by Dean Murray
**
We'd been driving for twenty minutes before Juan got a text from an unlisted number that contained nothing more than an address and a time. A quick text to Brandon confirmed that the text had come from whomever the Coun'hij was sending to contain the incident, but we still didn't have any idea who we'd actually be working with.
It quickly became obvious that we were going to struggle to hit the deadline that we'd just had imposed on us, so Alison swore under her breath and sped up a little more. The radar detector inside the SUV didn't chirp even once and I thought we were making pretty good time right up until Juan's phone buzzed again three minutes before we were supposed to be at the meeting spot.
Based on the expression on Juan's face he expected the text to be a reprimand for not having been there early, but after reading the actual text he shook his head in astonishment.
"It looks like we've got an odd one."
Juan passed his phone around and my insides jumped in nervousness.
I've been delayed, but I'm getting reports of some kind of fighting happening on the west end of town. I'll meet you next to the water tower as soon as you can arrive.
I handed the phone to Jasmin so that she could read the text and started looking for the water tower. A second later Juan found it on his side of the car.
"Change of plans, Alison. We're headed towards that water tower. Turn right here and I'll see if I can find a route there on the GPS."
My first thought as we arrived and Alison brought the SUV to a screaming stop was that it was odd for the water tower to have been put off to the side of the town away from where everyone lived. It made even less sense for the town this small to have such a large abandoned industrial park, only at second glance the area didn't look abandoned. There wasn't any graffiti or broken windows. In fact, everything about the area looked like an active, operational industrial zone except for the fact that the night was unbroken by a single working light for at least three or four blocks in any direction.
Juan offered up the explanation at the same time that I realized what was going on.
"Werewolves, and more than one or two if they've taken down so much of the electrical grid."
My blood ran cold as I realized just how much danger we were in. Given that werewolves were bigger than any hybrid and able to neutralize most abilities, it was rare for a pack of wolves or even a group of hybrids to come out on top in a fight against werewolves unless they outnumbered the werewolves by a considerable margin. Like say maybe three to one. There was a chance that we could deal with two werewolves if we had a little bit of luck on our side, but there was no way that we could defeat three or four of them and Juan was probably right that it would take more than two werewolves to black out so much of the city.
Jasmin looked as worried as I felt, and Jess was positively jumping back and forth from one foot to the other, but it was Alison who asked the question.
"So what do we do? Jump back in the SUV and get out of here?"
Juan shook his head. "The guy from the Coun'hij said that there was fighting. As wolves we'll probably be faster than the werewolves, so we can always run away if push comes to shove, but we should at least get some intel."
I opened my mouth to point out that the Coun'hij had forbidden picking fights with werewolves, but shut my mouth without saying anything. Juan was right. At the very least we were going to have to clean up after these werewolves, but it was more than that.
We were probably outnumbered and in a position where all we could do was run away, but if that didn't turn out to be the case, then a part of me wouldn't shed any tears if we were forced to engage and kill a werewolf or two.
Werewolves were nothing more than mindless killing machines and while Puppeteer had been able to use them to good effect in places like St. Louis, that didn't justify the order that had come down from on high forbidding the moonborn from killing werewolves in anything other than self-defense.
"Leave the keys in the car and leave the doors unlocked. If we get chased back this direction we're going to need to be able to leave in a hurry."
Juan shifted onto four legs in a crackling rush of power and one by one the rest of us followed. My beast seemed extra eager today and I cut loose with a stronger flare of power than I meant to release. Nobody else seemed to notice though and a second later we were all following Juan off into the unnatural darkness that you could only find where man had killed all of the vegetation and replaced it with artificial constructs of metal, glass and concrete.
As we got closer the lights started flickering at irregular intervals. I would have said that it had to be yet another werewolf getting closer to the scene of the fight, but rather than the flickering being the result of more lights dying, it was caused by blocks of lights out on the edge of the blackout turning back on for a second or two before once again browning out.
We rounded a corner and I saw my first real, live werewolf. It was huge, which went without saying, but the thing that struck me the most was the way that the light it emitted, the light that was part and parcel of being a living organism, looked subtly wrong.
