by Eva Sloan
“And once she does,” Günter continued, “We’ll capture her, and what’s left of her will meet the loving touch of dawn alongside you.”
A cheer erupted from the pack of werewolves, human voices mingling with feral wolf howls and growls. In that moment Luca hoped that his death would be enough to sate the werewolves thirst for vengeance, so they would stay away from Min. For he knew there wasn’t a chance in hell that Elaina would show her face, not to save him. Maybe she was somewhere close enough that she could watch. Now that sounded like Elaina.
Luca smile to himself. Günter saw it and moved closer, peering into his eyes. Then with that lightening quickness from before he belted Luca across the mouth. “Don’t be mistaken, you’ll see the light of day soon enough, vampire. If your mistress doesn’t come for you, then you’ll meet the sun and go to hell alone.”
He turned away from Luca and walked to the other side of the clearing, unsheathing a sword and swinging it absently as he moved. “As for Min, even though she has soiled her body and soul with you, once our business is through we will leave her in peace. I can only hope once you are but dust she will regain her sanity.” He turned and looked Luca in the eye. “Surely you have her in a spell, pushed or glamoured into a slavery of sorts.”
Luca laughed, feeling the chains dig further into his chest as he did so. He kept laughing through the pain, alternating with pained groans and grunts. He tasted his own blood from the punch the wolf had given him. It made the beast in him stir, though the silver chains kept it bound as tightly as they bound Luca. A thought came to him, that the last blood he’d taste in this world would be his own. It made the beast in him whimper and then scream with impotent rage.
“What’s so funny, vampire.” Günter stared with cool curiosity, holding the sharpness of his silver blade against his palm, smoke curling from where it touched his flesh.
“You don’t know Min as well as you think. She—” Luca fell silent. He realized with a cold surge of realization that it would be better for Min if the wolves thought that she had indeed been pushed. That the big bad vampire had taken her over and used her and that once he really was gone she would revert back to normal.
“What was that vampire?”
What looked like a yellow humming bird fluttered into the clearing, but no sooner did Luca focus on it than it fell to the ground, just a crumpled piece of paper the wind was already blowing away.
Luca looked down to the cold earth beneath him. The grass he stood on was scorched black. They’d used this spot to execute vampires before. Luca felt a pounding of terror rush through him, cold and lonely, and utterly overwhelming. He’d just be the next to die here. A foot note in the packs long history. But then he closed his eyes and tried to hold onto one thought. If he stayed quiet and just let it happen, Min would be safe, and probably never know what had really happened. The thought of her safe and ignorant of his fate filled him with hope.
The winds changed and Luca caught the faint scent of what he wanted more than anything on this earth. Min. It had to be his imagination. But a moment later the entire pack stopped their howling and chanting to scent the air as well.
Günter growled and then called out into the night. “Come out, Min! We can all smell you.”
Her laughter fell through the air like rain, touching everything as it did, making Luca’s flesh tingle. From the look on Günter’s face he felt it too.
Min appeared on the opposite edge of the forest, tall and strong and lovely, her raven hair streaming like shadows as she stood in the coming wind. Her smile was crooked and beautiful. “Should’ve known I couldn’t sneak up on a pack of werewolves.”
They all turned toward her. Some crouched, practically thrumming with otherworldly tension, muscles jerking in anticipation of pouncing on her. But no one went for her.
Günter raised his sword. “We wish you no harm, Min. I know this creature has you under its thrall. Once we have him and his vampire mistress in an ashtray, we’ll leave you in peace.”
She laughed again, and it tickled at the back of Luca’s neck. “You really don’t know me at all, do you?” Min said thoughtfully. “Leave town now, and I’ll leave you the use of your legs.”
Günter smiled, and brandished his sword at her. “I don’t want to fight you.”
“Why? Afraid you’ll lose?”
There were snickers from the pack, sounds that should never have come from the gnarled teeth and lips of wolves.
