Oscar led the way to the living room, peeking through the blinds to take a quick scan of the backyard. “Been quiet so far. Doesn’t look like you were followed.” Years on the job as a beat cop had kept him in shape. He looked strong, fit, and in charge.
“I made about a million unnecessary turns. Would’ve spotted a tail.”
He gestured to the love seat across from him and settled in his favorite armchair, its dark leather worn sandy brown in all the places that mattered most. “There’s something you need to know, kid.” Sitting in the dimly lit living room in a black T-shirt and sweatpants, Oscar’s dark African complexion was perfectly camouflaged against the armchair. Pearl-white teeth blew his cover—a stark contrast to the rest of him. He sighed. “I knew your father.”
The feeling of betrayal reared its ugly head. Oscar had come into her life eighteen years ago. Never once had he mentioned that he knew her dad. When it came down to it, the thing she valued most about their relationship was honesty. She always knew where she stood with Oscar, and he with her. There were no games, no guessing matches, no pretending. Just total unbridled brutal honesty. It was there from the moment they’d met. “Why’d you wait so long to tell me?”
His eyes revealed a sadness that took her off guard. “I was trying to protect you.” He regarded her for a long moment. “Your father and I were part of the same brotherhood. We ran with the same pack. He was a wolf, like me. He was our alpha.”
“My adoptive father,” she corrected him. “I know he was a wolf. I remember.”
“Your mother and father didn’t adopt you, Aspen.”
She leaned forward. “Are you saying they stole me?”
He shook his head. “They were your real parents. Your biological parents.”
The sting of betrayal lashed out again like a hard slap in the face. She held her tongue and waited for him to go on.
“Before you were born, the world already hated Shrouds. Your father was convinced it would one day come to this—that humans would decide we were too much of a threat and either jail us or wipe us out of existence. More than anything, he wanted to protect you from humans. He knew the only way to do that was to make you one of them.
“There were rumors that a vaccine had been developed by one of our kind. It could be given to an infant just after birth to effectively thwart their ability to shapeshift. There was conflicting data as to the vaccine’s effectiveness. For some, it lasted months. For others, years. The one thing we knew for sure was that it always wore off, eventually. Your parents didn’t want to take any risks, so they sought out this vaccine and gave it to you each year until your fifth birthday.”
That would explain how she’d made it through three decades of her life without shapeshifting. Aspen listened intently, hanging on his every word.
“You have to understand,” he went on, “it was a very volatile time in Shroud history. Humans would go on killing sprees just for the hell of it and wipe out entire Shroud families. Your father made all of us in the pack promise not to interfere if something happened to him. He made us swear not to take you in if you were orphaned. He saw each of us in the pack as a liability for you. He didn’t want you on the government’s radar at all. That’s why he had false adoption papers drawn up, claiming you were human.”
She thought for a moment, struggling to connect the dots. Her parents were murdered when she was six, and she spent the next six years in and out of foster homes. “But you broke your promise and took me in when I was twelve. Why the hell did you wait so long to come and get me?”
“There was little I could do for you without attracting unwanted attention, so I kept tabs on you from afar for six years. When I saw the vaccine seemed to be working, I maintained my distance. But watching you bounce from one foster home to the next was more than I could bear. I informed my pack that I was breaking the oath I’d made to your father. No one stood in my way. That was the night you ran away from your last foster home. I looked everywhere for you. The whole pack did, and none of us could find you. I was convinced you were dead…until that morning when I found you in the park.”
They were both pensive for a long moment. Aspen was filled with a profound sadness at the thought of never being able to shapeshift. Her ability to do so was taken away without her consent. “So I really am human?”
“That’s what I was beginning to think until Skye showed up here and told me about you. When she took your hand, she said she saw a panther.”
“So?”
“When we meet one of our own kind and shake hands, the shroud drops away. We see one another for what we truly are: the animal beneath the shroud. You and I have touched hands countless times since you were twelve. I’ve never seen a panther. Here,” he said, reaching over. “Take my hand.”
