Shifting Again Read online

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.

  Shifting Again edited by Rob Knight

  Cover copyright Cat Zheng, used with permission.

  Alpha copyright © 2006 by BA Tortuga; Hide copyright © 2006 by Cat Zheng; The Lost Tiger copyright © 2006 by Sean Michael; Plums copyright © 2006 by Camilla Bruce; Rescuing Ryan copyright © 2006 by Sara Bell; Seal Skin copyright © 2006 by Kara Larson; Singing Up the Moon copyright © 2006 by Angel; Who Will Know? copyright © 2005 by A. Steele.

  All rights reserved. No part of this eBook may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information address Torquere Press, PO Box 2545, Round Rock, TX 78680.

  ISBN: 978-1-934166-23-9, 1-934166-23-5

  Printed in the United States of America.

  Torquere Press electronic edition / October 2006

  Torquere Press eBooks are published by Torquere Press, PO Box 2545, Round Rock, TX 78680.

  http://www.torquerepress.com

  table of contents

  Foreword by Rob Knight - 4

  Hide by Cat Zheng - 5

  Rescuing Ryan by Sara Bell - 38

  Who Will Know? By A. Steele - 81

  The Lost Tiger by Sean Michael - 94

  Plums by Camilla Bruce - 154

  Singing Up the Moon by Angel - 174

  Seal Skin by Kara Larson - 201

  Alpha by BA Tortuga - 229

  About our Contributors - 284

  foreword

  by rob knight

  One of my favorite things in the world, literary or otherwise, is the shapeshifter. You might have noticed that, since I edited Shifting and Shifting Too. The great challenge behind Shifting Again was to find still more amazing tales of animal attraction and bring them together for a third book.

  Luckily for me, some of the best writers out there were willing to give it a go. The stories in Shifting Again go well beyond the wolf. They explore the cruelty of an animal in captivity, the myth of the selkie, whose seal skin is hidden away to keep him on the shore. Oh, if you're a werewolf fan, there's still plenty for you here.

  The one thing all of these stories have in common is the struggle for someone who is more than human to love, and love, in a human world, bringing out the vulnerability behind being different. Well, that and the heat factor. They're all about love, after all.

  I hope you'll give in to your primal urge and read Shifting Again today. And that you'll enjoy these stories as much as I did.

  Rob Knight, October 2006

  hide

  by cat zheng

  "Watch out!"

  Startled out of a daydream, Vonne flung himself to the ground. The metal drum report of gunfire rattled in the distance and glass struck down around him like violent hail. He swept the ground around himself clear, cursing.

  "Why can't the throwbacks stick to claws and jaws, eh?" His savior moved into the space he'd made and returned fire. Vonne rolled onto his side and grinned: recognition came at sound of the Northern accent as much as the sight of conflicting cowboy boots and hat. His buddy James Hewitt had spent more time on fishing boats than ranches growing up, but that didn't keep him from following his fashion muse even in the middle of war.

  "Wish they'd really go primitive," Vonne agreed. "It'd be easy huntin'."

  Gunfire rattled again, but it sounded farther away this time. Vonne glanced down at the ammo counter on his rifle. Hewitt followed his gaze.

  "We could use any advantage right about now." Hewitt gave Vonne a broad, close-lipped smile. Vonne grinned back, flashing teeth that closed together crookedly, and moved as Hewitt braced himself on the broken window ledge. Hewitt sighted his gun, finger in the trigger until he was reassured. He ducked back under cover. "What are you doing up here, anyway?"

  "I was hoping to get a better view. Just got too damn close down there, sitting and waiting. Plus, well--" Vonne had the decency to look slightly embarrassed. "Needed a private moment."

  Hewitt's laughter filled a lull between bursts of gunfire. "Yeah, I know what you mean."

  "Did you see the contraband Lewis had--?" Vonne was cut off by an eruption of sound below them, so violent and so close that the building trembled. The moment of safety vanished; the looks they exchanged were all furrowed brows and tight lips as more explosions sounded below them. Hewitt lunged to his feet, fury in his face, like he was ready to rush down to investigate with guns blazing.

