Shadow on the Moon Page 9

  "Why did you take them off?" Her emotions already hidden, she rose haughtily to her feet.

  "So I could get to you before you fell!"

  "Are you saying it's my fault you ran barefoot through the snow? Why on earth would you do that?"

  "To reach you in time," he snarled. "Now if you don't mind, I need my boots."

  Full of fury, disappointment, hurt feelings, and myriad other bewildering emotions, Dana glared into his angry eyes. For just a crazy minute there, when he'd held her in his arms, trembling as if he'd recovered something of immense value, she'd almost thought he cared. Now he acted like she was his cross to bear, a silly creature, barely worth the effort he'd expended.

  "I didn't ask you to play hero, Morgan. What makes you think I couldn’t have gotten out of there myself?"

  A scornful expression crossed his face and he gazed off in the direction of the pen.

  "Don't ignore me. You don't know what I could have done."

  To her surprise, he answered with a sorrowful groan. Dana turned to follow his gaze and her heart sank to her toes.

  The dogs were gone.

  Chapter Ten

  The seeming invincibility of the wer-wolf comes from the alchemization process. When this craven beast is wounded in either human or wolfish form, the act of transformation brings instant healing. Thus, all traces of former action is lost. What this means, brave hunter, is one never knows who is the beast among us. The deadly and cowardly creature that slinks into the woods with your bullet in its flank at night may yet walk with you hale and hearty come the morn.

  Dana lifted her eyes from the page, beginning to think she'd be spending the rest of her life huddled under the blankets of the narrow bed she now called home. Wind again battered the eaves, snow beat against the windows, and she missed New Mexico like crazy.

  Although she saw it pained him to do so, Morgan had insisted on pulling on his boots without her help, and when she offered to help find the dogs, he gruffly ordered her to carry wood inside so they wouldn't freeze during the storm. Although still angry, she had seen the wisdom of his suggestion. Besides, Morgan wouldn't have failed to secure the latch if she hadn't been chasing the helicopter.

  Alternating between bitterness and remorse, and heartbroken at failing to catch the attention of the helicopter, she'd done as he asked. After she'd stacked the wood and fed the fire, she'd wandered around the cabin at loose ends until she finally picked up the book.

  Likewise, a beast injured while in human form heals instantly after passing through the fires of alchemization. The neighbor limping at noontide from a stubbed toe will move freely and easily ere the night passes. Watch for these clues, so as not to be taken unawares. Many a dismayed hunter upon finally slaying the beast has soon gazed upon the face of a loved one. A husband, a wife, a lover, a friend. Yeah, even a parent or child.

  The door burst open, bringing Morgan and a flurry of snow. Dana's hand flew to her heart. He dropped his snowshoes beneath the pegged rack and seemed not to notice that he'd frightened her.

  "Did you find them?" Dana asked, after recovering from her start.

  He headed for the mat without answering, his boots thudding ominously with each step. Snowflakes still clung to his beard and he knocked them away fiercely, his entire demeanor bristling with outrage.

  "All but Fenris." He lowered onto the stool.

  "Do you think he'll survive the storm?" Dana blinked back tears. If that sweet dog died, she could blame no one but herself. Nor could Morgan.

  "Hard to say." But the crease between his eyes had deepened to a chasm. He glanced at the blaze in the fireplace. "At least you stoked the fire."

  At least.

  Never in her life had Dana felt incompetent. She'd always scorn women who couldn't change a tire, carry wood, or even shovel snow from a walkway. Now she felt an unwelcome sisterhood.

  "I'm so sorry." A tear fell over her lower lashes. Twice in one day. Dear Lord, she was even beginning to be as weepy as they were.

  "Don't cry," Morgan barked. "It won't change anything."

  She nodded and sank deeper into her blankets. Her head ached and her stomach rumbled. The storm raging at the cabin walls seemed even harsher than the one before. All was dark out side, and Dana had no idea what time it was. Her stomach growled again, more loudly this time.

  "I'll get you some stew soon as I'm done," Morgan said.

  "You don't have to wait on me."

  He bent to remove his boots, and Dana remembered his frostbitten feet. She threw off the blankets and climbed from the bed.

