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  Instead, he opened his arms, said, “Come here, Z,” and he just loved me.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Aurox

  Aurox ran, not knowing or caring where his body took him. He only understood he had to get away from the circle, from Zoey, before he committed another atrocity. His feet, fully morphed into cloven hoofs, tore the fertile ground, carrying him with inhuman speed through the winter dormant lavender fields. Like the breeze flowing over his body, emotions surged through Aurox.

  Confusion—he hadn’t meant to harm anyone, yet he had killed Dragon and perhaps even Rephaim.

  Anger—he had been manipulated, controlled against his will!

  Despair—no one would ever believe that he hadn’t intended to harm anyone. He was a beast, a creature of Darkness. Neferet’s Vessel. They would all hate him. Zoey would hate him.

  Loneliness—and yet he was not Neferet’s Vessel. No matter what had happened that night. No matter how she had managed to control him. He did not, would not belong to Neferet. Not after seeing what he’d seen tonight … feeling what he’d felt tonight.

  Aurox had felt Light. Even though he had not been able to embrace it, he’d known the strength of its goodness in the magickal circle, and recognized the beauty of it in the invocation of the elements. Until the sickening threads had claimed and controlled the beast within him, he’d watched, mesmerized, the soul-moving ritual that had culminated in Light washing the touch of Darkness from the land, and from him, though for him that purification had lasted only a moment. Only long enough for Aurox to realize what he’d done. Then the just anger and the understandable hatred the Warriors had felt for him had overwhelmed him, and Aurox had only humanity enough left to flee and to not kill Zoey.

  Aurox shuddered and moaned as the change from beast back to boy rippled through his body, leaving him bare footed and bare chested, clothed only in ripped jeans. A horrible weakness overwhelmed his body. Breathing hard and trembling, he slowed, stumbling to a walk. His mind was a war. Self-hatred filled him. Aurox wandered aimlessly in the predawn, not knowing or caring where he was, until he could no longer ignore the physical needs of his body and he followed the scent and sound of water. At the edge of the crystal stream Aurox knelt and drank until the fire within him was sated and then, overcome with exhaustion and emotion, he collapsed. Dreamless sleep finally won the battle within him, and Aurox slept.

  * * *

  Aurox woke to the sound of her song. It was so soothing, so peaceful, that at first he did not open his eyes. Her voice was rhythmic, like a heartbeat, but it was more than the rhythm that touched Aurox. It was the feeling that filled her song. Not that he felt with her the way he channeled violent emotions to fuel the metamorphosis that changed his body from boy to beast. The feeling in her song came from her voice itself—joyful, exhilarating, grateful. He didn’t feel those things with her, instead it brought to him images of joy and allowed the possibility of happiness to play through his waking mind. He couldn’t understand any of the words, but Aurox did not need to. Her voice soared, and that transcended language.

  Waking more fully, he wanted to see the owner of the voice. To question her about joy. To try to understand how he could create that feeling for himself. Aurox opened his eyes and sat up. He’d collapsed not far from the farmhouse, near the bank of the little stream. It was a winding ribbon of clear water that drifted softly, musically, over sand and stone. Aurox’s gaze followed the stream down, to his left, where the woman, wearing a sleeveless dress fringed with long strands of leather decorated with beads and shells, stood. She danced gracefully, beating out the rhythm of her song with bare feet. Even though the sun was just lifting over the horizon and the early morning was cool, she was flushed, warm, alive. Smoke from the bundle of dried plants in her hand drifted around her, seemingly in time with her song.

  Just watching her made Aurox feel good. He didn’t need to channel her joy—it was palpable around her. His spirit lifted because the woman was so filled with the emotion that she overflowed. She flung back her head and her long hair, silver streaked with black, easily reached her slender waist. She raised her bare arms, as if embracing the rising sun, and then began to move in a circle, keeping time with her feet.

