Chapter Twenty-One
Adelaide Oval, Adelaide, Australia
Kelly watched in shock as the boy stood there, calmly waiting for the much larger men to come for him. She wondered how the leader could order this, like he expected the lad to be able to overcome four grown-arse men. She stared as the boy not only acted unconcerned but motioned for the men to attack him. She winced when Liam rushed forward, expecting it to be over quickly. Her eyes went wide in shock when the boy seemed to explode and a large dog—no, a wolf—stood in his place. Liam never stood a chance.
She slumped in Owen’s grip, her legs unwilling to work as her mind overloaded from the unbelievable and gory sight.
Owen’s voice sent chills down her spine when he whispered to her, “I’ll be the one you face, bitch. I might even give you your little toy gun back to make it more fun.”
Nausea settled in the pit of Kelly’s stomach at his words. Her stomach turned and she was about to be sick when a tremendous BOOM from above made her sway on her feet. She almost fell when Owen unexpectedly released her.
His hands covered his ears as he fell to his knees, his face twisted in pain.
When she looked at the field, she saw a black object hovering inches above it. That was shocking, but what caught her attention next was something she would remember until the day she died.
It was a Japanese man dressed in some type of all-black uniform. He held a large pistol in his hand, and when he looked her way, his eyes were glowing bright red.
Kelly didn’t have time to notice anything else before a wave of fear washed over her. It was pure terror, stronger than anything she had ever felt. It sank deep into her very core, causing her to fall to her knees and curl into a ball. Her stomach heaved again, threatening to expel its meager contents.
The fear seemed to go on forever , then stopped as suddenly as it had started. She slowly opened her eyes and saw the man coming toward her at a steady pace. As he got closer, she could make out a patch on his right shoulder: a blood-red background with a woman’s head in white. She focused on the patch he wore to distract herself from the nauseated feeling. It wasn’t a woman’s head at all, it was a skull with long flowing hair and fangs protruding from the top jaw.
A vampire’s skull.
Decklan was enjoying the show from the sidelines, his attention focused on Dustin as he quickly took down the first man and moved to kill the second.
Then everything happened at once.
A huge explosion shook the stadium, causing him to cover his ears in pain as the noise assailed his sensitive hearing. Then Dustin jerked in mid-leap and crashed into the man, and they both fell to the ground.
Movement on the field caught Decklan’s eye, and he turned to see a being of legend. A daywalking vampire stalked toward him, his eyes glowing like embers. Decklan fought the sudden panic that ran through him and shifted to wolf form in the blink of an eye. Seconds later, his huge black wolf snarled a challenge at the vampire and rushed to meet him. He only made it a few steps before he froze, overcome by a feeling of terror so deep he had to fight not to fall to the ground in submission.
The fear continued to beat down on him, and when it stopped, the vampire was before him.
Akio looked down at Decklan, disgust on his face when he spoke to the Alpha. “You have disobeyed the strictures set forth by Michael. Worse, you have acted without honor and disobeyed the orders of Queen Bethany Anne. Your sentence for these crimes is death.”
Decklan shivered involuntarily. He snarled as he warily watched the vampire and crouched as he prepared to attack. He took one mighty leap toward him, intent on ripping the vampire to shreds. Decklan Walsh wasn’t fast enough to know he’d already died.
Akio brought his katana down in an arc, separating the Were’s head from his body with one powerful swing. The headless body lay at his feet and Decklan’s blood sprayed across the sparse grass.
Akio recognized the young woman on the ground from the video. He walked over to her and offered his hand, one eye on the Were still curled up in a ball on the ground. “Are you injured, young one?”
Kelly stared, her mouth open as she shook her head from side to side in response.
“Good. Stay here; all will be made right soon,” Akio told her as he turned to where Owen was climbing to his feet, blood running from his nose and ears.
Owen surged to his feet and grabbed Kelly, yanking her behind him as he faced the vampire. He crouched and put up his guard.
Kelly didn’t hesitate when she saw him focused on the red-eyed man, who eyed Owen with a contemptuous smirk. This arsehole had taken her from her home in the night, held her prisoner for weeks, and then not two minutes earlier threatened her life. Seeing him with his back to her in such a vulnerable position was too much for her to resist.
She took a step toward his back and screamed her rage at him.
Owen shook his head as he removed his hands from his sensitive ears. Whatever had caused the blast, it had overwhelmed his senses and knocked him to the ground. He felt a trickle of blood running from his nose, and his ears were ringing loudly. Although he healed faster than a human, he took longer than many other Weres. He squared off with the man, preparing to shift and end him, whoever he was, for daring to take what was his.
Kelly moved like a woman possessed. She took a fast step and cocked her rear foot, her eyes locked on her target.
Owen stopped himself from shifting when he heard a muffled sound from behind through the ringing in his ears and saw the man in front of him widen his eyes in surprise.
“Mother—” Kelly screamed as her foot came up to crash into the V at the top of Owen’s spread legs, “FUCKER!” she finished as she slammed her foot into his balls.
