An Apple for the Creature

Golden Delicious FAITH HUNTER

Faith Hunter writes urban fantasy: the Skinwalker series, featuring Jane Yellowrock—Skinwalker, Blood Cross, Mercy Blade, Raven Cursed, and Death’s Rival in October 2012—and the Rogue Mage series, featuring Thorn St. Croix, a stone mage in a postapocalyptic, alternate reality—Bloodring, Seraphs, Host, and Rogue Mage RPG and World Book. This short story, “Golden Delicious,” takes place in the Skinwalker series, after Raven Cursed, and between the short story in the e-compilation Cat Tales and Death’s Rival. When she isn’t writing, Faith likes to make jewelry, run whitewater rivers (Class II and III), and RV with her hubby and their rescued Pomeranian dogs.

Rick’s face was still tender, though the bruising was already yellow and the scabs had fallen off, revealing pink, healed skin. When he was human, it would have taken days to reach this stage of healing, but it had been less than twenty-four hours since he was sucker-punched. There were very few good things about being infected with were-taint, but fast healing was on that short list.

“He was trying to hurt you, yet you held back.” Soul glanced at him from the corners of her eyes. “It didn’t go unnoticed.”

He pushed on his teeth. They were no longer loose. “I’m betting he was a bully in high school,” he said. “Not used to a guy forty pounds lighter and three inches shorter taking him down.”

Soul’s full lips lifted slowly. “Without breaking his jaw, his knees, or dislocating his shoulder, all of which you could have done.” She made a left, turning onto a side road. Shadows covered them in the dim confines of the company car. “You taught him a valuable lesson. There are things out there that are bigger, faster, and won’t care if he carries a PsyLED badge.

“Speaking of things bigger and faster than human, walk me through it again,” she said, shifting their discussion as easily as she shifted gears.

“Human-sense evaluation, initial technology, followed by enhanced senses,” Rick said. “Then the pets and more tech as needed.”

From the back, Pea twittered and Brute growled. Pea was a juvenile grindylow, Rick’s pet and death sentence rolled up in one neon-green-furred, steel-clawed, kittenlike cutie. The werewolf taking up the backseat was stuck in wolf form, thanks to contact with an angel, and he didn’t like being called a pet, which meant that Rick did so every chance he got. The wolf hated leashes, his traveling cage, and eating from a bowl on the floor, but it wasn’t like he had a choice. Since Brute couldn’t shift back to human and had no thumbs, he had two options: accept the leash and being treated like a dangerous dog, or sit in a cage all day. He’d gone for the partial-freedom route, which meant partnering with Rick LaFleur. Rick, who hadn’t been human in two months himself, was at the training facility for the Psychometry Law Enforcement Division of Homeland Security—called PsyLED Spook School by the trainees.

The three composed a ready-made unit, a triumvirate of nonhuman specialists. If they could learn to work together. So far, that didn’t look likely. The werewolf might not be responsible for Rick’s loss of humanity, job, and girlfriend, nor for the total FUBAR’d mess his life had become, but Brute had been part of the pack that kidnapped and tortured him. Rick didn’t like the wolf or want him around, but like Brute, he had no choice right now. PsyLED had specifically requested them together, and had refused to accept Rick as a solo trainee. It was a package deal or no deal.

Soul said, “Treat this as if it’s a paranormal crime and you’re the first investigator on-site. If you spot something out of the accepted order, hold it for the proper time. You’ll find that by training your investigative skills to work to a specific but fluid formula, you’ll actually gain a freedom of thought processes that will work well in the field.” Soul pulled into a driveway.

“This training site is the most difficult you will encounter during your time here. In the last two months, three students signed their Quit-Forms and left the program after seeing the site.” Her eyes narrowed, the skin around them crinkling. “And I can’t explain why this particular crime scene has been so difficult on them.” She turned off the car.

The small ranch house was dark, crime-scene tape over the sealed doors, plywood over the windows. The grass was six inches high, the flower beds needed weeding. “Assuming that the grass was cut in the week prior,” Rick said, “we’re looking at maybe eight weeks since the crime.”

Soul looked at him strangely. “You’re the only one who even glanced at the outside of the house.”

“I was a cop,” he said, feeling the loss in his bones. “We look at everything.”

Soul grinned, losing years and making him wonder again about her. She could have been thirty or fifty, tribal American, Gypsy, mixed African and European, or a combo. “I knew getting an undercover cop in this program was going to work. That’s why I asked to be your mentor.”

That was news. Soul was one of the top three mentors at Spook School, and Rick hadn’t known how he’d been paired with her.

Soul opened her door, using the interior lights to twist a scrunchy around her platinum hair to keep it out of the way. “The neighbors called nine-one-one when they heard screaming and a dog howling. It was the second night of the full moon, nearly eight weeks ago. The first officers on the scene secured the area, called Medic, made arrests based on the evidence, and then called PsyLED.”

Rick stepped to the driveway and opened the back door for the pets. Brute leaped out—leash-free this time because there were no humans around—his white fur bright in the nearly full moon. Pea clung to his back, smiling, showing fangs as big as Brute’s. Most people saw a green-dyed kitten when they saw her. It. Whatever. Pea was as playful as a kitten, and could get lost chasing a ball of twine for hours, but if he or Brute stepped out of line and risked passing along the were-taint to a human, she’d kill them without hesitation. That was her job.

“You stay by the door until I’m ready,” Rick instructed. Brute scowled and emitted a low growl. This wasn’t the first time they’d been over this. The last time Rick had brought it up, Brute had walked over to his instruction manual and lifted a leg. Rick had just barely saved the manual from a nasty drenching. Now, he held the wolf’s eyes as the growl began to build.

Eventually, they’d have to deal with the question of who was in charge, and the wolf would have to accept beta status, acquiesce to Rick as alpha. Soul looked down at the wolf. “You’re part of Rick’s investigative team,” she said, her tone cold. “I will not have silliness.” Brute dropped his ears and whined, submissive, and Rick shook his head, wishing he knew her trick. Soul lifted her long skirts above the dew-damp grass and led the way to the door. She unlocked it and stood back, her fingers laced together.

