Wolves and the River of Stone (15 page)

“Hello, Bubbles,” Cara said as she landed on the cu sith’s head and began scratching her ears. Bubbles’s tongue whipped out and hit Cara’s hands with a wet smack. Cara laughed and wiped her hands through the cu sith’s coarse fur before the fairy jumped off. Bubbles raced back into the shop. Cara landed on the floorboards and began trying to wring the slobber out of her wings.

Peanut was on his hind legs with his front paws on Nixie’s waist. “Who’s a good boy? Who’s a good boy?” She was in total baby speak mode and Peanut’s tail was just a blur.

Foster wore a proud smile. “And they make the best guard dogs, don’t-”

Before Foster finished speaking, Bubbles bounded out the door again. Her tongue shot out, wrapped around the fairy, and he disappeared into her mouth with a squeak. She darted back inside, leaving the rest of us to stare at the empty doorway.

Horror gripped me before Cara began laughing hysterically. Then confusion gripped me.

“Shouldn’t you be upset?” I said as I made exaggerated gestures at the door. “Your son just got eaten in front of us!”

Cara shook her head and wiped a tear away. “She didn’t swallow, and-” she broke down laughing again before she could finish as Aideen said, “Spit that out!”

Aideen flashed into a six-foot-plus valkyrie and ran through the door, trailing a spray of fairy dust. “Bubbles! Spit that out right now!” She grabbed the cu sith by the scruff of her neck and boxed her ear.

I sneezed in the plume of dust as we followed Aideen into the shop, my allergy medicine unable to keep up with the direct onslaught. Peanut was glued to Nixie’s legs. I closed the door behind the group.

I swear Bubbles smiled before her tongue rolled out and delivered Foster onto the wood floor in a puddle of slobber. He groaned, stretched out on his back, and wiped the drool off his face. “Oh god, what happened?”

“Your guard dog tried to eat you,” I said.

Foster sat up. “That explains this ... mess,” he said as he tugged at his drool-soaked armor.

Aideen bent down and picked Foster up. “That’s going to take hours to clean.” She sighed and tossed Foster casually into the grandfather clock. I heard a cry before he landed with a crash and much cursing ensued. Aideen blushed. “Sorry,” she said toward the clock. “I forgot you can’t fly yet.” She lowered her voice and looked at me. “I’d better go check on him.” Aideen flashed into her normal stature and fluttered into the clock.

“I suppose I’ll help clean up his armor,” Cara said. She laughed and then took a deep breath. “It’s worth it though, just for the laugh.”

Nixie and I looked at each other when the fairies were gone. A broad smile crept across her face before we both burst into laughter.

“Alright, let’s open the shop up for the afternoon.” I paused before I walked into the front room. “You guys want some pizza?” I heard a resounding yes from the grandfather clock. With the pizza ordered and the sign flipped to open, I set about showing Nixie how to work a cash register.

“So I just type in the numbers on the tag?”

“Yep.”

“And hit the total button?”

“Yep.”

“This is easy.”

“Yep.”

Nixie looked up and smiled at me. She turned back to the register, typed in the dollars and cents listed on small piece of amber and hit the total button. The register dinged and Nixie said, “Now what?”

“Well, if they’re paying with cash, hit cash, and if they’re paying with a card, hit the credit button and swipe their card. If it’s debit, it will prompt them for a pin.”

“That’s it?”

“Pretty much.”

“You don’t seem to get a lot of customers in here, Damian.”

“Pff,” I said as I blew out a breath. “You should have seen it before Frank turned it around.”

“It was
worse?”
Nixie said.

I nodded. “Ever since I put Frank in charge of ordering, we’ve been making a lot more money. The books have always done well, but keeping them hidden from the tourists is a priority. Frank wants to launch some huge Internet campaign to draw more business in for the books.” I shrugged. “It could be worth a try. I’ll let him run with it. As long as I can pay the bills, and Frank, I’m happy. And speaking of bills-”

The bells jingled on the front door as the pizza delivery man walked in. “Watch the store for a minute Nix?” She nodded and sat down on the stool behind the counter.

