Creature Comforts

by Creature Comforts (lit)

  * * * *

  India twitched into alertness. Her every sense felt abused. Her body ached. Her nose filled with the acrid stench of burnt flesh and hair. Her own? God she hoped not. How long had she been out since the little bastard had Tasered her. She bit back a whimper at a steady burning at her neck, wrists, and ankles. She resisted both the urge to curl up into a ball in the darkness and to claw at the blistering pain from pure silver against her skin. Or to touch the matebond and reach out to Chase. He’d come for her, she knew it. And sacrifice whatever part of the Alpha’s plan he was vital to.

  “What about the flying demon?” India assumed he was the clerk from the youthful uncertainty. “It could come back. You saw how it fought.” When the other passengers didn’t respond, except to choke back a laugh, his whine rose another octave. “We should prepare. It could come back with more demons.” At least India assumed they were passengers from the steady rocking and road noise under the thin scratch carpet under her cheek. She also assumed that Thorn was the flying demon in question. Another whimper and a cough plummeted India’s hope that Tamara had gotten away safely. Damn girl probably froze trying to keep from obeying her command to run.

  “Why are you doing this to us?” Tamara’s hoarse, teary voice made India’s stomach clench in a building rage. “Please, take these off.” Tamara’s shackles clacked metallically. The pain and confusion in the female made India want to Change and rip their attackers into bloody pieces. And if she happened to swallow any of the pieces, then oops. “They hurt.,” Tamara whined piteously. In wolf form, the female would be curled up, ears flat, her tail firmly tucked underneath.

  “You! Wolf bitch. Shut it up.” One of the Houdini brothers bit out. Unlike Carter Hunter, India didn’t remember these two being very strong bodied. Rather they were fairly short with rounded sagging features, as if they’d lost weight recently. Balding, she thought. Very atypical of the majority of psychics. “And you, Apoo. Zip it about the demons. It was a harmless pixie.”

  Mother nature endowed them with a formidable magic that they could wield at will. The tricky bitch that Mother Nature was, she also made those same psychics part of the key to the other supernaturals survival. What better camouflage could nature have given them than making such extraordinarily rare treasures appear as ordinary and unfit? Hunters like Carter were the exception that proved the rule and scared those that would hunt his kind scared silly.

  “My name is Glen, not Apoo, assh—oof!” India felt the glow of an inner smile sooth a tiny bit of her pain. Glen the convenient store clerk may not have been Tasered, but that soft thud of a fist meeting belly couldn’t have felt good. She kept her eyes closed, not wanting to give up what little advantage she might have while they argued.

  “Now that’s not nice, Glen.” Houdini said. “You were willing to sell out a relative because she turns furry and runs around on all fours. So what does that make you?” He laughed low and dangerous. Something hard and blunt nudged her in the shoulder. The toe of Houdini’s shoe, she imagined. “What do you think about that India Demos?” He seemed to think that was hilarious and snorted another low laugh.

  “She’s not awake.” Glen’s protest was weak. His voice cracked mid-syllable. If the twerp thought she was going to go easy on him when she got loose for some supposed relative comment, he had another thing coming. Glen the sales clerk was on the same level as pond scum.

  “Of course she’s awake, you idiot.” The foot nudge became more of a kick against her head, bringing stars to her eyes and an involuntary growl to her throat. India glared until forced to close her eyes against the rising nausea. “See? The red glow in her eyes? Yeah, she’s awake and pissed. Just stay away from the teeth.”

  Seated in one of two rear-facing custom captain chairs her attacker moved his foot away, replacing it with the sallow features of his face. Dark eyes lit with an inner hate framed by a head with short wavy hair. Not balding as she’d first thought. Glen, the store clerk of either, she assumed, Indian or Pakistani descent, huddled in the other captain’s chair nursing his stomach.

  The bastard who kicked her, pressed thin lips tight in distaste while he sucked air through his patrician nose, making it thinner. His expression reminded her of a vulture she saw once, nodding it’s beak impatiently for the cars to get out of the way. “How did my friend Pete taste, you murdering bitch?” he hissed. India frowned, trying to dredge up through the throbbing pain in her skull the reason why she should know what he was talking about.

