by Joey W. Hill
He would learn later the scream that ripped from his throat was something even more unsettling than Rand’s, a primal noise that raised the hackles on every wolf’s neck. He was jerked up off his knees, arched back in an impossible way, almost levitated off the ground. Emerald and sun beam arcs of power spun around him, Goddard, and Rand.
Dorothy in the tornado, no house to protect her. That’s what he was, but he wouldn’t let the tornado call the shots. As Cai grimly hung on, channeling the power into the ground, the sky, the buildings, and even through his own body from whence it had come, he had brief flashes of things.
Fire, making macabre silhouettes of the trees, bending back from the force of a lashing wind. Wolves, running against that backdrop. Taking down Brutus. No stakes, but no problem for the shifters. Tearing a vampire apart worked as effectively as a stake. Surreal.
A yell of warning and the wolves scattered. The fire reflected against steel, a flash, and Malvin’s face showed an almost childlike expression of surprise. His head toppled from his shoulders. Before his body even hit the ground, Hector had likewise been decapitated, in a gruesome spray of blood. So quick and effortless, it was almost annoying.
Daegan apparently did live up to assessment of both dick and sword. Though, in all fairness, Cai had provided one hell of a distraction. He doubted anyone would remember that. He wouldn’t, because while he hadn’t been staked or decapitated, he felt one step away from worm food.
It was sometime later when he had that cohesive thought. Then he realized the wind had died, and there was no more flame. Just little flickers on the ground here and there. A few of the wolves had shifted to human and were stomping out anything that could leave a threat of forest fire.
There were no buildings left in the clearing. Goddard’s camp had been reduced to smoking piles of ash. Occasionally something that looked like an electric charge, a quick, ground-covering bolt of lightning, rippled over those mounds. Cool.
Cai blinked. He was on his back, head turned to stare at the main cabin, the biggest pile of electric ash. He didn’t want to look at that. His eyes moved to a body. Goddard, dead eyes, stake in his chest, rest of him mostly burnt up. That was a good feeling. But it still wasn’t what he wanted to look at. He had one important thing to see before he decided if he needed to puke up some internal organs.
Yeah, there he was. Rand. Pretty much wallpapered with smoke and ash, but still naked enough to give Cai prurient imaginings. Well, if he wasn’t worried about why he was lying on the ground. Fane was over him, along with Todd. They were doing something…
Cai winced, feeling a sympathetic stab through his leg as Todd and Fane splinted Rand’s. Rand white-knuckled Todd’s biceps, another of those harsh cries coming from him, but then it was quiet.
Didn’t matter. It still hurt worse than the million pains of his own that Cai knew were hovering just beyond that cloud of limited awareness. He should be over there, his arm the one that Rand should be bruising. He wanted Rand to be up and walking, not hurt. Only guy he knew who could walk with his dick swinging free and make it look sexy, not foolish.
“You’re in too bad of shape to think about anyone’s dick right now, let alone mine.”
Cai opened his eyes. What the fuck? Apparently, he’d zoned out again and woken up like a defenseless baby. Trying to orient himself by the position of the moon above, he realized probably another hour had passed.
“Given the day you’ve had, you can be forgiven for taking a cat nap.”
Cai’s lips tried to stretch into a smile, but it just hurt too damn much. Do wolves chase cats like dogs do?
“No, we eat them. Though the meat isn’t great. Carnivores don’t taste that good.”
Rand had a big stick acting as a crutch under his arm, though it was stretched out alongside his leg, because he was sitting on a propped-up stump someone had brought from somewhere so he could sit right next to Cai’s recumbent body. The shifter’s leg was swollen and he was in obvious pain, but he had a tight, feral grin on his face. Anyone else would have been screaming, but Cai expected the wolf was temporarily anesthetized by adrenaline, like all of them.
“I’d have to be dead not to think about your dick,” Cai said, recalling the earlier comment, which he hoped was a few minutes ago, instead of a couple hours. Nothing was clear. He wasn’t even sure if the words came out. His throat just didn’t seem to be functioning. But he was alive.
