Something Shifty

Published by Evernight Publishing at Smashwords

www.evernightpublishing.com

Copyright© 2013 Erin M. Leaf

ISBN: 978-1-77130-336-1

Cover Artist: Sour Cherry Designs

Editor: JS Cook

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.

This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

DEDICATION

For the one who showed me that sometimes true love happens when you least expect it.

SOMETHING SHIFTY

Erin M. Leaf

Copyright © 2013

Chapter One

Seth was only ten years old the first time he shifted. One minute he was dreaming—running through the woods out back, roots scuffing his feet while the wind scraped his face raw—the next he was wide awake, heart pounding. His blanket sat heavy and hot on his chest as he struggled to breathe, panic pinching its way up his spine. It wasn’t until he managed to wriggle his way out of the bed that he realized everything felt wrong. The house sounded... weird. He could see clear as day even though the only light was from the crescent moon, stamped on the sky outside the window like an omen. He tried to sit up, but his body didn’t work that way anymore. He tried to call out, hoping his mom or dad or someone would hear, but the sound that came from his mouth wasn’t human. He fell to the floor, body twisting, and landed on all fours. His room smelled like dust and fear.

Years later, he forgave himself for the panic, for the bone-chilling horror that made him cry like a baby that particular night, once he’d got himself back on the bed in human form. It wasn’t every day a boy went to sleep with opposable thumbs and woke up a wolf, but it took years for him to get over the panic he felt every time it happened. The worst part was that he couldn’t control it at all. Sometimes he turned into the wolf, sometimes into a bird, or a cat. It always happened at night, which was the only useful thing about it. When he tried to tell his mom, she’d said: don’t worry sweetheart. We all have crazy dreams sometimes. She thought he’d had a nightmare, but it wasn’t a dream. It was so real he had to pick animal fur off his pillow in the morning.

It wasn’t until he turned fifteen that he learned how to control it. Unfortunately, that was the night his mother and father died.

****

Read Chapter Four for tomorrow. We’ll be discussing the use of metaphor in both prose and verse for at least two weeks, so it would probably be a good idea to look at all the examples. Closely.

Seth smiled at his students as he leaned against the desk at the front of the classroom. Most of them were busy stuffing their laptops into their bags while the rest were focused on their phones. A few waved at him before heading out. He nodded at them before gathering up his own computer. And coffee. And the messy piles of paper he somehow managed to strew all across the desk every time he taught.

Hey, Dr. Dustin, are your office hours still on that weird schedule? And in the library?

He looked up. They are. Sorry about that, Mary. The Dean insisted. I can’t put off getting my office painted any longer so, yeah. Weird hours.

The girl shrugged, smiling. Well, it’s not like it’s a problem meeting there. I already spend most of my time stuck in the research section. Dr. Johnson insists that every source come from a ‘real book.’ He’s such a Luddite. She used air quotes to emphasize her disgust.

Seth laughed. Yes, well. He was my advisor when I was a grad student. That was almost before the Internet, and he was already a fossil back in the day. He’s a good guy though. Knows his stuff. Go easy on him, okay?

She shrugged, not looking convinced. Yeah, whatever you say, Prof.

He watched her saunter out, hips swaying, and had to shake his head. She was pointing her booty in the wrong direction for so many different reasons. He’d never get involved with a student, not ever, and also, she wasn’t his type. At all. He preferred his partners legal. He wondered why so many of his students persisted in making passes at him.

Yeah, but you never date, so how would anyone know what you like anyway? a little voice nagged.

He sighed and headed out. His complete and total lack of companionship was not the biggest problem in his life.

Chapter Two

Dex, if you don’t get your ass on stage right now, you’re going to miss the window for your sound check, Delia snarled. Even though her voice sounded tinny and small through the speaker, Dex sensed the underlying growl that punctuated her irritation.

He winced. He hated when his sister was pissed at him. Del, it’s not my fault. I got mobbed in the hotel lobby. I’m on my way now, he said, striding through the service corridor that ran behind the casino’s theatre. Seriously. Don’t get your panties in a twist.

If you’re not here in five minutes, it’ll be your shorts in a twist, and you won’t enjoy the experience when I yank them up your crack.

Dex laughed. Sis, I love you, but you aren’t very scary. He lied. She was actually very, very scary, as only a sister could be.