  “Pete? Who?” The foot connected sharply with her skull again, then her head jerked up at an odd angle with the fist full of hair he held. Snapping and snarling in defense, she wrestled against the silver chains until they slid wetly against her skin. Fresh fire flared between broken blisters and the pure silver fastened around wrists and ankles. She found them bolted securely to the floor, the ring digging into her side.

  “You killed Pete.” Carter Hunter’s words pinned her with floundering righteousness. His strong warrior’s body was as perfectly suited to his new role as supernatural predator as he had been as predator of the supernatural.

  Another jerk brought her back to the present. Lips peeled back from canine fangs, India’s stare promised death to the man who held her prisoner. “No. You. Murderer.” She growled, imagining the feel of his neck between her teeth. The blood flowing until he was dead. “The killer of innocents.” Like Rick Weis.

  He let go, sitting back in his seat crossing his leg just out of her reach. The ill fitting black dress pants leg rode up to show bulky black sports socks and dark brown leather shoes. He twitched the lapels of his jacket and sneered. “Monsters aren’t innocent.” She wished he’d lean forward a bit more so that she could bite his nose off. He laughed again as if reading her thoughts. “No. You think to blend in so well. Lawyers, mechanics, teachers.”

  He laughed again seeing the dawning realization in her face and reached inside his jacket. The shine of silver made her blood run cold. Behind India, Tamara whimpered at the sight of the silver hunting knife that the man drew out. He glanced past her at Tamera and tipped the point of the blade towards India. “Your little friend won’t last half as long as he did. But you…” The light of challenge in his eyes brought another growl to the back of India’s throat. “You’re a mean enough bitch to suffer hoping to kill me.”

  “You killed Rick Weis.” He probably killed Kasi Stephens too. Behind her Tamara choked out a moan of pain. India could feel the female’s emotional distress as she involuntarily called out to her fellow pack members through the packbond. The pleasure he got from Tamara’s terror shone in the fever bright intensity of his gaze.

  Beside him on the seat, Glen the sales clerk stared at the knife wielding sicko in horror. “You killed that school teacher?”

  Rick’s killer set the silver blade across one knee settled back in his seat. Except for the crazy eyes, he looked perfectly comfortable. “What do you think?”

  Glen looked down and away at floor. “Yeah. I think you did.” Glen swallowed hard, fear spiking from him as the other man made a sound of disapproval. “I mean, Yes, Mr. Hunter.” The morbid curiosity on Glen’s face must have appealed to her captor, because he stretched his thin lips into another smile.

  “All in good time Mr. Singh. We still have church services to attend tonight.” He tightened his grip on the silver knife, twisting it to thumb the blade. “Oh, and you can call me Chuck.”

  * * * *

  Compartmentalizing the urge to howl in frustration and pain, India listened as Chuck the supernatural serial-killing dweeb his conversion spiel on Glen, the convenient store clerk who was going to die either by Chuck’s knife or her teeth. Either way, the little worm had the half-life of a red-shirted Star Trek ensign.

  “God, Allah, or whatever you call the Supreme Creator.” Chuck Hunter said. “Gave us the means to protect ourselves from the minions of evil.”

  “Minions of evil.” Glen repeated, deadpan, nodding though he obviously thought
Chuck was a few dice short of a basement dwelling dungeon role playing game. “Right.”

  “Well, not you.” Chuck clarified, clearly feeling superior. “You’re just a null. Average human monster bait.” Glen nodded.

  Which wasn’t true at all. While Glen the clerk might be an average human, supernaturals didn’t usually go around eating them, except for dragons. At the very top of the woo-woo food chain, the big lizards considered everyone else beneath them and pretty much on the menu. Vampires subsisted on a high-protein liquid diet, i.e. blood. But India thought the source of that blood might be negotiable. Most other supernaturals, fairy-kind included, considered it bad taste to eat the meat of a two-legged or sentient creature. Anything that got swallowed in a fight involving teeth and claws didn’t count.

