Stain of Midnight

by Cassandra Moore

  “Not really. Fights have started to break out at all the supernatural hotspots in town. No werewolves in sight, but plenty of vampires.”

  “So Pirelli decided to get off his ass after all and try to solve the problem?”

  Sonja looked wry. “He doesn’t have a choice. Some of the ones he held through intimidation have decided to fight back. They’re laying siege to Pirelli’s manor.”

  Cameron twisted the key in the ignition. “At this rate, we’re going to be lucky if there’s a Tacoma left standing after tonight.”

  Sonja leaned her head back against the headrest. “If Teresa doesn’t do it, the unrest she’s started will. What a damned mess.”

  “Literally damned,” Cameron added, and pointed them toward the mountain.

  On any other night, the sight of Rainier in the distance would have comforted him. He’d never understood his fascination with the mountain before now. It went past the majestic beauty of the slopes, past the knowledge that his pack met and played there. The mountain fascinated him because the power it held had flowed through him. He had become part of Rainier, as much as it had become part of him. After so long as its guardian, the urge to save the mountain itself burned as strong as his desire to save the people who called this area home.

  Orange light streaked the sky around the mountain, angry with the glow of the deepening sunset. The full moon would come up soon. Cameron knew Teresa Espina had to already be somewhere on the mountain, empowered by her stolen demonic power to better tolerate the sun. How long before she finished the last abhorrent steps she needed to perform to take control of the ley lines? He wondered if they’d run out of time before they even set out.

  Surrounded in fire and an encroaching darkness, the mountain looked like the last, weakening bastion of the light. Cameron tried not to imagine himself as the most inadequate of knights, riding home to save king and country after the barbarians had already battered down the gate.

  “You sure about this?” Cameron asked, as Sonja climbed out of the Humvee.

  Not really, she thought, but that didn’t do them any good. So she nodded. “For some values of ‘sure’, yes. If we take ‘sure’ to mean ‘wishing I could pee on the floor like a nervous puppy’, then I am absolutely sure.”

  Cameron laughed, face lit up with the desperate gallows humor, and Sonja loved him for it. Both of them knew they might not see each other again after this moment. My last joke ever may have been about peeing on the floor. That’s right, Sonja. Live a classy life, die a classy death. Yet they still laughed. “All right. I’ll be where I told you I think Teresa will go. Be careful.”

  “You too,” she said. Unable to resist, she climbed across the seat for one more kiss. “I’ll bring the cavalry.”

  “I’ll try not to need it,” he murmured. “Just you.”

  The first sliver of the full moon peeked over the horizon. Both the werewolves could feel it. They had run out of time for goodbyes.

  Sonja slammed the door to the Humvee and didn’t look back.

  Russ had opted to hold his full moon meeting lower on the mountain than the Tacoma pack usually did. Easier to get back into town, Sonja figured, and the Seattle pack had far less attachment to the local geographical feature than the Tacoma wolves did. As the Humvee roared off, Sonja reached within for her wolf. As the familiar wave of guilt and resentment built, she let it roll through her, then away. I will never make excuses for being who I am. And I am a wolf.

  Fur settled over her with the familiarity of an old coat. Power came with the shift in shape. She welcomed it, embraced it. When she lifted her head to howl, she gloried in the sound of wolfsong. Outsider comes to your meeting, the howl said.

  More answered her. We allow you to come.

  She ran in the direction of the lupine voices. As she drew closer, other wolves came out of the woods to run alongside her. Escorts to ensure she didn’t cause trouble. Not yet, anyway. When she did, they wouldn’t have any ability to stop her.

  The forest opened into a clearing. A campground, Sonja thought, one of the smaller ones with a spigot and few other amenities. As little as she’d had to do with the Seattle pack, she’d known they had numbers, but seeing them in one place impressed her. Double at least what the Tacoma pack had ever possessed at their peak, men and women both who ranged in age from young adults to active senior citizens. All heads turned to watch as she ran in with her chaperones. Dozens of keen, bright eyes evaluated her intent, her strength. She held her head up higher.