  Vonne seized his friend's elbow and shook his head, ignoring the tightening feel in his belly. He chanced a quick look out of the window; smoke was pouring out of the lower floors. Sound drifted up: shouting, gunfire, and worst of all, screams. His traitorous gut lurched again, and Hewitt's face became a mirror of his own as the bad news sunk in.

  They stood simultaneously, Vonne shouldering his gun, Hewitt keeping his at the ready. Vonne cocked his head toward the back of the room. "We could probably get down that old fire escape in the back--"

  "No fucking way!" Hewitt scowled, breaking into motion. "Everyone's down there! We have to get back to them." Without waiting for a response he made for the door marked "STAIR" and Vonne hurried to catch up to him, cursing. As soon as Hewitt opened the door smoke frothed out, obscuring everything. Instinctively, Vonne recoiled, lashing out to pull Hewitt back with him--it was lucky, too, as gunfire split the air where they'd been standing only a moment before.

  Before either of them could even think of returning fire, the enemy lunged out at them, haloed by smoke like some hell-beast. Hewitt gave a strangled shout despite himself, stumbling back into Vonne, and their world filled with the pungent, musky reek of the creature.

  Startled as he was, Hewitt loosed the several rounds into the Primitive, knocking it back. Shaking its head like some giant shaggy bear, it threw aside its weapon in favor of claws as it lunged for Hewitt, and Vonne got his gun up in time to let off four shots of his own. He was lucky: thick hides, bony plates and relentless will still couldn't protect it from a bullet through the eye. Vonne thanked his lucky stars when it toppled over inches from reach of Hewitt's throat, dead.

  He could hear Hewitt's breathing, sharp and jerky, but leveling out quickly. At last Hewitt said: "Guess they still haven't grown bulletproof skulls yet, eh?" He turned to Vonne and smiled, lowering his gun. His hand shook so slightly Vonne wasn't sure if he'd just imagined seeing it.

  "Jesus, if they come up with that, I'm going over." He coughed, lungs feeling raw, and waved futilely at the smoke. Hewitt was coughing too. Vonne scowled and tipped his head toward the fire escape in the back. When the latch on the window that led outside wouldn't open, he shattered the glass with a few fierce strikes of the butt of his gun and wrapped his jacket round his arm to clear the glass away.

  The fire escape was holding, but just barely. Glancing down through the grated floor, he could see where some of the supports drilled into the brick sides of the building were beginning to twist and buckle from the heat pouring from inside. There was black smoke, so much of it. He couldn't see any flames, but he could feel the hellish temperature. Despite that, he plunged down the stairs, the clunking sound of his feet ringing in his ears. He stopped when he noticed Hewitt wasn't immediately at heel.

  His friend was coming down more cautiously, pausing to sight through the scope of his rifle every few steps, scanning, Vonne knew, on multiple levels. Vonne shook his head. "Don't fuck with all that, Hewitt. It's gonna be a hit and run, guarantee you," he shout
ed up.

  Hewitt frowned, but he came down after Vonne more quickly. "Think you're right," Hewitt said. "Whole building's gonna come down soon. Fuck, you feel that heat, yeah?"

  Vonne paused to peer over one side. Hewitt didn't even bother looking. He swung a leg over one side of the fire escape railing and hung a moment, muscles standing out in his wiry arms, before dropping to the ground. It was a long fall, but he didn't seem hurt when he hit ground. Vonne sucked in a deep breath. He wasn't fond of heights to begin with--wasn't fond of jumping off fire escapes with two floors worth of air still between him and the ground. But the fire escape was already beginning to creak and shift under his feet. He closed his eyes, counted to ten, and vaulted over the side.

