Kiera Hudson & The Adoring Artist (Kiera Hudson Series Three Book 3) (10 page)

Chapter Twenty

I dropped to the ground. It was like my legs had been kicked away from beneath me. I cried out. The pain was excruciating. I clawed at the earth. Sending up a shower of leaves and broken twigs. Throwing back my head I howled and howled, just like the wolf had done inside of me. But the wolf was no longer inside, it was making its way out of me – changing me – turning me into it. What had I done? I looked over at where I’d struck Potter with the rock. He lay sprawled on his back, eyes closed.

“Pot…
Potter
!” I howled. My body felt like it was burning up – just like it had the other night in my room. But there was no moonlight now to cool it. I looked down at the jagged opening I’d made down the centre of me. I could see black and blue fur bristle through the bloody opening. Fear gripped me as much as the pain I’d felt. Had it been this painful turning into the Vampyrus? Had I felt just as petrified as I did now?

Flesh fell away from my legs in thin strips as they stretched and contorted out of shape. It felt like my bones were being yanked on by invisible hands. My toenails grew long and pointed as my feet doubled in size. Why hadn’t Jack told me this is what it would be like? What hadn’t he told me how painful being a wolf would be? My heart pounded in my ears, and the world seemed to stretch in and out of shape all around me. I wanted to stop the change but I didn’t know how to, even if I could. The wolf had hold of me, had control of my claws as I ripped and tore at my own flesh – throwing it clear in bloody shreds. If I had fooled myself that the pain couldn’t have got any worse, then I’d been wrong. A pain so blinding gripped my skull. It felt as if it were being pushed open from the inside.

“Potter!”
I cried out, my voice sounding shrill and broken. Why wouldn’t he wake up and save me? What had I done?

Throwing my claws to my head, I rolled over, now on all fours. With my head feeling as if it were being repeatedly kicked and punched, I looked back over my shoulder and down the length of my back. My spine twisted like a snake under what little flesh I had left there.

“Please, I can’t bear it!”
I screamed.
“Please make it stop!”

Blood burst into my mouth as a jagged row of teeth pierced my gums. How could that beautiful creature that dwelt inside cause so much pain and anguish? Was this some kind of payback for keeping silent – denying the wolf her freedom for so long? Jutting my chin forward, I felt my tongue stretch inside my mouth. I flicked it back and forth, feeling the soft fur beneath it for the first time. And even through the pain tearing my head apart I could see the look of revulsion on Potter’s face when he’d learnt that female werewolves had a fine coating of hair beneath their tongues.

It didn’t stop him kissing Eloisa Maddison
, a voice as clear as my own whispered inside of me. Was it the voice of the wolf I could hear? If it was, it sounded very much like my own.

Eloisa Maddison was beautiful, but you will be stunning,
the voice whispered.
There is no other wolf like you – like us – Kiera Hudson
.

With my head feeling as if it had been stuffed tight with shards of broken glass, I looked back over my shoulder and down the length of my back. There was no more flesh covering it – just fine black hair and a long tail that whipped to and fro through the air. With each violent swish, it made an ear-piercing cracking sound like a whip.

I looked front again, the pain so blinding now that the darkness started to close in all around me like swollen storm clouds. When I could take the pain no more, I collapsed onto the ground and let the black take me.

How long I’d been out for, I didn’t know. Had it been mere moments or hours? I opened my eyes, then shut them again at once. Did I have blood in my eyes? The world looked like it had been painted red. I opened them again. The world was still bright red, like it had been set on fire. I looked over at where I’d struck Potter. He still lay unconscious on the ground beneath the tree. I guessed then I’d only been unconscious myself for no more than a few minutes. Either that or I’d struck Potter so hard and he was now dead. If there was any blood seeping from a wound I might have caused to the back of his head, then I couldn’t tell. The ground, the trees, the sky all looked as if I were watching it through a red lens. Fearing that perhaps I was right and Potter was indeed dead, I scrambled to my feet. I swayed back and forth like a capsizing boat. I realised that I was no longer in any pain. It had left me, but had the wolf? The ground seemed very close. I looked down and gasped. I wasn’t standing on my feet, but on all fours. I placed one giant paw forward, then another. I looked left and right, the world swam red before me. But it wasn’t just my eyesight that was different. It was my sense of smell too. The world seemed to be alive with scent. I could smell the leaves, the grass, the insects that scuttled through it. I could smell the trees and the birds which had made nests in them. I could smell the sky and the approaching rain. I could smell the water in the stream that ran nearby.

