by A. J. Vrana
“Save me?” Miya raised a brow. “And is that for my sake, or for yours?”
“Does that matter!” Evans threw his arms out. “The point is you’re in danger and—”
“Someone’s coming,” Kai hushed them, jumping out of the hammock. “Two of them.”
Evans opened his mouth, but he was quickly shushed by Miya. Barely a moment later flashlights could be seen, and two men emerged from the trees. One of them had a rifle, while the other carried an axe over his shoulder.
“Oh no,” said the onco-whatever. “You two should get out of here before they start trouble.”
“They’ve already started trouble,” replied Kai. He knew what bloodlust smelled like. From the corner of his eye, he saw Miya take a step back and move closer to him. She seemed to trust his instincts.
“Who’s there?” The man with the axe called out as they approached. He was the more confident of the two—tall with bulging biceps and shoulders. Hopefully, the shorter one with the gun wasn’t nervous and trigger-happy.
“Who the hell are you?” Axe-man demanded as he puffed his chest out at Kai. He gave the scrawny doctor a suspicious glance but seemed less threatened by him.
Seeing the snarl creeping onto Kai’s face, Miya quickly cut in. “He’s just—”
“Wow, not so fast, miss,” the other one warned, cocking his rifle. “We’ve been instructed to be real cautious with strangers out here.”
“But I’m the—”
“No one asked you anything!” the burly one hollered. He shone his flashlight in her face before addressing Kai again. “Now identify yourself. I haven’t seen you with any of the search parties.”
“You wouldn’t know me,” Kai glowered. As the light passed over his face, crimson reflected from his mahogany eyes.
“Shit!” the lumberjack wannabe jumped back, dropping the flashlight to the ground and swinging the axe off his shoulder.
The other one raised his rifle, pointing it straight at Kai. “What’s wrong?” His voice wobbled as he glanced wildly between his target and his friend.
“His eyes, man! He’s not human!”
Before the bullets came blazing at him, Kai kicked the flashlight straight at axe-man’s face. The gym rat managed to turn away just enough to avoid a concussion, so Kai lunged at him to draw attention away from Miya.
It worked. The gunman shakily followed while his friend roared in a fit of rage, swinging his weapon like a berserker. With Kai’s nimble body and quick reflexes, those heavy swings were easy to evade. Yet as the man turned to face him, something else caught the wolf off guard; his attacker’s face was warped beyond recognition. His eyes were pitch-black, his mouth twisted open and disjointed while his flesh cracked and split like a chasm. Dark blood oozed from the cavity slithering up the side of his face. It was enough to break Kai’s focus, though he managed to pull himself together for the second flurry of attacks.
Kai could hear Abaddon’s laughter emanating from a shadow lurking somewhere behind the logger. He knew the phantom was the puppeteer pulling the strings, and the human nothing more than a faceless puppet wearing a grotesque mask.
“Kai!”
Miya’s voice snapped him back just as the blade came down towards his shoulder. Sidestepping the swing, faded iron passed heavily through the space beside him, pulling the man forward with unchecked momentum. Kai quickly closed the gap between them and grabbed the axe arm. Twisting viciously, he forced the logger to release his weapon. Kai snatched it up and smoothly flipped the haft to turn the blade, striking the man on the back of the head with the butt and knocking him out cold.
Just as he turned towards the second attacker, the deafening sound of a gunshot rattled through the air. The ringing silence that followed was dizzying; he heard Miya cry out as a sharp pain cut through his left arm. Kai flinched but quickly regained composure before the gun was aimed at him a second time.
“What’s wrong with you!” It was Miya, throwing herself at the gunman. She grabbed the rifle, yanking it from his grip. The hunter quickly tugged back and shoved her—but not before she kicked him in the nuts.
Seeing her tumble back, urgency wrenched at Kai’s heart. He rushed at them with superhuman speed, locking the length of the barrel under his arm and landing a punishing elbow against the hunter’s face. His jaw snapped out of place, the crack followed by a satisfying wail. Fuelled by blind rage, Kai grabbed him by the back of the head and snarled in his face, then clamped his teeth around the man’s ear. Ignoring the muffled plea, he viciously jerked away, ripping the appendage clean off.