“I could end up killing you,” Günter said, ignoring the pack’s taunts. “And I would forever regret that.”
“Right back at you, big boy.” She pulled a long, gleaming sword from her side. It shone in the moonlight with silver grace.
“Nice sword,” the werewolf said.
“All the better to kill you with, my dear.”
A near inaudible snick came from behind Luca, and he felt the silver chains loosen. He fell forward involuntarily, but a warm, familiar hand held him up. He opened his eyes, trying not to call out as the chains were pulled out of his flesh. Min stood before him, her eyes wild and scared, but her mouth set in a determined line. Luca couldn’t believe that not one of the pack of werewolves could not see, hear or smell that Min was setting him free. And then it hit him. Magicks. His beautiful gypsy witch had bespelled the entire pack. Just as she had sent him running after no more than a glamour the night they’d met, she had them all ready to fight a mirage.
She took Luca up under his arm and helped pull him from the clearing, dragging him on his weakened legs as fast as she could. Luca felt so weak. And his extremities ached so badly they could well have been broken. But he pushed himself to keep going, just touching Min made his battered body feel better.
There was a terrible, desperate screech. Luca looked back to see the female werewolf spring into the air and attack Min where her image stood. She passed right through her, not even disrupting the image as she did. The pack broke out in a chorus of howls, shaking their heads, and looking around themselves. All at once every wolf in the pack turned in Min and Luca’s direction. God, they’re not even a hundred yards away.
“Faster,” Min said in a hiss.
“Let them have me,” Luca said. “I can’t bear the thought of them hurting you.”
“Your faith in me is heartwarming,” Min said with irritation, pulling him along with her.
“You can’t take them in a fair fight.”
Min caught his eye with a sly sideways glance. “Who the hell said I was going to fight fair?”
Luca could hear the pack closing in on them, rushing down like a tidal wave of claws ripping through the earth, howls and growls and excited yips slicing through the night. Another heartbeat and they’d be upon them. He had to do something. He felt such panic and pain at the thought of Min being killed, and he believed that if he was dead she would be safe. He seized on the only choice he felt he had. He would push her away and turn back, letting the werewolf pack tear him apart. It was the only way.
Luca felt his body tense as he tried to get his arm from over her shoulder to behind her, so he could push her away from him. But Min stopped in her tracks, straightened and pushed Luca to the ground first.
He looked up at her. She had a haughty expression on her face and her hands on her hips. “Suicide? Kind of melodramatic, don’t you think vampire?”
Shit, she read my mind!
“Goes both ways, lover.” She pulled her sword from her hip and turned on the approaching werewolves, a ball of fire in her free hand. Luca gazed up at her and shuddered at the brave power radiating from her being. The pack ground to a halt, holding back, uncertain how to proceed.
Then Günter came, weaving through the pack, still in human form. “Stop this madness, Min. You can’t hope to win.”
Min sighed, her shoulders slumping. “You’re right,” she said, shaking her head in defeat. She dropped her sword to the ground with a metallic clanging, and the flames perished from her other hand. Luca sucked in a breath of pure disb
elief. Even Günter looked shocked.
Chapter 20
Min about cracked up at the looks on all their faces. Even Günter, the great huntsman, he actually thought she was just going to surrender. She reached back over her shoulder and grabbed her secret weapon, what she’d pulled from the wall over her mother’s desk. The instant her fingers touched it she felt the power still there, waiting to be put to use, yearning to kill. As if it could sense that its prey was there for the taking. In the near full moon the shotgun flashed a tarnished silver. It looked as old fashioned as it was, though sleek and utilitarian in design, and it felt as solid in her hands… no, more solid than anything weapon she had ever brandished.
And in less than a second she had it cocked and aimed squarely at Günter’s chest.
There was a beat of silence. Min could see the cool calculation in Günter’s eyes. He knew that a gun with silver bullets could indeed kill a werewolf, if you shot it enough times, and in the right places. But one shotgun against a pack of over a dozen such beasts was ridiculous. She could see it in his eyes, though; he knew there was something wrong.
