“How can you be here?” I asked, dumbfounded.
“What, you think you’re the only one who can fly to the opposite side of the universe and come up with some half-assed ruse to get into this place?” He snorted. “You’re as cocky as that ugly coldblood of yours. Probably a good thing he left you when he did; otherwise, you’d end up with a brain as warped as his.”
I shook my head. “He hasn’t left me.”
“Well, I don’t see him anywhere. Did he turn ‘invisible’ since the last time I saw you?” he said mockingly.
“He’s just not here right now, that’s all.”
The shifter nodded. “Right, right, I see. He’s just ‘not here’ right now. As in, old grayskin is never coming back! I told you, these creatures change lovers as often as I change skins.”
“Look, let’s keep it strictly business, shall we?” I suggested tersely.
“Ooh, let’s.”
I rolled my eyes at him, struggling to keep my voice down. “I get how you got here, but why are you here?”
“Weren’t you listening, sweet cheeks?” He chuckled, pulling a toothy grimace that was meant to be a smile.
“What, you’re really a mercenary?”
“Don’t act so surprised.” He pouted. “You and your coldblood stooge might’ve passed me off as nothing more than an unwilling tour guide, but I’ve got a whole host of skills that you couldn’t even dream of, sunshine! I’m not saying this wouldn’t be a good way to go, with you sitting on my chest, but do you think you could let me up before you suffocate me with your thighs?”
I jumped up and staggered back, my cheeks flushing. I was so appalled by him that I forgot to look where I was going, stepping back too far. My hip crashed into the cart of alchemy tools, the metal rattling loudly.
“Keep it down, princess! Do you want the cavalry to come running?” the shifter hissed, as I struggled to still the juddering cart. “Honestly, if I get caught because of you, I’ll be really pissed.”
The two of us paused, frozen in a silent face-off. I kept an ear out for any approaching footsteps, either from the passageway below the lab, or the main door. Satisfied that nobody was coming, I stepped closer to the shifter, squaring off against him. I still didn’t know what he knew, and, until I could be sure, he wasn’t getting out of here alive.
“Where does that door lead?” I asked.
“A spiral staircase, which leads down from the attic,” he replied casually.
It wasn’t the exciting mystery I’d hoped it would be, but at least now I knew. “How did you find your way to the staircase?”
“I have this device,” he explained, gesturing to the strange object. “It traces the past movements of certain people using residual scent signatures. I just put a trace on Jareth Idrax’s particular signature, and it led me straight to the staircase.” There was something oddly disgusting about the way the scent trail worked, but if it had helped the shifter find the lab, I knew it couldn’t be all bad.
“You know I can’t let you leave this room, don’t you?” I said, a hint of apology in my voice.
“Then why did you let me up? Why not stick me like a hog while you had the chance?”
“Look, tell me what you know, and we’ll see if we can come to an arrangement,” I said.
He grimaced licentiously. “Now you’re talking my language.”
“Keep it clean, shifter, or I’ll change my mind.”
“Fine, be a killjoy.” He waved a rubbery limb. “A deal sounds right up my alley. I live, you don’t have to worry, and we both get what we want. You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours.”
I shuddered at the mental image it conjured up, imagining my nails getting lost in the folds of his pooling flesh. I could tell he knew what I was thinking, as an irreverent glitter rippled across his huge, red-veined eyes, which were more iris than anything else.
“Sounds good,” I said at last.
He stuck out his hand, the flesh hanging from his elbow like a skin-hammock. “The name’s Mort. I’d tell you what it’s short for, but you wouldn’t be able to pronounce it.” I took the proffered hand and shook it as quickly as possible.
“Riley. But you already knew that.”
“I enjoy the way it rolls around on the tongue—Riley, Riley, Riley,” he purred, pleased with himself. “Anyway, I defected from Orion not long after my little adventure with you and the bloodsucker. Orion decided it wasn’t enough to have us as cannon fodder and cheap labor, and decided he’d add ‘lab rat’ to our list of expendable qualities. He experimented with that elixir on a friend of mine, and my friend died horribly… I can still see the way her skin sloughed off her body and hear the screams as she melted in front of my eyes. He threw her out like she was trash, leaving her to wander the forest, alone.”
