Otherkin (17 page)
Authors: Nina Berry
After the afternoon’s classes and dinner, London, November, and I were getting ready for bed in the girls’ cabin when the front door creaked open. London shouted a warning, which turned into a laugh as the boys burst in, big grins plastered on their faces. Siku boasted how he’d give ’Ember a run at lockpicking now. Then he, Arnaldo, and Caleb wandered around the cabin, touching everything and making bad jokes about underwear and bunk beds. Eventually they settled in, and the six of us talked late into the night.
The only spot of discomfort came when Caleb sat on the floor near where I was on my lower bunk, leaning his back against the bedpost near me. I had trouble focusing on the talk because I kept looking at the back of his neck and imagining running my fingers through his hair.
London interrupted my reverie, leaning in and whispering, “Thanks.”
“What for?” I whispered back. November was juggling three tennis balls as the boys applauded.
London shrugged. “I actually forgot I was a shifter today.”
“Is that a good thing?”
She nodded. “My parents will never let me go to medical school. I’ll be trapped in the woods in Idaho my whole life and be a carpenter like my dad.”
“You’d be a good doctor,” I said. “Have you tried talking to your parents?”
“Yeah. They see humdrum hunters gunning down real wolves just for being wolves and they don’t get why I’d want to help heal their children. Why does everyone hate everyone else so much?”
“Wish I knew.” I slid my arm around her and gave her a hug. She didn’t pull away. “Things can change,” I said.
“Arnie, you should be an opera singer or something.” November was kicking her feet from her perch on the top bunk.
“Totally,” said London.
“My voice teacher thinks so too,” he said, making a slightly embarrassed face. “But my dad went ballistic when I told him that. He thinks opera’s, you know, not something real men do.”
“Give me a break.” November rolled her eyes.
“Do it anyway,” said Caleb. “Get a job, get your own place, maybe even go to college and study it. You’re old enough.”
“Just what I was thinking,” I said, throwing London a significant glance. “Any of you could do that.”
“I’d like to,” Arnaldo said slowly. “But my two little brothers will still be there, and if I leave, my dad might get really angry. I don’t want him to take it out on them.”
“Shit,” said November. “So does he, like, hit you?”
“You so don’t have to answer that,” London put in real fast.
Arnaldo said, his voice very quiet. “Ever since my mom got killed, he drinks more than ever, and when he’s drunk, he can get really angry and crazy. I can’t leave my brothers there alone.”
We sat in sympathetic silence for another second until Siku grabbed a pillow and lobbed it at Arnaldo, smacking him in the face.
“Jerk,” said Arnaldo, and threw it back, hard.
Seconds later pillows were flying. It turned into boys versus girls as London and I climbed up on November’s bunk to join her in an assault on the boys below. They retreated to the kitchen area, grabbing some old bread and a roll of toilet paper from the bathroom to launch at us until we threw our pillows and gave them ammunition.
Eventually we all ended up in an exhausted heap on the floor, giggling. The boys left the cabin slowly and reluctantly, mocking our poor showing in the pillow fight.
We were all a bit sleepy and punchy in the morning. Morfael sent Caleb away and had the rest of us remain in animal form after our first shift that morning. Then one by one, he took us each to a different spot on the school compound, out of sight of the others.
I was last, and he led me behind the boys’ cabin to a large rock. “Stay here until you hear me whistle,” he said. “I have hidden the same book you searched for yesterday somewhere on the school grounds. The first of you to find it will be free from kitchen duties for a week.”
As he glided away, I figured he’d deliberately made it tougher for us to cooperate in this exercise. No kitchen duty was a coveted prize no one would want to give away.
A high-pitched whistle split the air. The starting signal. I crept around the edge of the boys’ cabin, sniffing for anything that smelled like leather-bound pages. Hearing nothing inside, I opened the front door using one paw and my teeth. Morfael had taught us each how to do this a few days earlier. With no thumbs, simple tasks could be challenging.
Only a sliver of light illuminated the cabin, but that was enough for me to see every detail. I quickly found a pile of books next to a bunk that smelled a lot like Caleb, but none was the right book. I rubbed my cheek over his pillow before I realized I was marking it as my territory. I smelled something familiar under the bed and pawed it out to find a duffle bag. The zipper was a challenge, but I teased it open using one claw.
Inside lay an odd collection of items, including a glass jar full of dried leaves and sticks that I recognized as coming from the lightning tree near my school in Burbank. I also found a blue marble, an empty plastic water bottle, two rocks, a saltshaker, an unused postcard of Prague, a notepad and pen, and a plush stuffed elephant. For a moment I got misty, thinking it had to be some relic from Caleb’s childhood. But then I remembered that we’d fled the Tribunal compound with nothing but our clothes and Lazar’s BMW. Caleb must have acquired these things in the meantime. But why?
I forced myself to put the duffle back, and my paw bumped against something else. Another familiar smell reached my nose, and I pulled my back brace out from under the bed. The last time I’d seen it, Mom was putting it in the trunk of Lazar’s BMW. I’d been happy to leave it there. It looked smaller than I remembered. Seeing it brought back the pain of wearing it, the suffocation I’d felt because of it. What the hell was it doing under Caleb’s bed? It was weird enough that Caleb knew about the brace. But the fact that he’d seen it, that he had it under his bed, sent a wave of shame flooding over me.
I shoved the brace back under the bed, growling to myself. Better not to think about it.
Get back to the test.
