Dead Ice
Page 115

I was already remembering why I didn’t spend much time with her and she hadn’t been here five minutes yet. How was I ever going to sleep with her on the other side of me? It must have shown on my face, or maybe my scent changed; whatever the cause, Magda picked it up.
“You are not pleased with something I’ve done, and I’ve done nothing yet, not even spoken.”
“Your energy is sort of . . . loud,” I said.
Travis was sitting straighter beside me, not hugging anymore. He was tense; the question was, why?
“I don’t know what you mean by that,” she said.
“I know,” I said.
Travis was watching her less like another lion and more like a gazelle. No wonder he had problems with the other lions, and no wonder Magda did, too. They just had opposite problems.
“Okay, I need to sleep and the two of you need to work together to make that possible,” I said.
“We will sleep on either side of you and our lions will mingle with yours and help heal you,” Magda said.
“Yes, but not if your energy makes me feel like I have to prove I’m dominant to you all over again.”
A frown appeared between her yellow eyebrows. You didn’t see a lot of natural yellow eyebrows, not even on blondes. It softened her eyes even more, I think, or maybe black eyebrows would have given them more color; who knew?
“I have done nothing to challenge you, Anita. I acknowledge you as Regina to our Rex, and have never said otherwise.”
“You offered to sleep with Nicky,” I said.
“It’s customary when entering a new pride to offer yourself to the Rex.”
Travis finally said, “No, it’s not.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, and they were suddenly gray as rain clouds. “It was once,” she said, voice growing lower, as if the next sound she made would be a growl.
“That was then, this is now,” I said.
She turned that unfriendly gaze to me. “I am more aware than you will ever be that this is a future unforeseen and very unlike the past I knew.”
“I’m not going to apologize for killing the Mother of All Darkness, Magda.”
She looked genuinely puzzled. “I would not expect it; you do not apologize for conquering an enemy.”
“All right, I’m not going to apologize that my victory cost you a way of life; how’s that?”
“Again, I would not expect you to do any such thing. You do not apologize for winning a war.”
“You should Google the Vietnam War and see how people can apologize for a war, though I guess we didn’t win that one.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Anita is referring to more recent American history, and Vietnamese history. I guess the French and Russians were involved, as well.”
“I will look it up on the Internet,” she said, and walked farther into the room.
Travis tensed. I turned to him. “If she needs to tone down the big bad energy, you need to man up and stop giving off prey energy.”
His pale brown eyes darkened while I looked into them. He wasn’t changing into his lion; he was angry, and it turned his eyes darker. I thought the anger was a good sign; it meant there was more fight in him than he was showing.
“I’m trying, don’t you think I’m trying?” he said, and his voice was a little deeper, too.
“Just because he is a werelion doesn’t mean he is not a lamb, Anita.”
“I am not a lamb,” Travis said, voice lower still, so that it sounded like he needed a wider chest to make that bass.
Magda ignored him, talking directly to me as if he didn’t exist. “You cannot make a lamb into a wolf, Anita. Even if he has the skills to fight, he does not have the will to win.”
I actually feared she was right, but I hoped she was wrong.
Travis’s anger came off him like heat, and his beast rose with it. My skin prickled with the nearness of it. I looked at him and found dark orange lion eyes looking out of his face.
“Do you have such poor control of your beast, boy?”
The boy stood up, and I did not want to see her beat the shit out of him in front of me, nor did I want to get hurt again today trying to stop it.
“This is not restful,” I said.
Travis startled. Magda looked at me.
“I have a limited amount of time to sleep before the FBI calls and I have to leave for work. I haven’t slept in about twenty-four hours, so if you guys are going to fight, take it outside and I’ll find some other bunkmates.”
Magda dropped to one knee but kept her eyes on Travis the way you do in martial arts when you bow before a match. You bow, but your gaze stays on your opponent; otherwise he could kick your ass while you’re not looking. The fact that Magda accorded Travis even that much attention either was a good sign for him, or meant that she was just always that cautious.
Travis knelt, too, though he got tangled in his towel, so it wasn’t as smooth, but he did it. “I’m sorry, Anita.”
“Forgive me, my dark queen,” Magda said.
“First, don’t call me dark queen. I’ll forgive you both if you just stop squabbling and climb into bed, so I can sleep. You guys were not my first choice as a bed duo, and unless you shape up really quickly, you’re going to be off my list of ever bunking over with me, for any reason.”
Magda bowed her head, her eyes on me, but I knew somehow that she was still very aware of Travis. She was just that cautious; she didn’t see him as a real threat. “I am ashamed that I put my own petty grievances ahead of your comfort, my queen.”
“Me, too, Anita, I’m sorry.”
“Fine, I’ll accept the apologies on the understanding that we sleep now, quietly, with no more bickering.” I lay down and slipped under the covers, hoping that would speed things along. I couldn’t lie on my left side, so I had to lie with my back to the door. I couldn’t do it. I sat up in the bed, and tried to think if either of the other two rooms had a bed that was oriented the other way. I didn’t think so.
“Allow me to lie in front of you so that I block anyone who might come through the door to harm you,” Magda said, and slipped her blue pajama top over her head to expose a pale but very fit upper body with high, full breasts, and just below those very nice breasts was a scar that traced below them like an angry red scythe, with a straight line running down from one end of the crescent to vanish below her waistband, as if someone had cut a proverbial death scythe on her body. The fact that it was red meant it was recent, and since she should have been able to heal almost anything, it shouldn’t have been there. She could have had it as an old white scar, but not fresh. Muscles moved in her arms, chest, and stomach as she moved toward the bed. Her body was lean and athletic the way that J.J.’s was, though genetics had let her keep more breast, but other than that she reminded me of the ballet dancer who I enjoyed so much.
“You get front,” Travis said, “because if it’s a real fight all I can do right now is help delay them while you keep Anita safe.” He let the towel fall to the floor and climbed onto the bed, totally unbothered by the fact that he was now nude as he clambered over my legs to get to the wall side of the bed.
“The fact that you understand your limitations is the beginning of wisdom,” Magda said, as she slid out of her pajama bottoms. She was even leaner below, as if whatever trick of genetics had let her keep more breast hadn’t left room for much of a swell of hips, so they were very narrow, and her legs very long. She even moved more like a man than most women I knew, though I’d seen female martial artists who could take the sway out of their hips when they were fighting, or getting ready to fight. I wondered if it was her natural walk or just centuries of practice. I wondered how she’d gotten the big scar, and when.