Hunted (Auralight Codex: Dakota Shepherd Book 2)

by Shei Darksbane

  Raelya snapped at the backs of its legs, darting out and back in, then drew a line across its flank when her teeth found purchase and the Ursa-Skinwalker jerked free. The beast repaid her with a sharp kick backwards that sent her flying with a yelp as she slammed into the pavement a few yards away. Elisa was driven back by the Ursa-Skinwalker’s renewed vigor as it plowed forward, doing all it could to keep her off balance. I started to level my hand, readying for another shot with the Hellfire, when a flash of pale announced Amorie’s entrance to the fight.

  The silvery blade of Melhir flashed without hesitation or mercy, diving repeatedly into the Ursa-Skinwalker’s exposed flank. It roared and turned to face her, but she was gone in a flash of movement before it could even get her in view. Suddenly, she vaulted to its other side, lashing it with a savage series of slashes across its ribs. I heard a sickening splish as a globule of Skinwalker blood plopped onto the asphalt. I felt my lip curling; even its blood seemed somehow wrong and awful. I didn’t think blood was meant to sound like that, or smell like that either.

  My wolf was pushing so hard that I had to fight myself not to shift and join the fray directly, but Ralof’s earlier warnings echoed in my head about not being familiar enough to fight with the pack. I damn sure didn’t want to be a burden to them. My friends were too close and moving too quickly for me to dare the risk of launching Hellfire onto the monster, so I bided my time, hand blazing green in the dark, and waited for an opportunity.

  I found my opening soon enough. The Ursa-Skinwalker, bleeding from dozens of lacerations and unable to catch up to Amorie, turned instead on someone it could catch: Elisa. I’d noticed her beginning to slow from the wounds it had inflicted, and apparently so had the Skinwalker. It might be a wicked, evil, awful, horrible monster, but it wasn’t stupid. It reared up and swiped hard, forcing Amorie to dodge acrobatically out of its reach. She moved so fast, her form all but blurred to my sight, deadly yet graceful and elegant, landing on the pavement in her flowing split skirt and high heels.

  The Ursa-Skinwalker wheeled on Elisa, making use of the brief reprieve from Amorie’s assault. It twisted to the side and slammed its weight down with supernatural strength, the force of its blow reverberating through the ground, which was terrifying as that force had to go through Elisa to get there.

  The sickening sounds of bones snapping and flesh impacting the asphalt drew a cry of shock and fear from Raelya as I shouted, “No!”

  Dread sank into my stomach as Elisa crumpled beneath the massive white beast. As the monster raised its paws to turn on Amorie once more, my heart lurched at the sight of my packmate on the ground. Her torso looked wrong, misshapen by the crunch of bones and tearing of tissues when the Ursa-Skinwalker’s weight had fallen upon her. Blood pooled quickly beneath body. She twitched once, but I didn’t have time to decide if I thought she would make it, because I launched myself, hands blazing, at the dead son of a bitch that had hurt Mama Wolf.

  Of course, tiny, mere mortal that I was, the Skinwalker saw me coming. Those eyes twinkled with malevolent glee as it turned to face me, mouth open, widening its jaws ominously and unnaturally. The Ursa-Skinwalker lurched closer as I charged, but something made it turn away. A flicker of supernatural white and silver, Melhir raked hard across its throat and I hoped with all my heart for the clever blade to take its head.

  In the opening Amorie had just given me, I darted in and slapped my hands onto its face, pouring the Hellfire out with all my fury. The lambent flames did not disappoint my vengeant rage. They poured forth like a dam had burst, hungrily lapping up the Ursa-Skinwalker’s fur and flesh as if my hatred for the monster before me had become the fire’s own fury.

  It would have been a really awesome moment for me if the Skinwalker were just a bear. I’d have set that bastard on fire and made a clever quip about pic-a-nic baskets, and that’d have been that. But the Skinwalker hadn’t survived this long by accident. The massive white bear fell on me with murder in its eyes, its skin bubbling up grotesquely around its face, and suddenly, everything went dark.

  I was completely confused for an instant as the darkness around me brought no pain or dismemberment as I’d expected. It took me a few beats to realize what had happened. And by the time I figured it out, the Hellfire started biting into my skin as it spread across the Ursa’s discarded shell.