An agonized scream followed as the villager fell to the ground, thrashing as he clutched the side of his face. Kai spat out the ear like it was rotten fruit, then brought his heel down on the villager’s head to knock him unconscious.
He could smell the fear and adrenaline as he stalked up to Miya and took her by the shoulders.
“Are you all right?” he asked evenly, though he knew his eyes were still ablaze, blood dribbling down his lips and chin.
She nodded quickly, her body trembling under his touch. He wondered if part of her was repulsed by him.
“He shot you.” Her voice quivered as she clutched his arm. “You’re bleeding.”
“It’s fine,” he sighed, glancing down where the bullet had grazed him. He gently pulled her by the elbow. “Let’s get back inside.”
“Kai—you’re shaking.”
Stopping, he looked at his hand—still balled up in a fist. The tremor was noticeable, but it wasn’t from the fight.
“It’s Abaddon,” he seethed. “He’s doing this.”
“If he’s possessing people, we need to get out of here,” Miya urged. “Ama will be back soon. She might have some ideas.”
For once, he didn’t feel like badmouthing the white-haired she-wolf.
“Hang on!” It was the Golden Turd, finally emerging from his paralysis. He rushed over to them. “We can’t just leave them here! You seriously hurt them!”
Kai turned his wrath onto the doctor. “I will fuck the sun out of your sky if you don’t get out of my way,” he threatened, his eyes flashing with poorly controlled anger.
The girl quickly turned to Mason—his face pale as he recoiled. “Not a good time,” she warned. “Just come inside with us.”
“But we need to put his ear on ice!”
“Screw his ear! He tried to shoot us!” she yelled.
“But—”
She threw her arms out in disbelief. “They’re clearly not here to save me. They’re out for blood, just like you said! So you either come with us, or you stay here to sew Van Gogh’s ear back on and risk becoming target practice for the next trigger-happy psycho that strolls by.”
Kai was grateful she took the reins in light of his dwindling restraint. He watched as Evans descended into a moral crisis.
“I’m a doctor,” he insisted. “It’s my sworn duty to help people.”
“And what about us?” Miya’s temper flared as she jabbed him in the chest. “What about your duty to the people who had guns pointed at them for no reason?”
His face twisted like someone had gutted him. “I still don’t think they deserved this.”
“It’s not about what they deserve,” said Kai. “It’s just survival.”
The doctor turned to him, their eyes meeting properly for the first time. Kai knew he was running. The coward didn’t want to make a choice; he didn’t want to dirty his hands.
“If you try to save everyone, you’ll end up killing them all.” Kai glanced at Miya, then back at Evans.
“I destroyed one thing to save another,” he said, wiping the blood from his mouth. “It’s the only thing I’ve ever been able to do right.”
40
Mason
Mason Evans was at odds with himself. The final pieces of the puzzle were dangling in front of him, but to pursue them, he’d have to abandon the wounded villagers that had been shredded by Kai Donovan. He wanted to flip a coin, but he had
nothing on him. All he had was the dream stone, and he already knew where its vote would be cast.
Mason turned around and followed the pair towards the cabin. Who knew what possibilities were in Kai Donovan’s blood? Who knew what Kai Donovan was? A man? A wolf? Mason couldn’t abandon that—not now.
“I think we broke him,” Mason heard the girl whisper.
“He’s fine,” Kai dismissed her concern, then turned to frown at Mason. “Hey, unpucker your asshole. Makes everything run smoother.”
Mason’s mouth popped open, but he was at a loss for words. My asshole is just fine, thank you, he wanted to retort, but decided against it. He saw what happened to those men; he didn’t want to get on Kai Donovan’s bad side.
When they stepped into the cabin, Mason’s eyes fell on the woman he’d met at Gavran’s treehouse—Ama. Was she the one speaking before he awoke? She was sitting at the table, her face serene like she’d been expecting them.
“Did Gavran bring me here?” He couldn’t stop the words from leaving his mouth. His mind was still on the two men outside—that one ear lying in the grass as its cells slowly died, making it impossible to reattach.
