Something rammed the side of the mini-van, picking it up off the blacktop. The tires spun in the air, engine whirring as Berget gunned the gas pedal. She twisted in her seat so her feet were against the door. “Oh no, you don’t!”
A large, furry hand the size of two frying pans shot through the open window, grabbed her around the waist and yanked her out.
The car dropped, bounced once and flipped onto its side. I didn’t wait to ask questions or wonder what the hell was going on. I scrambled up through the center of the van and into the driver’s seat, then right out the window. Faris was already out and Alex was behind me.
I lowered myself from the side of the van and stared at the scene in front of me. Berget seemed to be okay, but she was pleading with a rather large, hairy looking beast that resembled an oversized ape. I ran a hand through my hair. “Big foot? Really, man?”
His eyes—bright, brilliant green—raised to mine. He lifted his hands up, the long hair hanging from them in dreadlocks in several places. In the dark of the night it was hard to see what color he was. But I was guessing shades of brown and maybe even green if what I was seeing was right. Not that any of it mattered. His fingers twitched as if beckoning me closer. “Blood heals. I need.” It was only after he spoke that I saw the pustules on his face, partially hidden by matted hair and dirt. Shit.
“You can’t, Rylee.” Faris put his hand on me. “Your blood is mingled with mine right now. There is a chance you could create some sort of big foot with vampiric qualities.”
I stared at him. “You’re fucking kidding me, right?”
He shook his head. “Unless we stop exchanging, you can’t give your blood to anyone. It is no longer Immune like it was before.”
Now that was a pickle I wasn’t expecting. Alex sniffed the air beside me, rising up on his hind quarters until he stood fully erect beside me. “More coming.”
Double shits. “How many?”
He took three exaggerated sniffs. “Seven, maybe more.”
Seven more big foot? Big feet? Whatever the plural was, didn’t matter. “We have to go then.”
The creature in front of us growled and it made me think of the slow, hissing rumble of a crocodile. Only louder and deeper. I lifted my hands. “Sorry, buddy. We can’t help you.”
“Blood helps. Heals babies. Tracker helps. Tracker always helps.” He pleaded with me and my heart squeezed painfully. Babies, they had sick babies. “Faris, how sure are you?”
“Sure enough. You can’t help them. The only way to help them is to get to the Destroyer.” That sounded like advice Liam would give and I fought not to look at Faris to confirm my suspicions.
“Berget, are you okay?”
“Ready to go.” She spoke from behind the big foot, who let out another low rumbling hiss. I racked my brain, trying to remember just how fast the American apes were. Faster than me most likely.
“On three, we run.” I clutched at the threads I’d tied to the Great Wolf. He was close, only a few miles away now. Maybe we’d luck out.
“Why not just kill them?” Faris griped.
“Too many dead already, and Doran is right about that. We might need them later,” I said. I took a breath, spun, and bolted into the forest behind me. Alex was with me, and Faris wasn’t far behind, guarding our rear. Berget caught up with ease.
“He’s fast,” she said with a glance over her shoulder. I couldn’t look. Everything I had focused on not falling flat on my face. Within the shadow of the trees, the darkness of the night was deep enough that gauging where the fuck my feet landed was bitching hard.
My foot caught a root and Berget grabbed me, yanking me upright. “How close is the Great Wolf?”
“Two miles,” I spit out as something grabbed my hair from behind and yanked me to a stop. Before I could do anything, the big foot had me in the air, benched over his head like he was fucking King Kong.
“Put me down, you idiot!” I yelled, hoping he would listen. No such luck. With the tip of one ragged fingernail—which happened to be the size of a small steak knife—he gouged a shallow furrow on my bare arm. The blood welled and he held his mouth open, shaking me like I was some kind of soda pop and he was trying to get the last damn drop from the bottom. My blood dripped into his open mouth.
“Must heal,” he said, holding me with one hand and slowly lowering me back to the ground. He didn’t let me go.
I pulled one of my blades and pressed the tip into his belly. “Let me go. Now.”
His fingers unleashed me as he groaned and clutched at his own belly.
