Changeling Hunter Read online

  Ember parked the Highlander on the cracked cement pad in front of a faded steel walk-in door. Before she got out, she gave the area a final 360-degree review to ensure she was alone. She would be stealthy in her approach. She was sure that the idling of the vehicle would mask her arrival. Satisfied that she was taking all the proper precautions, she popped open the driver’s side door. The door chime on the SUV happily pierced the still morning air. She cursed the vehicle’s trumpeting announcement. So much for being sneaky.

  The walk-in door was made of reinforced steel but held a collection of dents. It was slightly ajar, its lock broken.

  Against her better judgment, she pulled the door open the rest of the way and slipped inside the abandoned garage.

  The light switch near the door was unresponsive when she tried toggling it. Electricity had been severed to the building years ago. The only illumination came from the morning sun, peering in from the broken overhead door panels—the giant robot’s eyes—and what light that could sneak past her silhouette in the doorway. She stepped in and aside to let her eyes adjust to the dim interior.

  At one time, three decades ago, the garage would have smelled of oil and grease and diesel exhaust fumes. Tandem axle military trucks painted olive drab or woodland camouflage would be parked in the stalls, each being serviced by a crew of young enlisted Airmen in overalls. Rock and Roll might have played over the radio—music that now would be considered classic, but at the time were top hits.

  Now, the building was populated by mice and barn swallows. The stench was unmistakable for both. As Ember’s eyes acclimated, she walked cautiously. Dried bird dung and feathers matted the floor, especially beneath the mud-and-grass nests they constructed along the rafters and below the trusses of the loft. Scrap metal and broken boards were strewn throughout the building, along with stacked cardboard boxes whose corners were gnawed through by mice. When she brushed up against a rolled-up carpet, fine dust scattered into the air. Ember somehow managed to resist sneezing.

  She heard her attacker two seconds before the strike arrived.

  Ember spun, the cloud of decaying carpet dust billowing around her. The attacker’s fist swung for her face, but she stepped back in time to avoid connecting with it. A kick followed the punch, landing just next to her hip. A heavy boot ruptured the rotting cardboard box, its mouse-nest contents bursting as if they were made of gunpowder.

  Use your surroundings. Ember didn’t hesitate. She plunged her hand into the chewed-up paper and fibers, grabbed a fistful of the fine material, and flung it at her attacker’s head.

  Her aim was true; the powdery material exploded in the target’s face. A cough, a gag, and a woman’s voice swore an obscenity.

  Any of my hard parts are weapons. Any of their soft parts are targets. Ember followed up with an elbow to the woman’s solar plexus. It was a mistake.

  Dust got in her own face then, and Ember was momentarily blinded. Worse, her hit wasn’t hard enough to bring the other woman down. Worse still, the woman replied by shoving Ember backward, hard.

  Ember tripped over the stacked boxes, falling on one of the rolled up carpets. Spider webs and demolished mouse nest clung to her long hair. She gagged, coughed, and reached for something to help her back on her feet. Her hand found a wooden chair leg covered in the slime of fresh bird poop.

  She got to her knees just as her attacker jumped through the debris. Ember brought the chair leg up as hard as she could, striking across the other woman’s leg.

  The woman went down hard and yelled, “Fucking bitch!”

  Continuous motion. Ember threw herself at the woman before she could get back up. They rolled over decades’ worth of mouse feces, swallow feathers, and bird dung. Birds squawked in alarm above, making for the only exits. Their fluttering wings knocked loose fine dust particles and created a whirlwind around the humans who invaded their sanctuary.

  Ember was winning. The other woman outweighed her and was an impressively skilled fighter, but she also had a fistful of fine dust and mites in her eyes, nose, and throat. Taking a chair leg to the shin probably didn’t help.

  “Had enough yet?” Ember spat the words triumphantly. She used the wooden chair leg to pin one of the woman’s arms. Ember kept her knee on the woman’s sternum so she couldn’t break free from the slimy concrete floor.