The wind shifted directions slightly and the werewolf spun around as it scented us. I expected Juan to turn and lead us back towards the SUV at a dead run, but he charged forward, transforming into a hybrid as he crossed the distance between us and the werewolf.
Apparently Juan's actions took everyone else by surprise too because there was nearly a second pause before we all charged after him. I opened the mental cage where I housed my beast, asking for just enough power to shift forms again so that I could meet the werewolf as a hybrid, and my beast responded with another tsunami of power that ripped me from one form to another in a fraction of an instant.
My beast was ready, eager even, to exchange blows with the werewolf, but despite my words earlier, part of me was busy thinking about the repercussions of what we were about to do. Puppeteer was brutal when it came to enforcing the prohibition against killing the earthborn. He didn't manage to punish every single offense, and I was pretty sure that most of the people who ended up punished were already on the chopping block for other reasons, but even so killing a werewolf risked having half a dozen werewolves under Puppeteer's control showing up one night to execute you.
Juan eased any concerns with a single sentence a split second before he closed with the werewolf. "We have no way of knowing whether or not our contact from the Coun'hij has been dragged into this fight already."
It was a slightly threadbare excuse, but it was the kind of thing that kept people alive when the Coun'hij got around to reviewing the results of some fight. The fact that we could say we'd been sent to neutralize any threats to our contact from the Coun'hij should be enough to shield us from the Coun'hij.
That all flitted across my mind as I crossed the three remaining steps to the werewolf and then there wasn't time for any thoughts that didn't relate directly to my immediate survival.
The werewolf slashed at Juan as the lights flickered again, but Juan lunged to the right in a blindingly explosive move that kept him just out of reach of the werewolf's deadly claws. It was an impressive display of speed that I'd never seen bettered by anyone else before.
I was only half a step behind Juan so I hit the werewolf on its right side, digging my claws into its arms in an effort to slow its turn as it tried to follow Juan around as he flanked it on the other side. I felt strong, stronger than ever before, but I still wasn't a match for the sheer brute strength that the werewolf commanded so casually.
Despite my best efforts the werewolf pulled its right arm free of my claws. The action left bloody ribbons where my claws had ripped through the werewolf's flesh, but there was no sign that the pain slowed my opponent in the slightest as it reversed directions connecting with an elbow to my face that threw me back into the side of the building behind me.
I had a brief instant to be grateful that I'd been struck with the werewolf's elbow rather than the razor-sharp back edge of i
ts claws, and then I hit with enough force that I saw stars as my head connected with one of the metal structural members hidden in the wall.
If the werewolf had just been facing Juan and me, we would have lost the fight right then and there, but a chorus of yips and growls told me that the girls were in the fight now too. My vision cleared just in time to see Juan take four long slashes to the chest as he tried to dance back out of range after an aborted attack that had probably been intended to distract the beast so that the girls could spring.
Juan's attack served its original purpose, if not quite in the way he'd intended for it to. Jasmin used the fact that the werewolf was momentarily focused on Juan to jump and clamp her jaws down on the back of its right arm roughly where the triceps muscle would have been on a human.
Jess and Alison latched onto the back of the creature's legs, ripping with their jaws for nearly a second before they and Jasmin all three had to drop away and try to dart back out of range of its counterattack.
Jasmin and Jessica were just fast enough to dodge out of the way of the werewolf's claws, but Alison was a few inches too close and got slashed all the way from her shoulder down to her back leg. She was bleeding profusely and I could see bones showing through in a couple of spots, but Alison gamely spun around and prepared to spring at the werewolf again.
I'd managed to pull myself back to my feet while the werewolf had been busy savaging Alison, and I hit it from the side. I couldn't generate enough force to knock it over, but I did jostle its arm enough that its next attack missed Alison by several inches.
More importantly, the werewolf's momentum from that last swipe at Alison meant that it couldn't spin back around fast enough to stop me from sinking both claws into its back and getting my right foot set into the meaty part of its leg.