I paid the delivery driver in cash, although he probably wouldn’t have known if I paid him in manure, because he was staring at Nixie the whole time. I laughed as he left and then I walked to the back with a large onion, pineapple, barbeque, and anchovy pizza for the fairies. I still don’t know how they ate the damn things. Nasty.

The fairies descended on the pizza like a plague of locusts. Foster was wrapped in what looked like a toga and I tried not to laugh at him as he settled himself on the corner of the pizza box. The bell on the front door jingled as I walked back to the front room. I recognized the strawberry blonde hair in a heartbeat.

“Hey Ashley.”

“Damian! Oh, thank the stars you’re open today. I ran out of protection candles and need to buy some for a ritual this afternoon.” She glanced at her watch and grimaced. “It’s in an hour, and it’s a thirty minute drive from here!” She rubbed her face and hurried toward the candles.

“How many do you need?”

“Four, I think.” She paused and nodded. “Yes, four.”

“Take ‘em, no charge.”

“What?” She gathered two pairs into her hands and walked toward the register. “I can’t do that.” Her eyes moved to Nixie and she stopped dead. “Oh, hello, I didn’t see you there.”

“This is Nixie,” I said. I reached out, grabbed Nixie’s arm, and raised it so Ashley could see the bracelet. “The candles are on the house.”

“You make beautiful jewelry,” Nixie said.

Ashley smiled, nodded, and said, “Thank you, and it’s nice to meet you. I always hoped Damian would end up with a nice girl.”

“Keep hoping,” I said.

Nixie elbowed me in the gut and Ashley laughed.

“It’s nice to meet you too, priestess,” Nixie said.

Ashley crinkled her eyebrows at Nixie’s words. Her face relaxed a moment later and she stuffed the candles into her voluminous purse. She turned back to me and froze with her hand in her purse. “Goddess’s light, what are you wearing?”

“We went to a Renaissance Faire,” I said.

Ashley glanced at Nixie, still wearing her skintight jeans and black t-shirt. “And you didn’t have time to change?”

I wiped my hand down my face and laughed. “Long story. You want some pizza?”

“No thanks, I really have to run. It was good to meet you Nixie.”

“You too,” Nixie said as she waved.

The bell jingled again as Ashley bustled out of the shop at a near run.

Nixie smiled and reached out for the pizza box. “I like her. She’s funny, and truly gifted.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think she knew I was an undine, or at least not human.”

“Really?” I stared out the windows and wondered what that could mean. I took a deep breath and said, “You ever had barbeque chicken pizza, Nix?”

“No, but it smells wonderful.”

“That would be because it
is
wonderful.”

***

We were enjoying our pizza as the late afternoon sun lit the buildings on the other side of Main Street, until a screaming man joined us. The body smashed through one of the shop’s front windows, bounced off the wood floor, and crashed into a display of candle holders. The wooden, bronze, and silver candlesticks rang and twirled as they bounced off the ground, several coming to a rest below the candles at the far side of the store. I knew the man wasn’t human when the cu siths ran into the front room, barked like it was Armageddon, and then started backing away from the unmoving body.

The crumpled form began to shimmer and pop a moment later. I felt power surge past my aura and it didn’t take much to realize it was racing to the man on the floor. Black fur flowed around the man in the aisle before he rose up on his legs in a hunched, defensive posture. There was no four-footed wolf in the wake of that transformation. He had become something else—a living nightmare with long, clawed fingers, bulky arms, and a narrow snout. The werewolf leapt through the hole where my window used to be.

Nixie stared at me and blinked a few times.

I finished the last two bites of pizza I was holding, cursed, and grabbed my staff. I half jogged up the aisle to check out the scene. Sure, I was a necromancer, but my experience with werewolves up until the past few days had pretty much been “They don’t live here, why worry about them?” Having one fly into the Double D should have shocked the hell out of me, but I’d just finished consorting with a demon, met a living blood mage, and still had a codpiece strapped to my groin. It was just one of those days.

