Page 51 of Countdown to Murder
Damn. This would be easier if I didn’t have to worry about himchangingto snake and trying to kill me.
“If he shifts to snake, I’ll probably have to kill him.”
“He won’t shift.”
I looked at the python. “Is that true?”
He nodded. “They did something to me. I cccc...cccc...cccan’tchange.”
A vampire had drunk from him and was in his head, probably.
“I’m Mira. What’s your first name?”
“KK. KK. KKKKevin.” The stuttering was on my last nerve, but talking about it would probably make it worse, so I ignored it.
“Okay, Kevin. We’re going to sit on the floor together, in the middle of the room. We’re going to play twenty questions until we think of something else to do to occupy our minds. I’m weak and probably only a few hours from passing out. They’re going to have to ramp things up for me over the next couple of hours. If you aren’t enough, they’ll replace you with something else. So, I’m thinking of something. You ask questions first.”
He stared at me, and I shrugged. “If you don’t play twenty questions with me, I’ll occupy myself by torturing you. Your choice.”
“Animal, vegetable, or mineral?”
We’d made it through eight rounds of twenty questions when the door opened and a copperhead snake slithered in. The door closed, and I opened my mouth to get a better sense of the snake.
At first, I planned to shift into my usual snake, eat the copperhead, and get some energy, but then my Jacobson’s organ told me this was a shifter. A person who happened to be a snake at the moment.
Fuck.
I lunged, caught the snake behind the head, and sat back down before I fell. The lunge had used my last reserve of energy. Black spots floated before my eyes.
I closed my eyes and spoke, assuming the cameras and microphones were of good quality, because I didn’t have enough energy to speak loudly.
“I’m not going to eat the copperhead shifter. Put a real one in and I’ll shift and eat it, but I know nothing about this person’s life. The silver is making me weak, not to mention all the shifts. The silver will take me, soon. I can feel death’s grip. My heart doesn’t beat in a normal rhythm, and my kidneys aren’t filtering as they should. Toxins are in my muscles. If I pass out and the copperhead bites me, there’s a good chance my already weakened body won’t be able to fight the venom off, but you know what?” I opened my eyes, looked at the camera, and used my last reserves to raise my voice enough I was certain they’d hear me. “I’ll die, and that will be okay, because I’d rather be dead than back under the Concilio’s control.”
I looked to the boy who’d killed a child. He might be nineteen years old, but I knew ten-year-olds who were more of a man.
“I’ll hand you the copperhead so you can hold it, or I’ll let it go. Totally up to you, but I’m going to pass out soon, so decide fast.”
The door opened, someone walked in and looped the copperhead into a net, and I passed out.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Panda
I was beyond pissed when they finally let me in to see her. She had an IV in each arm. They told me they were giving her nutrition and fluids, but I recognized the smell and knew they were trying to counter silver poisoning.
And she hadn’t gained consciousness yet, but that might be a blessing. All that silver in her system was going to hurt like the fires of hell when she came to.
“You can’t kill him,” Nathan told me.
“Perhaps I shouldn’t, but I’m pretty sure Ican.”
“She passed the test, and it had to be extreme in order to meet the Concilio’s requirements.”
“She’s skin and bone, and has silver poisoning.”
“Mordecai says there were questions about her mortality. Whether she’s a child of Echidna or adescendant. They had to take her right up to death’s door to find out.”
Right. Descendant means she has more powers than a mere shapeshifter. Child would mean she’s a full-on goddess or demi-goddess, and would be immortal.