  He was sure he'd break something, being not so skinny or agile as Hewitt, though there was probably something to be said for being shorter and stouter and more compact. But the worst of it was the impact knocking the breath out of his body; his legs weren't a hundred percent, but nothing was sprained or broken, as far as he could feel. Hewitt shoved a hand in his face, lips stretched over his teeth in a grim smile.

  "Better get a move on, eh?" Hewitt hauled him up.

  They moved as quickly as they could toward the nearest cover, a wooded patch behind what used to be the Ministry's parking lot. Hewitt paused as soon as they were out of the open, looking back at the building.

  Vonne gave the area around them a quick naked-eye search, putting his back to a tree before glancing at Hewitt. "Come on. Greater Jersey squad is based maybe a mile off--we can get reinforcements, be back by morning--"

  "Nothing's gonna be left by morning." Hewitt seemed to remember himself and dropped down into a crouch behind some low growth next to Vonne. "Jesus, Vonne, you think anyone else got out?"

  "Of course, yeah, I mean, Captain had Jack the Cat on watch--he never misses any fucking thing, so they had to have warning, right?"

  "All the fucking screams--"

  "Maybe not everyone got out on time but--"

  "Why didn't they fucking warn us, then?" Hewitt yanked his radio off his belt; it was a slick, tiny but sturdy metal capsule, once upon a time for civvie comm, long since converted for the resistance's cause. He thumbed through the channels; there was nothing, dead silence, not even the awkward blip-and-gone of an inconsistent digital channel.

  "Radio's probably damaged," Vonne reasoned. "You should at least be able to raise GJ squad's comm if it was a-ok. Apes probably got jammers on."

  Hewitt said nothing, only putting his radio back on his belt. His whole face was tight, drawn, pale.

  "They're fucking alive, all right?" Vonne had to stop himself from shouting, managed to wrangle his voice down to a whisper. "So we better get moving and bring help." He didn't give Hewitt time to think or answer; instead, he moved forward quickly, scanning every few steps. Whether out of habit or intent, Hewitt fell into his place in the movements, reverse mirroring some of Vonne's movements, covering the openings in others. Vonne grinned, recognizing what they called "two man Stealth-and-Stalk." Early in the sixteen months of war they faced together, they'd worked out the best method to cross terrain stealthily and quickly with each other. Hewitt had insisted they give it a hokey name, like a kung-fu move or some elite evasive military strategy. Originally it had been three-man S&S, but that loss was one Vonne did his best not to think about, banishing it to lurk only in nightmares and his deepest subconscious.

  Like most of the resistance, neither of them were elite forces, no military training, not even makeshift boot camp. They learned by watching those few men who did have training, squeezing in knowledge in the long, awful waits between attacks, and by making mistakes. Vonne was from a family who liked to go on the occasional deer hunt, so he knew a gun well enough. Hewitt had been a park ranger, so he had some working knowledge of guns and forestry. Unlike most of the resistance, they had managed to survive these sixteen months intact, and more importantly, with their humanity intact, and Vonne was sure it was because of Stealth-and-Stalk--because they watched each other's back, learned together and cooperated to move the most swiftly and efficiently.

  They crossed through the small wooded buffer between the Ministry of Forestry building and the winding black snake of a long-abandoned road. The pavement was already beginning to break down under the force of nature, small weeds and grasses overtaking even a hint of a crack. Across the road was more forest. Hewitt crouched a moment in the perimeter of their section of trees, flipping his scope cap off and scanning the area across from them. He lowered his gun and shook his head.

  "All clear," he muttered softly, "But I still don't like it."

  "What's not to like? Hit and run, like I said." Vonne plunged forward, old habit making him look both ways before he set foot on the paved road, straining for some hint of cars coming. Nostalgia hit him out of nowhere: memories of crossing roads much like this to get to the tobogganing hill across from his house, back when there was enough snow to toboggan. He'd been really young, then, and there had been a handful of really cold winters before they disappeared entirely.

  "Apes don't leave survivors if they can help it."

  "Maybe they can't help it because our guys are out there kicking their asses, all right?"