  I made horribly unflattering sounds as I struggled with the heavy, gruesome blanket of the Ursa’s empty skin, shoving and clawing at it, desperately fighting to get it off of me. My heart was pounding, racing, and I could barely breathe with the smothering blanket of abandoned flesh clinging to me vengefully.

  I started to panic as I feared the Skinwalker would take advantage of my position and fall on me while I was trapped and helpless, crushing me with its dragon form or slicing me apart with some horrible claws I would never even see coming. It was all I could do to keep steadily pushing, hand over hand, folding the deadly, fiery blanket to the side until I managed to finally shrug it off. Raelya was dancing back and forth in front of me, trying to find a way to help without grasping the Hellfire-covered skin herself, and I was grateful she hadn’t done anything crazy like grabbing it anyway.

  I gasped for breath against the pain as the Hellfire seared into my arms where it’d licked onto my flesh, and now it seemed to gnaw at me like a living thing. I screamed as I closed my eyes and focused as hard as I could, willing the fire back into my palms. Reluctantly, the flames crept along my skin, meandering across my forearms, my wrists, and the backs of my hands like a belligerent child taking the longest possible path to his room.

  Finally, the flames vanished as they touched my palms and I collapsed to my knees, pressing my charred arms to my chest as they screamed at me in agony. I glanced at the Ursa skin and saw that it was engulfed in Hellish green fire, and I knew the Skinwalker wasn’t getting that form back. A ragged grin crept onto my face despite the searing pain in my arms. Raelya nudged my shoulder with her nose and gave a high-pitched whine. “I’ll be all right.” I said with as much certainty as I could muster.

  I scanned the area around me, but to my horror, Elisa was nowhere to be found, though a too-large pool of blood still marked where she’d been. I whipped my head from side to side, fear rising in my heart, mixed with hope that Elisa was up and fighting again, but as I followed the sounds of combat, I still saw no werewolf save for Raelya.

  I spotted the Skinwalker a few dozen yards down the road and my eyes grew wide. It seemed even a dragon was no match for my Amorie.

  “Holy crap.” I watched as she danced from the dragon-Skinwalker’s arm to its shoulder, leaping onto the armored beast with a skillful flurry of blows that sent a scattering of red scales flying. “I should never have doubted her…” Raelya whined at me again and I got to my feet. “Right. I have to help.” Raelya huffed and I glanced down at her. “I don’t speak enough wolf yet to know what that means, but you have to go find Ralof.”

  Raelya tilted her head slightly then growled at me. “I’m serious.” I said firmly. “We need the pack. Amorie is amazing, but I don’t know how many forms that thing has, or how long she can keep this up. If she weren’t a vampire, I’d be even more worried, but seeing as she is, I think there’d be time for the pack to get here and help if we hurry.”

  Raelya swiped her paw at my leg. “No. I have to stay and help her.”

  Raelya’s frustration seemed to reach a breaking point. She gave up trying to convince me in wolf form and shifted back to her human self. “Dakota, I can not leave you to fight this thing without pack!”

  I put a hand on her cheek. “Raelya, you have to. Someone has to bring the pack to the fight. And someone has to help her hold it off until they get here.” I closed my eyes briefly, summoned all the strength of will I could, and then met her eyes and beseeched her wolf to heed me. “Go.”

  Raelya’s expression hardened with concern and the obvious desire to say no to me, but she shifted back into her wolf form, threw her head back and howled, the
n ran off down the road toward the pack house.

  I turned back to the fight, took a deep breath, and jogged toward the ongoing battle between nightmarish enemy I hated and the vampire I loved.

  The dragon-Skinwalker launched its jaws at Amorie, mouth bristling with fangs as long as my forearm, but my girlfriend ducked under the strike and smoothly sidestepped as that deadly maw snapped shut. Twenty feet of spiked draconic tail raced in, whipping across the ground, but Amorie back-flipped gracefully over the deadly arch at the last moment. It was all too obvious that the dragon form was far faster than the Ursa had been, but still not nearly fast enough to keep up with Amorie. I kicked off my shoes and started shrugging off my shirt as I approached.

