Blossom and the Beast (The Alder Tales Book 1) Read online

  Blossom and the Beast

  RS McCoy

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2016 by RS McCoy

  www.rsmccoyauthor.com

  Cover Art by Kit Foster Design

  © 2016 * http://www.kitfosterdesign.com/

  Edited by Courtney Whittamore

  www.themoralofourstories.com

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted by the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database, retrieval system, or torrent web service, without the prior written permission of the author.

  For my boys

  Table of Contents

  The Bear Clan

  The Stranger

  Mother’s Inn

  Affliction

  Captive

  Trean

  The Beast

  Collection

  Lava Stone

  Transmission

  Hoop

  Festival

  Target

  Nunkai

  Trap

  Climber

  Serum

  Works by RS McCoy

  About RS McCoy

  Connect with RS McCoy

  The Bear Clan

  BLOSSOM STOOD WITH arms wide and eyes closed. A warm spring breeze sucked at her tunic. Her well-worn boots kept her planted to the metal structure protruding high above the forest. Below her, a sea of green, a vast expanse of tree tops stretching over the horizon. In her mind, she was a bird flying away, skipping across the sky like a stone on a pond.

  "Get down here, Blossom!" Hale’s annoyed shouts sounded like echoes on the wind.

  Even at a hundred feet up, as far from the earth as she could manage, her brother still found her. But that didn't mean she had to listen. He might be older and stronger and more responsible, but up here, she was free. That was sort of the point.

  "Blossom!"

  She turned and looked down at him, small as an ant from where she stood high atop the hollow metal mountain, some hulking rectangular structure that had long ago fallen over to be consumed by the forest. Covered with greenery over time, the remnant was so slick she had to dig in the heels of her boots for purchase.

  She'd never hear the end of it if she fell.

  "Blossom?" Hale shouted again. This time, she couldn’t ignore his frustrated tone.

  She rolled her eyes. She hated her name, hated the way her brothers loomed over her like hawks, hated the drudgery of her forest prison. She hated all of it.

  Two more weeks. Twelve days until her birthday. Twelve days until her transformation. Twelve days of trees.

  And then the rest of her life after that. She’d never get out of this forest.

  “Come on, better get down.” Blossom reached over to pat Fig’s head beside her ear. The motion made it look as if he nodded in response. Fig’s ferret feet scurried across her shoulders and down the collar of her tunic top, curling into his usual spot cradled against her hip.

  Blossom put both hands on the vine-covered metal and began the long climb back to the ground. The open, sun-filled sky closed in around her, replaced by thick forest. Back to the gloom under the canopy. There was no telling when she'd get to see such expanses of light again.

  She used her hands to steady her climb, lowering one foot after the other, closer and closer toward the ground. The canopy showed the first traces of pink, the earliest blooms of the alder flowers, her namesake. In a week, the Terras would dance around a grove and celebrate the start of spring, as they did every year.

  And like a good Terra, she should have been happy to celebrate with them.

  Thankfully, Blossom was a terrible guardian to the alder trees. In fact, her whole family was. There were no nights spent in prayer or whispered devotions to the sacred tree. The Bear Clan only pretended to love the Mother.

  Her thoughts flew from her head when a jagged edge of metal pierced her flesh, a long line from her littlest finger, down her palm, and into the meat of her hand. Blossom winced, more at the agony of telling her father than the actual pain. She wiped the blood on the side of her honey-brown pants and continued to climb down.

  "What happened?" Hale's bear senses had triggered before she descended within twenty steps of the ground.

  "Just a scratch. Nothing to be concerned about." Blossom twisted her injured hand away, but Hale was too fast.

  An angry huff escaped his nostrils. The tendons in his neck flexed, distorting the forest-green bear tattoo below his ear. "Da's gonna have both our heads."

  "I'll tell him it was my fault," she argued. And it was, in fact, her fault. Not that anyone would believe her. As the baby of the family, no one would let her take the blame for anything, even when it was earned.

  She was sick to death of always being treated like a child. She was seventeen for Alder Mother's sake. In a matter of days she’d earn her totem and her position within their branch.

  But for today, Hale knew, as well as she did, that things wouldn't change. Charged with keeping her safe, Hale would earn their father's anger for Blossom’s wound. Like a scene in her well-worn book, it played out the same every time. Da would tell Hale to keep an eye on Blossom. Blossom would get bored and decide to go see or do something else. Hale would get in trouble and Blossom would get off without so much as a cross look from Da.

  Blossom had no doubt Hale tired of her antics. But what was she supposed to do? Pretend like this green prison was enough? She wasn't like them. Deep in her bones, Blossom knew she didn't belong in the forest.

  As if to prove her point, Hale stepped back—one, two, then three steps—far enough away to avoid hurting her. Blossom, too, took a half-step back and waited for his transition to pass.

  Hale's arms erupted with thick hair so dark and unlike his light-hazel eyes. His body expanded, muscles over muscles, filling in the space around his slender figure. His legs lengthened, as did his arms, and his hands became paws tipped with sharp claws. His round face and kind features elongated into a snout, complete with conical, predatory teeth.

