Immortal Prey

by Diana Ballew

  The howls and yips of the approaching beasts suddenly stopped dead, taking the foursome by surprise.

  Before Erin had time to contemplate her move, she twisted and grabbed the gun from Maggie’s hand. In a flash, she threw it as far as she could, letting out a sigh when she heard the splash in the water.

  The moon illuminated the deep, angry lines spread across Maggie’s face. “You should not have done that.” She lifted her hand and formed a fist.

  Erin flinched, waiting for the impact that never came. She opened her eye a sliver and saw Regine clutching Maggie’s balled fist.

  “Don’t worry about that now, Charmaine. We have bigger problems.”

  Rudolpho slipped behind Erin and gripped her hands behind her back. The bones in her wrists rubbed together. She winced, fighting back the blinding pain in silence.

  He leaned forward and inhaled deeply. “You smell divine,” he whispered against her ear. His dry lips grazed the nape of her bare neck. “I imagine you’ll taste just as sweet.”

  She thought she would pass out and fall straight to the ground in a limp heap, but he held her firmly in his clutches, keeping her upright.

  “Help!” she managed to shriek. Suddenly, his large hand covered her mouth so tightly she couldn’t bite down.

  “Enough!” Rudolpho shouted.

  His breath smelled like damp decaying earth. Instantly, her skin crawled.

  She caught movement out of the corner of her eye. Dark shadows, high upon the cliff, moved swiftly down the bluff. Below, a pack of wolves, their haunches lowered, rushed like large rats along the tracks heading straight for the descending shadows.

  Icy terror flooded her veins, and feral animal scents blasted into her nostrils, as the odor of wild creatures grew closer.

  “Hold her tight!” Regine commanded.

  There was no doubt about it. She was going to die if she didn’t try something, anything!

  Maggie leaned in. “I can see you thinking, Missy. You forget, I know you all too well.”

  Erin scowled at the older woman patting her down and rummaging through her dress pockets.

  Maggie pulled out the sheathed knife and smiled. “Well, look what we’ve got here.”

  Erin’s heart sank to her toes.

  “Wait? What’s that, coming down the bluff?” Rudolpho asked.

  Regine turned, just as frightening yelps echoed into the night. Growls and yips and whines of pain ricocheted across the cliffs, reverberating in all directions.

  Rudolpho raised his head and howled. Regine yipped in reply.

  Erin froze, paralyzed with fear. She couldn’t move now even if she tried.

  In a flurry of movement, Rudolpho removed his hand from her mouth and roped her hands together, tying them in a tight bind behind her back.

  She cried out, unable to hide the pain as the ropes dug into her flesh.

  Maggie growled as though tortured. Rudolpho did the same, and Regine cried out in the night like an injured animal. Breathless with fear and near collapse, Erin watched in horror as the bodies of the morphing trio contorted and twisted, wild animal sounds coming from massive jaws glistening with saliva, as their clothes tore away, splitting like thin paper from their bodies.

  Instinct to survive swelled from within, feet-first. Before she knew it, Erin took off running in her unfastened shoes, the binding ropes behind her back. She ran and ran, leaping over driftwood and dodging the slippery seaweed and barnacle-covered rocks dotting the darkened shoreline.

  She glanced over her shoulder to see Maggie, Regine, and Rudolpho, each hunched on all four legs, their bodies covered in fur, as they sped toward the frightening sounds of wild animals fighting in a boisterous horde.

  “Oh, God, oh, dear God in heaven,” she prayed as she fled for her life. Her foot caught on the edge of a large piece of driftwood. She fell hard and hit her head and kneecap against the rocky shore.

  Warm blood trickled down her temple. Stars danced before her, and stinging tears flooded her eyes. She wiggled and arched her back, trying to rise from the ground, but without the use of her hands for support, her injured knee collapsed beneath her.

  She lay on the desolate beach, alone, terrified, hearing the horrifying sounds of wild animals in a vicious fight to the death.

  If only Derek were here!

  She blinked, and puddled tears streamed down her scraped cheeks. Ignoring the cutting pain, she rolled to her side, curled in a ball of injured flesh, and closed her eyes.

