Shauna, lying still on the floor, the cluster of rescued women a few feet away, hugging each other and squeezing themselves into as small a target as possible, but for one woman with defiant eyes, glaring at the far corner. Two of Finn’s group, hiding their fear as they too aimed guns at the far corner. And, the man named Mike lay dead on the floor, blood welling from his torn-out throat.
Her stomach churned. She swallowed hard and fought to remain standing.
“Stay back,” Finn ordered and she knew he was talking to her though he didn’t so much as glance her way. His complete focus was on the source of the low growls emanating from the corner just out of her line of sight.
Deliberately, Deidre stepped farther into the room, moving past Joe so that she could see what stood in the darkened corner herself. A dog. Black, muscled. Huge, square head, burning red eyes. Lips peeled back from glistening white teeth that looked gigantic and very sharp, blood on its muzzle, dripping onto the floor with soft plops that sounded like gongs in the stillness.
Chapter 12
Deidre swayed in place. It was the dog she’d seen outside Shauna’s apartment what felt like days ago. How had it found her?
“What the hell is that?” Joe muttered, his gaze and aim never wavering from the animal.
So she wasn’t the only one in the dark here. Somehow that made her feel both better and worse.
A low growl rumbled up from deep in the beast’s chest and rolled through the room like a sudden storm. The beast’s eyes swept over all of them and in those burning red depths, a promise of pain glittered.
“Hellhound,” Finn snapped. “Vicious. Strong. Under demon command.”
“Hellhound?” Deidre’s voice cracked on the words. The dog was even bigger than it had looked at a distance. Its head would reach her waist if she was stupid enough to get closer. Which she wasn’t.
At the sound of her voice, the hound’s head turned and those blistering red eyes locked on her as if she were the only one in the room. Its hackles lifted and the menacing growl took on a fevered pitch, becoming one long, continuous threat. She couldn’t look away from those eyes. It was like staring into the yawning mouth of Hell itself. Waves of evil rolled off the huge dog, chilling the air in the enclosed space.
Something inside Deidre quickened and flickered to life. Ancient memories spilled through her mind in a rush of color, scent and sound. She didn’t recognize any of them, but she knew them.
And they told her that this wasn’t the first time she had faced a hellhound. As crazy as it sounded, even to her, Deidre’s body knew exactly what to do. Instinct had her drawing on a well of power inside her, stretching out one arm toward the black dog and fisting her hand. The animal recoiled briefly, a growl cutting off as its throat squeezed closed under the magical assault. It shook its huge head as if dismissing her effort to stop it.
The dog shifted suddenly, lifting a saucer-sized paw edged with daggerlike claws before setting it down again. Finn stepped in front of Deidre. Fear and power rose up inside her, tangling together, creating a mess she couldn’t make sense of. Whatever she had accessed before was gone now. Her instincts had dissolved as quickly as they’d arisen. What good was it to be a witch if she couldn’t even save herself?
Forced to look around Finn’s broad back to see what was happening, she saw the hellhound turn its burning gaze on Finn. The growl that was both challenge and threat deepened, became a thrum of sound that echoed off the walls and inside Deidre’s mind.
“How the hell do we kill it?” Joe muttered.
“Silver.” Moving in a blur of speed, Finn whipped a dagger from the holster he wore and threw it. It happened so fast, Deidre couldn’t track it. The hellhound howled in pain and fell back a step. Blood erupted from the wound and even from across the room, Deidre saw the dog’s flesh begin to burn and char around the edges of the blade. Dagger still embedded in its chest, the beast gave another wild howl, then launched itself through the air.
“Look out—” Finn pulled Deidre down, but she still saw it all.
The massive hound sailed across the room, then passed through the tunnel wall as if it weren’t there. The stunned silence it left behind was almost as terrifying as the attack itself had been.
“What the fuck?”
Finn ignored the question whispered by one of the others. He threw a hard look at Joe and said, “Gather everyone. We’re out of here. Now.”
Frowning, Joe argued, “Shauna’s shot and the others aren’t in any shape for a trek across the city. Besides that, we’re not supposed to deliver them until tomorrow morning.”
“We can’t wait here. We’ll go farther along the tunnels and hole up closer to our target.” Finn turned to look at the huddled group of survivors and Deidre wondered what was going through his mind. A second later, she knew.
“Can you move?” he demanded.
One defiant woman looked at the others, then back to Finn. “If it means staying alive? Yeah. We can make it.”
Finn nodded and turned to Shauna. “You good to go?”
Deidre looked at her friend. Her caramel-colored skin looked pale. Her brown eyes glittered with pain, shock and fear. But she pushed herself up onto her elbows with only a wince to let them know how much the movement cost her. “You think I’m going to stay here and wait for the puppy from Hell to come back? No, thanks. I’ll make it.”
“Good girl,” Finn said, giving her an approving nod.
Leaving this place was okay by her, but Deidre glanced up at the rock wall where the hound had disappeared. “If it can pass right through walls . . . leaving’s not going to do us much good.”
