I SET OUT THROUGH the long grass. The wind was coming from the north, which was behind me. I couldn’t pick up any traces of human scent on the breeze. That meant there wasn’t anyone outdoors for at least a kilometer. No one directly upwind, that is. To the northeast or northwest? Possibly. So I covered a swath from the road to the water. A very faint scent came when I approached the beach—the smell of people mixed with that of burning wood. Someone with a bonfire up the beach. No one lurked nearby watching the studio—at least not in that direction.
I wanted to cross the road to check over there, but it was paved, meaning my tawny fur would shine like a beacon against the black. I paced along the edge, in the grass, thinking. Then I heard a car. I’d been too preoccupied to notice it until it zoomed around a curve, less than a hundred meters away. I dived deeper into the long brown grass.
The car slowed. I plastered myself against the ground, ears flat against my head, tail curled behind me. I could see the driver. Just a gray-haired guy scanning the roadside.
What if he’d spotted me? Were there cougars on Galiano? Even if there were, seeing one would be a big deal. Vancouver Island had more cougars than anyplace else in Canada, yet people lived their entire lives there and never spotted one of the elusive cats.
If this guy saw me and told someone, it could get back to the St. Clouds or the Nasts. They’d know I’d come to see my grandmother and even if I left now, they’d presume I’d made contact and they’d question her. At the very least, they’d question her. At worst? I started to shake.
It took a moment for me to realize the car had moved on. It had never even come to a full stop, just a mildly curious driver who’d noticed a movement by the roadside. I chuffed in relief, my flanks vibrating with the sound as I lowered my muzzle to my paws.
I had to be more careful. Damn it, I had to be a lot more careful.
When I’d composed myself, I decided I wasn’t crossing that road. Instead, I would circle behind the studio to check the other side. The least exposed route was right along the top of the beach embankment, a narrow strip of long grass.
Again, I screwed up. I’d completely forgotten that there was a path with steps leading from the patio to the beach. Every cottage had one. Luckily, this open strip was barely a meter wide, and I’d only be exposed for a few seconds as I crossed.
I glanced out at the water. No sign of a boat. I peered at the studio. The whole back side was glass, for the artist. The glare of the setting sun against the window made it impossible to see inside. Still, there didn’t seem to be anyone there.
As I crouched to scamper across, a scent wafted past. One that made my legs freeze. My grandmother’s scent, drifting from an open window. I glanced over and inhaled, feeling my sides shake.
So close. God, she was so close. All I had to do was—
No. Absolutely not. If this worked out, she’d know soon enough.
I took another step. A gasp. I turned and saw a figure silhouetted against the open patio door. It squealed open, and the sound jolted me back to life. I dived into the long grass on the other side.
“Maya!”
My grandmother’s voice. I froze again.
Her feet thumped as she ran across the tiny lawn.
“Maya!”
No. This wasn’t possible. I was imagining things. There was no way she could know—
I remembered the story she used to tell me when I was little. To explain my paw-print birthmark and the fact that my birth mother had abandoned me on the hospital steps.
She said my real mother was a cougar who’d had a late summer litter. She’d been an old cat and knew the signs that it would be a long, hard winter and her cubs wouldn’t all survive. So she’d begged the sky god for mercy, and he turned her smallest cub into a human girl and told the cat to take her into the city. She’d left me at the hospital, but before she went, she’d pressed her paw to my hip, leaving me a mark to remember her by.
Had my grandmother known the truth? That I was a skin-walker? Was I wrong to think my parents hadn’t been aware of the experiments?
My gut clenched. I turned to see her standing in the path, her hands to her mouth, her gaze locked on the dark patch of my birthmark.
“Maya.”
She dropped to her knees. I slowly walked to her. When I was close enough, she reached out and grabbed me around the neck, pulling me to her.
“It is you, isn’t it?” she whispered. Then she hiccupped a laugh. “I guess, if I’m hugging a cougar and it isn’t ripping out my throat, that answers my question.”
She hugged me again.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “You must be so angry and so confused. Are the others with you? Daniel and the rest?”
I let out a chirp.
She squeezed me again. “As horrible as this must be, at least you have each other.” She clutched my face between her hands. “If there’s any way for you to visit your parents, please, please do that. Your mother might not believe in the spirit world, but when she sees you, she’ll recognize her child. She’ll know you took the form of the cougar to come and say good-bye.”
Good-bye? Spirit world?
She didn’t know I was a skin-walker. She thought the birthmark meant I had a link to the big cats and that my spirit had taken their form to return one last time. It was like seeing a ghost.
I pulled back and shook my head.
“You can’t go to them?” she said, her voice cracking, tears streaming down her face. “Do you want me to tell them I saw you?”
I shook my head again. Then I pulled from her grasp and started to run to the guys, to get them over here to explain.
“Maya!”
As she shouted, I caught a scent on the breeze. One I recognized. Moreno—a man who worked with Calvin Antone, my biological father.
Footsteps pounded so hard I could feel the vibration. I caught other scents. A Nast Cabal team with Moreno, approaching from the south.
“Maya!” Grandma shouted.
I wheeled, growling, hoping she’d see or hear the team, but she just kept running after me, calling my name.
A dart whizzed past. I ran faster. Then I heard a gasp behind me and saw my grandmother falling face-first to the ground, a dart lodged in her leg. I tore back to her.
Footsteps came from two directions. Daniel called for me. Corey shouted, too, telling me to stop, to come back.
Another dart zinged past, so close it cut right through the fur on my haunch. I reached my grandmother. She was out cold, in the grass. I grabbed her shirt in my teeth and yanked as hard as I could. The fabric gave way and I tumbled back, a chunk of cloth in my mouth.
Daniel grabbed me by the loose skin around my neck. “You can’t help her! Come on!”
When he heaved on me, I caught another glimpse of my grandmother, lying in the grass. Rage and fear coursed through me and the world turned bloodred. Daniel heaved again and I spun, snarling, jaws opening, fangs slashing for his arm. Then I saw him and swung to the side, biting air instead.
“Maya! Daniel!”
Another voice I knew. One that filled my gut with ice water. Antone.
“Daniel!” Corey shouted. “Leave her! She’ll be fine. Come on!”
Daniel’s grip on my ruff didn’t loosen. He whispered, “Please, Maya. Please.”
I looked back at my grandmother. Then up at Antone. Then at Moreno and two others running behind him, all armed with tranquilizer guns. And it was like when they’d shot Kenjii. When they’d shot Daniel. I’d watched them fall and there was nothing I could do. Not against so many.
I tore my gaze from my grandmother and ran. When another dart whizzed by, I veered to the side. Daniel shouted, then realized I wasn’t circling back—I was separating us, making us tougher to shoot.
We were already in the long grass. That made me nearly impossible to hit. I looked over at Daniel. A dart hit the flap of his sweatshirt and lodged there. As he batted it out, I circled, racing behind him and bumping the back of his legs. He understood and bent over, running as low as he could, zigzagging, his dark shirt making him nearly invisible in the night.
“Corey!” He shouted. “Go!”
We made it to the neighboring cabin. That blocked us from sight—and gunfire—and we could hear our pursuers cursing as we slipped under the porch. They cursed even louder when they got around the cabin and didn’t find us there. As we hid under the porch, Daniel whipped a stone into the woods. Antone and Moreno took off, with Antone shouting for the others to go back for my grandmother.
Three days in the Vancouver Island wilderness hadn’t made Moreno any better at moving quietly through the woods. When he wasn’t thundering across hard earth or crashing through the undergrowth, he was cursing. As we waited there, listening and tracking them, I relaxed, and as soon as I did I lost consciousness.