Change (The Shape Shifter Series) (14 page)

“Perfect.” Adam smirked. “They will never know what hit them. Now, start packing.”

“Adam?” Clarissa smiled.

“What?” he barked.

“I'm glad you're on our side.”

He grinned. “Me, too.”

Meanwhile, David was doing the same thing. He felt like a refugee. The only thing Sofia had said was that he had to leave right this minute, and as he couldn't turn off the small voice in his head that screamed danger, he just nodded. Now he was speedily shoving his clothes into a bag and hoping he could get away soon enough. He hated the idea of leaving. He hated to be just a human, but he knew he was no good there. Sofia obviously had a plan and the best way to help her was to leave. Daniel was waiting in the car and Sofia gave him instructions. David didn't understand how Daniel had known to come, and Sofia was way too tired to explain. Something had happened. Something so bad that it had brought up that cold ice in Sofia's eyes and the fighter tension in her muscles. If someone had hurt Marie, they would be horrified. One thing was certain. When Sofia looked like that, she was the most dangerous enemy anyone could ever dream of, and anyone with a brain would run as far and as fast as they could.

“Tiamhaidh.” Marie's voice was nothing but a breath.

“What is it, mo gaol?”

“I think I'm having a seizure,” she whispered and her eyes rolled up.

Tiamhaidh grabbed her in his arms and ran to the main cave. He put her on the bed just in time before she started to convulse. It was bad. He had never seen a seizure like this. Marie's head turned from side to side and her skin went deep blue. He could only see the white
s of her eyes and all her limbs were cramping. Hard cramps that made her look like she was struggling with death. And then she stopped breathing.

“Help!” he shouted and everyone came running. “Help her!”

Hands pushed him away and he could see nothing past their backs.

“She won't make it,” Erag said, pleased. “I told you, she's not strong enough.”

“Oh, shut up,” Faol said and carefully lifted Marie's eyelid.

The elders bent closer and all Tiamhaidh heard were aahs and oohs.
“What is it? What’s happening?” he asked, sick with worry.

No one answered. In fact they were so confused by what had happened to Marie earlier that they packed even closer to her, completely blocking him out.

That's it, he decided. He pushed some of them aside and went to her. She was still convulsing, but the color was coming back to her face. Why didn't they help her? No one had moved, except Faol, who was still looking under Marie's eyelids.

“Get out of my way!” Tiamhaidh snapped. “You're killing her!”

“Does it matter?” Erag asked venomously. “She's nothing but human.” Baz looked angrily at him and he backed off with his hands up. “Suit yourself,” he said and smiled cruelly.

“Look,” Faol said and Baz pushed Tiamhaidh closer. She was smiling. “We're not killing her, we're healing her.”

He looked into Marie's eyes and froze. They were no longer green. They were yellow-brown and the pupils kept getting bigger and smaller in turn. The whites of her eyes had faded and they looked more wolf-like than human.

“Is she a shape shifter, too?” Tiamhaidh asked and swallowed.

“I can't tell for sure yet, but yes, I think she is!” Faol laughed.

“Freak,” Erag grunted and Tiamhaidh sensed that he wasn't alone in his opinion. “She's not a shape shifter. She's a disgrace.”

Tiamhaidh turned to look at him. His eyes were murderous. “Want to say that again?”

Erag smiled provocatively.
“Sure. She's a freak.”

Tiamhaidh revealed his teeth and growled. He walked around Erag and prepared to fight. Erag revealed his teeth, too.

“Enough!” Baz thundered. “Erag, out. Tiamhaidh, stop playing and come here.”

Erag snarled once more and left. Tiamhaidh went close to Marie again.

“Look,” Baz said and took Marie's hand in his. “It's not going to be easy for her, but she will heal.”

Her fingernails had changed. Her hands looked something between human hands and animal paws. Tiamhaidh touched
one. “She's like me. Adam was right!” He turned to Faol and bowed his head slightly. “Thank you.”

“Don't thank me yet,” Faol said. A warning gleamed in her eyes. “This was the easy part.”

He looked at her, confused. Marie's convulsing had stopped and she seemed to be sleeping. “I don't understand. She is healing, right?”

“Probably,” Baz said carefully. “But she needs time, and that we don't have.”

“What do you mean?” Tiamhaidh snapped. “We have all the time we need. If you can cure her, we're not going anywhere.”

Baz sighed and for once he looked like an old man. “There's something you need to know.  Erag is not alone in his opinion.”

Tiamhaidh shrugged. “I knew that already. So?”

