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  “This leads right out into Belltown?”

  “Not exactly. That leads onto an alley off a really quiet street near Belltown.”

  “But… I can hear it, it doesn’t sound like a quiet street.”

  “That’s because your hearing is like that of a wolf and then some. What you can hear is probably about a mile away.”

  Max stared up at the stairs. As she focused, she could begin to sense that the sounds were coming from some distance away, something she’d never had to deal with before.

  “That’s,” she glanced at River, “that’s really, really weird.”

  “Yeah, it takes some getting used to.” River smiled. “But this is what I meant when I said you’d be overwhelmed as soon as you went up there. Your senses are completely raw, like an exposed nerve. You’re not used to it and aside from anger the thing that can really trigger a transformation is panic. And you will panic. It’s nothing against you, it’s just how it is for us.”

  “So, why have you brought me here?”

  “I want you to see that you’re not trapped here. We’re not keeping you prisoner. All I want to do is help you learn how to control everything so that when you do next go up into the city, it won’t completely blindside you.”

  “And I won’t hurt anyone?”

  River nodded. “And you won’t hurt anyone.”

  Max sighed and dropped her head. The constant rumbling sounds from the streets above were starting to give her a headache.

  “There’s still so much I don’t get,” she said, “you keep saying ‘us’ and ‘we’ but who are we? What are we?”

  “How about we go somewhere we can sit and talk everything out? Maybe I can actually persuade you to accept some training?”

  Max looked back up the stairs.

  “I can’t stay long.” She said. “I don’t want to hurt anyone but I have something I really need to take of as soon as.”

  “I just want to get you to a point where you can control your emotions and your senses. If you really work for it, it probably won’t take longer than a day or two.”

  Max hesitated. She was torn. The longer she left Hayden the more at risk he was of being hurt by their father. But if she left now, she might risk hurting him herself. She couldn’t have that. She turned back to River and nodded.

  “Okay. Let’s do it.”

  Chapter 5

  “What kind of stupid name is that?”

  “Look, I didn’t pick it. Somebody way back in history did.”

  “The Rexin? That’s what we are? It sounds like a disease. Or a bad indie band.”

  “Is there a difference?”

  Max laughed. Okay, so maybe she kind of liked River.

  They were in a very different kind of room now. River had lead her through yet more tunnels until, finally, they’d surfaced up from under the floorboards of what seemed to be an abandoned warehouse, or hospital, or something. Max didn’t really care to ask. She was too preoccupied with the fact that whatever group of people she’d stumbled upon here had made a full on communal home for themselves in a place no one would ever think to look for them. She had to admire it.

  River had taken her through one of the bunk rooms where four or five makeshift beds sat unmade and empty along the walls, with a small smattering of personal belongings beside each one. They’d then made their way into what Max could only describe as a rec room. There was an old TV and an even older sofa along with a few chairs around it to one side, and to the other was a collection of tables and chairs, some with empty food cartons on them. Max could tell that pretty much everything in this place had been salvaged from piles of otherwise unwanted stuff and again, she admired it. They’d built a home for themselves. She was still confused and still wasn’t sure what she was doing there, but she didn’t hate it. And she wasn’t scared anymore.

  Now she and River were sat on either end of the aged sofa, each with a can of soda, quietly talking about anything Max had questions for. Which was a lot.

  “So, where is everyone? It looks like a lot of people crash here so…”

  “Well, most of them have jobs or other responsibilities in the city. They’re pretty much all capable of getting apartments and stuff for themselves but I guess they like it here. Living with your own kind and all that, makes things a little less lonely.”

  “Yeah, I get that.” As she usually did, Max thought of her brother. River seemed to notice her thoughts drifting off.

  “I think you said you have a brother?”

  Max looked back at her, focusing in again, and nodded.

  “Yeah, Hayden.”

  “Younger?”

  “By about four years. Just started his senior year.”

  “You guys are close?”

  “Have to be. We’re all each other has.”

  “You mentioned your father as well?”

  Max shuffled. Uncomfortable. River reached a hand out and placed it on her knee.

  “Hey, you don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.”

  Max smiled. “It’s okay. He’s just… horrible.”

  River nodded, waiting for Max to continue. After a moment, she did, unsure as to why exactly she was so comfortable talking about it all to a relative stranger.

  “So, my brother is pretty much everything to me. He’s the reason I do everything I do. When I moved out, I told him I’d get him out of there.” She frowned slightly. “Except, it’s hard enough supporting yourself in this world, let alone your kid brother who’s just trying to get through high school.”

  “So, he’s still with your dad?”

  Max nodded. “Hayden calls me every time dad goes out drinking. I go over, we have dinner, he does his homework, we hang out. And then I’m there to protect him when dad gets home. It’s always worse when he’s drunk. Sober he’ll just shout at you, maybe give you one slap if he thinks you’re not paying attention but that’s it. After a few drinks though, he stops bothering with words.”

  “Jesus,” River shook her head, “you’d think there’d be better systems in place to protect kids from that shit.”

  “People always say that. Thing is the systems are all there. You’d be surprised at how many kids just fall through the cracks regardless.”