“I’m sorry… That’s awful.”
“It was worse to live through,” he replied sadly.
“Why are they testing on your kind?”
“Orion wants to use us as test subjects before using the elixir batches on coldbloods. I guess we are easier to replace.”
It was such a Vysanthean thing to do that I couldn’t believe Brisha and Gianne hadn’t thought of it yet. Maybe, just maybe, there was a sliver more humanity in them than there was in Orion.
“He doesn’t even bother disposing of the bodies. He just piles them in an open, mass grave, only covering it with dirt when the stench and the flies get to be too much,” Mort continued solemnly. “Shifters have to be buried in a very particular way that allows their dead bodies to become one with the soil, but he ignored our pleas to give the proper funeral rites to our dead. We are things to him, not people. Now, I want revenge.”
“What are you going to do?” I asked.
“I haven’t decided yet.”
“Well, I might have a few ideas,” I said. “How about we take this somewhere less dangerous?”
I put the paring knife back in its place before putting the rest of the lab back in order. As soon as I was satisfied that the room looked undisturbed, I walked over to the trapdoor and opened the hidden panel. Meanwhile, Mort resumed the form of Doctor Ulani, morphing seamlessly from shifter to coldblood. He walked over to the workbench, where he’d left the silver box and his strange screen-covering device, and pocketed both.
“You should put that back where you found it,” I insisted. I wasn’t sure it was a good idea to take something from Jareth’s lab that actually belonged to him, where he was bound to notice something missing. I mean, I’d come to steal the black box back, but that wasn’t his to keep.
“Don’t you want to see what’s on it?”
“Can’t we take a look now?” I urged.
Footsteps echoed in the hallway beyond the lab’s main door, startling us both.
“I say we blow this joint before old man Idrax gets back,” he whispered, running back over to where I stood, still holding the silver box. With Jareth, or whoever it was, loitering outside, I realized we had no choice but to steal it and hope nobody noticed it was gone.
Mort peered down into the passageway below, giving an impressed whistle. “Down the rabbit hole we go!” he enthused, dropping into the underground tunnel.
Where this new allegiance against Orion would lead, I had no clue. I just hoped it didn’t end with us losing our heads.
Chapter Sixteen
“Where’s the real Doctor Ulani, anyway?” I asked, as we wandered through the passageway.
Now that I knew Mort was a shifter, it was weird to see him back in the form of Doctor Ulani. I kept looking for gaps in the mirage, trying to see where the flaws were in the shifter design, but I couldn’t see any. The guise was as close to perfect as possible. I supposed it had to be, considering the people he was trying to fool.
“No idea. Last I heard, he was MIA somewhere in the far reaches of the universe, presumed dead,” he mused, smirking. “I altered the paperwork, and hey, presto… he is resurrected!”
I rolled my eyes at him. “How
long have you been on Vysanthe, then?”
“I’ve been here for a few months, masquerading as this beloved doctor of Gianne’s,” he replied. “Although, in hindsight, I might not have picked the best profession. Turns out you actually need to know how to fix people to be a doctor, especially when you’re taking up the role of a well-respected specialist.”
“Instead of spouting a load of medical nonsense, like you did upstairs?” I teased.
“You caught that?”
I nodded. “I was under the bed the whole time.”
Mort laughed. “No way! I knew that grumpy one was talking weird. Nobody needs to speak that loudly.”
“Yeah, I was under the bed, and my friend was in the cupboard,” I admitted. “I don’t think you ever met Ronad, did you?”
“Was he the weird, tanned coldblood in the Siberian hut?”
I glanced at Mort suspiciously. “How’d you know that?”
“Relax, nobody else knew he was there. He just happened to be taking up one of my old hiding spots. I used to go there when I couldn’t be bothered with the rebel base anymore. Anyway, I let him be, but I was pretty annoyed at losing the hut,” he said. “I liked it there.”