“If we’re moving, we’re harder to track,” Finn snapped. Then he looked at Joe. “Get ready. We move out in five.”
“What about Mike?” Joe asked quietly.
Finn glanced at the fallen man, not a trace of regret or pity on his hard features. “Nothing we can do for him now.”
“He’s dead,” Deidre said. She didn’t look at the body again, but only minutes ago, he had been a part of Finn’s fighting force. Now he was just so much trash?
“Yeah, he is, and long past our help. And if we don’t move,” he told her, “he won’t be the only one dead.”
Deidre looked away from the cold emptiness in his harsh gray eyes. One minute he was fierce and passionate and the next it was as if he’d turned to ice. His features gave nothing away and were as glacial as the frost in his eyes.
Joe spoke up softly to reassure her. “When the rest of our group shows up here in a day or two, they’ll take care of Mike’s body.”
“The rest of you?”
Finn grunted. “Five of our guys were on another raid in Maryland—they had to skip tonight’s festivities.”
“How many of you are there?” she asked.
He ignored that and told Joe, “Gather up as much of the supplies as you can.”
“On it.”
“What if the others show up and there’s a hellhound waiting for them?” Deidre demanded.
“No way to get hold of them now anyway,” Joe said. “No phone reception in the tunnels.”
“So they could just walk into a trap.”
“They’ll be prepared.” Finn glanced around the chamber. “If that hellhound is coming back, it’ll be tonight and when it finds us gone, there won’t be a reason for it to return.”
“But—”
“Enough talking,” Finn muttered and turned to Joe. “The extra clothes I got for the women are in the far chamber.”
Joe nodded at one of the other men and he quickly moved off on the task.
“Make sure you’ve got the silver too.” Finn’s gaze swept the room, as if he were half expecting to see the hound come crashing back in. “Especially now, we want to be ready.”
“We wil
l be.”
Nodding, Finn said, “Five minutes.”
Then he came toward her and grabbed her arm, tugging her toward the doorway. Deidre’s heart was still galloping wildly in her chest and having Finn’s hand on her didn’t help the situation any. She threw a look over her shoulder at the spot where the hellhound had disappeared and wondered where it went. Would it need time to heal? Was it already crouched farther along the tunnel, waiting for another chance at them?
The others got busy, packing up supplies, stuffing backpacks with PowerBars, water and weapons. Shock was still running pretty hot. Not every day you got an up-close look at a hellhound. Even Shauna was on her feet, if a little wobbly. The freed prisoners stirred, with one of them seeming to take charge. Deidre finally swung her gaze back to Finn. She looked up at his profile as they left the light for the darkness.
His features were shadowed in the dim light and could have been carved out of bone with a hatchet. He looked hard and mean—and probably, she told herself honestly, was exactly what she needed right now to protect her.
Who the hell else did she know who could drive off a hellhound?
“Hurry up,” he told her as he pulled her along in his wake. Once again, she found herself running through the blackness at his side.
“Up the tunnel, down the tunnel . . .” she muttered, hurrying to keep up with him.
“Just listen.” His voice was low and rough and just barely carried over the sound of their footsteps. “That hellhound shouldn’t have been able to pass through stone.”
“Well, yeah, it’s not something you see every day,” she agreed, and winced when she stubbed her toe and still had to keep running alongside him.
“You don’t get it,” he said. “It shouldn’t have been able to do what it did.”
And, fear was back.
They made it to the crystal chamber and he released her. Moving around the room, he grabbed up his leather coat and slipped it on. Flipping open the lid of a trunk, he pulled out more knives, and throwing stars, then loaded up his pockets and hooked a new knife into the empty scabbard that had held the blade he lost on the hound. Then he picked up an automatic pistol. Briskly, he ejected the clip, checked to make sure it was full.
Deidre’s gaze landed on the row of bullets. “Silver? Seriously? Silver bullets? Like for werewolves?”
“Werewolves and so much more.”
“Werewolves are real?” Of course they were, Deidre told herself wildly. Why wouldn’t they be? There were men made of fire and dogs from Hell. Why not werewolves?
“Welcome to a new world.” He slanted a look at her. “Silver enhances white magic. Acts as poison to dark power. What do you think stopped that sucker a minute ago? That knife blade was pure silver.”
Oh, God. She wrapped her arms around herself and hugged tight. She’d stepped into the rabbit hole and just like Alice, she was lost in a world that made no sense. For years, she had worked for witches. Trying to convince the world that magic itself wasn’t dangerous. That power could be used for good to enhance everyone’s life.
Now, she was discovering there was so much more to the situation than anyone knew.
Hellhounds, for God’s sake.
Werewolves and who knew what else?
Dark magic.
Silver bullets.
She had spent years defending magic, but darker powers had never crossed her mind. And now it was all hitting way too close to home.
He slammed the clip home again, then tucked the pistol into his waistband. Grabbing a backpack, he tossed it to her. “Get some water. There are PowerBars in a box in the corner. Take as much as you can carry.”
“Why don’t you just catch on fire and zap us out of here?”
