him. Bullets whizzed everywhere, ricocheting off the walls and floor, filling the air with the burning scent of silver. Quinn had taken shelter with McLain and was picking hunters off the walkways one at a time with her feathered arrows. A hand clapped Seth’s shoulder. He hissed – but it was only Cleo. “Come on, sweetheart,” she said. “You’re with me.” She whistled to Emery. As he and a half-dozen other werekin broke off from the main group, pelting behind her down a side hallway that twisted deeper into the labyrinthine prison, Seth saw J.J. striding toward the steel doors, shouting, “Alfaro! Where’s the bull? Get him up here!” 328 There was a bellow, and a velvet-skinned bull charged down the corridor, hooves clop-clopping on the stone. McLain shoved Quinn behind him. Just as Seth turned the corner, he saw Alfaro ram into the doors with his horns, cracking the hinges. Then he was running, on Cleo’s heels as she surged into a circle of hunters in front of a set of glass doors. On the other side, Seth recognized the cellblock Agathon had led them through the night before. His heart flipped over in his chest. Ben. “AAARRGGGHHH!” A hunter with a burn scar waxing his cheek ran at Seth, screaming a battle cry. Seth cartwheeled to the side; the hunter’s battle axe chopped into the floor, with such force it stuck in the stone. Waxman yanked a pistol off his belt and leveled it at Seth’s heart, smiling wolfishly. Seth smiled right back. Scissor-kicked him in the head, skinned, and came down on Waxman’s chest, sinking his teeth into his neck. Waxman gurgled, then lay still. “Not bad, sweetheart,” Cleo said, as Seth skinned back into a human. She was at the keypad beside the doors, punching in a code on the glyph-keys. The red light above the doors blinked over to green. Cleo snagged a ring of silver keys off Waxman’s belt and started pitching keys to the werekin. “The cells should be unlocked now. Take off their collars, and send anybody who isn’t willing or able to fight out the back door.” She pitched a key to Seth. He didn’t have to ask whose collar it unlocked. At a sprint, he took off down the corridor. A burly man with salt-and-pepper hair was stumbling out of the cell at the very end, scratching his grizzled beard as though puzzled to find himself free. Seth grabbed him around the waist with a cry. Ben Schofield staggered; Seth’s arms didn’t even fit all the way around him. Seth remembered, with a pinch in his throat, how it had felt to be a little boy riding on Ben’s shoulders. Like he was sitting on top of a mountain. He tipped his face up. Ben patted the top of his head with one massive paw. “’Bout time you got here, runt. Started to think you forgot about me.” “We’re rescuing the Black Swan, too,” Seth said. 329 Ben swore, his Louisiana drawl thick enough to cut with a knife. “Stars almighty, I get penned up a few days and the planets realign. How’d LeRoi get her hands on the Black Swan?” “I hate to tell you this, Papa Bear,” said Seth, stretching up on tiptoe to fit the key into Ben’s collar, “but you’ve been penned up for more like a few weeks.” Ben swore again. As the collar popped off, a ripple moved under Ben’s skin. Rescued werekin were rushing past them, toward the side entrance. Some were just little kids, not even old enough to be in school. Seth didn’t want to think about what had happened to their parents. Dre was ushering them outside, to where Lydia was pointing them down the hill to safety. She had scrounged up a camouflage jacket somewhere. “Ben, you should go with them,” Seth said. “You’re hurt.” “And miss my chance to see the Black Swan?” Under his layer of bruises, Ben grinned, one of his cheek-busting grins. “Been waitin’ my whole life for that. Let’s go.” *** Cleo led them back to the rotunda by a different route. The prison was a maze of sky-walks and staircases, but she never faltered in choosing a path; by the time they came out on the second-floor catwalk, looking down at the Birdcage, the Resistance had broken through. Less than a dozen hunters remained, circled around the checkered-glass cage in the center of the room. Out of bullets, they were facing the werekin hoard with knives and whips. The tables from Chimera’s victory feast had been removed. The rotunda looked stark without them, a killing field littered with bodies, hunter and werekin. The Black Swan had her hands pressed to the glass, dark eyes darting around the room as though searching for someone. She was speaking – Seth could see her mouth moving – but the cage was soundproof. No words came through. Automatically, Seth looked for J.J. To his relief, he spotted him standing with Quinn. The collar around his neck cast a bruise-like shadow on the fair skin of his throat as he turned, 330 watching itty-bitty Melody Little stride to the front