  “I wouldn’t actually.”

  Max raised her eyebrows, looking questioningly in River’s direction. River looked like she hadn’t meant to say it, like she’d been lost in some distant memory and the words had just slipped out. She chewed the air for a moment before continuing.

  “My mother was a good woman but she had a lot of problems. One of them was bringing home men that took advantage of her. They never bothered with me much but that just meant they didn’t care that I saw it happen pretty much every time. I remember there was one guy – I was like, eight – and he just wouldn’t stop and I got so angry. I was just a kid and my transformation hit like a train. I had no control at all.”

  “What happened?”

  River receded into herself. Whatever memory trail she’d been following, she quickly turned away and ran back to reality.

  “I don’t like to talk about it.” She said quickly.

  “Did you kill him?”

  “I really don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Okay.” Max nodded. “No talking, we can do that.” She got to her feet, offering her hand out for River to take. River might not have wanted to talk about but Max understood now. She could see it in River’s face. That’s why she was so keen on control and Max couldn’t blame her. “How about we take care of some of this training stuff instead?”

  River looked up at her and smiled, clearly grateful for the change in subject. She took Max’s hand and stood up.

  “Training it is. Follow me.” And without letting go of Max’s hand she began to lead her away, back to the tunnels and through yet another maze.

  Every time they turned down another tunnel, Max half-expected River to drop her hand but she never did and Max couldn’t help but smile to he
rself. For a weird, hot, hippie wolf-girl, River wasn’t actually so bad.

  Chapter 6

  “Concentrate!”

  Max let a growl slip from between her teeth.

  “You know, when you said training, this wasn’t exactly what I had in mind.”

  “Hey, you’ve got places to be remember. You wanted the fast way, this is it.”

  Max rolled her eyes. She could feel a thin sheen of sweat over every inch of her body and all she was doing was sitting cross legged in the middle of an empty room. River, meanwhile, was several feet away and throwing small rocks at her in very quick succession.

  “If I didn’t feel like you were insane before, I do now.”

  “We’re women who can turn into wolves, Five, there’s nothing sane about it. Now concentrate.”

  “Ow! Not the face, okay?”

  “Concentrate!”

  “I am!”

  “No, you’re not. You’re angry and it’s getting to you, I can see your hands shaking from here.”

  “River, I grew up with an abusive father… I’m always angry. I know how to control it.”

  “Then why was it anger that triggered your transformation?”

  “There was a lot going on. I don’t know. I was upset.”

  “Hold on.” River paused in her throwing. “What exactly happened? Why were you so upset?”

  “I don’t really want to think about it.”

  “It must have been something different. Something that caught you off guard. Because… of course you’re angry all the time. That makes absolute sense, it wouldn’t be anger that caused you to transform. It had to be something else.”

  Max looked over to her with a furrowed brow. River was watching her expectantly and Max sighed.

  “He threw me out of the house,” she said, “told me to never come back and that I wasn’t allowed to see Hayden anymore.”

  “Ouch. I’m sorry.”

  Max shrugged. “You’re right, that caught me off guard, I never thought he’d actually do that and I just freaked out. I can’t not see Hayden.”

  “I think I get it now,” River said, “you’ve been to hell and back. You know anger and pain and everything else like it but you lost control of the situation when he did that. I’m guessing you don’t know that feeling nearly as well.”

  Max nodded and River gave her a small smile.

  “You panicked, Five,” she said, “it was never anger that caused your transformation. It was fear.”

  “Yeah, I’ve never dealt very well with fear.” Max returned the smile. “Maybe you’ve noticed.”

  “Maybe a little.”

  “So, how do we train for fear?”

  River leaned back and took a deep breath, pondering.

  “I’m not sure, honestly.” She said. “Is there anything here that scares you? Maybe we can use that.”

  Max watched her and cleared her throat. “Yeah, there’s a couple of things.”

  “Go on?”

  “I, uh, I’m not really sure if I want to say.” Max could feel herself starting to blush and she hoped River wouldn’t notice.

  “Oh?” River smirked. She’d noticed. “Are you, maybe, scared of me, Five?”

  Max felt her heartbeat skip a little at the glitter in River’s eyes.

  “Maybe.” She said. “And… you can call me Max. That’s – that’s my actual name.”

  River’s smirk faltered. The glitter was replaced with something warmer, kinder, as she began to understand that Max was trying to let her in.

  “Okay then, Max,” she murmured, “you better concentrate.”

  And then she came in close and sat by Max’s side, facing her. Max went to turn to meet her but River made her stay where she was.

  “Close your eyes,” Max did so. River’s voice was warm and quiet, “and concentrate.”

  “On what?”

  “On me.” And she delicately touched her fingertips to the inside of Max’s wrist. Max twitched but kept her eyes closed, biting a little at her lip as her stomach clenched. River continued to whisper almost directly into Max’s ear. “I want you to take every single bit of that fear and pain and anger, and I want you to let it go through you, as it should, without it taking over. I want you to acknowledge that it’s there but know that it doesn’t control you.”

  “That’s a lot to deal with at once.”

