Chapter fifteen

''Listen.'' Jane huffed. ''You don't have to like me, you just have to stay alive. And this means you have to learn how to control this.''

She looked around and found Maura among the tombstones.

''It's not that!'' The Doctor exclaimed. ''I can't understand what you want me to do!''

''Okay, okay.'' Jane waved her hands dismissively and walked up to the smaller woman. ''Lets take it from the top.'' She gestured to their surroundings at the old cemetery. ''You're a necromancer, you're drawn to the dead people. This is your natural habitat.'' Maura arched an annoyed eyebrow at her and Jane shrugged. ''It's true.''

''Okay, so what now?'' Maura crossed her arms over her chest.

The Detective twirled the small knife between her fingers and sensing Maura's unease she held it out to the Doctor, handle first. She gave Maura her hand and held the bowl directly under it. The Doctor hesitated, blade hovering over the scarred palm.

''It's okay, I'll heal.'' Jane nudged her but the Doctor shook her head again.

''I can't...'' She said through her teeth. ''It still will hurt.''

''It's okay.'' Jane nodded. ''It's nothing.''

She didn't look away when Maura made the incicion and blood trickled freely down into the metal bowl.

''We can't keep doing this.'' The Doctor muttered.

Jane withdrew her hand, sealing the cut with a handkerchief. ''I know.'' She agreed. ''You will eventually need to find some kind of small animal for this, I've heard of necromancers using rats and chicken.''

''I don't know if I could-''

''You would have to.'' Jane stuffed the handkerchief in her pocket and stared down at her now healing hand. ''I won't always be around and you can't use your own blood, it would make you dizzy eventually.'' She came behind Maura, taking her hand in hers, easing their fingers in the bowl. She felt the doctor stiffen against her but she let it go and they crouched down together, smearing a bloody symbol on the grave, one that Maura could swear she had seen somewhere before, because she felt a strange familiarity with it.. Then she guided Maura's fingers to trace the same symbol, only inverted.

''This is Life.'' She said, pointing to the first symbol. ''This is Death.'' She pushed Maur'as. ''And you're the bridge between these two.'' Her hands reached up, covering Maura's eyes. ''You need to forget the world around you and think of the world inside this grave. This is easier because you know the name.'' The tombstone marked the grave clearly, it belonged to a man named Harry Gordon. ''Forget about everything else and focus on that name, feel your energy pass through this tombstone and inside, deep inside the grave...''

For almost a second Maura felt the two symbols heat up, burn with energy against her palms. The solid surface under her hands was not solid anymore but felt like a vibrating liquid. Then she became very aware of Jane pressed against her and all that energy was out of her control, unharrnessed and misdirected.

Jane let out a surprised gasp and she stumbled backwards, barely managing to catch herself on another tombstone and not end up on the mossy ground.

''What the hell...'' She muttered, looking down at her forearm, at the dark and blistered area where Maura's hand had touched her.

The Doctor was on her feet and tried to move closer but Jane held her other hand out, holding her back.

''It's me, isn't it?'' She asked Maura and the woman blinked.

''What do you mean? What just happened?''

''Ever since I told you about the Executioner, you've been weird.'' She tried to keep her voice from reaching an accusing tone. ''You're afraid of me, you can't trust me and you can't focus.''

''How can I trust you!'' Maura snapped, wound tight with tense energy. ''I have a man lying in my morgue table and when I opened up his stomach I found blood in there, and you know what? It wasn't his blood!'' Her hands were clenched into fists and she stepped closed, despite Jane's earlier unspoken request to keep her distance. ''Next thing I know Vampirism is a thing that really exists and I seem to have a vampire that has been killed execution style in my morgue!'' She opened her arms with exasperation. ''And then you tell me you're the Executioner!'' She furiously searched Jane's eyes for a reaction. ''What the hell am I supposed to think?!''

''You think I killed this man.'' Jane offered quietly.

''Yes, yes I do, and I want you to tell me I'm wrong!'' She angrily wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. She wasn't used to speaking to other people this way, it made her upset and she hated it.

There was a long pause, the cool breeze shuffling through Jane's untamed hair.

''I can't.'' Was the only answer Maura got.

She hadn't believed it, not the first time the thought formed in her mind, not even a few second before. It was just something she had to prove didn't happen. She realised she hadn't wanted it to be true. But it was.

''How could you?'' Maura's voice sounded high pitched, even to her, and she hated it. ''You executed that man in cold blood! You're a murderer!''

''No.'' Jane said, finally letting anger reach her own words. ''You don't get to do that, you don't get to give me the hollier than thou crap.'' Without wanting to, her finger was jabbing at Maura's chest. ''You don't get to hide behind self righteousness, you don't get to judge me and what I have done.''

The Doctor was now painfully aware that Jane was physically bigger and stronger than her. No, it wasn't just that. The anger seemed to seep out of her skin like dark, raw energy. It scared her.

''You don't get to stand there and call me a murderer.'' Jane continued, lowering her voice. ''That man had already killed three women, do you want to know about that?'' She leaned closer to Maura. ''He would lure them in his apartment, they would have sex and when he was done with them he would kill them.'' She reached for Maura, her hands around the smaller woman's waist, pressing her against the tombstone behind them. She leaned even closer, her lips hovering over the side of Maur'as neck. ''He would bite them and suck them dry...'' She whispered and her words brought goosebumps against the doctor's skin.

Maura pulled away and the slap across Jane's cheek echoed in the empty cemetery.

The Detective snorted and Maura covered her mouth with her hand, shocked with her own actions. Jane looked down at her watch and shook her head.

''I have to go.'' She said in a low voice and looked around them. ''Suzie is here.''

''...What...?'' Maura asked, confused.

Instead of an answer something moved through the thick bushes on their right and something yipped. Maura jumped but she calmed down when she saw it was just a small dog, a brown cub with white spots. Then she realised it was a wolf cub.

Jane moved in front of her, hiding her field of vision and when she managed to look again in the wolf's place was a naked woman. A woman who was no stranger to her.

Senior Criminalist Suzie Chang was standing before her very eyes, under the pale moonlight, and she was smiling up at Jane. The Detective shrugged out of her leather jacket, enveloping the smaller woman inside it's warmth. Suzie stepped closer and wrapped her arms around Jane, who pressed a kiss on the top of her head.

''Hey...'' She said, as Suzie laid her head against her chest. ''All okay?''

''Yeah...'' The Criminalist sighed, looking content to just stay there.

''Hang on a second!'' Maura cut in. ''What's going on there?''

Jane turned to her, her demeanor towards the Doctor cold, without showing any indication of the anger Maurah had seen before. ''Suzie is a submissive wolf, one of the new cubs in the pack. She needs an alpha when she shifts for a few months, to make sure she learns to-'' She paused, realising she shouldn't share more than she should. ''The things she's supposed to learn. And stays in control.'' She looked down at her watch again. ''Someone is here to take you home, I don't think we'll manage to do anything tonight. We'll try again tomorrow.''

She turned around and without a second look at Maura she took off her clothes unabashedly, setting them down in a neat stack. She walked off without a hint of self consciousness into the thick trees until Maura couldn't see her anymore.

Doctor Isles found herself with mouth agape and hadn't recovered from the shock enough to close it.

Um you guys still interested in this story? Let me know
LK