The Daemon Within
Page 12
Isa was trying not to laugh, too. Either way Dmitri took it and said he would. “Da, vampire friend. I vill see this note out.”
Over me and Isa teasing him, “Thank you. We can leave now,” he added, his face still incredibly red.
Chapter 22
You didn’t need to be fluent in Russian or whatever to know what all the wooden signs hanging from the various trees said. ‘Warning – No Trespassing.’ We weren’t in the relative safety of Pripyat any more, this was a place that probably could’ve given Sinai a run for its money in terms of ill feelings. It didn’t take long after leaving the village and heading south to pick up the scent. There was certainly something wild about these wolves, that much I knew.
What I didn’t expect upon arriving at the homestead was a huge satellite sticking up from behind the house and a guy texting on his cellphone waiting for us at the front gate. Alexi didn’t look much older than me, with his shaggy brown hair and his rugged, old jeans, he could’ve been Chernobyl Vic. I wondered if Dmitri sensed kindred spirits and that’s why he offered this option.
He put the phone away. “I wondered when the newcomers would arrive.” There was barely an accent. If you didn’t know to listen for it, you probably wouldn’t have even picked it up. “Did Dmitri send you?”
I was curious if someone had been able to tip him off. “Yes.”
“Good. Come inside, I’m sure there’s much to discuss and not much time.” He gave us a half smile. “That’s how these things normally go, isn’t it?”
“Not always,” I replied. “But this time, you’re right.”
Alexi opened the gate and the two vampires cautiously followed me into potential danger. The odor of the wolves was thick, but I couldn’t even hear ‘em. I wondered just how Alexi kept them under control.
As we entered the home, there was a small table in the kitchen that Alexi plopped down around. “A werewolf, daemon, and two vampires enter a bar,” he joked. “At least that’s how I imagine this whole thing would go.”
“How do you know about my daemon?”
“Sasha smelled you a mile away.” With his thumb, he pointed out the back window. “Sasha is the triplet with the best nose.”
“I don’t hear any wolves,” Isa questioned.
“They are sitting, waiting for my command. Are you friend or are you foe?”
I knew it was a rhetorical question, but Gregory was just so damn formal. “We are not here to hurt you, if that is what you mean.” He was getting nervous, repeatedly checking outside to see where the sun was. “We need your help and it is a bit urgent, I am afraid.”
Alexi wasn’t really interested in talking to the vampire. “It is rare for two Omegas to be in one place.”
“It’s also rare to be in the middle of Chernobyl and meet a wolf who sounds more American than anything else.”
He took my jab in stride. “When the pack issued its decree that my brothers were a threat and that my skills in hunting and fishing were too piss poor, they sent me out here. Thanks to a satellite I salvaged, at least old American sitcoms became a part of the family.”
Underneath it all, he was bitter – just as I had been. If he hadn’t been, that would’ve bothered me. “You don’t believe you were relegated to Omega because you can’t hunt, do you?”
The vampires were getting annoyed with my lack of perceived hurrying, but I knew how to handle an Omega. “Nope, my brothers were too great a danger and I’m the only one they’ll listen to. Get rid of me, get rid of them, simple as that.”
“When’s the last time you or your brothers have been free to roam?”
His head snapped back over to the vampires. “Are the rumors true? Did one of you kill the Chernybog?”
“I did,” Isa stated proudly. “Why do you ask?”
Alexi gave a slight smile to her answer, but it quickly disappeared. “I might be in the middle of nowhere, but I have allies. The three of you are going after the Silvers and have been sent here to recruit me.” He leaned in. “If I was going to throw my lot in with you, I wanted to make sure that my brothers and I teamed up with the best.”
I took that as him joining the cause. “So we can count on your help to save the pack?”
Not so fast my friends. “Me, sure. But it’s not me you want.” He stood up. “Come, if you want the help of the triplets, you’ll need to convince them.” The three of us stood up, only to be stopped by Alexi. “The two vampires should probably hang out here,” he suggested. “Let them get to know the wolf first before making things too difficult.”