Baz sighed. “
There’s only a few of us who really want to heal Marie. Most of us just wanted to test her and see if she survived. Now that she has … well … they don't want to see more. They'll want to destroy her before she actually is a shape shifter.”

Tiamhaidh was silent. He stroked Marie's hair absentmindedly and stared at the wall with blind eyes for a moment. He managed to staunch the trembling of his hands and keep his face still. After a while he turned his gaze to Baz. “I see. And what are you going to do about it?”

“We can't do anything,” Siobhan interrupted with her bright voice. “We can't take any sides. If we do, they'll destroy us, too.”

“And that can't happen,” Tiamhaidh said bitterly. “After all, she's just a human.”

Siobhan sighed. “That's not what I meant. It's just that you don't know what they can do. Why do you think the other elders left and gave their positions to individuals like Erag and Liam? They left because they didn't have a chance against them, and neither do we. So the safest thing for us to do is step aside.”

“And let them destroy her?” Tiamhaidh’s voice sounded strangled.

No one answered. Tiamhaidh felt powerless. How many hours did they have before they came to take Marie away? Two? Four? Maybe more. Would it be enough? Would Sofia make it there in time? One thing was certain: if she did, she could save Marie. There was nothing more frightening than an angry mother trying to protect her child. And Sofia was not just any mother. She had powers she didn't even know about, and the best way to help her was to try to find out what powers she did have.

“How many of you are against humans?” he asked and straightened his back.

“I'm not sure,” Faol said softly. “Why? Siobhan just said that we can't take sides, and I couldn't agree more.”

“Just answer me,” he snapped. “How many will help Erag and his gang?”

“Thirty, maybe forty, I guess,” Siobhan said and came closer.

Tiamhaidh clenched his teeth.
“And how many of the elders are with him?”

“Only four,” Siobhan whispered, and continued when he glanced at her in surprise, “But we don't want to fight. Can't you see that we're not fighters? We're healers and teachers. Look around. How many soldiers do you see?”

Tiamhaidh looked around and was stunned. Most of the elders were sitting quietly, staring at the floor. They looked fragile. Old and beaten. He felt anger rising inside him. “So that's it. You're going to sit aside and do nothing? I can't believe my eyes. Do you know what humans would call it if you killed Marie? Murder! You hear me? Murder!”

The elders glanced at each other cautiously. They knew he was right, but they were afraid of Erag and, most importantly, they were afraid of Gunward.

Siobhan sighed and touched Marie's cheek. “I don't know about you others, but I'm not a murderer. I'll do whatever I can to save her.”

Baz and Faol came closer, too. “We're in, too. After all, she is our granddaughter. But we need a plan.”

“Can you trust these others?” Tiamhaidh said and looked at the four elders he didn't know.

“Yes, you can trust us,” an old man said.

“I didn't ask you,” Tiamhaidh snapped harshly.

“Yes,” Faol said wearily. “I think you can trust them.”

“That's not good enough. I need to be sure they don't turn their backs on me in the end. Siobhan, you can see into their minds, right?”

Siobhan nodded.

“Well then, would you check if I can trust them or not?”

The elders flinched. No one had doubted their loyalty before, and when Siobhan stepped closer to them they actually backed away. Tiamhaidh glanced meaningfully at the cave’s entrance. A woman stepped forward. Her lips were pursed tightly and her face screamed disapproval. Siobhan walked up to her and put her hands on her forehead. She closed her eyes and pressed down gently. Then she did the same with the other three. Baz and Faol looked ashamed. They understood why Tiamhaidh wanted to do this, but he should still have trusted their word.

“You can trust them,” Siobhan said sadly. “They still don't want to choose sides, but they don't want Marie to get hurt.”

“Fine. Now I need you to go out and find as many shape shifters on our side as you can.”

Siobhan smiled. “That's not necessary. I'm not one of the elders for nothing. I promise that there aren't any mindshapers in Senja who are more powerful than me.”

“I doubt that.” Tiamhaidh gritted his teeth and she looked at him questioningly. He shrugged. “What?”

“Nothing,” she said doubtfully. “I'll call the others and maybe then you can share your little secret with us?”

Tiamhaidh pressed his face against Marie's hair and pretended he hadn't heard her.

Marie woke to find
she was surrounded by faces. She didn't know how long she had been out of the picture, but obviously quite some time, as the cave was full of people. Most of them eyed her nervously. Siobhan was speaking quietly to a very young girl, who looked about twelve, and Tiamhaidh was giving orders and acting like a war general. Baz and Faol were speaking to the scary-looking man who had escorted her there. The air was full of soft noise and everyone looked worried. What was going on?

