Wild and Free

by Kristen Ashley

  “Got it, man,” Poncho agreed.

  “Hook,” Ursula called, and Hook must have looked to her because she kept going. “You gave me happiness. I vow to fall before your daughter does.”

  “Babe,” Hook whispered and said no more.

  The witch was reaching up toward their heads, muttering under her breath.

  “Good luck,” Poncho said softly.

  Gregor slid his eyes to the man and nodded.

  The next instant, he was in hell.

  * * * * *

  Somewhere in a Café in Nevada

  “Not good, not good, not good,” one man chanted.

  “Get ’im! Fuck ’im up! Yes!” another one shouted.

  “To your back!” Naomi screamed, then moaned, “Thank God.”

  “No! Yes! No! Yes!” a woman cried.

  “Get up, guy, get up, guy, get up,” a waitress whispered, eyes on the fallen Wei, his body lifeless amongst the carnage on-screen.

  “Shit!” a man boomed. “They got that female wolf!”

  * * * * *

  Delilah

  With a frightening yelp, Sonia as wolf slid on her side across the Tarmac, and every inch of my skin prickled to see her coat matted in blood, claw and teeth marks everywhere.

  The next second, the wolf that pounced on her was grabbed by the throat and thrown through the air.

  But he left something behind.

  The gore of his gullet in Callum’s jowls.

  Callum tossed it aside with a shake of his head and nosed her. She shook her head and got to her paws.

  Then he nosed her firmly in our circle and turned toward an attacker.

  I caught all this before I felt movement close beside me.

  After thinking how I could ever see the whip of action to make my play, somehow, the action around me had come into focus.

  Vivid focus.

  Using it, I jumped on the back of a vampire who was all over Xun. He twisted to throw me off. With experience with Abel hauling me around, I held on with everything I had. Calling for more, I curved my hand around his jaw and yanked back.

  I didn’t get him very far, but I got him far enough for Xun to shove the jagged end of the mailbox pole straight into his throat. He twisted and slashed it to the side, opening a gaping wound, blood spurting.

  The vampire fell to his knees.

  I jumped off and kicked him in the head so he fell to his side.

  Xun lifted the pole over his head and bore it down, hacking into his neck.

  “Back!” Xun grunted, still hacking. “Now, Lilah!”

  I backed into Leah.

  “Babe, Gregor’s here,” she told me, grasping my hand.

  I didn’t see him.

  What I saw was that our guys now had weapons.

  Gregor must have brought them.

  It didn’t matter.

  Wei was down. By the looks of him, I was sure he was dead.

  I’d seen Cain appear and he was sliced to shit, looking like he was barely standing.

  I’d lost track of Jezza and Flo.

  Ruby was down, like Wei, unmoving.

  We were losing.

  All was going to be lost.

  Standing in a sea of bodies, drenched in blood, we were going down.

  * * * * *

  In a Convenience Store Somewhere in Florida

  The crowd was larger.

  They didn’t realize it, not a one of them, but they were all holding hands.

  They were silent.

  All their gazes were locked to the screen.

  * * * * *

  Delilah

  “No,” I whispered. “No!” I screamed.

  Sonia barked. It sounded like she was trying to say something, but I didn’t speak wolf.

  “Fuck this,” Leah hissed.

  Bending down, she pulled a sword from a fallen, headless vampire’s hand and I blinked when, fast as lightning, she entered the fight.

  It was then I heard an indistinct roar of fury and I looked that way to see Lucien had appeared.

  The sound was coming from him.

  Then he moved, hacking his way to where his bride was fighting.

  I heard a whiz and a clash and I whipped around.

  Shit! I was nearly taken out by a vampire sword.

  That vampire was now headless, and Ursula, who saved my ass, turned and winked at me before she shot away.

  I had no time to watch. Chen was fighting a golem.

  Head down, I charged, barreling into the giant headfirst, agony shooting down my back but catching him off guard, allowing Chen to hack off his hand.

  “Come on, blue light, come on, blue light, come on!” I cried, lifting, twisting, and hauling up my knee hard, catching him right in the golem family jewels I couldn’t understand why he had, considering he tore off flesh to make babies.

  Apparently, it was a good target.

  He grunted, his remaining hand going between his legs.

  Chen hacked off his head.

  I stepped back, looking for what I could do to help next, seeing Leah, shit-hot, moving at almost a blur of speed, using all Xun, Wei, and Chen had taught us (and then some), kicking major bad guy ass side by side with her husband. They were working as a team, weirdly in tandem like they were synced.

  Then Chen took off the golem’s leg at his knee and he teetered before crashing to the ground.

  That was when I saw we had new allies.

  Surprising ones.

  Dogs.

  And cats.

  And rats.

  And snakes.

  And fucking bunnies.

  They were everywhere.

  They couldn’t do much.

  But considering there were hundreds of them, and they all were straight up pissed and attacking the bad guys, they sure as hell were distracting.

