Chapter 7
Leonie had a lot of experience in pulling teams together. Sometimes, you needed to sit everyone down to talk through their feelings and come to a group consensus. Other times, you just needed to take charge.
This, she had decided, was definitely one of those times.
“We’ll put you in here,” she announced, leading the way into a cabin. “Fortunately, one of the counselors I’d assigned to this group isn’t due to arrive until this evening. You can have his room.”
Shan trailed behind her, having to duck to squeeze through the door. “Ms. MacCormick. This will not work.”
“Oh, don’t worry, you aren’t displacing anyone,” she said, though she knew perfectly well that wasn’t his objection.
“I’ll just shuffle the room assignments and put the other counselor with a different pack.
And it’s Leonie. Camp policy. All the staff to go by first names, with the kids as well as each other. ”
Shan still had that stunned, deer-in-the-headlights sort of look, at least if the deer in question was wearing sunglasses. “Ms. MacCormick—”
“Leonie,” she corrected firmly. She opened the door to one of the counselor bedrooms, next to the main dorm where the children slept.
“Here we are. It’s small, but cozy. I’m sorry I can’t put you in your own private cabin, but those are reserved for senior staff.
We don’t want campers to start wondering why a regular pack counselor is getting special favors.
Anyway, you should be comfortable enough here.
Can you call wherever you were staying and get them to send over your things? ”
Shan stood in the middle of the small, simply furnished room, looking as out of place as… well, a secret agent at a summer camp. “I was not staying anywhere. I did not anticipate this case would take more than a few hours to resolve.”
She clicked her tongue, flipping to a fresh page in her clipboard to start a new list. “I’ll send Conleth out to get you some essentials to tide you over. Let’s see, you’ll need sneakers, socks, swim shorts…”
“Ms. MacCormick,” Shan tried again.
“A couple of pairs of jeans, some non-camp T-shirts for when you’re off-duty, maybe a sweatshirt or two,” she continued, as if she hadn’t heard him. “Oh, and underwear, of course. What’s your waistband size?”
“Ms. MacCormick.” Shan placed a gloved hand on her clipboard, halting her busy scribble. “Leonie. You cannot do this.”
She pulled her pencil out from under his hand. “Yes, I can. Believe me, I’ve dealt with much bigger disruptions at much shorter notice. Compared to some of the nonsense Conleth and Zephyr have dropped on me in the past, you’re a piece of cake.”
“Let me rephrase.” Shan kept his fingers spread across her half-formed list. “I cannot do this.”
She wrinkled her nose at him. “Is this where you try to claim to be a big, tough guy who could face down a room full of armed thugs without batting an eye, but breaks out in a cold sweat when confronted with a bunch of children? Because I don’t believe that for one second.
You were great with the kids back there. ”
He shook his head. “Leonie, why do you think I am here?”
Now it was time to let him talk. She sat on the bed, patting the blanket to invite him to take a seat next to her. “Because it’s your job. And it’s clear you take your work seriously.”
He remained standing, stiff as a soldier under inspection. “Did you not wonder why I am able to remain at camp as long as required? Why my superior is happy to have me occupied with—forgive me for being blunt—such a trivial case?”
“Not really,” she had to admit. “Sorry. I spend so much time here, it’s all too easy to forget there’s a world outside summer camp. I should have realized a special agent would have better things to do.”
“It is not that.” Shan fell silent for a moment, looking down at his gloved hands. “I need to show you something.”
He took hold of one glove, loosening it until he was able to peel the tight-fitting leather from his skin. Silently, he held out his bare hand.
Over the years, dozens of worried kids had trusted her with their deepest, darkest secrets. Whether the confessions were heartbreaking or hilarious, she’d learned not to react.
Even so, she barely managed to stop herself from gasping.
Orange fur covered the back of his hand from the wrist down. His short, thick fingers were crooked, like he couldn’t fully straighten them. Black claws curved from the tips, wickedly sharp.
Shan was holding very still. Even without being able to see his eyes, she somehow knew his hidden gaze was fixed on her face, trying to gauge her reaction. She had the sense of the moment teetering on balance, waiting for her next action.
She reached out. Shan twitched, but let her take his hand. His fur was as soft as velvet, warm against her palm. Turning his hand over, she discovered rough, dark pads, like a cat’s paw.
It wasn’t very professional, but she couldn’t help the delighted smile that broke across her face. “You have toe beans! Well, finger beans, I suppose. That’s adorable.”
Whatever Shan had expected her to say, it clearly wasn’t that. He stared at her—or at least, she assumed he did.
“Sorry.” She patted his hand, adopting a serious expression. “Let me try again. My, what big claws you have. Very impressive.”
Shan seemed to have temporarily misplaced the ability to speak. His mouth opened, then shut again.
“But we’re veering off-topic.” She released him, sitting back. “Why, exactly, do you think you can’t be a counselor? Because so far, I haven’t seen any evidence to support that position.”
“Leonie,” he said with a touch of exasperation. He held up his hand, light gleaming from his claws. Goodness, they really were impressive. “I do not look like this by choice.”
“I didn’t think you did.” She shrugged. “Not that there’s anything wrong with your appearance.”
And boy, was that the understatement of the century. She’d already been having a hard enough time not flat-out ogling him. As a fellow feline herself, she could appreciate a fine set of claws.
Down, girl, she told her inner lioness firmly.
Out loud, she continued, “If anything, this makes you even more perfect for the role. A lot of kids come here because they’re having trouble with their shifting, or their animals.
It would be good for them to be able to talk to a counselor who can relate to their issues. ”
Shan made a harsh sound, deep in his throat. It might have been a laugh. “You think I would be a good role model for children? Leonie, do you have the slightest idea what I am?”