  Blossom grimaced. It wasn't fair that every single member of her clan had a totem—everyone but her—it was gloriously unfair.

  Hale collapsed to his front paws and let out a low growl. Where her brother had stood only seconds before, now stood his totem, the animal representation of him—a brown bear. In his human form, Hale was tall and wiry, the smallest of their clan with the exception of Blossom herself. In his bear form, he was the largest. Da said it was because Hale was meant to lead them one day.

  One day after Da was given to the Alder Mother’s grove.

  Until then, he was the youngest son of the clan leader, and the one in charge of keeping Blossom out of trouble. Blossom promised herself, as she had countless times before, that she would end these excursions. They only served to discredit Hale, and someday he'd need the full respect of the clan.

  Bear-Hale lowered his body to the ground, pressing his belly to the cool soil.

  Blossom shook her head. She didn’t need a ride. She refused. It was another reminder she didn’t have her own totem.

  Bear-Hale growled again. He lowered his eyes to hers and looked at her with those deep, black pools.

  It was a good thing he was her favorite brother.

  Blossom grabbed a handful of neck-scruff with her good hand and pressed her boot along the top of his paw, crawling up his side like she’d done so many times in the five ye
ars since Hale’s transformation.

  “This is the last time,” she told him, the same as she had for the last year, but her words were cut short by his sudden motion.

  Bear-Hale took off running. The steady loping of his paws made her clutch tight to his fur, desperate to keep from being thrown off. Da would really lose it then.

  They passed between the massive tree trunks of the sacred alders, some so large it would take twenty people to wrap around it. Others were smaller, no more than ten years old. The alder bark was pale white with ashy patches. The good Terras thought them to be beautiful, with their pink flowers that bloomed so numerous they blocked out the green, but to Blossom, they were the bars of her prison.

  Stupid sacred trees.

  She cursed each one as they passed.

  Bear-Hale’s breath was still measured and even when he slowed at the edge of their temporary camp. Moss-green fabric hung from low-hanging branches, arranged in pointed, triangular structures, open only at the wide flaps in front. Between them, low fires already burned.

  It would be dark soon.

  Bear-Hale soon stopped, tilting his shoulder toward the ground to ease her down. Once she was well away from him, he shook like a dog from a lake. Bear-Hale trembled with such force it sent a flurry of dark fur away from his body.

  Blossom couldn’t see through the cloud of black, but she knew beneath his skin, his bear muscles had faded and the claws had retracted. Before the hair settled on the ground, Hale stood tall and used his hands to smooth the front of his shirt.

  Satisfied he’d transitioned back to his human form, Hale stomped toward the camp. Fig’s feet clawed up her ribs, and his whiskered features appeared on her shoulder a moment later. Blossom sighed out her frustrations and followed him into camp.

  Tasia stopped her moments later.

  “There you are. Lathan was looking for you.” Tasia bent over the fire tending to a roasting deer.

  Blossom didn’t mention the irony.

  “Where is he?” Blossom tried to act interested, even though she fully knew she wouldn’t go looking for him until she’d run out of other options.

  “With your Da. Something happened out at the cut today. Nobody will say a word to me about it. You know, I’m not one of you yet.” Tasia rolled her eyes and chuckled, wiping her hands on her light-brown apron.

  Blossom would have felt bad for her—she had gotten the short end of a very short stick—but Tasia was too spirited to ever be pitied. Blossom’s Da traded a pair of fine horses, two barrels of grain, and a full Alder trunk for the pretty blonde with a deer totem. A bride for the oldest Frane son.

  Tasia had made the best of it, integrating into their illegal alder-harvesting operation like she belonged there all along. She loved Lathan, and someday they’d have children together. It was the best possible scenario for any Terra in the Alderwood.

  It was the most Blossom could hope for her future, though it was a little disappointing to think her da would trade her for horses and grain. It painted a pretty grim picture for the rest of her life.

  Blossom thanked Tasia and hurried through the camp, passing rows of tents and women at work either washing, cooking, or cleaning. Just watching them waste their days at such tasks made her want to dart into the forest and keep running until her feet gave out from under her. It was like a noose tightening around her neck.

  More than halfway through the camp, Blossom pulled back the flap of Hale’s tent. He stood with his back toward her, already pulling out his medical supplies.

  He knew she’d come to him for help. Not because he was the most skilled in the medical arts, but because she trusted no one like she trusted him.

  Blossom settled into the wooden chair and waited. The inside of the tent was dim, the only light coming from a single lantern and a crack of sunlight where she’d failed to close the flap all the way. Fig scurried down her arm and wriggled across the tent to the little wad of fabric on the floor, the one Hale kept for him.

  “This can’t go on, Blossom,” he said, his back still to her, and his voice low with apology.

  Her chest constricted. “I know. I’m sorry. I’ll stay in camp.”

  Hale’s shoulders sank as he put both hands flat on the table. “You can’t do that either.” He pushed off the table with considerable energy and turned to face her. In one hand, he held scissors, gauze, and a vial of healing ointment, and with the other, he pulled over a second chair. Hale sat with the chair-back between his legs and held his hand out for hers.