“There’s no way in hell I’m letting Vic go out there with three unstable wolves!”
“Isa, it’s cool.” We needed the help and if this was the only way… “Besides, you’re fast enough where if I get into trouble, you’ll be there before they can snap me in half.”
Gregory snickered but Isa’s look remained the same. “If you get attacked, maybe I’ll be too preoccupied to help.” Awww, she was pouting.
“I’ll be fine,” I reassured her. Turning to Alexi, “Time’s a-wasting.”
****
He led me out the side door and we stepped into a huge pen. Three monstrous wolves were sitting on their hind legs, just looking at the two of us. “The one to the far right, that’s Sasha,” he said. Sasha was a huge black wolf.
The introductions went on. “In the middle, that’s Hugo.” He was ashen colored with distinct bright yellow eyes. “And last, but not least, is Micha.” He gestured to the black wolf with the white stripe going down its back. Micha looked like a skunk, a large, murderous skunk that would eat you whole.
“Those are some big boys,” was all I could get out.
“With what you’re wanting to do, you’ll need some big boys.” Sasha gave off a low growl. “He thinks you reek of daemon,” Alexi told me.
“I have the Warg in me, that’s probably what he smells,” I explained.
Alexi wasn’t much listening to me. Huge was pawing the ground at the same time. Filling me in, “Hugo, on the other hand, thinks you’re trustworthy; says you’ve been touched by the Holy Spirit.”
Dmitri had said something very similar before we departed. Could the Eye of the Redeemer be emitting some sort of holy scent? “Can I ask him what he’s referring to?”
“Sure, but I doubt he’ll answer you.”
Alexi was right. Hugo just sat there looking at me, not enlightening me to what his previous comment meant. “This isn’t going anywhere fast.”
“Micha is the tiebreaker; we’re just waiting for him.”
The last wolf got off the ground and started walking towards me. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to be scared or what. I decided to hold my ground and just wait to see what happened. Micha stopped in front of me and sniffed the front of my shirt. He began to howl and his brothers joined in, Alexi included.
When he was finished, “It’s settled. We will join you into Silver territory.”
“That seems really easy.”
“We were always going to go,” he leveled with me. “These boys have been itching for a fight for a long time, but it was interesting getting their reactions. Two of the three seem to think you’re some sort of divine figure.” Alexi just shook his head. “I’m smart enough to know you’re just a wolf with some fancy trinkets around your neck.”
Alexi popped a pack of cigarettes out of his jacket pocket and lit one up with a fancy Zippo lighter. He offered me one and as tempting as it was, I politely declined. “Vic,” he said before taking another long drag, “the disaster changed us. We’re not like the other wolves. We’re angry. We have an insatiable drive for vengeance, against anyone or anything.”
The ease at which he said that was a bit disturbing. “Where we’re going, the drive to fight and survive is paramount. I think that’s why Dmitri pointed us in your direction.”
The black wolf with the white stripe yelped something at Alexi. “He’s not an angel, Micha,” Alexi barked.
He was right; I wasn�
��t. Looking at the wolf that first sensed the Warg, “Sacha thinks I’m some sort of daemon, doesn’t he?”
Laughing, “We all know you’re a daemon, Victor.” He patted Micha on the head and he rejoined his two brothers. “The amount of positive energy surrounding you, that’s what we were curious about.”
I hadn’t been able to get an answer from the wolf brother, so I thought maybe Alexi would offer me something. “I’d love for you to elaborate.”
“Some answers you’ll need to discover for yourself.” The sun was starting to get dangerously close to the horizon line. “Your vampire friends are going stir crazy inside. I think we’d probably better get back in and get our little adventure underway, wouldn’t you agree?”
Seeing as how Gregory and Isa’s heads were sticking through the window, I couldn’t help but to laugh. “Let’s go before they leave us behind. We wouldn’t want to miss any of the action now, would we?”