“I thought you said you weren’t going to hurt them?” Berget was at my side, helping me navigate the terrain away from the big foot.
“I didn’t.” Which worried me. He groaned again and a loud rumble in his guts made me think we might be in for a show I didn’t want. Last time I’d hear noises like that, Alex had gotten into the spicy Thai food and no one had been able to stand within twenty feet of him for days. Apparently, my blood didn’t agree with him.
The hair on the big foot’s body lifted as if with a life of its own, and a guttural moan slipped out of his mouth giving me a glimpse of flat, broad teeth. He ground them together, a crack rebounding through the air.
“Faris . . .”
“I told you, your blood isn’t really your blood anymore. It’s a blend of yours and mine. I have no idea what it’s going to do to him.”
I opened my mouth, was going to ask what the hell we were supposed to do when a series of wolf howls rolled through the air. I did a quick count. Ten. There were ten werewolves coming our way along with the seven other friends of the big foot. Fucking hell. This was not how I wanted to deal with things.
The big foot in front of us suddenly let out a mind numbing roar that rooted my feet to the ground. Like a spell. He lurched toward me, his eyes blood shot and saliva dripping from his mouth.
“You have to kill him!” Faris shouted.
I knew it, damn, I knew it. I pulled my second sword and stepped toward the towering big foot. “I’m sorry.” I whipped my swords forward, crossing them in front of me. They cut through the big foot’s guts, opening him like a stuffed tick. He dropped to his knees and I spun into him, slamming my blades through the neck, taking his head.
I jammed my blades back into their sheaths and started toward the Great Wolf. A couple of miles.
“Why aren’t we running?” Berget whispered beside me, looking over her shoulder several times.
“They’ll catch us anyway because I’m too slow, and even if one of you carries me they’ll catch us. So we walk and conserve our energy.” Alex bounced beside me, his hair flopping as he went up and down.
“Rylee, big wolves coming. Big, bigger than boss.”
Fantastic. That was just what I wanted to hear. I pulled my crossbow free and fitted it with a bolt. Carried it loosely at my side. The bolt, edged in silver, would do serious damage to a werewolf or vampire. Same as my whip laced with silver filament.
“Thought you weren’t going to hurt them?” Faris laughed the words at me and I had to restrain myself from using the crossbow on him.
“Everyone keeps pointing out that if I don’t make it, the world is royally screwed. Maybe I finally believe that shit.”
I tapped Alex lightly on the head. “Tell me when the wolves are thirty feet out.”
“Yuppy doody, Rylee.” He spun around to stare into the darkness, walking backward with high, exaggerated steps until he was in front of me, ears and eyes trained on the forest behind us.
My heart was racing. This was not how I normally did things and it rubbed me the wrong way. Twitching, I fought not to spin around. Fuck it.
“Alex, stay close.” I turned, bringing my crossbow up to my cheek, sighting down the channel. Faris and Berget let out twin groans that at another time would have made me laugh. Ten werewolves, we could take them. They were probably sick anyway.
There could be no mercy in me, not if I wanted to keep the world whole and
my loved ones safe. I stood, watching the darkness, waiting for a glimmer of golden werewolf eyes.
A shimmer of silver to the left and I adjusted my aim, saw the eyes, pulled the trigger. As the snarl of pain erupted, I was already fitting the crossbow with another bolt. A glimmer of eyes to my left and I loosed a second bolt. A yelping cry told me my aim was true.
“Alex, stay back.” Like everyone else, he’d taken my blood, but what if the effects wore off? He would be vulnerable to the pox. I managed to get a third bolt in, but not before they were on us.
Alex didn’t listen to me, but threw himself into the fray, snarling and snapping. Berget and Faris were there, breaking necks like they were brittle twigs. From the corner of my eye, I saw Berget feed on one of the werewolves, drinking him down. A massive, brindled wolf leapt at me, claws and mouth extended. I fell backward as I shot the last bolt. It caught the werewolf through the lower jaw and slammed into his brain. The wolf jerked in mid-flight and fell to the ground at my feet.