The werewolf spun around as I jammed the talons on my right foot into its other leg, but it was a heartbeat too slow. It had allowed me to get set and I was holding on for everything I was worth. Juan came in from the left side, grabbing the werewolf's left arm with both of his claws at the same time that Jasmin sank her teeth once again into its right arm.
Between the two of them and me the werewolf was carrying an extra eight or nine hundred pounds and even its unnatural strength wasn't up to doing that without slowing down noticeably. I felt the werewolf change directions again, spinning to the left in an attempt to bring Juan into reach of its right hand and its fangs, but this time I used the brief instant when it had no momentum to lever my right foot up higher on its body.
I felt Jess hit the beast a second later, tearing into its leg in an effort to hamstring it. Juan dropped away only inches ahead of the claws that would have opened him up from stomach to chin if he'd tried to continue to control the werewolf's left arm.
With the werewolf's left hand free Jasmin was in increased danger, but she let go and danced back just before the werewolf could savage her. Alison joined Jess in an effort to damage the creature's legs enough to bring it to its knees, but it swiped at the two of them and the only thing that saved them from serious injury was that they were partially shielded from the attack by the werewolf's own bulk.
I used the distraction they provided to move my other foot higher as well as going for a new hold with my left hand. It was risky and I knew it as I made my move, but I could tell that the girls especially were tiring. Faced with the choice between potentially being bucked off of the werewolf or moving too slow and watching one of my friends die, there really wasn't any option but to move more quickly and hope that I could manage to hold onto the werewolf for just long enough to kill it.
My claws must have hit a particularly sensitive spot because the werewolf suddenly howled and threw itself back into a wall in an effort to dislodge me. It probably would have succeeded except for the fact that Juan charged forward and hit the creature hard enough to spin it around so that its right shoulder took most of the force of the impact with the building.
The werewolf's roar brought answering howls from two more of its kind and my breath caught as I realized that I'd completely forgotten about the other werewolves that we'd known had to be in the area. The werewolf we'd been fighting had just given away our position and we probably only had seconds before we'd be up against three or even possibly four of the things. We needed to disengage now, but that was going to be almost impossible with Alison hurt and me stuck on this werewolf's back.
Times were as desperate as they were likely to get. The werewolf's vulnerable head and neck seemed to be miles away from my current position, but I knew that wasn't the case. The distance was only a matter of feet, but it was feet that I was having to cover slow inches at a time.
The werewolf rebounded off of what was left of the wall and slashed at Juan in a blur that was too impossibly fast to follow. I would have said that there wasn't any way for her to manage it, but Jasmin somehow latched onto its wrist and once again her weight threw off the werewolf's timing and speed just enough to save Juan from being disemboweled.
I took the biggest gamble of my life and banked everything on the assumption that the werewolf was going to reverse its course once again and spin right in an attempt to put Jasmin down before she could disengage and retreat back out of range. I launched myself up and to the right in an effort to preempt the werewolf's moment and as my claws and talons all came free of the werewolf's back I saw it blur into motion as its lunge to the right combined with my leap to create an incredible amount of relative motion.
My entire world narrowed down to the werewolf's neck and the slow arc of my left hand as I fought to bring it around so that the two would meet. It seemed for a second as though I was going to miss, but then the wolf's motion brought its head down a few precious inches as it tried to sink its claws into Jasmin who'd dropped to the ground and was trying to duck the attack.
The claws on my left hand sank into the werewolf's neck just below its jaw and I felt my arm strain in protest as my momentum was abruptly redirected with my left hand as the pivot point. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Jasmin dodge the werewolf's first swipe by a fraction of an inch, and then I was sailing over the creature's right arm as inertia brought me around in front of it.
I saw something like surprise in the werewolf's eyes as both of my feet sank into its chest and then my right hand was buried in its neck as well and I used the leverage provided by my feet to rip both sets of claws through the side of its neck as I threw myself backwards.
I'd been able to feel the werewolf's claws arrowing towards my vulnerable back, and I'd half expected to die, but my clunky back flip launched me a few inches above the trajectory of the werewolf's claws. I landed heavily on my knees and looked up just in time to see the werewolf drop to the ground in a spray of blood.
"Jess, go get a first-aid kit now!"