  "Then where's the fucking gunfire, Vonne?"

  "I don't fucking know, Hewitt!" Vonne scowled at Hewitt and hurried them back under cover; but this was good a sign as any that there weren't any Primitives around. Their voices would have provoked a human enemy out, never mind one with hearing as good as a dog or a cat's.

  Without another word, they fell back into their partnered movement; they made good time, going until the sun baked the temperature so high that they had to seek cover and stop. Noontime was a good time--heat was so bad nothing mammalian liked to be out of the shade. And far as anyone could tell, Primitives did the same as any man and found a cool, quiet spot to sleep until temperatures let up.

  Hewitt and Vonne didn't have much more refuge than the shade of the trees, but to stop moving helped a great deal. Vonne stripped off his heavy canvas jacket and bundled it up between a few large roots, resting his head on it. Hewitt shed down to his bare skin and silver cross and dog tags and dropped down in the wedge of roots next to Vonne.

  "Jeez, man, body heat," Vonne protested, though he kept his voice low. He elbowed Hewitt and laughed. Hewitt checked his gun and tucked it against his elbow, replying in an equally low tone.

  "You won't be complaining about body heat when I peg one of them throwbacks coming straight for your throat."

  "Any throwback stupid enough to run around in this heat can have it." Vonne snatched Hewitt's hat off his head and put it over his face. The brim hid his smile at Hewitt's appropriate response.

  "Fuck you, that's my pa's hat--"

  "--Bullshit!" Vonne said, placing a hand firmly on it and fighting off Hewitt's half-serious attempts to get it back. "Weren't you always bragging how you ordered it out of some catalogue for all those box-tops?"

  "Fuck off," Hewitt said, but he was laughing. "You mean, I won it off some jerk from the South who thought I was just some skinny forester's kid."

  "You were some skinny forester's kid."

  "Well, you were some jerk from the South."

  "South to you guys, maybe," Vonne agreed. He folded his hands behind his head, one elbow resting comfortably on Hewitt's thigh. "Shit, it's weird, thinking about that year. Dad moving us up north just about overnight, and then not even a few months later everyone else trying to do the same..."

  "First Primitives that year too," Hewitt said, his voice weirdly even.

  "Yeah," Vonne said. "I thought they were kind of cool, at the time."

  "I told my dad I wanted to be one."

  Vonne stared at Hewitt until the other man cracked a smile.

  "To piss him off," Hewitt finished. "You gotta admit, they got all the advantages."

  "Don't mean I want to be one." Vonne frowned. "That's why we're fighting this, right?"

  Hewitt st
ared off into the trees. "I'm fighting this because they started it. Because they thought being better means getting rid of the not-as-good."

  "But you wouldn't want to be one," Vonne repeated again, fixing his friend with a curious look. Hewitt didn't notice.

  "If I wanted to be one, I wouldn't be sitting here guarding your sorry ass now, would I?" He spoke without looking at Vonne, but when he was done he turned and smiled. Vonne realized he'd been gripping his gun hard, just out of sight. He forced himself to relax and let go. He made himself smile back, feeling a little angry with himself.

  Hewitt slapped him in the shoulder and shook his head. "Get some sleep, you asshole. I'll be sure not to wake you when the throwbacks come for me."

  "Shut the fuck up," Vonne said, but he leaned back and pulled Hewitt's hat down low over his eyes. Tree roots and rocks were no substitutes for a pillow but his jacket, rolled into a bundle, did just fine. He couldn't help the hint of smile as Hewitt's weight settled against him, one hand brushing along his thigh and then coming to rest on his knee. It was sweaty and hotter than if they'd slept farther apart, but it was good, comforting, to have that hard, lean body against him. Things had gone bad, real bad, today; but they were still here, the two of them, and that made it something less than awful. He had learned long ago to take what small comforts he could find, and so he savored the coolness of the shade and the noises of a thriving forest, birds and insects singing him a peculiar midday lullaby, the feel of Hewitt against him.