by Amelia Jade
Aksel’s look soured. “True. Fucking Fenris. What do you think, a company of them?”
Luther nodded. “That’s what I was thinking. So, the two of us, against three dozen of them. What odds!”
“There are other Cadians here,” Aksel said as they jogged along, constantly looking over their shoulder. “Cloud Lake isn’t that big, but it’s still a lot of space for thirty-six shifters to cover, especially if they’re working in teams of three.”
“True,” Luther agreed. Calling Cloud Lake a city was a bit of a stretch. It was perhaps fifteen thousand people, maybe twenty thousand including the surrounding areas. That was a lot of space to hide within. And yet…
“Unfortunately,” he continued, “they know where the major areas we tend to congregate are. They can eliminate a large portion of the city, especially at this time of night. We need to be careful. Odds are we’re probably being herded somewhere.”
A form came stumbling out of an alleyway.
The pair immediately dropped into a combat stance, ready to charge, but the figure threw a hand up. “Wait!” it wheezed.
Luther recognized the accent. The person was from Cadia.
“Are you okay?” he asked, closing in on the other shifter. A moment later the smell hit him. Wolf.
“Little banged up,” the other man said, grateful for the assistance as Luther hooked an arm around him and helped him along.
Aksel jogged forward, scouting the way.
“Fenris?” Luther asked the injured shifter.
“Yeah, three of them. All bears.”
“Us too,” Luther muttered, not bothering to say more. There was nothing else needed.
“Fucking Fenris,” the wolf shifter muttered.
They continued through the nearly empty streets, keeping a watchful eye out. Behind them they occasionally caught a glimpse of pursuers, but they kept well back. After a few minutes the wolf shifter stood up a little straighter and began to run more on his own. Time was healing his wounds.
Behind them, they heard the sound of splintering wood. The trio paused as a shape hurled itself from a building on the left, the wooden door slamming outward. Luther halted his forward progress and began to run after the lone shape, figuring it to likely be another Cadian shifter.
Three more figures rushed out of the building though, hooting and hollering as they chased down their prey.
“No!” Luther roared in anger as the trio of figures caught up to the Cadian shifter well before Luther could have gotten close. The lights on this stretch of street were dim, and though he couldn’t make out what was happening, the sound of a spine snapping was a distinct noise that he would never mistake for anything else.
The form dropped limply to the ground, and the three Fenris shifters turned their attention to Luther and his friends, rushing down the street toward them.
“Time to go!” the wolf shifter said, yanking hard on Luther, forcing him to spin away.
The big bear shifter almost resisted, but the logical part of his brain kicked in, spurring him forward.
Shifters rarely used motor vehicles, preferring to travel by foot, unless they were going extreme distances. It took two days to get from the far side of Cadia to Cloud Lake, but it was a beautiful journey, and well worth the time.
At times like this however, Luther regretted not having a faster means of escape. They managed to stay ahead of their new pursuers, eventually leaving them behind.
There was the sound of fighting up ahead.
“Let’s go!” Aksel said, and the trio surged forward.
The noises were originating from an alley on the right. As the most healthy, Luther led the group as they rounded the corner and took in the scene in front of them. They came across another trio of Fenris shifters working over a pair of Cadians. Luther snarled and darted forward. He longed to shift into his bear and open up the unsuspecting shifter’s back from waist to neck, but the rules about shifting in human territory were extremely strict. His life would be forfeit, unless it was to defend himself from another shifter in animal form.
That didn’t mean he couldn’t wreak utter havoc, however. He reached the nearest bear shifter at the same moment it cocked its arm back to deliver another blow. Luther’s arm swept up from underneath, and he bent his own arm in half as well. The two arms locked together, bent around each other.
Except Luther had momentum and surprise on his side, while the first inkling the other shifter had of his presence was when his arm was yanked backward with stupendous strength. The shifter yelped and flew around in a half circle before Luther bent at the waist and flipped his victim over his back and down into the concrete under his feet.
“Fuck you,” he snarled as the Fenris shifter’s head rebounded brutally from the ground, stunning his foe.
That was the only opening Luther needed, and his arms snaked around the attacker’s head and twisted violently. The bear shifter from Fenris was suddenly a corpse in his arms. Luther fought back the urge to vomit and rose to his feet, but the battle was over. The surprise was complete, and with the two other shifters lending their weight, the remaining Fenris shifters were also both down, never to rise again.
“Such a fucking waste,” he snarled at the dead bodies, noting a third in the corner at the back of the darkened alley, another wolf shifter from Cadia, who they’d been too late to save.
“Thank you,” the tiger shifter said with a nod. He and his friend looked ready to move off.
“We travel together,” Luther pronounced, and his trio headed for the mouth of the alley.
There was no compromise in his voice.
“We will make our own way,” the tiger shifter said forcefully.
Luther snarled and got in the other man’s face. “There is a full fucking company of Fenris shifters roaming Cloud Lake, seeking to obliterate any of us that they find. We have strength in numbers. We will travel together until we reach Cadia. Do you understand?”
The tiger shifter was close to panicking, he could see that. Whoever he was, he wasn’t trained for this sort of thing, and instead was simply relying on the weapons and strength given to him by being a shifter. He was well out of his depth here.
