by Cecy Robson
The future that awaited Aric broke my heart. Whether we were together or not, I wanted him to be happy. “I wish the Elders would have chosen someone more to his liking.”
Koda huffed. “Anara didn’t choose Barbara for Aric. He chose her because she comes from a long line of fertile purebloods. Anara’s focus is to help reestablish the were race at all costs. If he or the other Elders gave a damn what Aric wanted, they’d allow him to be with you. You’re who he wants. And you’re who he needs.”
I closed my lids tight, not wanting to release more tears. My tigress rose to the surface, giving me much needed courage, despite how much she missed Aric’s wolf. “We both know that’s not going to happen.” I walked slowly around Koda and into the house. He mumbled a curse and followed me.
My sisters were taking the food out of the oven and placing it along the black and tan granite counter when we entered the kitchen. Bren and Liam met me with smirks and implicit challenges. It was a game my fellow ravenous beasts and I frequently played at chow time. I smiled despite myself. It was great to be around those I loved and who loved me back. The Catholic schoolgirls weren’t cutting it.
My sisters hurried out of the way. Shayna lifted a dish towel from the safety of the family room. “Get on your mark,” she said. The wolves and I crouched. “Get set.” My tigress flicked her tail in anticipation. “Go!”
The wolves and I raced to the stacked plates, playfully elbowing each other in an effort to be first in line. Never get between beasts and their meals. I made it first, my small frame and quick speed allowing me to slip around the snarling pack of “big bads.”
Bren’s growls were especially loud—after all, there were blueberry-stuffed crepes and sausages at stake. Taran shoved us into the family room as we finished filling our plates and then grabbed a few things for herself. I sat on the cream-colored sofa with Danny and Bren and dug in.
“So, witch fire, huh?” Liam said through a mouthful of bacon.
I sipped my milk, then placed it back on the coffee table. “Apparently. There are no signs of anyone entering Misha’s home—”
“Which means one of the unholy bastards tried to snuff you.”
Gee, Koda was pissed. There was a shocker-roo.
“Misha says the lake has been whispering sweet nothings in his ear again,” I said. “Apparently some dark critter sees me as the end to its existence. Did you happen to pick up on any would-be psycho wearing a ‘Celia Wird Marks My Doom’ button when you reviewed the recordings from the surveillance cameras?”
“Nope. I went back a week—nothing unusual near the Hummer.” Koda’s tumultuous brown eyes cut to me and narrowed. He continued making his eggs Benedict his bitch without much comment. I’d tricked him into admitting he’d hacked into the vamps’ surveillance system. And he hadn’t liked it one bit.
“Aric wants you home,” Gemini said. “Once he hears what the vampire has discovered, he’s not going to be happy.”
Without Aric there, home wasn’t exactly the same, even though my sisters remained and the wolves frequently stayed with them. “As an Alliance member, I’m trying to bring down the Tribe just like the other remaining weres, witches, and masters in the coalition. It’s not any less noble because I happen to fight alongside the vampires.”
“The same dead assholes who are trying to kill you,” Koda snapped. Shayna cupped his knee with her long slender fingers, instantly calming him.
“You don’t know that.” My gaze swept the room. “And what’s to say I would be any safer here? Our days of flying under the radar and avoiding the supernatural are long gone, peeps.”
Taran placed her half-eaten plate on our heavy wooden end table, between the picture of our parents and foster mother. “But at least then you’d be with your kind and with your family—where you belong, Ceel.” I could taste an inkling of her bitterness. She hadn’t liked it when I informed them I’d be leaving home to work for Misha, but as the months went by, her dislike had turned to resentment and now loathing.
“I’m not moving back. If someone or something is trying to kill me, I want to keep it as far away from you as possible.” I tried taking a bite of my waffle. It was cold and suddenly didn’t taste as sweet. “Misha wouldn’t be investing so much time in me just to off me later.”
“No, but he would to bang you.” Bren didn’t mince words nor did he apologize. He continued to dig into his plate. “Keep your eyes open, kid. Murderous psychos aren’t the only thing you need to worry about in vamp camp.”