  Blossom produced her injured palm. His half-dozen rings, made of iron and black steel, shone in the sliver of light from the tent flap, a stark contrast to her naked fingers. “I can do it,” she lied. It would all but kill her. Days filled with fetching water or grinding grain—a slow, agonizing suicide.

  Hale didn’t answer. Instead, he drew a wad of clean fabric across the wound, wiping away the dried blood and the bit of green still lodged in it. Then, he smeared a healthy glob of healing ointment over the wound before wrapping her hand in gauze.

  “We saw Norin of the Amaris clan at the cut.”

  “So?” Blossom didn’t understand until she saw the way Hale’s eyes stayed low on her hand, refusing to look at her.

  “No way. I’m not even eighteen. It’s way too early,” she protested. They both knew it wasn’t out of the question, just less likely. She was close enough to transformation. Clans could come forward to trade for her at any time.

  Hale licked his lips in concentration. He focused on his task far more than he needed to, but Blossom knew it was to keep from thinking about it too hard. The night her father agreed to a trade, Blossom would join her new family. Hale would lose his only sister, and Blossom would never see any of her brothers again.

  Her chest felt as if it might cave in. Her whole life, she’d known this day was coming. The clans traded for wives. This was the way of the world. As a high-class female, she would one day be claimed by a neighboring clan, traded for like a bolt of fabric or a barrel of grain. Blossom put a hand to her sternum and tried to rub away the suffocating sensation. It was far too hard to breathe.

  Hale finished with her hand and stood to return his supplies to his kit. From his pocket, he produced the well-worn wooden coin he always carried. Ignoring her presence, Hale flipped the coin in the air and caught it in a closed fist. Then, he pressed it to the back of his other hand and stared at the result.

  Over his shoulder, he offered her a small smile, his previous worry fading into relief. Between his fingers, he held up the coin and showed her the result: an alder leaf.

  Blossom rolled her eyes. “That doesn’t mean anything.”

  Hale shook his head. “It means the Alder Mother has a plan.”

  She would never understand how Hale could stake his life on a coin toss. On one side, the carved leaf of the Alder Mother. On the other, the silhouette of a bear. Faith in the sacred tree or faith in his totem. It was how he made every major decision.

  In some ways, she envied him. It was so easy for him to replace fear with faith, and all with a few motions of his hands. Blossom would never be so lucky.

  Hale ran a hand through her mop of messy chestnut curls and smiled as if nothing had happened.

  But Blossom knew she was as much at risk now as she was moments before, regardless of what Hale’s coin told him.

  “Come on,” Hale prompted, urging her out of his tent and toward the center of camp. Blossom could feel every set of eyes on them as they walked. Hale’s hand rested on her shoulder, refusing to let her stray until they arrived at Da’s tent.

  Twice as tall as any other, Da’s tent was the same moss-green of all the tents in their clan—the color of Terra. Above each flap, a painted silhouette of the totem of the person who lived there. For the Frane brothers, all bears. For Da, a fox.

  The urge to know her own totem bit into her like a thorn. She wanted to know. Needed to know. Twelve days until she had her answer.

  Hale lifted the flap and pu
shed her inside, following close behind.

  Blossom huffed as she landed next to Lathan, who looked down at her with a quiet nod. Her oldest brother’s face was cast in heavy shadow from a candle on the table. Ahead of them, Da sat at his alder wood table with a man she’d never seen before. He had the same almond-brown hair of all Terras with a thick beard to match. He wore a goldenrod shirt and sat engaged in conversation with Da, the low candle flickering between them. And on his hands, more rings than she could count. Even at a distance, Blossom knew he was one of the wealthiest men she’d ever seen.

  “What are they talking about?” Blossom whispered, not at all sure she even wanted to know.

  “You, of course.” Lathan was no use at all.

  “Norin’s asking about you to see what kind of offer he wants to make.” At those words, Blossom spun and saw her second oldest brother, Parson, emerging from the shadows. He put an arm around her shoulders and pulled her in, kissing the side of her head before he released her.

  Like phantoms, the four Frane children stood in a row, watching their father discuss a trade for his only daughter. They all shared the forest-green eyes and milky skin of the Frane clan, but only Blossom had her mother’s curls and freckled features.

  Blossom felt lightheaded. With her three brothers at her side, it was hard to feel in danger. But at any moment, Da could make a deal, and she would have to leave. They wouldn’t be able to protect her any longer.

  She wished she could hear what they were saying. At the same time, she knew it was probably better that she didn’t. She could only imagine the things Da was saying. Blossom is a difficult child who never listens. No one can keep her under control. She doesn’t even have her totem yet.

  As much truth as there were in those words, she knew her father would never speak them to Norin. He would gain much more from their deal if Norin thought her valuable. It was in the interest of the clan to make her sound as good as possible.

  Then, the two men stood and clasped each other’s shoulder with their right hand, a bond of solidarity.