“Who’s Gavran?” asked Kai, raising an eyebrow at Ama. She smiled but said nothing.
“You don’t know him?” Mason’s stomach churned as he re-imagined Kai spitting out the ear like it was gristle off a lousy steak.
“Never heard the name,” Kai shrugged, then turned to Ama and motioned his head in Mason’s direction. “You know this guy?”
“We’ve met once,” Ama acknowledged.
“You said we’d meet again,” Mason recalled.
“And we did.” She seemed undaunted. “What was the commotion outside?”
“You attacked those men,” Mason accused Kai. “I know they were armed, but you attacked first. Maybe they wouldn’t have used their gun if you’d been less confrontational.”
“I don’t need to stick my dick in a tiger’s mouth to know it’ll get bitten off.”
“Mason,” Ama drew him back, “you might find this hard to believe, but I trust Kai’s instincts. I don’t think he would have attacked unless he already knew those men posed a serious threat. You might have all ended up getting hurt if he didn’t.”
“Or butchered like a cheerleader in a ’90s slasher film,” Kai added, stripping his shirt off and examining the wound on his arm.
It was a deep nick—possibly in need of stitches—but Kai didn’t even flinch as he cleaned the blood off with a rag and some whisky. Mason watched, suspended in medical horror, as Kai took a swig of the liquor after pressing the cloth to his arm, then tossed it to the end of the bed. The bleeding had already stopped, further convincing him there was something special about this man’s genetic makeup. Kai Donovan was built like a rock. And given the way he fought those men, Mason couldn’t help but wonder if this rogue had once been part of the military. Perhaps some experimental program? But that didn’t explain the markers of wolf’s blood Sashka found. Nothing could explain that.
“I’m sorry, Ama, but that’s illogical,” Mason argued when his thoughts grew too loud. “We can’t speculate what those men might have done. There was still time to talk things through.”
“What about this whole situation even approaches logic?” Miya interjected. “They had guns. They obviously wanted to hurt someone.”
Emiliya Delathorne wasn’t the sweet, demure Amanda he remembered—and yet she still tormented him with a familiarity he couldn’t place. He peeked at Kai—an oppressive presence in the corner. Even though he said nothing, he also let nothing slip.
“Why are you looking at me like I fucked a horse?” he grunted when he caught Mason side-eyeing him.
Mason wasn’t sure what he’d gotten himself into, but he’d wanted the truth, and no one said the truth would be pretty. He didn’t know how deep this rabbit hole ran, but even with Kai threatening to defile the sun from his sky, Mason was determined to follow it to the bottom.
“Just never seen anything like you before,” he replied.
Kai smirked and tipped the whisky bottle Mason’s way, his dark eyes mocking him. “And you were never meant to, golden boy.”
41
Miya
All the fear had drained from Miya’s body. Her heart was still, her hands steady. Was she tougher now, or had she grown desensitized to things that should’ve unsettled her?
As she looked over at Kai, poking at the bullet wound in his arm, she realized how much easier it was getting through that last ordeal. She had a comrade in him—someone she knew had her back. That alone made the fight worthwhile.
He’d wound up being more than a few firsts for Miya. She’d always been standoffish, and yet here she was, sharing every inch of herself with a wolf in the woods.
But where would that take them? What were they to each other? Miya knew she didn’t want a fleeting tryst. But what of Kai? Was he capable of love? Did he understand romantic partnership? She’d blown off his earlier questions to avoid acknowledging aloud that she craved more. It was true that entangled bodies were nothing earth-shattering, but entangled hearts and lives—that left her pulsing with both excitement and terror.
Miya wished Hannah was still with her. Her best friend had always faired so much better in relationships, but she was out of reach when Miya finally needed her for one.
Yet Kai was hardly flippant the way many humans were. On the contrary, his intensity could bite through steel. And while this was welcome in their more intimate moments, Miya wondered if the wolf could be pacified when necessary. It was impossible to know, but she was struck by a jarring revelation.
She wanted to stay with him, terror be damned.
Miya could have walked into a fistfight blindfolded, and she would have felt safe with Kai by her side. Hell, she might have even taken a swing.
