Chapter Eighteen
Cliff
I stormed my way out of the living room and through the quaint kitchen to the back door, staring out at the sparsely grassed yard in search of my brother. “Rayne, asshole, c’mere.”
I canted my head to listen for sounds that didn’t come, only the clucking of chickens and the idle chatter of Pecker, proclaiming his aptitude at mating.
Gross.
Beyond the small run, I caught sight of a paddock, a few old horses milling about, grazing. They appeared to be the stockier sort, wild looking in their own way. Amid them, a strange horse pawed at the earth, its coat the color of stormy skies with markings like ripples of water in concentric circles that moved every time I blinked. And in that same space stood my brother, and beneath that a six-legged horselike creature with a wild, whipping mane like lightning flowed through it, stormy as the horse I could see and as dangerous as anything I knew.
“What the fuck is this sort of shit, dude?” I gestured at him, earning a snort of derision as the monstrous horselike creature pawed the earth with front legs less like a horse’s and more opposable, tipped in gripping hands, ready to claw and rend sod.
“You can come here and hang out with me, or I can go home, get my ass pounded by Buck, and call River for a hangout sesh.” I folded my arms, fighting the burning sensation pricking at my temples. I had to hold it out, needed to keep my shame from showing.
A snarl of teeth that went from flat to sharp in a jarring transition almost made me flinch if it weren’t for the shimmering center of him where part of my brain still saw Rayne.
I glared back and dusted myself off before flopping onto the ground, lying back, and staring up at the clear sky. The odd cloud had drifted in, casting wandering shadows over the earth. “Fine. I’ll just lay out here shouting at a fucking creepy horse caterpillar thing. What the fuck, man? Six legs? Horsebug…”
He stamped one of his hooved feet and the clouds above me darkened, spreading out like frost on a windshield.
“Sky piss. Okay. Bring it on.” I crossed my legs and tensed as Rayne loped forward, head hung down as his expression remained menacing.
“Don’t care what you threaten or look like, bro. It’s you in there, or you’d have already chomped me or pissed Buck off enough to come out here and do his own angry stamping and growling.” I kept my breaths steady as I tried not to focus on Rayne’s terrifying form, the spreading clouds, and threatening aura. It was Rayne in there, my older brother. By ten months… I knew it had to be.
“Like…I get that you don’t know if you’re you or not. But I can look at you and tell what you are. I see a horse and that six-leggy thing. I see a long-legged bird with ridiculously peacocky head feathers. I see a sharp-toothed, lanky thing with fiery eyes and a whiplike tail. Beyond that, I see you. I see my brother. I feel you, Rayne. Do you see all the mirages? When you look at me, what do you see?”
Rayne paced around me once then twice before snorting and laying in the dying grass. His chest rose and fell, the many beasts within him sighing in sync with his mortal self. In his voice that was also the cry of the strange bird, a growl of a wolf, and the snarl of his many-legged beast, he agreed. “I do. I see you. I see fuzzy shapes of things you’ve not chosen yet.”
“See, that’s kinda cool. I want to try turning into things, I think. Ever get stuck or forget how to change back?” I glanced over, watching his stormy expression shift to something more curious.
“No.” His voice came in stereo, as if from several mouths at the same time, but at the heart of it was my brother. Rayne.
“Knowing me, I’d get stuck as something awful. Probably a hedgehog or emu…” I shrugged and Rayne didn’t laugh, but the soft huff of breath wasn’t annoyance.
“Idiot.”
I reached for him as he settled. “C’mon man. I’m so new to all this. You’ve got a head start on me, big bro. I need support.”
“As if I really know all the answers.” Rayne didn’t shy away from my touch as I rested a hand on the back of his neck, fingers scruffing in his mane.
I had half an idea as I sat there. I had a chance. I had to take it. “Rayne?”
“What?” Rayne’s eerie equine face turned to me, eyes full of lightning and fire.
“Why the long face?”
“I died. That’s a lot to han—” He paused. “Oh, fuck you.”
I snorted and scooted away as he leaned over, teeth bared and nipped at my arm. “Ow!”
“This is serious!”
“I know! But I’m also serious when I tell you that you’re my brother.”
“Am I, though? Really?” Rayne slid back onto his feet and bared his enormous form over me, sharp teeth lining an alligator-like mouth that split his ungulate face with a wet hiss. “Because I’m different, now. I’m so many new things, powerful things, old things and new. I don’t even bleed right any more!”
