Page 22 of The Eagle and the Shrew

He walked toward Nari to get a better view through the living room window. “Something about her seems familiar.” He scratched at his chin with his left hand. “But I can’t recall where I might have seen her before.”

The woman knocked again. “I just need directions.” Her voice was muffled through the door.

The woman seemed innocent enough, yet things weren’t adding up. How did a frail, old woman get lost in the middle of nowhere? Nari hesitated, her hand hovering over the doorknob. She considered a partial shift to bring her talons out for protection, but what if this was just a human, lost in the woods? She turned to Anson, whispering so the woman couldn’t hear her. “I don’t trust her. Use my phone to call for backup.”

“Where is it?” he asked, keeping his voice low.

“Please hurry!” the woman cried. “I need to use the bathroom, too.”

“One moment, please! My friend is looking for our map,” she called out before she turned to Anson, lowering her voice so the woman outside couldn’t overhear. “My phone is on the coffee table. The code is 1016. Text Grayson and Cass. Let them know we have company.”

She watched as Anson walked back to the coffee table and picked up her phone. Nari turned back to the door with a smile plastered on her face. “We have an outhouse out back,” Nari lied. “You’re more than welcome to use it. ”

The older woman hunched over a little bit more, putting a hand to her lower back before coughing a little. “I think I need some water. I’m a bit dehydrated,” the old woman croaked. Was it Nari’s imagination, or did her face seem somehow more wrinkled than before?

Crap. Nari couldn’t have an old woman croaking at her door just because she was being overly cautious. How much harm could an old woman do, even if she turned out to have nefarious designs? Nari dared her to try something. She’d learn just how quickly Nari could shift and scratch the woman’s eyes out with her talons. “I have to let her in.”

“But do you?” He stood, looking back at the door from the other side of the couch.

She supposed she didn’t, and a nagging suspicion in her gut told her things weren’t adding up. Some old woman wandered into the deep woods on a mountain without any gear and just happened to be asking for directions at their cabin? The only cabin for miles.

“I can’t let you in. My friend is really sick. It’s contagious,” she lied, not knowing what else to say. “But I can give you a bottle of water. Give me a minute to go get it for you.” Hopefully the lie would buy them some time. She could leave the door, looking like she was going to the kitchen for water, and instead head to the armory hidden in the bedroom. She wasn’t sure how much the woman could see from the window in the cabin’s door.

Nari started toward the back of the cabin but froze in her tracks when a bang sounded at the front door.

She turned to see that the old woman had kicked the door open. And as she entered the cabin, something strange happened to her features. It took Nari a moment to realize what she was seeing before her very eyes.

The woman’s old age reversed. The wrinkles on her face smoothed, and her skin tightened until she looked just about Nari’s age. The liver spots on her face and hands lightened back to pale skin, her spine straightened, and all of this took Nari’s attention away from the fact that the woman drew a weapon. “If you even think about shifting, I’ll taze you.”

Anson’s voice emerged as not much more than a squeak when he called out, “Ariel?”

12

“Hello, brother.” Ariel spat out the word as if it were poison. “Long time no see.”

Anson rubbed at his eyes, not believing what he was seeing. “How?” He didn’t know what else to say.

She cocked her head to the side, her auburn hair sliding over her shoulder. “How what?”

He realized he wasn’t sure. As to why she was helping Grimm? Unfortunately, he’d had a front-row seat to the man’s manipulation tactics. That made sense. “How did you grow old and then young?” He was stunned, barely able to form sentences. He tried so hard to rescue her, but was she too far-gone? He buried the thought, not wanting it to be true. She narrowed her eyes at him. It wasn’t until then that he noticed he was tapping his wrist again, trying to make the thought not happen.

Ariel didn’t say anything about the motion. Instead, she explained, “My genetic condition.”

“The hormonal imbalance.” That was what they’d been told was the reason she had to spend so much time in the hospital. Why, at times, Ariel was so exhausted she could barely keep her eyes open. The doctors said that if her body didn’t learn to regulate itself, she could die. “What of it?”

“Dr. Grimm fixed me. Made me better.”

Nari snorted. Until the sound, Anson had forgotten she was still in the room. “Dr. Grimm doesn’t help anyone. He makes them worse.”

Anson nodded. “Everything he gives comes with a price.”

“My price was worth it.” Though whatever the price was, she didn’t say. “I can shift with special abilities, making my age look whatever I want. I control my hormones and body now. Who would suspect a harmless old lady of kidnapping?”

“You’re helping him get more test subjects!” Anson spat. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Though, after a moment, he could. That was exactly what he did for Grimm in the hopes of getting Ariel back. “What did he promise you?”

“Nothing you would understand.”

Anson was about to pry when shit got real. In one fluid movement, Nari tore off her T-shirt, changing her arms into great eagle wings. After launching herself into the air, she shifted her feet into talons, launching them toward Ariel. Her claws raked across Ariel’s arm, making her drop the taser.

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