  Creating opening after opening for the small army of The Three to deliver devastation.

  * * * * *

  In an Apartment Somewhere in Washington DC

  The woman smiled a very small smile, a weak stream of hope filling her heart where fear had taken hold.

  “They even have the bunnies,” she whispered.

  * * * * *

  Delilah

  “Holy shitoly,” I breathed, staring at a vampire who was trying to shake a dog off his leg as a cat was clawing his face.

  “Down!” I heard Abel shout, and instinctively, I hit the deck, landing on bodies (and body parts).

  I felt something whiz over me.

  Then Abel whizzed over me. I lifted my head right when a body dropped in front of my eyes, neck first.

  Blood gushing.

  I didn’t even have time to gag before I was hauled up and twisted so I was front to Abel’s back.

  “Jump on,” he ordered.

  “Baby, you can’t fight with me—”

  “Hold the fuck on!” he thundered.

  I wrapped my arms around him and held tight, swaying, jerking, jolting, as he kept fighting.

  “Can you use mind-control?” I asked into his ear, keeping my hold tight.

  “Too many,” he grunted, swinging. “Gotta focus.”

  Shit.

  A sword slashed through my shoulder, the pain so immense I almost dropped my arms.

  But I held back my whimper. I didn’t want Abel to have to think about me.

  It was then I heard a strangled, terrified, tortured, “Mom!”

  Aurora.

  This meant Barb.

  Abel whirled and leaped over bodies, me looking around him, seeing Barb on her ass, one hand behind her holding her up, the other one outstretched. She was bloodied and cut, a weak ray of vermillion light sparking from her palm, a vampire over her, arm with a sword swung out to the side to take her head.

  As he swung and Abel raced to him, the sword clashed against another one.

  Gregor was there.

  Abel had to stop to fight someone, whipping this way and that, taking me with him.

  But he’d whipped back whe
n it happened.

  Even if it was a vampire blur, I saw it with total clarity.

  In fact, it went in slow motion.

  So I had every second. Every fucking second of Gregor losing his head burned in my brain.

  Burned in my memory.

  For eternity.

  * * * * *

  In a Pub Somewhere in London

  “No!” a girl cried out, her voice hoarse with despair.

  But after the sound faded away, the room went silent.

  And everyone kept their eyes to the screen.

  Each one holding hope to their hearts.

  By a thread.

  * * * * *

  Delilah

  I let go of Abel, my feet hitting the ground, and the world stopped.

  All action around me suspended.

  Completely.

  There was only Gregor’s headless body, slowly, so damned slowly, sinking to the ground.

  Like the sound was muted, distorted, drawn out, and slowed down, I heard Yuri’s desolate, enraged howl.

  My breath stopped, my heart stopped, my frame electrified as Gregor finally crashed to the Tarmac.

  And it was then I tipped my head back, drove my arms straight down, and balled my fists.

  I opened my mouth and cried my despair to the heavens.

  The sound was foul.

  It was wreathed in anguish.

  And while I made it, unbeknownst to me, from the middle of my body, a ring of blue light flashed, sweeping out in a circle, growing wider, wider, wider, wider, cutting through the combatants, the houses, and beyond.

  I dropped my head, saw my bloodied boots. Next to one, the arm of a golem; at the tip of the other, the head of a vampire.

  I closed my eyes.

  “Gregor,” I whispered, his name torn from me, and I felt every letter as they passed my lips ripping me to shreds.

  * * * * *

  In Front of an Electronics Store in New York City

  On every screen in the window, dozens of them, was a shot of the mortal, bloodied, injured Delilah Johnson, head bowed, grief for a fallen vampire she liked and respected etched along every centimeter of her frame.

  Scores of people stood on the sidewalk, the crowd arcing out into the street, having stopped traffic.

  But the drivers honked no horns. Car doors were left open so they could get out, approach, and watch.

  And from the throng who gazed at the television screens, there was nothing.

  Nothing but silence united in heartache.

  * * * * *

  Delilah

  “Bao bei,” Abel whispered, and I felt his hand on my back.

  I stood unmoving.

  “Lilah,” Abel said from closer, his lips to my ear, his hand pressing into my back.

  I remained still.

  “Baby, you did it.”

  I opened my eyes to blink and lifted my head.

  I looked around.

  Standing were ours, the few of them we were, except Xun and Chen were bent over an immobile Wei.

  Scattered in endless heaps were the bodies of the dead enemy.

  Wandering around, aimless, sniffing, slithering, hopping, were the animals.

  And on their knees, weirdly motionless, was our enemy.

  “Told you, pussycat, whatever you got, that shit is the shit,” Abel told me.

  “Wh-what?” I stammered, my eyes drifting to him.

  “That blue light?” he asked, and I nodded. “Went through them. All of a sudden, they quit fighting. It took them down to their knees. Left ’em there.”

  “I…you’re joking,” I whispered.

