Night Shifters (33 page)

“I was impressed by the Great Sky Dragon,” Tom said. “But not scared as such. So I paid attention to who took the Pearl, and it was another dragon in attendance. He put it in a wicker basket. And I loitered till the dragon shifted shape. He was the owner of a small Chinese restaurant in town. I followed him there. And then . . . I . . . well . . . I waited. And I watched. And I planned. And then I ran in, got the Pearl and got out of there fast.”

Tom frowned. “I must have taken them completely by surprise, because they didn’t even think to follow me for a while. And meanwhile I found out they couldn’t sense or follow the Pearl by sense if it was submerged in water. I couldn’t follow it if it was submerged in water. I brought it out West inside an aquarium packed in foam peanuts in a cardboard box, in the luggage hold of various busses.”

“Did it help with the addiction?” Rafiel asked.

“It helped with controlling myself, not necessarily the addiction—though perhaps the two are related. When I got it out and looked at it, I felt . . . calm, peaceful, accepted. And then even if I shifted, I didn’t feel like it was a terrible thing or that I should be shunned or killed for it. Does it make sense?”

Rafiel nodded. He was frowning. Keith was looking back, and his eyes were wide—and was that pity in them? Tom didn’t want Keith’s pity.

“Anyway,” he said, looking out the window at the mostly deserted landscape they were crossing, “anyway, I kicked the habit. It wasn’t as difficult as I thought. Rough moments, but I think that the fact we heal so easily . . .” He shrugged.

Rafiel nodded. “It would help, wouldn’t it? The tendency to reassert balance. And Keith, when you asked if we were, I guess, immortal? I don’t know, not more than anyone else. It’s hard to say. Until you die you don’t know, and then it’s academic. I try to stay away from people trying to shoot me with silver bullets.”

“Or any bullets,” Tom said, wryly. “And before you ask, I brought the Pearl with me to Goldport. And it’s stashed in water. They want it back. To be honest, I wouldn’t mind giving it back, but I can’t. Because I think once I give it back to them, they kill me.”

Rafiel made a face. “There has to be a way of giving it back.” He was quiet a while. Then he said, “But I guess it doesn’t have anything to do with the beetles, then?”

Tom shrugged. “I didn’t know about the beetles till tonight.”

“What would you estimate the percentage of shifters in the population is?” Rafiel said. “From your travels?”

“I don’t know,” Tom said. “Not very high. Considerably less than one percent. Even if we go on legends.”

“Even if we go on legends . . .” Rafiel said, as an echo. “But you know, we know three at least, in our immediate sphere, and then there’s the beetles, at least two. From their size, there’s no way they can be non-shifters. And there’s one of their victims who smelled like a shifter—though I only caught a bit of blood. And another that was definitely a shifter. The corpse in the parking lot.” He nodded at Tom. “His wife said he was a coyote shifter.”

“Lucky bastard,” Tom said feelingly. “A coyote would be much easier.”

Rafiel laughed and for a moment there was a bond. “Tell me about it,” he said. “Here’s the thing, though, Tom, why so many of us? And why is all this activity around the Athens?”

Tom shook his head. “I have no idea.”

“Except,” Keith said, “except maybe there’s something like the Pearl of Heaven? Something that calls shifters there? That works on shifters?”

“Perhaps the Pearl?” Rafiel asked.

Tom didn’t think Rafiel was working for the triad, but you never knew. “Not the Pearl,” he said. “At any rate, where I have the Pearl, it’s submerged. So it’s not exerting influence on anyone. If the dragons who know what it feels like can’t feel it, then neither can anyone else.”

“Um . . .”

“Speaking of the triad,” Tom said. “How come we’re driving their car, and they’re not hot on our trail?”

“Well . . . you flamed them pretty thoroughly,” Keith said.

“Yeah, but . . . come on? No one has checked? And don’t forget they have aerial transportation.”

“Well,” Rafiel said. “Two things. While you were in the bathroom at the station, I called some friends in New Mexico and told them the old station was a triad hangout and I’d heard from a friend that it had just gone up in flames. At a guess, any of them that got out is in too much trouble to talk, much less count the car wrecks in the parking lot. It’s genuinely possible they think you burned.”

Tom nodded. “And the other thing?”