Rick pulled on a pair of black nitrile gloves and flipped on the inside light. There was no furniture in the room, but it was far from empty. “It’s a witch-working, salt-circle, internal pentagram composed of feathers, river-worn rocks, tiny moonstones, and dead plants. Two pools of blood in the pentagram suggest a blood rite, but it’s an odd combo for one. Blood rites usually require full, five-element mixed covens.” He stepped away from the front door, moving sun-wise, or clockwise, a foot outside the circle, to avoid activating any latent spells. “We have five practitioners, from four of the elements—air, water, two moon witches, and oddly, the death-magic branch of earth witches.” Death-magic was rare, little-known, and almost never practiced. Adepts were considered dangerous by other witches, because they used dying things to power workings, and when nothing around was dying, they would steal the life force of the living. In Spook School, he had learned how they worked. They were not nice people.

In the corner, standing with Soul, Brute was growling again, the basso so deep it was more a vibration on the air than actual sound. His mentor put a hand to the wolf’s head, and Brute hunched, his shoulder blades high. Pea was staring at the circle, her eyes wide, one paw-finger at her mouth. It was the animals’ first crime scene, and Rick could imagine how awful the sights and smells must be to them.

“The composition of practitioners made for a lopsided but feasible working,” Rick said. “The death witch was coven leader, sitting at the north, with a moon witch to either side, and air and water at the base, which made for the best balance the coven could get in during the full moon.

“The scorch mark in the center of the circle suggests they called up a demon, likely one that was moon-bound. If they called up a demon, it was for something bad, and I haven’t heard of anything happening that might be demon-born.”

Soul tilted her head, acknowledging his analysis, but not giving him more information.

“The salt ring is broken in three places, which suggests that the working was completed or was interrupted in such a way that there’s no residual power remaining. If this was a fresh crime scene and no one had been into the room, the first thing I’d do is verify with the psymeter that the working is not active. Do you want me to go ahead and do that?”

Soul said, “Not now. Proceed.”

Rick studied the circle. “Because of the blood-magic, I’d call in Psy-CSI to take trace matter and blood samples to be held for possible DNA in the event that we have humans to compare, and in the event that this was a fatal crime.”

Soul nodded, expressionless. “The investigators did so.”

“Photographs, samples of each of the elements used, fingerprints, blood spatter workup—” Rick stopped. He was standing at the air point, studying the blood pattern. It was smeared and splattered over a large area, maybe four feet, but not puddled, as it would have been had the witch collected the blood in a bowl and then spilled or poured it. He bent closer and saw hairs in the blood. There were three, with more in the blood in the center of the circle, a lot more, some in small clumps. Stress caused some animals to lose hair. “—and speciation of the hairs,” he finished after a brief pause. “Then I’d search the rest of the house. Shall I bother? It smells empty.” Spook School knew everything about his situation, had tested his sensory perceptions extensively during his interview phase. Soul knew he had much better senses than a human, even in his current state.

Soul shook her head.

“End of human eval.” Rick dropped to one knee in a tripod position, weight on knee, feet, and one hand. He sniffed in short, quick inhalations. An electric shock slammed through him, triggering the memories. Werewolf. He gasped, the jolt of pain and terror whipping through him. He managed a breath, then another, breathing deeper, forcing the fear and panic away with each breath. The witches had sacrificed a werewolf on the full moon. Rick opened an evidence packet. With a pair of tweezers, he picked up the hair closest. “Each hair is three inches long, pale at the root, fading to gray, and black at the tip.”

Soul watched, assessing his reaction. She had known. Of course she had known. Except for Brute, this was the first were he had scented since the attack, the kidnapping, and the subsequent torture by the Lupus Pack in New Orleans. And his reaction to it was part of what would make or break his qualification and acceptance into PsyLED.

Slowly he lowered the hair into the evidence bag, fighting down the panic attack. He had thought he’d conquered the PTSD. Not so. The scars and the mangled tattoos on his shoulder and upper arm ached, feeling blistering hot, though they weren’t. He forcibly relaxed, breathing slowly to decrease the fight-or-flight response brought on by the scent. The words clean and concise, his brain actually still functioning, Rick said, “Presumption: Speciation of blood in the center of the circle was revealed to be werewolf blood. Second presumption: It bit the air witch, badly enough to transmit the were-taint.”

At the words, Pea launched herself from Brute’s shoulders and scampered across the room, leaping, crabbing sideways; she disturbed nothing. Brute followed slowly, but outside the circle, the overhead light throwing odd shadows, the darkest ones pooling under the werewolf. His growl, until now only a vibration, grew in volume. Rick realized that Brute had already detected the other werewolf, had known what had happened here from the moment they entered the room, and had been kept calm only by Soul’s hand on his head. Rick would have to learn to read Brute in the field—assuming they passed the training

Pea stopped at the center of the circle and scraped at the dried blood with one scalpel-sharp claw. She brought it to her nose and sniffed. She sneezed, hard, covering her tiny mouth with a paw, then raced to the dried blood at Rick’s feet. Brute and Pea stood, nose-to-nose, sniffing.

Slowly, Brute moved to the center of the circle and sniffed again. His ears went back and the vibration of his werewolf growl filled the room, seeming to bounce off the walls into Rick’s chest. Brute’s pale, crystalline eyes stared up at the former cop, his growl increasing in volume before falling away into a whine. If Rick hadn’t known better, he would have thought the wolf was feeling worried, concerned. But three seconds spent with an Angel of the Light could have been no cure for Brute’s cruelty.

Pea stepped over the salt circle and put her forelegs on Rick’s jeans-clad shin, staring up at him. Her tail twitched, her face mournful. “Yeah,” he said to her, stroking her once in comfort. “We’re too late. Maybe weeks too late.” He looked at Soul. “Did the witch turn?” Soul pressed her lips together and didn’t answer. Rick figured that info was need-to-know, and trainees were the lowest on the information ladder.

On his hands and knees, Rick circled the room, sniffing, letting the scent signatures settle into his brain, new memories, new associations. Rick turned to Brute. “You’re up.” The werewolf held Rick’s eyes with a predator’s intensity. This was something they had worked out the first day of school, a Q&A to keep them from having any Timmy-fell-down-the-well moments of attempted communication. “Take scent signatures of the subjects.” Brute snarled at him, but walked slowly around the circle, sniffing at each spot where a witch had knelt during the working. When he was finished, the wolf sat down again, waiting for the confirmatory questions.