of the werekin ranks. “Put down your weapons,” she squeaked, “surrender to us, and we will grant you quarter!” “No!” yelled a tawny-haired man Seth had seen skin into a cougar. Hatred shone in his yellow cat’s eyes. “Hunters don’t deserve mercy. They track us down, collar us, enslave us – ” “They were tortured, too.” J.J.’s voice was quiet, yet it carried easily around the rotunda. “Hunters are forced to serve Chimera, same as we are. They didn’t ask to be what they are.” Cleo caught her breath. “You have my word,” Melody promised the hunters, “that if you lay down your arms, you will not be – ” One of the hunters, a gray-haired man with a buzz cut and a missing right ear, aimed his crossbow at Melody’s heart. “Bestiarii never surrender,” he growled. And then, he yelped. The pane of glass behind him had begun to ripple, as though the Birdcage were made of water. Seth’s brain struggled to process what it was seeing. How could glass move, separating from itself, the panels coalescing into a tall, distinct shape? How could the shape change color, from checkered squares of white and black to mottled bluish-gray? Only as onyx eyes appeared did Seth finally understand: One of the Gen-0 had been standing in front of the Birdcage all along, chameleon skin blending perfectly with the multicolored panes. He was massive. Naked to the waist, wearing a long kilt the color of fresh moss, bald head and bare chest scrolled with tattoos of scarlet glyphs. A lizard tail coiled around his webbed feet. Lizardman’s forked tongue flicked out, as if tasting the terror on the hunters’ faces. He raised his hands. The glyphs on his chest fired as though newly-branded. Hunters screamed. A rush of warm air swept through the rotunda; when it cleared, eleven columns of black ash crumbled into oily piles at Lizardman’s feet. Emery squeaked. “What is that?” “Xanthe,” Dre chirped. He was leaning on the railing, looking delighted. “He’s a Gen-0.” When everyone turned to 331 stare at him, he shrugged. “What? I hacked into Project Ark’s files like two years ago.” Seth really liked this kid. “Come on, young’uns.” Ben hoisted his bulk onto the rail. “Let’s get down there.” They all jumped, even Cleo, who had a disconcertingly catlike ability to land on her feet. Dre skinned, and the small brown falcon soared neatly down to the rotunda floor. McLain had rushed forward, hands pressed to the outside of the Black Swan’s cage. The young girl inside laid her palms on the glass, matching them up with his. “We’re getting you out,” McLain promised. “Just hold on. We’re getting you out.” “Where’s Agathon?” Seth asked, of no one in particular. And no one answered, for just then, a gust of wind stirred the air. McLain’s eyes flew to the ceiling. “Take cover!” he shouted. Seth made to turn, expecting snipers to be lining the balconies, but Cleo tackled him, flattening him under her. Seth twisted, peeking out around her elbow, looking for J.J – There he was, throwing Emery behind one of the staircases, Quinn’s hair flashing as she pushed them both behind her. Ben had Dre and Melody, each tucked under one arm. Something was falling from the sky, a sparkling cloud tinged with a metallic scent that stood Seth’s hair on end. And he remembered. The vent in the ceiling, programmed to release silver powder if anyone touched the Birdcage. Silver powder burned the skin right off of werekin. Fighters were diving left and right. There was a bellow, and Seth saw sparks strike off the obsidian floor as Alfaro, in his animal skin, charged at the bank of barred windows. McLain shouted at him – “Take cover!” – but Alfaro, bellowing louder as the silver powder struck his flanks, slammed straight into the glass. The bars burst apart. Panes crashed down, a waterfall of jagged shards. The noise was deafening. Cleo curled tighter around Seth, shielding him with her body as night air swept through the rotunda, sweeping the poisonous cloud out the doors at the far end. Outside on the terrace, Alfaro clambered to his feet, shaking glass and silver powder out of his dreadlocks – cut and blistered, but alive, and grinning. 