“Well, he’s here again, and now we’re stuck in this house until Navan comes back and we can decide what to do.”
“Princess, he is never coming back,” Mort insisted. “I told you back then, and I’ll tell you again: a human and a coldblood will never last. He’s probably seen something he likes better and run off after it.”
I gritted my teeth. “Navan is coming back. I spoke to him a few weeks ago. Well, he said he was coming back, but I think something might have happened to him, because he still hasn’t turned up.”
“I bet you twenty credits he never does.”
“Don’t say that!” I snapped, punching him in the arm.
Mort raised his hands in mock surrender. “Sorry, it was a joke! I’d ask what’s got your panties in a twist, but even one day in this place would make me want to hang myself.”
Ignoring his comment, I pressed on with more serious matters. “I don’t suppose you had anything to do with blowing up Queen Gianne’s hangar, did you—the one with the deep-space fleet inside?”
Mort grinned. “I might’ve. Why, you impressed?”
“It’s a simple question. Did you, or didn’t you?”
“I was part of the strike team that Orion sent to blow it up, but I only helped out because it sounded like a fun mission,” he explained. “What can I say, I like things that go boom! Plus, it meant I got to leave Earth and the threat of being the next lab rat in line for the chopping block.”
I frowned, wondering how much I could trust Mort. “Why did you join Orion in the first place?”
He shrugged. “I originally signed up in the hopes of having a bit of power, you know? I wanted to be part of something bigger than myself, and there was nothing for me back home, unless I wanted to be a gumshi farmer.”
“Gumshi?”
“They’re hard fruits filled with sour, noodle-like fronds. It’s the staple food for my people back on our planet, though you can’t find it anywhere else,” he said. “It was a bit of a shock to discover the delights of human food, let me tell you! I think I doubled in size the first month I was at the base.”
I laughed, trying to imagine the shifters eating burgers or sandwiches. “Where’s home for you?”
He snorted. “As someone who wants to keep her planet a secret, you’re a little hypocritical,” he teased. “It’s way out in the Tarantora Quadrant. Most people call it Mallarot. I’d tell you its full name, but your puny human tongue wouldn’t be able to cope.”
“Are you glad you left your planet?”
“Easy, Diane Sawyer,” he chided playfully. I guessed he’d seen a bit of Earthen TV too.
I shrugged. “I’m just curious to get to know you better, since you asked me to trust you.”
“I’d never do a thing like that,” he shot back with a mischievous grin.
“You know what I mean, Mort. Better the devil you know, right?”
“Well, I didn’t fit in any better with the rebels than I did on my home planet, if that’s the scoop you’re after,” he said, after a moment’s pause. “I was an outcast on Mallarot, and I was an outcast with Orion’s posse. So, now, my loyalty is up for sale. I’m not sure it’s worth much to anyone, but I’ve been waiting for the right opportunity—and the right person—to tether my proverbial wagon to.”
“Are you tethering it to me?” I wondered.
“That depends.”
“On?”
“On whether you can offer me the revenge I want. That’s my price, for now.”
I smiled. “Well, there’s six of us who are looking for allies to join in our fight against the rebels and the rule of the two queens. We want to do away with Orion and keep Earth safe from Brisha and Gianne,” I explained. “If you help us, we’ll offer you the revenge you want and safe passage off Vysanthe, when we all escape ourselves. In exchange, we’ll need intel about the rebels, and whatever you can tell us about Queen Gianne from what you’ve learned as one of her doctors.”
Mort scoffed. “And why would you want to do that? As long as Orion is on Earth, he’s your best bet for keeping it safe from the queens.”
“A threatened planet isn’t a free one. With Orion there, the human race is at risk,” I replied. “He’s using our blood in his elixir—you know that. As long as he’s on Earth, he has a free supply of it, and he’ll continue to kill my people until he gets his fill. We’ll end up as slaves, and I refuse to let that happen.”
“You make a good point.”
“Plus, he had shifters draining the blood out of humans, right? As far as I’m concerned, your people are cold, ruthless killers,” I said, recalling the husks of the shifter victims. “You might have forgotten, but the last time I saw you, you were threatening to drain the blood out of me. So, you might make it sound like you’re all peaceful gumshi farmers, but I know different.”