“All the witches were female,” Rick said.

“You can tell that by scent?” Soul interrupted, surprised.

Rick held up a finger, watching the wolf. There weren’t many male witches because they tended to die at puberty, but it was always wise to confirm. The wolf nodded, which was a strange gesture on the animal.

“Were all the witches related?” Rick asked.

Brute shook his head.

“Two were related,” Rick said.

Brute nodded once.

“This witch”—Rick indicated a point on the pentagram—“and that one.”

Brute nodded again. Most covens were related by blood, even if widely spaced on the family tree.

Soul’s eyes gleamed and her nostrils widened. Rick could hear her heart rate increase. “Very good,” she murmured.

Pea stood on her hind feet, asking to be held. Rick boosted her up and Pea balanced across one shoulder, her tail curling around his neck, her furry cheek next to his. She didn’t purr, exactly. It was more part-purr and part-croon, rhythmical, musical, and harmonic.

Soul crossed the room, walking widdershins, or counterclockwise. When she reached him, she buried her hand in Brute’s ruff, scratching his ears. The werewolf sighed in happiness. “None of the other trainees did half as well, not even the witches, and they had a better handle into magic-working than you will ever have. Starting a week late, you are better at this than any of the others.” A half smile curled her lips. “Don’t tell them I said so.”

“Psymeter,” he said, not responding to the compliment. Rick knew that, in his case, being the best was not a guarantee that his triumvirate would graduate and go on to be PsyLED agents. They had other issues. Lots of other issues.

Soul lifted the strap of the bulky device from around her head. The training units were older models, having been pulled from field use when the agency got lighter-weight, more compact ones, but the older models still worked. Rick stepped outside, clipped the box to his belt, and turned the unit on. He zeroed it to the outside magical ambience, which should have been close to zero. The meter needle fluctuated and settled safely in the green zone. This particular device had been calibrated just for his unit, taking into account their magical energies, which had higher-than-human readings.

He deliberately did not look up at the sky. Tomorrow night was the first night of the full moon and he got weird close to the full moon, wanting to sit and stare up at it. For hours. Yeah. Weird.

Rick stepped back inside and instantly the meter spiked. Rick stopped and looked at Soul. The meter wasn’t reacting to her—Soul showed up as human though she definitely was not—but to something else in the room. “It’s redlining. This far out time-wise from a working, it should be a low yellow, max.”

“What might that signify?”

“Several possibilities. The working was interrupted. The working is still active, which means they transferred the working to an amulet. Or it had a delayed result yet to be released. But I don’t see signs of anything magically active, so which was it?”

Soul shook her head. “We don’t know yet.” Rick handed Soul the psymeter and she touched Brute’s shoulder, which came to her waist. The gesture was part scratch and part something metaphysically calming, which made Rick once again wonder what Soul was. Fairy? Elf? The wolf started panting and closed his eyes.

Rick said, “I want to see the crime-scene photos, mug shots, and the notes of the OIC and the IO.”

“Why?” She sounded sincerely curious, not if-I-ask-a-question-he’ll-learn-something curious. “What do you think that the officer in charge and the investigating officer might have missed?”

“I don’t know. But the meter’s still redlining. I might see something that the rest of you missed, or something in the photos might hit on what I smelled or saw. I might draw a different conclusion or ask a different question. I want to see all that because tomorrow night is the start of the full moon. And we might have a werewolf out there.”

Soul stared at him, her black eyes speculative. They were even blacker than his own Frenchy-black eyes, and usually they sparkled, throwing back the light like faceted black onyx. But tonight they were somber. Soul pulled a cell phone from a pocket in her gauzy skirt and punched in a number. “Have the on-call administrator call me back ASAP.” She closed the cell.

Rick studied the circle once more. “Did our people make the three openings in the salt?”

That enigmatic half smile lit her features again. “No. It was that way when we found it.” Soul’s platinum ponytail slid to one shoulder and stayed there when she raised her head. She was graceful, small, and curvy in all the right places. He wanted to know more about her, but he also understood that the relationship between trainee and mentor was one of strictly enforced professionalism. There weren’t a lot of law enforcement jobs open to someone who carried the were-taint. He wasn’t going to blow his chance to work for PsyLED by giving the wrong signals. He’d made too many mistakes where women were concerned. He’d lost his humanity because of that. He turned and went outside.

The light inside the house went out behind him and he heard Soul lock the door. He could count the tumblers if he wanted to. Cat hearing was part of the enhanced senses he’d gained when he was bitten by a black were-leopard.

Soul’s cell tinkled, New Age musical chimes. She walked away, opened it, and instead of saying hello, said, “Mariella. Thank you for returning my call.”

“How did your wonder boy do?” Mariella Russo, the instructional administrator, asked.

Though Rick had never met the IA, he’d remember that voice. It sounded rough as splintered wood, as if she smoked four packs of cigarettes and drank a pint of rotgut whisky every day. Soul knew he had acute senses, but she never acted accordingly and he’d learned a lot of interesting things by listening. He turned away so Soul couldn’t read his face. Pea nuzzled his cheek and he stroked her, absently. Brute was a white shadow off to the side, glowering at him.

“Our best PsyLED investigators took two weeks to determine what his unit deduced in only twenty minutes,” Soul said. “And, thanks to his law enforcement training, he added observations that the other trainee units missed. It will be in my report. He wants the crime-scene photos, mug shots, and the notes of the OIC and the IO. I am recommending he be given access.”

“This situation is far too delicate and volatile for a trainee to have that sort of entrée,” Russo said. “So the answer is no, Soul.”

“Rick LaFleur didn’t turn or go insane at the last full moon,” Soul said. “He survived it. Intact. He may see something we missed. Or he may know something he doesn’t realize he knows until the memory is triggered or the association falls into place.”

“What Chief Smythe needs from him is the name of the witch who created his counter-spell music. Get that and we’ll reconsider.”

Rick went cold. Was that why he had been invited to train at PsyLED? Because the department wanted access to his friend, an unknown witch, one not in the databases? Or access to a charm no one had ever heard of before—one that controlled the pain brought on by the full moon? And most important, why would Liz Smythe want it?

Pea made a twitter of concern and he stroked her gently. “It’s okay, Pea.” But it wasn’t. Not by a long shot.

