10

Lexie lay awake in bed, listening to the faraway howls of gray wolves and clutching her knife to her breast. The wolf inside her was anxious, wanting to sniff out the strangers and run or fight with them all. She let the howls lull her to sleep, pushing out thoughts of packs and conspiracies and desperation.

Above her, Lexie saw crisp stars break through the clouds. The sky was a deep blue, shadowed by looming pines. A breeze kicked up and the clouds began to travel and separate. In a moment, the sky was clear and broken only by clods of purple clouds.

She admired the winter sky for its clarity. Something about the cold made the night lights shine brighter. Just as she thought this, she felt teeth on her neck, sinking slowly, testing. Lexie froze. If she flinched, the wolf’s jaw would tighten and tear. His musk made her eyes water, or maybe she was crying.

The alpha’s teeth sank deeper, breaking flesh. Her blood cooled in the night air.

She nearly howled with the tension, but didn’t have a chance. With a faint whimper and snuffle, the wolf freed her throat.

Lexie looked overhead, seeing the curve of the waning gibbous moon glint through the pine needles. A moment of shifting paws, then Lexie heard the wolf shuffle away. Lexie breathed slowly at the calm quiet before a hint of the foreign crept its way into her brain. She eased up on her elbows to see a shadow at the edge of the clearing. Her eyes strained into the darkness. The being moved into focus. It was a Rare wolf, gray and brindled, standing stoic in the shadows. She pushed herself to standing, frost cracking beneath her footsteps. A white plain expanded in all directions. Lexie stopped, listening to the wind. The sun joined the moon; the blinding landscape turned blue with a sudden solar eclipse.

The Rare didn’t move, still, save for the breeze dancing across its fur. Lexie kept its eyes trained in hers, and in the periphery she saw her knife glint in the space between her body and the Rare’s. Lexie looked at her knife and found she was no longer standing on frost but dried mud. The desert landscape was cracked like the skin of a long-dead corpse. Her toes dug at the dust.

The Rare stepped into the sunlight and its form receded, giving way to the lithe naked form of a woman. Archer. She stepped forward, her bare feet making no noise as they broke the caked mud into dust. Her skin glowed golden, radiating warmth into this cold, dark place. Her breath drew clouds though she didn’t shiver as the breeze glanced off her naked flesh. She stepped toward the knife and placed her palm atop it. With that motion, her body returned to her true wolf form. She held her paw on the blade and beckoned Lexie over with a sweep of her heavy skull. Lexie felt chilly tears roll down her cheeks and the need for a thousand words she couldn’t find. Archer silently gestured to the knife, encouraging Lexie to take it. Lexie placed her hand upon the hilt and felt the tears flow freely.

“I miss you,” Lexie whispered through tear-stained throat. “So much.”

She pulled the knife from beneath Archer’s paw, and Archer shifted once more, back into her human body.

Archer stood, leaned to her, and pressed her lips, russet and hot, against Lexie’s. The moisture of her skin made Lexie wince. Then Archer stepped away. The knife thrummed in Lexie’s hands.

* * *

Lexie woke when a cello suite started playing—Jenna’s alarm—and Jenna began rustling in her bed.

No one in the Pack could sleep far past the earliest riser, so Jenna’s tendency for perkiness at dawn pissed everyone off before they were even vertical. Lexie buried her face in her pillows, knowing her efforts were futile. Maybe she should just give in. Go out. Experience what a dining hall breakfast tasted like.

Lexie hadn’t even reached the sidewalk when she heard a car slow to meet her pace. She turned to see Randy, leaning into the passenger’s seat to speak out the window.

“Lexie, can we talk?”

“I’m going to class.”

“I’ll drive you.”

“It’s less than a quarter mile away. It’ll take you longer to drive.” Lexie hurried down the sidewalk, but Randy kept pace.

“Please? I want to apologize.”

Lexie sighed and stopped.

“I’ve been texting you like crazy for two weeks,” Randy said.

“I’m not interested in manic drunkards right now.”

“Is that what you think I am?”

“Is it?”

Randy threw the car in park and looked Lexie dead in the eyes. “That night was … crazy. Before that, I was sober for eight and a half years.”

Lexie gave her a look.

“I’m not an alcoholic in the traditional sense.”

“No, just in the modernist one,” Lexie said.

Randy laughed. “That’s funny. You’re sharp.”

Lexie rolled her eyes.

“Please?” Randy asked.

Lexie tugged at her braid and threw her backpack through the window, climbing into the passenger’s seat.

Randy sighed and drove them toward campus.

“Okay, I just … you really freaked me out the other night, all right? I’ve never … seen a corpse before.”

Lexie sighed. “You get used to it.”

Randy laughed bitterly and shook her head. “What are you into?” Randy asked.

Lexie fidgeted with her hoodie’s zipper. “A bunch of shit that you don’t really want to know about.”