That got an answer, in the form of another three way howl.
Chapter 23
Dusk was settling in the forest as we made our way towards the Silvers’ encampment. The three wolves were out front, with me and Alexi behind them. The vampires, Isa and Gregory, trailed behind. Before we left Alexi’s homestead, Isa relayed to me that her and Gregory were weary of the wolves. I personally found their company to be refreshing. There was something about Alexi that I really liked, though I couldn’t really put my finger on it.
Since we had some time to talk, there had been one thing I’d been wondering. “Alexi, what’s your inner wolf like?”
“You don’t want to find out,” he answered. “Besides, if I transform, my brothers will go berserk, as I am the one who can keep them in line.”
That seemed quite ominous. “Does something bad happen when you transform, well besides your brothers going crazy?”
He chuckled softly. “Hasn’t the Warg told you? Ever since you came into my presence, he’s been on edge.”
The Warg and I hadn’t been on the best of speaking terms since we left Sinai. Mustering up some internal dialogue, “Hey, you ready to talk to me again?”
“You are only coming to me because the man-beast told you to.” Good to see he was still in a fine mood. At least he answered. “You want to know if his words are true, correct?”
“Yeah, but I want to make sure we’re solid, too. We’re about to go to war with some heavy hitters and I’ll need your help.”
“Humph,” he sighed. “I must warn you that next time you call upon me, the bloodlust will be great. Keep that in mind before you enlist my power. Friend, foe, it won’t matter, it will need to be sated.”
I took his warning seriously. I remember vividly my attack on Jonathan and how vicious it was. That wasn’t something to be taken lightly. “I’ll remember.” But we needed to get back to the point. “What’s up with Alexi? You know something, so out with it, please.”
His mood became a tad less cranky. “The Omega is tainted. Even before the radiation touched him, his wolf was corrupted.”
“How is that possible?” I went on, questioning. “He wouldn’t have even been old enough to transform for the first time.”
“Victor, Alexi is the son of the dark one, the Chernybog.”
My blood ran cold. “Everyone stop,” I commanded aloud. The vampires and the three wolves seemed so surprised that they did as I asked without question. Back internally, “You didn’t feel the need to tell me this before?” I raged.
“You never asked,” the Warg replied emotionless before drifting out of communication range. I hated it when he did that.
Pointing at Alexi, “When were you going to tell me?”
“Tell you what, Vic?” Isa asked. Gregory stood beside her, equally perplexed.
My finger was shaking I was so mad. “He’s the kid of the Chernybog.”
You could’ve cut the tension that popped up quicker than a jackrabbit with a knife. Isa immediately vamped out and Gregory wasn’t that far behind her. Alexi’s brothers began to growl and we had the makings of a Mexican standoff in the middle of a radioactive forest. Things were looking bleak.
Except for Alexi’s face. “My mother made a grave mistake, seeking comfort in that devil when she had an issue with my father. The villagers, they won’t even acknowledge what happened, just that I’m a freak.”
Dmitri led us to believe that no wolf ever made contact with the Chernybog. “Why on earth would your mom go to that… thing?” I asked.
He shrugged his shoulders. “Maybe she didn’t fear him or maybe it was black magic, who knows? We never really talked about it. My father just accepted our life on the outskirts, never stopped loving my mother.”
“I thought the whole ‘he didn’t have any usable skills’ reasoning was a lame one to be named an Omega.” I hadn’t even realized it, but Roscoe was pointing at Alexi’s head, my finger on the trigger. “Why didn’t you tell us sooner?”
Still unmoved by the looming threat, “My father died the day of the accident. He accepted what happened and raised me no different than my three brothers. That thing she killed,” he motioned towards Isa, “was just the black stain on my past. I was so very happy to hear you killed him,” he added.