  Aurox was so caught up in her song that he didn’t realize she was turning to face him, and would see him, until their eyes met. He recognized her then. This was Zoey’s grandmother, who had been in the center of the circle the night before. He expected her to gasp or scream at the sight of him suddenly appearing there in the long grass at the edge of her stream. Instead her joyous dance came to an end. Her song ceased. And she spoke in a clear, calm voice. “I see you, tsu-ka-nv-s-di-na. You are the shapeshifter who killed Dragon Lankford last night. You tried to kill Rephaim as well, but you did not succeed. You also charged my beloved granddaughter as if you meant her harm. Are you here to kill me, too?”

  She lifted her arms again, drew a deep breath of the cool, clean morning air and concluded, “If so, then I will tell the sky that my name is Sylvia Redbird, and today is a good day to die. I will go to the Great Mother to meet my ancestors with joy filling my spirit.” Then she smiled at him.

  It was her smile that broke him. He felt himself shatter and in a trembling voice he barely recognized as his own, Aurox said, “I am not here to kill you. I am here because I have no other place to go.”

  Then Aurox began to weep.

  Sylvia Redbird hesitated for only a small heartbeat of time. Through his tears Aurox watched her tilt her head up again and nod, as if she’d received an answer to a question. Then she walked gracefully to him, the long leather fringe on her dress rustling musically with her movements and the touch of the cool morning breeze.

  She did not hesitate when she reached him. Sylvia Redbird sat, folding her bare feet beneath her, and then she put her arms around him and drew his head to her shoulder.

  Aurox never knew how long they sat like that together. He only knew that as he sobbed she held him and rocked him gently, back and forth, softly singing a chant and patting his back in time to her heartbeat.

  Finally, he pulled back, turning his face away in shame.

  “No, child,” she said, taking his shoulders and forcing him to meet her gaze. “Before you turn away, tell me why you wept.”

  Aurox wiped his face, cleared his throat, and in a voice that sounded young and, he thought, very foolish, said, “It is because I am sorry.”

  Sylvia Redbird held his gaze. “And?” she prompted.

  He blew out a long breath and admitted, “And because I am so alone.”

  Sylvia’s dark eyes widened. “You are more than you appear to be.”

  “Yes. I am a monster of Darkness, a beast,” he agreed with her.

  Her lips tilted up. “Can a beast weep in sorrow? Does Darkness have the capacity to feel loneliness? I think not.”

  “Then why do I feel so foolish for weeping?”

  “Think on this,” she said. “Your spirit wept. It needed to mourn because it felt sorrow and loneliness. It is for you to decide whether or not that is foolish. For me, I have already decided there is no shame to be found in honest tears.” Sylvia Redbird stood and held one small, deceptively frail hand out to him. “Come with me, child. I open my home to you.”

  “Why would you do that? You watched me kill a Warrior last night, and wound another. I could have killed Zoey as well.”

  She cocked her head to the side and studied him. “Could you have? I think not. Or at least I think the boy I see at this moment could not kill her.”

  Aurox felt his shoulders slump. “But only you believe that. No one else will.”

  “Well, tsu-ka-nv-s-di-na, I am the only person here with you at this moment. Is my belief not enough?”

  Aurox wiped his face again and stood, a little unsteadily. Then he took her delicate hand very carefully in his. “Sylvia Redbird, your belief is enough at this moment.”

  She squeezed his hand, smiled, and said, “Call me Grandma.”
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  “What is it you call me, Grandma?”

  She smiled. “Tsu-ka-nv-s-di-na is my people’s word for bull.”

  He felt hot and then cold. “The beast I become is more terrible than a bull.”

  “Then perhaps naming you tsu-ka-nv-s-di-na will take some of the horror from what sleeps within you. There is power in the naming of something, child.”

  “Tsu-ka-nv-s-di-na. I will remember that,” Aurox said.

  Still feeling shaky, he walked with the magickal old woman to the little farmhouse that rested between sleeping lavender fields. It was made of stone and had an invitingly wide porch. Grandma led him to a deep leather couch and gave him a hand-woven blanket to wrap around his shoulders. Then she said, “I would ask you to rest your spirit.” Aurox did as she asked while Grandma sang a song softly to herself, built a hearth fire, boiled water for tea, then retrieved and gifted him with a sweatshirt and soft leather shoes from another room. After the room was warm and her song was finished, Grandma motioned for him to join her at a small wooden table, offering him food from a purple plate.