  Crazies and psychopaths notwithstanding, average humans didn’t have much of a draw for supernaturals. They didn’t have any inherent magical potential. Nulls couldn’t be turned into vampires, couldn’t breed with wolven or Change if bitten. Fairykind steered clear of them and dragons claimed they tasted bland. No, Glen and the rest of the non-magical human population didn’t have much to fear, except for the occasional vampire bite.

  Now, Chuck, was another matter entirely. Supernatural instinct was to acquire and treasure the psychic human. They were treasures to be acquired and managed carefully. Valuable assets. It was just a shame that those same treasures and assets were attempting to kill the supernaturals who would protect them.

  India could smell the power as he used his gifts to influence Glen’s mind. Or so India assumed from the slight glazed look in the dark skinned man’s eyes. The scent of magic coming off Chuck in small bursts was a seductive mouthwatering aroma that promised power to her super sensitive senses. Too bad the source made her stomach twist in revulsion.

  “But thankfully God gave you nulls us psychics to protect you from the darkness.” Chuck, actually leaned over to pat Glen on the knee. India couldn’t think of the crazy as a real Hunter. Not in the same league as the very dead Pete or in Carter’s. The Hunter turned wolven and his predecessor were prime Alpha material. They acted according to their own credo, Carter’s being the more honorable, she suspected. Chuck was a zealot in a jihad. A murdering sheep who liked to inflict pain. “You’re damn lucky the deacon decided to take an interest in the werewolf problem here in East Texas,” he emphasized his point by tapping the flat of the blade against Glen’s knee. The clerk didn’t seem to mind much. Glen looked drugged, nodding in agreement. “Deacon Gabriel has been watching them for some time, you know. Long before your uncle contacted us about your own little problem.”

  “Great uncle.” Glen corrected in a mumble. Even zoned out by whatever the psychic was doing to his mind, he had the presence to look askance at India. For the first time, the worm looked guilty. The van turned slowed and turned off of smooth paved road, crunching over what India took as rock, then bumping cross-country. Every dip and jolt drove the metal ring her restraints were attached to into her side. Tamara whimpered, a sad canine sound of defeat that fed India’s resolve.

  “Chill.” Chuck advised. The scent of psychic spiked, confirming her suspicions that he had some minor form of human mind control. Had his gifts been strong enough to manipulate a supernatural’s mind or even his own kind, she believed he would have already done so. Then again, he had taken pleasure in hurting Glen before. “Both you and your great uncle can watch as we take care of the last of the werewolves who defiled your family.”

  “Who is your uncle?” India asked, she ignored his soft correction and his obvious struggle to regain his own thoughts. Her heart pounded, fearing the answer. Glen looked at her then away, guilt and shame stamped all over him. Chuck smirked, knowing the answer as he fingered the silver knife. Yeah, he probably got off on such sickness. “Randun Singh.” There was no need to push further. Glen’s dark Indian complexion blanched at her grandfather’s name. Avoiding looking at her, he fumbled off the seat belt and stood. Without a glance backward, he went to the front of the van.

  “It sucks when your own cousin stabs you in the back.” Whatever point Chuck wanted to grind home, she didn’t care. India closed her eyes as she accepted the truth. Her human relatives wanted her dead. Her grandfather, possibly even her mother, had arranged for her and her pack to be put down like a bunch of rabid dogs. She and her father had not been close like Adam and his offspring. Still, she missed him. Gin Demos had cared enough to take her and make sure she was raised among those who would accept her. “Of course you got it twice, didn’t you?” he laughed again, enjoying her pain.

  “You seem more the stabber than the stabb-ee.” The burning sting of the silver had lessened, making her wonder just how bad the burn was.

  “No. I’m saving humanity from the monsters.”

  God save her from the delusions of the Hunter’s. This time she laughed, but with bitter irony as she remembered her mate’s words. “That’s funny, I thought we were the ones saving humanity from you.”

  Chapter Thirty

  In the end, need outweighed personal grudges. On Adam’s word, the wolven and the weres stripped and Changed. As one, they and their allies surged into the forest. Morgan and his fairykind kept pace easily. Wren and his pixie swarm maintained formation just above Chase. “Ha!” Wren exulted spinning in a short aerial display. “The Great Hunt is reborn!”