332 Until a shadow passed over them. Cleo rolled off of Seth, into a fighter’s stance, ready to pounce. “Wait,” Seth said, catching her arm, as the shadow flew down from the catwalk and glided harmlessly over their heads, landing in a rustle of black robes and membranous wings beside the Birdcage. It was Agathon. Quite calmly, he raised one powerful fist above his head and brought it down on the dome. The Birdcage shattered into a million pieces. Cries of victory rang out all around the rotunda. McLain was the first one to leap over the broken glass. The Black Swan rose, shaking glass out of her glossy black hair, and placed her hands in his. “Will,” Seth thought he heard her say, in a soft, musical voice. McLain beckoned to Agathon. The girl threw McLain a questioning look; he nodded, grimly, and she bit her lip as she stepped into Agathon’s open arms. She looked tiny cradled against his chest. Running footsteps were drawing nearer, down the corridor, along the catwalks. Resistance fighters began to pull together in the center of the room, forming ranks around their fallen kindred. The fight was not over. Ben was growling orders. Seth saw J.J. pull Emery out from under the stairs. His golden eyes met Agathon’s across the room. Some wordless communiqué passed between them, and Seth had the sudden, uncomfortable feeling they were agreeing to a plan no one else was privy to. The other Gen-0, Lizardman, had disappeared. Agathon lifted into the air. The Black Swan cried out and clung tighter to his neck. “Will!” McLain’s features might have been etched from stone. “Go,” he commanded, hoarsely. “Get her out of here, Agathon. Take her somewhere safe.” Agathon dipped his head. With a flutter of wings, he soared out into the night, a dark shadow passing across the full moon. Not a single werekin moved. Ursula LeRoi had just glided into the room, flanked by a dozen hunters, and twice as many Marines. 333 *** “These are my terms,” LeRoi said. She stood on the dais where J.J. had lain during Chimera’s victory feast, hands in the pockets of her white lab coat. Her hunters ringed the room, rifles trained on the sixty or so surviving werekin. Seth stood beside J.J. Cleo was anchored on his twin’s other side. The Marines had not budged from the doorway. Their gazes were fixed on McLain. LeRoi went on, smoothly. “Every werekin in this building will submit to being collared. You,” she flicked her fingers at McLain like she was brushing lint off her sleeve, “will surrender to General Burke for court martial. If you tell me where you have taken the Black Swan, I will see to it that your sentence is commuted from death to life in prison. Agree to these terms, and most of you,” she glanced at J.J., “will live. Refuse, and we will exterminate you all.” “With all due respect, Dr. LeRoi,” McLain said, “you can take your terms and go straight to hell.” Seth expected her to order her men to shoot him. Instead, LeRoi’s full lips melted into a smile. “Tempting, to become attached to these creatures, isn’t it, Captain?” Her fingers dipped inside the collar of her lab coat, sliding along a delicate gold chain. J.J. tensed. “Tempting, to believe their pretense of affection is genuine – that, were they free to do as they chose, they would love you, as you have loved them. But they are not of our kind, Captain. They are not even of this Earth. As I told Elijah Bishop, if we do not conquer them, they will conquer us.” McLain looked like he was about to drop the “with all due respect” part from his next reply. But before he could say anything, Emery Little broke from the werekin ranks. He had lost his denim jacket somewhere; his arms were peppered with burns from the silver powder. Yet he did not flinch as he stared down LeRoi. “You may have resurrected us, Doctor, but you know nothing about werekin. We will never consent to be collared. The Black Swan is beyond your reach now, and someday, she will finish you. If it’s my last wish on this earth, I wish that she sends you back to whatever pit it is that spawned you.” 334 Then Emery did the most unexpected thing imaginable. He skinned. LeRoi screeched. The cotton-tailed bunny had shot across the floor – straight up the leg of her pants. A small pink nose popped out beside her ear, only to vanish again; LeRoi slapped at her chest, trying to swat the bulge moving down the front of her shirt. The hunters were too stunned to help her. Seth was stunned himself. What was Emery doing? The rabbit shot out of LeRoi’s pants and off across the floor again. Something small, shiny, and silver was clutched in his teeth. “Dre!” Quinn shouted. “Now, Dre, do it now!” LeRoi grabbed her throat. Her face went from white to purple in a heartbeat. “Stop him!” she screamed. Hunters scrambled to train their rifles on the bunny. From the corner of his eye, Seth saw Dre skin, soaring up toward the rafters. LeRoi lifted her hands, crying out a spell in a language that spoke directly to the magic in Seth’s blood, like a live wire had been connected to his heart. He thought for a second she was cursing Dre right out of the sky, and he started to shout at Quinn for putting him in harm’s way; but then the collar around J.J.’s neck began to glow, and Seth realized what LeRoi was doing, and what Emery had stolen from her. On a scream of pure agony, J.J. dropped to his knees, spine arching as pain spiked through him. Seth felt that pain in his bones, as though the marrow had been turned to scalding lava. He slumped into Ben. “J.J.!” he