Placing one paw in front of the other, and with my snout near to the ground, I made my way slowly toward Potter. Even before reaching him, I knew that he was alive. I could smell the blood pumping through his veins. Placing my paws on either side of his shoulders, I stood astride him. My long, black snout just inches from his face. He looked so peaceful. Leaning in closer still, I washed one side of his face with my tongue. I could taste him.

With a flick of my tail, I turned away, drawn by the smell of the free-flowing water some feet away. I trotted toward it, my throat aching with a burning thirst. Standing on the bank of the stream, I looked down into the water. I let out a yelp of surprise at my own reflection. I narrowed my eyes at the sight of the wolf that was staring back up at me. It narrowed its eyes at the very same instant I did. The water rippled and so did my reflection. My face was now like that of a giant wolf and so too was my body. Lowering my head, I lapped up some of the water. It cooled my tongue and throat.

“You don’t have to always look like that,” a voice suddenly said from behind me. “You can look more human – more like Kiera, if you want to.”

Spinning around, I faced Potter who was standing just a few feet away, one hand pressed to the side of his head, where blood trickled through his fingers.

Chapter Twenty-One

“I’m not sure, but if you can pull the wolf back – you know, inside – so you look more human than wolf,” Potter said. Taking his hand from the side of his head, he winced and looked at the blood covering his fingers.

How did he know what it was like to be a wolf? How did Potter know how to control it? He came toward me. I rolled back my upper lip in a snarl and took a step backwards, my tail swishing back and forth behind me.

“Hey, hey, hey,” Potter said, waving the bloody hand before him. The smell of the blood was maddening and I wanted to lick the last of it from his fingers. “I just want to help you, Kiera.”

Did he really? Didn’t he just want the wolf to retreat back inside so I was weaker, so I was easier for him to kill? “How do you know so much about wolves?” I asked. But words didn’t sound like words at all – just a series of snappy barks.

“I haven’t got the faintest fucking idea of what you’re trying to say,” he said. “But you need to pull the wolf back. That look doesn’t really suit you.”

Hoping that he was true to his word and that he wasn’t trying to trick me in some way, I closed my eyes and concentrated. In my mind’s eye, I could see the wolf. She sat on her hindquarters in the centre of my head. I looked at her, our eyes meeting – a new understanding – a new respect – forming for each other deep inside the both of us.

Back
, I whispered inside my mind.
Retreat!

The wolf got up, and turning, it sauntered to the back of my mind. With each step she took, I felt my body change – like I was coming forward again. Outwardly I could feel myself standing – straightening up.

“Stop”, I whispered at her. But this time the command wasn’t just inside my head, but spoken out loud.

The wolf stopped just like I had told her to. She turned to face me. I could just see her sitting within reach in the darkest shadows of my mind. She stared back at me with her blazing eyes and nodded her head as if she understood.