She remembered the seizure and something strange. She remembered her hearing getting better and her nose detecting every tiny smell in the cave. Oh, and her eyes. Something had happened to her eyes. She had been blind for a while and everything had been a total mess, but something strange had definitely happened. For a second her body hadn't been her own but like someone else's, and now it hurt everywhere.

She tried to get up and felt so dizzy she almost fainted. Tiamhaidh leaped across the cave and grabbed her just before she hit the floor.

“What happened?” she whispered. “Who are these people?”

“These are the ones who are on our side.” He smiled and helped her to sit up better.

“So few,” she sighed in disappointment.

“Well, we still have the ‘maybe’ group, and it's the biggest group of these three.”

“I don't understand. What's the ‘maybe’ group?” She rubbed her head.

“It's a group of fools,” Tiamhaidh snorted. “They're afraid to choose sides, so they'll wait and join the winners.”

“But that's awful!” Marie yelled and slumped. She didn't feel well and she couldn't understand how anyone could just stand aside while horrible things happened in front of their noses. She felt really sick. “I think I'm going to puke,” she whispered.

“Yeah, me, too,” Tiamhaidh snapped. “I think the human-haters are much better than the people who can't decide. At least they stand behind what they believe.”

“No,” Marie whispered and put her hand on her mouth. “I literally think I'm going to puke.”

He quickly stood up and ran to get a bucket. He placed it under her chin, and not a minute too soon. She leaned over and let it all come out. When she was finished she wiped her mouth on the paper towel someone had given her.

“Great,” she mumbled quietly. “Now they'll love me even more.”

Tiamhaidh didn't answer. He grinned at her and kissed the top of her head. “Are you okay?”

“Yes. I'll just rest here for a while,” she said and lay down.

“Are you sure?”

She nodded and he got up. He stared at her a while and sighed. “Fine.
If you say so. I'll take care of some problems and be back in a minute.”

Marie murmured something that sounded like okay. Tiamhaidh glanced at her once more and left.

Marie felt exhausted. She listened to the quiet talk around her and felt embarrassed. They had all come there because of her, and what did she do? She puked in front of them. Great. Now she was a puking freak. She felt the change coming, but she was too tired to tell anybody. It felt strange. It felt nothing like a seizure but it still shook her insides from head to toe. She tried to lift her hand, but she was too weak. She knew she didn't have the strength to call after Tiamhaidh, so she prepared herself for it. After she gave in it almost felt enjoyable.

She remembe
red a story from her childhood - Little Red Riding Hood - and felt like she was the wolf in the grandmother's bed. The only thing that was missing was a nosy child who asked stupid questions. She felt her ears changing and she started to hear better. She could hear the slightest sound across the cave. Her eyes felt different, but she didn't have the power to open them, and something was certainly happening to her body. It felt strange and awkward. She heard yelling around her and felt someone touching her. Why was she so tired? She tried to smile, but that was difficult. Her mouth felt weird. She searched it with her tongue and froze. Her tongue met her teeth, but they were not human teeth anymore. She could feel four sharp canine teeth and a lot of other teeth that weren't supposed to be there. She opened her eyes and started to scream. Or at least she tried to scream, but it wasn’t a scream that came out of her mouth. She was howling and she saw the others backing away. She tried to stand up but it was impossible. Her feet were like jelly and she was like Bambi on slippery ice. She crumpled and fell. She tried again and again until finally she was able to stand on her new four legs.

“Oh my God! She's beautiful!”
A solid whisper filled her mind.

“
Yes!”
Tiamhaidh's mind rejoiced.
“You're really beautiful!”

Marie howled miserably and looked at him. He was amazing. How was it possible she hadn't recognized all the minor details in him? His eyes that were bluer than the bluest sky, his dark, short hair that looked so soft,
and his body that was all muscles and smoking hot. He smiled at her and she managed to make some sort of grin.

She tried to walk, but it wasn't that easy. She peeked behind and saw a big furry tail. Wow! I have a tail, she thought, and was depressed. Yes, she had a tail, but she didn't know how to use it. She dangled her head. She wasn't much of a wolf. How sad. And then she felt a wet tongue on her face. Tiamhaidh had changed into a wolf, too, and was licking her snout.

“You're dashing!”
His mind was like a whisper.

“
I am, aren't I?”
Marie said, delighted, as communicating felt so easy again.
“Am I a shape shifter now?”

“
What do you think?”
His mental voice was dry.
“You're a wolf, so yes, you're a shape shifter. Now do me a favor and make a small circle in the middle of those people.”

“
But I don't know how to walk!”
she shrieked.
“I don't know how to use my tail.”