The hackles on Lou’s back raised up, and the sight of that cleared my head. How stupid of me. This time it wasn’t Morgan at all. This time it was a shape-shifter, clothing herself in Morgan’s persona. Maybe Ramsey hadn’t been exactly sleeping after all. She reached toward me, but I had a surprise for her as well. I reached into my pocket and balled up the change-inhibiting ball of earth I carried. Matching her smile, I walked right up to her, and for a moment she hesitated, unsure of herself. Then I flung my hand out, quick as a snake. She jerked her head back, but not in time. The glob of dirt plastered itself over her neck and shoulder, dripping down and staining her tee shirt. She couldn’t transform herself now until she cleaned it all off, and that would take her a while.

It was still two against one, but Ramsey hardly counted and the Morgan persona had no real strength or defense. And I wasn’t just one, anyway-I had Lou. He’s too small to have much use in a physical fight, but he has strong jaws and sharp teeth, and could keep someone like Ramsey at bay until I had time to deal with him. My talent could easily overcome Ramsey, and although the Morgan shape-shifter wouldn’t be affected much by it, I had one more thing as well. I had my knife.

I took it out and snapped open the blade. Morgan had spread her fingers wide and seemed to be straining. Her smile faded as she realized nothing was happening, and an expression of frustration appeared on her face. Then the beginning of panic. I allowed myself a moment of sweet satisfaction.

Lou spun around and gave two quick warning barks. Ramsey was up to something. I’d dismissed him as a threat, but that’s never a good idea, no matter who it is. He was on home turf, and desperate, and anyone can be dangerous if you give them the chance.

I turned quickly, leaving the fake Morgan on her own for the moment. Ramsey hadn’t moved from the door, but he wasn’t quite Ramsey anymore. His face had narrowed considerably, his hands had sprouted fresh new claws, and he’d grown a bit in height.

The Wendigo had originally warned me that they traveled in pairs. Always. I’d neglected to ask what happened if one of them died. Since we hadn’t been able to close the energy pool, an open conduit remained between their world and ours, and apparently a bench player had been brought in to help out. Maybe these shape-shifters had a psychic connection between each other, or maybe the Morgan imitator had just been thoroughly briefed. Either way, there were now two of them to deal with and I was in trouble.

My knife, which a moment before had seemed a weapon of deadly purpose, now seemed weak and ineffective. A four-inch blade is a dangerous thing. It can slice through flesh and sever arteries. If you’re strong, you can even plunge it straight into a heart, even if you don’t know what you’re doing. I’d never before used a knife for anything more violent that cutting rope or slicing salami, and against a tiger or a bear or a brain-eating shape-shifter it seemed a very long shot indeed. But a long shot is better than no shot at all, and at the moment of truth you either do what you must or you die. It doesn’t get any simpler than that.

Lou poked his nose into the back of my knee once, then again, sharper. That’s his signal for when he’s about to do something he thinks is clever. Sometimes it is, and sometimes it isn’t. I hoped this was one of his cleverer thoughts.

He charged the shape-shifter, snarling in his most ferocious manner, but before he reached it he uttered a strangled yelp, stiffened, and keeled over. Immediately he started twitching, then jerking, then howling with a tone that set my teeth on edge. His legs flailed around and shook with tremors, foam came out of his mouth, and he snapped his jaws over and over, so strongly I thought he was going to break some teeth. He was in the midst of a typical grand mal seizure.

It was impossible to ignore. I had a hard time looking away, and I knew it was all an act. The shape-shifter was momentarily transfixed-it was something totally unexpected, outside its experience. Its head was turned away from me, and for just an instant it forgot I was even there.

I would have bolted past it through the door, but it was blocking the exit. I had one chance, and I took it. I was across the tiny room in half a second, knife held low, and by the time it reacted and turned its head toward me it was too late. I was right up on it, and I plunged the knife into its throat and immediately yanked it out toward the blade side. I sliced partly through the tough trachea, and more important, tore through the carotid artery. Blood spurted out, pulsing with every strong beat of its heart.

It could still have killed me then with one swipe of its powerful claws, but it instinctively reached up in a vain attempt to staunch the gushing blood streaming from its throat. I jumped back as Lou scrambled to his feet, miraculously healed.

The thing was tough. It could have taken a bullet and still have fought on. But when blood is draining from a main artery, it doesn’t take long to sap the strength. And there’s a psychological element as well. A wound like that, a wound you instantly realize must be mortal, produces a paralyzing fear and robs the will. It gave a bloody cough, took two hesitant steps, and sank down with its back against the door. I was no longer even in its thoughts.

I turned to face the Morgan one. She was frantically scraping off the dirt I’d smeared on her, and had managed to get rid of most of it. There was still enough left on her body to inhibit her ability to transform, but not enough left to stop it completely. She was stuck in the middle, a weird hybrid of attractive young woman and voracious shape-shifter, still recognizable as Morgan, but with those trademark claws and a horribly distorted jaw and mouth. She was larger than she’d been, not a full-sized monster, but not a slim girl anymore.

I thought she might run when she saw her partner dying on the floor, but the thought never entered her mind. She bounded over to the fallen shape-shifter, looked down briefly at it, and then sprang at me, claws outstretched.

I wasn’t going to get lucky twice, and she wasn’t going to be taken by surprise. Without thinking, I spun and headed up the stairs to the level above.

Now I had the high ground, and I’d have at least some advantage when she came after me up those narrow stairs. It wasn’t much, but every bit counts. Lou was behind me when I made my break toward the stairs, but he made it to the top before I did.

The room upstairs was windowless and even tinier than the room below. A bureau was pushed up against one wall, and almost the entire rest of the space was taken up by a mattress on the floor, reeking of the creature’s lair and covered with tangled sheets and blankets. And blood. Now it was my turn to be distracted.

Ramsey, the true Ramsey, lay crumpled on a corner of the mattress, chest opened in a familiar fashion, skull shattered and empty and smeared with viscous gray matter. He couldn’t have been dead more than a few hours. Karma. Ramsey might have been weak and morally repugnant, but he’d paid for his sins.

I wrestled the bureau to the front of the room and jammed it between the narrow walls of the stairway. It wouldn’t slow down the shape-shifter for long, but every second was precious. The sight of Ramsey’s body had given me an idea. Not a nice one, but beggars can’t be choosers.

When I was young, before Eli straightened me out, I’d had a brief fling with the dark arts. I never got into it seriously; it just wasn’t me. But I’d learned a few things that I’d just as soon have forgotten, except you don’t forget things like that. And one of those things, not surprisingly, had to do with fresh corpses and blood. There’s a reason they call it the dark arts.

It was no time to be squeamish, though. Moral and ethical considerations tend to vanish when you’re faced with a deadly shape-shifter and nowhere to hide.