I braced my shoulder and ran at him, shoving as hard as I could. The ground beneath my feet shifted and Rayne went tumbling, kicking sod as he went. As he scrambled to stand, the sky darkened, clouds multiplying with the threat of rain. “You’re my fucking brother. You’re just as stupid as he ever was. Pigheaded. Sitting here keeping secrets. We all thought you’d die or disappear one day doing all the secretive shit you do.”
“Oh please, like anyone ever cared.” Rayne climbed onto his feet, hooved back legs digging into earth as the first tiny spits of rain fell.
“I care. I’d have cared a lot more if you called. I care even more so that there’s a baby in there that you absolutely have no business trying to raise on your own. Jeez, dude! I can’t let my niece grow up surrounded by—” I gestured at him. “You burned salad, once!”
“I can cook, now. I learned.”
“That’s the only point I’ve seen so far that tells me you’re not the same person, jackoff.” I rubbed my shoulder and rolled my head, letting my neck crack. There was so much power flowing about, like the air tingled around me.
“You can’t even take my pain seriously!” Rayne snorted into the air, his breath a fine mist of droplets and fog.
“So dramatic.” I rolled my shoulder and in the blink of an eye, he charged me, front legs bared with clawed fingertips, head dipped to show me two smoothly curved horns fit to ram into my side. Without second thought, I stepped back, arms up defensively, but it wasn’t fast enough. The weight of him slammed into me, claws gripping tight.
In the same breath, my mind went blank, the sensation of dry, cracked earth buckled beneath my feet, and the power of stones rolling down mountainsides wrenched me apart. The hands that grappled back with Rayne were not my own golden-skinned flesh but a sinewy bronze, sprouting a fine sheen of gray-black fur, claws sprouting from my fingertips.
I had only a moment to recognize the change before Rayne dipped his head, catching me under my arms with his horns to sling me across the paddock.
The world spun around me, rain dotting my face as I hit damp earth with an impact so hard I saw stars and lost my breath. Choking, I clawed at the earth with my strange arms and found not just one set but another joining it, black claws clasping for purchase as the rest of my body stretched and raised, leaving the dirt beneath me farther below. As I righted to my feet and threw my head back, an unfamiliar weight adorned me, like a crown, anchored hard, and I opened eyes that saw nothing but thick new lashes and a wider field of vision.
After being thrown so hard, I couldn’t make my thoughts coherent. The world swayed unsteadily beneath me and when Rayne reared onto his back legs, ready to pounce me with his force, so too did I leap forward, my body agile, longer, legs beneath my torso supporting it, not maneuvering it. A pelvis that normally centered my weight only bore some, but it wasn’t unnatural.
I twisted my form and kicked back legs that barely caught the side of my vision, bucking at him with cloven hooves adorned with that same gray-black feathering. A wicked thud shot back as Rayne bleated in shock and went flying, earning my ire as I chased him, claws drawn.
We ran at one another, heads down, instinct pushing us as the clack of two very solid sets of horns smacked together, rattling our entire bodies before clattering together.
Rain fell harder, the clouds above silent, as if missing thunder, lightning swimming in their depths. The earth beneath us rumbled, rippling like a blanket over a waterbed almost as I braced myself and snarled. Clods of earth flew up around me, pelting us in an attempt to smash into an ever-dampening Rayne.
“You’re my fucking brother,” I shouted. I twisted my head to clack our horns together, snarling with my alien-shaped mouth. I had tusks of some sort, large fangs that made speaking difficult as my tongue navigated their points, but I knew how, by instinct. “You smell like him, look like him, and you have the same fucking heart, man. I know you.”
“But you don’t know! I bled out. I—River took my last blood. I felt myself slip away. I woke from the light. I—my body isn’t the same anymore.”
“But I don’t think my body is the same, either, asshole. Look what you’ve done to me. I’m as much a monster now as you!” I shook my head and snarled when my head caught in the crook of one of his horns. “And at least you’re with someone you were always attracted to! I wasn’t even…” I wanted to say I wasn’t gay, but I knew I was. I knew I always had been. “It changed me!”