Todd was there, helping him up. Rand got up at the same time. As he did, he reached for Cai with his one free arm, a gesture that said he wanted Todd to turn Cai over to him. Todd glanced at Rand’s leg, but Rand just gave him an intent look, and Fane’s son acquiesced, though he let go of Cai gradually in case Rand was overestimating himself.
He wasn’t. As Rand slid an arm around Cai, Cai had an odd compulsion he followed, pressing his face briefly against the male’s jaw and temple. He inhaled the scent of smoke and lingering magic from Rand’s snarled hair, and found his voice again. “Don’t ever do something like that again. If he was strong enough to break me, he could have done worse to you.”
“He was not strong enough to break you,” Rand said.
There was a lot of weight to those words, and they made things inside Cai even harder to manage, so he ignored them.
“Yeah, he was. He just got distracted by the green fire shooting out of his ass and every other orifice.”
He thought of Rand running toward Goddard, stake in clenched fist, that killing light in his eyes, the sheer power of him, as strong as those flames. Yeah, maybe that kind of strength was far easier to break than most realized. But Cai was never underestimating the wolf again. Even as he’d still bust his ass later for doing something that stupid, no matter how capably he’d done it.
He blinked, clearing another hazy recommendation for unconsciousness out of his eyes. “We should find a place to sit for a really long time.”
“We will. In a minute. Gideon is coming.”
Cai focused enough to see what Rand was seeing. Gideon was striding toward them. Daegan was nearby, too. Sitting on another log, he appeared to be cleaning his sword or sending thanks to the decapitation gods. Cai figured Gideon was his emissary to check on how they were doing.
“Don’t be mad at him,” Gideon advised, showing he’d heard what Cai had said. “For one thing, that was a truly stellar staking. Second, it’s what we servants like to do.”
“Stake vampires? How reassuring.” Cai realized his voice was really fucked. It was like a frog with smoker’s cough.
Gideon grinned. “Help our vampires. Save their asses on occasion.” He glanced toward Goddard, the remains of Brutus and all the piles of ash. “We were on our way, you know.”
“Yeah, but you were taking such a damn long time about it. I figured you’d stopped off at the general store to get yourself a Coke and a Moon Pie.”
Daegan joined them, the sword disappearing into the folds of that movie-prop style duster he wore. It should have seemed melodramatic, but he seemed to live up to the coolness of the coat. Not that Cai was going to tell him that.
Gideon tossed his vampire master an amused look. “Hell, we should have done that. These two and the wolf pack had everything in control. Those double-decker Moon Pies are awesome.”
“If you don’t annoy me on the way back, maybe we’ll stop and get you one,” Daegan said.
“Dovia,” Cai rasped.
“We came upon Lady Dovia and the shifters protecting her, just before we arrived at this location,” Daegan said. “I told them to take her on to a safe place and wait for a signal that all was clear.”
“Good,” Cai said. How had he gotten back on the ground? Rand was there with him, sitting propped up against the stump, Cai pretty much lying in his wolf’s arms. He should do something about that, but it didn’t bug him enough, looking up at everything from that vantage point. Whenever he tried to move his head, the world tilted in the wrong direction.
Cai tightened his hand on Rand’s, lyi
ng loosely on his bare chest. “Danger’s past. She can go to Fane’s for the night. No reason to bring her back here.”
“Except to see he’s dead,” Gideon said. “Sometimes, that can be important.”
Cai met the male’s midnight blue gaze. Lot of blue eyes going around—his, Rand’s, Gideon’s—but all of them different shades.
“Yeah. It is.” He shifted his attention to Rand. “Let it be her decision.
“Of course.” Rand drew a female shifter over and spoke to her in a low tone. In human form, she was slim as a willow, her curves small but appealing. She had long, dark hair and looked like a Native American. At Rand’s direction, she shifted back to a wolf, her coat an interesting-looking golden color. She moved out of the clearing, likely to get a good acoustic point to send up a relay signal. Confirming it, a series of howls and yips kicked off a few minutes later, thankfully from only one or two wolves, because Cai didn’t think he was up to a full victory serenade.
