“Who are you?” Randolph asked.
Deferring to him out of instinct, the Mongrel removed the edgy tone from her voice and said, “Lyssa,” in a way that made it sound close to listen.
“Liam passed the gift to you,” Randolph said. “I’ve heard others of your kind weren’t strong enough to endure as much.”
Lyssa glanced down at one forepaw that looked as if it had been nearly halved by an axe. “We’re different, but not like you. We think Liam was lying just to save his own skin.”
“Lying?” Liam asked as he reared up and showed the full glory of his one multifaceted eye. Subsiding like a tide after laying waste to a beachside community, he growled, “Maybe a little.”
“Kayla warned us of that,” Max explained, curling his lips and tongue around every word, as if still getting used to his new mouth. “But I knew there was a chance of something happening. At the very least, his meat would have been shared by our entire pack instead of handed over to those Skinner ghouls.”
“Shared,” Liam beamed, “and most definitely enjoyed. Just ask some of my old lady friends from London.”
After silencing Liam with a growl, Randolph shifted his focus to the burrower wolf. “Your name?”
As the Mongrel bared his teeth, its eyes showed equal parts fear and longing.
“He don’t speak,” Liam explained. “Either that or the poor fella’s shy.”
“What about the rest of your pack?” Randolph asked. “Have they been changed?”
Even on a face as twisted as Max’s, the contempt was clear to see. His eyes narrowed into yellow lines as he replied, “Kayla wouldn’t allow it. She and Ben are content to grow fat in Kansas City, scrounging for whatever human scraps they can find. When she saw what we became, she wanted to be rid of Liam forever.”
“Some of us volunteered for the change anyway,” Lyssa said. “It’s not perfect, but it’s more than we were before.”
“You think so?” Randolph growled. Even after he stood up straight, his body continued to rise. His ankles stretched into reversed knees as his legs stretched to new lengths. Claws snaked out of his toes and fingers. When his snout emerged from his face amid a series of loud, wet cracks, the true Full Blood stood before them.
Liam looked on with an eye that darted back and forth between the Mongrels. “Oh, see I was afraid of this. Randolph don’t exactly like to share his territory with anyone.”
“You brought us here to be slaughtered?” Max asked. Re-flexively changing into his squat burrower form, he sprouted claws that curved around like scythes to dig trenches into the rock. Whiskers sprouted from a nose that extended from his face to make way for the uniformly rounded teeth in his mouth. “You said we’d look for others like you,” he snarled.
“And it looks like we found one. Sorry, Max. Nothin’ I could do, you see.”
There was no more talking after that. When Randolph sprang forward, he reached out with both hands. A bellowing breath came from his mouth, and if not for the deadly arsenal of fangs and claws, he might have been just another rush of wind.
Lyssa and the digger-wolf hybrid scattered in opposite directions. Their speed was impressive, in that it was enough to get them out of the way before Randolph tore them into bloody ribbons. Max, on the other hand, dove straight into the hole from which he’d appeared.
As soon as Randolph hit the pile of rocks, he slashed at the hybrid with his claws. One bony talon snagged in the Mongrel’s flesh, but the creature was so panicked that it tore itself loose without seeming to realize the damage that had been done. Since that one was temporarily out of reach, Randolph moved his hungry gaze to the female. Lyssa bared her fangs, which were even longer now than when she’d been speaking to him a minute ago. Although she’d shifted into a more bestial form, her body retained the lithe silhouette that defined her species. As blood pumped through her veins, muscles grew beneath her flesh until she was large enough to pose a challenge.
Randolph sized her up in a fraction of a second and twisted his upper body around to snap at her. Impossibly fast, and strong enough to turn one unlucky rock into powder with a wild swipe, the Full Blood would have sunk his fangs deep into her neck if not for the hole that opened up directly beneath his left forepaw.