The female werewolf he’d called Giselle laughed, still monstrous in only her human form. “Idiot witch!” She hurled herself toward Min, her hands suddenly transformed into long sharp claws.
Min didn’t hesitate, she shot the bitch. Silver hellfire burst from the gun, and shaved off both Giselle’s legs, dropping her to the ground where she writhed, cursed and screamed hysterically. “You fucking shot my legs off!”
Min looked down on the fallen werewolf. “They’ll grow back, eventually.” She pointed the shotgun straight at the werewolf’s face. “Unless you prefer I end you right now?”
Günter looked down dispassionately upon Giselle’s wounds. “Her legs have been burnt off.”
“Your point?” Min turned the gun on him.
“What the hell’s in that shotgun?”
“Not a thing.”
Günter sniffed the air. “Not silver?”
Min raised her brow to him. “No ammunition at all.”
He smiled slyly. “It’s the gun.”
Min let it glint briefly in the light of the moon, and then pointed it back at Günter. “A Bellini, and enchanted with pure hellfire. There’s a piece of a dragon’s tongue in the ammunition chamber, and a silver shard in the barrel. It never needs reloaded. Was my great grandfather’s, and then my grandmother’s, and then my mother’s—now it’s mine.”
Günter stood there surrounded by his pack; the look on his face was thoughtful until his eyebrows rose with surprise. “So this is the Klashnov? The render of wolves.”
Min nodded and smiled.
“You never told me you descended from the wolf hunters.”
“What can I say? I like a little mystery.”
Günter smiled through his exacerbation, his hands on his hips as he threw back his head and laughed. “That weapon has killed more of my kind than anything in history, and you what, just had it mounted over the fireplace?”
“Something like that…so do you and yours walk away now, or do I really need to start tearing you apart?”
Günter’s smile turned hostile, but he didn’t move, didn’t say a word. Just stared into Min’s eyes.
Min pulled cocked the shotgun, her finger pressed to the trigger, feeling the gun practically begging her to pull it, its hunger for more death pulsing into her. “Well, wolf. What will it be? I have an early morning, and this little stalemate is eating up my beauty sleep.”
Min could feel herself relax, holding the gun, ready to simply start slaughtering herself a pack of werewolves. She never felt such a peace, such tranquility. Her willingness to kill made a shiver run up her spine. Part of her wanted Günter to attack. By the pestilent gods she hungered for it.
Günter slowly raised his hands and backed up a step. “You win, Min. We will leave the city immediately.” There were hisses and growls from the pack, but they all followed Günter’s lead and slowly backed away. “Just know I won’t soon forget this, Min. There will retribution. And tell that vampire bitch—”
“Elaina isn’t with us, Günter.” Min interrupted him irritably. “You can chase her to the ends of the earth for all I care. Kill her, you have my blessing.”
“He is bound to her,” Günter growled. “I can smell it on him. She made him.”
Min smiled. “He won’t be, not if you kill her.”
“He is still a soulless monster.” He looked at her with such disbelief.
Min smiled. “No one’s perfect.”
Günter snorted, a rueful smile pushing the disgust from his features. “Yes, you snore.”
“I do not!” Min had to will herself not to pull the trigger.
Luca laughed, clutching at the wounds on his chest. “You do. It’s like a chainsaw.”
She shot both men with savage glares, not sure which one she wanted to shoot for real first.
“I could almost like him,” Günter said as he disappeared into the surrounding trees, laughing. “If the smell of him didn’t make me want to puke.” And he and his werewolves were gone.
“Goodbye, Günter.” Min whispered into the night. “Happy hunting.”
She stood there, quiet as the tomb, listening to the surrounding woods, to the sounds of cars encroaching from the city that surrounded the park, sending out her senses to check for any preternatural presence, until she was satisfied that the pack had indeed left.
