Lost Vegas Series

by Lizzy Ford

  He paused when he reached the cavernous interior and let his senses adjust to the noise ricocheting off the walls. The scream bounced around him, until the inner pyramid was filled with a deafening roar. With some effort, and the assistance of his deformities, he determined its source: the apartment at the very top.

  Unable to explain how a skinwalker could possibly be in his home, Arthur nonetheless sprinted to the elevator reserved exclusively for the Hanover’s and rode it with great impatience to the top.

  Before he reached the family’s private residences, the sound suddenly stopped.

  He sprang out of the lift as soon as the doors opened, past the baffled guards, and down the hallway.

  Arthur drew his weapons, already knowing they were useless against the creature he had seen destroy villages, and slowed his pace.

  “Father?” he called.

  “Sir, the Shield –” one of the guards shouted after him. The man trailed him towards the other end of the apartment.

  “Go.” Arthur turned and snatched his tunic. He hauled the guard close. “Keep everyone away! Do you understand?”

  The guard nodded hastily and stepped back. Arthur waited for him to leave the hallway before focusing again on what was before him.

  With any luck, the skinwalker would not be willing to murder him, until he had fulfilled his end of their deal.

  Questions poured through Arthur’s mind as he moved towards the faint flicker in his mind indicating where the creature was. How had Black Wolf made it this far without being seen? How had he accessed the most secure residence in the building?

  How had he done anything without leaving a telltale path of slaughter behind him?

  Arthur drew a deep breath to steady himself as he tiptoed down the hallway. His father was present in his quarters, though Arthur’s magic was unable to tell what condition his father was in. He was torn between two conflicting thoughts: hoping the threat to the city was dead and praying his father was alive. Anger fluttered through him.

  Arthur pushed his feelings aside to focus on his current objective.

  Oddly enough, his magic indicated that the skinwalker was in Matilda’s room, which Tiana had told him transitioned to her after Matilda’s death. Arthur passed his room and his father’s then paused in front of Tiana’s.

  He opened the door and entered, bracing himself for an attack.

  “I know you are here,” he whispered to the dark room beyond the door. Easing the door closed, he breathed deeply, took a step, and then stopped to listen.

  A growl resounded from deep within Tiana’s quarters.

  “We have a deal, friend,” Arthur reminded the skinwalker.

  Was it capable of comprehending a person when in its beast forms? Arthur had not thought to ask this or any of the other questions suddenly entering its mind.

  He took another step.

  The growl grew louder.

  He stopped.

  “Do you remember me?” he asked. “Remember our common friend? The sweet creature who protects you? Who helps me?”

  The growl subsided without disappearing.

  “You do know who I am,” he said.

  His mind told him where the creature was. The fact the skinwalker wasn’t attacking was the best sign Arthur could imagine.

  “I am placing my weapons down,” he said. “Then we can talk.” He lowered his knives, heart pounding loudly in his ears. “See? They are down.” He pushed them towards the skinwalker with a foot. “You are in no danger.” He dropped his hands to his sides.

  The growling stopped.

  Arthur licked his lips anxiously. Either the beast was preparing to pounce or was calming down. “Come on out of there,” he said and stepped closer to the closet in which the beast hid.

  Silence filled the room. Outside the door, he heard the clatter of Shield guards gathering.

  Arthur retreated and locked the door before returning to his place near the closet door.

  “Those men outside the door will overreact when they see you,” he warned the skinwalker. “While I’m well aware you can take care of yourself and murder everyone for miles around, I also know this floor can be locked down completely. You will not be able to escape the building, no matter how many Shield members you kill. You will have no choice but to leap out the window. Even you cannot survive that fall, my friend.” He inched closer. His stomach turned over and over, and his instincts – reading the intentions of the creature – were torn between warning him away and telling him it was safe. “I can help you. Come out, and we will leave here together.”

  Arthur held his breath. The stillness of the creature was as telling as its growl. He waited despite knowing how likely it was for the Shield to break down the door soon. He was no longer the heir to his father, but he was still his father’s son and one of the only two Hanover’s currently located in the city.

  Come on, he urged the creature mentally.

  The beast stepped one foot out of the closet without making a sound. Its fur was the color of night, its eyes glowing the shade of the moon.

  Arthur noted the eye color but did not have the chance to dwell on why it had changed from the last time he saw the beast.

  The skinwalker took another step out of the closet then a third and fourth. It stood, the hair on the back of its neck standing on end, and its body crouched as if to attack. It had not chosen the form of a bear this time but of a great black panther.

  “I have not seen you in this form before,” Arthur said. “You seem …” smaller.

  The words died in his throat. Moonlight from Tiana’s windows reflected off a medallion around the beast’s neck, and the reason behind the noticeable changes in the beast suddenly made sense to Arthur. During the time they shared together in the Diné village, Tiana had shown him her medallion and explained how her guardian possessed an identical one that lit up when they were close.

  Arthur’s eyes widened, and he stared at it … at her … in quiet disbelief.