“The chief administrator can ask for her own information,” Soul said. “Come on. Let Rick see the crime-scene photos.”

Russo sighed. “Why do you always try to get the protocols changed, Soul?”

Soul’s laughter floated on the night air. “Because I’m the best. Because of what I am. Agree, Rus’. You know I’m right.”

“Fine. An intern will deliver the file to LaFleur’s private chambers before you get back to base.”

Rick smiled tightly, his eyes on the house across the street. The “private chambers” comment said a lot about his entire stay at Spook School.

“She agreed,” Soul said. Brute flinched. Rick held his own recoil in. She had appeared right next to them without a sound, even with his and Brute’s keen hearing. He remembered what she had said to Russo, “Because of what I am.” And he wondered, not for the first time, what Soul was.

When he let himself into his quarters, the file was on his desk beside his MP player, which was loaded with the counter-spell melodies he played during the full moon. The private chamber was a twelve-by-twelve space in the back of the Quonset hut that held Spook School’s paranormal supplies. He slept away from the trainees’ barracks for a lot of reasons: because of Brute and Pea, who were deemed too dangerous to sleep near humans, and who refused to sleep in cages—not that he blamed them. And because he was too dangerous to be around humans at the full moon; Rick refused to be caged too. Because PsyLED was afraid that he might snap some full moon and bite his partner, he would never be a solo investigator, never be paired with a human or witch. His nonhuman unit was already established—a de facto triumvirate—if he didn’t kill Brute first.

Brute went to his bed—a cedar-chip-filled mattress on the floor in the corner—walked in a circle three times, lay down, and closed his eyes, Pea curled against his side. Rick showered and took the file to his own bed—a two-inch-thick mattress that had seen better days, on a corroded metal, folding bed frame. He hadn’t complained. He’d take what he could get, hoping to salvage something of the law enforcement career he’d lost when he contracted the were-taint.

He opened the file and started through it. The first thing he noticed was that there were only four mug shots, not five. There had been five witches at the crime scene, he knew that by the scent patterns. He flipped through the arrest reports and discovered that the coven leader had gotten away and the other coven members had refused to name her. Rick closed the file. Delicate and volatile . . . That could mean most anything.

He flipped through the arrest interviews and quickly discovered that one of the witches was Laura McKormic, the wife of Senator McKormic, a hard-line Republican from the state of Georgia, and an avowed witch hater. Now Rick knew why Russo claimed that the situation was delicate. Politics.

Laura McKormic rang a bell different from politics, however, and Rick booted up his old laptop to Google her. According to news reports, Laura had been killed in a one-car accident forty-eight hours after the arrest, but Rick could find no coroner’s report and no accident report. That meant she was likely the woman bitten at the scene and was hidden away in a private asylum—a werewolf, a danger to herself, her family, the public, and mostly, her husband’s career. Female werewolves who survived the initial bite went into immediate and permanent heat, and insanity was never very far behind. Rick closed the laptop. He had personal knowledge of just how bad that could be for the bitches themselves, and for the humans who came into contact with them. He reached up and scratched the scars on his shoulder. That had to be why Smythe wanted the name of his friend, the witch who had provided the counter-spell for his own were-shifting problem. To help Laura find a measure of peace from the binding of the were-taint.

From his pallet, Brute whined and thumped his tail. Slowly Rick turned his head to Brute and met the wolf’s eyes. Brute was watching his hand on the scars. The wolf dropped his head to his paws and whined again. Rick frowned. He recalled little of his time with the Lupus Pack, under their control, but it had all been bad. Beatings. And worse. Stuff Rick chose not to remember. Some of it at Brute’s hands back when the were had been able to shift to human. But Rick had been there when Brute came into contact with the angel Hayyel. Maybe the angel’s presence had affected both of them, because having Brute in the corner of his bedroom didn’t seem as awful as maybe it should have. Rick slid his hand away from the scars, ridged and numb, and yet somehow burning. Brute’s eyes followed.

“Full moon is coming,” he said, and Brute whined again. Rick closed the folder, dropped it to the floor, and turned off the lamp. Rolled over and pulled up the blanket. “Go to sleep.”

Morning was back to basics, which meant breakfast in the farmhouse kitchen. From the yard, as he climbed the steps, Rick could hear dishes clatter and classmates chatter. He wondered who would try to cause trouble this time. The cook frowned on weres and had tried to keep his entire unit out of the kitchen, saying that, “Animals should eat outside.” Some of Rick’s fellow trainees weren’t much better. Brute and Pea beside him, wearing red and blue PsyLED K9 harnesses, Rick entered the big room and moved to the left of the doorway, out of silhouette—instinct, to get a wall at his back.

Mary, three tables down, looked over the rim of her coffee cup and nudged Walker. “Our were-animals are here,” she murmured. “I had hoped they’d be out of the program by now.”

Walker pursed his lips. “I tried.”

Rick reached up and touched his face. The fading bruises were no longer painful, but they had been a virulent yellow in his shaving mirror this morning. “Not animals,” he said, loudly enough to be heard by the other trainees. The room went silent and Mary blushed scarlet, the tell-tale of pale-skinned redheads. The other trainees swiveled their heads toward him, then to the couple. Rick stared Walker down and said, “A PsyLED unit. My unit.” He pretended not to see Brute’s ears prick up, and kept his eyes on Walker. He dropped his voice to a low growl and lied through his teeth, “And the next time you try to kick Brute, I’ll either let him eat you, or I’ll take you down. No chance to sucker-punch me again.” Brute chuffed and smiled at Walker, showing way too many teeth. “You may have me by forty pounds, but you won’t get back up.”

The other trainees looked from the guilty couple, to the table holding the instructors and mentors, and then back to Rick. From the corner of his eye, he saw Soul put her hand on the arm of his jujitsu teacher, holding the man still. Rick winked at her, and her brows went up in surprise. “It’s okay. He’s lying,” she murmured, her words audible to Rick only because of his enhanced hearing. “And the wolf is perfectly in control.”

Two tables down, a blonde named Polly stood to see Walker. Into the uneasy silence, she said, “You tried to kick his partner? If LaFleur doesn’t take you down, I will.”

Brute chuffed quietly at the term partner. Pea chittered and sat up on the wolf’s back to see better, sounding pleased.