I scrambled up and looked around. They were all dead. Every last one of the pack was killed. A sick, horrible feeling rolled through me. If the supernaturals kept coming after me, I would be forced to kill them. The only ones who might be able to stand with me in the last showdown with Orion. And the bastard demon knew it. I was effectively killing off my own potential allies in order to survive, yet the paradox was that it could kill me in the end.
I didn’t have time to think more on that. In the distance, another set of howls made the hair rise along the back of my neck.
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” I swung my bow onto my back and looked around. The Great Wolf was closer, which meant he was coming our way.
“Alex, howl for the Great Wolf.”
“You gots it.” He tipped his head back. “Greeeaaaaaaat Woooooolf. Coooooome.”
Berget raised her eyebrows. “That is not what I thought he would do.” Beside her, Faris burst out laughing, the gold rim back around the edge of his eyes. Once more I decided not to point it out to him. No need to provoke him.
Alex panted slowly, his head swiveling first to one side, then the other. “Great Wolf is close. He says so.”
A chill danced across my shoulders. I turned slowly in a full circle, Tracking the Great Wolf. He was close, as in I-should-be-seeing-his-furry-ass close.
“Hey, wolf boy. You want to show yourself?” I turned and found myself staring down into the face of a rather large, black wolf. The scar down his shoulder drew my eye. At least I had the right wolf. His dark eyes were bottomless and there was no mercy in them.
I didn’t flinch. Just stared. “I need your help.”
He pressed his muzzle against the hollow of my throat, then turned to look at Faris who gave a low growl that was not a vampire’s. The Great Wolf looked over my shoulder and for just a minute, I thought I heard him say grandson?
I blinked several times. “Did you say grandson?”
The Great Wolf’s eyes shot to mine, narrowing, lips pulling up over teeth big enough to do some serious damage. I held my ground. “I’ll ask again. I need your help. Please.”
He stepped back, his jet-black fur and eyes making him difficult to see. If it hadn’t been for that scar on his shoulder, I would have lost him in the trees. No wonder I hadn’t seen him sneaking up on me.
The second werewolf pack skidded to a stop. A series of whimpers leaked from their lips as they went from snarling maniacs, to whimpering puppies.
Alex shook a fist at them and snarled. “Yes, that’s right, scaredy cats!”
I shushed him. “Alex, don’t tempt fate.”
The Great Wolf let out a low chuckle and shook his head. Again, I heard a single word said with a strange mixture of sarcasm and laughter. Submissive.
“Yeah, well, that’s what you get when a submissive isn’t so doormat-like any longer,” I said, hoping to get a reaction. I did.
The Great Wolf leapt at me, knocking me to the ground. His huge paws were on my shoulders, keeping my hands pinned. His back feet dug into my ankles, locking me to the ground. Fuck, I’d just been owned by an oversized dog.
A blur of blond hair and golden eyes was all I caught as Faris sent the Great Wolf flying. “She’s mine, don’t you forget it, old man,” he snarled in a voice not quite his.
“Liam, ease up. We have to play nice when we want someone’s help.”
“Easy for you to say, you never play nice.” His eyes flicked to mine, golden and oh-so-beautiful. I shrugged. No point in denying it. That was a hard truth about me. Around us the other wolves whimpered and shifted, like they didn’t know what to do. Attack or run. I felt the same way.
“Great Wolf, or whatever the fuck your name is, are you helping us? We’re going to save the world with or without your help, but it will be a hell of a lot easier with.”
The Great Wolf seemed to grow and I realized he was shifting. “I hope to hell you can keep clothes on when you do that,” I said before I thought better of it.
His body morphed in a fluid spell of shifting bones and flesh, not unlike the way Liam shifted.
He lifted his head, and those dark eyes and hair struck me to the core of my guts. It wasn’t Liam, I knew that. But the similarities were so strong I wanted to run my hands over his face to feel the lines of his jaw, the edge of his brow. He wore a button down shirt that could have been a dark blue, and something like khaki pants but his feet were bare.
“You’re related to Liam, aren’t you?”
He nodded and that one word came back to me.
“You’re his fucking grandfather?”