  No doubt remained. Tonight she would die.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  I inhaled deeply, and the scent of Erin’s fresh wounds blasted into my nostrils. I sprinted as fast as I could, determined to keep the emerging beast at bay. But hearing the harrowing sounds of my Weres fighting to the death with Queen Regine’s formidable Shes, the more the animal inside me took hold.

  Coarse hair burst forth, covering my hands. My jaw grew so tight I knew it was only a matter of time before I emerged a killer wolf.

  I had to reach Erin, and fast.

  Why hadn’t I thought to drink of the cocktail before fleeing the house?

  Wait.

  I stopped in my tracks, tunneled through my coat pocket, and retrieved the flask. My fingers shook as I tried to unscrew the cap and pour the liquid into my mouth. Drops. Only warm drops. I tossed the flask into the wiry mounds of bramble bushes and tore after Erin.

  I hurried down the bluff a safe distance north of the fighting near the tracks. The echoes and thuds of battling beasts bounded off cliffs, slicing through the darkness of night. Frightened birds squawked and screeched above, wings flapping hastily from sheltering roosts. Escaping vermin scurried near my feet in a frenzy of wavering brush clinging precariously to the bluff.

  I jumped the rails at the base of the cliff and ran toward the shoreline. Odors of feral animal blood and gore permeated the moist air, baffling my senses, as I tried to detect Erin’s exact location.

  I stopped, closed my eyes, and lifted my nose high in the air.

  My love, where are you?

  I caught the aroma; the sweet, succulent scent that belonged to Ersule, and to Erin, mixed with the heady aroma of her fresh blood. A moan near the rocky shoreline caught my attention.

  “Erin,” I called.

  A soft whimper replied.

  A gunshot rang out high above the cliff, followed by loud bellows from an angry resident dressed in a bathrobe. The clashing beasts abruptly silenced.

  Panic flooded my veins. Christ. Hurry!

  Terror ripped through my heart with every rushing step. There, on the shoreline ahead, lay a wounded Erin.

  I dashed forward, bent low, and cradled her neck with my morphing hands. “Erin,” I murmured, though my voice had grown deep and gravely.

  Her eyes opened a sliver. “Derek?”

  Ropes bound her thin wrists. I fumbled like an eager child, and managed to untie the restraint.

  “Maggie. She … ”

  “Shhh, my love. I know. I’ve been onto that woman ever since you arrived at my party wearing her grandmother’s emerald combs.”

  “She … she took my knife. She held … a gun.”

  The sounds of clacking animal nails in flight tore into my skull. The noises drew closer, dozens of approaching wolves following on the heels of the other.

  Fear, dread, and the instinctual need to survive the impending onslaught beckoned the wolf inside me.

  My throat and jaw throbbed. Illuminated by the moon above, I kicked off my tightening boots as my clothes began tearing to pieces. I growled and hissed as mounds of smooth muscles under tufts of bristled golden hair burst forth.

  Quickly, I scooped Erin into my arms.

  “Take me away,” she whispered before wilting into my arms.

  Shiny hairpins reflecting the silver moonlight dropped on my feet, and her ebony hair tumbled, soft as silk against my muscled arm. Determined to keep her alive, I gently licked the bloody wound on her temple.

  She sti
rred and whispered, “I’m dying, Derek.”

  “Hold tight, my love.” Tears filled my eyes to brimming. Silently, I cursed every moment I had walked this earth. Cursed meeting Ersule. Cursed luring Erin into my wicked, devious, selfish trap. What kind of man was I? With the answer looming before me, ugly and as dark as the devil himself, I gnashed my growing teeth together.

  I’m a man trapped between worlds of moral men and evil beasts.

  Regine yipped franticly, rushing and nipping at Gregore’s lean, furred legs, only inches behind him. The horde of wolves suddenly made a sharp turn and headed straight for us.

  “Watch out, King!” yelped Edgar.

  My eyes darted right, left — nothing for rapid shelter except a gathering of driftwood.

  I lay Erin down and quickly arranged the pieces of wood. I placed her inside the sheltering area. “Stay still, my love.”

  I managed to place two more shielding pieces of wood above her small shelter before the first She lunged for my throat.