Bureaucrat, he thought with a sneer. They were the only ones allowed out of Cadia besides the Guardians, the protectors of Cadia’s borders and its soldiers in the event of a war with another shifter stronghold.
It had been centuries since the last of those, but it seemed like Fenris was about to end that stretch of peace. The Massacre of Cloud Lake, as he was sure the night would become known, could only engender one response from Cadia.
“Okay,” the tiger shifter said as Luther glared at him, his voice wavering slightly when he spoke.
Luther switched his gaze to the wolf shifter, who also nodded. There was less panic in his eyes, however.
“Time to go,” Aksel called from the entrance to the alley. “They’re coming.”
The five of them darted from the alley, heading in the opposite direction of the oncoming Fenris team. They passed another scene of devastation, where a bar had been trashed by what could only be shifters. Humans stood around in a panic, and Luther thought he glimpsed one body on the floor inside.
There was no time to stop their headlong flight, however. They needed to get to the outskirts of Cloud Lake and into the forests beyond, where they could lose their pursuers.
“Faster!” he urged his charges.
Aksel was still scouting ahead of them, while Luther hung back and watched their rear. The three shifters they’d picked up were all in rough shape, even though the first wolf shifter was doing better now. He realized then that he still hadn’t gotten any of their names.
A morbid thought flitted through his mind. Why did he need their names? It seemed unlikely at that point that they were actually going to make it out of Cloud Lake alive. Luther hadn’t mentioned this to anyone, but the obvious evidence that the Fenris shifters had been to the parts of the city they were now running through
made it clear.
Behind them he heard boots crunching through the snow.
A look over his shoulder showed a large group of men emerging from an alleyway. He stopped counting when he reached double digits. It looked to be roughly a dozen total. A full squad, a third of their estimated strength.
That was not good news. Not at all.
“We need to move,” he said urgently. “Much faster. Much, much faster.”
The wounded tiger and wolf shifter tried valiantly, moving faster for a short period of time, using up what energy reserves they had, but it made no difference. Their pursuers inexorably came on, advertising death.
The first wolf shifter, having looked back behind them as well, slowed until he ran alongside Luther. “We won’t make it. They’re going to get us all.”
“I know,” he muttered, having reached that conclusion the moment he saw them. Their run was a doomed one, but he didn’t want to tell the others. It was possible, after all, that he and Aksel could slow the Fenris team down enough that some of the others could make it out alive.
After all, that was what they were supposed to do. Protect Cadia and her people.
That’s what a Guardian does. You are no longer a Guardian. You were fired.
It was true. What did he owe Cadia anymore? He could go anywhere he wanted. He could avoid this stupid conflict if he so chose. All he had to do was renounce his Cadian citizenship, and he would be free to live.
The idea grew strength within him.
The wolf shifter looked at him oddly. “I will do my best to slow them down,” he said numbly. “Luck, my friend, and thank you.”
Luther opened his mouth to reply, but it was too late. Black fur sprouted from the man’s body even as he slowed. The bear shifter looked over his shoulder as a muzzle jutted forward from his face and his arms became powerful legs, joints reversing themselves as he landed on all fours, a massive dire wolf darker than the blackest night.
The animal launched itself at the group, teeth snapping. Shifters shouted and parted around the beast.
All of them but one, Luther saw. The big man, a huge brute easily three or four inches taller than he was, stepped forward, arms wide. The wolf leapt at him, a two hundred and fifty pound mass of muscle and fur.
The huge bear shifter barely rocked. His arms came together around the back of the wolf, and Luther closed his eyes, his head turning back to the front as he watched the massive biceps begin to squeeze. The wolf yipped and yelped as the grip tightened, and the cries became more frantic as Luther heard the first bones snap under the immense pressure being applied to it.
There was one final high-pitched yelp, and then silence, except for the shifters pursuing them.
The wolf had bought them time though. The big shifter discarded the wolf corpse with contemptuous ease. The gap between the two groups had widened a lot. It had also created something else.
Hope.
The forests loomed large up ahead, and the quartet darted toward them.
Behind them he heard the Fenrisians roar in anger as they went to a full charge, but it was too late. Once they could make it to the forest, he and his team would be able to split up and lose them, using their intimate knowledge of the terrain to their advantage. Their pursuers had waited too long to spring the trap, and the sacrifice of one bold wolf shifter had made it all possible.
Luther regretted his earlier callous decision not to get the man’s name. He deserved to be remembered for his sacrifice.
The four Cadians crossed over that magical line between Cloud Lake and the land beyond, and they were free.
Power surged through Luther’s body as his bear, restrained for so long, came charging to the surface.
He barreled forward, his destination clear.
Base Camp needed to hear about this attack. They needed to be ready.
Cadia was at war.
Chapter Five
Allix
Yet another blast of freezing wind skirted down the stairs and washed through the room. Allix pulled the blanket provided to her by the officer tighter around her shoulders, though she knew it would do precious little to ward off the chill.
“So there were five of them?” the officer asked, pencil poised over her notepad as she looked at Allix expectantly.