I followed Juan's gaze and felt my throat tighten up as I saw that Alison was lying on the ground surrounded by blood. She'd transformed back to two legs, which meant that she was either critically injured or dead, but as I dropped down next to her I saw her chest slowly rising and falling.
I must have shifted at some point because when I went to apply direct pressure I did so with human hands rather than hybrid claws, but I didn't remember forcing my beast back into its mental cage in order to change forms.
"Don't die on us, Alison, Jess will be back in a minute."
My voice broke as I said whatever came to mind in an effort to keep her with us while I held her wounds closed and tried not to think about her odds.
Jasmin dropped to her knees next to me and placed her hands next to mine in an attempt to help stanch the bleeding, but I somehow knew it wasn't going to be enough.
Juan's voice cut through the mental haze that was rapidly taking me over.
"Alec, back on your feet. I need you in your hybrid form. Someone is fighting those things and our best hope of keeping Alison alive is to go help kill those other werewolves before they come over here and end us all."
I shook my head.
The threat of the other werewolves had somehow become a distant cloudy thing when compared to the imminent death of the pretty girl who'd just spent the last few days lounging around the pool with me.
Juan's backfist knocked me to the ground. He hadn't put any real strength behind it. He was still a hybrid and I'd been in my primary form so if he had put any real oomph into the blow it probably would have snapped my neck.
As attacks went it was remarkably restrained, but my beast didn't view it as such. A surge of power lashed out of me as a transformation ripped through my body. I'd never felt my beast so enraged, but the power that had been unleashed was only a shadow of what I'd displayed in St Louis.
I hadn't been expecting the sudden flare of rage from my beast, so I hadn't been prepared for it any more than I'd been prepared for Juan's backfist. Under those circumstances I should have practically lit the area up with a power storm, but it was almost as though the power that my beast usually drew on was being funneled somewhere else.
That all passed through my mind almost as an afterthought because my real focus was on trying to bring myself back under control enough not to try and kill Juan. I succeeded, but it was a close thing. As my breathing came back under control I turned back towards Alison, but Juan lunged toward me in a move that was only half feint.
"If you go back to her then I'll kill you myself. We need to get in on that fight or we're all as good as dead."
"You don't know that."
"Maybe not, but that won't stop me from killing you."
I felt my lips draw back from my fangs but the sound of four feet sprinting back our way told me that Jess was at most seconds away from helping Jasmin.
"Fine, we'll do it your way, but if she dies then I will make sure you join her within minutes."
Juan's smile showed his fangs and seemed to say that his beast would likewise welcome a chance to see who was truly dominant once and for all, but after holding my gaze for a second he turned and started off towards the sound of fighting.
As I followed him I wondered if the other battle had just started up, or if it had been going the entire time and I had just been too focused on our battle to notice anything else. Our contact's reports of fighting from this area certainly suggested the latter, which was disturbing. A leader needed to be able to keep enough presence of mind to deal with the larger picture as well as the fight he was involved in or his people would eventually be outmaneuvered and killed when someone blindsided him with something he should have seen coming from a mile away.
Juan led me round a corner and suddenly we were in the middle of another battle. This one was shape shifters against werewolves also, but where there'd only been five of us and one werewolf, here there were two werewolves with what looked like another one dead a few feet away.
The battle was too fluid and there were too many figures, wolves and hybrids alike, darting in and out for me to count how many people had faced off against the werewolves, but there were a number of bleeding forms scattered around the periphery of the battle and it seemed that whatever had been gained by one werewolf being killed had been offset by attrition in their own ranks.
"We help with the one on the left."
Juan sprang forward even as the words left his mouth, but I hung back for just long enough to see how his presence would impact the fight. Juan tried to catch the werewolf from behind but it spun around and slashed at him, forcing him back just long enough for it to catch one of the original hybrids it had been fighting with claws to the shoulder.
The other hybrid reeled back away, but in the same instant that the werewolf's claws had touched her, the lights had flickered again. I filed that curious bit of information away as I stepped in and slashed the werewolf's arm as it turned back to deal with Juan. The werewolf shrugged off my attack, but there were enough of us now that we'd forced the werewolf completely onto the defensive.