  Dark eyes glared back at her, and the woman showed her teeth. Her incisors were sharp points, and her cuspids were growing longer. The woman’s face became broad and feral, her whiskered nose black above a toothy maw. Fur punched through her skin and clothes disappeared. Those dark eyes now reflected like a pair of angry mirrors.

  The whole shift happened in less than a second.

  Ember was thoroughly familiar with changelings, but she rarely met one who could fully shift in under a second. It took incredible discipline and years of practice to perfect such a transformation so quickly—while being pinned to the floor, no less.

  She was tossed like a rag doll. Ember skidded on her butt along the uneven concrete floor, coming to rest against a rusted grate. The chair leg clattered uselessly into the shadows.

  The 140-pound mountain lion stalked a wide circle around its prey. Its ears were flat against its buff-colored head, and its lips snarled to show the sharp canines that would soon crush Ember’s larynx if given a chance. Its claws clicked against the cold floor.

  The walk-in door was fifty feet away, with no shortage of obstacles. She would never be able to outrun the cougar.

  Ember struggled to her feet and looked for anything she could use to defend herself. If she could just stun the creature, or distract it long enough to get outside, maybe she could lock it in, somehow.

  The changeling wasn’t going to give her the chance. The mountain lion opened its jaw and emitted a frightening scream. It pounced at its prey, claws extended.

  If not for the cement block support column at her back, Ember would have crumpled to the floor against such a force. It wasn’t much of an improvement to be pinned against that column, especially as the recipient of the full brunt of a cougar’s lunge.

  She brought her arm up to protect her throat and felt the lion’s jaws latch on. Teeth designed for tearing through animal hides closed in around her forearm. The lion’s claws raked across Ember’s other arm, shredding her skin like tissue paper.

  Bloody hell, this was such a bad idea.

  3

  I Know How to Talk to People

  “Bugger all, Debra, you’ve lost the plot!” Ember screamed into the mountain lion’s face, hoping to get through to the human brain within. “You won! I give!”

  For a moment, she feared that the snarling cougar would ignore her surrender. All it would take is a mere flinch for the jaw to close and Ember’s forearm would become so many shattered pieces.

  Reluctantly, the big cat let her go. The beast brought its paw to its face, and a long, pink tongue began cleaning trace spots of blood from its claws. In scarcely more time than it took to blink, a tall, athletic woman stood in its place, performing a final lick at her fingernails.

  Ember shuddered at the sight of the changeling licking flecks of blood—her blood. She looked down at her left arm. The scratches were superficial but plenty deep enough to draw crimson tracks across her tanned skin.

  “God damn it, Debra! Look what you’ve done.”

  Debra stopped lapping at her fingers, seeming to belatedly recognize what she had been doing. She spat on the floor and wiped her lips with the back of her hand. Her voice was unapologetic when she offered her defense. “You threw mouse shit in my face!”

  “You’ve been teaching me for a fortnight, telling me how I need to use my surroundings.” Ember drew her right arm along her pant leg in a futile attempt to rid herself of cat saliva. All she managed to do was attach pin feathers to the sticky smear. “When you told me you were going to ratchet up the realism of my training, I didn’t know you meant Tetanus and Hantavirus.”

  The tall woman just shrugged and proceed
ed to the exit, crunching broken glass beneath her heavy boots while she continued spitting.

  Ember glowered at her instructor’s back for a moment before following. Outside, she blinked at the bright sunlight and filled her lungs with fresh air.

  “That really fucking hurt,” Debra complained as she rubbed her shin.

  “Really? You’re going to whinge at me?” Ember held up her scratched arm as her defense.

  Debra combed her fingers through her jet black hair, picking fuzz and feathers from her scalp. She scrunched her nose at the slimy bird poop on her fingers. “Maybe this wasn’t such a great scenario after all.”

  “Yeah, you think?” Ember squinted at the woman. “Not that I don’t appreciate your willingness to teach me non-magic based self-defense and all, but can we go back to the dojo tomorrow morning?”

  “It’s important that you learn how to handle yourself in real-world situations.” Debra winced as she touched her shin. “But maybe you have a point.”