  She didn’t see Curtis, or any obvious enforcers. He ought to have been the easiest one to spot, with the exception of his alpha, but Sonja couldn’t find him in the crowd.

  Russ stood at the head of the pack. He looked surprised, the kind of surprise that hopes it won’t end up disappointed by what it fears might happen. “That you, Miss Carter?”

  Sonja shifted her form back to human. “It is. You invited me to come.”

  “I did, but I admit, I didn’t think you’d take me up on it.” He folded his arms over his chest. “Come to join up, then?”

  “It would be easier for everyone if I could just convince you to name a new enforcer.” She spread her hands. “It doesn’t even matter who, as long as it isn’t Curtis.”

  A scowl darkened Russ’s face. “Did Roswell put you up to his?”

  “Sanity put me up to this. Tonight is going to go very, very badly if you don’t. Curtis is in league with the vampire trying to destroy the damn city.” She swept her hand to point up the mountain. “Where is he right now? Up there with her?”

  “It’s none of your business,” he growled. “Despite what you may think, Miss Carter, I am not an idiot. I know my people. Curtis has been with me for years. If all you came to do is make accusations, then I’ll save us all some time and exile you with your friends.”

  Adrenaline burned through her veins in a sudden rush. Within the vault of her mind, her wolf howled, demanding she set it free. That had frightened her once, the howling, feral power that clamored for release. Not her beloved magic that she had to call from outside herself and mold. No, this power was her, and to turn it down would be to deny herself. Never again.

  “No,” she said, both to Russ and to the ghost of shame that had haunted her before tonight. “I have come to challenge you for leadership of your pack.”

  Stunned silence. It didn’t last long. “You can’t do that,” Russ spat, angry and caught off-guard. “The local pack can’t put up a challenge until the next full moon.”

  “I’m not part of the local pack. I never have been. For all my time in Tacoma, I have been a lone wolf.” The wildcard. The loophole. The one who could cut through the bullshit.

  One of the older werewolves quirked her lips in amusement. “Actually, Russ, she can do that. It’s one of the reasons smart alphas don’t keep lone wolves around.”

  Russ snarled. “I don’t have time for this.”

  “Then you’d better beat me quickly.” Sonja took three quick paces forward to stand in front of him. “Answer the challenge or surrender, alpha.”

  He didn’t have much of a choice. “Challenge accepted.”

  Cameron counted three heartless corpses in the woods around the cave entrance. By the shrieking that echoed from the alcove, a fourth would join them soon enough.

  In Cameron’s dream, the cave had seemed endless. Not so in reality. It created more of an alcove with a view than a cavern system, though Cameron thought it might once have looked different. Shapes in the rocks suggested geological activity had closed any downward passages and left only this niche behind. He got the distinct impression that the mountain had closed the area off to protect itself.

  He edged up behind one of the rocks that jutted out near the alcove to try for a view inside. Once he had it, he wished he’d avoided the sight. Curtis held a struggling captive, one of his own enforcers if Cameron didn’t miss his guess, while Teresa vivisected the unfortunate man with her hands. One arm had already sunk elbow deep into the
man’s torso. The other arm, the one on the side Sonja had perforated with a crossbow bolt, Espina still seemed to favor. She kept it tucked close to her body as if she didn’t want to move it. It slowed her down, he could see, but it didn’t stop her.

  Bile forced its way up into Cameron’s throat when she licked blood off her finger with the idle motion of a baker tasting a bit of frosting that had escaped the cake.

  Apparently, it bothered Curtis, too. “Could you fuckin’ not?” he asked, face twisted in a grimace.

  “Waste not, want not,” Teresa chided. “Why does a little sampling of blood bother you so?”

  “Because it’s fucked up.” Curtis sounded like it should have been obvious to her. Cameron had to agree with him. One shouldn’t need an etiquette book to realize it was in bad taste to lick one’s fingers while pulling the heart out of a sacrifice.