The girl beside Polly leaned back in her chair and said, “And I’ll help.” She looked at Rick. “I knew he was hassling you. Sorry I didn’t step in.” She raised her voice so the instructors couldn’t pretend not to hear. “I don’t tolerate bullies.”

Some of the tension Rick carried melted away as both girls patted an empty place at their table. “Come on, gorgeous,” Polly said. “You can eat with us.” She flicked a look up at Rick. “And your ugly, bruised handler too.”

Rick shook his head at the ribbing. “Go sit with the nice ladies, Brute. Be charming. I’ll bring you a plate.” The wolf rolled his eyes up and Rick said, “Yeah, I know. Six eggs over easy, half a chicken, raw, and apples, quartered. Come on, Pea. Let’s go through the line.”

Rick tossed the grindylow to his shoulder and turned his back on the wolf, going to the buffet. While loading up three plates, he watched in the mirrors over the serving table as Brute padded to the table and sat beside Polly, who was a dead ringer for a young Gwyneth Paltrow. Brute rested his head on her thigh and looked up at her with puppy-dog eyes. Both girls went all mushy and started petting him.

It was ridiculous. Brute got more female attention than he did. And it wasn’t like Rick was ugly, despite the bruises. At six feet even, with black eyes and black curling hair, he’d been known as a ladies’ man, a player. Of course, that was part of the reason he’d been bitten by a female black were-leopard, tortured by werewolves, lost his humanity, his job with NOPD, and his girlfriend, but that was another story.

Rick set Brute’s plate on the floor, Pea’s beside his on the table, and slid into the proffered seat, digging in. The eggs were perfect, and the pancakes, while not as good as his mom’s, weren’t bad, especially when he poured warm blueberry syrup over them.

“Is he really a werewolf?” Polly asked, her fingers in Brute’s fur.

“Yep. The only tame werewolf in the world.”

“You tamed him?” she said, her tone going skeptical.

“Nope. An angel named Hayyel did.”

“No shit?”

“No shit at all. I was there. Saw the whole thing. Pass the coffee?” The girls exchanged a pointed look and Polly poured him a cup. Rick glanced at the wolf’s pale eyes. Brute looked . . . shamed. Rick narrowed his eyes. The wolf was not feeling shame for what he had done in his life. No amount of penance assigned by an angel could make that happen.

The schedule was a twelve-hour day: three hours of physical training and combat sparring, six hours in class, with a break for lunch, then shooting, at which Rick excelled. He grew up on a farm in the South and had practically been born with a gun in his hand. Dinner was at seven, with library study time after. The library was a computer room with no books, but with electronic links to everything: the National Crime Information Center, the National Law Enforcement Telecommunication System, the FBI’s Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System, the U.S. Department of State’s database of biometric facial recognition and iris scans, and databases the CIA had been compiling since 9/11. They also had access to every state’s motor vehicle records, criminal warrant and parole records, and wanted information. The computers allowed access to Interpol and most of the law enforcement agencies in treaty nations, not to mention advanced GPS and satellite photo programs that made Google Earth look like a high school science project.

Everything was encrypted and was monitored by advanced artificial intelligence counterterrorism software, just in case someone was running unauthorized searches or a sleeper terrorist was compiling a database for use against the U.S. It was a cop’s wet dream. The library alone was reason enough to join PsyLED, and that didn’t count all the cool toys stored in the other half of his Quonset hut quarters.

Polly joined Rick there for study. He could tell she was interested, but for lots of reasons, there would be no big love scene to end the evening: it was against the rules for trainees to hook up, Polly had a night-training session, and the biggest reason—Rick could transmit were-taint to a human through sex. The proscription against sex—for the rest of his life—was something he hadn’t been able to make himself think about yet. At all. Instead of encouraging Polly, he kept it casual.

Together they researched a bungled crime scene from the seventies and talked shop, while Brute and Pea lay curled in the corner. Later they all went to the farmhouse kitchen for snacks and beer. The nearly full moon was just rising over the trees when they said good night, Polly heading to the admin building to meet her mentor, and Rick to the Quonset hut to get out of the moon-glow.

He nodded to the security guards he passed, his night vision so acute that he could pick them out in their night-black camo. Ernest lifted two fingers from the stock of his weapon and Rick waved back. Ernest was a former PsyLED operative, now fifty-seven and retired, working part-time to keep his hand in. Rick understood that; most cops had problems quitting full-time work, going from service and adrenaline to sitting in front of the TV or playing golf.

As he reached for the door handle, Brute came out of nowhere and slammed into his legs, sending Rick stumbling to the side. The wolf started that horrible, low-pitched growl, the one that made the hair stand up on Rick’s arms. Rick stared at the handle. There was nothing there, nothing visual anyway. He bent and sniffed, but smelled nothing except his own scent. He looked at the wolf, who was staring at the door, head down, slightly hunched, as if he was going to pounce.

“Someone went into my quarters?”

Brute nodded, dropping his head once.

Rick ran through the scenarios. He wasn’t allowed to carry his sidearm on campus. None of the students were—they weren’t on duty, they were in school—so going in alone would be stupid. But if he called for help and no one was in there, he’d look like an idiot. So . . . He took a slow breath and let it out. “Let’s be stupid and see what this is.” Rick stood to the side of his door, his back against the wall, and turned the knob slowly. Opened it an inch and sniffed. Brute stuffed his snout inside and sniffed too. After a moment, his ruff settled and he looked up at Rick. “I agree,” Rick said. “Whoever it was, is gone.” He reached in and turned on the switch, flooding the small space with light. No one was there. There weren’t any hiding places. And witches didn’t have invisibility spells. Or at least that was what he’d been taught. Of course, if they were invisible, how would you know?

They entered slowly, Brute at Rick’s side, alert, quiet, intense. “We’ll quarter the room. When you smell something, give me the signal.” Rick moved around the room, his jeans brushing the wolf’s side. Brute kept his nose to the floor, his ears pricked sharply. He sat in front of the small dresser, and again at the closet, which was the signal they had worked out for having found something. Rick opened both dresser and closet, but the wolf showed no particular change in attitude. The intruder hadn’t done anything with his clothes, so, why come in here? The wolf stopped at the old bed, the small laptop lying on top. Brute sniffed and sat.