He paused to look at her. “Right. Great plan. Do I leave you here alone while I take the others first? Or maybe leave you alone at the river while I come back for them? One. At. A. Time.”
“Oh. I didn’t know—”
“Yeah,” he grumbled. “The only way for all of us to get out of here is the human way. The slow way. Now fill that pack.”
Chastened, Deidre curled her fingers into the rough canvas and squeezed tight before she moved off to do what he said. Why would she argue? He was right. They had to leave and frankly, anything that got her out of these tunnels would be okay with her.
Filling the pack as quickly as she could, she asked, “So how did the hound do it? Go through the wall?”
“Demons.” He didn’t say anything else.
“Demons?” Honestly, she didn’t know how much more information she could handle. Wouldn’t there be a tipping point where her brain just simply exploded?
He huffed out a disgusted breath. “Did I mention it’s a hellhound? Lives in Hell? Where the demons are?”
“Great, sarcasm,” she said, nodding as she grabbed two more bottles of water. “That’s helpful.”
He ignored that. “One of those demons—maybe more—have spelled that pup so that it can move through walls.”
“Pup?” she asked, hands stilling as she stared at him. “That was a puppy?”
He snorted. “Full-grown hounds can reach the size of a buffalo. Or bigger.”
“Holy crap.”
“That about covers it,” he said wryly. “Question is, how did it know we were down here?”
She had an idea about that. It had been settling over her for the last few minutes, like a cloak of ice. “Actually, I think it must have followed me.”
“What?” Perfectly still, he stared at her as if she were speaking Greek.
She pushed another couple of PowerBars into the backpack. “I’ve been seeing it for the last couple of days.”
“And you didn’t think this was important enough to tell me?”
“I didn’t know it was a dog from Hell, did I?” She zipped up the pack and swung it over one shoulder. The heavy weight made her stagger a bit. But she narrowed her eyes on him. “And just when did we have all this free time for a little heart-to-heart talk so I could tell you anything?”
He took a breath and the muscles in his jaw twitched as if he were grinding his teeth together. The fight for patience was written all over his face but when he spoke, the snap in his deep voice told her he’d lost that particular battle. “Where’d you see it?”
“Last time?” She shifted the weight of the pack, trying to make it comfortable. “When we saved the witches. It was in the parking lot when everything was getting shot to pieces.”
“Fan-fucking-tastic.” Grabbing a few more throwing stars and stuffing them into his coat pockets, he said, “Must have followed your scent. It’s been on us all night probably.”
Well, that completely creeped her out. “If that’s true, why didn’t it attack until now?”
“Who the hell knows why hellhounds do anything?”
“Great. Why would it follow me anyway?”
“Following demon orders. I told you that.” He straightened up, crossed the room and took the backpack from her.
“I can carry it,” she snapped and grabbed it from him.
“Fine.” He slipped the straps over her arms, set the pack onto her back and didn’t even laugh when the weight pushed her forward a step or two. “Let me know when it gets too heavy for you. Don’t want you slowing us down.”
“Charming. Do I get a weapon?” Not that she knew much about knife fighting, really—and she didn’t know how to shoot, either. But damned if she wanted to go through those tunnels empty-handed, either.
He looked at her and frowned. “You are a weapon. Anybody throws a knife or points a gun, use your power to deflect it.”
“Sure. No problem. Because I’m so used to doing that.” She knew she was being unreasonable and didn’t care. After the night she’d had, who had a better reason? “And if the he
llhound attacks me? What am I supposed to do about that?”
She could see he didn’t like the thought of that. Well, that made two of them. Finally, he pulled a knife with a five-inch blade from one of the pockets of his black leather coat and held it out, handle first. “Carry this, then. The blade’s silver. Any hit you make will hurt him. If he gets too close, swipe it across his eyes.”
Deidre swallowed hard at the image that brought up, but she nodded. Her fingers curled around the leather- wrapped hilt of the knife and as she got used to the feel and weight of it in her hand, she tried to get a grip on just how far out of orbit her world had slipped.
Shaking her head, she whispered, “Why is this happening? Why are demons sending their attack dogs after me?”
“Only one reason,” he said and his voice dropped to a low rumble of sound that seemed to dance along every one of her frayed nerves. “The ante’s gone up in this game.”
Game. It was a game? Her life?
“Other Eternals and their Mates have completed their missions. Somebody somewhere’s getting nervous. Looks like Hell is pulling out all the stops now to keep us from getting your piece of the damn Artifact.”
There it went, she thought wildly. She could almost hear her brain reach its tipping point and start to snap. Frustration bubbled over and she wanted to tear at her own hair as she demanded, “What freaking Artifact?”
Those pale gray eyes of his swirled with secrets and promises that chilled her to the core as he looked at her. He seemed to be measuring her, judging how much she was ready for—and finding her wanting. He shook his head and said only, “Long story. No time. Get moving.”
Chapter 13
Finn took the lead, holding his sword out in front of him. His right-hand man, Joe, brought up the rear and the others were grouped in the center. Deidre, he kept right beside him. He didn’t want her falling behind or getting lost or getting a burr up her ass and trying to escape him.
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