screamed. The hunters were taking aim at the rabbit. In a blink, Emery skinned; he threw up his hand, and something swooped down toward it; bullets ricocheted off the floor and walls, but the small brown falcon weaved through them, making for Cleo; her hand shot out; Dre’s beak opened; the key – the key to J.J.’s collar, nicked right off LeRoi’s neck – tumbled, as if in slow motion, through the air… …right into Cleo’s palm. The rotunda had erupted into pandemonium. Enraged, the werekin ranks charged the hunters. Xanthe the Lizardman appeared from seemingly out of nowhere and lifted his hands, casting silent spells that rumbled the walls, burning hunters to 335 ash where they stood. The Marines rushed in – but instead of opening fire on the werekin, they began picking off hunters. Seth was only distantly aware of any of this. He had crawled to J.J., who was writhing on the floor, tears streaming down his cheeks as Cleo fit the key into his collar with trembling hands. “I’m here, J.J., it’s Cleo, I’m right here, hold on,” she was saying. “Seth,” J.J. managed to gasp. “LeRoi…” Seth whipped around. Through the smoky haze of gunpowder, he saw Ursula LeRoi racing toward the open window. Escaping. He had skinned before he consciously decided to. In two long, loping strides, the jaguar crossed the room. LeRoi screamed as his claws sank into her shoulders from behind. She twisted as she fell, managing to brace an elbow against Seth’s chest as he snapped at her face. Her other hand came up. In it she held a pistol. Seth could smell the silver on the barrel. Something was hurtling toward them, a blur of black and silver. LeRoi’s lips curled into a feral, triumphant smile; her finger touched the trigger just as the black jaguar crashed into Seth, sending them both toppling through the shattered window, onto grass powdered with newly-fallen snow. Seth landed on his side, unaware of sliding back into his human skin as his temple impacted painfully with the ground. Panicked shouts and stampeding feet sounded distantly in his ears. A face appeared above his. “J.J.,” Seth tried to say. He wasn’t sure he actually formed the word. Warmth was spreading across his stomach. His nose picked up the sweet-wet scent of blood, the sharp metallic tang of silver. Blinding pain uncoiled inside of him. Seth’s vision went white, an explosion of light that hurtled him up, up, up, into the stars. 336 Epilogue “And that,” said Seth, “is all there is to tell.” Leigh folded a corner of his pillowcase between her thumb and forefinger, contemplating the dust motes swirling above their heads in the syrupy afternoon light. They had done this a lot the past five days: laid on Seth’s bed, stared at his ceiling, and talked. It had taken him that long to work through his life story for her. Since the battle, Seth hadn’t been up for much but talking. LeRoi’s close-range silver bullet had ripped him open hipbone to hipbone, a half-inch below the belly button. Without the combined healing powers of the Gen-0s and his own supernatural powers of regeneration, he would not have been around to tell his tale. “So.” Rolling onto her side, Leigh launched in to her usual litany of questions. “Your dad never told Chimera where to find you?” “He didn’t know where to find me.” Seth wiggled onto his side. “He and Naomi agreed that if he was ever collared, she would take me away, somewhere he wouldn’t know to find us. That way, Chimera could never force him to tell them where I was.” “And how did Chimera find the Black Swan?” “We’re not sure,” Seth said, “but Ben thinks it’s most likely we have a spy in the Resistance.” This was what Ben had told Seth when he had stopped by to see him earlier in the week, along with Ms. Ingrid McLain, who had also brought along the homework Seth was missing at Fairfax High. His books and papers were now piled on his dresser, with a Get Well Soon card from his Honors classmates and a big balloon from the basketball team, signed by everyone except Cam. Seth’s cover story for missing a week of school and resurfacing with a brand-new scar? Motorcycle accident. He was trying not to dwell on how much of this weekend he would have to devote to studying if he wanted to keep his grades high enough to be eligible for basketball. 