Dreams of Gray Read online

  Bone wasn't supposed to be black, was it?

  “Holy fuck, PJ. What’s happening to me?”

  My friend, to her credit, didn’t let out the terror she was no doubt feeling. She swallowed and wrapped both my hands in clean paper towels. Then, she retrieved my top and bra from the stall and mopped up the puddle of blood I’d left behind. Finally, she helped me back into my shirt. My back was tender, but no longer burning.

  With all that done, she looked at me with steely resolve in her eyes. “We’re going to get you better, Dree. Let’s go to the hospital.”

  I wanted to protest. I hadn’t had much luck in hospitals lately. As far as they were concerned, I was perfectly normal. I thought of the black things poking out of my fingers.

  Let’s see them call this normal.

  Decision made. I nodded to PJ and we walked into the common area. Our shift manager was standing there, apparently waiting to rip me a new orifice.

  Surprise! I ripped myself ten all on my own!

  She choked when she saw the bloody towels, and we walked right past. By the time we got to the door, the entire office was filled with silent, staring mannequins. I wanted to scream at them. PJ just glared. They parted, and someone even had enough autonomy to open the front door.

  PJ piled me into her car and squealed out of the parking lot. I concentrated on breathing deeply and thinking of anything other than bleeding out of my goddamned fingertips.

  About halfway to the emergency room, I asked PJ to pull over for a minute. She didn’t want to, but she gave me a stern look and did it anyway. I pulled the paper towels off my hands.

  There wasn’t a scratch.

  PJ grabbed my hand and looked startled. “What? Gone, just like that?”

  It was Monday, and for the first time in my life, I had more important things to worry about than work stress. I was beginning to wonder if I was human anymore.

  11

  PJ took me home and insisted on monitoring me the rest of the day. I finally convinced her I was fine (well, at least not bad enough to start bleeding again), and she left with strict orders to call her if my situation changed.

  I collapsed on my bed and was just about to go to sleep when someone knocked at my door. I let them knock twice, then got up and answered.

  It was Alan. Perfect.

  He didn’t look too worse for wear from our last encounter. He wore a form-fitting wife beater that showed where he’d bandaged his shoulder. His hands were in his pockets, and he looked so much like a lost puppy I wanted to kiss him.

  I didn’t.

  “Hi,” he said.

  I stepped out of the doorway and he came in.

  “I didn’t expect to see you again,” I said. “Like, ever.”

  He shrugged and sat on my couch. It protested his weight. I perched on the opposite end, and pointed at his bandage.

  “How is it?”

  He rotated his arm a bit. “Okay, I guess. Stiff. You didn’t go too deep.”

  I felt my face go beet red. “I really am sorry. I don’t know what came over me.”

  “Yeah, I’ve been thinking about that. Maybe I should be flattered.”

  I laughed until I realized he was halfway serious. “What?”

  “Well, you obviously thought I was tasty.”

  We both laughed that time, and it felt good. We had dinner that night, followed by chaste cuddling and a movie. I wasn’t ready to risk wild abandon just yet. We kissed good night, and that was it. He walked back home, and I went to bed.

  Good old normal me. Maybe if I kept telling myself that it would stick.

  12

  “You sure you don’t want to howl at the moon with me tonight?” PJ asked. I could tell she didn't want to ask over the phone.

  “I’m sure, PJ. I’m done with clubs for a while. Do me a favor, though?”

  “Sure.”

  “Park closer this time. I’ll give you the extra ten bucks. It’s not safe parking in the boonies.”

  She snorted. “Yes, mom. If I bag a pair of twins, I’m calling you up for an orgy.”

  “Sounds good. Have fun.”

  “Later, ho.”

  When I went out lately, I stuck to populated areas after dark and took along protection: a six-foot-tall off-duty policeman named Alan. He made a good deterrent.

  We’d taken things slow for a while after my nibble and gradually worked our way back to plain old vanilla sex.

  Speaking of which, he picked the moment I hung up to step out of the shower without his towel. I was sitting on the bed when he walked in wet and glistening and oh-so-naked. I couldn’t help it; I pounced. I dragged him to the bed and threw him on his back. I wasn't that strong, obviously, so I figured he was humoring me.

  I hopped on the bed and presented my tight little ass to him. He got the hint and gave me a slap, then started kneading. I was soaking when his fingers slipped inside me.

  I batted his hand away and said, “Doggy. Now.”

  He was happy to oblige. I liked to watch us in the mirror on the dresser when he did me from behind since I got a great view of his chest as he pounded me. I was in heaven.

  That was when hell poked its ugly head into the mix.