The hybrid who had caused the lights to flicker darted in and slashed the werewolf across the chest at the same time that the other hybrid from the same pack grabbed the werewolf's arm. I was pretty sure that the second hybrid had simply been trying to protect the first hybrid, but it created the perfect opening for me as well and I took it without thinking about what would happen if I was too slow.
I jumped over Juan, who'd just been knocked down by the werewolf, and although I didn't land as well as I had on the werewolf that we'd just finished killing, I still managed to get both hands and feet buried in the werewolf's back well enough to ride out the next couple of seconds as the werewolf tried to knock me free.
Juan grabbed hold of one arm at the same time that the two hybrids from the other pack grabbed the werewolf's other arm. The werewolf threw itself backwards into a light pole in an attempt to crush me, but the combined efforts of all three hybrids was just barely sufficient to slow it down so that the impact knocked the wind from me rather than shattering bones as it otherwise probably would have.
Gasping for breath as I was, it was nearly more than I could handle to maintain my hold on the werewolf's back. The werewolf staggered slightly and I looked down and saw that a pair of wolves had attached themselves to the creature's legs while a third wolf was dangling from the arm that Juan was fighting to keep immobilized.
"Hurry up and kill the damn thing already!"
The words came from the larger hybrid, the one who had made the light flicker, and the voice was unmistakably female despite the distortion introduced by the fact that she was in her hybrid form.
In one sense her frustration and urgency was completely understandable, but I was the one who had just nearly been crushed to death and my beast didn't take kindly to her tone. Another roar of power escaped me and this time it was very nearly as strong as I'd ever felt it before. There was still the tiniest feeling that something was siphoning away a portion of my vitality and energy, but as the power washed out of me and crashed into the female hybrid it seemed to take my exhaustion and weakness with it.
The werewolf flung Juan and the wolf away, which then caused the two hybrids from the other pack to release it so that they could avoid being stabbed, but I easily rode out the sudden shift in direction and then repositioned myself higher in two explosive movements.
A second later I was high enough up to reach the werewolf's throat and it dropped to the ground as its life leaked out of the arteries that I'd just severed. Everyone else who had been involved in the fight was as much as a dozen feet back by that point in an effort to avoid being caught up in the werewolf's death throes, so they made it over to the last werewolf well before I was able to untangle myself and go help.
This time there was nothing of strategy or finesse to the kill. The hybrids and wolves, Juan included, who had been fighting the werewolf I'd just killed threw themselves at the werewolf, joining the moonborn who had already been fighting it in a writhing ball of claws and fangs.
Two hybrids made it onto the last werewolf's back and started climbing it while everyone grabbed an appendage and pulled. The last werewolf was dead within moments of the second one dying and then we were left staring uneasily at each other.
The female hybrid was the one who broke the standoff. She looked around, seeming to verify that the lights were all back on, and then ordered her people to see to their injured. Only after everything seemed well in hand did she turn back to Juan and me.
"I'd ask you what you're doing here in my territory, but I already know. Brandon sent you after I refused to return his calls, didn't he?"
Juan nodded and then apparently decided that it was time to deescalate things and shifted back to his primary form.
The female hybrid looked at the ha'bit that all of our people wore and wrinkled her nose in disgust before looking pointedly at me. Shifting forms was more difficult than I expected it to be. This time my beast was working at cross purposes to me, trying to maintain our current form rather than shift down to something less durable and fast. If the Tucson pack decided that they wanted us dead then there wouldn't
be much we could do to stop them other than running for the SUV and hoping that we were faster than them, but my beast didn't always think in those kinds of terms.
It took what seemed like a frozen eternity to force my beast back into its metaphysical cage, but it finally yielded to my will and I shrank back down to my human form. The female hybrid stared at the two of us for several moments before following suit and discarding her towering hybrid shape.
The Tucson pack didn't follow the Sanctuary convention of wearing ha'bits, so she was completely naked, but she seemed less bothered by that fact than I was.
