Snow: The White Crow (11 page)

Cursed children start to lose their drive to play after a few years of being cursed.  They still have the emotions of children because of the hormones in their bodies, but are much more mature as their minds age while their bodies don't.  My heart goes out to those poor children and cheer whenever the Red Hood frees another segment of the population of the curse.

I sent a small wave of power rippling through me, coaxing the land, asking a favor.  Rachel squinted at me, she must have felt something.  Then a small smile graced her face on her face as flowers grew and bloomed, lining the playground as we drove past.

We spent the rest of the drive concentrating on the file for operation Bandicoot.  The last known location of the men, the last transmissions.  The status of the missing men sent out in search of the Bandicoot team.  And discussed possible methods to locate them.  Twenty men and women in all.  Ten in the original team and five each in the two teams sent in after them.

I muttered, “If we could somehow contact Red, that would double our numbers and our chances of finding and returning the men if they still live.”

My wolf glanced at me as we went deeper into the mountains.  “Didn't you say they gave you a card?”  I squinted not knowing if I had actually told her that or if she were somehow in my head again.  I couldn't bring myself to be upset if she had because she was obviously not consciously doing it, and... I sort of liked her in there, knowing I could share more of myself with this fascinating woman... my mate.

I sighed. “It is just for an answering service since cell phones don't work around them.  Kind of like how mine goes on the fritz when I am drawing on my power.  They have magic almost dripping off of them at all times.”

I pondered that for a moment, wondering where they derived their power from.  Other than Daria's Alpha compulsion they didn't have any real magic of their own.  Then I realized that if they were the balance to the demonically based magics and black magic that created the werewolves, then it stood to reason that it was something that the gods of nature may be supplying somehow, but it would need some sort of focus.  Some object that fed them energy.  I'd have to ask them later if they cared to share that much with me.

Then I tapped my cell that I had pulled out of my pocket with the card as I contemplated.  Then said, “They said to just call and they would find me.”  I looked at the plain white card that was thick linen stock, and at the number written in calligraphy on it... there was nothing else on the card.  I dialed the number as Rach kept glancing from the road to me with curiosity.

The first ring hadn't even finished when a woman with a heavy European accent answered simply with, “Name?”

It almost caught me off guard and I grinned at myself and replied, “Gretta Snow.  I'm trying to...”

The woman cut me off. “Miss Damaschin will find you.” And the line went dead.

I blinked then looked at Rachel who looked amused.  I knew her wolf ears picked up the other end of the conversation.  I said, “Well then.  That was... terse.” We chuckled and I wondered out loud.  “So how is she supposed to find us?  How will the answering service contact her if they can't call her?”

I absently twirled the card in my hand then stopped and stared at it.  “I wonder.”  I mused and opened up my senses.  It was subtle, so subtle that unless you were looking for it you wouldn't find it no matter how sensitive you were to magic.  The ink on the card started to pulsate, it tasted of a sweet magic, something pure, something of nature.

I let out a surprised chuckle and held the card up to her.  “I've been Lojacked.  The card is a homing device, and calling the answering service activated it.  This is a beautifully crafted weaving, so subtle and delicate.  It doesn't taste like Maireni or Daria's magic.  I've seen this kind of weaving from pixies and it has the lavender tang of Romanian magics.  Could they be working with the pixies?”

The sun was low on the horizon when we pulled up to the old Slater Mining headquarters.  It hadn't been vacant long, the government had occupied the large modern building and the lodge until six months ago.  Once the large caches of silver Slater had hidden in his warehouses were emptied and shared across the world's walled cities to aid in defense, and all the paperwork was scoured, the place was abandoned.

I glanced around as Rachel first drove us around the perimeter with our windows down.  Both of our nostrils were flaring as we drew in air over our tongues. Most of the glass in the windows of the office building had been broken out by vandals since the place was abandoned.  I could see crime scene tape fluttering in the wind from when Red had killed Slater.

