Black Rook by Kelly Meade

she could smell him—the musk of his aftershave, the sharpness of sweat, and the deeper, damp leaves scent of his loup garou nature. She had never smelled anyone so acutely in her life. Of course she’d spent almost her entire life around other Magi. Perhaps the loup simply had stronger body odor?
    The silly thought almost made her giggle.
    He helped her sit on the edge of the desk, but the faint dizziness didn’t dissipate. Dr. Mike held her chin loosely in his hand and looked into her eyes. She stared back at him, alarmed and confused and somewhat loopy.
    “Her pupils are dilated,” Dr. Mike said. “Are you feeling any sort of numbness or shortness of breath?”
    “No, just dizzy.”
    “Heart palpitations?”
    “Not really.”
    Dr. Mike took her wrist and held it, then glanced over his shoulder at the clock. “Your pulse is close to one hundred. That’s much too fast for a woman your age at rest.”
    “She’s probably nervous,” Rook said.
    “Mind your own health, son.” He spoke with a fond gruffness that made Rook smile, but it did nothing to ease Brynn’s nerves. “Miss Atwood, I don’t want to alarm you, but it’s possible you’re having a reaction to your own poison.”
    “No, I can’t be.” She shook her head, which turned out to be a mistake. Her vision blurred, and perspiration broke out on her forehead and upper lip.
    “Brynn?” Rook said. He grabbed her hand, squeezed it. The shock of his touch grounded her briefly, before being broken again by dizziness. She tried to press back and couldn’t manage it. Something was very wrong.
    “It’s all right, young one,” Dr. Mike said. “It’ll be all right, you’ll see.”
    “This isn’t happening,” Brynn said. Her voice sounded muffled, far away.
    The sleeve of her t-shirt was pushed up, then something cold touched her shoulder. She tried to look, but Rook turned her head back toward him. She focused on him—his concerned eyes, his full lips, on those strange silver things in his ears and the hints of tattoos on his neck. Something stung her shoulder.
    “I don’t understand,” she said.
    “You’ll be okay,” Rook said. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”
    “Promise?”
    “I promise.”
    A rush of vertigo changed everything, and Brynn reached for him even as she fell.
    ***
    Carrying an unconscious woman down the stairs and out the front door of the auction house was a little too conspicuous for Rook. Of course, laying Brynn out on the office floor on a couple of towels, with the wicker chair cushions as pillows, wasn’t a spectacular compromise, but it was the best he and Knight could do. Even Dr. Mike was surprised at how quickly she’d succumbed to the small dose of ketamine he’d given her to counteract the poison. She wasn’t full-blood loup garou, and she’d been exposed to the poison longer than Rook, which seemed to account for her strange symptoms. Dizziness instead of the forewarned seizures.
    He just hoped they’d acted quickly enough.
    Once he deemed Brynn stable and sleeping, Dr. Mike packed up his bag, blood samples, and the ring, and he returned to his office to run his tests. With his own strength returning, Rook found himself pacing the length of the office, agitated and confined by the small room. His steps fell in uneven measures, creating an imperfect melody in his mind that did nothing to distract him.
    “You’re making me dizzy,” Knight said from his perch on the edge of Father’s desk. The wicker chairs were not comfortable without the cushions, and no one but Father sat in his leather chair.
    Rook mentally flipped him off and continued pacing. “How could she not know?”
    “About what?”
    “Having loup blood.”
    “If her Magus blood is dominant, it’s possible she’s never even shifted. We’ve stumbled across human-loup half-breeds who have no idea they’re part loup.”
    “But her father has to know. He’d have to know her mother wasn’t human or Magus or whatever it is