Taking a deep breath, I opened my eyes. Potter stood some feet away looking at me. The expression I could see on his face was unreadable. Was it awe, shock, or disgust I could see pulled over his rugged good looks? Whatever it was, I was no longer seeing in the world in shades of red. It was as it was before. Lowering my head, I looked down at myself. I was no longer standing on all fours, but upright. I was naked and I immediately covered my breasts with my arms. I did this not only because Potter was gawping, but because my body was covered in a fine coating of silky black hair. The coat of hair was so fine that my skin was visible through it. My hands were claws, but not like they were when in my Vampyrus form. They still looked somewhat human, but each finger was long and slender, each capped with a sharpened nail. The backs of my hands were covered in the same silk-like hair that disguised the rest of me. I glanced back over my shoulder to discover that the tail had gone. The stream continued to flow just feet away, so turning, I headed toward it. Dropping to my knees, I peered down into it and gasped at the sight of my own refection. I put my claws to my face. Unlike the rest of my body, it wasn’t covered in that fine black hair. The hair seemed to thin out at my collarbone and went no further, leaving my neck and face free of it. But my face had changed shape. It now looked like a vague reflection of my true self – but it was strange because if I looked hard I could see my human self peering out from beneath. My mouth was the same as it had always been, and just like in my Vampyrus form the teeth in the upper corners of my mouth were sharp and pointed like fangs. But it was the rest of my face. There was no snout like a wolf. It had gone, leaving me with something close to a feline look. My eyes looked like that of a cat and they shone a fiery hazel. My dark hair appeared thicker but was just as long as before as it spilled in black and blue streaks over my shoulders and down my back. My ears were pointed and each tip jutted through my hair on either side of my head.

“Here, put these on,” Potter said. My hoodie, jeans, and boots landed on the bank on the stream beside me. With my back to him, I stood and pulled on my clothes. I pulled up the hood of my sweat top and hung my head low.

“You don’t have to hide yourself,” Potter said. “You still look beautiful, Kiera.”

Why was he being so kind to me? Why would he say such a thing? “I thought you hated wolves,” I said, finally turning to face him from beneath my hood.

“Not all of them – not you,” he said, lighting a cigarette.

“Not all of them?” I asked.

“There was a girl – we hung out for a while, but I had no idea she was a wolf,” he said. “Not to start with.”

“What was her name?” I asked, peering out from beneath my hood, still too uncomfortable and unsure of the way I know looked to fully reveal myself to him.

“Eloisa Maddison,” he said.

Perhaps I should have been surprised by this, but I wasn’t. I knew that Potter and Eloisa had once been lovers before – in a
where
and
when
that seemed to be slipping further and further away with every passing moment that I spent in this new one. So therefore, I wasn’t too surprised to learn that they had been lovers once again.

“What happened to her? Where is Eloisa now?” I asked.

“Dead,” Potter simply said, taking another draw on his cigarette.

I didn’t have to ask him whether he had killed her. Potter killed her once before in the hangar just outside the town of Wasp Water. He had ripped her heart out right in front of me. “Did you hate her so much that you had to kill her?” I asked.

“She was a wolf,” Potter so matter-of-factly stated, it was chilling. “She killed innocent children and women. Besides, she didn’t really like me. She knew what I was. Eloisa was using me so as to infiltrate The Creeping Men. She deserved to die.” 

“Then you better kill me,” I said, dropping to my knees before him. “I have never killed a child and I don’t ever intend to. But as you can see, a wolf does live inside of me.” I pulled back my hood, tilted back my head, and exposed my throat to him. “I haven’t come to fight with you, Potter. I haven’t come to start a war between the wolves and Vampyrus. I won’t choose and I won’t take sides. If being half wolf makes me your enemy, then kill me now, because I won’t fight you.”

I closed my eyes and waited for him to tear out my throat, or rip out my heart just like he had done to Eloisa. With my head back, I heard Potter come forward. He stopped beside me. I kept my eyes closed and steadied my racing heart. But instead of feeling his claws sink into me, I felt his hand fall gently on my shoulder.

“I’m not going to kill you, Kiera,” he said.

Slowly, I opened my eyes and looked up into his face. “Why not?” I whispered.

“Because it’s not my decision to make,” he said, turning away. “Although I should kill you for what you did.”

“What did I do?” I asked, still kneeling.

“You hit me over the fucking head with a rock,” he grimaced over his shoulder at me.

“No, I never,” I lied, getting back to my feet. “Something must have fallen out of the tree.”

“What was it – a ten ton fucking squirrel?” Potter groaned, gingerly touching the spot where I’d struck him.

“I only did it because I was scared…” I started to explain.

“Scared of what?” he asked.