Time to be manly and get on his own feet. He struggled up, with Daegan’s help. The vampire courteously stepped back once he was vertical. Gideon had assisted Rand, mainly because the splinted leg wouldn’t make rising easy, but Cai was mortified that Rand looked steadier, even with his crutch and messed-up knee. Cai swayed alarmingly.
Rand shifted closer, though Cai mostly tried not to prop with his full weight. “Hell.” He looked down, blinking to focus. “My legs are still attached, right?”
“All of you is in one piece, but you look like Sybil at the prom.” Gideon slid a critical look over him. “A lot of blood on you, and I think most of it’s yours.”
“A feeding would be in order. For both of you.” Daegan was studying him as closely. “What happened there, at the end? The fire.”
“Explosives,” Rand said. “Gas lines between the cabins. Fane and his boys figured out how to turn it to our advantage. They’re handy that way. Respectfully, we need a moment.”
Rand said it courteously enough, but was already moving Cai away from the two vampire hunters.
He is totally not going to buy that shit.
“Have him prove differently. Here.” Rand kept a bracing arm around his waist and back. “Use me to lean. Where are we going?”
How had he known what Cai was wanting, needing? Was his mind that open? Emanating feelings that he couldn’t even figure out himself, Cai stopped again, swaying this time from an even more alarming rush of…everything. Rand’s arm tightened around him, that strong, muscular arm and big, stable body. Cai had never leaned on anyone, let alone someone he felt he could lean on forever and who wouldn’t give an inch.
“You need to lean on me as much as I do you,” he said defensively, pretending not to see Rand’s knowing look.
“Whatever you say, vampire. This was an incredibly stupid plan, you know,” Rand said, studying the carnage.
“That’s what usually works. I’m going that way.”
“I know.”
They limped together to where Goddard lay. Dead eyes staring. Dead. Actually dead. Cai’s lips pursed and then the world tilted again as something shifted in his chest, so large, powerful and fierce. He wished he was like Rand and could howl. Howl out all of it.
“Goddard took me from my family.” Rand knew it, and Cai could have thought it, but somehow it was important to say it, even in that crazy frog-voice. “All these years, the others are gone, because his freaky-assed sect of Trads have a way of turning on each other and ending up dead, big surprise. All these years…”
Cai’s lips firmed. He was wrong. He did feel like he’d been staked, or that the fire he’d used to immolate Goddard was still burning in his own chest. “I need you to step back.”
“You’ll fall.”
“Maybe.”
Rand gave him a searching look. He stepped back, but he stayed close.
Cai made one very unsteady step toward Goddard, standing over him. “For every time you did it to me, asshole.”
Maybe it was because he’d been hanging around wolves too much, but it was the one thing that made sense to him right now. He unzipped his pants and, heedless of the wolves milling, the silent regard of Daegan or his servant, he pissed all over the dead vampire’s body.
He managed to get his pants fastened and done up, and was able to step back a couple paces before his knees buckled. Rand caught him around the chest, and Cai found his face back in that same welcoming broad shoulder. How in the hell was the guy still standing? He had a sturdy-assed crutch. That’s what it was.
“Thank God I don’t have a shy bladder; else that would have come off far less cool,” Cai muttered.
“You’re assuming it was cool to begin with. I merely assumed it was your way of acknowledging he beat the piss out of you.” But there was a gentle note to Rand’s voice that eased some of that pressure off Cai’s chest.
He moved Cai toward the edge of the clearing. Cai could see a nice patch of ground he thought might be a good place to lie down and peacefully die.
“No dying. There are enough deer trails close to this place that an ATV can get through. One’s being brought to us from Fane’s.”
Cai’s gaze shifted to Rand’s broken leg. “You need a lift, too. And my blood, to help that heal.” He hoped. He thought of that magic, turned into a destructive force, the way it had tangled around the break like barbed wire. It gave him an uneasy feeling. He didn’t know shit about the magic, had just given it free rein. If he’d crippled Rand…
“Stop borrowing trouble. I didn’t know vampires did that. Piss.”
Cai’s mind stumbled over the segue, the innocuous question, but he felt a weak smile tilt his lips at the wolf’s mild chastising. “Sometimes you’re like a wife, you know that? One of those sitcom ones.”