  “Start small. Start with your fear of me, whatever it is. Think about it, let it sit there, but focus on my touch and my voice and know that you’re safe with me, even with that fear there.”

  Max took a deep breath. Her heart was pounding, bruising itself against her ribs, and River’s delicate finger tips were tracing the skin up her arm to her elbow. It was incredibly distracting. But she tried to do as she was told. Focus. Concentrate. She dug back into her mind to find the little knot of fear she had there with River’s face on it. Newly formed and still raw, she wanted to push it away and not think about it, but the constant reminder of River’s presence left her wanting to do this so she pressed on and let the fear fill her mind.

  “Do you want to tell me about it?” River asked. Her voice was slightly closer now but still just as gentle. Max felt goose-bumps erupt across the nape of her neck.

  “What do you want to know?”

  “Well, what exactly is it about me that scares you?”

  Max felt the fear tug at her. It was resisting. She didn’t want to talk about it. Talking about it made it real. But she pushed herself.

  “You’re something different.” She said. “And not in the sense of what you and I are, it’s got nothing to do with that. It’s you. The way you talk, the way you look, the way you act, smile, look at me. You’re like nothing I’ve ever known before and that’s both incredibly appealing and absolutely terrifying.”

  She could feel the blush creeping in and she was quite glad that she was being made to keep her eyes closed so she couldn’t see River’s reaction to that.

  “I don’t know if it helps but you’re quite unique to me too.” River mumbled. It surprised Max and if she didn’t know better she’d say River sounded shy. “But, what exactly is so terrifying about it?”

  Max sighed. Again, that resistance in her head. She could feel the fear threatening to take over but she focused on the sounds of their breathing. Concentrate.

  “My life right now is all about my brother and I. There isn’t room for me to try and fit anyone else into that. What’s terrifying… is how badly I want to anyway.”

  Rivers fingertips stopped their tracing.

  “Oh.” She said. “You want to get closer to me but you’re scared that’ll take away from what you need to do for Hayden?”

  “Exactly.” Max could feel a lump forming in her throat. Her heart rate quickened and she could feel the fear starting to creep across the back of her mind. Her skin prickled with a now familiar heat. “I’m sorry if this is – if I’m – I’m sorry.”

  “Hey,” River’s voice was just as gentle and Max could feel her shifting closer, “it’s okay. I understand.”

  Max felt fingers brushing her hair back behind her ear. A thumb tracing the skin down her neck. She shivered and leaned in to the touch. Her concentration was waning. The fear remained but the feeling of River’s breath tickling her skin was distracting enough.

  “What are you doing?” Max whispered.

  “Two things.” River said, shifting even more so that she was right up against Max’s side. She put one hand in Max’s hair and tilt her head slightly away from her, exposing her neck, before leaning in to whisper against her skin. “First, forcing you to concentrate even harder. Second, hopefully making you see that you’re allowed to get close to people – there’s enough room.”

  Max felt her eyes roll back a little at the feeling of River’s lips scarcely brushing at the skin of her neck and shoulder. She could barely focus on what River was saying. She wanted to resist. That nagging fear in her mind told her she shouldn’t be doing this. Begged her to move, t
o push River away. But she couldn’t. And when River pressed one small, gentle kiss to the skin beneath her ear, any resolve she might have had crumbled completely. Her eyes opened. She turned to River and without a word wrapped a hand around her cheek and pulled her in for a kiss.

  She could taste the salt from her own skin on River’s lips. The hand in her own hair gripped a little harder and held her close and Max moved her own arms to wrap around River’s waist and pull her into her lap. The heat caused by that fear steadily gave way to a different kind of heat. One that simmered in the pit of Max’s gut and trembled with her heart and breaths in her chest. There was something electric about the feeling of River’s lips on hers and she groaned as Rover nipped her teeth over her lower lip.

  Without even thinking, Max moved them both so that River was now lying underneath her. They had scarcely broken their kiss, just a heated collision of lips and teeth, but Max paused then, taking a second to look down at the woman beneath her. Silver hair sprawled out around her face and her eyes seemed to have turned to a darker, bluer hue. She still had one hand wrapped in Max’s hair and she tugged lightly, a small smile curling in the corner of her mouth. Max needed no further encouragement. Training could wait. She returned the smile and planted their lips together once more.

  Clothes were quickly ripped form bodies and tossed to the side – more on River’s part than Max’s, who was very keen to see more of the body she’d briefly seen earlier – and Max began feverishly placing firm, hot kisses all over River’s skin. Her collar, her chest, her ribs, stomach, hip bones. Everywhere that Max could find, she branded with her kiss. And not once did River’s hand leave Max’s hair.

  By the time Max began kissing up the inside of one of River’s thighs, River was almost panting. Her chest heaved and her skin glistened in the faint light around them. Her eyes were closed but flickered slightly with every brush of Max’s lips against her skin. Max moved higher and higher, watching River’s face intently. She slowed and River’s brow furrowed ever so slightly. She nipped at the pale skin near the top of the thigh and felt the grip in her hair tighten harshly in response. She smiled and brushed a kiss where her teeth had been and continued onward.