"I'd just kick you out of our territory, but I'm afraid that I owe you one. We came expecting to fight two vacuums but prepared for three. That fourth werewolf would have torn through us like tissue paper if you hadn't taken care of it for us."
She sighed and then stepped forward and offered her hand to Juan. "My name is Jaclyn. I'm the alpha of this pack."
Juan looked more than a little uneasy at the prospect of touching her hand, but I couldn't blame him. Jaclyn's prowess in single combat would have been respectable even without the ability that she'd manifested decades ago, but with it she was unmatched by any other hybrid I could think of offhand.
Brandon was stronger and faster than she could possibly be, but Jaclyn was able to funnel a powerful electrical charge through her hands and feet, delivering the equivalent of a massive Taser blast into whomever she happened to be fighting.
Pieces started to click into place inside of my mind and I blurted out my observation without thinking.
"It isn't just your hands, you can charge your whole body. When the werewolf cut you across the shoulder the lights flickered, which had to be you delivering a jolt that partially overwhelmed its natural absorptive ability."
Juan's mouth clicked shut and then he shook his head at me in resignation before turning back to Jaclyn and taking her hand.
"I'm Juan out of the Colorado Springs pack and this is Alec."
Jaclyn was smiling as she shook Juan's hand, at least right up until he provided my name without also telling her which pack I was from.
"Graves?"
I nodded. "Yes, but Kaleb and I don't see eye to eye on most things."
Jaclyn rolled her eyes at me and didn't extend her hand. "That's pretty much the kind of transparent lie I'd expect out of Kaleb's spawn, but I expected better based on what I've heard about you, Juan. I'm not entirely surprised to hear that you've ended up down here on the border killing cats with that piece of trash Brandon, but I thought you'd at least have enough integrity not to let Kaleb turn you into some kind of demented babysitter."
Now that Jaclyn had shaken his hand without zapping him, Juan seemed much more relaxed. He smiled at Jaclyn as a pair of white SUVs pulled up and some of the people she'd sent away piled back out of the vehicles with first-aid kits and various other supplies in their arms.
"Kaleb didn't have anything to do with this. He apparently decided that Alec needed to be blooded and once Alec was sent down here Brandon stuck me with him. Alec's been a pleasant surprise though. He volunteered our team for this at least partly because he was hoping to get a chance to talk to you."
"Your life is so bad you were hoping for a quick end?"
I shook my head. "I was hoping to be able to get your take on everything that is going on. Since I arrived down here I've started finding out a lot of things have been kept secret from me. I figured that the best way to get a clear view of what's actually happening is to talk to people who are dramatically opposed to Kaleb and everything he stands for."
"That's it?"
"I had hoped to also be able to convince you that I'm not my father, that I'm someone who you could someday work with under the right set of circumstances, but I know that's a long shot."
One of Jaclyn's people handed her camouflage cargo pants and a black tank top; she slipped them on without looking away from me.
"Kid, you've spent so much time in the dark that you won't even be able to see the truth when it's shoved right in front of your face."
"Try me."
"Some things can't be conveyed through words, Alec. Some things you have to see with your own eyes to believe."
"Fine, so take me wherever it is and show me."
"I can't do that, not without putting my people in an unacceptable level of danger."
I threw my hands up and shook my head at her. "I'm really trying here, Jaclyn. I don't know how to convince you, not in the short amount of time we have before our contact on the Coun'hij arrives and we have to go babysit him."
Jaclyn went white. "You didn't tell me that someone from the Coun'hij was on their way."
Juan stepped up to answer that particular question. "We figured it was obvious. We didn't know what was going on here, we just knew that the humans had found bodies with wounds they couldn't explain. The Coun'hij is sending someone to make all of the evidence disappear. We're just along to protect whomever it is that they've sent."
"Everybody get the wounded into the SUVs and then I want the entire area doused with vinegar! We don't have much time, people."
I opened my mouth, but two sets of footsteps interrupted whatever it was I'd been about to say. An unfamiliar man stepped out from between two buildings. Jasmin was following him and she looked so uncomfortable that I started towards her only to have Juan pull me up short.
"Is everything okay, Jas?"