  "I'll heat some water for your feet. I should have done it while you were—"

  "That isn't necessary."

  "Yes, yes it is. You're a doctor, you should know that." She hurried to the sink and picked up the pan under the dripping pump.

  "My feet are fine, Dana."

  Ignoring his protests, she bustled to the stove, replaced the venison pot on top of the flickering burner with the water pan, and turned up the heat.

  "They're fine, I tell you."

  "How could—" She glanced down at his bare foot and gave out a little shriek.

  His toes should have been red, even blistering, but they were as pink and healthy as hers.

  "That's impossible," she said in a shocked whisper.

  "I heal quickly." He hid his foot inside his fleece slipper. "Hunting for the dogs got the blood circulating. My toes stung awhile, that's all." He bared his other foot and shoved it into its slipper with considerable haste.

  . . . the act of transforming brings about instant healing.

  Dana shook her head.

  A husband, a wife, a lover.

  She shook her head again. What was wrong with her? It was bad enough she might have cost Morgan his dog; she should be glad his feet weren't damaged. Instead, she was having ridiculous thoughts spawned by a stupid book about creatures that didn't exist.

  "Uh, good." Feeling a little sheepish, she took the water pan back to the sink, then offered to dish out some stew for Morgan, wanting something, anything, to keep her mind off what she'd just read, just seen.

  "I'm not hungry." He stood then and stripped off his jumpsuit. Without another word, he stalked to his bedroom and disappeared inside.

  Feeling thoroughly rebuked, Dana lifted the lid of the stew pot, but the normally delicious aroma turned her stomach. Returning to the bed, she bundled up. The Lycanthropy Reader lay open next to her, to the page where she'd left off.

  It was filling her mind with nonsense, undoubtedly fueled by the fierce storm and relentless darkness, and belonged back on the bookshelf. But despite these thoughts, she picked it up again.

  This author prays, dear hunter, that you are not among those who have wept over the coffin of a beloved, slain by your own hand.

  The sentence filled Dana with inexplicable sadness, and for the third time that day her eyes brimmed with tears. She replaced the book on the table, blinking hard, trying to make sense of her feelings. Soon she dozed off.

  When the knock came, she'd been dreaming. Someone was shouting "With a huff and a puff," and she felt like a slab of pork about to be devoured. She came awake with a rush of terror, head pivoting, searching the room, trying to make sense of the noise. The sturdy outer door was virtually quivering from the force of the blows from the other side. The tingle she'd come to associate with extreme danger vibrated from her head to her toes.

  She ran to Morgan's bedroom and pounded on his door.

  "Morgan," she cried. "Someone's here."

  His door cracked an inch. "What?"

  "Someone's knocking on the door." Her mind whirled with confused thoughts. How could that be? No one could travel in this weather.

  Morgan shut the bedroom door in her face. Seconds later, he came barreling through, nearly knocking her over as he headed for the front entrance. He yanked it open to reveal one of the most striking women Dana had ever seen. Shorter than Dana, she was exceedingly slender, with a narrow face and round, ti
lted dark eyes. She moved out of a swirl of snow and stepped imperiously over the threshold, whipping the skirts of a Cossack-style coat around her legs.

  "I wish to speak with you, Morgan." Her voice held chilling self-possession.

  A nondescript person, made more so by his contrast with the striking woman, shuffled in from the whirlwind behind them. His eyes were downcast and his shoulders slumped pathetically as he dragged in a snow-caked bundle.

  The bundle whimpered.

  "Fenris!" Dana dropped to her knees, reached out for the dog's frozen collar, and dragged him to her chest. Ice crystals clung to his poor coat and he quivered against her breast, leaving chilly, wet spots on her thermal shirt. His cold tongue lapped at her cheek.

  "Leave him!" the woman commanded. "He's for Morgan."

  Dana glowered. "How did you get him?"

  The answer came in the form of a feral smile. Although it had to be her imagination, Dana thought she heard the man growl. She shot him an angry glance and he withdrew, seeming to hide in the woman's skirts.