337 “Naomi hated keeping secrets from you,” Ben had told him, one of his paw-like hands curled around a coffee cup in Lydia’s kitchen. Seth had been wrapped up in a bathrobe and a quilt, recovering from the fever that had accompanied being poisoned by the silver in the bullet. “We knew if you found out about J.J., you’d join the Resistance to save him, and we couldn’t risk LeRoi getting her hands on you, too, and adding your blood to the Ark. Thomas made the both of us swear by the Black Swan never to tell you about your brother. Naomi went back on that to send you here, to your mother. That was the lie she hated most – letting you believe your mama didn’t want you.” Ben had been among the Resistance fighters to help Thomas Sullivan escape from Fairfax the night J.J. was taken. After Thomas was collared, he and Naomi had appointed themselves Seth’s bodyguards. Six weeks ago, Seth would have been furious about the deception. Now, he was grateful. Thanks to Naomi and Ben, he had lived free all of his life. Staying that way was up to him. Seth crawled off the bed now and started dredging clean clothes from his dresser. His laundry situation was getting dire. Almost die saving the world and you still had to wash your own jeans. Leigh sat up. “You could have told me, you know.” Seth had assumed they would have this conversation eventually. “I was afraid you’d think I was a freak,” he said. “You are a freak,” Leigh said, and dodged the wadded-up sock Seth pitched at her. “I’m just saying you could have trusted me.” “I do trust you.” Seth sighed. Might as well get the whole truth out there at once, like ripping off a Band-Aid. “If I’d told you I was werekin, I would have had to tell you that your father was working for Chimera, and I didn’t want to do that.” Leigh lowered her eyes. “I wish you had told me. Then I would have known what he really was.” This was as much as she had said about Jack in a week. Jack had already moved out, packed his bags and set up residence in the loft apartment above the Steward and Regent Law Firm – which was just “Steward” now, Seth supposed, since Regent had skipped town, along with LeRoi. Divorce proceedings were 338 underway. Seth thought Jack was lucky Lydia hadn’t skewered him with his katana. Turning on Chimera in the end hadn’t counted for much in the face of seventeen years of lies. Leigh was refusing to speak to her father. She had burned her Georgetown sweatshirt on a ceremonial pyre in the backyard. Seth had not spoken to Jack yet, either. He planned to, though. He had questions, about Thomas, about Regent, only his soon-to-be-ex step-father could answer. “Anyway,” Leigh said, unrolling his wadded-up sock and slapping it against the pillow, “I wasn’t talking about the werekin stuff. I meant you could have told me about you and Marshall.” Seth froze with his hand inside his sock drawer. “What about me and Marshall?” “Gee, I don’t know, Seth. Maybe that you’re dating him?” Seth whirled around. Leigh was smirking like the cat that caught the canary. “How do you know about that?” he demanded. “Marshall told Whitney, and Whitney told me. Don’t be mad,” Leigh said, quickly. “He said she could. I know you guys are keeping things on the down-low – ” “Leigh,” Seth closed his drawer, “you are never to use that expression in conjunction with my love life again. Ever.” Leigh grinned. “My point is, you could have told me. I wouldn’t have outed you.” “It wasn’t about that. I thought you might be upset.” “Give me some credit, brother dear. We may live in Hicksville, but most of us here are more progressive than that.” “Not about the gay part. About the Marshall part. Because you liked him first.” Nope, this wasn’t awkward… “You know,” Leigh said, philosophically, “I didn’t really like Marshall that much. He’s gorgeous, definitely, but he’s so…nice. Nice gets boring. Now, Captain McLain.” She waggled her eyebrows. “There is one fine-looking hunk of soldier. I wouldn’t mind to let him dress me up in camouflage and – ” “Leigh, seriously, I might want to eat again someday, okay?” Leigh giggled. Seth sank down on his windowsill. “So Marshall told Whitney we’re dating?” “That’s what she said.” Leigh pulled her hair in front of her face, checking for split-ends. “Is it not true?” 339 Seth didn’t know. He and Marshall had never finished their conversation about being an us. When Seth had awoken in Fort King’s infirmary, nearly twenty-four hours after the battle, Marshall had been at his bedside. Seth’s relief had quickly turned to fury when he had heard what Marshall had been up to. LeRoi had vanished. But she would still be out there somewhere, still searching for the Source, still obsessed with raising Lemuria. The Black Swan believed someone inside the Resistance had orchestrated her capture. Someone high-ranking; only a small circle of Resistance fighters knew who she was, or how to find her. Until the spy was found, it was safest for the Black Swan to disappear. And so, like a true Golden Boy, Marshall had volunteered to take her wherever she wanted to go. They had driven away from Fort King in his Audi, the boy next door and the mythical savior of Seth’s kindred. Sixteen hours later, Marshall had returned, alone. Bad enough that Marshall, like Seth’s family, might be targeted by whatever remained of Chimera for his association with werekin. If LeRoi