Thick, rounded paws reached from the hole, sank curved nails into Randolph’s leg and began shredding. Instead of simply flaying skin from flesh, Max used the werewolf’s limb to pull himself up from the ground. As soon as he snagged a tendon, he hooked a claw around the sinewy fiber and pulled until the ropy strand snapped. A bellowing roar flowed from the depths of Randolph’s massive frame and filled the sky above him. Perhaps spurred by the sound of his fellow Full Blood, Liam pounced at Max. If his claws had found their mark, they would have easily torn the Mongrel into uneven chunks. Instead, they scraped along rock and even grazed Randolph himself when Max ducked back down into his hole.
When he’d dug his first tunnel through the mountain, Max was able to take his time and slither through the narrow passages he’d made. Now, the Mongrel scraped frantically beneath the surface, knocking flat sections of the basin’s floor askew as he carved his escape route.
Randolph left a trail of blood in the air as he sprang forward to get ahead of the burrowing creature. Skidding upon his wounded leg, he brought a fist down like a hammer to crush through the rocky crust. Before he could pull Max from the ground, the wolflike Mongrel circled around from another angle to dig into the Full Blood with every tooth and claw at his disposal. Reaching over his shoulder, Randolph grabbed the hybrid by the scruff of its neck and pulled him free the same way he might rip out an arrow lodged between his shoulder blades. The hybrid tore open a large flap of skin from Randolph’s back, but the Full Blood still maintained his grip and slammed him to the basin floor.
As this one went, Liam had to contend with Lyssa. He’d been blindsided by the feline Mongrel as she ran along the edge of the rock wall like a race car cruising on the steepest slope of a track. She pushed away from the wall and flew at him with the intention of sinking her claws into his side, but was stopped in midair when Liam snapped his head around to clamp his jaws around her neck.
The muscles beneath Lyssa’s skin were more solid than any other Mongrel he’d faced. They shifted around his teeth to add another layer of padding before anything vital was pierced. Liam savored the moment while curling his lips back and pressing his jaws in tighter around her. His fangs sank in another quarter of an inch before Lyssa began scraping madly at his eyes and throat.
Unlike the Skinners who needed charmed weapons and trickery to hurt a Full Blood, Mongrels had a natural weapon at their disposal. Even Nymar fangs could wound a werewolf, but the leeches simply didn’t have the raw power needed to get the job done. Normally, a single Mongrel didn’t possess that kind of strength either. Lyssa, on the other hand, was proving that her uniqueness ran deeper than Liam had previously expected.
He pondered this while she shredded half of his face and further ravaged the callused pit where his right eye had been. Considering how bad that wound had itched since he regained consciousness, the Mongrel’s claws weren’t entirely unwelcome. Once the scratching dug a little too deep, he ended it by clenching his jaws shut tight enough for the Mongrel to shift her priorities from attack to defense. He swatted away one of her paws as if disciplining a child and then absorbed a few painful gouges along his forearm before grabbing the front portion of her chest. From there, he tore her off and pinned her to the ground. “There you go, sweetness,” he growled. “Just lay down and let me take care of you.”
“You said you’d lead us somewhere safe,” Lyssa growled. “Somewhere away from the packs and Skinners.”
“I don’t see neither of them around here, luv.”
“You changed us. Made us better. There’s no reason for this.”
Leaning in so he could be heard over the commotion of the other Full Blood’s struggle with Max and the hybrid, Liam said, “Randolph ain’t the sort who plays well with others. Neve
r was.”
Since she was no match for the werewolf in a one-on-one fight, and her pleading was falling upon deaf ears, Lyssa only had one remaining option. She clenched her eyes shut, relaxed in Liam’s grip, and bared her neck to him.
Recognizing the gesture that would bring an end to a great number of disputes between wolves, Liam seethed with an anger that showed even within the ravaged pit of his right eye socket. “What are you doing?” he snarled as he tightened his grip on her. “You wanted to be one of us? A Full Blood defers to no one. Not ever! You make me sick, you pathetic little bitch. Killing you is too damn easy.”
“Liam.”
If the ebon werewolf heard his name, he didn’t acknowledge it. He was taking too much pleasure in slowly grinding his claws within Lyssa’s flesh. “You know how long I made humans suffer when I led the charge against their city? I had to keep them alive so they’d survive long enough to turn into a Half Breed. But you, luv,” he said in a voice that was less intense but twice as chilling. “You can take so much more punishment than one of them.”