Isa must’ve believed each word that came out of his mouth because her fangs retracted and her eyes went back to normal. “Vic, put the gun down.”
If she trusted him, then so could I. As my arm lowered, “You still should’ve told us before.”
“You’re right,” he acknowledged. “People just have a bad way of judging me once they find out. When I picked up on the Warg’s intuition, I figured we might as well deal with it before we enter the Silver’s territory.”
“So that’s why you don’t transform?”
“Yes, Vic. I have two curses, one of the radiation and one from the dark one. My wolf form is a creature that shouldn’t walk these grounds.”
Nodding slowly, “Don’t fool yourself, Alexi.” He gave me a funny look. “Where we are going, we’re going to need monsters if we want to win.”
It was his turn to see the truth in my words. “Maybe, but only in a worst case scenario. If I transform, there will be no friends, just targets.”
It was eerily similar to the warning the Warg gave me just moments ago if I called upon his power. “Under my breath, “That makes two of us.”
“Did you say something, Vic?” Gregory asked.
“No,” I lied. “We wasted enough time sorting this out. I think we best get going if we want to make it before it gets too late.”
I can’t say the overall feel of our dysfunctional group had improved any, but at least the desires to shoot, stab, and bite had gone down. With unease, the road towards the Silvers continued on. The falling sun didn’t help, either, as the bad memories of Alexi’s dad threatening us were still pretty fresh. In the dimming light, he even started to look a bit like his biological father.
Fortunately, the moment we left the Wormwood, those ill tidings faded away. Night was about to fall and we were getting closer to the Silvers by the minute. It was time to employ some diversion tactics. “Okay, we all know werewolves got good noses, so we’ll need to break this party up a bit. Alexi,” I hesitated just a split second, “can you and your brothers circle around and come in from the north? If they pick you up, they won’t be expecting us to the south.”
Alexi walked over to his brothers and even though no words were spoken, something was happening. When an agreement, I’m guessing, was agreed upon, Alexi came back. “We can certainly cause a distraction. If you want, we can even signal our descent.”
“That’d be great,” I replied. “When we hear the howls, we will take that as our time to act.”
With a casual plan in place, Alexi and his brothers went one way, leaving me and the vampires to continue the route we’d planned. “Can we trust him?” Gregory asked once Alexi was well out of earshot.
I didn’t really know. “I think so,” I answered, almost skeptical myself.
“They really didn’t have anything to do with what happened to him.” Other than trying to wipe out his pack, I suppose. “No one saw the nuclear plant melting down and it was his mom who made the mistake.”
She gave me that ‘poor Victor” look. “When you have that much aggression bottled up, you just need a reason. We gave him one when we showed up at his door.”
“You know a lot about someone who did not really reveal too much about himself willingly,” Gregory spoke up.
“It’s not the person; it’s the pain I understand. Don’t you understand the same pain, Gregory?”
I’m not sure what she was talking about, but Gregory sure did. “How do you know about that?”
She didn’t gloat or anything, but, “I would be a pretty piss poor tactician if I didn’t study up on all the threats after I got off Neverland.” Looking right at him, “And you were considered a threat to me, to us, Gregory.”
Isa didn’t need to lump me into this – Gregory was like one of my best friends. “The last thing we need to do right now is open old wounds.” The first hints of werewolf were hitting my nose. They wouldn’t notice us, but it was getting very close. “Can we focus on the task at hand?”
Both of them nodded and let it go. I pushed the thoughts of Gregory’s hidden past out of my mind, for I knew the dangers of curiosity. Instead, I focused on going forward and getting us in position by the wolves. By the time I did that, the moon was high in the air, giving us enough light to see what we were up against.
From our vantage point, quite some distance away, the Silver camp looked pretty sprawling. There were numerous targets, not counting any vampire reinforcement that may have shown up since the death of that Anna. There was only one thing to do, be honest with my friends. “We’re going to need the Warg,” I told them.
“We knew that,” Isa said nonchalantly.