Paranormal After Dark: 20 Paranormal Tales of Demons, Shifters, Werewolves, Vampires, Fae, Witches, Magics, Ghosts and More

by Rebecca Hamilton

  "Cease," I added when it appeared that Wilder would keep trying until he either broke a leg or actually managed to achieve reverse verticality. Then, leading him back in the direction from which we'd come, I asked, "Now are you ready to talk business?"

  Chapter 8

  AS WE REENTERED the site of our previous altercation, Fred's eyes met mine with pure relief. Beads of sweat stood out on his forehead despite the cold day, but he'd given up on straining against his invisible bonds. Instead, his nostrils flared as he struggled to catch the first hint that the wolves at his back planned to charge.

  Feeling sorry for the oathbreaker, I waved a release across all three shifters. The two wolves prepared to spring forward, but their eyes latched onto their alpha's first. And Wilder stilled them with the faintest shake of his head. "Leave us," he ordered.

  Every single member of my own pack would have argued the point. Abandon their alpha to stand alone against a similarly powerful werewolf and another shifter? No way.

  Fen would have rolled her eyes and told me to grow up. Chase would have placed a firm hand on my shoulder to prove he had my back. Tia would have scowled and then called up the hidden meanness that her lupine half so seldom shared with the world.

  But Wilder's lackeys instead turned away without complaint and melted into the trees. And they weren't just biding their time so they could circle around and attack either. Instead, quick footfalls took Wilder's underlings further and further away from our meeting place, the simple obedience of their aromas fading away into the distance. Their boss had spoken, so his underlings were obeying with alacrity.

  The situation was far too familiar. This was the type of alpha my father had been, too. The leader who was heeded without question, whose pack mates assumed he could gnaw his way free if he bothered to step into a trap. The one whose mere presence made females and males alike avert their eyes and bow down in immediate submission. The ultimate alpha.

  And Chief Wilder was offering that same position to me on a silver platter. He'd ruled his pack with an iron fist for so long that it would be simple for his named heir to step into those steel-toed boots. Since my strength obviously surpassed his own, I would find it a piece of cake to hold onto the power being blithely tossed my way.

  My father would be so proud.

  The thought gave me the strength to do what needed to be done. I glanced to the side to ensure that Fred was paying attention to our conversation, then I took a step forward into Crazy Wilder's personal space...

  ...And broke my oath.

  "Here's my answer to your question," I told the grizzled alpha. "I refuse to come to Haven as your heir and leave my pack. I won't obey your command."

  * * *

  IT WAS ONE thing to smell the foul oathbreaking aroma emanating from another shifter. It was something else entirely to cringe inside my own skin as the black smoke encircled my head and invaded my mouth and nostrils.

  I tried to stand tall, but instead found myself falling to my knees and retching up raw fish and rice. I don't think I'll ever eat sushi again, I thought, drowning in my own odor.

  Still, I forced myself to breathe deeply until my stomach ceased roiling. And when I was able, I opened my eyes and peered up at my opponent.

  Crazy Wilder lived up to his nickname. His anger at my refusal had turned his eyes into hard black coals that burned in their sockets and he seemed seconds away from turning wolf and tearing out my throat. So I hurried along the words that had caught on the vomit at the back of my throat.

  "Watch carefully, Fred," I croaked out. Then, forcing weak muscles to obey me, I stood and stepped away from the pile of half-digested food on the ground. The smoky cloud around my body was so dense, though, that I couldn't even smell the change in aroma as I distanced myself from the waste. Instead, my head swam and stars danced in front of vision that was suddenly dim and undependable.

  "I won't leave my pack," I repeated, clearing my throat and wishing I'd thought to bring along a bottle of water. Heck, I'd settle for a breath mint—anything to block the taste of vomit and the insidious scent of smoke from my attention.

  "Why not?" Wilder demanded. "You're worthless to them now. And to me. After all the work I put into you...."

  He turned away, hands clenched into fists and I coughed out my request before he could leave me there drowning in my own bad choices. "Wait."