“Son of a bitch. Is this shit real?” Taran opened her presents the moment Bren swallowed his last bite of food. She’d gone insane over the car. The shopping spree from all of us had floored her, and you could have heard a pin drop when she pulled the necklace from its velvet case.
Emme shook her head. “Maybe they’re Austrian crystals.”
I played with my hair. “Knowing Misha, they’re real diamonds.” I explained about Agnes and Edith’s naughty ways and how Misha had chosen to punish them. That made everyone else, with the exception of Gemini, more accepting of the gifts. Taran immediately clasped it around her neck. As with everything else, it looked stunning on her.
Shayna shielded her eyes as if blinded by the dazzling necklace. “Holy sparkling rocks, Batman,” she said.
Taran admired her reflection in the hall mirror. “Damn. You can say that again.” Another small velvet box remained. Gemini snatched it off the table and shoved it into his pocket. I noticed, and so did Taran. “Babe, what are you doing?”
“It’s nothing. I’ll take it back.”
Taran frowned and strutted to his side. “Let me see it.”
Gemini reluctantly gave the little red box to her and we watched as she opened it. Taran pulled out a beautiful silver cross with a single diamond set in the center. Emme and Shayna stepped closer, smiling. The silver necklace sparkled despite the dim lighting in our family room.
“It’s so pretty,” Emme said quietly.
I leaned forward to get a better look. “It’s engraved.” I grinned when I saw the lettering. “Taran, read what it says.”
Taran’s eyes brimmed with tears. “It says . . . ‘Mi Bella Taran,’” she whispered softly.
Gemini had engraved it in Spanish, a tribute to our mother’s Latin heritage.
“What does that mean?” Koda asked.
Gemini’s face mimicked the color of his burgundy sweater. “My beautiful Taran.” His gaze swept to her. “I wanted to get you a ring . . . but I know you’re not ready for that.”
Taran’s actions spoke louder than any words she could have uttered. She removed Misha’s necklace and tossed it to Shayna. Tears streamed down her face as she placed the cross around her neck and threw her arms around Gemini. “It’s the most beautiful gift anyone has ever given me,” she whispered. Taran had dated many men. But she had never found true kindness or love until she met Tomo “Gemini” Hamamatsu.
Gem murmured in her ear, “Happy birthday.”
The rest of us returned to our seats in an effort to ignore the heat from Taran’s thank-you.
“Do you mind if I try on your other necklace?” Shayna asked.
Taran snuggled against Gemini. “I don’t care—”
She jerked away from Gemini, stumbling back against the wall. Gem grabbed her to keep from falling as her irises bleached to white. Everyone tensed. The wolves and I jumped to our feet, straining to detect something with our preternatural senses. Nothing registered except the frantic efforts of my tigress, struggling to free herself from within.
Emme clutched Liam’s arm. “What is it, Taran? What’s here?”
Taran’s voice lowered to a deep, unrecognizable rasp. “Tribemaster.”
CHAPTER 5
If Webster’s published a supernatural equivalent of a dictionary it would define Tribemasters as “the deadly and highly intelligent of
fspring of a demon father and a powerful witch mother, capable of producing spawn with predatory instincts who feed on human flesh” or “supernatural evildoers in charge of a large group of Tribesmen.” They might even include an illustration of Noah Webster himself screaming and sprinting away from said evildoer.
I had the nightmarish displeasure of meeting a Tribemaster when the Tribe emerged several months back. He thought my sisters and I had the perfect wombs to bear his children. He also pummeled three pack Elders and Misha’s maker, Uri, and he beat the unholy snot out of me and tore off Misha’s arms. I managed to punch a hole in his head and rip out his brain, only because his claws were busy skewering Aric.
We didn’t sense anything at first, until the ground began to tremble. There was a loud squishing sound, similar to someone pulling his or her galoshes out of the mud.
“Oh, shit. That can’t be good,” Bren said.
“Celia, get your sisters and— Where the hell is Shayna?” Koda’s head whipped around, searching for his mate.