  I’d gotten used to the idea of my back heating up during sex. It sounded weird, I knew, but you’d be amazed what becomes normal after a while. I felt the usual itching, but I was too busy getting another itch scratched to care.

  I knew the runes were going to turn red, but Alan tended to have sex with his eyes closed, so he probably wouldn’t notice. I leaned into him and timed my thrusts with his. I heard a tear and realized my fingers were digging into the sheets a little too much. Again, no biggie. I could buy new sheets.

  “Fuck me harder!” I said, nearly growling it.

  He obliged, and I was inflamed inside and out. For a while, there was no sound but the bed springs and the wet, hot slap of our coupling.

  “Oh! Yes! More!” I shouted at him.

  A crack came from somewhere, but my moans drowned it out. I opened my eyes to get a good look at us joined before I came, and I saw a pair of alien yellow eyes looking back at me. I was so close to orgasm that even that seemed okay. I finally crested and let out a long, low howl.

  Alan froze. I was still basking in the afterglow, and through my foggy eyes, I saw my hands had changed. Not only had I shredded the sheets with long black nails that popped out of my fingertips, my hands themselves looked longer. My thumbs were a full three or four inches further up my arm than my fingers.

  What the hell?

  I quickly climbed off Alan and ran for the bathroom. I locked the door behind me and looked in the mirror. This was a dream. A nightmare. It had to be.

  My crooked canine teeth were so large I couldn’t cover them with my lips. My hands looked like someone had grabbed my knuckles and stretched, and my fingertips were something out of a horror movie. Black, sharp-tipped claws glistened with my own blood from where they’d erupted.

  I followed my body down and saw two sets of red bumps down my torso. I carefully felt them, making sure not to slice myself up with my claws, and found they were incredibly sensitive. Almost like—oh God! They were nipples.

  I hadn’t realized I’d been standing on the balls of my feet, either. I tried standing on the heel, but my heel was too far up my leg. My formerly red toenails were curved black barbs that clicked on the tile as I watched.

  I was a freak. A circus sideshow. How did this happen?

  I awkwardly turned around and noticed a nub of skin at the base of my spine. Dear God, I had a tail. At least the start of one. My tattoo had changed as well. The runes were angry red, but now, the knots around them were red as well, almost like cuts.

  I sat on the toilet and cried for what must have been half an hour. Alan knocked and asked if I was okay.

  “I’m pffine,” I lisped around my fangs, and started crying again. “I’m thorry. I don’t feel good all of a thudden.”

  “Okay, no problem. You want me
to go?” I could tell it damn well was a problem, but he was trying to be considerate. Score one for him.

  “I—” I looked down at my altered form. “Yeth. I’m tho thorry. I’ll call you in the morning.”

  “Okay. Hope it wasn’t dinner.”

  “Me too. Night.”

  Once I heard the front door shut, I lay down on the cold tile floor and brought my knees up to my chin.

  What was I?

  13

  I eventually got up and walked out of the bathroom. Working a doorknob with no thumbs was a challenge. I tripped on my own elongated feet and ended up on all fours on my bedroom floor.

  It felt strange and not strange at the same time. I tried moving around on all fours for a bit, and it began to feel more natural. Sharp pain screamed through my torso as my muscles shifted.

  I dropped to my side as more pain built in my spine. It got more and more acute with every heartbeat, then I heard a loud POP! and the pain was released.

  I needed to be outside.

  I fumbled to my knees, which felt rubbery and odd, and used my knuckles to push open the bedroom window. I crawled through and fell into the leaves outside my window with a crash.

  I crawled on elongated hands and feet around the corner of my building and into the woods behind it. The more I crawled, the less awkward it felt. My legs cracked and burned and I felt another hot POP!

  I could move easier then. My knees were constantly bent, and when I walked, they came up along either side of me.

  I moved deeper into the woods. My eyes adjusted to the darkness quickly.

  As I padded along the forest floor, the balls of my feet and heels of my hands lost sensation. When I looked at them, I saw that they’d darkened and hardened into pads.

  A bright flash of pain struck my ass, and I dropped to my side again. It felt like a finger was trying to dig its way out of my back. The skin above my tailbone stretched like it was made of putty. When it got to two feet long, it stopped. I tried to cry, but all that came out was a whimper.

  I got back up onto all fours and felt my balance improve somewhat. My ass wasn’t sticking up into the air as much. Either my legs had gotten shorter or my arms longer. I couldn’t tell.

  I tried to talk. Something to reaffirm the human mind I still had inside this changing form. I growled, mewled, and whined, but I got nothing intelligible.

  The next wave hit me, and I balled up as best I could against the pain. My teeth clenched. My ears pulled and stretched, and suddenly, I felt the evening breeze from the top of my head rather than the sides.