She huffed through the phone and hung up, not bothering to say goodbye. He grinned and slid it into his pocket. His twin could be a pain in the ass, but he loved her dearly. When he pushed through the metal doors into the open space of the venue, he had to pause and take it all in for a minute. He looked around at the empty seats, the stage with random pieces of equipment in various stages of setup, and of course, the people. His crew was great. Every one of them was also a member of his clan. Every time he sang, every time they helped him set up and pack up, he felt blessed. He never took their willingness to travel the world with him so he could perform, for granted.

He took a deep breath, savoring the electric sting of anticipation. He was here, doing what he loved. So what if he couldn’t shift anymore? That lack didn’t define who he was, no matter how much his parents believed otherwise.

Dex! Come on, will you?

He looked at the stage, not surprised to see his sister waving a clipboard at him. Her eyes were still brightly golden—she must have gone for a quick flight this morning. She was one of the few shifters who could change into more than one animal and her favorite form was an eagle. She often went out just after dawn to catch the changing thermals as night bled into day. It would take a few hours for the color to fade back into the light brown of her natural human eyes.

I’m coming. He hopped up onto the stage, squeezing between the monitor speakers set along the front.

Here, she said, shoving his microphone at him. And don’t do those scales like last time. My eardrums nearly burst, she said, peevishly.

I did my warm-ups in the dressing room, relax, he replied, switching on the microphone. The plastic and metal warmed in his hand. He closed his eyes and tilted his head up, centering himself. After a few deep breaths, he sang a few bars of his latest hit, pleased to hear the mix was just right.

John got the levels perfect. He gave the older man hunched behind his equipment in the middle of the theatre a thumbs up. John shrugged and smiled, tweaking a knob on the mixer hooked up to his computer.

Yeah, well, after the fit you pitched last time… Delia began.

Dex switched off his microphone. Oh please, you know and I know that wasn’t John’s fault, and I never blamed him for it. He was just as pissed as I was.

You threw your ear monitor at the venue’s manager, Dex, Delia said, her voice flat with suppressed irritation.

He deserved it, he said, mulish. He shouldn’t have been fucking around with the mix, especially not in the middle of the set. He nodded at his band as they began wandering onstage. Jack raised an eyebrow at him as if to ask: need some help? Dex shook his head. No need to drag his guitarist into a sibling spat.

You bitched him out on stage, in front of a few thousand people. You got him fired. I’d call that a bit of overkill, Delia insisted, not letting go of her side of the fight.

Dex had to grin. They’d been arguing with each other since birth and at this point, he actually found it kind of soothing. He should have known better. He switched the microphone back on, signaling the end of the discussion. The rest of his band was nearly ready: Jill on bass, Mark on the drums. The only one still messing with his equipment was Sanjay, but that was nothing new. The keyboardist slash programmer slash dude who could do insane things with a theremin always took a bit longer than the rest of them to get his setup just right.

Delia rolled her eyes at Dex and he shrugged at her. She flipped him off. He grinned as he hummed a few notes into the live feed. The reverb was a little much, but John fixed it as soon as Dex noticed it. Delia watched him sing, clearly still disgruntled, so he winked at her, just to make her nuts. She was the one who’d nagged him to be on time. No sense letting her get away with sibling abuse when he was just doing what she wanted. It was nice to get the last word in for a change.

Finally, she lost interest in needling him and wandered backstage, checking things off on her clipboard. The band was mostly ready, so Dex launched into a shortened version of another song, the band hurrying to keep up. He smiled again, this time out at the empty seats. He loved his job. Whenever he thought about his inability to shift, the yearning deep inside him for the animal he’d been, he poured his grief into his music. He’d been one of the rare ones too, like Delia: a shifter with a half-dozen forms. He had even been able to shift into wolf form—there were only three other shifters he knew of who could do that. The loss was sometimes overwhelming, but he had more than enough in his life to keep him happy and occupied without obsessing over something he couldn’t fix. Or at least, that’s what I tell myself, he thought.

A half hour later, he was wiping his face with a cloth and joking around with his drummer when Delia came back onstage, this time looking grim.

Del? What’s wrong? He frowned, his gut already churning.

She pressed her lips together, hard, obviously trying not to cry. She was white as a sheet.

Fuck, it’s something really bad. He’d only ever seen her look this upset once before: the day he’d lost his ability to shift. She was the one who’d found him, half bird-half man. Broken.

When he held out his arms, she rushed into them, her thin body shaking. His drummer, Mark, stepped closer, face concerned. Delia?

It’s mom and dad, Dex. She sucked in a shaky breath. There’s been an accident.

His