Shayna barreled down the stairs, holding the sapphire- encrusted daggers Misha had once gifted her and Taran’s necklace fastened around her neck. Silver light streaked from platinum facets and into her arms. The diamonds glimmered in a burst of light as Shayna’s power transformed the daggers into long and deadly swords.
Squish, squash, squish.
Gemini stalked toward the door. “It’s getting closer. Everyone outside—now!”
“I don’t want Shayna involved,” Koda growled.
Gemini furrowed his brows. “There’s no choice, Koda. It’s too late to get them to safety.”
Shayna jetted past me, her determination tensing her slender frame while fear blanched her face. She was spooked. And yet there she was the first one out the door. Koda and I bolted after her. I didn’t understand her need to race ahead of us, especially given her blatant terror. I stopped short of plowing into her when she stumbled to a halt on the snowy front lawn. She froze, her focus glued toward the sloping entrance of our neighborhood.
I froze, too, when I saw what had crashed the party. Oh, hell no.
What appeared to be a giant maggot, the size of a city bus, slithered and crept its way along our cul-de-sac in wet and small slimy bounces.
Gemini rushed to my side. “Taran,” he growled, “put the neighbors to sleep—as many as you can. No one else needs to see this.”
I wished she could have done the same for me. The thing looked nasty. I didn’t remember Buffy having to deal with this shit.
Taran stepped forward, releasing ribbons of blue and white mist from her core. They spread like widening translucent streamers encasing the neighborhood in a light fog. Unfortunately for Mrs. Mancuso, that was the moment she chose to storm out of her house to harass us. “Taran Wird! What in the name of sin are you up to?” Mrs. Mancuso’s eyes crossed the moment she inhaled Taran’s mist. She flipped over the porch railing and landed in her hedges, snoring the moment her orthopedic shoes hit the lawn. It was a tense moment, yet one that couldn’t stifle Taran’s chuckle.
The wolves changed and prowled toward the Tribemaster. Danny, the pack’s newest werewolf, awkwardly followed suit. Poor guy, he hadn’t signed up to go furry. Bren had turned him following a near-death battle a few months back. The others moved with predatory grace, their heads lowered and their ears pinned back. Their actions promised a vicious assault and a battle to the death. Poor Danny just concentrated hard to put one paw in front of the other. The giant larva lifted his wobbly head when he saw them approach, though his eyes weren’t visible through the rolls of pale gray flesh. His voice sounded wet, garbled, and sinister as his giant lips peeled back to reveal a mouthful of serrated fangs. “Bring me Celia Wird and I might let you live.”
Emme’s breath caught. “Could he be the one who tried to kill you last night, Celia?” she whispered.
Maggots weren’t known for their hearing. This one did just fine. His wrinkled face shot in my direction. He didn’t know me when he’d first arrived, but now he did. He roared, furious and loud, his black tongue shooting out past his daggerlike choppers. “Mine!”
“Sorry, Celia,” Emme squeaked.
I answered my attacker with a roar of my own, my anger and fear calling forth my protector. I took the offensive and ran toward him, yelling at the wolves to destroy the brain. My sweater and jeans ripped like Velcro from my almost four-hundred-pound tigress form as my claws broke through the frozen surface of the snow.
The wolves and I attacked as one. I leapt and dug my claws and fangs into where I thought his skull might be. His skin bounced like thick, rubbery gelatin—really nasty, slimy gelatin. I raked his flesh; it felt like I was scratching an oversized bouncy ball with human nails. He shook his head sharply, more to buck me off, and definitely not because I was inflicting much damage. I flipped back and sprinted around him the moment my paws touched the freezing asphalt. I circled him, searching for a weak spot. Strange rounded spikes protruded along the length of his back. I didn’t think they were meant to enhance his beauty and hoped we’d kill him before we discovered their true purpose.
A wolf howled in pain as I leapt onto the Tribemaster’s back. The maggot struck Danny hard with his monstrous head. Danny staggered back, trying to escape.
The Tribemaster flung his giant tongue out his mouth and spiraled it around Danny. He lifted him high into the air and slammed him repeatedly against the road. I drove my claws into two pink spots on the Tribemaster’s head, mistaking them for eyes precisely the moment my sword-wielding sister stepped in.