“I was scared that if you saw me like this,” I said, raising my hood over my head once again, “then you might hate me.”

“I don’t think I could ever hate you, Kiera,” Potter said, flicking the smouldering butt of his cigarette into some nearby shrubs, “even though you nearly caved my skull in with that rock.”

“I’m sorry,” I whispered.

“And what about the kiss?” he said. “Was that just a distraction so you could knock me out and change into the wolf?”

“Partly,” I shrugged.

“I’m not sure how to take that.” He frowned.

“I enjoyed kissing you, Potter. I always have…”

“Always?”

“Since you kissed me when we were together in the cell block,” I corrected myself. “But I guess now that you’ve seen me like this – you won’t ever want to kiss me again.”

“Do you want me to ever kiss you again?” Potter asked, coming slowly forward. He stared deep into my cat-like eyes. I looked back. I so wanted to see my Potter staring back at me but I couldn’t be sure whether he was or not. But if I kissed him, drew him deep into me, would I draw my Potter out, just how I’d drawn out the wolf inside me?

“I don’t know,” I said, breaking his intense stare. “I just need some time. A lot has happened that I don’t truly understand – stuff that I’ve yet to figure out.”

Believing that I was talking about the change that had just consumed me, Potter said, “Have you always known that you were half wolf?”

“Not always,” I said. Then reaching for his hands, I held them tight in my claws. “You won’t tell anyone – not Murphy or any of the others. Can we keep it our secret?”

“Do you have any idea what you’re asking me?” Potter said.

“Please,” I whispered.

“If the other Creeping Men ever found out that you were a wolf – if they ever found out I had kept it secret from them, they would kill both of us.”

“But why? I’ve done nothing wrong.”

“To them you are our enemy,” Potter said. “Wolves are the enemy of all men – of all other creatures human or not.”

“But I’m not truly wolf or Vampyrus,” I said.

“So what does that make you?”

“Perhaps it makes me the one who can bring a true truce to the war between the Vampyrus and the wolves,” I said. “I believe that we have enemies on both sides.”

“The wolves have been my true enemy for as long as I can remember,” Potter said.

“And how much do you remember?” I asked him, still holding his hands tight. I feared that if I let go of them I might just take hold of his shoulders and shake him. Shake him so hard that everything he had forgotten about us would fall back into place.

“What’s that s’posed to mean?” he said.

“Murphy told me about what happened, how you shot him in the back of that police van,” I explained.

“Has that old fart been bitching about me behind my back?”

“Look, it’s more important than the juvenile squabbles you share with Murphy…”

“Who are you calling juvenile?” Potter puffed out his chest.

“Just listen to me for once!” I cried. Potter was fast bringing me close to the point of exasperation. “How long ago did you shoot Murphy in the hip?”

“Four or five years ago?” he said. “So?”

“So what do you remember prior to shooting him?” I asked. “What was your life like? Where had you come from?”

Potter pulled his hands from mine and turned away. Grabbing his shoulders, I forced him back around to look at me. “You don’t remember anything, do you? Just like me, you got one of those letters inviting you to start working for The Creeping Men. And I bet the letter was signed by someone called Lois Li.”

Potter looked at me. Slowly, he nodded his head.

“I don’t think there is anyone called Lois Li,” I said.

“There has to be,” Potter said.

“Have you ever met this person – your employer? Has anyone?”

Potter shook his head. “Not that I know of.”

“Can’t you see someone or something is fucking with you – with me – with all of us!” I exclaimed.

“Who?”

“I don’t know that yet,” I sighed. “But I don’t think Lois Li is a name at all. I think those words – those letters – come from a longer message.”

“What message?” Potter asked.

“I don’t know that either,” I said, fearing that he might start to disbelieve everything I had just told him.

“You could be wrong about all of this,” Potter said.

“But I could be right and neither of us will ever know if you tell the Creeping Men about me – about what I really am,” I said.

Potter held my stare for what seemed like time unknown.

Finally he said, “So what’s your plan?”

“First, we save Nev,” I said, striding away knowing that Potter had my back once again, and I had his.