She moved to Luca and helped him to his feet, but the sight of him lying there, bleeding from so many long tears in the flesh of his chest stopped her in her tracks. His wounds weren’t healing. “What’s wrong?”
Luca chuckled painfully as he pulled himself clumsily to his feet. “Silver heals almost human slow for vampires as well as shapeshifters. But it will heal, in time.”
~*~
Min took Luca home. After she warded her home from the werewolves with more than overkill, and blacked out the windows of her bedroom with blankets, she crawled into bed with him and shivered against his cold body. But finally fell to sleep as she felt Luca fade from his body. Vampires really did just turn back into beautiful corpses when the sun came up. A tear fell from her eye to his smooth pale chest. But he would come back to her the next night.
~*~
When Luca came too, the sun had just set, the sky still had the slightest blue to it, and Elaina was standing, staring at him through the window with that maniacal smile on her face. He saw her lips move, but couldn’t hear her voice. But he didn’t have to. She was ordering him to the front door of the house. He rose from the bed that held Min, passed out of her room and down the hall, down the long stair case and then to the front door of the house—no control at all over his movements, just doing as Elaina commanded.
He opened the door and walked out onto the porch. He was naked, and Elaina chastised him; though, she was laughing as she did it. “Could you not take the time to pull on a pair of pants? My, my…you really do not have any resistance to me, do you?”
Luca wanted to resist her. He’d tried to pull himself from her control every step of the way, but as it had always been, he had no control over himself once his mistress gave him a command. He sucked in the night air, trying to stanch the fear that was welling up inside him, threatening to drown him. If Elaina didn’t just outright kill him there and then, she would most assuredly command him to go back into the house and kill Min. The thought made him tense all over, his blood turning cold as he desperately tried to break free. It became all the cooler as he saw the inevitable: that he was hers to control, no matter what she wanted him to do. He was but a slave to her whims, again.
But instead of giving Luca any further orders, Elaina started talking.
“It matters not how long it’s been since we last laid eyes on each other, or how so very long since we have enjoyed each other’s touch.” Her cold, hard, dainty hand slid down the flesh of his chest, brushing over the smooth skin, and digging into the wounds the silver chains
had left behind. “I will always have absolute power over you, my Luca, and there is not a thing you can do about that. It is as unchangeable as the seasons, as the passing of time. It is finite.”
“What do you want, Elaina?” Luca asked, and then gasped as she pushed her finger into one of the gashes on his chest.
“I don’t want anything.” Her eyes flashed with heat as she pulled her fingers free of his flesh. That malicious insanity that had heralded Luca into this long, dark journey into the afterlife…his afterlife. She licked his blood from her fingers. She bared her teeth, her words heated with anger as she circled him. “If I’d wanted you, I would just take you. If I wanted you to gut your pretty little witch, you would rip her into as many pieces as I asked you to. And if I wished you to walk into the sun itself—” She moved in and pushed herself against him, her hands on his shoulders as she lunged toward him, until he could feel her cold breath on his cheek. Her white teeth opened as she moved in closer, as if she was going to take a bite out of him, and then she smiled and let her teeth snap closed with a clink worthy of a bear-trap. She backed away, giggling in a demented stream that bordered on musical. “Then you would be nothing but a mound of ash.”
She whirled about, as if dancing to music only she could hear, and then came to rest sitting delicately on the railing of Min’s porch. “All I wish to do is pass along a bit of knowledge to my only child. You know, give him some motherly advice.”
The tension seemed to melt from Elaina’s body and the volatile energy that was close to erupting from her just seemed to die, as if it had never been there to begin with. But Luca knew it was there, and would always be. It just showed itself when it wanted to.
“As I was telling you, no matter how long it has been, my power over you remains the same. No matter how powerful you may become, my control over you will continue, unchanged.” She stood again and slinked silkily over to him, her big black eyes glittering like a night sky filled with stars. “The lesson, my beautiful boy, is that everything has its limits, no matter how powerful it has become. You just have to figure out the boundaries.”