  There was some satisfaction in knowing that she gave as good as she got—right up until the shift caught her off-guard. Ember should have seen that coming, given how relentless her instructor was in teaching her the importance of keeping one’s opponent guessing. Retzev, Debra had called it. Continuous motion, unpredictable and without hesitation.

  After her close call two weeks ago, Ember knew she needed to step up her education. Debra Morgan worked at the Magic City embassy as a security officer and was regarded as someone who knew how to handle herself. As best as Ember and Wallace could independently verify, Debra was also trustworthy.

  All the same, Ember wasn’t about to trust Debra any more than she needed to. She wouldn’t tell her, for instance, that her motivation for becoming more resilient was because she was nearly raped and killed by three changeling spies under the employ of a manipulative bureaucrat. She wouldn’t tell her that there was corruption within the Druwish government that potentially reached even to the Druw High Council in England.

  It didn’t raise any suspicions that an Associate Investigator would hire a member of embassy security to teach her basic personal defense. Debra’s methods may have been rough, but there was no denying that Ember had learned a lot in the short time she’d been sparring with her. Even the mindset of heightened situational awareness was enough to justify the bruises.

  Ember drove back to Minot, to Apartment Number 302 in the old brick building that used to house the Northern Moline Plow Company. She’d been staying there for the past six weeks since arriving in North Dakota.

  Lost in her thoughts, she walked the third-floor hallway of her apartment building, fishing the keys out of her purse. On a subconscious level, she registered that her neighbor, the mysterious “M. Anderle” had another package awaiting him or her. If experience was any guide, it would be silently retrieved before she next walked the hall.

  Following a much-needed hot shower, she dried her hair with a blow dryer in front of the bathroom mirror. Ember stared at the fire-blue eyes looking back at her. Her hair hung midway down her back and was a dark gold, lightening as it dried. The new scratches on her arms joined a pattern of bruises old and new—evidence of two weeks of intense daily martial arts training.

  Around her neck was a thin cord, from which a carved wooden pendant in the shape of a coyote’s face dangled. The gift from her woodworker friend Anna never left her. It had become something of a talisman, reminding Ember of her purpose, her duty.

  Next to the coyote’s face, along the curve of one naked breast was a red, puckered scar a few inches long. She could have had it healed and the scar removed—even a Novice Healer with a Leystone could do it—but Ember decided to leave it. It served as a different sort of motivator, reminding her of the stakes should she fail.

  She got dressed and returned to the Highlander. Normally, she would walk the four blocks to the Parker Suites, but today she would be playing chauffeur.

  Ember found a parking space on the street—a rarity for downtown Minot, but it was early enough in the Monday morning yet—and strolled into the building.

  “Hi Ami,” Ember waved at the receptionist in the lobby. “Is Gloria in yet?”

  The mocha-skinned girl smiled but looked confused. “Good morning, Ember. Gloria who? I don’t know of any Gloria.”

  “Doctor Gloria Rout. I could’ve sworn I told you about her on Friday. She arrived this weekend to work in the Department of Wellness for a few weeks. I’m taking her out on a tour today.”

  Ami just shrugged.

  A mature woman’s voice answered from the reception area. “Ah yes, my driver. I’m right here. Ember, is it?”

  Ember turned to meet the owner of the voice. The Level Five Healer was a tiny thing who had to be well past her 200th birthday. She walked slowly with a slight stoop in her back and made no effort at hiding her age. Her grey hair was in tight curls, and she was dressed in a knitted pink sweater overtop a floral-pattern dress. Her wrinkles had wrinkles. She looked every bit the part of someone’s great-great-grandmother.

  Her handshake was surprisingly firm, however, and the old Malvern woman straightened her back to assess Ember with sharp, grey eyes framed by gold wire spectacles. She tightened her grip and gestured at the scratches on Ember’s arms. “You look like you’ve seen some trouble, young lady.”

  Ember shrugged self-consciously. “It’s just Krav Maga.”

  “Kravma-what now?”

  “Self-defense training.”

  Gloria raised her chin and lowered it slowly. “Right. And this involves knives, does it?” Her voice held skepticism.