“You’ll be taking some punishment yourself if you don’t back up.”
Blinking as if he’d been awoken from a dream, Liam turned toward the source of the voice. Randolph stood behind him in his human form. His fur had receded all the way under his skin, leaving him naked but still less vulnerable than any of the other Mongrels in the vicinity. Liam sought them out next. He spotted the hybrid curled against the far side of the basin licking one of several wounds. Max emerged from another hole and stretched his neck out toward Liam’s belly. All of the Mongrel’s teeth were bared and poised to eviscerate the Full Blood. Even if Max couldn’t get the job done, he was bound to make a hell of a mess.
“You really think you can put me down before I get to you?” Liam growled.
“That doesn’t matter,” Randolph said. “I wanted to find out what these Mongrels were made of, and they’ve shown me plenty.”
“We’re not Mongrels anymore,” Lyssa said. “Kayla was very specific about that.”
“Well you’re sure as hell not Full Bloods,” Liam pointed out. “And if this little bugger doesn’t crawl back into his hole pretty damn quickly, he won’t even be a resident of this plane of existence.”
Reluctantly, Max eased back into his tunnel. As he retraced the path he’d dug beneath the surface, dislodged earthen plates rattled over his squirming back. The motion stopped and one of the plates was shoved aside so he could poke his head up several paces away from either of the werewolves. “He’s right,” Max said to the other Mongrels. “We shouldn’t follow someone like Kayla if she’s not willing to accept us. But we won’t follow the likes of you, Liam. Not anymore.”
“I’ve never seen anything like you,” Randolph admitted. “Our two kinds have fought many times, but there have never been survivors to go through this sort of change.”
“That’s not true,” Max said. “The survivors of those battles were always killed after the fight was over. Put down for their own good, we were told.”
“It’s in our history,” Lyssa told him. “Most of it’s known only to the pack leaders, but it’s there. I saw it for myself in Kansas City. Some of the Mongrels that were wounded while fighting you were killed by Kayla herself. I was tending to my husband after he was wounded by Liam when she came and told me to rest. She thought I was gone, but I watched from a distance and saw her slash his throat. After it was done, she told me he’d died and that we should burn his body immediately.”
Randolph’s brow lifted slightly above his crystalline eyes. “So she knows about the change?”
“She knows the rumor,” Max said. “I spoke to her when the humans in KC were still cleaning up the mess Liam made. She knew something would happen, but not what. I think she was hoping to find some missing element that would make a difference between us changing into whatever she feared and changing into a Full Blood.” Looking to Randolph, he asked, “Is there?”
“Honestly, I don’t know. Most of the times I’ve encountered Mongrels, I’ve been forced to fight back a swarm of them intent on killing me.” Holding up a thick hand before the inevitable argument came, he added, “Whatever the reason for our past conflict, it’s behind us for now.” The wounds on that hand were closing like clay being reshaped by an unseen sculptor. His leg was in much worse condition, but not as bad as it had been a short while ago. “Things are different. Do you know of a Skinner named Jonah Lancroft?”
“The Mind Singer spoke of him,” Lyssa said. “For a while I thought I’d only dreamt that name. Is he real?”
“He was, but I lost track of him over sixty years ago. Lancroft was a creator. He made things to help the Skinner cause, and it’s possible he came up with a way to hide his scent from us. There are groups of Skinners meeting in Philadelphia right now. Loose talk among them mentions Lancroft’s name and that he was the one behind the Mud Flu. It’s also said that he was killed by his own kind.”
“Does Lancroft have a way to complete our conversion into Full Bloods?” Lyssa asked.
Always quick to pounce on an opportunity, Liam jumped in with, “If anyone would have such a thing, it would have been him.”
“Their intent is to kill us, not help us become more powerful. The reason I asked about Lancroft is that he was rumored to have created a way to inhibit our ability to heal. The Skinners must rely on antiquated methods of harming us, but we’ve still been able to heal after surviving a fight with them.”