Aspen drew in a quick breath as a large wolf appeared before her with fur as black as the darkest night sky. The only thing that betrayed Oscar’s nighttime cover were pearl-white canines, which protruded menacingly from both sides of his muzzle. He circled her slowly, sniffing the air around her as he moved.
She couldn’t take her eyes off him. Seeing Oscar in this form was magical for her. Instincts told her he was the pack leader. She’d be willing to bet anything the wolves outside took orders from him. Until now, this was Oscar’s world—a world he’d kept private.
He sat in front of her and peered into her eyes intently. Returning his gaze, she recognized Oscar’s eyes at once. A warm shade of chestnut brown, they could be loving and tender with her or guarded and unyielding on the job. Long seconds ticked by. She got the feeling he was studying her. Feeling suddenly self-conscious, she wondered if something was wrong and drew back, breaking their connection.
Back in human form, he stared at her, mouth agape.
“What’s wrong?” she asked. “You were looking at me funny.”
He leaned back in the armchair.
“Do I have a giant panther pimple or something?”
“You’re definitely a panther,” he said, rubbing his chin in thought. “But your eyes…they’re the brightest yellow I’ve ever seen.”
She failed to see the problem. “Don’t panthers have yellow eyes?”
“Maybe. Probably.” He waved a dismissive hand in the air. “That’s not the point. When we shift, we always keep our human eye color, regardless of our animal.”
“So what does that mean?” She scooted forward on the love seat. “Can I shoot laser beams from my eyes?” she asked jokingly, trying to break the tension.
“I can’t believe this,” he said, standing from the armchair. He started to pace around the living room. “All this time…I never knew.”
“Guess that makes two of us.” She tried to be patient, waiting as he paced. “Care to clue me in?”
He sat beside her and set a hand on her shoulder. “It means you’re a Myriad, Aspen.”
“Let me get this straight. I was born a Shroud, but my parents gave me a shot for the first five years of my life that made me a temporary human, and now I’m a Myriad?” She looked up, thoroughly confused. “What the hell is a Myriad?”
“It’s a very special kind of Shroud. Myriads were thought to be extinct. Humans hunted them down all over the world and killed them off over a century ago. Yet here you are,” he said, shaking his head. “Your parents must have known about you. That explains why they fought so hard to keep you off the radar. They knew how valuable you were.” He rose from the sofa and resumed pacing.
“They were hoping the vaccine would suppress your shapeshifting ability until you were fully mature and at the peak of your power.” He stopped pacing and turned to her. “Your parents were brilliant. I should’ve known they had something up their sleeves. Can’t believe it took me this long to put it all together.”
At the peak of what power? Aspen had so many questions, but her instincts told her not to interrupt Oscar’s train of thought. She had never seen him excited like this before.
“Myriads always assume the animal of the mother. In your case, your primary animal is a panther, but you can shapeshift into any animal at will. The telltale sign of a Myriad is bright yellow eyes, markedly different than the eyes you have in human form. Myriads also possess unique…” He paused, studying her. “Abilities.”
She could tell Oscar was choosing his words carefully, which wasn’t like him at all. Alarm bells went off inside her head. “What do you mean by abilities?” Processing all this new information was making her hungry.
“With each Myriad, it’s different,” he explained. “You won’t know until it happens.”
“Are we talking superhero abilities? Or is it more like I wake up one morning to discover I have a hidden talent for knitting?”
“The abilities vary, from what I understand,” he said vaguely. “Now that the vaccine seems to be wearing off, the important thing is to start paying attention and be on the lookout for certain…changes.”
There it was again. That telltale pause. He made it sound like she was about to go through puberty all over again.
She’d grown up believing she was human. But she was actually a Shroud? How could this be happening? She was still reeling from the revelation that her adoptive parents were her real parents. They’d chosen to withhold the truth beyond their graves, even from her. A part of her felt angry with her parents and betrayed by Oscar. How could he let her go through life believing these lies?
