Lone Werewolf Duology (bxb)

18. What Doesn't Kill You

"Here. Keep it for me." He went to Liam, opened his unresisting hand and stuffed the cross into Liam's cupped palm. The thin chain spilled after it in a soft puddle of silver. Too late, Volya spotted a curly brown hair caught in the silver links.

"Oh, sorry." He would have untangled it, but Liam closed his hand around it before he could do it.

"I'll keep it safe for you," Liam promised and it sounded like, I'll keep you safe.

Let the fools on the net rave over the art-déco color of Volya's eyes. The truth was they were deep-seated, sunk between the brow and the jutting cheekbones, rather small and shaped like a pencil-tip. If one wanted the amazing ones, Liam beat him ten to one. His were an open book; and not some random train schedule either. Oh no! It was a page filled with sweet, sweet poems for the universe to read.

He staggered back from Liam and went to sit on the chair June liked so much. June plastered electrodes on his temples and over his heart.

He didn't object once, only glanced triumphantly at Liam: Naturally, they had the electrodes!

Liam shrugged apologetically, like man, I didn't know, okay?

June took her baseline measurements, then led him to the farthest end of the trailer toward a whizzing metal sarcophagus. Volya eyed it warily. "You want me inside?"

"Yes," June declared. "A full body scan. For Dr. Sangha." By the look of it, she would truss him like a pig and stick him inside if Sangha needed it.

He climbed in. The bloody thing wasn't built for comfort. Sangha took the investigation over, sitting at the workstation with the most screens. Or at least she did when the coffin's lid closed over it.

"I'm a werewolf, remember? Not a vampire," he quipped.

Sangha didn't even roll her eyes like Marina would have had. She said firmly, "Stay still, please. Avoid talking during the scan," and that was it.

He stretched inside the metal casket and applied himself to not moving. Something whirled on the outside of it. Light stayed steady. Nothing else happened for a while, except for Volya's fingers and toes turning icy-cold. Finally, he was released and sat on the edge, feet dangling, taking a few deep breaths.

The high-tech coffin weighed and measured him, and probably found him lacking, but he was relieved for it to be over.

Sangha smiled warmly from her workstation and picked a clipboard from the shelf. "Volya, there is one more thing I wanted to talk to you about. You refused a counseling session yesterday."

He wiggled his bare toes to restore the circulation. "Yes. I'm too far gone for it. I mean, if I were sane, would I be sitting here half-naked, volunteering to help you study my werewolf ancestors?"

Something distinctively world-weary flickered in Sangha's gaze. "You can put your clothes back on right now—"

"Even the socks?" ...and the cross?

"Yes, Volya, whatever would make you feel comfortable. We'll take as much time as needed to help you. There's no rush."

No rush? Even though Sangha exuded infinite patience, Volya wouldn't be fooled. Sangha, June and Liam were all on pins and needles. He could effing smell it. If he were vengeful, he could make them squirm to get back at them for not telling him anything. 

He envisioned asking Liam and June to leave the premises, counting the leaves on the living wall, then confiding in the kindly lady doctor about not being loved as a child. Telling her about the inner voice that applied the high voltage whenever his heart hesitated. Maybe crying a little. 

"I..." he chewed his lip, trying to figure out the best way to dodge the navel-gazing event. He felt ready for the Olympics in the individual category there, so he saw no need to add a team effort on top of it. "I came to terms with being abandoned a long time ago, Dr. Sangha."

"The news of your family had a strong impact on you," she pointed out as neutrally as when she was asking him if he could digest butter.

Sangha was wrong about butter, but she was on the money about the your-mother-loved-your-twin thing. He tossed lots of stones into the river because of it. And now he was fine. "Yeah, that sister thing rattled me a tad, but I'm okay now. It's all water under the bridge."

"Volya, it's okay not to trust the counselling and still try it."

"I said, I can deal. Respectfully, ma'am."

Sangha clicked her tongue, put a cuff on his upper arm, disinfected the underside of his elbow, and then jammed the syringe into his vein to show off her disagreement, which was kinda passive-aggressive of her. Or even vamp. God, maybe he did need counselling if he kept thinking about vampires and werewolves. He was getting worse than a teen girl about it.

The red meniscus shot up the thin plastic tube connected to his vein. So, his blood was still as red as the next guy's, thank goodness, despite the ancient DNA and CRSPRs frolicking in it like tadpoles in a pond.

Once Sangha filled a row of vials from his vein, she commanded Liam to keep an eye on Volya for fifteen minutes and call her back if he felt woozy...

"Oh, yeah, I am," Liam said, giving the vials a wince.

"So keep an eye on each other," Sangha replied in an even tone. Then she cradled her ruby bounty in her white-clad arms and whisked it to the separate trailer. It probably contained another lab.

June went along, so Volya was left alone with Liam.

Liam threw the discarded t-shirt over Volya's shoulders and pulled up a chair to sit right next to Volya. "Those extra-wide pecs over-awe me, but you look positively frozen."

"Almost," Volya touched Liam's wrist with his fingertips. His nails had a slight purple tinge. "Like a frog from a deep well, eh?"

He didn't expect Liam to catch his fingers between his steepled palms and breathe on them, but his eyes closed, accepting the caress. "You want a towel? They have a bunch here for the Mnemosyne. I can get you one."

Dizziness took Volya, but it wasn't the call-Sangha-immediately woozy feel. The electrical sensation that spread over his skin threatened to blow up with the million dollars' worth of scientific equipment, or at the very least unpeel the electrodes off his skin.

"N-no," Volya stammered. He could hear Liam's every breath, every racing heartbeat. They sat as close together as he did with Toshka on that last night in the orphanage, when their hips touched. Not as close as when Toshka had kissed him good-bye.

"What are you doing?" Volya's voice pitched ridiculously high, even in a whisper.

"Making amends," Liam replied in an impossibly soft voice.

If Sangha ever roped him into one of those counselling sessions, Volya would tell her that maybe, just maybe, he could live with not having had been loved as a child, so long as he was loved as an adult, in the here-and-now. It would be such a terrific thing, to be loved. But not just any kind of love. No, he meant true love, love with a capital L, love that wasn't easy to win. When he loved like that, was loved that way, the past would lose its power to hurt him.

The bond, the brain slug said, you want the bond, sounding like duh. Volya cringed: 'bond ' meant many things, some of them downright creepy.