  “Aveline,” he breathed finally. To some part of him, buried deep enough it was intertwined with his instincts, he was expecting this. The daughter of the Devil had always been special in the same way Tiana was: in her blood. Arthur knew from the moment she appeared in a vision to him, even before he sent out search parties to find the elusive assassin-in-training who was destined to become his sister’s guardian. “What are you doing here?”

  The skinwalker’s mouth opened, and she made a quiet, plaintive sound. Arthur tilted his head, hoping to hear her words, as he often did with Black Wolf’s spirit guide. No words or images formed in his mind.

  “Can you not turn human? I will understand you better,” he said.

  She shook her head.

  “You cannot turn human?” he prodded.

  Another shake.

  Before Arthur could respond, one of the Shield members pounded on the door.

  “Go back in there and hide,” he ordered her quietly. “We can sort all this out later. I need to protect you first.”

  Aveline obeyed and slinked back into the closet.

  Arthur went to the door and yanked it open. “Whatever it is, it is not present here,” he told the phalanx of Shield members jammed into the hallways. “Has anyone checked on my father?”

  “We evacuated him,” one of them reported. “We will do the same for you.”

  “Gentlemen, I am one of you,” he said and smiled. “Who better to show you the hiding places no one other than my family knows?” He walked into the hall and closed the door behind him. “No one is to enter the sacred personal space of Tiana, the Hanover heir, unless he is accompanied by my father or me.”

  No one objected to his firm tone, and Arthur pointed to his father’s quarters with one hand and his with another. “Search those two rooms and report to me your findings.”

  Five Shield men piled into each room, and another two into the cramped space of the room where Tiana once resided.

  Arthur remained close to the door to Tiana’s
quarters. As if suspecting the danger her movement or sound could place her, Aveline did not stir from within the dark space.

  Arthur managed to subdue the flurry of thoughts running through him. His situation had become more complicated than before. If Aveline were unable to turn into a human, and Arthur had an appointment to fake his own death in the morning, how was he supposed to sneak a

  Book Four

  Black Wolf

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  The presence of his wolf drifted out of the skinwalker with the same gentleness the creature had always used to guide him. One moment, the subtle, warm energy hummed within him. The next, it was gone, replaced by a void that felt cold. Empty. Alone.

  The skinwalker sat up, focusing hard on the spirit wolf. No whisper of her energy remained. No image of her appeared in his mind.

  He bowed his head and wished her safe passage back to her realm, and then stood. The spring night was cool without being cold. The air smelled of the rainclouds blown in by a stiff breeze. The weather was unpredictable this time of year, though warmer than he was accustomed to.

  The skinwalker slept apart from the others, who had all sought shelter from the elements in one of the burnt out buildings remaining of the village that once stood in the shade of pine trees, beside the great expanse of grasslands covering the distance between this forest and distant mountains. He had created his own shelter out of the poncho and fur cloak in his possession.

  Black Wolf left his shelter, impervious to the chill in the wind, and strode to the place where the trees met the prairie. He stood, senses outstretched and thoughts drifting among his options.

  They were few now that she was gone. Neither of them would ever see his homeland again. This much he knew without a doubt.

  He stood silent, unmoving. For the first time since he was a child, he did not entirely know what to do. His guide had found him when he was five and had been a constant source of wisdom.

  He felt the magic of the pale-faced girl brush the back of her neck before she spoke, and twisted his head to see her from the corner of his eye.

  “I hope you do not intend to run,” she said. Her voice was firm with him alone. Around the others, from whom she had no need to fear anything, she cowered and spoke tentatively.

  Black Wolf faced the prairie again, a half-smile on his face. The pale girl afraid of her shadow was a predator who responded to another predator in her territory. While he had learned the arts of both offense and defense at a young age, the Hanover girl knew only defense.

  She’s a half-predator. His smile faded. His wolf would have appreciated his humor.

  But she was gone, and he was alone in the world.

  “Your fingers are tiny,” he said and turned to confront the Hanover girl full on. “You will do something for me.”

  Her guarded expression grew suspicious, and she folded her arms across her chest. Unless he attacked her companions, she was harmless. Ignoring the swirl of power around her, Black Wolf retreated to his shelter for a knife and then sat on a stump nearby.

  The waif followed.

  “One hundred braids,” he said.

  There was a pause.

  “You want me to braid your hair?” the Hanover girl asked with no small amount of confusion in her voice.

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “My wolf has died. I will burn my hair with her body.” He felt the shift without seeing the woman behind him.

  “I am sorry she died,” the Hanover girl whispered.

  Black Wolf said nothing. Seconds later, her light touch was on his hair. She released the leather tie that kept his hair length at mid-back rather than its full length past his ankles.

  “Why do Natives grow their hair so long?” she asked absently and shook out his hair.

  “It is an extension of our spirits. Hair is sacred.”

  The Hanover girl asked nothing more, and the power around her gradually relaxed and became stable again. He had never met someone with her unique sort of magic. After a lifetime exploring his own capabilities and the world, he was not surprised she existed, only that she had no idea how to wield the immense deformities she possessed.