“Yes. Like everyone else has already told you,” she said with exasperation. “Two of them came in, and were friendly, polite, whatever. Everything you would want out of a customer, to be honest.” For some reason, Allix found herself leaving out the bit where one of them had tried to buy her “services.” The more she thought that over, the more her brain seemed to tell her that he hadn’t been trying to do that after all.
What she couldn’t figure out, however, was why he had been giving her such a large tip. He’d just arrived to the bar after all, and barely begun to drink. That was where her newfound logic about his intentions hit a dead end.
Had he been sweet on her?
The thought ripped through her body with a thrill of excitement as she considered that particular angle, one she hadn’t thought of before. Could he, Luther, have been trying to make her night better after she’d just been groped by another patron? She tried to hide the smile the thought brought to her face.
“Ma’am?”
She blinked, suddenly remembering the police officer in front of her. “Pardon?”
“I asked what happened next?”
“Oh, right.” She shook herself. There would be time to contemplate Luther later… “They were drinking, and I went to bring them another round, but I didn’t notice that three others had entered. So I ended up being basically trapped between the two parties. The newcomers were rude and crass. One of them grabbed my ass when I told him to take a seat.”
Allix saw the female officer’s lip curl back, and for the first time, was glad that it wasn’t a male across from her.
“Lovely characters, I’m sure,” the officer muttered, her pencil scribbling frantically.
“Nothing but the best here,” she replied. “Anyway, they said something about Cloud Lake no longer being Cadian turf. That only Fenris was welcome now? I wasn’t sure what to really make of that bit.”
The officer nodded, pencil still scratching on the paper.
“Anyway, the two Cadians decided that a fight wasn’t worth it I guess, and they were on their way out.”
“What stopped them?”
“I told the newcomers that I wasn’t serving them if they couldn’t prove they could pay. That I wasn’t afraid to call the police if it came to that.”
The officer’s head continued to bob up and down. “Sound plan. What went wrong?”
“They didn’t give a shit,” she said bluntly. “The leader told his companion to ‘show me how they pay.’ Which resulted in them dumping a half-full pitcher of beer over me, hence why I reek like booze right now.”
She watched the lead make markings on the notepad, waiting for it to slow before she continued.
“The Cadians didn’t take that well, and before I could do anything about it, one of them had hauled the asshole who poured beer on me out of his seat, and was smashing his face in with his fist. After that, it all sort of became a blur, to be honest. I know I saw it at the time, but now my memory just tells me that they were fighting.”
“That’s okay, it happens, it’s natural. Don’t feel bad about that,” the officer reassured her, eyes coming up from the notepad to meet Allix’s. “I don’t really need details of the fight anyway. There was one fatality, but because we know for certain it was shifter-on-shifter, it doesn’t concern us. We simply cremate the body and be done with it.”
Allix’s eyebrows rose.
“We try to notify their governments of course, but it’s very rare that someone comes and actually claims the body.”
The woman shrugged. “Then again, it’s fairly rare we get dead shifters on our hands either. It’s been a while. So maybe things have changed. But we can’t charge the guilty party for it. They ha
ndle all that internally. So it doesn’t matter who killed who.”
Allix looked at her in disbelief. She had to be lying. “They care that little?”
The officer shrugged. “From what I gather, it’s more that death is a lot more common amongst them. They’re partly ruled by their animal side, which means they don’t view life with the same set of eyes that we do. It’s confusing, I know, but they are different in the long run,” the officer said. “Anyway, thank you for your time. I gather the owner is on his way?”
There was the sound of shouting and angry words from the entrance.
“More like just arrived,” Allix said glumly.
The officer glanced behind her, then back at Allix. “Oh. I’m sorry.”
There was nothing more that needed to be said between them.
“I should get back to cleaning up,” Allix said, handing the blanket back to the officer and trying not to shiver as fresh cold seeped through her thin clothing.
“You’re going to get sick if you work in your wet clothes in this cold,” the officer said.
“Probably,” Allix agreed. “But I need a job, and if I don’t, I’ll be fired.”
“Allix!” The owner practically screamed her name, despite the general quiet in the bar.
“Yes, Marvin?” she asked, grabbing the nearby broom she’d set down when the officer first started questioning her and using it to begin sweeping up wood chips from the destroyed tables and chairs.
“What the hell happened here? What did you do?”
She looked up in surprise. “Do, Marvin? I didn’t do anything. Do you really think I’m capable of smashing tables and chairs on my own? I’m flattered at your opinions on my strength, I really am, but trust me when I tell you I do not have the muscle power to do this. I mean shit, look at the wall!” she exclaimed, pointing at the body imprint left that had smashed through drywall and actually dented the cinderblock foundation of the building.
“No, of course not,” Marvin snapped. “But I understand you were right in the middle of it, that you caused all this with your attitude!”
Allix tried not to roll her eyes, only partially succeeding. Marvin hated her because she wouldn’t sell her body like the other girls, who all turned a portion of the profits over to him. Yet much of the clientele loved her, as did the other girls, because she often did their jobs for them while they flirted with the men and made more money that way. So he didn’t fire her, though he’d come close several times.