There were tons of fresh smells from recent activity.  Men and women, clean bloods, infected, and werewolves from last night.  Cordite, there had been a battle recently, but I wasn't sure when.  Blood, lots of blood.

I smiled in a predatory manner as I added Red and Daria's scents in the mix.  They had tracked the witches here.

I checked my cell and there was no service, that would explain the loss of communications, but I thought the cell tower had been repaired when the government took over the site.

I reached out, questing to see if I could feel anything living that wasn't wildlife, looking for the familiar feel of motion without being able to touch whatever was moving.  Nothing.  Even the local wildlife was keeping its distance.  Whatever happened here wasn't natural.

Since my senses were open, I noticed something hiding.  Black magics permeated the area, hiding something.  I pushed at it and felt the casting dissolve, then the scent of Lamia hit my nostrils.  Rachel seemed surprised as her nostrils flared.  She said, “They were here, the two witches.”  I nodded, they had headed... I paused, the scents were confusing, they headed everywhere at once?

I ignored my nose and looked with my magic and saw, a complex weaving that I couldn't break without taking some time.  It was a confusion spell that laid so many false trails to confuse all the senses.  I said, “They laid false trails with black magic.  The old crone was here, so the two witches are together.”

Once we were both satisfied the area was deserted, we got out of the car.  Rach was panting and I could feel her wolf rising.  I said, “Okay, let's get you to the lodge and locked away for the night. I'll investigate the area tonight then in the morning we can go on the hunt.  Maybe Red will have contacted us by then.”

We checked our gear then the locks on the small wolf cage in the back of the vehicle we brought in case we didn't get to Slater Mining before nightfall.  It was our failsafe for my girl.

With her wolf so close to the surface, her musk was almost overwhelming.  I wanted the woman, but we only had about fifteen minutes before sunset.  Not enough time.  I chuckled at my new found libido and she chuckled too.  She must have gotten a flash from me.

We got up to the lodge which hadn't been touched by vandals for some reason. The windows and FMBs were all in great shape.  We opened the door to get her to one of the many wolf cages by the panic rooms and were hit by the overwhelming smell of werewolf, blood, and death.

We were immediately on guard, our weapons drawn and my magic building inside of me.  We stepped in and I felt like we had stepped through a veil as black magics tickled my spine and made the fine hairs on my body stand on end.  I quickly turned and reached out and my hand met resistance at the doorway.  “Fuck,” I muttered.

I looked at Rach, who was at my back covering me as she looked around.  I said, “Some sort of barrier trap, be careful.  It lets things in but not out.  I can probably disassemble the spell.  It will take twenty or thirty minutes.  The second Lamia is much more skilled and powerful than the first.”

She nodded. “Okay then, let's clear this place and get me locked away and then you can work on that.”  I nodded back and we went through the lodge.  We found discarded body armor and blood spatters everywhere, and the bones of a man who had been completely devoured.  There were claw and fang marks all over the bones.  What little flesh was left was starting to rot.  This had happened last night when the last search party disappeared.

Then I got it.  “This trap was for them.  They had wolves in here when the three infected men, one Clean Blood..”  I sniffed the air. “And one woman came inside.”

She shook her head. “Wouldn't work.  There are over a dozen panic rooms in here.  They could have waited them out inside.  Of course, they would have been sitting ducks for anyone not wolf.”  Then we both snapped our heads to each other and started running for the nearest room.

I ran to the panic room and she dropped beside it to check the wolf containment cage.  We both cussed.  Someone had destroyed the locks; both were useless.  We ran room to room and the others were the same.  At the main door I noted the panic button and all of the FMB controls were smashed.

We stared at each other then the sun outside, we were a minute away from sunset.  She looked at me with pain and love in her eyes and drew her nine mil and started swinging it up to her temple.  It had the color coding on the clip for silver rounds.