  My nose became wet, and I could see it grow longer and thicker. It pulled my mouth out with it. My tongue spasmed. I opened my mouth a bit, and it fell out. It was easily twice as long as normal. I licked the tip of my nose with it in a strangely instinctive gesture.

  A million tiny ant bites assaulted me from head to toe – muzzle to tail, I guess. I couldn’t turn my head as easily, but I watched my hands – paws – grow darker.

  I wanted to cry, scream, run from it. I did run, and though I was disgusted at this new form, I found myself enjoying the feel of the evening wind on my pelt. I entered a clearing and saw the moon above me full and bright. I screamed, and it came out as a piercing howl.

  Apparently, my brain could only take so much, because I didn't remember anything after that. That was enough, trust me. This time, I woke up in my apartment, at least.

  I wanted desperately to find out that I’d just had some bad Chinese and feverish dreams. Propping myself up on the floor of my bedroom, that hope was once again shattered. My carpet looked like a Great Dane had tracked in mud through the open window. That much told me that I wasn’t completely insane. Damn it.

  I absentmindedly placed my hand over the nearest paw print. Aside from the longer fingers, it fit. The knuckles were an exact match.

  I ran to the bathroom and threw up. It came out black, which just made me retch more. I closed the lid and cried myself back to sleep.

  14

  It was Sunday. I turned off my phone and warned Alan I might be catching when he came by. I spent most of the day sitting in my robe on the couch. I had made myself a cup of tea, but it sat cooling rapidly on the end table. I stared into nothing. My brain was numb.

  So I was a wolf now? A freak. A creature. What had I done to deserve this? When had it happened? What would I tell PJ? Alan? My parents? Could I tell them anything, or would I spend the rest of my life hiding in fear of the moon?

  Had I been the one who scared off the homeless guy outside the club? Had he seen something wrong inside me? Something animal? I shrugged away the thought. No sense mourning the wicked.

  A knock at my door made me jump. I checked the peephole and saw an unfamiliar woman outside. She wore a denim skirt and an obscenely open jacket with nothing underneath. I also noted, with a little jealousy, that she wore them well.

  Her long black hair was streaked with gray, though, so perhaps she was just having a mid-life crisis. Petty, I know, but it made me feel better. I cracked the door but left the chain on.

  “Can I help you with something?”

  She looked me up and down, which was a feat since she could only see three inches of me through the door. I was about to close the door on her when she spoke. Her voice was rough, like she was an old smoker.

  “Wait. I don’t know your name, but we need to talk.”

  “If you’re selling something, you really need to practice that opening line. Anyway, I’m not interested.”

  I was about to shut the door when she flashed me. Seriously. She undid her jacket and confirmed that she wore nothing at all underneath it.

  I was stunned, but not by her tits. Okay, maybe that was part of it. She dropped the jacket off her shoulders and turned around, and I saw intricate black knots surrounding a set of six runes. It was exactly the same pattern as mine.

  “We need to talk,” she said again. This time, I didn’t argue.

  15

  “My name is Slate.”

  She didn’t bother re-buttoning her jacket. It was a little distracting. I offered her a seat on the couch.

  “Dree,” I said.

  She nodded. “I’ve been following you.”

  The hair on the back of my neck bristled. Way to put me at ease, lady.

  “What do you mean?”

  Her head cocked to one side. “I mean, I’ve been following you.”

  “For how long?” I asked.

  “Since you were marked.”

  The way she said it put a tick in my spine that shivered its way down. Marked. Was that what happened?

  “Do you know what it means?” I asked.

  She nodded. I waited for her to continue, but she just stared. She had an unsettling way of doing that. Like I was prey.

  “Do you—I mean—does it also…”

  “Change me?” she asked. “Yes, it does.”

  “Is there a way to stop it?”

  Her eyes went dark for a second. I could swear they actually blinked yellow, and then back to brown.

  “No,” she said quietly.

  That wasn’t the answer I was hoping for. Anxiety started playing hopscotch on my kidneys.

  “So we’re stuck like this, forever?”

  “Perhaps,” she said.

  Slate got up, leaving her jacket on the couch. She paced – no, stalked – my living room like she had more muscles than a human should. It was hypnotic. I noticed, too, that the last rune on her back just above the line of her skirt was faded.

  “Slate,” I asked, “how long have you been like this?”

  She stopped pacing but didn’t turn to face me. “Too long.”

  “So there’s nothing at all we can do?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  My ears pricked up. “But it can’t be stopped?”

  She came and sat back down. “The change can’t be stopped, no.”

  “But?”

  “But he can be stopped. The one who did this to us.�
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  Now we were getting somewhere. “Who is he? What did he do to us?”