  Okay, so that was more of a command than a request too. So sue me.

  The stiff rod of my opponent's back proved that he wasn't at all pleased to be ordered about with another shifter present. Still, Wilder's feet were frozen in place, so he couldn't resist swiveling around to peer at me over one shoulder.

  I paced across the earth to face the grizzled shifter, sparing a single glance for the other oathbreaker whose head was cocked to one side curiously. "See, Fred, this is what you need to know about breaking oaths." My words were clearer now as my speech pushed the awful flavor back down my throat. The oathbreaking aroma, though, showed no sign of dissipating from the air.

  Still, I took the time to explain for the sake of the shifter who had been a member of my pack for a few hours at least. Hopefully he'd get something out of an experience that I suspected would give me nightmares for years to come.

  "Oathbreaking is in your own mind, not in the mind of the shifter to whom your word was given," I continued. "You told my pack that you had no choice but to break your oath, Fred. That you were saving an innocent, not doing wrong. And if that's the case, then you can clear your aroma just as I plan to clear mine."

  Now I turned back to face the other pack leader and noted the hint of a smile curving up one side of the older man's lips. Hoping he wasn't a sore loser, I sucked in a lungful of oily remorse before speaking again.

  "Chief Wilder," I addressed him formally, "you and I both know that I've broken no oath. Eight years ago, I swore to give you an unnamed favor at a time and place of your choosing. But I also told you that you could take your pound of flesh from me alone. That my pack would not be harmed by my debt."

  Wilder opened his mouth and raised one hand as if to argue against this belated interpretation of my words, but I stilled him with a glance. No, I wasn't quoting myself verbatim, but that was the gist of my caveat and he and I both knew it.

  "And if you'd asked me to take over your pack that day, I would've been forced to obey. You were right—I was a stupid puppy then and an alpha in name alone."

  I paused and the faces of a dozen pack mates flashed before my eyes. Yes, I'd been only half an alpha when I stole Wade out of my brother's iron grip, a quarter of an alpha when Chase rescued me from my own lupine nature at a computer conference years ago, and a bare fraction of an alpha when Fen saved me from Alexis during the Winter Hunt.

  Then I smiled as I finished. "But now I lead my pack as you lead yours. I'd sacrifice anything to keep the shifters and human beneath my care happy and healthy. And leaving them would harm my pack. It would mean you were taking my debt from them, not me. That's not what we agreed."

  Wilder growled, and I saw the beard on his face grow a quarter inch in a second as the wolf inside fought to be released. "Semantics." The single word was as much as he could muster with his animal half so rampant, but he got his point across.

  In response, I shrugged. "Maybe to you. But not to me."

  And as I spoke, the black cloud lifted away from my head, spreading out around the three of us like a drop of ink splashing into a pond of clear water. For a moment, the poison was black and obvious, but then the smoky haze expanded and diluted until the scent of leaf mold and pine trees once more filled my nostrils. My oathbreaking aroma wasn't entirely absent, but it was so faint now that I suspected not even Chief Wilder could smell it on my skin.

  "If you want to be free of your curse," I finished, speaking to Fred but looking at the other pack leader, "that's how it's done."

  Chapter 9

  I KNEW BETTER than to think Fred would relinquish his foul aroma so readily. So I wasn't surpr
ised when he instead got to his feet and fled down the trail, oily smoke following in his wake. Perhaps the oathbreaker would apologize to whomever he'd wronged and find closure, or perhaps he'd continue with his scheming con-man ways. It wasn't my concern now. I'd given the shifter a fishing pole; now it was on him whether or not he learned to feed his soul.

  In the meantime, Wilder's shoulders had slumped and I could tell the other alpha was well and truly beaten. My father—or Wilder himself—would've taken the time to kick his opponent in the ass while he was down. But I instead offered the only consolation I had available.

  "I won't leave my pack to take over yours," I told him. "But I'll do whatever I can to make your transition easier. I'll prop up your power if it needs propping and I'll stand for you at All-Pack."

