Chapter Six
Cold sweat slickeddown my tingling spine. I jammed my key against the lock, but the metal slid uselessly against the wood. I tried again. Again Ifailed.
“Ness! Wait up.” Everest was barreling down thehallway.
There were two ofhim.
Three.
I didn’t want to be sick in the hallway. He grabbed the key from my fingers, opened my door, then helped me in. I scrambled to the bathroom and knelt in front of the toilet just as a jet of vomit spewed out of mymouth.
“Did you eat something bad?” Everestasked.
I hadn’t eaten anything since lunch. I shook my head, but that angered thethrobbing.
Another wave of sick spurted out ofme.
My vision blurred and readjusted. Unfortunately, my sense of smell didn’t blur. The acrid stench of vomit was so acute it made my nostrilsflare.
Everest took a seat on the edge of the bathtub. “Was it true what you said earlier? That you changed three daysago?”
“Are you really grilling me right now?” I hoisted myself from the floor, flushed the toilet, and turned on thetap.
“No, I’m not grilling you. I’m asking because I have a theory. Did you or didn’t you changeyet?”
I splashed cold water over my face then squinted at my reflection. My eyes looked wrong. I blinked. My irises glowed like the neon sign over the ice-cream parlor August would take me to on hot afternoons when our dads needed towork.
I spun toward Everest. “It’s—It’shappening!”
He sighed. “I take it you didn’t change three daysago…”
I lifted my hands in front of my face and slowly turned them. My nails had lengthened and werecurving.
I stared in horror at Everest. I couldn’t become a wolf here. Not in my bathroom. I would destroy it. In beast form, my muscles would grow and my movements would become choppy and rough. When I’d changed for the first time at eleven, I’d destroyed my bedroom and clawed through the living room couch. It took me weeks to master my wolfform.
Would it take me weeksagain?
As though someone were carving out my vertebrae, blinding pain vaulted up my spine. I arched backward and gritted my teeth. Pointy canines dug into my lower lip and split the soft tissue. Blood dribbled down my chin. As my shoulder blades popped out of their joints, I bit back a scream and fell forward, landing hard on my palms andknees.
The seam on my wrist burst open and blood gushed out. A crimson river trickled in the grout between thestones.
“It’s going to be okay, Ness. I’m right here. It’s going to be okay…” Everest’s voice sounded like it was coming from another room. He crouched beside me, his palm cool against my scorchingneck.
The blood from my lip slopped onto the slate flooring and mixed with the blood from my wrist. I sagged and blinked. Had it been this painful six years ago, or was the pain augmented because of the years I’d deprived my body of itstransformation?
Tears dripped off my cheeks and tangled with the blood. “I can’t. It hurts…” My voice was more howl thanwords.
My mind turned hazy with ache, and my elbows gave in. I yelped and flailed forward, smacking my cheek against the cold stone floor. The blow felt as though it had shattered the cartilage in my face, but perhaps it was the wolf within that was shattering my face, just as it was altering my bone structure, dislocating my joints, and hardening my sinews. I closed my eyes and willed it tostop.
Begged for it tostop.
And itdid.
* * *
There wasan incessant jangling inside my skull.Ugh.I pressed a pillow over my face and squashed my lids tight, my lips tighter. Searing pain radiated over my mouth. I pitched the pillow off my head and sat up so fast my bedroom swam before my eyes. I touched my throbbing lower lip. My fingers came away red, wet withblood.
It hadn’t been adream.