She trusted him.
It was more than she could say for most people, especially the new guy, Mason. She didn’t know him, but she knew she didn’t like him. The judgment was accompanied by a pang of creeping guilt; didn’t he deserve a chance?
Sure, he was a bit pretentious, but he wasn’t mean-spirited or stupid. Maybe it was his obvious naivety or the way he drooled after Kai, treating him like a rare specimen under a microscope. Maybe it was both. Or maybe, Miya thought, it was that he was a coward, just like her. Neither of them seemed favourable to facing reality, and this led her to an uncomfortable conclusion.
You’re projecting, she scolded.
She could tell Mason Evans was everything she loathed to become: preoccupied with appearances, disoriented by a puritanical morality, trapped by a religious commitment to some veil of logic. He was a slave to the insecurities driving him. If all Miya wanted was to be self-aware, becoming Mason Evans would have been her ultimate punishment. Yet she feared they weren’t all that different.
“He was there. Pulling the strings,” said Kai. He sat on the bed with his back against the wall, one knee drawn up as he glared into empty space.
“Abaddon?” Ama’s question was met with a nod.
“Who’s Abaddon?” Mason asked.
“The thing you saw out there, making the villagers rabid,” Miya explained. “Ama—” she walked over to the table and sat down. “I think I’m onto something.”
“What is it?” Ama asked, leaning forward on her elbows.
Miya took a deep breath, glancing at Kai, then at Mason. Hopefully, Sherlock’s brain wouldn’t shatter. “I can’t shake what I saw in the dreamscape. The first time I tried to get back to this side, the Dreamwalker was there, hovering over my body while Abaddon was nipping at my heels. It can’t be a coincidence they were both there.”
Ama smiled like she’d anticipated this. “Go on.”
“Then I find out Abaddon knows exactly what happens to the girls who disappear. He told me so himself. Now the villagers are out looking for me. They think I’ve been kidnapped by the Dreamwalker. It’s always about the Dreamwalker. And yet here’s Abadd
on in the middle of it. These two must know each other.”
Before Ama could respond, Mason cut in. “So there’s another spirit involved? I didn’t hear or read anything about an Abaddon in the legend.”
“But you did see him.” Ama glanced up at Mason, refusing to break eye-contact until the light bulb went off.
“The shadow from my dreams,” he realized, his back hitting the wall as he ran a shaky hand through his curls.
Kai swung his legs over the bed and eyed the new member of their cabin, then glared at Ama. “You knew about Abaddon’s consistent appearance because of this guy.”
“Gavran showed me in a dream,” Mason continued. “While she was alive, the Dreamwalker was driven out of the village by this shadow. The shadow was responsible for turning the villagers against her.”
“Seriously, who the fuck is Gavran?” Kai grumbled.
“From what the three of you have seen, I suppose we can string the pieces together,” said Ama. “Obviously, Abaddon and the Dreamwalker are linked somehow. Mason,” she looked at him, “according to you, Abaddon—or one of his incarnations—was responsible for the Dreamwalker’s original exile. Presumably, this exile is what prompted the town’s paranoia and collective guilt.”
Mason nodded. “They’re afraid of her retribution. That’s why they keep inventing these stories about her coming back to kidnap girls. It’s some kind of sick repetition of the same event. They drove her out, so now they imagine her returning every now and again. And whenever she supposedly comes back, the village turns on their own girls.”
“Are they being driven mad?” Miya suggested. “Sure, they’re paranoid that she’s coming back for revenge, but every time they think someone’s been kidnapped—”
“They end up killing the girl they were trying to protect,” Mason finished her thought. “Just like Elle Robinson.”
“That doesn’t sound good for you, Lambchop.” Miya met Kai’s gaze, his expression forlorn.
“If the town is manipulated into hurting its own girls over and over again, the Dreamwalker’s revenge is always complete,” Miya offered, her eyes still on Kai. He was on his feet now, pacing like a nervous animal. “The villagers always think her revenge is on the horizon—but it’s already happened. And it keeps happening because they keep repressing the memory of their own history.”