  “Ahhhh!” I pounded her snout with my morphing paw and sent her hurling toward the water’s edge. Fury mounted, and my limbs swelled into mounds of furred muscle, and my teeth grew into lethal blades jutting from my jawbone.

  A second She lunged and bit into my arm, tearing away skin and fur. My cry of pain pierced the night sky.

  Charlotte leaped into the air, her powerful jaws opened wide, and she tore into the She wolf.

  I stood on all fours, haunches lowered, snarling, waiting for the next wicked She attack.

  Gregore ran toward me, his tail and legs bloodied, with Regine snapping and biting mere inches from his muscled haunches. Tired and weak, he darted behind me as Regine and her son, my son, came in for the final kill.

  Bristled hair rose tall along my back. With Gregore shielded behind me, I dug my thick nails into the dirt, holding my ground, and howled like the mighty King of Beasts I had truly become.

  Regine, Rudolpho, and the trailing Shes stopped in their tracks, and everything went momentarily silent.

  Queen Delacour panted, vapor rising from her large nostrils, her predatory eyes glowing.

  My gaze snapped to Rudolpho, the man-beast who would become king of my clan upon my demise, the monster who would become king if the child carried within Erin’s womb were slaughtered.

  With every ounce of what was left physically human within me, I stared them down and growled, “You will not win!”

  Regine lowered her mighty furred skull and slowly approached with Rudolpho by her side.

  My weary Were clan tread forward and moved in next to me, their voracious eyes glowing in the darkness, feral loins poised for attack.

  The queen’s wounded, faithful followers lined up beside her, their large bared teeth glistening with fresh blood and gleaming sinew.

  A rush of sea air carried the scent of Erin’s injuries blasting into my nostrils.

  And they smelled it, too.

  Ravenous eyes instantly locked upon mine. In a flash, Regine lunged for me, and Rudolpho advanced at lightning speed toward Erin’s small shelter.

  I dodged Regine’s swift advance and took off for Rudolpho. Regine followed, yipping as she shadowed my hindquarters. She was fast, incredibly fast, but my faithful white-furred Were, following on the queen’s tail, was far faster.

  Gregore sprang into action and fled toward Rudolpho, who scrambled like a demon on a mission straight from hell, pushing, tearing, and chewing the driftwood shelter leading straight to my beloved.

  Erin screamed, and I saw the horrifying sight of Rudolpho’s large head fully immersed within the enclosure and heard the grotesque sounds of his snapping jaws breaking the dark night.

  Following on the heels of the faster white Were chasing Regine closer to the railroad tracks, Franz yipped wildly.

  A She lunged for Gregore, and the two fought in a rolling ball of fur near the water’s edge.

  I attacked Rudolpho and bit hard into his shoulder, ripping fur and muscle from bone.

  He yelped in a flash of pain. More determined than ever, he scratched and pawed violently at Erin.

  Moonlight shimmered above the growing fog threatening to cover the area like a shroud. For a split second, my eyes locked with Erin’s through the slats of the driftwood barrier.

  “Come back to me, Derek,” she said.

  My God!

  I tore into Rudolpho with everything I had, but he had managed to force his head deep within the shelter.

  An agonizing scream of pain tore through the darkness, and the smell of Erin’s deep wound permeated the air. I growled, ripped, and slashed, this time biting into Rudolpho’s throat and not letting go. I forced his massive body to the ground and hovered over him.

  Panting, bloodied, and wounded, he stared up at me, his glowing eyes seething with fury.

  A sound both quiet and deafening arose from the small enclosure. At that exact moment, I knew that my evil, desperate son had inflicted a mortal wound on the woman I had vowed to love for all eternity.

  A beam of light from the south came into view, followed by the clacking of an approaching train slicing the dark mantle of death. A massive shriek pierced the night as the roaring train passed.

  I ripped into Rudolpho’s chest with my jaws. He fought back with sharp, curled claws tearing into my legs. The clamor from the battling Weres stopped abruptly. Undaunted, Rudolpho and I fought to the death.

  I wouldn’t let go. Not ever. I needed his wounds to go especially deep. Deep enough for a true Were kill.

  From somewhere behind me, Gregore called, “Queen Regine Delacour is dead.”

  Rudolpho growled and cried out, “Nooooo!”