  She started on the left side of his head, and he on his right.

  The skinwalker glanced towards the shadows. He had placed the knife three feet from where he sat, aware of the assassin lingering in the darkness, charged with guarding the Hanover girl. One day, he hoped to test her abilities, but not while she was guarded, and not when she was fully rested. Whether an enemy possessed physical strength or magical, it was never wise to incur the wrath of someone at full strength but to wait until the circumstances favored him.

  “Your wolf was very kind to me,” the Hanover girl said.

  No one could understand the depth of his relationship with a companion he had traveled with for a hundred years. Those who could speak to his guide had been very few – the Hanover’s, an ancient skinwalker Black Wolf met on his journeys, two shamans, and a random stranger who had fled screaming when the wolf spoke to him some forty years ago. The skinwalker remembered everyone who spoke to his spirit wolf, even though he dismissed the faces and identities of all the lives he had taken and deals he had made, once he received his payment.

  Those who spoke to her were special. Those she chose to spoke to were even rarer. There was something about the Hanover siblings his wolf had liked upon meeting them. For his part, Black Wolf had not wanted to understand initially. The brother and sister had caused him more trouble than anyone else he could recall. On the surface, and in their thoughts, the two were too simple to interest him. The girl’s thoughts were always pure, naïve, the boy’s proud and kind.

  They were boring.

  Except … they were also complicated. Predators who chose to dote over prey rather than realize the extent of their abilities. The combination of purity and magic, of kindness and strength, of absolute power and selflessness, was rare enough in the world that Black Wolf reluctantly understood his spirit guide’s fascination with the siblings. Even he was forced to acknowledge they had been drawn into something unique.

  With four hands braiding, the job went quickly. He gathered a handful of hair into one hand.

  “Take the knife and cut them at the base,” he said.

  Tiana hefted the knife. “I cannot guarantee I will not cut you,” she replied.

  “I have seen the scars on your arms. You know how much force it takes to penetrate skin. Use less.”

  Her breath caught in what he assumed was embarrassment, and she tugged her sleeves down to her wrists. The Hanover girl returned to her position at his side and began to carefully cut the clumps he created from his scalp.

  The touch of cool air against his skull was unwelcome. It felt as if the wind slid through his skin to join with the void that had formed earlier inside him.

  The Hanover girl was slow in her duty, and dawn lifted the night from the forest. An odd silence fell when she had finished. He sensed no threat and twisted to see what she was doing.

  The Hanover girl was studying the braids in equal parts curiosity and understanding. He glanced at the hair he had grown over many decades and noted the stripes of white that had not been present before his guide died.

  “You are dying, too,” she said.

  “So I am.”

  “Are you afraid?”

  “No.”

  She met his gaze with her Ghoulish eyes. “But you are,” he assessed. “You cut yourself and fear death.”

  “I know what to expect from pain,” she replied with the honesty that was unique to her.

  He shook his head. “What you fear is not death. No man fears eternal peace. He fears dying at a time not of his choosing, before he has accomplished all he wishes to.”

  “Is this what they tell you before you murder them?” she asked, a flicker of wariness entering her gaze.

  “It is what they tell me when they cross over.”

  Her eyes dropped to the space beside h
im, and he sensed one of the spirits was visible. Her expression became shuttered.

  “You are grateful I will die soon,” he said with a faint smile.

  Her cheeks blazed red, and she looked down. “In truth, I was not thinking of you.” The Hanover girl set the braids gently across his lap and stepped back. “It is not right to wish anyone dead.”

  “To wish and to kill are different,” he replied. “You murdered Ghouls. Sentient, intelligent creatures who resemble us and act differently.”

  “Self-defense is different,” she said, though she was frowning. “I think.”

  Black Wolf did not have enough time left in the world to mold her into the predator she was capable of becoming. He gathered the braids and stood but left the knife as a truce offering to the assassin whose energy he felt each time Rocky poised for action.

  Voices came from the direction of the burnt out cabin where the two western Natives accompanying their party had slept.

  “They never stop arguing,” the Hanover girl said, looking in the same direction.

  Black Wolf half-listened to the Natives with his keener-than-human senses as he placed the braids of his hair into a satchel.

  “Do you know why they are arguing?” the Hanover girl called after him.

  “Over you. Over me. The route we took. The route they want to take to return. Whose father will be charged with leading the first assault on the city. How many more trained warriors each one of them has. Whose tribe has first rights to trade agreements when the Hanover’s are gone.” Black Wolf shrugged. “Meaningless chatter.”

  “Meaningless?” the Hanover girl exclaimed. “This seems important to me!”

  “None of those things matter.”

  She shook her head, clearly not understanding. He debated leaving her small mind to figure it out for herself. Acutely aware of his waning existence on this plane, he decided to enlighten her rather than wait.

  “If you or I choose to enter the assault, it will not matter how many warriors exist in the world. It will only matter whose side one of us is on,” he explained.

  Realization crossed her face. “I am not like you. Or my father,” she said. “I will fight no war.”