Shayna sliced off the Tribemaster’s tongue with an expert flick of her wrist. He roared in pain and spewed Shayna with black-colored fluid. The inky mess knocked her back, blanketing her completely. She rolled to her feet, narrowly dodging his snapping fangs.
I yanked my claws free, pulling out what resembled long, wrinkled, fluid-filled earlobes. I realized too late they were his testes. Oh, gawd. I shook my paws like a madwoman—or, rather, an extremely skeeved-out tigress. One of them landed on the hood of Taran’s new car, splattering the windshield with thick pink foam; the other exploded all over Danny’s back. He yipped excitedly over the Tribemaster’s roars, knowing I’d caused some damage, but sadly oblivious to the amount of supernatural semen coating his bluish fur. Perhaps that was a good thing.
I shook off the disturbing chills buzzing down my spine. I didn’t like how close the maggot’s fangs were to Shayna, and neither did Koda. We landed at her side. Koda caught one of the larger fangs between his jowls and pulled with the force of his entire body. He extracted the tooth, causing the creature to writhe in agony. I tackled Shayna out of the way just before his head whipped back, barely missing us. His skull landed so hard it rattled the neighborhood and cracked the road. Danny wasn’t so lucky. The Tribemaster nailed him in the ribs and sent him flying into our neighbor’s yard. He landed with a loud crack and his head twisted in the opposite direction. I shoved Shayna back toward the house with my body and growled at her to stay put. Her fear was making her reckless. I worried she’d get hurt. When she didn’t make an effort to return, I raced back to check on the others.
Emme knelt over Danny, trying to heal his broken neck. Liam perched at the top of the screaming creature’s head. All I could see were his back legs and his wagging tail as he burrowed his way through the thick gray flesh and toward the creature’s brain. Black blood and chunks of flesh splattered his brown fur. He’d caused major damage. In a few more feet he’d cast the blow to end the Tribemaster’s life. Koda distracted the creature from attacking Liam by continuing his role as the periodontist from hell. Extracted fangs littered the street like piles of bones.
Taran stood in the middle of the road, generating wicked blue and white fire and waiting to strike should Liam fail. She was in a good spot—safe, and ready to sear the Tribemaster’s hide. I joined Gemini and Bren, who gnawed at the creature’s side try
ing to reach the vulnerable underbelly. I raked with my claws and pierced the flesh until I caught something long and slick reaching for my throat. I veered out of the way, narrowly missing the long wet tongues that ensnared my friends. The tongues had emerged from the spikes lining the Tribemaster’s back. They squeezed, cutting through the wolves’ fur and into their flesh.
I sliced through the tongue, tightening around Bren’s large neck, only to have another whip me across the face and pull Bren tighter. Gemini howled, calling the pack. Another tongue encircled his muzzle, sealing it tight and silencing him. Usually another were would answer his howl. My ears strained to hear a reply. None came. The pack wasn’t coming, and we needed help.
Having a master vampire for a guardian angel had its advantages. I concentrated on Misha and called him through the connection he’d passed to me long ago. Misha, I’m under attack. Get your Armani-clad butt over here.
I fought the other tongues trying to snatch me while I clawed my way up the creature’s back. I sliced Bren free and charged toward Gemini. Gemini’s oil-black wolf snarled and something cracked. A second identical wolf punched through his back, severing the tongues with a powerful snap of his fangs. My tail flicked with excitement. Watching Gemini split into two wolves never got old.
I helped Gemini’s twin wolf free his other half and then trudged through the jungle of tongues toward Liam, slicing at anything that attempted to rope me.
Liam scrambled out of the hole he’d made before we reached him. He changed back to human, panting and covered with black ooze. “It’s not there! The brain is somewhere else in his body.”
Which made sense, considering I’d cut his male parts from his forehead.
Shayna’s screams cut through the mist. “Danny, look out!”
Danny had attempted to rejoin the battle. He should have stayed down. The Tribemaster batted him with his tail and launched him into the side of Taran’s new Mustang, leaving a huge dent. Emme lifted Danny with her telekinetic force and pulled him to the side of the house and away from the fight.