  Aurox sipped the honey-sweetened tea and ate from the plate. “Th-thank you, Grandma,” he said haltingly. “The food is good. The drink is good. Everything here is so good.”

  “The tea is chamomile and hyssop. I use it to help me be calm and focused. The cookies are my own recipe—chocolate chip with a hint of lavender. I’ve always believed chocolate and lavender are good for the soul.” Grandma smiled and bit into a cookie. They ate in silence.

  Aurox had never felt so content. He knew it couldn’t be, but somehow he had a sense of belonging here with this woman. It was that odd but wonderful sense of belonging that allowed him to begin speaking to her from his heart.

  “Neferet commanded me here last night. I was to disrupt the ritual.”

  Grandma nodded. Her expression was not surprised but contemplative. “She wouldn’t have wanted to be revealed as my daughter’s murderer.”

  Aurox studied her. “Your daughter was murdered. You witnessed the record of it last night, yet you are serene and joyful today. Where do you find such peace?”

  “From within,” she said. “It also comes from the belief that there is more at work here than what we can see—what we can prove. For instance, at the very least I should fear you. Some would say I should hate you.”

  “Many would say that.”

  “Yet I neither fear nor hate you.”

  “You—you are comforting me. Giving me sanctuary. Why, Grandma?” Aurox asked.

  “Because I believe in the power of love. I believe in choosing Light over Darkness—happiness over hatred—trust over skepticism,” Grandma said.

  “Then it is not me at all. It is simply that you are a good person,” he said.

  “I don’t think being a good person is ever very simple, do you?” she said.

  “I do not know. I have never tried to be a good person.” He ran a hand through his thick blond hair in frustration.

  Grandma’s eyes wrinkled with her smile. “Have you not? Last night you were commanded by a powerful immortal to stop a ritual, and yet, miraculously, the ritual was completed. How did that happen, Aurox?”

  “No one will believe the truth about that,” he said.

  “I will,” Grandma said. “Tell me, child.”

  “I came here to follow Neferet’s command—to kill Rephaim and distract Stevie Rae so that the circle would break and the ritual would not succeed, but I could not do it. I could not break something that was so filled with Light, so good,” he spoke in a rush, wanting to get the truth out before Grandma stopped him, shunned him. “Then Darkness took possession of me. I did not want to change! I did not want the bull creature to emerge! But I could not control it, and once it was present, it only remembered its last command: kill Rephaim. It was only the washing of the elements and the touch of Light that halted the beast long enough for me to regain some control to make it flee.”

  “That’s why you killed Dragon. Because he tried to protect Rephaim,” she said.

  Aurox nodded, bowing his head in shame. “I did not want to kill him. I did not intend to kill him. Darkness controlled the beast, and the beast controlled me.”

  “Not now, though. The beast is not here now,” Grandma said softly.

  Aurox met her gaze. “He is. The beast is always here.” He pointed to the middle of his chest. “It is eternally within me.”

  Grandma covered his hand with hers. “That may be, but you are here as well. Tsu-ka-nv-s-di-na, remember that you did control the beast enough to flee. Perhaps that is a beginning. Learn how to trust yourself, and then others may learn to trust you.”

  He shook his head. “No, you are different than everyone else. No one will believe me. They will only see the beast. No one will care enough to trust me.”

  “Zoey shielded you from the Warriors. It was because of her protection that you were able to flee.”

  Aurox blinked in surprise. He hadn’t even thought of that. His emotions had been in such turmoil that he hadn’t realized the extent of Zoey’s actions. “She did protect me,” he said slowly.

  Grandma patted his hand. “Do not let her belief in you be wasted. Choose Light, child.”

  “But I already tried to and failed!”

  “Try harder,” she spoke sternly.

  Aurox opened his mouth to protest, but Grandma’s eyes stopped his words. Her gaze said that her words were more than a command—they were a belief.