  A familiar voice came suddenly from thin air beside me. “I wouldn’t do that.”

  “What the—” I whipped my head to the side as my heart flipped over and I stumbled a couple of steps back. “Mira?”

  Mira’s disembodied voice responded. “Amorie told you to stay out of it. She knows what she’s doing.”

  I glared at the nothing where Mira’s voice seemed to be coming from, and as my eyes fixed on that spot, I found I could see the faintest ghostly image of the irritating vampire standing just slightly out of my reach. A crumpled Elisa in human form rested just past her on the ground, similarly transparent, but blessedly still breathing.

  Seeing what Mira had done for me, I swallowed a few choice words I might otherwise have used, and decided that the best course was just to ignore her and do what I had to do. “I have to help her. Thank you for taking care of Elisa for me. Please… Please keep her safe.”

  I turned my attention back to the fight and started jogging toward it again.

  The dragon-Skinwalker reached in with its claws, grabbing for Amorie. She leapt deftly onto its arm, seizing it firmly and sawing brutally at it with Melhir. Scales parted as easily as Ursa hide had, and the dragon-Skinwalker roared and reared back, forcing Amorie to hold on for the ride. I lost my pants and underwear, hopping awkwardly out of them both as I watched the dragon-Skinwalker trying in vain to shake Amorie off. It seemed to give up when its efforts proved useless.

  I saw the dragon-Skinwalker’s belly swell as it inhaled, and its underside started glowing ominously, but by the time I realized what it was doing, it was too late to shout a warning. Flames fountained forth from the dragon-Skinwalker’s mouth and my heart skipped a beat as the inferno washed over Amorie’s position. My sensitive wolf eyes were blinded for a moment by the sudden glare of light in the darkness. I didn’t know much about dragons from my SII training manual, but I knew some pretty relevant facts about fire and vampires.

  “Amorie!” I screamed in desperation as I blinked my eyes furiously, trying to clear the spots from my vision. Tears streaked down my face in fear despite my brimming anger and I felt myself starting to shift. I broke open the jar of rage that lived deep down in my chest and let it mix with the terror and fury of the moment and that was all it took to call the varulf out.

  For a moment, everything went still as my eyes clouded over with red. The dragon didn’t rush me, instead lowering its mighty head and scanning its surroundings with ancient, intelligent eyes. I howled in rage and stalked toward it, ready to tear it apart and feeling as though nothing could stop me.

  Amorie suddenly appeared from the darkness and fell on the dragon-Skinwalker’s head. Melhir struck deep, deep enough to stay anchored in flesh as the dragon-Skinwalker roared and whipped its head to the side in anger and agony, Amorie’s dress flapping from the motion like a victory flag in the wind.

  The dragon-Skinwalker settled back to the ground, lowering its weight onto all fours as it readied for some kind of attack. The logical part of my brain seemed to have retreated so much that trying to name what the monster might be doing seemed impossible. All I knew was that it still wanted to fight, and I would oblige it as soon as I could reach it.

  As the dragon-Skinwalker settled itself down, however, its savaged front leg gave out and it slammed to the ground. Amorie wasted no time, and I could see her fangs prominently through her bloodlust-driven grin as she seized one of its horns and tugged Melhir free, stabbing the great monstrosity again and again through the top of the head, each blow going deeper than the last.

  The beast within me surged enthusiastically and I found myself howling eagerly as I hurried toward the fight. Had I been in my human form, I would have been stunned by the sheer brutality of Amorie’s showing. In the war form, I was simply thrilled by it.

  The supernatural reptile breathed a gout of flame and arched its neck, eyes rolling back wildly in its head. Just as I crossed the last dozen feet to its side, the dragon-Skinwalker spread its mighty wings and beat them rapidly, sending a powerful gust of air in my direction which threw me back half as far as I had come, and sent me sprawling to the ground. Enraged, I came up snarling and ready to tear the Skinwalker apart, but the dragon was gone, and it took my eyes a few seconds to find the small form that had taken the great beast’s place.