  "And if the wolf wins before I find another alpha to take my place?" Wilder growled. He clearly thought little of my offer, and I didn't blame him. It was too little too late.

  "Then I'll tear out your throat myself," I promised. To a human, the words would have sounded ominous. But Wilder and I were both wolves and we knew the assurance was the greatest kindness I could offer.

  The two of us stood for a moment in the still forest while birds that had fled the strangeness of the oathbreaking aroma began singing once again. A squirrel complained from the branch of a nearby oak tree and I smelled a fox pacing toward us then fleeing as it caught a whiff of our predatory scents.

  I kept my stance calm, but I knew I was balancing on a knife edge. One slip and I'd fall to gut myself on the sharp blade...or rather, on Wilder's sharp teeth.

  Behind the other alpha's eyes, his wolf was even more rampant than my own. Which was saying something since I sometimes felt so lupine I wasn't able to string two words together. The animal growled and paced within his human skin, itching to tear into me with the only weapons he understood—fangs and claws.

  A smarter shifter would have reined in his own lupine nature to prevent bloodshed. But instead, I released my animal side entirely so I could speak to Wilder's wolf with my eyes. Calm, I commanded him, and the older wolf quietened like a high-strung horse responding to its owner's hand.

  The effects wouldn't last forever. They probably wouldn't last until dinner time. But it was all I could do.

  I didn't expect thanks from the older alpha, so I simply turned away, preparing to hike back to the pack that I knew was waiting a few miles to the south. And even though I'd made the right decision, my throat was still tight from melancholy.

  The trouble was, Wilder's dilemma hit too close to home. I just hoped that if I lost my grasp of the human world as I grew older that someone would have the sense to put me down before I turned into the grizzled old wolf who stood at my back.

  As I remembered the strengths of the shifters beneath my care, though, I realized I didn't need to worry. They'd stand for me and for each other. And if it came down to it, my pack would do what needed to be done.

  My mind was already running forward to the relief I knew would show on my best friend's face as I walked through our front door. To Tia's exuberance as she pulled me into her arms.

  To the enticing pack princess whose trail I'd lost in the city earlier that afternoon but that I surely could pick back up if I tried hard enough....

  But Wilder's final sally cut through my musings as efficiently as he'd intended. "You have my blessing, you know."

  Despite my best intentions to hightail it home before I got into even more trouble, I turned back around to face him. My opponent's wolf was once again quiescent, his human face coated with that unholy glee Wilder sported when he knew he had the upper hand and was looking forward to watching you dangle from the end of his hook.

  But this time I found myself smiling instead of shivering. "What do you mean?" I asked.

  "You know," Wilder answered. "Or you will know." Then he shifted into lupine form, his clothes puddling beneath him on the forest floor. And he loped away to rejoin his defense force.

  Wilder probably meant to shake me up, but this time I was the one left laughing in his wake. Because the older shifter was right. I did know.

  Terra was waiting out there for me to find and claim as my mate. She was terrified of my wolf and uninterested in being part of a shifter pack, but I'd find a way to reel her in.

  And when I did, I'd have her father's blessing.

  Well, at least I have that going for me. My tongue lolled out of my mouth in simple lupine pleasure as I abandoned yet another set of clothing to the forest. Tia would scold and Chase would grumble, but Blaze was our accountant now so I didn't have to worry about how to pay for a replacement. Instead, I'd just trust my bloodling nature and lean on my friends' shoulders as needed.

  It's good to be part of a pack.

  * * *

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  About Aimee Easterling

  Aimee Easterling has been spoiled by four dogs, has spoiled six cats, and has largely been ignored by two guinea pigs, four turtles, a cockatiel, and a slew of fish during her thirty-some year life. Studying biology and working as a naturalist have both informed her writing, but she's quite willing to let reality slide in favor of a good story. When not writing, she loves to read and always keeps books by Robin McKinley, Patricia Briggs, and Elizabeth Peters on her shelf. She is currently hard at work writing her next novel.