  He bowed his head again. This time not in shame, but in response to a tentative glimmer of hope. Aurox took one small moment to savor the new, wonderful feeling. Then, gently, he took his hand from under Grandma’s and stood. In answer to her questioning look he said, “I must learn how to prove you right.”

  “And how will you do that, child?”

  “I must find myself,” he spoke with no hesitation.

  Her smile was warm and bright. Unexpectedly, it reminded him of Zoey, which made the tentative glimmer of hope expand until it warmed the center of him. “Where will you go?”

  “Where I can do the most good,” he said.

  “Aurox, child, know that as long as you control the beast, and do not kill again, you may always find sanctuary with me.”

  “I will never forget it, Grandma.”

  When she hugged him at the door, Aurox closed his eyes and breathed in the scent of lavender and the touch of a mother’s love. That scent and that touch stayed with him as he drove slowly back to Tulsa.

  * * *

  The February day was bright and, as the man on the radio said, warm enough to start wakin’ up the ticks. Aurox parked Neferet’s car in one of the empty spaces at the rear of Utica Square, and then he let instinct guide his steps as he walked from the busy shopping center along the backstreet called South Yorktown Avenue. Aurox smelled smoke before he reached the great stone wall that encircled the House of Night.

  This fire was Neferet’s work. It reeks of her Darkness, Aurox thought. He didn’t allow himself to consider what that fire might have destroyed. He focused only on following his instinct, which was telling him he had to return to the House of Night to find himself and his redemption. Aurox’s heart was beating hard as he slipped within the shadow of the wall and made his way silently and swiftly around the east boundary of the school until he came to an old oak that had been split so violently that part of it rested against the school’s wall.

  It was a simple thing, really, to scale the rough wall, grasp the winter nude branches of the shattered tree, and then drop to the ground on the other side. Aurox crouched in the shadow of the tree. As he’d hoped, the brightness of the sun had emptied the school grounds, keeping fledglings and vampyres within the stone buildings, behind darkly curtained windows. He moved around the split base of the tree, studying the House of Night.

  It was the stables that had burned. He could see that easily. It didn’t seem that the fire had spread, though it had left an exterior wall to the stables collapsed. Tha
t damaged opening had already been draped by a thick black tarp. Aurox pressed closer to the tree. Picking his way over the splintered fragments of its broken base, and its tangled mess of limbs, Aurox wondered why no one had thought to clear the wreckage of the tree from the otherwise meticulously cared for grounds. But he didn’t have time to wonder for long. A huge raven suddenly landed on a drooping limb right before him and began a terrible and loud series of croaks and whistles and oddly disturbing clucks.

  “Go! Be gone!” Aurox whispered, making shooing noises at the big bird, which only made the creature explode in more of the croaking noises. Aurox lunged forward, intent on throttling the thing and his foot caught on an exposed root. He fell forward, hitting the ground heavily. To his shock, he kept falling as the earth opened under the weight of his body and he hurled, headfirst, down … down …

  There was a terrible pain in his right temple, and then Aurox’s world went black.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Zoey

  I’d fallen asleep wrapped in Stark’s arms, so waking up to him shaking me while he glared and almost shouted, “Zoey! Wake up! Stop it! I mean it!” was totally confusing.

  “Stark? Huh?” I sat up, dislodging Nala, who’d made herself into a fat orange donut on my hip. “Mee-uf-ow!” Nala grumbled and padded to the end of the bed. I looked from my cat to my Warrior—they were both staring at me like I’d committed mass murder. “What?” I said around a big yawn. “I was just sleeping.”

  Stark grabbed his pillow and wadded it behind him so that he was propped up in bed. He crossed his arms, shook his head, and looked away from me. “I think you were doing a lot more than just sleeping.”

  I wanted to strangle him.

  “Seriously, what is wrong with you?” I asked him.

  “You said his name.”

  “Whose name?” I blinked, having a flashback to that creepy old movie Invasions of the Body Snatchers and wondering if Stark had turned into a pod person.