  I sprinted for the tall, spindly form that this foolish creature had chosen to take next. Somewhere nearby, my Alpha’s voice rang out in the night and I paused just long enough to answer him back with a howl of my own before rushing my prey. I could see the vampire still fighting with her little sword, and the now puny Skinwalker seemed to have a little sword of its own. I was not concerned with tiny pieces of metal, however. I was ready to tear this pathetic intruder apart and show it the price of daring to set foot in my territory. I finally reached the fight and threw myself on the Skinwalker’s puny back, sinking my teeth triumphantly into its shoulder.

  Distantly, I heard Amorie crying out as something small and sharp bit hotly into my side and I felt something tearing deep inside. I stumbled back as the Skinwalker raised the blood-drenched sword and my vision narrowed and swam.

  Amorie’s sword slapped the Skinwalker’s sword aside, and he turned his back on me as she forced him to face her. I tried to growl in anger at the dismissal, but my breath caught in my throat. I heard my pack howling nearby. They were close; so close. As soon as they showed up, we would tear this intruder apart. My head swam dizzily, my pulse pounding in my ears, and the ground suddenly flew up to meet me.

  29

  Little Love

  Amorie

  I had always loved to dance. My earliest memories were of dancing with my older sisters, and many were the times when my father had whipped me for dancing when I was supposed to be working. When Dreena had taken me in and turned me, I had danced with nobles, and queens, mages and devils. I had danced arm in arm, cheek to cheek, back to back, and blade to blade, with my beloved mistress for centuries.

  And now I danced with the Skinwalker.

  The Navajo abomination was an uncouth, brutish partner. I imagined it usually solved its conflicts via supernatural strength, and the almost unparalleled survivability and utility of its form-shifting ability. But against me? It was only a matter of time. As it lost skin after skin to my Melhir and Dakota’s Hellfire, no doubt priceless relics each, it grew both more desperate and more enraged, more committed to the prize it had come here to claim.

  That was the idea.

  My claws dug into one of its horns, anchoring me to its head as I plunged Melhir into its massive skull over and over. The blade, forged as bane to any supernatural and quenched in the blood of my mistress mingled with my own, had never failed to kill, and I knew it would not fail me this night. Dragon-Skinwalker blood sprayed out, splashing my face and soaking my dress, and my vision reddened as Hunger fought discipline to drive my actions.

  I watched with amused detachment as it spewed deadly flame harmlessly into the air only a few feet away. I knew if it didn’t change soon, I would kill it regardless, and wondered idly what form it would choose to die in. Then I saw the werewolf coming, and that was almost enough to shake me from my battle trance.

  A seven foot monstrosity, a blend of wolf and woman built for war, this one sporting predominantly
white and light gray fur with a striking sable jacket and mask, rushed for the fray. I recognized those little white spots under both eyes and knew it could only be my Dakota’s war form, despite never having seen it before.

  Damn it, Mira. I told you to keep her out of this!

  I’m sorry, Mistress! My daughter replied through the mental link we shared. Your wolf-girl is too dumb and wouldn’t listen to me!

  I had no time to respond to Mira’s overly harsh criticism of my lover, a fact she was no doubt all too aware of. I cursed again silently, but could do little at the moment but ride out the momentum of the beast as it reared beneath me. I lost sight of Dakota momentarily as it spread its wings and buffeted the air in agony.

  Then, suddenly, I was falling, the dragon beneath me seeming to bubble and boil inside its scaly hide as it shifted into a much smaller form. I hit the ground and rolled, coming to my feet with Melhir transposed between myself and where my senses told me the Skinwalker had gone.

  What I saw there elated me. The Skinwalker stood nine feet tall, a deformed and twisted parody of a young Navajo man hidden in its distended torso and too-long limbs. My sources had told me during the flight to expect this possibility, that its original, human form was warped from having been so long bonded with the evil spirit that gave it its powers. Now you are mine, mon ami. I felt the surge of minor magic as it summoned a great, etched blade of its own, brandishing it at me with pride and anger roiling in its dark, inhuman eyes.

  It swung the ancient, silver-edged greatsword at me easily with one hand and I ducked under the blow, careful to keep my hair from arching up into the blade’s path. In return, I stuck Melhir into the meat of its thigh and twisted, unable to keep a fang-showing-grin from splitting my face. It really had been too long since I’d had a good fight.