Owen was trying to figure out what was wrong when the pain hit him like a runaway train. Even though Weres recovered quickly from injuries, a swift kick to the jewels still hurt. He turned, intending to kill her on the spot, but he should have maintained his situational awareness. He learned that when he was yanked back by his neck and slammed to the ground.
“Bad wolf. Stay.” Akio chuckled. Seeing the human woman deliver a blow to the man who had wronged her made him smile. Well, after he’d winced.
Owen shifted on the ground, and a large wolf jumped up in his place. He darted at Akio, so enraged that he didn’t realize what he was. His intent was to hamstring him and then kill him slowly.
Akio lowered his sword.
Owen saw it too late, just before the tip sank into his eye.
Akio shoved the blade so it exploded out the back of the wolf’s head, then twisted and pulled the blade out, spinning as he brought it up and around. His body was a blur as the blade whistled through the air to impact the back of Owen’s neck. Akio froze, his blade held point down as the wolf’s head spun end over snout and landed with a solid thump on the ground.
Kelly’s eyes went wide as she saw what Owen was and how easily the strange man in front of her had dispatched him. She took a step back when he looked her in the eye.
He shook his head. “That man was not honorable.”
Before she realized it, the first thought through her mind came rolling out of Kelly’s mouth. “Fuck him. Son of a bitch had it coming.”
Akio quirked one eyebrow up and then nodded. “Yes, you are correct.”
He looked behind her and then pointed toward a giant bearded man standing by the strange black box. “Go to Horst; he will keep you safe. I still have work to do.”
He was gone in the blink of an eye. One second he was in front of her, the next he was gone, and all hell was breaking loose in the stands. She sprinted the short distance to where the man stood, and when she turned back, there were no words to describe what she saw.
“He’s killing everyone,” she whispered.
“Nein,” the man behind her murmured. “Not all. Only the guilty.”
.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Adelaide Oval, Adelaide, Australia
Kel
ly watched in awe as Akio moved among the people and wolves in the stands. It was pandemonium, with most trying to get away while others attacked. He was moving faster than her eye could follow, one minute standing in one place, the next several rows away. Whenever he stopped for a split second, his sword flashed and another body crumpled to the ground.
The huge blond man behind her was yelling repeatedly, “Do not fight. Stand down, or you will die.”
To Kelly’s surprise, a brown wolf stopped running, and seconds later, a nude woman stood in its place. Kelly watched as she sank to her knees, head bowed, and the swordsman passed her and struck down a man she recognized as one of the guards who had walked the perimeter of the enclosure with a club. He never saw the blade that took him in the back of his head.
It was done in moments. Where over one hundred people had been sitting and watching the field, now a quarter of them lay dead, and the rest knelt submissively like the woman had.
The man was covered in blood and gore as he slowly walked through the crowd, stopping twice and looking into the eyes of first a red-headed woman and then a skinny man with a scar down one side of his face. Each time his blade flashed and the person died.
“What is he?” Kelly wondered out loud.
“He is a Queen’s Bitch,” Horst explained. “The most dangerous being you could ever meet, as well as the best friend an innocent person could have.”
Kelly turned and stared at the bearded man behind her, his eyes focused on the scene in the stands.
He continued, not looking away, “When the things that go bump in the night misbehave, he is the retribution. His name is Akio, and I am proud to call him my friend.”
Kelly turned back to the stands and saw him approach an older man with gray streaks in his hair and stare into his eyes. She was surprised when instead of lashing out with his sword, he offered the man his hand and pulled him to his feet. He said something too soft for Kelly to hear, and the man nodded shakily and made his way down to the field.
He walked to them and nodded to Horst respectfully and then to her before he addressed Horst. “I’m Henry Smythe. Akio told me to come here and wait for him.”
“Horst.” He nodded as he held his hand out to the older Were.
They continued to watch as Akio went through the crowd, sparing many but cutting down others with no hesitation.
“How’s he deciding who he kills?” Kelly murmured.
“I have no idea,” Horst lied.
“He’s only killing the ones who supported that arsehole, Decklan,” Henry growled. “Good riddance to the lot of them.”
“How does he know that?” Kelly asked. “I recognized a few of them from the guards I’ve seen around the stockade, but he just arrived. And why have they all stopped running?”
Horst shrugged again, keeping his own counsel about Akio’s abilities. One thing he was sure of was that anyone Akio killed deserved it.
Akio was done in a few moments, and there were now two distinct groups in the stands: the terrified live ones and the ones who knew no fear, the dead. Akio made his way down the steps and out onto the field where the others waited. He eyed Henry Smythe long enough that he started to sweat visibly. After almost a minute, Akio nodded once, pulled a cloth from one of the many pockets in his shirt, and started cleaning his blade.
Henry Smythe took a deep breath and shivered when Akio broke the intense eye contact. He didn’t know how, but he knew he had been judged by the deadly vampire. Whether he had passed remained to be seen.
When Akio was done cleaning the blood from his blade, he sheathed it and spoke. “You did not agree with what happened here. Neither did the ones who still live. Why did you allow it?”
Henry’s eyes shot open wide. “How? What? No.” He stammered to a stop when Akio tilted his head with one eyebrow raised.