Rick studied his computer. Pea leaped to the bed and raced around the laptop, twittering, almost as if she were scolding it. Rick still had a pair of gloves on his desk from the crime scene and he pulled them on before carefully lifting the screen. He didn’t see it at first, and he never would have noticed it at all except for Brute’s nose and Pea’s verbalizations. A tiny black dot was on the black keyboard where he would rest his palms when not typing.

He had to get someone in here to check it out, but if he was going back into the moonlight, he’d need his MP player and the counter-spell music. He reached to the desk.

It was gone.

Shock swept through him, electric, hot. In an instant he was back at his first full moon, three days in a New Orleans cell, drugged to the gills, as his body tried to turn itself inside out, fighting to shift, struggling to change into the black were-leopard that was his beast. Tried and failed over and over again, held to his human shape by the mangled tattoo-spell on his shoulder and upper chest. The artwork bound him to his human shape, his human form, and stopped every attempt to shift. The full moon meant pain like being struck by lightning, pain like being flayed alive. Mind-breaking pain. He didn’t want to shift, didn’t want to be a were, but even that would be better than the three days of hell.

His heart thundered. He broke into a hot sweat. The world telescoped down to the desktop, empty of the MP player. Rick reached out and touched the surface of his desk. Gone.

He blew out a breath, heated and hard. He had uploaded the music to a cloud backup system. He could easily download it to his computer for instant listening.

He dialed Soul on his cell. “Someone’s been in my room and stole my MP player. They also left something on my laptop. Brute found it.” He described the tiny dot and added, “I’m in my quarters. And no, I didn’t touch anything except the light switch and my laptop, and I was wearing gloves.”

“I’m on my way,” she said.

Rick closed the cell. An hour later, his room had been swept for listening devices and video recorders, and the black dot had been confiscated. His room was clean, and Rick finally got to bed. He needed sleep, but he was edgy, restless, and couldn’t keep his eyes closed. The full moon sucked. Each one could be the last night of his life, or leave him permanently furry like Brute. That was enough to make anyone jumpy. Finally, Rick opened the laptop, downloaded the counter-spell, and hit Play, the laptop volume so low no human could pick it up. With the music playing in the background, he fell asleep.

At three twenty-two a.m., his cell rang and Rick fumbled for it in the dark. “Yeah,” he mumbled.

“Rick. Are you all right? Say something logical,” Soul demanded.

“E equals MC squared. Isosceles . . .” He yawned in the middle of the words and swiveled his legs up, sitting. “. . . triangle. ‘Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty,’ and so on. Will that do?”

“I just heard back from the lab. The black dot recovered from your laptop was LSD on absorbent blotter paper with a sticky-back. Someone wanted you incapacitated or out of control.”

Rick grunted, thinking. “The list of people who might want me to become dangerous, and who know where I am, is confined to the people on campus.” He heard Soul’s long, drawn-out breath at the accusation. “Mary and Walk—” He stopped, remembering that Chief Smythe wanted the name of the witch who recorded his counter-spell. Thinking about Polly’s sudden interest in him—keeping him out late so someone could get into his room? “Mary and Walker. Maybe Polly. And whoever wanted my counter-spell music.”

After long moments, Soul said, “We need to talk.”

“About Chief Smythe, who wants the name of the witch who made the counter-spell?” Rick let the harsh tone cops use on suspects grate into his voice. “Wants it enough to enroll me here, even though I’m dangerous?”

“We need to talk,” she repeated, her voice steely. “I’ll be there shortly. Meet me in the kitchen.”

“Yeah, yeah, sure.” He closed the cell and got up, dressed, and headed out. Brute and Pea were there first, Brute blocking the door, Pea riding on his shoulder. Rick reached for the leash, but Brute growled and shook his head slowly, the human motion utterly un-wolflike. Rick sighed. “Fine. But keep close.”

Outside, Rick leaned against the wall in the shadows and waited. Brute, however, went scent-searching. He started right at the door, his nose to the ground, and began a circular pattern, walking and sniffing in an ever-widening spiral. He was about twenty feet out when he stopped, his nose buried in a clump of grass. Even in the moonlight, Rick could see his ruff stand on end.

“Brute?”

The wolf chuffed and breathed in and out in short, sharp bursts. Rick had seen the wolf get scent-lost before, his wolf-brain taking over, leaving the human part of him behind, disoriented and confused. Dog people called it nose-suck, which might be humorous in a toy poodle, Chihuahua, or shih tzu, but not so much in a rottweiler, pit bull, or werewolf.

Pea scrambled down from Brute’s shoulder and inspected the tuft of grass with her nose as well. She scampered to Rick, mewling and chittering.

“Brute, are you scenting the person who put the LSD on my keyboard?” Brute didn’t react or respond, and Rick knew better than to touch him. Wolves had violent physical reactions to being brought off a scent-binding and he wasn’t in the mood to be mauled. “Brute?” He whistled softly and finally the wolf raised his head. His pale eyes were wholly wolf, feral. Rick went still, vamp-still, not even daring to breathe. The wolf growled so low Rock felt it vibrate in his chest. “Brute? Stand down. Stand down.” Pea launched herself across the two yards and landed on the wolf’s head with a catlike yowl. Brute yelped. In a moment, they were rolling around on the ground, roughhousing, the scent forgotten.

Rick blew out, letting the adrenaline rush melt away. “Brute,” he said, his voice a command. The animals’ heads came up fast. They stopped playing, and Rick could see the intellect again in Brute’s eyes. “Were you scenting the person who put the LSD on my keyboard?”

Brute dropped his head and raised it. Yes.

“Okay. Can you follow it? And not get scent-lost again?” Rick asked. Brute nodded. A small grim smile pulled at Rick’s lips. “Then let’s see where it goes.”

With Pea riding his shoulder, Brute turned, sniffed, and started running to the back of the Quonset hut, his nose to the ground. Rick followed at a trot. He was halfway around the building when he ran out of the shadows into the moonlight. The moon-call hit him. His breath stopped in his lungs; his muscles cramped in an electric spasm. He hit the ground face-first. The night vanished.

Rick woke slowly, the dark night full of scents. He knew where he was and who was with him by the scent patterns alone—the Quonset hut. Brute, Pea, and Soul were there. Soul was sitting on the edge of his bed; he was lying on the floor. His music was playing, the musical notes of the flute driving back the pain.

