The House (15 page)

Eddie was
shaking against me. I realised it was because he was crying in
earnest now. His hands gripped my arms so tightly that it cut off
my circulation. I wasn’t about to make him let go though. I could
feel his claws slip into my skin and the warm rush of blood from
the puncture marks. It hurt like hell but to point it out to him
would be to lose any ground that we’d managed to gain.

He thought he
was a monster; it takes something big for a person to believe that
of themselves. Or someone cruel - there were plenty of good people
who’d been abused into thinking that they are bad or evil. It’s why
witches born to human parents are removed from them so young.
Nobody was willing to take the risk that the child’s parents
wouldn’t understand.

Eddie was
muttering nonsense in my ear. I couldn’t make most of it out at all
but I did glean that he’d had a girlfriend at some point. I also
got the impression that he hadn’t changed out of choice as such, it
sounded like he’d been ill. Beyond that I couldn’t discern one word
from the next; he seemed to be repeating the same phrases over and
over with no sense or reason to them.

“Why do you
think you’re a monster?” Stripes asked. She was stroking his hair
gently whilst trying to subtly remove his claws from my arms
without tearing the muscles they’d embedded themselves in. It was
also a good question. I really should have thought to ask it
myself. I blamed my slow thinking on the sharp pain. We really had
to get those claws out soon or I would start to heal around them. I
did not want to have to remove anything that my body had healed
around already.

“I’m a
monster,” was Eddie’s only response.

“Stripes is
right. Tell us why you think you’re a monster and maybe we can
help,” Hercules said. He was carefully guiding Eddie’s other hand
out of my arm. Unfortunately, Eddie then grabbed Hercules instead
and I saw him wince as the claws slid home; at least Hercules would
heal faster than me. There was blood running down my arms at an
alarming speed. Of course, it also meant that Hercules’ body healed
around the claws almost straight away. It would be much more
difficult to pull them out of him.

“I hurt her. I
didn’t mean ... couldn’t stop ... hurt, blood, crying ... couldn’t
... not go back.” He was muttering slightly louder in answer to the
questions.

“It’s alright.
Whatever happened, it’s alright.” I cradled him closer and kept
hugging him. Trying to think of something that would help. I didn’t
come up with anything - zip, nada, blank. All I could hope was that
now he’d had his breakdown he’d be more open with us. “Come on,
let’s get you to bed.” I had to let go with one arm to pick him up
and since his claws were still pushed into my left arm I moved my
right under his knees. As I moved, he pulled his arms away from
mine and Hercules’ and wrapped them around my neck. There was only
a faint trace of Hercules’ skin on his claws and I prayed that he
wasn’t in a state to notice. It would disappear as he shifted his
hands back.

They always
tell you to lift with your legs. I’ve never figured out how to lift
with your legs when they’re trapped. I tried, and if I’d been human
it would never have worked. Mind you, if I’d been human I couldn’t
have carried him in my arms at all. I pushed up half with my
muscles and half with power; it left me dizzy. The slow swell of
power had drained me and reignited the high I’d felt a few minutes
before.

“Do you need
help?” James asked. I nodded slowly so as not to aggravate the
dizziness into sickness. He put his arms next to mine and started
to take Eddie’s weight. Stripes tried to get Eddie to let go of my
neck from behind but he was beyond all reason. We had to walk very
awkwardly with James taking most of the weight, Eddie’s arms
wrapped securely around my neck, and Stripes and Hercules trying to
balance us. It was one of the most ridiculous things I had ever
done. Any one of us could have carried him - hell, any one of us
could have thrown him if we’d wanted to - but he was being so
awkward it took all of us. Maybe it was a good thing. With all of
us touching him we could give him more comfort, maybe make him feel
a little safer.

We were
alright until we got to the stairs. There was no way we’d all fit
up them as we were and since Eddie wasn’t letting go anytime soon I
had to take his full weight. James put his hands on my back to help
support me with Stripes and Hercules trailing behind looking
worried. Once we reached the top of the stairs James tried to take
back his burden but it was only a few metres to Eddie’s bedroom so
I waved him away. Well, I shook my head since I couldn’t move my
arms enough to wave without dropping Eddie completely. It would
just cause more problems to try and make him let go now.

