Storm Cursed (Mercy Thompson #11)(25)

“Have you seen enough?” he asked.

I started toward what I thought was the nearest bathroom, and he stepped between me and it. “No. You don’t want to go into the freezer. There are some things you don’t need to see. We should go.”

I looked pointedly at the dead bodies, scratching the floor once per body I could see. One on each of the two tables, two in the dentist chairs, two tied up on dining room chairs. I sneezed and looked around.

“I forgot,” he said.

He gave the kitten he held a worried look, but told it, “This should only take a minute.”

He strode briskly to a large storage bin near one of the corner rooms and pulled off the lid. It was a big, sturdy bin, but it shouldn’t have been big enough to store a body.

I peered inside and wished I hadn’t. The body inside was missing legs and arms—which explained the size of the bin. My brain wanted to turn the corpse into a stage prop. His face was almost featureless because his eyes, lips, nose, and ears had been removed long enough ago that the wounds had healed over with scar tissue.

He looked mummified, but my nose told me that he, like everyone else in the room, had been alive only a few hours earlier. I didn’t recognize him, but I knew the ghost who lingered, petting the corpse.

Sherwood’s voice was grim. “Adam said this was Elizaveta’s grandson and that likely Elizaveta had done most of the damage to him herself.”

His name had been Robert. The ghost looked at me, then spat over his shoulder and scowled. I ignored him as I sniffed dutifully at the pitiful body.

I made Sherwood wait until I’d sniffed around all of the bodies again, paying special attention to fingers and faces. Then we both escaped the basement of Elizaveta’s house. I don’t know who was more relieved: me, Sherwood, or that poor kitten.



* * *



? ? ?

I couldn’t change back. Adam assigned someone to take my car back to our house. Then he packed me, Sherwood, and the kitten into his SUV to head for the veterinary clinic while the pack pulled the bodies, human and otherwise, from the house. Pack magic would keep neighbors or low-flying aircraft from noticing what the pack was doing.

Everyone would wait for Warren to return with the firestarters. The plan was for Joel and Aiden to turn Elizaveta’s family—and all the dead animals—to ash.

Sherwood suggested that the house be burned down, too—which I was highly in favor of. Given the state of things that I’d seen, I doubted that anyone would ever be able to get a peaceful night’s sleep in that building without someone doing a major exorcism or something of the sort to lay the ghosts to rest. I’d never seen an exorcism performed in person, so I didn’t know if one would work.

Adam decided against burning Elizaveta’s house because he didn’t want to draw the attention of the authorities. And because it was a decision that should not be made without Elizaveta’s say-so.

I was glad to be in the SUV headed away from that charnel house. Adam didn’t say anything—and Sherwood was never exactly a font of words. The only sound for most of the trip was the kitten’s squeaky moans. I’d never heard a cat make that sound before—and I hoped I never did again.

“He’s dying,” said Sherwood, breaking the silence. His attention was on the animal he held on his lap. He sounded casual, but my nose told me better. It didn’t take a psychologist to understand why he’d be concerned with an animal rescued from a witch’s lair.

“He made it this far,” Adam said bracingly, proving that he’d understood Sherwood, too. “It’s just a mile more to the clinic.”

Sherwood pulled the kitten up to his face with big hands that supported its whole body evenly and breathed its scent. “Did you know?” he asked. “About the black magic in that house?” His head tilted away from Adam told both of us how important it was to him.

Adam shook his head. “No. I’d have put a stop to it. I had no idea.”

Sherwood nodded. “And what are we going to do about it?”

“We will do nothing,” Adam said. “This is something for me to do.”

Sherwood studied Adam for a long moment.

“There will be no black magic in my territory,” Adam said softly. He gets quiet when he is very angry.

Sherwood relaxed in his seat.

The kitten survived until we reached the clinic.

I waited behind the very black windows in the SUV while Adam and Sherwood took the kitten in to the emergency vet. I wasn’t advertising what I was—there had been a couple of times that the only reason I survived the bad guys was that they didn’t know I could change into a coyote. The fight with the goblin this morning was a good example.

They came out about a half hour later, looking grim.

Adam told me as he got in the car, “Touch and go. Lots of broken bones, some of them half-healed. Lots of superficial and not so superficial damage. Minor skull fracture. Dehydrated and starving. They have him on IVs and have treated everything they can treat. It’s up to him now.”

“They thought it was us who had tortured the kitten,” said Sherwood.

Adam nodded. “Until a lady in the waiting room recognized me and got so excited. Sometimes the publicity can be useful.”

“There will be headlines,” said Sherwood, sounding more settled now that the cat was out of the car and out of his care. “Werewolves rescue tortured kitten.”