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  JUMP TO...

  A DOSE OF BRIMSTONE by NOREE COSPER

  END OF DREAMS by KIM FAULKS

  HAUNT by HEATHER HAMBEL CURLEY

  DARK CROSSINGS by ANN SIMKO

  HEADSPACE by CALINDA B

  THE OTHER F WORD by SUSAN STEC

  UNLEASHED by RACHEL MCCLELLAN

  HIDDEN INTENTIONS by STACY CLAFLIN

  THE COMPLETE BLOODLING SERIAL by AIMEE EASTERLING

  SHE WHO FIGHTS MONSTERS by KYOKO M

  ST. CHARLES AT DUSK by SARAH M. CRADIT

  WICKED BY NATURE by MADISON SEVIER

  UNDERLIFE by MARISSA FARRAR

  DRAGON’S REDEMPTION by EDEN ASHE

  MILAN’S RETURN by GRAE LILY

  THE BREAKERS CODE by CONNER KRESSLEY

  THE MEDIUM by MR GRAHAM

  WICCAN WARS by HEATHER MARIE ADKINS

  CARPE NOCTEM by KATIE SALIDAS

  A QUESTION OF FAITH by NICOLE ZOLTACK

  SHE WHO FIGHTS MONSTERS

  Book Two of The Black Parade Series

  BY KYOKO M

  Copyright © 2014 by Kyoko M

  Try a little Brimstone to bring out the demon in you.

  The dynamic supernatural duo of Seer Jordan Amador and her husband the archangel Michael is back in the sequel to the bestselling urban fantasy novel, The Black Parade, trying to solve a deadly case. Someone is methodically hunting down and murdering Seers one by one. After six months with no leads on the killer, Jordan and Michael are forced to work with their worst enemy—the archdemon Belial: a self-professed Prince of Hell who is dead set on stealing Jordan for himself. However, with the archdemon’s help, they pick up on the trail of the serial killer and plan to stop him no matter what the cost.

  When the shocking truth behind the murderer’s identity is revealed, Jordan begins asking herself if she is still fighting for the good guys or has she become one of the monsters she is desperately trying to stop?

  She Who Fights Monsters is the second novel and third book in the Black Parade series. It follows The Black Parade and The Deadly Seven: Stories from The Black Parade.

  She Who Fights Monsters

  by Kyoko M

  Copyright © 2014 by Kyoko M

  Cover designed by Gunjan Kumar. Background cour
tesy of Katie Litchfield. Dragon silhouette courtesy of Bonny Truong.

  Edited by Jillian Leigh.

  References

  Bacon, Francis. “Of Death.” 1612.

  Milton, John. Paradise Regained. 1671.

  Reuss, Theodore. Das Erotische in Goethes Faust und die Tantriks. Publication date unknown.

  Shakespeare, William. “Antony and Cleopatra.” 1623.

  Prologue

  The Story So Far...

  JORDAN AMADOR IS a Seer sentenced to eternal damnation for murder unless she leads 100 souls to rest. Jordan arrives home from work to find a man she saw in the park waiting for her and he wants to talk. Reluctantly, she lets him in only to find that his name is Michael and he is a poltergeist—the first one she’s ever met. He manages to convince her to take on his case and find out how and why he died.

  During the investigation Jordan finds out from Archangel Gabriel that Michael is in fact Commanders of God’s Army in Heaven and has been missing for the past two years after being sent to Earth to find the Spear of Longinus – the spear that pierced the side of Jesus.

  Jordan encounters the demon Belial, who reveals that he wants to inhabit Michael’s dead body because it has the power to control the emotions of all human beings. In order to do this, he needs her blood and so he plans to kill her and use her blood to open a channel into Michael’s body that will allow him to access it. He also reveals that he sent the demon-like creature into her apartment two years ago to lure the last known Seer out so he could capture him, but Jordan’s intervention prevented him from succeeding.