I thanked all the ladies of nature for my enhanced reflexes as I slapped the gun out of her hand then slapped her.  “Don't you dare!  We can get through this, I won't let you hurt me.  I love you, got that Rachel!?”

She was shaking her head and crying. “If I kill you I wouldn't be able to forgive...”  I slapped her again.   This brought her out of it as wolf eyes locked on mine.

I grabbed her hand and dragged her into a room  I pointed at a cage.  “Get in!  I'll barricade it and then the room.”

She dove in and I slammed the door as she started stripping out of her clothes while I pushed the heavy bed in front of the cage.  I stacked the rest of the furniture on the bed then got out into the hall when the first pained grunt signaling the start of her transformation began.  I locked the door from the hall.  That wouldn't stop a human, but an unthinking werewolf wouldn't be able to operate the lock.

There was no way to block the door from the hall since it opened inwards. So I just went to the next room and locked myself in then duplicated the other barricade with the bed and furniture.  I called upon nature as I heard the first snarls and banging indicating her wolf had come.  The vines I called in through he window, whose FMBs had not lowered into place, recoiled from the black magics that trapped me inside.  It was damaging nature and that hurt me as it hurt the vines. I could try to subdue her with magic if she got out, but I didn't want to hurt her.

I heard wood cracking and an enraged wolf.  I sat down and concentrated on the trap spell.  She had woven it like a basket.  Each piece interwoven with the others.  Forming a complex and multi-layered approach.  This wasn't meant for mere humans, infected or not, it was meant to trap something powerful like... the Red Hood.

I set about disassembling the trap with my own magics as I heard Rachel break out of her cage,  I heard wood splintering as she went insane destroying the furniture that had trapped her like it was prey.  Then the slamming of a body and claws against a door.             

I lost my concentration when I was suddenly looking at a half demolished door as I tore at it with my claws.  I was enraged, the door tried to stop me from hunting.  It had to die!  I blinked away her sight and the rage that was so invigorating and there was nothing of Rachel in it, it was all primal beast.  I swallowed, suddenly thankful that the cursed didn't remember what their werewolves did.

There was a crack in the hall then I jumped at the sound of a body being thrown against the door to my room and the scrabbling of claws that accompanied the growling and snarling.  I redoubled my efforts to get through the trap.

Then there was the sound of metal giving way as a hinge snapped and wood started splintering.  I just needed another couple minutes, I almost had it.  Her claws tore through the wood and her snapping jaw came through the hole as she started slamming her body into the door again.

I didn't want to hurt her!  The hole was almost big enough for her to squeeze through now.  The lights reflected off of her shining red pelt.  I'd never seen a wolf that color.  If it weren't for the fact she was trying to tear me apart, I'd say she were beautiful.

She snarled at me and paused, her nostrils flaring and she made a screeing sound as she pulled air over her tongue.  She snarled wildly and her two front paws rested on the opening in the door and her retractable, recurved claws that were more like a jungle cat's extended. Then with her amber eyes on me, her fangs bared and dripping with saliva she pulled and the wood gave way under her tremendous strength.

She stepped through and onto the bed, lashing out and causing the furniture to tumble off of it.  I was on my feet and backing up.  Pulling all of my power to me.  I could feel my brand on my shoulder heating up.  I didn't want to hurt her, my eyes were welling with tears.

She leaped to the ground and started forward but then scented the air again.  I was ready to stop her, but it would probably also kill her with the amount of energy I'd have to throw to stop a werewolf, they are very tough and hard to stop.

I whispered, “Rachel.”  The wolf started moving from one side to the other, ears flat to her skull, her tail suspended behind her.  She didn't attack instantly like any werewolf would do.  Instead she took one slow step toward me at a time, stalking.  Why didn't she attack?  Wolves were all instinct.  I looked at her.  Then blinked.  No, it couldn't be that simple could it?  I dropped to a knee, my eyes on hers, my magics ready to strike in an instant.