  "For Christ's sake, shut the damned door!" roared Morgan. "Snow's getting all over the floor."

  The pathetic man scrambled forward and nearly collapsed in his effort to close the door against the driving wind. But the woman was undaunted.

  "I've returned your runt, Morgan. Unwise to leave him roaming about in such weather." She winked, as if there was a secret joke between them.

  If there was, Morgan didn't seem to get it. He drew his eyebrows together, deepening the crease between them to a gash. "Is that supposed to earn my gratitude?"

  "This we need to discuss." She gave Dana a meaningful and malevolent glance. "Alone."

  Morgan looked incensed and apprehensive at the same time. His gaze flickered from Dana to the woman to the man, who huddled near the door. Finally he cocked his head toward his bedroom.

  "In there." He took a few threatening steps in the direction of the woman's companion, then glanced down at Dana. "You get my meaning?"

  "Si, si," the man said obsequiously.

  Morgan took the woman's arm and ushered her into his room.

  Dana stared at his closed door, fuming. She didn't like that woman's proprietary air toward Morgan one bit! And what was he doing taking the visitor into the room he'd declared off-limits to her? But Fenris was still shivering in her arms and needed her care. She led him to the mat where she told him to sit, then she pulled some towels from beneath the sink. Sitting beside him, she roughed up his soaked gray coat, dislodging the clinging crystals. He wiggled happily beneath her touch and was soon sitting in a puddle on the mat. Dana took him to the fire, instructed him to lie down, then began heating some drinking water for him.

  All the while the man followed her movements with cunning dark eyes. Dana wasn't much good at hospitality, especially to such unexpected and unwelcome guests, but supposed she should offer him something.

  "I could heat up some cider," she said. "Would you like some?"

  "Si." His sly eyes flickered with momentary gratitude. "It would be, uh, be bueno."

  So he spoke very little English. That explained his odd behavior.

  A few minutes later, she gave Fenris the warm water then handed a steaming cup to the visitor. He took it and began slurping noisily.

  "You can sit down if you like." She pointed to one of the chairs by the table and he shuffled over to it. Dana did her best to ignore him while she mopped up the puddles their entrance had left, then headed for her bed where she curled up with the cider she'd poured for herself.

  After a few laps from his bowl, Fenris got up and began nervously roaming the room. From his place at the table, the man stared at her over his cup.

  Dana stared back, her skin again a mass of prickles.

  She wondered just how long Morgan would be.

  * * *

  "The woman for the runt," Lily said sweetly, gliding around the room, touching this, touching that. "It's a fair trade, is it not?"

  As her slender hand came to rest upon the shackles bolted to the inside wall, Morgan snarled. She laughed. "And what are these, dear Morgan? Something to help you resist the fullness of the moon? Ah, yes, that night will soon be upon us. Then who do you think will protect the mortal female? Trade her to me now and save yourself the grief."

  "There's nothing to trade, Lily. I already have my dog." They both knew she couldn't harm Fenris anyway.

  She frowned delicately. "Poor Jorje was to keep it outside. I must chastise him. Yet he was probably shivering grievously in the storm. He does despise the indignities of the human form." Her hand snaked out, stroked Morgan's beard. "You understand that, don't you? Although, of course, it is the beastly form you despise."

  Morgan backed away, repulsed. "Not just the form. I also despise you for giving it to me."

  "I am not as bad as you think. Don't I always spare the children and also keep Jorje from harming them? I am not completely brutal. You think you hate me, but like us, some day you'll come to relish the wolf's life and thank me for bestowing it."

  "It's been four years since you tracked me down and I still curse the day we met. Why do you think I'll change?"

  She smiled, clearly confident in her ultimate control. "Some, they say, take a decade or more to adjust. I shall wait. Time, dear Morgan, we have in abundance."

  "I'll see your bones buried in consecrated ground before I become your mate."

  "Sebastian has decreed it!" Lily snarled. "If you do not obey, he will one day come, to your everlasting regret. His chastisements, I assure you, are not as gentle as mine."

  Morgan buried one hand in his shaggy hair. Here he was, again debating with a creature completely immersed in brutality and artifice.