“Blow me.”
“Maybe in a bit.” Cai’s brow furrowed, grasping at the question. “Born ones don’t, I think. Pee. Have to ask that one to be sure.” He nodded toward Daegan, conferring with Gideon. “Make sure he’s in a good mood before you ask him if he has to pee like the rest of us non-gods. Oh, wait; better idea. Ask Lady Lyssa instead. I’m sure she wouldn’t construe a question like that as disrespectful.”
Rand snorted. Yank my chain, and I’ll tell Dovia’s father you impregnated her. Since I won’t share how, he’ll assume the normal way and chew off your dick.
Eww. That may be how a wolf father would retaliate, but not a vampire. Just saying.
Cai didn’t want to think about the issues Rand’s comment had raised, issues that had been set aside for higher priority ones of survival, until just now. Rand’s gaze darkened with regret. He hadn’t intended to treat the subject flippantly, Cai saw, but it was okay. It had been a rough day. There was room for some social faux pas.
Rand lifted his head at a distant howl, followed by another series of yips. He met Cai’s gaze. “She doesn’t want to come.”
“Yeah, that’s what I figured.” Cai let his gaze pass over the clearing. He thought of the spacious home with the fences and forest around it, Leona’s loving arms and Greenwald’s devotion, even if muddled by Ennui. “It may take a while, but she has what she needs to reclaim her life. She doesn’t need to come back to the nightmare to get past it. She’s a tough female.”
Rand made a noncommittal noise, but cocked his head as further communications came. “She doesn’t want to go to Fane’s home yet, either. She wants me and you to meet her where she is. Stalker took her somewhere pretty. Good lad.”
Fane had approached Daegan and Gideon, apparently to communicate what his son had relayed. Nodding, Daegan moved toward Cai and Rand, Gideon with him. “We’ll stay with you until Dovia is delivered back to her parents,” the vampire said without preamble. “The additional reinforcements will allow you both a chance to recuperate.”
“Is a guard necessary?” Rand asked.
“Yes,” Cai said, at the same time Daegan and Gideon did. “Goddard’s an isolationist, but the mountains are the preferred habitat for plenty of Trads. I don
’t know if there are more in the area, but best not to get careless. She’d be valuable to any of them.”
Even more valuable now.
Rand could see that troubling thought reflected in Cai’s face and doubly cursed himself for treating the topic carelessly. The vampire’s thoughts were weighted with exhaustion, laced with too much pain for Rand’s liking. How many times could a vampire get so wounded, replenish himself with blood, and get up, as vibrant with health as if it had never happened?
“We have a cat’s nine lives, times a billion,” Cai reassured him, and repeated his earlier concern. “You’re taking blood from me. That leg doesn’t look good.”
Cai could be right on the physical end of things, but Rand’s question had been directed to Cai’s state of mind.
“You first,” Rand said.
Even Daegan and Gideon looked concerned about the vampire, though Rand was pleased to see both warriors also looked at Cai with respect. As they damn well should. He’d surprised and impressed the hell out of the wolves, Rand knew.
As for his own feelings…well, it might be foolish, but as soon as he could lay hands on the vampire, he hadn’t let go of him or moved more than a few paces away, and it wasn’t because of a bad leg.
With a weary half smile, Cai nudged Rand, bringing his attention back to him. “Fine. I’ll take a mouthful or two from you, but I’ll do it on the way. Let’s go see what our rescued princess needs.”
Chapter Sixteen
Rand was right. Stalker had taken her somewhere pretty. The secluded mountain glade had a deep pool of water fed by a short waterfall from higher ground. The water zigzagged along shiny rocks and fed the pool, which trickled out into the gurgling, continued track of the creek. There were little purple wildflowers and mossy banks. It was cool, and the moonlight filtered in through the interlaced branches of the trees above, providing illumination but not an overbearing amount of light.
She was sitting on the bank by herself. Windrunner and Stalker were close by, but it was clear she’d asked for the space. She was wrapped up in a blanket they’d provided. When Dovia lifted her head at their approach, her gaze went to Rand, but the shifter surprised Cai by directing her attention back to him, to let him say what needed to be said.