  “You’re so provincial.” Teresa motioned for Curtis to dispose of the body. Drops of blood flew off her hand with the motion. “We need to hurry. Are you ready?”

  “More than. Let’s get this over with.” Curtis pitched the body out the entrance. Cameron ducked behind the rock again and lost his line of sight.

  “One would think you did not like me. Even after all we have been through together.” The too-saccharine tone didn’t leave any questions about Teresa’s opinions of Curtis.

  “Lady, I don’t have to like you to get what I want from you.”

  “That was surprisingly apt.”

  Cameron chanced a look around the rock again. With his eyes adjusting to the increasing darkness, he could make out four shapes in the approximate corners of the cave. The jars. Bigger than he’d expected. Plain but for spidery runes etched along the surface. Tacky decorations one might find next to a faded plastic plant at a second-hand shop, except that the sight of them made the hair on the backs of his arms stand on end.

  It got no better when she lifted the lid on the one nearest her. Dark, fetid lumps of meat filled the canopic jar to the very rim. Not meat. Hearts. His brain ran gruesome calculations. If each heart were the size of his fist, and the jar was full, how many hearts were in it? And if all four were full... Guess how many hearts are in the jars and you could win your very own demon. What the fuck is she doing with all those?

  “Stand here,” Teresa said, interrupting Cameron’s thoughts. She directed Curtis to a place between two of the jars. Cameron squinted. Lines etched in powder covered the floor, though he could hardly see them for the darkness. It reminded him of Lindsey’s ritual circle the day before.

  The jars really are like Lindsey’s bowl. They hold the power, and they keep the demon in the circle. The jars have the power of all the hearts that have been put in them. Curtis has the power of the mountain. So, she’s going to, what, direct all that power into the demon? That’s a lot of power. Lindsey had summoned up a half-formed being just with a bowl of stored blood. Cameron couldn’t imagine what a person could do with all this.

  Guess I won’t need to imagine. He watched as Teresa closed the powder circle around Curtis’s feet. Once she had it as she wanted it, she fetched a small, wooden box from where it rested near a wall.

  Even Cameron could hear the whisper. It wrenched a violent shudder from him, because he remembered it. It had infiltrated his mind in Kiplinger’s basement and tried to compel him to give in. “The three-thousandth full moon is nearly in the sky. Do you have what you promised to me so long ago?”

  “I have it,” Teresa answered. Cameron would have sworn he heard fear under the cool vexation in her tone. “The time has come to free you from your prison. I have gathered power for hundreds of years to give you a mortal form once more.”

  The voice turned beguiling. “You could have given me yours. Already strong with the energies of the dead. Imagine what we could be if we combined our power.”

  “No!” she barked. “Do not overstep yourself, Malgerius. I have what you require. You will have your form. You will empower mine. But you will work through the intermediary, or you can stay in that shriveled lump of flesh for all eternity.”

  Never give an entity your own energy. They will use it against you, if they don’t outright use the connection it creates to take you over. Cameron looked over the setup again and tried to find the weak link. Teresa had stored flesh and energy in the canopic jars to give to the ritual, but Cameron realized she had done more than that.

  She hadn’t just needed the Guardian to unlock the power of the mountain for her. She needed an intelligent conduit who would remain loyal while he directed power through the ritual, both to the demon and to her. The Guardian also guarded her. Curtis would serve as a power source and a firewall.

  The demon needed Teresa to perform the ritual and give him the power she had promised him, and he needed Curtis to hand over the mountain’s power and exchange it for Teresa’s demanded return of her magic. Teresa needed the demon to return her magic, but needed Curtis to provide both power and protection. Curtis needed Teresa and the demon to become a shadow wolf like he wanted, and probably, he needed Teresa to get out of here alive with both his power and his sanity. It was the most fucked-up tripod of uneasy alliances Cameron had ever heard of. It must have taken Teresa half the time since she struck her bargain with the demon to create this delicate balance.

  It’s really going to ruin Teresa’s day when we pull the power out from under her.