Keith chuckled. “We bought three cans of spray paint. While you were in the restroom, we spray painted the top of the car. Just the top. So that aerial surveillance . . .”

“Painted? What color?”

“Mostly bright orange,” Rafiel said. “It was what they had. The front is still black. We ran out of paint.” He grinned at Keith who was still chuckling. “People did look at us like we were nuts.”

“I bet.”

“So what do we do now?” Keith asked.

“Well, first we get to Goldport,” Rafiel said. “I’d like to change clothes . . .” He frowned down at himself. “And I probably should call in and figure out the news on the case. Also tell them I didn’t drop from the face of the world, since I was supposed to be at work a few hours ago.”

“And then?” Keith said.

“And then I think Tom and I, and Kyrie should get together and figure out what we’re going to do. Both about the Pearl of Heaven and the triad and about the beetles.” He looked back at Tom. “They attacked Kyrie’s house, you know, after you left.”

“Damn. Is she okay?”

“She’s fine.”

“My fault,” Tom said. “I shouldn’t have stayed there. They were probably after me.”

“Don’t be a fool. I think they were after her. She had seen them in the parking lot, dragging a corpse, and it was clear they knew she saw them.”

“Hey,” Keith said. “Why you and Tom and Kyrie? Why am I being left out of this? What have I done wrong?”

Rafiel frowned. “Well, you’re not . . . one of us, are you? I mean . . . we have to police our own and help our own, because if one of us is discovered, the others will be too. But you don’t have to help us. You’re not . . .”

“Yeah, but I want to help,” Keith said. “Can I like be an honorary shapeshifter or something?”

“Why?” Tom asked, puzzled.

“Oh, hell. You guys are cool. It’s like SF or a comic book.”

“Except you could get hurt. Quickly,” Tom said.

“I could get hurt very quickly anyway. Look, they knew you were my friend, they came to my house to get me. Surely that means I’m already not safe. I might as well help.”

“Tom, he has a point,” Rafiel said. “Kyrie’s house is clearly not safe. Your apartment is destroyed. I doubt that Keith’s apartment is safe. And I . . .”

“You?”

“I live with my parents,” Rafiel said. “They know I’m a shifter. They help me if needed. It’s convenient.”

“I didn’t say anything,” Tom said.

Rafiel shrugged. “But I can’t bring you guys there. If we’re tracked . . . I can’t risk them. Dad isn’t doing so well these days.”

“So you’re saying you don’t know where we can get together?”

Rafiel nodded. “Drop me off at home first. Then call Kyrie and tell her to meet you somewhere. Then pick me up in her car. We should leave this one in a public park or something. I don’t think they’ll report it stolen, but you never know.” He drummed his fingers on the side of the wheel. “And then we’ll figure out where to go. Perhaps a hotel room? A hotel would be good, wouldn’t it? It’s so public that I don’t think even the triad would risk it.”

Tom nodded.

“And I’m in? I’m in, right?” Keith asked.

“You’re in,” Rafiel said.

“There’s a distinct possibility you’re too addled to be left on your own,” Tom said.

“Hey,” Keith said, but he was smiling.

Tom felt odd. There was a weird camaraderie. He hadn’t had friends in a long time. He hadn’t ever had friends, truly. Not real friends.

He only hoped he could keep them all alive by the end of this.

Kyrie was standing at the counter, adding up her hours, when her cell phone rang. She dipped into the apron pocket, and brought it out. “Yes?”

“Kyrie?”

It was Tom. Until she felt relief flooding through her, she didn’t realize that she couldn’t be absolutely sure he was still alive till she heard from him.

She almost called his name, but then realized that Anthony was behind the counter doing something and that she didn’t know if Frank was hanging out somewhere. So, instead, she said, “Yes?”

“Thank God it’s you,” he said. There was a sound like coughing. “You didn’t say anything and I wondered if I’d done something wrong and called the police department in New Mexico.”

“What?”

“Later. Rafiel said he’d told you that you might need to pick us up.”

“Yes.”

“Well, can you come? We’re in the parking garage for the zoo. We’ve parked on the third level, and we’ll come down to meet you up front. In front of the zoo.”

“We?”

“Keith and I. We’ll swing by Rafiel’s place on the way, okay?”

“Sure.”

She hung up and found Anthony staring at her. “Was that Frank?”

“No.”