Mort pulled a face. “Orion got us hooked on it. We’re not bloodsuckers, like your boyfriend—we were forced into an addiction. It was one of his ways of controlling us. We drained blood for Orion’s elixirs and got to keep a little morsel for ourselves,” he explained. “I was a different shifter then, high on human blood. But I’ll have you know, I gave it up, cold-turkey. Haven’t touched a drop since before my friend was killed, and don’t plan to touch that stuff ever again.”
“Why should I believe you?” I countered. “Who’s to say you won’t try and drain every drop out of me now?”
He shrugged. “Believe me or don’t. That’s up to you. I’m just telling you how it is. The thought of blood turns my stomach now.”
“I’ll be keeping an eye on you, either way.”
“Please do.” A salacious grin tugged at his lips.
“Anyway, I have my own personal vendetta against Orion,” I continued, feeling the pulse of rage in my chest. “He killed a friend of mine, too.”
“He did?” That seemed to pique Mort’s interest.
I nodded. “His name was Galo. He was a lycan who put his life on the line for me. It was my fault he got captured, but Orion sent him after me with a chip inside him—a chip that would kill him at the press of a button.”
“Let me guess, our mutual acquaintance decided to pull the trigger?”
“He sent Galo just to get back at me, and he threatened everyone I love,” I said. “So, I want to hit him where it hurts. I already killed his girlfriend, and I won’t stop until he can’t hurt anyone anymore.”
Mort whistled, evidently delighted. “You killed Pandora?”
“She forced my hand, but yeah… I killed her.”
We paused beside the panel that led into the basement while Mort thought about my offer. After all, if he didn’t agree to my terms, I was going to have to make a very quick decision. I didn’t want to hurt Mort, now that I knew more about him, but I couldn’t let him leave,
either.
“You present an intriguing case, Riley,” he purred, tapping his coldblood chin. “I tell you what. I’ll agree to your offer, on the condition that you deliver on your promise at a moment’s notice. If you can’t give me that, I’m off to share my information with someone else—someone who can give me what I want.”
“What information do you have?” I countered.
“See for yourself.” He reached into his pocket and removed the silver box, tossing it to me. I caught it just in time. The box almost crashed to the ground. When I looked up, Mort was laughing. As useful as he might be, I wanted to knock the smirk off his fake face.
“What does the other thing do?” I asked, pointing to Mort’s pocket, where he’d put the strange screen device.
He smirked. “I told you, it finds things… and unlocks things.”
“Yeah, I know how it helped you find the lab, but how did you find the device under the workbench?”
“Never you mind. You’ve got an unlocked comms device with all the information in it, and that’s all you’re getting for now. Wouldn’t want you getting too greedy now, would we?” he teased. “So, do we have a deal?”
I felt as though time had slowed to a standstill. I still didn’t know if I could trust this shifter, and he was asking a lot of me in return. What if I couldn’t make good on my promise when he wanted me to? Would it matter, when the time came? I wished I had the others with me, so we could all make a conscious decision. Without them, I was making the choice for everyone.
Besides, it was clear I couldn’t be trusted to make good decisions. I’d just agreed to take a comms device from Jareth’s lab, and that choice had left me feeling distinctly uneasy. I knew we should have left it, but it was too late now. I just had to read what was on the device, as soon as I could, and get it back to the lab before anyone realized it was missing.
“Before I’ll agree to your terms, there’s something I need you to do first, to prove your loyalty,” I said anxiously. “After all, our history isn’t exactly the best.”
Mort arched an eyebrow. “Go on.”
“Judging by your gadgetry, I’m guessing you have a way of communicating with people all over the place?” He nodded, spurring me on. “Well, I need you to find a way to contact Navan. As soon as you’ve managed to get in touch, I want you to come straight back to me. I want to know if he’s okay, and I want to know when, and how, he’s planning on getting back here, to the Idrax house. I want to know every part of his plan, okay? Only then will I decide if you can be trusted.”