Even with the music, his skin burned as if he’d been flayed with stone blades, drenched in gasoline, and set on fire. All he wanted was to go back to sleep, find that dark and pain-free place he’d left upon waking, and stay there until the misery ended. Instead, he said, “That was really stupid.” The words were mumbled, but he knew he’d been understood when Soul laughed softly and Brute snorted.

“I do hope that is the last time you forget to carry your music when you go out under the full moon,” she said. “I brought my old MP3 player and downloaded your music. Here.” She leaned down and draped the cord over his head to rest on his neck, the speaker close by his ear. “Are you up to trying again, or shall the werewolf and I do this alone?”

Rick pushed up with his palms, groaning. His abdominals felt like he’d been stomped on by a herd of rampaging elephants. The rest of his muscles had a fine quiver through them, like his body was carrying an electric current. “Sure.” Kneeling, he caught the desk as the room spun. “I feel just peachy. Just let me puke my guts out for an hour and I’ll be ready to go.”

Soul rested her hands on his shoulders. “See if this helps.” The skin below her palms stopped aching. Instantly. From there it spread down his body, soothing and cool. Somehow the sensation made him think of the color green, green water, green grass in a green meadow. In two minutes he was mostly pain-free.

Raising his head, he looked up at Soul. “You’re not a witch. Not a were. You measure on the psymeter as a human, but you’re not. What kind of creature are you?”

“Creature,” Soul tsked. “Such rude, personal questions. Surely your mother taught you better. Let’s find the person who stole your music and wanted to drug you.”

Rick cursed, but managed to roll to his feet. All he wanted to do was curl up and sleep, but making the grade at Spook School would be an effort of perseverance, and the three days of the month when he was moon-called were the days the PTBs would watch him most closely. The world lurched and he nearly fell, but Brute came and sat at his side.

After a moment, Rick rested his hand on Brute’s head. He had never touched the wolf before, and the long hair was coarse, but the shorter hair near the wolf’s skin was softer, and warm. Far warmer than human skin. The heat felt good on Rick’s chilled skin. Brute didn’t react, didn’t look up at him, or snap, or move away. Pea raced up the wolf’s back, then up Rick’s arm to his shoulder. She nuzzled his cheek and crooned softly. Rick chuckled, his voice hoarse, and adjusted the player’s strap.

“Brute. Follow—” He stopped. Soul had said something about his mama and manners. “Brute, would you please follow the scent you discovered outside?”

The werewolf huffed softly and went to the door, taking his warmth with him, leaving Rick’s hand cold. He followed the wolf slowly, feeling the moon-call’s ache in his bones. But if he wanted to be a PsyLED agent, he had to make it through this full moon, sane and functioning. And the next moon. And the next after that.

He paused at the threshold and took a slow breath, fear skittering up his spine on chitinous legs, sweat trickling in its wake. Stepping into the moonlight took an effort of will. But he followed the wolf back to the scent-marked grass in the moonlight. This time, Brute took a single sniff and started walking, nose to the ground, glancing back only once to make certain Rick was there. Soul close behind them, they moved across the compound, past the farmhouse kitchen. Toward the business offices, the library, and the communication building.

One of the security guards stepped from the shadows and looked them over. It was Ernest, and Soul paused, asking the guard to follow them. They wound through the compound, Brute’s nose to the earth, and they reached the administration building. At the foot of the stairs, the werewolf paused, burying his nose in the grass again, breathing in and out with no rhythm, fast, short, long. Soul and Ernest stood silently behind them. Rick could hear the crackling of the guard’s radio.

Finally, Brute blew out and turned his head to Rick. The wolf’s head was down, his shoulders high, ruff high, ears flat. Whatever he was smelling, it wasn’t good. Brute started up the steps to the admin building, setting his paws carefully, slowly, his nose moving back and forth over each step. When he reached the narrow porch, that low-pitched, rumbling growl started, and Rick automatically reached for his weapon. He was unarmed and his hands closed on empty air. Brute snarled, showing fangs. Behind him, he heard the soft whisper of leather-on-steel, as Ernest drew his sidearm and positioned to the left. Soul moved quickly to Rick’s right, her feet silent on the wood.

Brute stared at Rick, his eyes almost glowing, trying to communicate . . . something.

“Are you still tracking the same scent from my quarters?” Rick asked.

Brute nodded once, then shook his head.

“Yes and no?”

Brute nodded, showing a gleam of teeth in the night.

Rick asked, “Have you smelled this scent before?”

Brute nodded, his eyes so intense that Rick felt, for a moment, like prey. He had no idea what to ask next. Brute huffed, put out a paw, and traced a jagged shape.

Rick asked, “The full moon?”

Brute shook his head.

Rick said, “It’s just a circle.”

Brute huffed, his head jutting forward.

“A witch circle,” Rick said. “The witch circle at the crime scene. You found the coven leader. Here.”

Brute nodded once, slowly.

“She’s been here all along?”

Brute nodded and turned back to the door, his eyes, nose, and ears focused on the wood.

“Someone I’ve never had contact with.”

Soul said, “Call backup, Ernest. Now.”

The guard didn’t bother to reply, but murmured into his mike, “Backup to Admin. Silent, armed approach.” To Soul, he said, “I’m carrying only standard ammo.”

Soul pulled up her skirt to reveal a thigh holster. She handed Rick a Smith & Wesson .22, still warm from contact with her body.

Holding a weapon, Rick instantly felt better. He released the magazine and checked the ammo. “Silvershot,” he said. He slammed the magazine back into place, pulled back on the slide, injecting a round into the chamber. Rick stepped into the shadows beside the door and slowly turned the knob. It wasn’t locked.

He pointed to the wolf, and held up one finger, then to himself and held up two fingers, then to Ernest with three fingers. The guard nodded, pointed left. Rick nodded and pointed right. He turned off his music and opened the door. Brute flowed in like a white cloud, hunched down, silent. Rick followed to the right, and felt, as much as heard, Ernest and Soul move left.

Inside, the entry was dark, lit only by the green glow of computer battery backups. Brute didn’t need more light; neither did he. They moved through the entry, around the counter, to the doorway in back. It opened to a hallway, offices on either side. Music flowed through the air, the mellow sounds of wood flutes, familiar and calming. His music, stolen from his quarters, the music that Chief Smythe had been so interested in.