  His seething gaze snapped to mine, his glowing amber eyes simmering with hatred. “I was born to be king!” he spat. “Do you hear me? I must be king!”

  The remaining Shes sniffed the air and fled, their yips of mourning and fear tearing across the night sky.

  A steady flow of blood poured from the deep wounds I’d inflicted on Rudolpho’s chest. Sensing the end of the madness lay near, I salivated, drool dripping from my mouth, landing lazily upon his muzzle.

  Growing weaker, his body wilted, and his glowing eyes paled like the waning rays of the evening sun.

  “Surely, you felt something for my mother all these years,” he whispered. “You would not kill your own son, would you, Father?”

  Father. My God.

  My stomach knotted. Centuries ago, Ersule and I had longed to be parents. A daughter, a son, the gender of our child would never have mattered. But month after month, our hopes had dimmed to black. Now, my blood son lay begging for his life with haunting words.

  At the moment of Queen Regine’s death, Rudolpho had become king of his own She clan. But his dominant mother had raised him to be as malicious as she, demanding respect rather than earning it. Like her, he wanted it all, to rule the ancient bloodlines and spread evil. This murdering, man-beast was nothing I could ever have imagined in a son … or have ever wanted. His feeble attempt at binding us as father and son could never succeed, for he would destroy all that was true, dear, and worthy, dooming our small clan to extinction.

  I recalled Koenig’s words from long ago, “You will know what to do. ’Tis in your blood.”

  I forced my eyes from Rudolpho’s and stared at the deep wound to his chest exposing his bloodied, beating heart. The injury would have been mortal to any man or beast, but not a strong, determined Were.

  The image of Abraham leading his son, Isaac, to slaughter raced through my mind as I gazed down at him. This wicked son of mine would kill me, the woman I loved, and our child purely for his own gain. Unlike the biblical story, I knew no angel from heaven above would save Rudolpho’s soul at the final hour.

  I raked my nails along the shore where shells and smaller pieces of wood littered the rocky beach.

  Rudolpho licked his chipped bloodied fangs. “You haven’t the guts,” he spat. “You’re too much mortal and not enough beast!”


  Anger heated my throat and stung the back of my eye sockets. I blinked away the burn.

  “You’re weak!” he shouted, his eyes glowing fiery amber once again. “Do it, you coward. Do it — I dare you!”

  I leaned, grabbed a splintered piece of driftwood with my large teeth, and held it firmly in my powerful jaws.

  He spit in my face. “Do it, you coward!”

  Wind whipped across the bay in a gust humming an ancient, primitive tune of survival. I held my breath and plunged the sharp end of the wood straight into the gaping wound, piercing his heart.

  His wicked heart stopped beating for a moment, then resumed with a slow, steady, determined thud. His eyes slowly widened. “You are an evil beast, same as me. Never forget that. I will see you in hell, Father!”

  “You first!” I snarled. I bent low and wedged the wood deeper.

  Blood gurgled and dripped from Rudolpho’s snout and mouth. His darkened heart skipped a beat, then two, then three.

  As the black cloak of death slowly descended, I watched the fire within his hateful gaze slowly fade.

  The sudden sound of quiet wounded my ears. I stared at Rudolpho — the lifeless, evil corpse that never should have walked the earth.

  I rushed for Erin and tugged and tore at what was left of the small splintered shelter. I nuzzled her bloodied neck.

  “Derek,” she whispered. Her eyes closed, and she went limp.

  My God, she would die a mortal death if I didn’t do something quickly.

  My eternal love for both Erin and Ersule gave me strength, guiding me forward. I licked and sucked the jagged gashes Rudolpho had inflicted upon her throat.

  Humiliation filled my every pore knowing it was I who had caused such damage with my greedy quest for immortal love. But as I tasted her succulent blood, felt the warm liquid drip into my throat, my withered heart sprang to life. If Koenig had spoken the truth all those many years ago, my wife of so long ago would return to me. Piercing guilt gripped my belly, for I had fallen deeply in love with Erin, too.

  Erin’s heart ceased, and her body grew cold as I devoured the last drops of her sweet blood. Gazing at her motionless eyelids framed by ebony lashes, I willed myself not to crumble into a million pieces as I sat back on my haunches and waited.