found out Marshall was the only person on the planet to know the Black Swan’s whereabouts, she would stop at nothing to capture him. They hadn’t fought about it yet, because Marshall had refused to argue with Seth while he was hurt, and since that first day, Seth had neither seen nor spoken to him. Golden Boy track records did not make up for disappearing for over a day – and then refusing to explain where you had been or what you had been doing. Marshall was grounded. As in serious lockdown. No phone, no Internet, no crossing the driveway to visit Seth or Leigh. Meredith was even driving him to school because Dr. Townsend had taken his car keys. With good behavior, he might be eligible for parole around his thirtieth birthday. According to Leigh, who had seen him at school, Marshall considered it a small price to pay for aiding the werekin cause. *** After he shooed Leigh out of his room, Seth took a hot bath and slipped into jeans and a T-shirt. The ropy scar across his 340 midsection had faded to salmon-pink. In time, like the lacelike scars on J.J.’s hands, it would turn white. But Seth would carry it the rest of his days. He had been shot point-blank by a silver bullet. Even werekin healing had its limits. Peanut butter cookies were cooling on the stove when he meandered downstairs. Lydia was in the living room, engaged in one of her thrice-daily conversations with her divorce attorney. Will McLain was just coming in the back door. Seth tossed him a cookie. “Perfect timing,” he said. “A good soldier always knows when grub’s on.” McLain doffed his field cap with a grin. “Good to see you up and around. Aunt Ingrid told me you looked pretty rough earlier this week.” He leaned against the counter Seth had hopped up on. “Your mom home?” “She’s on the phone. Divorce stuff. You can wait if you want, but she may be a while.” “That’s okay. I actually just needed to leave this for her.” McLain placed an envelope labeled CONFIDENTIAL on the counter. “Her credentials,” he explained. “So she can come and go from Fort King as needed while we set up Operation Swan Song.” “Cool code name,” Seth said. “It was your brother’s idea.” Seth was not surprised. J.J. had been holed up with the Resistance command all week. The battle had changed the face of the war the werekin were fighting. General Burke and his black ops division, under the command of Captain McLain, had set up shop at Fort King. Project Ark was no more; whichever shadowy government committee had overseen the project had, thanks in large part to McLain’s lobbying, opted to forego collaring werekin. McLain’s unit had a new mission now: destroying what was left of Chimera, freeing the werekin still in captivity, and guarding the Ark. Now that mission had a name. Operation Swan Song. The existence of werekin would remain classified, for now. But no longer would they be hunted with impunity. No longer would the Resistance operate in the shadows. They were organized now. They had an H.Q. 341 And Seth had gotten his wish. He would be staying in Fairfax. “Will!” Lydia came in, beaming. Now that she had her memories back, she remembered her old friend Ingrid and her nephew quite fondly. “Oh, are those the credentials? I actually wanted to talk to you about some things…” Seth scooped up a handful of cookies and headed to the basement. He didn’t have top-secret clearance like Lydia. Lydia had offered to convert Jack’s office into a second bedroom for J.J. J.J. had declined, instead dragging the seldomused camping gear out of the garage and literally pitching a tent in the basement. Seth tried not to take that as evidence of how brief his twin intended his stay with them to be. J.J. was not downstairs, but Poe was napping on the green blanket folded neatly atop his cot. “Been spying on anybody lately?” Seth asked her. She blinked her one eye. McLain was gone and Lydia was mixing up another batch of cookies when Seth came upstairs. “You must be feeling better,” she said. “I haven’t seen you move without wincing in days.” “Does that mean I can go back to school tomorrow?” “Honey, don’t you think it’s too soon?” Lydia said. “After all you’ve been through…” “Please, Mrs. Steward?” Seth turned on his big, pleading eyes. “I am so bored. There’s nothing to do here all day. You’re off plotting with the Resistance. Leigh is at school. J.J. is doing whatever J.J. does. Yesterday I watched four hours of SoapNet. Four hours. Is that the life you want for your child?” “Okay, okay,” Lydia laughed, weakening. “But no basketball this week.” “Mom!” The cookie dough spoon stilled in Lydia’s hand like the batter had turned to cement. Seth worked his lower lip between his teeth. The word had simply burst out of him, as though it had been sitting on his tongue for weeks. After a moment, Lydia resumed stirring. “Don’t ‘mom’ me, Seth Michael. You were shot in the stomach. That means you sit out a week from sports. However,” she raised a hand to still his 342 protest, “I do believe Marshall is in the driveway shooting hoops right now, if you wanted to get in a little practice…” Seth kissed her cheek. “Thanks. Mom.” Lydia tried very hard to make her grin into a stern glare. “Take it easy, please? No pushing.” “Got it,” said Seth, backing away. “No pushing.” “And no dunking.” “Absolutely. No dunking.” “And put on a coat.” Mothers. Outside, Marshall was going in for a layup, guarded by Dre Alfaro. “I’m shocked at you, Indiana,” Seth said, as he stepped over the shrub-fence. “Aren’t you supposed to be in your room, meditating on your sinful ways?” “Dad’s at work,” Marshall explained. He motioned for Dre to pass the ball to Seth. “Stand back, Dre. Let Philadelphia here show us how it’s done.” “I don’t know, Indiana.” Seth looked Dre up and down. He had on his usual pinstripe pants and a vintage Star Trek T-shirt – Re-Spin attire. “Seems to me Baby Bird has some moves of his own.” Marshall narrowed his eyes. Before he could say anything, a clunker van pulled up to the curb. Emery little leaned out the window, waving to them. Emery had come by to take Whitney to see Cleo’s new place. Leigh and Whitney were hailed, and they all piled into the van, since Marshall’s Audi was off-limits. Technically Marshall was not allowed to leave the house except for school and basketball, but Dr. Townsend was at the hospital, and Meredith was off for a girls’ weekend in Vegas with her sisters, so he decided to risk it. Marshall was all kinds of rebelling these days, Seth thought. Cleo had taken up residence in Regent’s house, which at first had baffled Seth; it wasn’t like she had happy memories of the place. The house did have certain advantages, though. It was close to the fort, for one. And there was the tricked-out underground training studio, the siege-worthy stockpile of weapons, the awesome hot tub in the master bath…The Resistance had also wanted someone to keep an eye on the house in case Regent chose to return, though personally, Seth doubted 343 he would show his stripes in Fairfax again for a long while. Regent was too clever for that. Emery parked beside the woodpile, behind a battered Jeep with a DON’T HATE THE PLAYER sticker on the back glass. Through the window, Seth could see J.J. sitting on the kitchen counter, chatting with Vixen O’Shea. He frowned and started for the front door, but Marshall caught his sleeve. “Wanna take a walk?” he said. Seth watched Quinn flip her fiery hair over her shoulder, and sighed. “Sure,” he said. *** They strolled down the winding drive, close enough to hold hands, though they didn’t. Cotton ball clouds dotted the sky, swabbed pink by the February sunset. Snow clung to the grass in uneven patches, frosting the gnarled tree roots. Seth had never appreciated just how peaceful it was around Regent’s house. Most of the times he had been there he had either been driving his motorcycle or running for his life. “Are you feeling better?” Marshall asked. “Two hundred percent,” Seth said. “Well enough to kick your butt for that stunt with the Black Swan.” “It wasn’t a stunt, Philadelphia. Someone had to help her, and you were a little busy.” “Agathon – ” “ – isn’t exactly inconspicuous enough to help a person disappear,” Marshall said, patiently. Seth kicked a rock. “Well sure, if you’re going to be all reasonable about it.” Marshall grinned and sat down on the trunk of a fallen-over hickory. Seth remained standing, hands in the pockets of his camouflage jacket, determined to say his piece. “I don’t like you being in the middle of this, Indiana. And by ‘don’t like,’ I mean I don’t want you in the middle of this.” “Do you think I want you in the middle of it?” “That’s different. I don’t have a choice.” “You’re wrong,” Marshall said. “You do have a choice.” 344 “No. I don’t.” Seth extended a hand, letting his claws slide out, rosettes bloom along his wrist. “Born this way. Can’t change it.” “But you could run away,” Marshall persisted. “Go Underground. You choose to fight.” “Well, that’s me,” Seth said. “It doesn’t have to be you.” “I’m not interested in being a warrior, Seth. I hope that’s the last battle I ever see, and I didn’t even really see it.” Shaking back the sleeves of his letterman’s jacket, Marshall pushed his dark hair off his forehead. “I did what I did because it was the right thing to do. If I’m ever in a situation like that again, I hope I have the guts to do the same thing.” There really wasn’t anything Seth could think of to argue with that. He sat down on the tree trunk. “So,” he said, trying not to sound nervous. “Before we were rudely interrupted by people trying to kill me, I seem to recall you and I were