  “The Great Hunt!” The elves led by Morgan picked up the war cry. “The Great Hunt!” The wolves and weres following Adam howled and cried out their own version. The plan to break into groups was forgotten as a wild and glorious magic built between. A mixture of were and fairy, roiled with a life of its own as they raced to confront the enemy in their territory. They were the Hunt. Life, death, and justice made manifest. The power eclipsed everything else.

  Chase’s paws hit the ground in time with the beat of the magic swelling through him. The power grew. Dimly, he was aware that their Hunt had grown larger. The piercing cries of a pair of eagle-sized hawks blended into the war cry as more allies joined them. A unicorn and a black horse screamed their challenge into the Hunt. Dryads danced amidst the running animals. He did not know how they kept pace, or how the power drew them in, he just accepted that they did.

  The Hunt found its first victim in the outer perimeter of the camp. They rolled over the psychic, the magic of the Hunt naming him enemy. A hawk picked him up, dropping the guard behind Chase in the midst of their group. He screamed once before being silenced in a rush of teeth, claws, and hooves.

  Another sentry ran for the safety of a civilian Humvee. The black horse and the unicorn broke off after him. Both screamed for his blood, fangs bared in their equine mouths. “Ha!” Wren shouted in Chase’s ear. “You can’t outrun a nightmare! Or a unicorn!” The unicorn speared the man through the chest, just as the black nightmare claimed a shoulder with her teeth.

  The Hunt pushed Chase on until a familiar whine in the air made him pause. In the back of his mind, instinct told him he was forgetting something important. The ground exploded in front of their leading edge. Shouts and growls from the Hunt pressed them on, the magic seeming to feed on the deaths of their enemies. The smattering of gunfire blossomed red against the chest of an elf. He fell screaming and clawing at his chest. The sudden fire in his side told Chase that he’d been hit, but it faded fast under his fast healing metabolism. The lead bullet passed through leaving no significant damage. He pressed on relishing the taste of enemy blood between his teeth.

  More explosions rattled the Hunt as they raced over a rutted field to the source. A circus style tent sat to the side of an area filled with tents, campers, busses, and large military style vehicles. The Hunt targeted the military vehicles as their main danger. The group raced past the tent and into the Church’s main camp.

  The Hunt relished the enemy that came running towards them. Explosions rattled their formation. The psychics fired automatic rifles into the Hunt, bringing screams of pain from both fairy and weres as both lead and silver
found its mark. Another wolf, large and brown, knocked into him. Chase snarled. The other wolf snarled back, butting him again. Shoving him from the pull of the Hunt.

  Enemy from within! The Hunt accused. Chase snapped, sinking his teeth into the other wolf’s shoulder. They rolled, biting, growling. Breaking free, the wolf ran and stopped. Chase followed, bloodlust demanding…what? Chase surveyed the scene with unclouded senses.

  The main knot of fighting centered around what appeared to be the weapons and cargo area. Smaller groups and individuals fought the remaining losing psychics. Trucks flipped on their sides and made inoperable lay like carcasses. Dead, maimed psychics, wolves, were animals, and fairy kind littered the path from the road.

  The brown wolf hunched in pain as the magic of the Change buzzed in the air. Chase closed his eyes, letting the other wolf’s Change pull him along. His own Change pulled him upright. The tickle of receding fur and face made him open his eyes. Focusing on Carter Hunter, Chase waited until the other had recovered from the transition.

  “Damn, that hurts.” The Hunter grimace. “How do you do it without pain?”

  “Don’t fight it.” Chase rubbed a hand over his face. “The wolf is part of you. You’re not human anymore, so trying to keep yourself human works against the magic of the Change.”

  “What do you know about being human?” The ex-Hunter snapped, shaking with frustration and loss.

  “I know what it’s like to have your humanity taken from you.” Chase watched the main tent fall slowly, giving the other a moment to gain control of himself. A mushroom imploding on itself. “You don’t have to be a monster though.” He smirked at Carter’s goggled incredulity.