A few metres
can seem like a very long way when you’re trying to carry someone
if you’re not feeling well. I just about made it across the hall,
then through the door to collapse on the bed. Part of my mind was
aware that I was lying half on and half underneath Eddie. Part of
my mind was content to just fall asleep on the soft mattress.
Another part was lost in the same power-induced high that had
reduced my higher thinking to nil.

I woke with
more arms and legs tangled up around me than I could count. It
definitely wasn’t just me and Eddie lying there. I opened my eyes
slowly, allowing them to adjust to the morning light. I could
breathe so nobody was lying on directly on top of me, not that it
helped with my limbs. I was reasonably worried that I couldn’t
actually feel very much of my body. I wondered how much circulation
I’d lost. I really wanted to know how we’d all ended up together.
Or how all of us fit in the bed for that matter. Even a double bed
isn’t made to fit more than two or three people.

“Is anyone
else awake?” I asked, trying to lift my head up and failing.
Someone was on my hair and, combined with whoever was trapping my
arms and the person who appeared to be holding my leg hostage, I
couldn’t move. Not without risking serious injury to just about
everyone.

“Kind of.” One
of the guys replied but in my sleepy state I couldn’t tell who it
was. Half a minute later I realised it was Hercules. “How long have
we been asleep?” he asked. He sounded quite far away; it’s amazing
how much distance a few bodies can put between you.

“I don’t know.
Everyone’s
fucking on top of me and I can’t see the damn
alarm clock,” I replied. I tried to wiggle around enough to see it
but the thought of not knowing who I was wiggling on top of stopped
me. There were some things that you just didn’t do. That, and it
pulled at my hair and I was really quite attached to it.

“Hey, no need
for the language.” Great. James was awake as well; two more and
maybe I’d be able to move. At least I knew I wasn’t on top of
James; that would have been embarrassing. In fact, I saw James sit
up, apparently almost completely unencumbered. If only I could be
so as well.

“Stripes.
Eddie. Wakie ...WAKIE.” I raised my voice as much as I could while
lying down. For some reason it’s much harder to shout from a
horizontal position.

There was some
grumbling and moving around from the other end of the bed. It
didn’t move the bed around enough to be Eddie so it had to be
Stripes. I would have kicked Eddie to wake him up if I knew which
of the mass of bodies he was. I had to wonder at how many of us
were really there. I was sure there were too many limbs for five
people.

“Can anybody
get up?” Hercules asked. Apparently I wasn’t the only one who
couldn’t move. I felt the bed move and my left arm was freed. I
looked up to see James sliding off the bed onto the floor. I nodded
my thanks and started to squirm my own way out. I felt my elbow
connect with something solid. Eddie looked up, staring daggers at
me; I think I elbowed him in the head. I also realised that it had
been Eddie I was mostly on top of; I was glad I’d stopped
wiggling.

I gave one
last push off the bed which turned out to be a bad idea. I landed
on my bum. At least it had enough padding to soften the impact. I’d
always thought that that’s why we evolved fat on our behinds; we
two-legged peoples tend to fall, a lot. Shifters tend to fall less
- the strength helps - but we aren’t any more graceful than the
next person, no matter what the legends say.

“Nice,”
Stripes laughed. I smirked up at her. Alright, I’m more clumsy than
most and Stripes is just plain graceful whatever she does. “Have we
slept all night?” she asked. Everyone groaned and I turned to look
at the clock.

The clock said
seven but I couldn’t tell if it was morning or afternoon. Eddie
would have to have a damned analogue clock.

“Not a clue,”
I replied. “Bloody analogue.” Then I spotted a coms pad. I picked
it up and pressed the screen. The screensaver had the time on it
and it was still the evening. It gave me some comfort to know it
wasn’t the morning after. “Evening. We only slept for an hour.”

“So that’s why
I still feel like crap,” I laughed. Then the coms pad went off in
my hands. Eddie had it set to vibrate and ring so that it made me
jump twice as high. For a moment I nearly answered it, almost an
automatic reaction. I remembered just in time that I didn’t know
Eddie nearly well enough to answer his calls. “Eddie, you’ve got a
call.” As if it wasn’t already obvious.