The frame around one doorway was bright, and Brute padded down the hallway, nose down, to that door. Rick followed, and the music grew louder. He expected the office to be Chief Administrator Liz Smythe’s. Instead, it was Mariella Russo’s office, her name in gold leaf on the wood. Mariella Russo, who was on call the night he went to the crime scene.

He stood back and let Ernest take his place. The man reached out and took the knob in hand, turning it slowly. The door didn’t creak as it swung open. Light flooded into the dark hall along with his music, amplified, and a stench like rotten cabbage, rotten eggs, and burned matches. Rick covered his nose. Brute padded inside two paces and halted.

The office furniture had been pushed back, exposing the wood floor painted with a witch’s circle and pentagram. In the circle was a dark cloud and a body, human, Caucasian, female. Blonde. Rick felt the shock of recognition. Polly. He didn’t have to wonder if she was dead. Her abdominal cavity had been ripped open, and the cloud was feeding on her. A demon. Mariella Russo was sitting at her desk, staring into the witch circle, her cupped hands in front of her, holding something that glowed yellow-green.

Soul leaped for the desk, her body leaving the floor in one smooth, sleek movement. Agile. Inhuman. Both Ernest and Rick lifted their weapons in two-hand stances. Fired. Two taps. Ernest’s slammed Russo mid-center of her body mass. Rick’s shots hit her forehead.

A half second later, the concussion of the shots still echoing, Soul was standing behind the desk, holding Mariella’s hands in hers. She eased the thing, whatever it was, from the dead administrator’s hands. “Call for a containment vessel,” she ordered. But Ernest was already doing so, his voice soft and in control.

Brute whoofed and growled and ended on a faint whine, his eyes on Soul. Yeah, Rick thought, remembering her speed, like a time-jump of movement. She wasn’t human. No way, no how. Not with that leap. He walked to the circle and stood beside Brute, one hand on the wolf’s head, scratching gently at the base of the upright ears.

The demon raised up out of Polly’s naked body and hissed at them, showing a mouth full of sharp, pointed teeth. Ernest turned up the volume of the music and the demon closed its eyes, settling back to the corpse, as mellow as Rick felt when the music protected him from the moon-call. He thought back to the spell at the crime scene. They had called up a moon-demon. Soul lifted her eyes to Rick. “Please go back to your quarters.”

Rick ejected the magazine of Soul’s .22 and put the safety on before setting the gun on the desktop. He and his unit backed out just as four men rushed into the room, one carrying a cylindrical canister with a rounded top.

The next morning, Rick and the others of his triumvirate were called to the chief administrator’s office. Since he hadn’t started with the other trainees, Rick hadn’t met the CA, Dr. Smythe, but now, the chief was sitting at her desk, her face grave, her salt-and-pepper hair in a short bob, her face set in the no-nonsense expression of a drill instructor. Soul was standing against the window, her arms crossed, shoulders hunched, her stance protective and uncertain, maybe just a bit defiant.

The former cop, the wolf, and the grindylow stood inside the office, Rick’s eyes drawn to the pile of things on the CA’s desk. It was his nine mil and holster, his backup ankle weapon, stakes, three silvered vamp-killers, his money, ID, credit cards, and the little black velvet jewelry box he’d purchased on his last leave.

He hadn’t seen his stuff since that last leave, two weeks ago.

His next leave was days away.

It was two weeks until graduation.

They were booting him out.

Rick’s heart dropped. Brute looked up at him and whined. Nudged his hip with his damp nose. Rick put his hand to the wolf’s ears and scratched.

“It has been brought to my attention,” the CA said, “that you were part of the reason—”

“The only reason,” Soul interrupted.

The CA nodded serenely. “The only reason why Mariella Russo’s crimes were discovered. We now believe the three students who supposedly signed Quit-Forms in the last few weeks did not terminate their schooling, but may have been fed to her demon.” The CA leaned back in her chair and templed her fingers at her chin. “We have launched a full investigation. We also understand that you witnessed . . .” She looked at Soul over her fingers. “. . . something that is classified, and must remain so.”

Did she mean the sight of Soul flowing-leaping-gliding over the desk to catch the thing in Mariella’s hands before she dropped it? Or the containment cylinder? Or—

“But that isn’t why I called you here,” the CA said. “We have a problem in New Orleans. You are from there, yes?”

Rick straightened. This didn’t sound like a you’re-fired speech. “Yes, ma’am.”

“And you are familiar with Leo Pellissier, the master of the city?”

“I am.” He was related to Leo’s heir too, but he didn’t offer that, not now, not ever.

“We would like you to travel there and deal with the situation.” Rick’s breath exploded out of him, and he sucked in another. He hadn’t been aware that he’d been holding his breath. Smythe looked at Soul and her lips lifted into a faint smile. “Just so you know, Soul is against this. She feels you need more time here. Which is why, if you accept, she will be going with you.”

Soul’s mouth opened for a moment, then closed. “You could have told me,” she said.

The CA chuckled. “If you agree to the assignment, Soul will accompany you into the field and provide both a temporary partnership and the last weeks of your training. You may return for graduation, of course. Soul, please explain the assignment to your in-field trainee. If he accepts, collect the necessary gear from the Quonset hut, and credit cards for your expenses from financial.” Smythe stood and held out a wood box. “I am assuming you will accept. Your temporary badge.”

Rick took the box and shook Smythe’s hand. He wasn’t being booted. He was being given an assignment. Before graduation. “Thank you, ma’am.” The CA placed his gear in a paper bag, and had him sign for his personal belongings. Holding the bag and badge, Rick left the admin building with his unit and Soul. They stopped in the sunlight and Soul studied him, shading her eyes.

“They didn’t kick my ass out.” A smile pulled at his face. He wasn’t sure how long since he’d grinned that widely. Probably since he lost his humanity. “I have a present for you,” he said. Rick reached into the paper bag and handed Soul the velvet box. “It was supposed to be a thank-you gift, for after graduation. But you should take it now. Sorry it isn’t wrapped.”

Soul raised her eyes to his and started to speak, but stopped, and took the box instead. She opened it. Inside was a golden apple on a thin gold chain. “A Golden Delicious apple,” he said, “for the . . . creature.” He laughed as sparks flew from her eyes when he brought up the fact that she wasn’t human. “Tell me about the operation.”