having a serious conversation.” “Actually, we were interrupted by Whitney,” Marshall said. “But point taken.” He looked over at Seth. “Are you still offering what you were offering? For this – us – to be private?” Seth nodded. His mouth was too dry to speak. “In that case,” Marshall said, “I have a long answer and a short answer. Which do you want first?” “Short,” Seth said, automatically. He was no good with suspense. “Okay. The short answer is: I don’t think right now is the best time to come out to my parents. I’m not saying there will ever be a good time, but I think there’s enough going on for both of us right now without adding that to the mix.” Fair enough, Seth thought. It had been a crazy month. “And the long answer?” “The long answer…” Getting to his feet, Marshall walked a little ways away. He leaned against a maple tree with his arms folded. The slanting light cast shadows under his eyes, deepened the planes of his face, and Seth could imagine how Marshall would look ten years from now, with all the boyishness gone. He thought about things like that with Marshall. Seth’s life had never been settled. Even 345 now, he wasn’t sure how it would all pan out – if LeRoi would send her hunters after him, if Operation Swan Song would be scrapped, the werekin exterminated as a threat to the human race. He didn’t know how long he would get to stay in Fairfax. He didn’t know how long he would get, period. “The long answer is that the night I met you, New Year’s Eve, I had made up my mind to ask Leigh out, officially,” Marshall said. Okay. Not the story Seth had been expecting. He did his best to arrange a neutral expression in place. “I didn’t mean to use her.” Marshall drummed his heel against the base of the tree, that look hovering around his features again. “I’ve never had a girlfriend. Gone out on a few dates, but nothing ever felt right. Dad had started mentioning it. Casually. Asking me what girls I liked at school, who I was taking to prom. And I’m not deaf. I know the stuff Cam says about me behind my back. “I’d only ever thought of Leigh as Whitney’s best friend. Then she started high school last year, and it was like, all of a sudden people were pushing us to go out. I couldn’t understand what was holding me back. Finally I just decided to go for it. At midnight, when the ball dropped, I was going to kiss her. “Then you walked into that kitchen, and you were so…you.” Seth smirked. Cockiness was one of his finer qualities. “I wanted to stay right there and talk to you, all night, but I couldn’t think of a single thing to say. Whitney was fixing you milk and cookies, and you were smiling at her, and I was jealous. Of my sister. Flirting with a guy. “I didn’t kiss Leigh at midnight. I was sick. I didn’t want it to be true. I went home, and I told myself it wouldn’t be true. I would be your friend, just your friend. But then I saw you, on Leigh’s birthday, and – I couldn’t.” Marshall finally took a breath. “Because it is true. This is who I am. It’s like your skin. You can’t hide it, and you can’t change it.” He looked away then, into the trees. Seth stood. Closed the distance between them with one long stride. Took Marshall’s hands in his, linked them behind his neck, and stretched up on his toes so their foreheads were touching. 346 “Would you?” he asked, softly. “Would you change it, if you could?” Marshall turned his head. Those baby blue eyes locked onto Seth’s. “Not with you,” he said. “I wouldn’t change it with you.” 347 Acknowledgements Thanks most especially to my early and avid readers: my sister, who reads (and loves) everything I write, and corrects my sports lingo when I err; Abby, who allowed me to immortalize her in fiction for a second time as the beauteous Quinn O’Shea; Patti, who assured me jaguars are the most badass of cats; and L.J., who listened to more drafts than any friend was ever required to. Thanks also to the readers at FictionPress.com for their insightful reviews of a much different version of this story – you inspired me to continue; to Cady, for providing the insider’s high school perspective; to Ambreena, for persuading me in a single email of the impact these stories could have on readers; to Amy and Howard, fellow “mountain climbers,” who keep me somewhat sane during the writing process; and to Cinda Williams Chima, for the heartfelt advice that real writers love to write, others to have written. Finally, to all of the courageous souls out there, young and old, gay, straight, bi, or trans, who dare to live in your own skin: Thank you for making the world a more beautiful place to be. 348 About the Author Jesse Daro spends most of her time writing. Science fiction, fantasy, and horror are her favorite genres. She has a Ph.D. in English and teaches literature and writing in the Midwest. 349