“From the lessons,” she agreed, “but from here too. And it’s not a single sound, but many things that, combined, have a single meaning.”
A moment of thoughtful silence. “All right. What else?”
She shivered. He curled around her in response, and she felt warmer. Safe.
“Blood,” she whispered. “It’s winter. There’s snow on the ground, and that snow is splashed with blood. And I saw feathers.” She turned her head to look at him. “That’s why I was trying to scream, trying to get someone to listen. I saw broken black feathers stuck in the bloody snow.”
Simon studied her. “You could see them? It’s not dark out?”
She thought for a moment, then shook her head. “Daylight. Not bright sun, but daylight.”
“Did you recognize the place?”
“No. I don’t remember anything in the dream that indicated where, except there was snow.”
Simon reached across her and turned off the light. “In that case, go back to sleep, Meg. We’ll chase this prey in the morning.”
He stretched out beside her and fell asleep almost immediately, just like he did when he was in Wolf form. Except he wasn’t in Wolf form, and she didn’t know how to tell him that having him sleeping beside her, looking and feeling like a human male, had changed something between them.
CHAPTER 2
Parked in front of his best friend Grizzly Man’s house, Wild Dog sat in his father’s pickup truck with his other best friend, Howler, and waited for the fun to begin. Windsday was trash day in this part of Walnut Grove and the freaking Crows from the Courtyard would be flying in just ahead of the garbage trucks to pick over the trash humans threw out. Every freaking week they came around and poked in the trash cans that were put out at the curb. They poked and pecked and flew off with all kinds of crap because, really, that’s all Crows were—crap pickers.
Nothing people could do about it. Government Man said so. Couldn’t even take a potshot at the black-feathered thieves because the jail time and fines could ruin a whole family. But Grizzly Man, who knew how to find shit on the computer that you wouldn’t want your parents to know about, had learned about a bitching game called Crow Bait and Roadkill. Girly boys could sign up at the site and play the game on the computer, but if you wanted to try the real thing you needed two very special drugs: gone over wolf and feel-good.
It wasn’t easy to get your hands on the stuff, and neither drug was cheap. It had taken him, Grizzly Man, and Howler two months of pooling most of their spending money to buy the vials that Howler had acquired from a friend of a friend who knew a guy who knew a guy. Now they were going to find out if the drugs and the game were worth it.
“Come on,” Wild Dog muttered. “I’ve got to get the truck back before the old man wants to leave for work.”
Howler rolled down the passenger-side window. “I hear the garbage trucks. They must be on the next block. Is G-Man ready?”
Wild Dog pulled the mobile phone out of his pocket and made the call. “You ready?” he asked when Grizzly Man answered.
“I gave ’em the dosed meat,” G-Man replied. “You sure about the dosage?”
Gods below, no, he wasn’t sure about the dosage. Last week the three of them had split half the vial of gone over wolf in order to try it out, and he had only the vaguest memory of what happened after they caught up with Priscilla Kees, who had no business walking home alone after dark. But he remembered that he’d felt beyond horny. He’d felt wild and powerful—and he wanted to feel that way again.
But not for a while. Not until things cooled down. Priscilla hadn’t come back to school, and he’d overheard his mom tell his grandma that the vicious attack had caused some kind of damage to the girl’s innards down there and maybe other kinds of damage, and she wasn’t letting her daughter walk alone even to a friend’s house that was six doors down the street. Not until the animals who had done that to Priscilla were caught.
It felt weird hearing his mom talk that way, like she wanted to lay on some serious hurt. That scared him some, which was why he was glad they voted to use the rest of the gone over wolf for the game. By the time they could afford another vial of the drug, everything would be back to normal.
“Hey, Wild Dog,” G-Man said. “You still there? The dogs are acting funny, and I don’t like the way they keep looking at me. It’s weirding me out.”
“Here they come,” Howler said as the Crows flew in. Leaning forward, he rested one hand on the dashboard.
“Come on, you freaks,” Wild Dog whispered. “Enjoy some spaghetti and feel-good.” He snickered. Take some feel-good, and you’ll feel so good you won’t feel a thing.
Howler swore the drug was powerful enough to make a full-grown Wolf as helpless as a newborn puppy—or keep all the damn Crows grounded. So yesterday they’d bought a large take-out order of spaghetti. This morning they’d laced the food with feel-good and left handfuls of it next to six garbage cans on the street.
The Crows came in, winging toward the cans that didn’t have tightly sealed lids or had items left next to them. As soon as the first Crow spotted the spaghetti, birds came in from everywhere, and Wild Dog couldn’t tell if they were Crows or crows. But they were all gobbling the spaghetti.
“Go on, you stupid shits,” Wild Dog whispered. “Eat up.” He spoke into the mobile phone. “G-Man. Almost time.”
“Hey,” Howler said. “Who’s that?”
They watched the petite black-haired girl walk from house to house, looking into the garbage cans.
“That’s perfect,” Wild Dog said. “We’ve got one of the Others in human form.”
“Garbage truck will be here any minute,” Howler said. “We need to be gone before someone spots us.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Wild Dog watched the birds for a moment longer. A car coming down the street had to swerve to avoid a bird that didn’t even try to get out of the way. Perfect. “G-Man, let the dogs loose.”
The two hunting dogs that belonged to G-Man’s father ran out of the backyard, spotted the birds, and tore into them with a savagery that made Wild Dog feel excited and a little sick. A couple of the birds flapped their wings in a feeble attempt to escape, which did nothing but draw the dogs’ attention to them—and to the girl standing frozen next to a garbage can.
“Oh, shit,” Howler said. “I know who that is! It’s the new girl at school. Her family just moved here, came all the way from Tokhar-Chin. We’ve got to stop the dogs!”
“We can’t stop them!” Wild Dog grabbed for Howler’s coat, but Howler had already half fallen out of the truck and was screaming, “G-Man! Get your dad! Get your dad!”
Nothing to do but go with his friend. Couldn’t be seen just sitting there with Howler yelling and the girl screaming and people coming out of their houses, some dressed for work and some still in their bathrobes despite the snow and cold.
Suddenly someone shoved him aside and was yelling at everyone to get out of the damn way, and …
Bang. Bang.
That same someone was now yelling at people to call the cops, call for an ambulance, and Wild Dog finally recognized him. Didn’t know his name, but knew he was a cop friend of G-Man’s father.
The cop was next to the girl now, pressing his hand right against the wound on her neck that just kept bleeding. He looked up at G-Man’s father and said, “I’m sorry, Stan, but I had to shoot them.”
“Is the girl going to be all right?” Stan asked.
The cop paused a moment, then lifted his hand and shook his head. After cleaning his hands with fresh snow, he rose and stared hard at Wild Dog and Howler. “What are you boys doing here?”
Stan just stared at the girl, then at the dogs. “Gods above and below, what got into them? And how did they get out of the yard?”
“We’ll take them in, get them tested. Find out if they went crazy for a reason.” The cop was talking about the dogs—sure he was—but he kept staring at Wild Dog. Then he looked at the dead birds. “Yeah, we’re going to need to do some tests.”