  He turned his head away indifferently, a blatant snub.

  "How dare you insult me?" she screeched in Lupinese, scraping a threatening foot against the floor.

  She darted to his table and swept aside a gas lamp. It crashed to the floor. Fuel spilled, staining the wood, and caught fire. Morgan calmly stamped it out, then turned to her. In the dimming light from the solar fixture on the wall, he saw her stare at him in outrage. Her silver hair began to bristle and grow. Her fingers, bare beneath the sleeve of her coat, began to splay. With a powerful leap, she landed in front of his dresser, picked up a hairbrush and threw it against the wall. It hit with a sharp smack, then fell to the floor.

  "You hopeless fool! That lamp, this brush, that food you keep on your silly shelves. These mortal accouterments do not become you! Nor will they preserve your humanity!"

  Then she lunged at the shackles on his inner wall. Growling gutturally and causing a great clatter of chains, she pulled and yanked, clearly trying to tear them from the wall. But her efforts were futile. Morgan had installed them to withstand the full power of his wolf nature, and she could do no more than make them clank.

  Frustrated, she turned to his inner door and pounded on it. "Why have you made yourself this cage?" With another roar, she charged at the outside exit, clawing at the metal door. "You've built a fortress, trying to hide from your nature. You fool, you total, utter fool! I gave you a gift, a precious gift, and you reject it!"

  As Morgan wearily witnessed her melodrama, he found he couldn't tear his gaze away. How easily she alchemized. No painful spasms. No agonized groans. He despised her with the depth of his soul, but still felt a terrible stab of envy each time he beheld her effortless transformation.

  She saw his eyes upon her and her rage disappeared as quickly as it had come. She leaped back to face him. "I have decided to forgive you, my darling. I see your wistfulness. You wish to know my secrets."

  Her eyes had sunk into the cranny beneath her emerging brow and were now all pupil and iris. She stared boldly at him and lifted a silvery hand to draw a single claw down the tender skin of his exposed neck. Parting her lips to reveal her deadly fangs, she leaned toward the spot where her claw rested. "Come, darling, let me reveal my secrets to you." Her honeyed tone somehow managed to give sw
eetness to the bitter sounds of the Lupine tongue. "Slaughter this woman and join me in all our glory. Then you too will know the ease of alchemization. One human kill, Morgan, is all it takes, then the shape shifts without slicing the mortal form with pain."

  "Get out, Lily." He deliberately used English, letting her know it was over.

  A hum of rage formed deep in her throat. Her eyes narrowed. With a sudden thrust of her head, she clamped her teeth on Morgan's throat. They stood stock-still for an instant, Lily's jaw poised open over his jugular vein.

  Her huge head had towered more than a foot above him while she stood upright, and in mortal form Morgan had no defense against her. But her attempt to frighten him into alchemization had no effect. He'd lived as one of her hellish kind long enough to know she would not, could not, harm him. No werewolf had ever killed another. It was a Lupine law Lily would never violate.

  Nor could she harm Dana as long as she remained on his land. A werewolf's territory was sacred. But, oh, how she wanted to. He felt her hate, her desire to destroy him for rejecting her so cruelly, felt how badly she wanted to deny the only law she lived by.

  "Do it!" he growled. "Put me out of my misery."

  He arched his neck, pressing against her sharp fangs. A tooth pricked his skin; blood trickled down his neck.

  With a distressed whimper, Lily released her hold and fell back. Her hands flew to cover her mouth, but not before Morgan saw the scarlet drop staining one fang. His blood. She'd tasted his blood.

  The realization filled her eyes with horror. She shuddered, and for a heartbeat Morgan pitied her. Like him, someone had made her what she was. Unlike him, she was too weak to resist her mutant nature. She even relished it.

  Then a shutter fell across her face, blocking those feelings. Her fangs and claws faded; the hair disappeared; her brow retreated. When it was done, her eyes were cold and hard. Morgan's pity, too, had vanished.

  "Be warned, Morgan," she said. "You are mine. I will not let the woman have you."

  With that, she straightened her back with dignity, gathered her Cossack coat around her legs, and stalked out of Morgan's bedroom.