  “Something like that, yes. Shall we be on our way, Gloria?”

  “It’s Doctor Rout if you please.” The old woman released her grip and pointed at a medical bag resting on a chair behind her. “Be a dear and fetch that for me, would you?”

  Ember smiled politely and collected the leather bag and the wooden cane leaning next to the chair. She offered both to Gloria, who accepted only the cane and used it to begin walking to the door. Ember glanced at the bag she held, then back at Ami, who offered a smile and a shrug.

  “You’re not going to make me walk far, are you?” Gloria said as she hobbled. “These legs aren’t what they used to be, you know.”

  “I’m parked just around the corner, Glor—Doctor Rout.”

  “Good, good. Because I only have so many miles left in these legs. I’m not about to use them all up chasing down the street, you know. I suppose you’re going to make an old lady open the door, too.”

  “Oh, um…of course not.” Ember rushed to the glass doors of the lobby and swung one open, holding it for Gloria. She waved at Ami before releasing the door and grabbing the handle of the exterior door.

  Ember pointed out the rental vehicle and opened the passenger door of the Highlander. She tossed her own satchel in the back seat along with Gloria’s medical bag. The door chimes sang their greeting loudly.

  “Oh, that racket!” Gloria waved her hand limply at the SUV. “Why do they make these things so noisy?”

  Ember chuckled. “That’s a great question, Doctor Rout. I’ve been wondering that myself.”

  Gloria eased herself into the seat, tucking her cane in beside her. Ember was about to swing the door shut when the old woman shook her head. “I guess I’ll try to buckle myself in, then.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry. Let me help.” Ember leaned in and assisted in drawing the seatbelt forward. After the door was closed she muttered, “Which pensioners’ home did Wallace dig this woman up from?”

  Doctor Rout may have been old, but she was also considered loyal and trusted by Wallace. She was an accomplished Healer and he had sent her to the Magic City to assist Ember in trying to heal the disabled changeling scouts who had become injured by their foray into the fog during the Mandaree Incident of 2001. Though Ember had acquired the object she’d come to refer to as the Aedynar Artifact, she had no luck trying to use it. But then, Ember was no Healer.

  The doctor seemed un
impressed by everything. The city of Minot, the agrarian countryside, the numerous species of wildlife Ember pointed out as they drove. She drove past the decommissioned Air Force Station that she had visited earlier that morning. Gloria deemed the outcropping of old buildings on the hill “a dreadful eyesore.”

  “Did you meet Elton Higginbotham yet, Doctor Rout?”

  Gloria thought for a second and then nodded. “Oh yes, the Director of Wellness. He’s such a nice man, that one. You know, Wallace warned me to be careful about Higginbotham. I gotta say, I don’t see anything wrong with the man though. Very charming, very handsome. If I were fifty years younger—”

  “Elton Higginbotham is an especially dangerous man, Doctor Rout.” Ember emphasized and repeated her warning. “Especially dangerous.”

  “Oh, he doesn’t seem so bad. Maybe you just got off on the wrong foot with him.”

  “Just please be careful what you say around him, okay? He’s not someone we can trust.”

  Gloria shook her head and looked out the side window. “She thinks I don’t know how to talk to people. I know how to talk to people.”

  The hourlong drive to Plaza felt like an eternity with this traveling companion. They were parked on Highway 23, waiting for a flagman at road construction when Gloria started sniffing the air. “What is that unholy scent?”

  Ember frowned. She sniffed the air, then tucked her nose down at her left armpit as casually as she could. “I don’t smell anything, Doctor Rout.”

  “Oh please.” Gloria dropped her hand in a limp, dismissive gesture. “It smells like something died in here. This is the driver Wallace assigned me? A girl who doesn’t bathe.”

  “Glor—Doctor Rout,” Ember sighed, “I just showered an hour ago. And I’m not your driver. You do understand why Wallace sent you, right? I requested you.”

  “Right, right. I suppose I’m a big idiot. Wallace begged me to come help you because you have some changelings who aren’t able to shift. They probably just don’t want to shift—you ever think of that? No, I don’t suppose you have.”