The security light came on as I drove up, illuminating parts of the house and yard and not others. The three mouser cats were on the porch, mewling and crying, tails straight up, walking in circles—not in a line like the possums in the neighborhood, but with each cat going its own way. They were acting very strange, almost the way cats acted when in heat, but all my cats had been spayed or fixed prior to me taking off for Spook School. No kittens for me.
I turned off the truck, gathered up my gear, and opened the door, letting the icy air of night sweep in. It carried in a noise that had never belonged here, on Soulwood, a purring, chuffing sound, in and out, two sets of them. As if breathing out of sequence.
Wereleopards. Close by.
A scream slit the night, powerful and petrifying. Not an African lion roar, but the dark of jungle nights, half shriek, half rumble, a hacking, growling reverberation that spoke of blood and threat and death. Close. Too close.
I twisted, searching for the sound, still in the protection of the truck body. I dropped everything onto the passenger seat. Drew my weapon and a flashlight. Placed my feet to the ground. The rumbling noise was from the roof of the house. I trained the powerful flash high. On the roofline, at the crest, were two leopards, a black leopard and a spotted one—Paka and Occam. Their eyes were trained on me, one greenish gold in a black coat, the other the amber shade of old gold, in a spotted coat.
For a moment, I knew what it felt like to be prey, a prickly, enervating weakness, as if all the blood had already drained from my body. The cats were crouched, showing fangs, white in the flash.
Pea was between them and me, on the edge of the roof, facing them, her neon green fur standing out all over. Her impossiblesteel claws were out, catching the flash in silver slashes of illumination. She was spitting with rage, and when Paka shifted her paws, Pea yowled with fury, louder than the weres, the sound full of warning. The mouser cats bolted to the ground and under the front porch. Paka seemed to rethink whatever it was she’d wanted to do and settled back, belly to the crest of the roof.
I stayed where I was too, protected by the body of the truck, and shined the flash around. I spotted Rick on the porch, curled into a ball in the shadows of the swing. I trailed the strong beam over him. He was a mess. Bleeding from what looked like claw slashes and fang bites. Paka’s bites? Rick was a were stuck in his human form, unable to shift into his cat form, spending the three days of the full moon each month in torture. But from the black hair covering him from head to foot, it looked like Rick was now part cat, partway through the shift into his black leopard form, which he had never achieved before. The tats on his shoulder were four glowing golden discs, so bright that they looked heated. As if reacting to the burn of the tats, Rick tightened the muscles of his arm and gripped it with the clawed hand of the other. Cat claws. He mewled, clearly in agony.
I eased back into the cab and shut and locked the door. And though I didn’t want to, I punched up Soul’s cell number. Rick was in trouble, and this werecat stuff was out of my sphere of knowledge. Rick leaped off the porch and landed on the ground, on all fours, crouched in the shadows cast by the security light. Rick. Fur covered. Naked, otherwise. Things I did not need to see. The cell rang.
Rick set his belly to the ground. Elbows and hips high. Began crawling toward me. Fast. So fast.Ring two. Rick leaped to the hood of the truck.
The Chevy rocked with the weight. His paws made little curved dents in the hood. His paws, clawed, trying to grip the metal. His shadow cut across the hood in stark lines. Soul’s line rang a third time. Rick leaned in to the windshield and snarled at me, showing leopard teeth.
My breath stopped in my throat. Rick was half cat, half human. Partially furred. His face was cat jawed with human-shaped forehead and eyes, irises glowing greenish gold. Ears pointed, high on his head. Fanged. Nose wrinkled as he scented me. His tats glowed like heated gold.
He snarled again, eyes on me. Licked his jaw.
I was...prey. Dinner.Oh... God.
A flash of green swept across the hood of the truck. Pea. Landing between Rick and the windshield. Between Rick and me. She growled, spit, and launched herself at Rick. Steel flashing.
I screamed, “Pea! No!”
Rick and Pea rolled off the hood, into the shadows beside the cab. Screaming and yowling. Blood splattered across the windshield. Three drops splatted onto the land of Soulwood.
The earth woke up, alive and hungry. I could feel it without even standing on it.Bloodlust.The land was hungry. Waiting.
Rick screamed, a cat scream. Piercing, shocking, this close. I flinched away from the door. Rebounded off the seat. Blood splashed and sprayed, landing in wide arcs that I could feel even though I wasn’t touching the ground. Soulwood sucked it up, waiting for me to feed it. Hunger gripped my rooty belly.
A black leopard landed in Rick’s place, Paka, paws touching down lightly before she leaped off and into the fray. The cats rolled into the yard, into the brightness of the security light. The roof over my head dented. Popped back in place, dented again.
There was a werecat on top of the cab.Occam.
This was... not good. I stifled a hysterical giggle, pulling my sidearm from its case. I removed the magazine full of standard rounds and slammed the new magazine home. Silver hollow points. The gestures calmed me. My breath came easier. Steadied my need to feed the land.
Soul’s voice said, “Where are you? Are you in danger?”
I had dropped the cell. I fished it from the crevice of the seat. My fingers weren’t shaking. The barrel of the gun was rock steady. The need for blood eased away a bit more. And when I spoke, my voice didn’t carry the hysterical laughter of only moments before. “I’m in my truck at the house. Danger looks possible. Rick and Pea and Paka are in a catfight to end all catfights.”
“So I hear.” Soul sounded calm and wry. “I heard you prepare your weapon. Silver ammo?”
“Yes, ma’am. Hollow points. But I really don’t want to kill them.” Not that I needed hollow points. All I needed was to take the lovely, lovely blood and feed them to the earth. I was in no danger. But my friendswere.
“Try to avoid brains and hearts and they might survive. But save yourself first,” Soul said.
From the roof, a paw appeared at the top of the windshield.Another. A long, catty chest and belly. Occam was walking down to the hood. Just like one of my mouser cats might. Before he might show me far too much of his catty parts, he leaped to the hood, denting it deeper than Rick had.
When all four paws were on the flat surface, the werecat turned and looked at me, then back at the fray. He lay belly down on the still-warm hood. I had a feeling that Occam was guarding me. Maybe so he could eat me later. My laughter escaped in a judder of lips. Occam turned to me and snorted before looking back at the battle.
The fight was bad, bloody. Rick was covered in bites.