  If they did. Cameron glanced at the bright, golden moon as it rose over the eastern horizon. Hurry, Sunny. Kick his ass already. Shit’s about to get real here.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Sonja could see from the first swing that Russ had underestimated her. Everyone forgot that lone wolves could live on their own because they didn’t need a pack to survive. Without anyone else to rely on, they learned to take damn good care of themselves.

  He shifted shape with a lazy roll of his shoulders. For all his impatience, he didn’t seem to mind showing off how easily he thought he would take care of the challenge. How long had he led the Seattle pack, she wondered, and how often did someone bother to challenge him for leadership? Even wolves became creatures of habit. An alpha who led their pack well didn’t garner people who wanted them overthrown. It had taken an offended, lonely lover to challenge Peter’s hold on the Tacoma pack. Russ held on by the remnants of his skill, true, but more by his reputation and image.

  Sonja didn’t fall into the temptation to do a little showing off of her own. He thought he didn’t have time for this. She knew she didn’t.

  A fight won fast and well is the best form of bragging, her father was fond of saying. She let the moonlight burn through her. Her bones creaked and stretched as she took on her half form. Muscles added bulk and power, until she felt like an invincible predator here to take what belonged to her. Another night, it might have scared her. Not tonight. Tonight, they threatened her mate, and for that, she would become a lupine god of vengeance.

  Russ tried to feint with a swipe of one clawed hand to goad her into an attack. She grabbed his extended arm. Nails bit into his forearm as she gripped him, then brought the palm over her other hand up to drive his elbow backwards against the joint. He howled and wrenched his arm out of her grip, leaving bloody gashes along his forearm.

  Suddenly, he became far more serious about their challenge.

  No feint this time. He snarled, teeth bared, and threw a flurry of angry strikes. She sidestepped, deflected the blows off to the other side with one hand. Her free hand drove a palm strike into his eye. By small fortune, his orbital rim didn’t shatter. He turned his head to wrap his teeth around her hand before she could draw it back. Pain blossomed in her fist, which in turn made her angrier. So she shoved her fist straight back into his muzzle to grab hold of his tongue.

  He flailed back, choking and gagging on her hand and his own blood. Blows impacted off her arm, her snout. She ignored them. Still holding on by his tongue, she drove her knee into his midsection once. Twice. Three times, until her hand grew too slick with blood
and spit to hold. The last kick connected her foot with his ribcage and launched him sideways. He tumbled to the ground.

  The air tasted like rotten flesh. Blood curdled and soured. Even without her former magical gifts, Sonja could feel the mountain’s energy change. Teresa had started her ritual.

  Rage had begun to take Russ. She could see it in his eyes. The simmer of the full moon’s power. The taint of shadow that coated the area’s energy like cold napalm. His own anger at a challenge, at his failure to meet it thus far. Sonja forced her mind into calm discipline just like she’d learned from her earliest lessons, let alone the ones she herself taught. She didn’t imagine Russ had any formal training. Just experience. It would cost him. She would see to it.

  She lifted her bloody hand and beckoned him with three fingers. Bring it on, alpha boy.

  He lowered his stance and bull rushed her. The air huffed out of her lungs as he connected. She dropped her weight. Momentum carried him over her head. He managed to get his feet under him, but not for long. She whirled her legs around and lashed out with one to sweep his knees. He thudded awkwardly onto his side.

  Agile, she rolled up to her feet. He grabbed her leg to pull her down, leaving gashes as he did. She let him drag her in. As he hauled her toward the ground, she brought her elbow down on his face. A pained yelp escaped him. Half kneeling over him gave her the perfect position. She drove her fist into his midsection hard. He raked at her side with his claws, beat on her with his fists to stop the assault. It worked. She rolled away to get to her feet before she soaked more damage. Sticky blood dripped down into her fur to mat into grisly chunks.

  Whispers tickled at the edge of her hearing. She chanced a look around at the pack. Many turned their heads, eyes narrow as they tried to identify the source of the sound. Sonja knew where it came from. She was running out of time.