“No, I don’t. So tell me, Shan. What is it about you that’s so terrible?”
Shan didn’t answer for a moment. He picked up his glove, turning his attention to the fiddly process of fitting it back over his hand-paw.
Now that she knew what was hidden underneath, she could see the telltale signs of his difference; the stiffness of the joints, the care he took to avoid tearing the leather with his claws.
“In China, some of the oldest stories tell of the Four Perils,” he said, apparently to his glove. “Four evil creatures, born of wickedness, standing in opposition to all that is good and right. The taotie. The hundun. The taowu. And the qiongqi.”
The word he used was unfamiliar to her—something like chee-yon-chee. She would have asked Shan to repeat it, but she knew better than to interrupt him now that he’d finally started talking.
“Out of all the Four Perils, the qiongqi is the most vicious.” He said it without emotion, as if relating a simple fact.
“Wherever there is argument, it can tell who speaks truth and who lies. It knows those of pure heart from those motivated by malice or greed. The qiongqi chooses who to help, and who to hunt. Who will go free, and who will be its prey.”
She’d asked him earlier, in innocent curiosity: What does truth taste like?
And his reply, curt and harsh: Delicious.
“Okay,” she said, carefully not letting any reaction show in her expression. “Let me check I’ve got this right. Are you saying your animal wants to, uh…”
“Eat people?” Shan finished dryly, while she was still trying to think of a polite way of asking whether he battled an unfortunate inclination toward cannibalism. “No. Meat does nothing to satisfy the qiongqi. It hungers for truth.”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
“It is,” he said grimly. “Leonie, is there truly no secret that you keep locked in your heart? Nothing you do not want to admit, even to yourself?”
She wanted to say no, of course not. Protest that she had nothing to hide.
But he could taste lies.
Shan nodded, taking her silence as the answer it was. “You see now. We all have things we would rather die than say out loud. Those are the truths the qiongqi craves. The ones that hurt.”
“So…lies taste bad to your animal,” Leonie said, still trying to figure out where he was going with this. “Which means it doesn’t have any interest in people who aren’t sincere. But people who do usually tell the truth…attract it?”
Shan nodded again. “Like a wasp to honey. But the sweetness of harmless truths is ultimately unsatisfying to the qiongqi. Like a diet of nothing but candy. It craves more. To strip away all the comforting illusions, all the little lies we tell ourselves. It longs to rip open its prey and feast on the deepest truths, raw and bleeding. That is the only thing that makes it content.”
She digested that. “Have you ever tasted a truth like that?”
A muscle flexed in his jaw. “Once. When I was ten years old.”
“What happened?”
“I revealed a truth best left unspoken.” His voice was tight, clipped. “My father left. It broke my mother. She never recovered.”
It was like she’d walked face first into a concrete wall. “Oh. Shan, I’m so sorry.”
“It was not your fault.” The bitter emphasis he put on the word made it clear exactly who he blamed. He held up his hand, claws now hidden. “After that, I learned to repress my nature. But a qiongqi is not easily caged.”
“Your animal is fighting you? Trying to take control?”
“Yes. I keep the qiongqi starved and imprisoned. In retaliation, it twists my body.” He paused, and although he didn’t move his head, she somehow had the impression of his gaze sliding away from her.
“It has become… harder to contain recently. That is why I was given this assignment. Here, it does not matter that I cannot pass as human.”
Oh, the poor man. Shifter Affairs agents had to be able to operate in mundane society without revealing their true nature. Shan was facing not only increasing physical impairment, but the end of his career.
Shan tugged at the cuff of his glove, pulling it over his wrist. “You say the children would benefit from having a counselor who also struggles with his animal. But I do not have an animal. I contain a monster.”
There was no anger or self-pity in his voice; only bleak acceptance. She didn’t need special powers to know he truly believed it. If he’d been a camper, she would have wrapped him in a hug.
“I don’t believe anyone is born a monster.” She held up a hand, forestalling any attempt at argument. “Shan, tell me this. Would you ever let your animal’s instincts overrule your own judgement?”
His reply came, swift and certain: “No.”
“Then it doesn’t matter what it wants. You’re no more dangerous than I am.” She knew it was true, down to her bones—and unlike him, she trusted her own instincts. “And I truly believe you’d make a good counselor.”
Shan’s tongue darted across his upper lip. “I tell you what I am, and you still want me at your side?”
“Yes,” she said, willing him to taste the truth of her words. “Frankly, I need your help. I’m worried about the kids.”
“I did not think you believed there could be a genuine threat to the camp.”
“I don’t. If you ask me, Zephyr and Conleth are being ridiculously paranoid about this whole thing.
Rufus may believe there’s something strange in the woods, but you said yourself that your ability only determines whether someone’s lying, not whether it’s objectively true.
I’m certain this will all turn out to be nothing. ”
Shan was still looking confused, at least for him. She was getting better at reading the minute shifts in his expression. “Then why do you wish me to stay at all?”
“Because yesterday, I would have bet my own animal that Rufus would never flat out lie to me.” The sheer wrongness of it felt like a lead ball in her stomach.
“Not for any reason. And the other kids are acting out of character, too. Estelle and Archie can be a handful, but they wouldn’t play a prank that might genuinely worry any of the camp staff.
And even if they did, Beth and Finley would never go along with it.
They wouldn’t tell a lie this big without very good reason, Shan. But I have no idea what it could be.”
“And you want me to help you discover it,” Shan said slowly.
“The kids clearly aren’t just going to tell us what’s actually going on. It’ll be a lot easier to uncover the truth if you’re right there with me, able to sort fact from fiction.” She searched his face, but she couldn’t read his expression at all now. “I need your help, Shan. Work with me. Please.”
His throat worked. He breathed out a heavy sigh, and nodded.