“Why do they have to turn into giant, muscled wolf-men?” I said under my breath. “Can’t they just turn into nice, friendly dogs?” I grumbled some more as Nixie ran up behind me.

“They’re werewolves, not shapeshifters,” she said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

I pushed my way out the front door to the jingle of the small bell and stepped into a scene out of a nightmare. I had a pretty good guess who the bulky, khaki-colored wolf-man on the cobblestone street was outside my shop as soon as I laid eyes on him.

“Carter!” I yelled.

His eyes flicked up to me, followed by one pointed ear, then both flicked back to the werewolf I’d watched shift a minute earlier. Carter moved to the side and I could see a streak of blood along his left arm, with more in the street beside him and along the side of a smashed up SUV.

Carter growled something like, “Stay back,” as he launched himself at the other werewolf. And I do mean launched. He went from a crouch to a furry missile faster than I could blink.

Carter’s arm punched through the other wolf-man’s neck in a spray of gore. The horrific crunch of cartilage and tearing of flesh were nauseating. I wasn’t sure how much damage the wolf could take, but when Carter twisted violently to the side and the other wolf-man’s head came off with a meaty snap, I was pretty sure it was dead.

Carter threw back his head and roared. The remaining windows shook on the front of the shop. He dropped the head in the gutter and crushed it beneath his huge paw. He jumped in front of me, movements verging on vampiric speed, and locked his clawed hands on my shoulders before I even realized what was happening,

It took everything I had not to crap myself. Carter’s face had elongated along with his teeth. He had a narrow, wolfish snout, and walked hunched over. The muscles in his arms looked like furry bowling balls and there was nothing human left in his eyes. They retained their color, but I knew the man before me was more wolf than anything else.

“Who are they, Damian.” Carter’s voice was a gravel-filled growl.

I swallowed. “Uh, who?”

I heard swords being unsheathed and caught a flash of white out of the corner of my eye. A moment later I heard Foster when he said, “Carter?”

The wolf’s ears flicked toward Foster’s voice as he nodded slowly.

“Carter, there are too many commoners here, come inside,” Cara said.

The claws relaxed their grip a little as I became aware of a swarm of screaming, terrified, tourists.

“They almost killed her,” Carter growled. “They asked for you and your master, Damian.”

“Maggie?” I said, stunned.

The wolf growled in affirmation as he pushed me into the brick wall and walked into the shop.

Carter’s claws cut furrows into the hardwood floors as he paced to the back room. I stood in the doorway and stared at the wolf-man before he began to shimmer and pop. Power burned against my aura as Carter shifted back to a human form, his transformation giving off waves of force. His muscles shook and flattened out over his arms as his back straightened. His fur just fell off. Carter was looking at the ceiling as he rolled his neck and stretched his back.

I stared at the pile of khaki fur and said, “You’re worse than my mother’s old malamute.” I toed the bed of fur and said, “Damn.”

Carter didn’t laugh.

“Oh, Carter!” Aideen said. She flashed a bright white as she morphed into her full height. She reached out for Carter’s left arm and he winced when she touched it. “You’re not healing ... why?” Her eyes widened and she whipped her hands away from the wolf like she’d been burned.

Carter balled his hand into a fist and grimaced when the muscles in his arm contracted. “I don’t know. One of the necromancers ... Zack, or Zachary. He hit me with something.” He rolled his arm to the right a little and I got a good look at the damage. The wolf wasn’t healing at all. A deep red and black bruise was expanding near his wrist as we watched.

“Had to be Zachariah,” I said. My eyes wandered over his arm. “That’s broken, Carter.”

“Look closer, Damian,” Cara said. She sounded sick, and for the first time I was worried more about Carter than I was about what he might do to me.

I nodded and focused my Sight. Then I saw it. A pulsing blob of black and bloody red was burrowing into the werewolf’s arm. “Holy fucking, fuck me, what
is
that?”