“Damn,” Anthony said. “I don’t know where he’s gone. I’m going to have to stay here and wait for the day-shift people. Will you wait with me?”

“I can’t,” Kyrie said. “I’ve got to meet a friend.”

“The guy you were talking to?” Anthony asked, gesturing toward the enclosure. “He looks an awful lot like Tom.”

“It’s his father,” Kyrie said, as she headed for the door. She’d parked up front again. She didn’t think she could ever park in the parking lot again. Not for all the money in the world.

“Oh,” Anthony said, just as she opened the door and went out.

Kyrie realized a little too late that Anthony might think that she was having an affair with Tom’s dad. But she didn’t think so. Anthony was a rather conventional person, other than the bolero thing, and was more likely to have her engaged to Tom in his mind—and to assume that his father’s visit had something to do with finalizing the arrangements.

The drive to the zoo wasn’t long. Just a few blocks down Fairfax and then a turn into a tangle of streets named after presidents.

It didn’t really matter which you took, since they were all parallel. Either Madison or Jackson took you to a sharp turn at Taylor and then up Wilson where the street namers had run out of presidents and offered, instead, Chrysalis Street, which in turn, exhausted by all these flights of fancy ended in Main Parkway, where the zoo, the library, and the pioneer museum were all located.

Finding Tom and Keith at the entrance wasn’t hard either. She simply took a long turn around the parking lot, and—circling by the door—saw the two only people standing there, since the zoo was still closed.

She very much doubted it would have been hard to find them even if there had been crowds streaming by the door, though. Tom looked like he’d been put through a shredder. There was blood on his face, his hair was a mess, and he looked like he was about to fall over of tiredness.

But he smiled when he saw her, and she couldn’t help smiling back as she opened the door. For some reason, she expected him to be mad at her, for throwing him out—for thinking he’d gotten high. But he didn’t look resentful at all. He sat in the passenger seat, while Keith took the backseat. And Tom strapped himself down with the seat belt, too, she noted.

“We have to call Rafiel and go get him,” Tom said.

“We do?”

“Yes. He went home to change. His clothes were shredded sometime . . . around the time they captured him.” He gave her a quick rundown of everything that had happened and Kyrie listened, eyebrows raised, trying not to show just how harrowing the account was. Particularly the torture.

When he was done she thought how strange he was that he should have endured all that torture and yet have roused himself to action when he thought Keith—and herself—were in trouble. She took a sidelong glance at Tom, who was dialing his cell phone. There was someone there, she thought. Someone salvageable despite whatever his upbringing and his unexpected shifter nature had done to him.

“Rafiel,” Tom said into the phone. Followed by raised eyebrows and, “I see.” Which was, in turn, followed by, “Sure.”

“He wants to know where we’re going to be. He says he’ll meet us. He’s looking up some data on missing people. He says there’s a spike over the last two months. He wants to know what the chances are those people are shifters. Something in the family interviews might give it away, he said. And he definitely wants to figure out how many people were headed for the Athens or vicinity when they disappeared. So he says he’ll meet us wherever we’re going. And he asks which hotel.”

Hotel. Kyrie had been thinking about this. There was an off chance the triad—or the beetles, whoever they were—would decide to call around to hotels for their names. But the hotels they would call around to—if they got around to that—would be in their price range. Not the Spurs and Lace.

“We thought it would be better to meet at a hotel,” he said into the phone. “Particularly a large hotel. Lots of guests. No shapeshifter, even one not quite in his right mind, would want to have that kind of public revelation.”

“Where are we going?” he said. “Rafiel says he’ll meet us wherever.”

“Tom . . . What do you think of your father?”

Tom’s eyes widened. His face lost color—which she would have thought impossible before. “Why?” he asked.

“Because he’s in town and he—”

“Hang on a second,” Tom said into the phone. “I’ll call you back in a couple of minutes.” He hung up the phone and set it in his lap, then looked at Kyrie. “My father?” he said, not so much as though he were verifying her words, but as though he were in doubt that such a thing as a father existed.

“Your father came to town two days ago and he—”

“Oh, shit,” Tom said. “You realize he’s probably working for the triad?”

“He was,” Kyrie said.

“And? What did he do? Where did he go?”

“He came to me.”

Tom’s hand clenched so hard on the phone that his knuckles shone white through the pale skin. His face remained impassive. “What did he ask you?”