Crimson Death
Page 125

   “It was a genetic condition that I could ignore most of the time. I didn’t tell anyone.”
   “A lycanthrope could have smoked me on the PT tests, but you and I were always neck and neck for the top time, number, whatever. Did you hold back so I wouldn’t guess you weren’t human?”
   “No, you pushed me to work as hard as I could to keep up with your arse. Being a born wolf doesn’t give you much more than human physical abilities. I’m in the top percentage of most PT and I’m not aging out of it yet, but you pushed me, Forrester, which means you’re in the top percentage, too. I’m part wolf—what’s your secret?”
   Edward tried to keep frowning, and then smiled and stared at the floor as we slowed down. Either we were in traffic or we’d turned onto a smaller road.
   “Do I say, No secret, I am just that good, or do I say, Lying bastard? Every type of lycanthrope I’ve met is better than human-normal, like superhero better. I’m good, really good, but I’m not superhero good and you should be.”
   Nolan shook his head. “I swear to you, I did my best to beat you, or at least keep up with you. I’m too damned competitive for anything else.”
   Edward gave a small smile. “You seemed to be.”
   Nolan looked at the two weretigers. “Are you both that much above human-normal physically?”
   They both said yes, and then Pride added, “Are you saying that your type of lycanthropy doesn’t show up on a blood test that’s specifically looking for it?”
   “That’s right.”
   Dev and Pride looked at each other and then back at Nolan. “If we could pass the physical, some of us would have tried for the military,” Dev said.
   “I can’t picture you in the military,” Nathaniel said.
   Dev turned to him with a grin. “Not me, but some of my other cousins would have.”
   “Military service would have divided you from your other loyalties,” Jake said.
   Pride asked, “Are you saying that even if we could pass the physical, we wouldn’t have been allowed to join?”
   “It wasn’t possible,” Kaazim said, touching Jake’s arm, “so it does not matter; it is moot.”
   Nolan was watching the interchange. He was trusting us with his secret, but we didn’t have to trust him with any of ours, not until I’d had time to talk to Edward in private. “It sounds like the born wolf is different from the clan tigers in more than just flavor of inner beast.”
   “It would seem so, but these are the first clan tigers I’ve ever met, and since I’m almost certain Devereux and Christensen are the same clan, maybe other clans will be closer to my people,” Nolan said.
   “To our knowledge none of the clan tigers can pass a blood test for lycanthropy,” Kaazim said.
   “Which means,” I said, “maybe what you have isn’t lycanthropy. Are you tied to the moon at all?”
   He shook his head. “No, we aren’t forced to change with the full moon, or forced at all. Once we gain control of the power we can go years without changing form.”
   All of us who fought against our inner beasts exchanged looks. It was Dev who asked, “Don’t you miss it?”
   “Miss what?”
   “Your beast.”
   “I do, but it’s a preference. I could choose to be fully human and never become the other again.”
   “Do you know any werewolves who have chosen to do that?” Pride asked.
   Nolan nodded. “My mother, for one.”
   “I’d have never guessed she was anything but human,” Edward said.
   “The less you change form, the less you give off the energy. It’s said that if you go too many years you can lose the ability to slip from human to animal, but I don’t think my ma would care. She helped teach me how to control my wolf and how to shift form, but once that was done I’m not sure she ever changed again. I’d come home for visits and ask her to come run with me, but she would never do it again. It was like her being a wolf like me was a dream.”
   “Did you have other family that went into the woods with you?” Jake asked.
   “Cousins, but there are fewer and fewer of us every generation. Unless we start marrying closer into the family line again, there may come a day when there are no MacIntires or MacTires worthy of the name.”
   “I seem to remember a second cousin of yours that you told me to stay away from,” Edward said.
   Nolan smiled. “She’s married now and has three kids.”
   “Are any of them werewolves?” Jake asked.
   “No.”
   “Would she tell you if they were, or would she just have the tail removed in the hospital and hide it from everyone?” Edward asked.
   “Some have tried, but you can’t ignore your shadow from birth. If they take after our ancestors and are not taught control, the inner beast will come out in other ways. The last of my cousins that were treated that way ended up in prison. He nearly beat someone to death in a bar fight. Part of what we learn to control as children is the amoral part of ourselves. The wolf sees nothing wrong with fighting for what is his, or when threatened.”
   “Wolves in nature seldom fight to the death,” Jake said.
   “And they aren’t put into situations like school, or bars where they can drink until they lose all sense of themselves,” Nolan said.
   “Very true,” Jake said.
   “Wolves are not dogs,” Nolan said, “and they do not behave like dogs when you put a collar and leash on them.”
   “True again.”
   Nolan looked at Edward. “I didn’t think it would bother you this much. Makes me think if I’d told you years ago we wouldn’t have been friends.”
   “Honestly, I don’t know. I wasn’t as comfortable with shapeshifters back then, but you’ll always be Wee Brian to me.” He said the last with a perfect Irish accent, as far as I could tell.
   Nolan sighed and shook his head.
   “Wait. Wee Brian,” Dev said, “for real?”
   “I’m named after my father, who’s named after his father, and further back. I hated being Wee Brian.”
   “Little Brian would be bad enough, but even with an Irish accent Wee Brian would be hard as a kid,” I said.
   He smiled and looked up. “My da is Little Brian, my grandfather is Young Brian, and my great-grandfather was Old Brian, because that’s what Great-Grandma Helen insisted on calling him after he named their son Brian Junior.”