The Great Wolf shrugged, a wry smile on his lips that was so like Liam’s it tore at my heart. “I wouldn’t say fucking, yeah? I haven’t had the pleasure of that in a damn long time. But yeah, your wolf was my grandpup. Pity I didn’t get to meet him before he offed himself.” I stood and Faris, or I should say Liam, stayed one step in front of me. The Great Wolf narrowed his eyes. “You can call me Griffin, Tracker. But that one there”—he pointed at Liam—“Who in the name of the mother goddess is that?”
I lifted a hand. “Griffin, meet your grandson, Liam.”
CHAPTER 17
Liam
Faris didn’t try to fight for control as they stared at the man in front of them. The resemblance between them was uncanny. Put them in a lineup and Griffin could have been his twin. More so than even his own father.
As if reading his mind, Griffin nodded. “Your mother’s side, boy, yeah? But by the goddess, what are you doing in a vampire’s body? That seems like a damn stupid idea.”
Liam grimaced. “Wasn’t my idea. The vampire is a necromancer. He called on me to use my ability to heal. Then I got stuck.”
“Bullshit. You didn’t get stuck, you chose to stay. No such thing as a spirit getting stuck, yeah?” Griffin didn’t smile, but still he thought the older wolf was laughing at him.
Faris twisted around inside him. Not stuck?
“Then why I am still here? I tried to leave when I was first in this body.” That was the truth too. In the beginning, he didn’t want anything to do with Faris.
Griffin pointed to Rylee. “Because you bound your soul to her, didn’t you? I see the ties between you. That’s the tricky part about a binding. Means you two are together no matter what, and if one of you is dead, your spirit can’t move on. Unless she dies, you’re going to be bosom buddies with the vampire there, yeah?”
He swallowed hard, but there was no saliva to wet his lips. Stuck with Faris for an undetermined time was not something he wanted to have to deal with. Especially not when he was able to see exactly what the fanged one wanted to do with Rylee.
Rylee cleared her throat. “Honestly, this is all damn fascinating, and maybe we’ll get a chance to sit down for fucking high tea at some point, but we’re on a time crunch.” She eyed Griffin. “Yeah?”
He gave her a lopsided grin and looped an arm across her shoulders, which made Liam bristle. He took three steps forward and
knocked his grandfather’s arm off her.
“Liam.” Rylee shook her head. But it was too late. Bad enough that he had to share her with the vampire.
Griffin stepped into his space, a low growl trickling over his lips as he physically shoved Liam back. He kept pushing until they were twenty feet away from the others. His voice was low enough that Liam knew Rylee wouldn’t hear, but he wasn’t so sure about Berget. “Boy, what are you going to do when she tumbles with the vampire because he tricks her into believing it’s you?”
Horror, sharp and pungent, smacked him as if it were a living thing. “He won’t fool her.”
“No? Why do you think he isn’t fighting you? Why he isn’t pushing you out? Because that is the flipside. Even a green necromancer could, so fresh to the power that he doesn’t even realize he can toss a spirit. He’s playing you. Learning your moves.”
“He’s not really a necromancer.”
“Then how did he call on you? He’s playing you, Liam. Playing you for the fool you are. Your love for her is admirable, but he’s banking on it. And when the time is right he’ll make her his. One way or another.”
That was not what was happening. Yet even as he thought it, Faris pushed himself forward, stuffing Liam into a back cubbyhole.
Faris reached out and tapped Griffin on the shoulder. “Thanks for the warning, old man. But she’ll choose who she wants. I won’t force that on her.”
Griffin let out a snarl. “She’s my family too now, vamp. Remember, if you mess with her, you mess with me, yeah?”
Faris gave him a mocking bow, even going so far as to stick his leg out as if they were at court. Liam railed against not being able to say anything and when he tried to come to the surface, Faris shoved him back. As if it was no effort.
Fucking vampire, Griffin was right. He was being played.
She’s mine, Faris! MINE!
“She is her own person, Liam. That is something you struggle to understand. She’ll choose, and when she does, I’ll break the bond between the two of you and send your soul to its rest.” Faris gave Griffin a nod and brushed past him.
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