He sped up, and I didn’t dare do so. Never run from werewolves; it only makes them hungry. He said something soothing. It might have been in Czech or Slovak, but “Here, puppy” is a phrase that needs no translation.
A four-board-wide fence spanned a rare space between two buildings. I’d paid little attention to it when I’d passed it the first time except to note the dark green splatter of graffiti that was no more legible for being in Czech than the graffiti was at home. Now I was happy to note that the fence was level, top and bottom, but the ground had a little swell on one side. So there was a space just big enough for a coyote to slide underneath with enough panache that it looked like I’d done it before.
See? I am a dog going home, not the foreign mate of a foreign Alpha running away from a nice werewolf.
I found myself in a garden that was much bigger than the four-board fence had made it appear, because the garden extended along the space between the two buildings and into a back area that was pretty and green.
There was a dog in the garden—a very big dog who couldn’t have squeezed out the hole I’d squeezed in through. The large female mastiff came around the corner of the building just as my follower grabbed the top of the fence and chinned himself up to look over the fence.
The werewolf probably thought I smelled weird. It is hard to smell yourself—but I’d been in an accident, been hauled to Italy, smuggled myself aboard a diesel bus, then traveled halfway across Europe. “Interesting” was probably a light word for what I smelled like. Maybe he’d caught a whiff of pack, but since I could hardly feel them, I didn’t think so.
The mastiff, bless her, welcomed me into her yard like a golden retriever welcoming a burglar into his home—that is to say, with a wagging tail and licks of affection. That is not my usual experience with mastiffs, but I wasn’t going to complain. The werewolf in human form laughed, dropped off the fence, and patted it. He said something cheerful and quiet—and he left.
I snuggled against the lonely mastiff for maybe a half hour before getting up from her side and sliding back under the fence. She didn’t notice my going. Her quiet snores made me feel guilty, like a lover who sneaks away in the night. I was comforted by her sleek, well-groomed body; someone loved her.
I checked the fence from habit—and yes, I’d left some fur behind, but that couldn’t be helped short of changing back to human and cleaning the bottom of the boards—naked. So I ignored it and walked off thoughtfully (and painfully—I was becoming less pleased with the cobblestones with every step).
I probably would have returned to my camping spot, but I didn’t want to go straight back to where my purloined backpack was. I was being paranoid, but paranoia was a good thing. The Lord of Night was after me.
The circuitous route back to the restaurant took me through the old Jewish Quarter—I knew that because there were lots of signs for lost English-speaking tourists like me to follow. And because of the Old-New Synagogue.
The Old-New Synagogue was about six hundred years old or so, which made it the oldest operating synagogue in Europe. I only remembered all of that because I thought the name was funny. I’d wondered about the Old-Old Synagogue, but I guess the name was a translation error and there wasn’t one. Still, it was an awesome name—and the building was interesting-looking.
Six hundred years old. I stared at it and tried to imagine how it would feel to be Bran or the Moor and look at such things and remember before they were built. To look around the city and realize that the oldest thing in this old city was probably you.
Adam would be there someday, assuming nothing killed him before then. I don’t know about me. I don’t think anyone does. My half brother, who is also Coyote’s child, says that sometimes we live a long time, half-mortal and half-avatar or manitou or whatever Coyote and his kindred spirits are. Coyote told me I was too caught up in naming things—which is an excuse to not understand them. I had a few names for Coyote that I was too polite to use.
I was trotting down a very narrow backstreet, this one less touristy than the first few I’d found, when, between one step and the next, every hair on my body rose.
I shrank down against the wall I’d been walking by, trying to hide myself between a step and a garbage can. Magic swept through the street and paused by me. Magic and something that called to my supernatural nature in a way I’d never felt before.
My hiding place had not worked, so I stepped out to face . . . a ghost.
I have an affinity for ghosts, something I inherited from my father in addition to being able to change into a coyote. I see them when other people don’t. I used to think I knew a lot about ghosts, but I’d started to believe that no one did. I generally tried not to pay attention to the ghosts because it made them pay attention back.
This one waited with the same utter stillness I’d seen in Stefan and a few other vampires. But it wasn’t the ghost of a vampire—yes, there are such things. It wasn’t anything I’d ever seen before. I’d never seen a ghost that could hold as much magic as this one did.
Darkness gathered around it, giving it size without form. Ten feet at least, maybe a little more. There was a heaviness about it—it felt dense. The weight of the magic it held, a weave of magic filled, in part, with a kind of power I’d never felt before, made it difficult to breathe.
Some of the energy felt very familiar, but I couldn’t place it. It wasn’t fae magic or witchcraft. Maybe if it hadn’t been entwined with the totally alien feel of the other magic, I could have placed where I’d felt it before.
I took another step, and the mist of magic touched my feet, washing over me with a strange, clean warmth. It should have scared me, that feeling. Whenever any magic feels good—that’s the time to worry.
But, alone in a strange city, with the monsters hunting me, I closed my eyes, and the shadow pulled away the weariness, the pain, and the fear that I’d been battling since I woke up in the house of the Lord of Night. It fed me comfort and energy and light—and it fed from me, too. At the time, caught in its magic, I didn’t care. I felt the magic brush the bonds I shared with Adam and the pack and hesitate on that other bond.
Impulsively, I took my human shape and stood before the ghost of Prague’s past with my hands open and outstretched. “I mean no harm to you or yours,” I told it—it did not feel male or female to me. To my human eyes, it was even less clearly defined.
There was no reason to suppose that it spoke English. But the words had come to my tongue by instinct—as a coyote shapeshifter, I trusted my instincts more than most people did. Ghosts generally could understand me no matter what language I spoke.
It contemplated me for a moment more, then cried out hoarsely, a sound of rage and frustration and loneliness that should have shook the windows in the nearby buildings but didn’t. No one came to see what caused the noise.
Runnels of magic slid down my face, as if it had taken a swipe at me with claws. The sensation dug into my bones like hot metal—almost as shocking as the wrenching twist from warm delight to fear. Then the whole thing, magic and all, slowly dissipated. For one instant, I glimpsed something glowing on the center of its forehead, letters that disappeared before the last of the magic. Not letters in any alphabet I knew, though they resembled two oddly written “n”s and an “x.” It could have been Arabic or Russian, but I was pretty sure it was Hebrew and that the three letters together spelled emet, truth.
Because I had just met the Golem of Prague—or what was left of him, anyway.