“Pass it up
would you?” Eddie said. I looked up to find him on the edge of the
bed with his face startlingly close to mine. Definitely still
suffering after-effects of the power rush. I held my hand up with
the coms pad and Eddie took it very quickly. I should have checked
who was calling. He shut off the call as soon as he saw who it
was.

“Oooh, who was
it?” Stripes asked,

“Yeah, who was
it?” James echoed.

“Was it your
looovvver?” Hercules added. We were laughing so much that we barely
heard Eddie’s firm denial. Which of course made us laugh even more.
There is nothing we love more than a little teasing, unless of
course it also comes with gossip. Sometimes I thought that shifters
lived for gossip.

“Hey, why
don’t you lot find something better to do with your time than
torture me,” Eddie snarled. He took a playful swipe at Stripes who
jumped away off the bed to land perfectly happily on her feet. I
shook my head. She always landed on her feet, I never did.

“Nope, nothing
better,” Hercules continued. He managed to move away just in time
to miss Eddie’s foot as it tried to connect with his head, but only
just. I found myself snorting with suppressed laughter at the
sight. He gave in gracefully though and bowed out the room tipping
his imaginary hat. Stripes followed quickly on his heels. James
waved as he left, leaving me alone with Eddie. I was glad we’d all
started off on a playful note. It gave me hope that maybe Eddie
would fit in with us after all. Play came naturally to us; we
really were immature but we loved it.

“Are you
alright?” I asked. I was really hoping that whatever had happened
hadn’t scared him off too much.

“I’m fine,” he
said, looking at his feet as he sat cross-legged on the bed.

“Liar.” I
pulled myself up to sit next to him - far enough away that I wasn’t
invading his personal space, close enough to have a decent
conversation.

“I’m fine.” He
still didn’t look up.

“No you’re
not. Nobody could be fine after that. Overwhelmed ... excited ...
terrified even ... but not just fine. You’re trying to tell me that
nothing that happened affected you in any way?”

“Yes ... no
... I don’t want to talk about it.” At least he looked at me. His
eyes were closed off in the extreme though and I couldn’t read him
at all.

“Fine.” I
started to stand up and he grabbed my hand. “What? You don’t want
to talk. I’m going to find something more interesting to do until
you change your mind,” I told him. I was sick of mollycoddling him;
if he didn’t want to play, fine, I could wait.

“What
happened?” he asked me, a nervous edge to his voice like he
expected me to bring him down.

“What about
not wanting to talk?” I asked him.

“I ... have to
know.” The look on his face made me sit back down a little closer
to him. It shouldn’t be allowed for a person to look that much like
a lost puppy.

“Honestly, I
don’t know. It probably had something to do with how you reacted to
my power,” I shrugged.

“What about
your power?”

I sighed. I
had to tell him the truth and he was going to hate it. “I’m
different.” What a cliché opening. “I’m a true-born, meaning that
my father was a witch and my mother was a shifter. It means that I
have abilities that are beyond what shifters should be able to do.”
He looked unbelievably lost and I had the feeling he wasn’t
understanding anything. “I don’t know how to explain it. It’s part
genetics and part ...” I waved my hands vaguely in the air. “ ...
something. It’s magic; nobody knows the hows or the whys.”

“But what is
your power?” He sounded more than curious. More like the answer
meant something to him. I wasn’t liking the direction this
conversation was going. Whenever I got into a conversation about
power, changing back always followed. Becoming a shifter is a life
choice and a true-born shifter cannot reverse it. I was hoping that
it was more an interest in magic than that though. He was clueless;
it was possible he really didn’t know anything about witches.

I laughed,
trying to lighten the mood and partly because the happy fog was
still swirling around me. “I don’t think you really want to have
this conversation. How much do you know about witches?”

“They don’t
mix with shifters much, that’s all I know,” he said. He shrugged
his shoulders and pulled his knees to him. He looked so very small
and so very lost sitting there like that. I would have hugged him
but I didn’t think he’d appreciate it. It almost physically hurt
not to though. I nodded in answer - that was all most shifters knew
and they had it wrong. Shifters don’t mix with witches, too much
bad blood.