Randy’s nostrils flared, and she opened her eyes wide. Lexie feared the other woman was fighting back tears, or something worse. She just wished for a clean break so Randy would have a shot at finding a nice girl to play with instead of getting caught up in Lexie’s various insanities.

“I don’t want to be an accessory to… .” Randy shook her head and concentrated on changing lanes.

“You’re not an accessory to anything,” Lexie groaned. She gestured for Randy to turn right at the intersection and counted the seconds until they would arrive at a campus building—any campus building.

Randy shook her head. “I guess it explains a lot about you. I’ve been in the scene a long time and have seen some crazy-ass shit, but that was beyond.”

“Wait,” Lexie asked, incredulous, “are we talking about the sex, now?”

“In part, yeah. I mean, there was a lot going on between us—”

Lexie groaned.

“—a lot going on in you.”

“What do you mean?”

Randy pulled herself toward the steering wheel and pushed back, nervous.

“I’m not going to say that you checked out, but you didn’t really seem there anymore. I probably should’ve stopped a couple times when you didn’t respond to my check-ins.”

“Gross!” Lexie scowled. “Are you saying you thought I wasn’t responsive and you kept going?!”

“Shit, Lex, you were having a real good time. Mega sub space. It’s not like I … .” Randy tightened her lips. “You weren’t giving me the signs that anything was wrong until you told me to stop. Then on the way home … .” She nearly chuckled. “I was not prepared for that.”

“Neither was I.”

“Are you kidding? You ran headlong into the dark with nothing but a seven-inch blade on you. It seemed like you had been training your whole life for something like that. That’s what’s got me freaking out. What the hell, Lex? Are you like a marine or a fucking ninja or some shit? That was fucking freaky.”

“I’m not a ninja.”

“What happened out there?”

“This is my class,” Lexie said.

“What’s going on with you, Lexie?”

“I don’t know!” she shouted. “I don’t fucking know! No one does. No one knows what my mom was trying to teach me when she sang me lullabies in dead languages. No one knows why I seem to stumble over corpses like it’s my job. No one knows why I’m so fucking scared to let go of this knife! No one knows any of these things. The only one who did died when I was eight.” Lexie felt the truth of her answer settle onto her muscles like a chill. “’I don’t know’ is the only answer I’ve got for you. And if that’s not enough for you, then I don’t know what else to say.”

Randy’s face was frozen in shock.

Lexie saw Randy’s defensive posture and checked herself. She had whipped out her knife without even realizing, waving it in her right hand like a madwoman, feral and ready for a fight.

“What are you doing with that knife?” Randy asked in the forced evenness of someone trying to calm a wild animal.

Lexie looked at the blade, seeing her own reflection limned with honey-colored fur. She sheathed it. “I don’t know that either.”

The two sat in the car. An apology formed on Lexie’s lips, but found no voice. Finally, she grabbed her backpack and muttered, “I have to go. I’m late.” Despite not owing Randy anything, she still felt the lie bite her like an insect.

“I’ll keep your secret,” Randy said. “Whatever it is.”

Lexie nodded. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“Can we … ?”

Lexie slammed the door and shook her head. “Sorry, no.”

“I’ll make it up to you. Promise I will.”

But Lexie was already walking away. Randy hit the steering wheel with the heel of her hand then sped off.

 

Lexie loaded her plate with sausage, bacon, and eggs, scolding herself for taking so long to try out the whole “up in time for breakfast” thing.

She grabbed the Milton Gazette and sat alone at a round table by the windows. The dining hall was empty but for two tables. One was full of swimmers carbo-loading after their morning practice. The second was full of boys, Stefan among them. Stefan wore smudged eyeliner and his hair was streaked with glitter. He looked like he’d gone straight from the dance floor to the breakfast table. He reached to the boy next to him and tugged on his earlobe. It was the skinny waiter from Mao’s. Lexie scarfed down her meal, keeping her eyes trained on the table. The waiter wore a tight white t-shirt and khakis. He giggled and batted Stefan’s hand away. The boys were all playful and high energy, wolfing down their huge breakfasts and replaying scenes from the previous night.

She gripped her knife and squinted at them, needing confirmation, though she’d already held the evidence in her hands that night by the lake, in the form of Stefan’s furry back. Her head hurt. She couldn’t keep focus, and nothing happened, no faces within faces, just blurry boys.

None of the others noticed Lexie staring, and Stefan was making an effort to ignore her glares. She skulked until they took their trays and left. She returned to her table with another tray of eggs and bacon, with a little juice for nutrients, and flipped open the Milton Gazette to find about the new developments in the Bree Curtis case.

Investigators are saying, the article read, multiple different kinds of wounds on Bree’s body indicate that her injuries were not due to one lone Rare wolf, but the work of a pack.