“Well,” Liam said as he turned the right side of his face toward the others, “more or less.”
“Liam’s eye may well heal if given enough time,” Randolph said. “Anyone who has seen the Mind Singer knows that some of his wounds never did.”
“Got his neck snapped somewhere along the line,” Liam said. “Something like that should have either killed poor Henry before he became one of us or cleared up after his first change.”
“He was a Full Blood, wasn’t he?” Max asked. “Wasn’t that enough to sustain him?”
Randolph sighed and turned his back on the others as if he’d either become fascinated by the rugged landscape or bored with the company he was forced to keep. “I’ve had my neck broken a few times. It’s not pleasant but it’s also not fatal for us.”
“I been hung,” Liam said with the same tone he might use if comparing his story to the ones told by a bunch of drunken fishermen. “Rope burns are just as bad as the bone gettin’ snapped.”
Continuing as though Liam hadn’t opened his mouth, Randolph said, “Henry’s neck was broken while he was held in Lancroft Reformatory. I’ve been through the ruins of that place and found nothing but a single intriguing scent. Years later I’d assumed whatever advances Lancroft had made were either lost after the place became a Half Breed den or taken when it was cleaned out by the Skinners. This new discovery in Philadelphia has unearthed more than Lancroft’s research. Much more. The place is swarming with Skinners. They’re anxious and expecting to be attacked. Fortunately, all five of us have advantages that go beyond brute strength or speed.”
“Perhaps we could talk to them,” Max said. “Some of them are more open to reason than others. After working with them in KC, they may still trust us.”
“Talk will come later.” Shifting his eyes to the other Full Blood, Randolph said, “They think Liam’s dead. Or, they would have if he hadn’t been intent on sending childish taunts to them.”
Liam curled his lip into something between a snarl and a disgusted sneer.
“And I’ve had words with them myself,” Randolph continued.
“Right,” Liam grunted. “We both know how well that turned out.”
Randolph’s face twitched. More specifically, the muscles that ran beneath the jagged scar tissue on his cheek flinched as if he could still feel the Blood Blade sliver that had put it there. “You Mongrels have proven to be an asset. You fight well and can prove valuable in the times that are to come. We cannot allow Lancroft’s creations to be freel
y distributed. When this current turmoil among them settles, we can cripple their efforts before they even know they’re in danger.”
“They’re always in danger,” Liam said. “Even the dumbest animals would know that by now.”
Focusing on a point to the east, Randolph said, “Yes, but some dangers cut deeper than others.”
Chapter Four
“Who the hell are these guys?” Cole asked as yet another batch of new arrivals walked into the basement through the glowing curtain of beads. The Dryads called the room a Skipping Temple because it could be used as a waypoint to shuttle someone to a further spot like a stone skipping across the top of a lake. Ever since Lancroft had been killed, nobody was skipping much farther than his basement.
Since the Skinners didn’t have membership cards, they identified themselves by holding out their hands to show the distinctive scars on their palms made by the thorns in their weapons. Those scars were more than just conversation pieces. Elements from the varnish that made the weapons powerful enough to combat supernatural creatures mingled with a Skinner’s blood, tainting it with traces of the Nymar and shapeshifter components within the mixture. Cole learned firsthand that the scars itched in the presence of Nymar, burned when shapeshifters were in the vicinity, and made his hands cramp when a heavy rain was on the way. That last part could have been a product of his age but he preferred to blame the scars.
Paige sifted through a pile of weapons stored in an old locker that looked as if it had been pulled out of a bus stop. Holding a wooden stake in one hand and a rusted cleaver in the other, she only glanced up long enough to take a quick look and reply, “I dunno who they are. Why don’t you ask them?”
“It’s three in the morning. How much longer do I have to meet and greet these people?”
“Stop whining, Cole. We were here when all the Lancroft shit hit the fan, so we’re the ones everyone’ll want to talk to.”
“Rico and Daniels were here too,” Cole whined. “How’d they get out of this?”
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