I walked around blindly, pretending to explore the rest of the cabin until the suffocating feelings went away. The bathroom held a combination of smells that made me glad I lived with girls. But the book was not in the cabin. As I left, I caught a glimpse of a lean, silvery form slipping through the trees near the girls’ cabin.
Get back to the test.
I walked around blindly, pretending to explore the rest of the cabin until the suffocating feelings went away. The bathroom held a combination of smells that made me glad I lived with girls. But the book was not in the cabin. As I left, I caught a glimpse of a lean, silvery form slipping through the trees near the girls’ cabin.
London. Her nose and ears must have alerted her I was there. But while we were in animal form, the creature instincts were much stronger. And wolves did not socialize with tigers. We were competitors.
But after last night, I felt we were friends. I uttered as soft a call as I could. A second later, London’s muzzle appeared through the bushes, her ears alert and upright, her eyes, so wild and blue, staring right at me.
I smacked my tail twice against the boys’ cabin wall behind me, then shook my head, hoping she’d understand. She in turn pointed her snout at the girls’ cabin. When she looked back at me, she also shook her head.
I exhaled a ruffled “grr” of satisfaction. So the book wasn’t in the girls’ cabin either.
Together we strode toward Morfael’s bent house, watchful for the others. As I turned the doorknob, something crashed two rooms away. At least two of our friends were in the kitchen and, from the sound of it, still searching.
London crept in first, surveying the dark living room. Someone had pulled the rug half upside down and pushed the couch away from the wall. So they’d already searched here. I followed her in, and we inched toward the door to the library, using all our skill to move with utmost quiet.
As we entered the silent library, more rattles and a grunt signaled that Siku was one of the shifters in there. Maybe we should try to join forces.
But London had stiffened, nose trembling as her eyes scanned the bookshelves. She’d caught the scent.
It would be just like Morfael to hide the one book we wanted among hundreds of others. I moved to her side, inhaling to see if I could find that particular book. But all the dust and moldering paper invaded my senses at once. I couldn’t pick out the difference.
London had a wolf’s superior nose. She got up on her hind legs, front paws on a low shelf for balance, and pressed her nose against the second highest shelf.
Behind us, the hinges on the door to the kitchen groaned. I whipped my head around to see November in rat form walking on her hind feet, pushing the door open with her small pink paws. She let out a piping shriek at the sight of us.
I advanced toward her, tail lashing. She scampered sideways along the wall, letting go of the door.
It never slammed shut, because Siku burst through it. He skidded to a stop, blotting out the doorway with his enormous silhouette, and took the scene in: me standing over November, with London on her hind legs, nose at the books.
He snarled and lunged toward London. I got in the way and he barreled into me. I fell on my side, back legs trying to get a purchase against the furry bulk now pressing down on me. But he got his arms around me in a suffocating hug, his teeth near my throat. I thrashed, but he squeezed me until the air left my lungs, his grip too strong for me to wiggle out.
My own teeth were near his jugular, and my back feet could have raked his belly, possibly disemboweling him, but this was an exercise, not war. I tried to squirm again, hoping I wouldn’t have to surrender. But Siku only squeezed harder. Pain lanced through my ribs, and red spots danced before my eyes. I couldn’t inhale, couldn’t get free. Somewhere in the distance I heard London whining.
My thoughts grew fuzzy. If only I could get smaller somehow, maybe shift to human form, shift somehow into something, anything that could evade his grasp . . .
Blackness flashed through me. Not the pillow-black of unconsciousness but the rocket-black of shifting. The pain vanished as I slipped through Siku’s hold, rolling to the floor, scrabbling away from him, leaping from the floor to the top of a chair and farther up to sit on the bookshelf London had been nosing.
Wait, what?
I was sitting on my haunches, front paws before me, whiskers quilling outward.
I was sitting on my haunches, front paws before me, whiskers quilling outward.
I fit on the bookshelf. I looked up to see the next shelf looming over my head. The books beside me, red and brown leather-bound, were around the height of my head.
London barked. I looked down at her and she whined, backing away. Siku let loose an ear-splitting roar. November chittered and ran back and forth along the baseboards, as if she didn’t know where to go.
I looked down at my paws, which were still white, black, and orange, but now in uneven splotches, not stripes. Turning my head, I could see my back and tail, no longer banded like a tiger, but haphazardly swirled, like a tortoise shell. I had shifted into another form, all right. I was a house cat.
Siku shook his huge head as London continued to back quietly away from me, her ears tight against her skull, her tail between her legs. I meowed, not understanding. How could I be more terrifying as a small cat than as a tiger?
November pushed at the door to the back cave and disappeared behind it. London was almost out the other door when it swung open and Morfael walked in. He took in the scene, white brows lowering.
“There is nothing to fear,” he said, his voice reverberating with command. “Siku, Laurentia, return to your cabins and shift.”
London bolted out of the room. Siku bared his teeth at me, then lumbered through the door.
Morfael approached me, his staff tapping the floor. He looked enormously tall now that I was so much smaller, a gaunt giant in black.
“You,” he said, “are precocious.”
I wanted to ask what he meant by that, but could only make a trilling noise.
The living room door slammed opened to admit Caleb, a bit breathless from running. “What happened? I saw London bolt out of here, then Siku . . .” He trailed off as he caught sight of me. “What is that cat—
Dez?
”
Dez?
”
I meowed.
Morfael said, “It is she.”
Caleb’s eyes widened and he stepped toward me. “But this is a second form, completely different from the first. It’s unheard of!”
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