“Your identity isn’t your sexuality! You can’t just take one dick and decide you’ve had some grand epiphany. You’re alive, always have been, and now you always will be. You won’t be like me. You’ll know you’re you!” Tears welled in his bright eyes, golden drops that sparked as they hit the ground between us, hands grasped in grapple as our heads twisted and turned to continue pushing back and forth between one another. The first buck and shudder of a sob came from his form.
“How do I know they didn’t hit my head too hard or overdose me when they kidnapped me, Rayne? I got caught up in your problems with the hogs. How do I know Grim didn’t figure out what I was until after he’d killed me? How do I know?” I shuddered at the thought and was glad that I had relative certainty I hadn’t.
“Because you weren’t drained and forced and—”
“I wasn’t! But you were, and that sucks, but the moment I felt you, I knew you were my Rayne but different. You were better. Happier. Death didn’t change you, life did. Vida and Storm, man. They’re the change.” My throat clenched as I pressed back, clenching my fingers until Rayne’s grip faltered, fingers releasing me in defeat. Our hands slid down our arms as we collided into a shaking hug. “I’d know you, always. I see you in all the forms. There’s no human in all the forms Storm has. Have you ever seen a human in him other than the one he shows you?”
Rayne gave a noise of dissent as we clasped one another tighter.
I tried to move my head slightly and found our horns locked, keeping my neck bent at an unnatural angle. Fuck.
“No.”
I dropped my shouting as the rain came down in harsh sheets and the earth trembled, calming beneath me. “I’d know you, always. We may be distant. We may have grown apart, but I know my brother.”
He snorted, and I huffed, our breath fogging around us as we clutched tighter. Rayne adjusted his head, tugging at our locked horns. “And I know mine. Missed you.”
“Missed you, too.” Our embrace tightened as we had the same idea, fighting our locked horns for a few seconds with huffs of misplaced laughter until we were human once more, arms locked.
“Dickhead,” I said, shoving Rayne off of me as I buried away the sensation of my cheeks burning and hyper in a way I hadn’t been since I was an excited child, hopped up on sugar and or caffeine.
“Takes one to know one, fartsucker.” Rayne buried his face against my shoulder, hiding a shudder that I knew hid tears.
“You kiss your daughter with that mouth?” I shoved him back and mussed his hair, half amused when he looked up, clothes scuffed and face scratched. A swollen spot on his lip told me I’d got him once, at least. By the ache in my jaw, I’d say he’d gotten me, too.
My hens fight over me. It is okay. Come to me, hens, I will shake tail and preen each of you.
I glanced over and saw a very proudly puffed-up Pecker poised on a fencepost in front of Buck, Storm behind him with Vida whimpering in his arms. Playing it off, I wiped my mouth on my shirtsleeve and offered a halfhearted smile. Buck and Storm didn’t react, though, both their expressions stormy and tense.
“That little runt is a pervert, yeah?” I glanced over at Rayne. He shrugged and avoided looking in Storm and Buck’s direction. I couldn’t blame him. We’d been tossing about in the dirt like a few kids, scrapping over hurt feelings.
I hesitated approaching, watching Storm’s face harden when our eyes met. Stepping back, I faltered when Rayne rested a hand on my shoulder and shoved. “Come on. They get pissy when the godbeast gets let out. Makes everyone a little crazy. Eh, Buck?”
Buck nodded, fierce eyes tracking me as I approached. A slow breath trembled free of him as I jumped up and swung a leg over the fence. “Took to it much easier than Rayne did.”
“Took to what?” I released a rather unmanly yelp when Buck pulled me off the fence and hefted me in his solid arms. Being held bridal-style was not on my list of things I ever wanted, but it was nice.
“Your godbeast. It was beautiful, but never attack Rayne again if you can help. Storm wasn’t too keen on it.” Buck ended his warning and leaned in for a soft kiss.
“I needed it.” Rayne nudged Storm and took Vida from his arms. “Sorry.”
“If anyone would know you, it’s him. Are you better now?” Storm offered Rayne a hopeful smile.
“A bit. Cliff kicked some sense into me, and I kicked the godbeast into him. We even?” Rayne glanced at Buck and grinned, turning his affectionate gaze back to Storm.
“Fat chance.” I laughed as Buck gave me a squeeze.
“I’d say so.” Buck rubbed his chin on my head with a firm scruff, making me squirm and laugh.
I wasn’t sure what sort of life I’d walked into, but I was certain I’d found home.