The impaled cabbage looked far too much like a head. Creepy.
Almost as creepy as the single palm-width eyeball atop its body. The sclera glistened white as a broken bone in the moonlight.
He skidded to a halt, nonplussed. The spider thing, disturbed from its snacking, flung the cabbage at him.
He dodged easily, glad Merrilee had gotten his blood pumping earlier, and the old produce flapped past. The spider thing scuttled off the Dumpster, its hard-tipped claws clattering loudly in the still night. It sprang away, tipping over the Harley.
Okay, now he was creeped out and pissed. And a little worried. The Fat Boy was a big machine, and the spider thing had dumped it like it was some girl-friendly crotch rocket.
The creature scrambled toward the street, Beck in pursuit.
Creepy things were not allowed to creep around his territory.
So late at night, the town was quiet, slumbering, only a few porch lights still glowing. Good thing. He didn’t want the unsuspecting human population to see this obviously unnatural thing.
Plus, he wished he’d stopped to put on his pants.
The spider ran straight down the middle of the road. For a three-legged thing, it was fast, preternaturally so.
But then, so was he. He realized, when it rotated as it ran to eyeball him again and then put on a fresh burst of speed, that it was at least semi-sentient.
He’d lose the creature if he shifted. In the blurred time he needed to cross into the verita luna, it could dart any direction and be gone. But he wasn’t sure he could keep up.
He needed to hasten the shift and hold his focus for those crucial moments. He just needed a concentration point... He thought of Merrilee, stumbling unaware upon this creature as she sneaked back to steal his jeans.
Between one footfall and the next, he shifted.
The pain and dazzle of the verita luna almost made him stumble. Only blind stubbornness kept him on the pavement.
As his vision cleared, sure enough, the spider thing was veering toward an alley.
Beck lunged, right behind it, with all four paws digging into the gravel.
The thing squealed, a shrill and livid sound, like sheet metal tearing. From the next alley over, a dog barked.
Obviously, the creature had thought it could escape when he shifted. Despite his insta-fur coat, he felt chilled. It knew what he was. Worse, it had thought it knew a wereling’s weakness during the change.
It scuttled for a wooden fence, vaulting with blurred speed over the edge.
Beck launched himself behind it and managed to catch its trailing third claw in his teeth.
The thing slashed backward at him with another leg, but that left only one leg for it to catch itself.
They fell and rolled across the backyard in a flurry of fur and slashing barbed legs. In a noisy clatter, they bashed through a set of folding chairs and a grill. The puff of charcoal ash made Beck’s nose itch with a terrible sneeze, but he held on grimly.
The backyard deck light flashed on, halogen bright.
“What the h—?” The last word was lost in a rising bellow.
Beck dug his feet into the lawn, struggling to hold back the squealing spider that nevertheless managed to drag his two-twenty weight several yards.
Until the grizzly—clad in shreds of striped pajamas—reared up and came smashing down with both front feet, monstrous claws curving wickedly.
The spider made one urk sound and greenish goo sprayed from the eyeball.
Beck leapt back, pawing at his muzzle to get rid of the foul taste.
When he looked around, Orson, the barbershop bear, had shifted back and stood in the remnants of his nightclothes with a pair of grill tongs hefted like a spear over his gray head. He plunged the tongs into the splattered spider, pinning it to the earth.
A spiral of oily smoke twisted up from the creature.
This time, Beck sneezed.
Orson planted his hands on his scrawny hips. “Well, hell. Look what the dog dragged in.”
By the time Orson had gone inside to fetch a robe and an extra pair of pajama bottoms, Beck had shifted and was rinsing out his mouth from the garden hose.
“Imp tastes like ass,” the old man said.
“More like acid,” Beck corrected as he took the offered cotton pants.
The pants were far too small since they fit Orson in his human incarnation, not his verita luna shape. Where the old man packed away all the pounds he added to his grizzly form was one of the mysteries discussed at length—in the proper company—over beers at the bar. Most of the townsfolk werelings had decided he kept it in his voice.
But Beck was relieved there was still considerable strength in the old man. And he was glad enough for the pants too.
Avoiding the squirts of green goo, Beck approached the thing impaled on the lawn. “What is an imp?”
“Phae.” Orson spat the word as if he too tasted the fetid, greasy char.
Beck frowned. “We haven’t had trouble with their kind in...” He shook his head. “Since before my time.”
Orson huffed out a breath. “Not before mine. I was a boy last time I saw one. Cocky bastard, walking through town just as dusk settled, all wrapped up in his glamour. Lying through those smiling teeth. Probably fanged, though no one could see.”
Pursing his lips, Beck decided not to remind Orson that they had fangs of their own. Though he’d never dealt with phae himself, he knew all the old stories. Werelings had always hated the phae. Phae glamour was an affront to the verita luna, where the shape was the truth.
Not that it was always a truth they could share.
But werelings had not abandoned the sunlit world as the phae had. They’d kept to themselves, kept quiet, and kept their ways while the phae had skulked away, driven by changes in a world to which they would not—or could not—adapt.
Beck studied the grill tongs. “So those are iron.”
Orson nodded. “One thing those liars can’t lie about. Cold, hard iron will end them.” He spat again. “But nothing’s made of iron anymore. The steel-born phae can creep back in if no one’s watching.”
Crouching beside the imp, Beck looked at the big ruined eye. “What was this one watching?”
“Maybe nothing,” Orson said. “Maybe just a stray.” But he didn’t sound convinced.
Beck nodded, more at the concern not spoken. “I think we might need to do some hunting.”
“My boys will do a walk through town. No sense getting everyone worked up about nothing.”
Beck thought about the stories he remembered. “The phae have no argument with us.”
“Besides us being where they wish they could go.”
“They can’t have my town,” Beck said. He heard the wolf in his own voice, protective and possessive.
Speaking of protective and possessive...
He glanced at Orson. “Merrilee needs to know about this. Can you deal with this mess?”
The bear-kind nodded. “If I leave the iron in, it’ll just melt away. But I’ll bring the boys over for a whiff before we head out on patrol.” His eyes glinted. “If the phae want a war, we know how to fight.”
After making a few investigative calls, Beck aimed for the winding road to the lakeside village. The first golden light of morning reminded him the last thing he wanted was a fight. He’d put fighting behind him when he took his honorable discharge. He wanted the peace to brew his beer and serve his pack. He wanted quiet nights to run free. He wanted...
But what he wanted and what an Alpha had to do were two different things and not as easily brought together as a wereling’s shifts.