"I think so. Jess and I got Alison stabilized and we were in the middle of loading her into the car when this guy showed up. I think he's from the Coun'hij, but he hasn't said a word yet. So far all he's done is gesture for Jess to stay with Alison and for me to follow him."
The Tucson pack had gone almost completely still. There was still a little movement out on the edge of things, mostly people who hadn't seen the Coun'hij's operative yet. Jaclyn looked like she wanted to spit.
"Just for the record, none of you are welcome in our territory ever again. Anyone who arrives in the company of that thing permanently puts themselves in my bad graces."
Juan didn't look particularly happy about Jaclyn's pronouncement, but he didn't seem prepared to argue with her.
"I don't understand. It's not like we had a choice, we were just given a time and a place and told to meet him here."
"Saying you don't have a choice is just a coward's way of rationalizing their cowardice, kid. You guys have until tomorrow morning to finish up whatever work he has to do to wipe all of this under the rug and then you'd better be gone. I can't kill Oblivion without bringing the entire Coun'hij down on me, but I'm willing to see how far your daddy is prepared to go to avenge you if you're not gone by sunrise."
Things were moving too fast and I didn't have any of the background information that I'd need to make sense of them. I wanted to ask what was so bad about this particular operative, but before I could say anything a four-legged shadow detached itself from a wall and threw itself at the operative.
I didn't realize that it was one of the Tucson wolves until after she was airborne. She'd taken me completely by surprise, but the guy from the Coun'hij didn't even blink. He dropped down to one knee so that the wolf sailed over his head and then the operative casually reached up and let his fingers run along her side as she flew past him.
I expected the operative to shift to hybrid form so that he was prepared for the wolf's follow-up lunge, but the operative simply stood back up and watched as she hit the ground and rolled bonelessly for several complete revolutions before coming to a stop.
Every other wolf from the Tucson pack took a step forward as though planning on attacking, but Jaclyn yelled for them to stop. Her control of her pack was absolute and everyone skidded to a stop leaving a strange kind of scene with the operative on one end, Jasmin at his back looking like she wasn't sure she was on the right side of the fight, and more than a dozen moonborn on the other side looking like they wished they could tear the operative to bits.
I'd never seen anything to match what th
e operative had just done. The ability to kill with a touch when not even shifted to a combat form surely made this shape shifter even more deadly than Brandon or Jaclyn either one.
"What just happened?"
The words slipped out of me of their own accord, but when Jaclyn turned her glare on me I refused to back down. After a couple of heartbeats Jaclyn looked at the operative once more, but he simply smiled and made a gesture that seemed to say that he was waiting for her to explain everything to me.
"That's Oblivion. He's the Coun'hij's top troubleshooter because he doesn't just sweep evidence under the rug and leave people as laughingstocks when they can't back up their fantastical stories, he destroys the memories of anyone who's seen anything the Coun'hij doesn't want to go public. Jane isn't dead, but she might as well be. Everything that made her an individual is gone. She's been wiped clean and the child he's left in her place won't even remember her own name."
"He's been here before."
It was more a statement than a question but Jaclyn nodded in agreement. "Yes, he's been here before. That's why Jane attacked him. Oblivion did the same thing to her sister last year. Most packs don't even suspect that the Coun'hij has someone so insidious at their beck and call, but our pack got called into help after an op down here went sideways and Oblivion lost most of his protection detail. Jane's sister did or said something to piss Oblivion off and he wiped her clean. It was one of the things that pushed me over the edge where the Coun'hij is concerned."
Oblivion returned Jaclyn's glare without any expression on his face and then turned to Jasmin and motioned for her to pick Jane up and carry her to her pack mates. I stepped forward to help her but Oblivion grabbed my wrist. My beast had understood the significance of what had happened to Jane, and tried to break free, but I held onto control of my shape by the slimmest of margins.
It was one of the hardest things I'd ever done, but shifting to a hybrid wouldn't save me if he'd already decided to scoop out everything that made me the person I was. I had a split second to wonder whether or not it would hurt to have all of my memories stripped away, but then he released me and shook his head. Once he was satisfied that I wasn't going to help Jasmin, he waved for me to follow him into the darkness.