In that instant, she realized there was a part of her that had always felt…different. She had felt a kinship with Shrouds her whole life, but she’d attributed that to being raised by Shrouds who loved her and treated her well. Had she felt that kinship from the outset because she was one? She wanted to believe she would have felt the same if she really was human. Believing it gave her hope that humans and Shrouds might, one day, overcome their differences enough to realize just how much they had in common and coexist peacefully.
Her next thought made her heart skip a beat. “Would you have taken me in if I wasn’t a Shroud, if everything my parents told me was true?”
Oscar hung his head in thoughtful silence. He was quiet for so long that Aspen decided she didn’t want to hear his answer. Knowing the truth might change her relationship with Oscar forever.
For the last eighteen years, he’d been her hero, a Shroud who opened his home and heart to a human. She’d always believed he possessed more integrity than every other human she’d ever met. But maybe Oscar wasn’t the man she thought he was. She balled her hands into fists and shook her head, determined to stuff down the tears that were threatening to break free.
“Had that truly been the case, there’s only one thing I would do different,” he said, finally looking up. “I would have found you sooner. As a human raised by Shrouds, you would have faced endless ridicule. I would’ve wanted to save you from that.”
There was the Oscar she knew. She searched familiar brown eyes and knew he was telling the truth. “But I thought I was human and I did face endless ridicule. So what’s the difference?”
“The difference is, you’re a Shroud, Aspen. I figured your shapeshifting abilities would manifest sooner or later, and if push came to shove, you’d be able to defend yourself. Placing you with humans was like hiding a lion among lambs.”
“How can you say that when humans have been murdering Shrouds for centuries?” she asked, dumbfounded.
“Because Shrouds are stronger than humans. In here,” he said, tapping a finger against his temple. “Always have been. Probably always will be.”
There was a part of her that instantly sensed the truth in his words. The Shrouds she’d encountered in her life, both on and off the job, all seemed to possess a certain mental toughness, a resilience that she’d come to admire over the years.
“The morning I found you in the park was the best and worst day of my life. I felt like I had found my daughter. You may not be my blood, but it sure as hell felt like you were. Still does,” he said with cheeks full of tears. “Shroud or human, I should have come for you sooner, kid. I’m sorry.”
“You found me exactly when you were meant to,” she assured him. “When I look back on that time in my life, there’s nothing I would change about it. I believe all of it happened for a reason. You saved me that day. And you’ve been there for me ever since.” She went to Oscar, sat on the armrest beside him, and wrapped her arm around him. “You’re the person I trust most in this world. I’ve never said thank you, but I try to live my life in a way that honors you and everything you sacrificed for me.”
“There were never any sacrifices. Raising you was a privilege. I was the lucky one.”
She gave his shoulder a gentle squeeze, stood, and returned to the love seat with a sigh. “If you think getting all sappy and showering me with compliments lets you off the hook for withholding the truth for so long, you’re wrong. I’m still mad.”
“Copy that. You have every right to be.”
Silence filled the space between them.
“Taking accountability and validating my anger is a good start,” she said finally. “If you threw in pancakes at IHOP every Sunday for a year, I might be able to let this go.”
“Just a year?”
Oscar was right. His eighteen-year omission was a serious offense and should be treated accordingly. “Make it three,” she said. Out of habit, she reached up to rub the phoenix pendant between her thumb and forefinger. Remembering it was now in new hands made her smile. “And Skye comes, too.”
“Already figured she was part of the deal. She showed me the necklace you gave her.” Oscar had given Aspen that necklace the day after he found her in the park.
He laced his fingers together and lowered his head, pretending to give her demands serious thought. “Five years,” he said at last, looking up with the no-nonsense expression he reserved for the job. “Final offer. And I’ll throw in twenty boxes of those Girl Scout cookies you like.”
“Thin Mints?”
He nodded.
“Done. All is forgiven,” she said. They shook hands and then hugged, long and hard.