Page 37 of Shift of Destiny
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Moira stood on the corner, waiting for her cue. She could feel Chance to her left, though he was concealed in the recessed doorway of Fantastic Faerie Frocks. She sent a pulse of love along their mate bond, which was apparently a palpable thing to every other shifter and magical creature they’d run across. She’d never been so congratulated in her life.
When the town council of Kotoyeesinay decided to do something, they went all in. Once again, they’d had to turn volunteers away for the little drama they were about to enact. Shiloh, in his native coyote form, but magically disguised to look like Pruhon’s big gray wolf, would chase her down the street and catch her right in front of the sheriff’s station, just as they were escorting Lawrence Witzer to his limousine. She’d pretend to stab Shiloh with her wicked-looking plastic knife, and he’d pretend to rip her throat out with his dying breath. Kotoyeesinay’s elf elders would take care of the rest with magic.
Shiloh yipped once. Moira took off.
“Help! Help!” she shouted. She turned and looked over her shoulder. Shiloh, with an overlay of huge, slavering wolf, was barreling toward her. So were nine other shifters of various species, each disguised to look like one of Pruhon’s wolf pack.
A shifter wearing the Richie illusion brought back memories of his murderous rage, spurring her to run faster.
She pretended not to see the sheriff’s station door opening and Witzer stepping out, with uniformed Chantal behind him.
Moira pretended to trip, then launched herself into the tumbling roll she’d learned from a bored stunt coordinator on the set of a movie she’d helped cater. The borrowed elbow pads, kneepads, and umpire’s vest took the brunt of the impact, but it still stunned her for a moment.
Stab me!projected Shiloh, as he slowed and approached her with convincing menace.
“Pruhon, no!” shouted Witzer. “She’s mine!”
Shiloh-as-Pruhon snarled defiantly at Witzer, giving Moira the perfect opportunity to stab at Shiloh’s side several times with her plastic knife. Shiloh howled theatrically in terrible pain, then leapt on her and licked her neck wetly.
She screamed, then at the next lick, cut off her scream and stabbed one more time, then let her legs and arms go limp. She lolled her head to the side.
Shiloh’s seventy pounds of furry weight dropped on her, nearly making her jackknife when his paw hit her bruised stomach and ribs. He sent her a wordless apology.
All around them, the rest of Pruhon’s supposed pack began attacking each other and dying in spectacular and gruesome ways. Chantal jumped in, too, pretending to protect Witzer and be knocked down and savaged by her younger brother, an adolescent bear with a wolf overlay. The real shifters were hamming it up, clearly having the time of their lives.
To Witzer, the street would look like a gory mess of blood, flesh, and dying wolves. He took the bait of seeing his limousine drive around the corner and made a dash for it, narrowly escaping the frenzied wolves that had gone insane at the death of their alpha. He waved his arms to get the driver to stop, then frantically launched himself into the passenger section. The limo tires screeched on the pavement as it peeled around a corner and made good its escape. Glade magic would help the limo find its way quickly out of town.
After several long moments, the street exploded with the laughter of eight naked men and women, including Shiloh. He fell off her and rolled into the side of an oversized jaguar that hadn’t shifted. The jaguar licked Shiloh’s face.
“Oh, goddess, did you see the look on his face?” wheezed Shiloh.
“No,” said Moira as she sat up. “Somebodyput his furry snout right on top of my head, and I couldn’t move.”
Chance and several others began distributing clothes to the naked shifters.
“It was just like you said,” said Shiloh. “He thought he was the hero of the story, escaping with his life because destiny singled him out.”
Chance helped her up and into his embrace with a lingering kiss.
“Come on, Matteo,” Shiloh said to the big jaguar. “Shift naked and show everyone how smokin’-hot handsome my husband is. Make them all jealous.”
Matteo turned out to be dark and suavely handsome, but Moira was much more interested in admiring her own mate. Too bad he wasn’t naked, too. She kissed his chin. “Did the twins connect with their video crew?”
“Yes. We substituted the adjusted footage, gave them all memories to match about spending all night filming Witzer and editing the video, and sent them and their van toward Cheyenne, where there’s a TV station with a satellite uplink.”
“Good,” said Moira. “Witzer will be ruined, one way or the other. His sons will probably destroy the empire inside a year.”
A pair of older, plump women came out of the sheriff’s station. “Did we do good?” asked one. Their masking magic faded to reveal two pointy-eared, green-skinned dryads who wore leaves and flowers for clothing.
Chantal crossed to them. “Perfect, Adjaini. Thanks to Witzer ‘accidentally’ overhearing you as ‘Jane,’ he thinks all the psychics in Kotoyeesinay are scam artists with a bunch of stage tricks to fool the gullible.”
“It’s like I said when I first got here,” said Moira with a laugh. “Best tourist gimmick ever.”
Chance slipped his hand into hers. “Iolo Maxen’s back in town and wants to see us.”
Her eyes widened with dismay. “Oh no, did we leave a mess at the store?”