“What I meant to say was,” Henry took a deep breath as he gathered his thoughts, “Decklan was crazy. Not just a little bit, but murderous-rage fucknuts-crazy if he felt he was being challenged in any way. He wouldn’t just kill the person he thought was against him, their entire family suffered.”
Horst growled. “Those are not the actions of a true Alpha.”
Henry winced, his mind going back to what had happened to the last Were who questioned Decklan, as well as his wife and both his children. “No, he wasn’t a true Alpha, but with the followers he has, um, had, nobody dared challenge him after the first time.”
“Other than murdering these people, what were his plans?” Akio asked.
“He wanted to take over and have an area that was Weres-only, no humans allowed. He planned to start here and spread his poison across Australia. The ones who followed him thought the same.”
“Why here?” Kelly interrupted.
Henry looked at her and then to Akio who nodded once. “We’ve been living in a small town about five hundred kilometers to the north since shortly after the world ended. It was a hard life, but we were in the mountains and able to survive. The human population of the town was wiped out by one of the bugs that went around after the electricity stopped. We moved in and had a working community. Farming and hunting kept us fed, and everyone was given a job. Like I said, it was hard, but we were happy.
“It was a place of safety, and we took in any others who found us. There were a few small farms in the area still run by humans, and we traded with them while keeping our nature secret like the strictures required.”
Kelly cocked her head to one side. “Strictures?”
“The rules that forbid us from revealing ourselves to humans.” He glanced at Akio. “On pain of death.”
Akio held up a hand to stop Kelly from interrupting. She bristled, not accustomed to being shushed, but before her mouth could get her in trouble, Henry continued.
“Decklan and his brother Owen came to the town about two years ago. Decklan was always talking about a land for Weres and how humans were parasites, using resources we needed and not giving anything back. Most of us knew it was a lie, and our Alpha Robert ordered him to stop spreading his hate or leave. We had nothing against humans. We coexisted peacefully, each group providing things the other needed.
“Decklan did as he was told, but he had a following, most of them newcomers like him who agreed. When two of the stations we traded with were attacked and burned, Robert suspected Decklan and his band. When he challenged him about it, Decklan killed him.
“Robert was a smart leader and we all respected him, but he was old. Once Decklan had established himself as Alpha, the first thing he did was send his men out to kill all the remaining farmers and burn their farms.
“He ordered everyone to prepare to move, and when the beta questioned him, we learned what he was capable of. He killed him and ordered his men to kill the entire family. Only the daughter was spared, and truth be told, she would have been better off if they had killed her too. He only spared Maggie because Owen wanted her.” He nodded at a red-haired young woman watching fearfully from the stands, the same one who had confronted Owen earlier when he was bringing Kelly out.
“She didn’t have any choice in the matter if she wanted to live. Owen forced her to go on raids and threatened to kill her at every turn until she gave in and acted like she was on board. I was one of the few who knew the truth, that she hates Decklan and Owen. She wanted nothing more than to see both of them dead. She wasn’t strong enough to do it herself and couldn’t get any support from the town. We were all too scared of Decklan and his gang.”
He took a deep breath and let it out in a long sigh. “After a few months, Decklan informed us that we needed to move here. He said that Adelaide didn’t have much of a human presence and was the best place to set up so we could have a Weres-only country. He loaded everything he could into a couple of old trucks we had managed to get going with some homebrew fuel and made sure there was nothing left for anyone to survive with if they stayed. He sent an advance group straight here to secure this area and force-marched the rest of us here in
one week.
By the time we got here, the advance group had killed every human left in the town, not that there were very many. As best I could tell, some disease went through here and killed most of them about a year ago.
He nodded at the stands. “Decklan had his group kill all the humans for ten kilometers around. Things got real crazy after that. He made us build that damned holding pen and sent out raiding parties to bring you folks in from the outlying areas. He wanted every human within fifty kilometers either captured or dead. We just found out today what he had planned for you.”
Kelly’s face paled as she listened. Planned genocide to take over the land was crazy to her. There wasn’t anything left that was worth it.
While her mind was still processing everything, Akio spoke. “Henry, you are a man who knows honor, but your fear has caused you to act in a manner that was without honor, and you must atone for it.”
Henry lowered his head in shame, knowing he had allowed fear to make him behave in a dishonorable manner. He stood silently, his head bowed, waiting for his death. When it didn’t come, he raised his eyes slowly until he faced the black-clad angel of death before him.
Akio continued, “You and your pack need to atone for the harm you have caused these people. You will work with them, help them recover, and together create a place that is safe for all. The humans are resilient and capable of doing great things, and the Weres are strong and are capable of ensuring the area is protected from any who wish to cause harm.”
Henry’s eyes widened in shock, not only that he was still alive but that this vampire had just ordered him to break the strictures.
“But…the strictures.”
Akio cut him off, his eyes holding a hint of red. “The strictures have been revised by Queen Bethany Anne. Those who will act with honor and work with humans may do so with her blessing. Those who do not and cause harm to them will be dealt with accordingly.” He nodded at the bodies scattered throughout the stands.
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