  “Look around,” he threw out an arm then grabbed my hand and pulled me to the nearest one. Keeping me close, he asked the female vampire. “Feel like moving?”

  Her eyes fired and her body jerked.

  Only slightly.

  But she stayed on her knees.

  “Holy shitoly,” I breathed, then stopped doing it altogether when it crashed into me.

  My head shot to Wei.

  “Already checked, pussycat,” Abel whispered to me. “He’s still with us.”

  Xun was looking at us. “He’s breathin’, brother, but we gotta get him home.”

  “I’ll see to that,” Teona said, prowling to them. She crouched, then carefully lifted Wei’s body between her legs and into her arms, pressing his back to her torso.

  I squeezed Abel’s hand tight as Wei’s dead weight swayed lifelessly when Teona took him into her hold.

  “Touch me if you’re going back with me,” she said to Xun and Chen.

  “You go back. I’ll stay,” Chen said to his brother.

  Xun nodded, touched his hand to Teona’s shoulder, and Teona looked to Cain.

  “Later, baby,” she said softly and disappeared.

  I let that impossibility filter through me before, mindlessly, I turned and slowly started walking, my hand in Abel’s, taking him with me.

  As Abel and I stepped over bodies, I saw Yuri crouched over his father, his head down, his gaze to Gregor, his frame blocking our view of the man who kept us safe so we could fight the good fight.

  And whose death, apparently, led us to victory.

  “Allow me to take him home, sweetheart,” Barb said quietly, bending and touching Yuri’s shoulder.

  “Take Aurora with you,” Yuri replied, his always-smooth, cool voice gruff with unconcealed emotion.

  Hearing it, my throat clogged.

  “Okay, honey,” Barb whispered and bent over Gregor.

  Aurora got close.

  “Yuri, sweetie—” She touched the back of his hair but got no further speaking.

  “Go, button,” he ordered gently.

  God, they were so freaking cute together.

  “As you wish,” she whispered, bent, kissed his hair, and moved to her mother.

  They clasped hands, and after both of them turned sorrowful eyes to Yuri, they disappeared, taking Gregor with them.

  Abel and I got close to Yuri’s back as the rest of us gathered around him.

  He lifted his head but didn’t come out of his crouch.

  His eyes turned to the vampire who took his father’s life.

  “You will not die so mercifully,” he whispered, and at his tone now, goose bumps rose all over my skin.

  We heard sirens in the distance and I suddenly felt cold.

  There was a reason for that as three phantoms, with a bevy more behind them, as well as some wraiths floated in front of us.

  “We’ve taken out the cameras. You’re free to do as you wish with the others,” the phantom in the middle of the three at the front stated.

  “Cameras?” Leah asked.

  “This was televised around the world. Everyone saw it. Now the cameras and microphones have been disabled,” the phantom to the left said.

  “Brilliant,” Lucien clipped.

  “Yuri, let’s go home.”

  I looked down to Yuri to see Sonia on her knees in front of him, Callum standing close behind her. She was bloodied but clothed. There were claw marks slashing across her upper chest, more across her hip, if the blood seeping through her jeans was any indication, and bite marks on her neck and arms, but she looked strong.

  “Yuri, honey.” She lifted her hands to his cheeks when he made no reply. “Let’s go home.”

  “You survived,” Yuri said, his voice freaking me out because it was not cold, it was not rough. It was nothing. “The Three survived. He fell.”

  A tear tracked down Sonia’s cheek as she said nothing but kept holding Yuri’s face.

  “He fell,” Yuri whispered, and there was no longer nothing in his voice.

  It was full.

  Full to the brim with pain.

  My eyes got wet.

  “Please, come home with me. We need to be with Gregor,” Sonia begged, her voice edged with a sob.

  Suddenly, Yuri stood.

  “Yes, Sonny. Home,” he stated shortly.

  She nodded, straight
ening, but I moved fast.

  Getting in front of Yuri, I got close and wrapped my arms around his middle, pressing my cheek to his chest as I hugged him tight to me. And only when I had him close did I say, “Your dad was to the total bomb, Yuri. The absolute bomb. The vampire Gregor was awesome.”

  Yuri stood motionless in my hold for a long time and I was going to give him that. In that moment, I’d give him anything.

  But finally, I felt his hand curl light on the back of my neck.

  “Yes, Lilah,” he said quietly. “He was.”

  “We’re fading, honey. Grab hold,” Sonia called.

  I let go and Abel wrapped his arm around my chest, pulling me back just as Yuri lifted his hand, Sonia took it, and she and her brother faded away.

  “King of the Wolves, what do you wish for the rest of them?” one of the phantoms called on a prompt.

  That was when I looked around and took everything in.

  It was gruesome.

  But we’d been joined by others, and not just the phantoms.

  The humans had left their houses. Some were sticking close to their doors, standing on their stoops. Some had wandered into their yards, though not far. All of them held weapons, guns, baseball bats, knives.

  I didn’t know if they were worried about us or if they got it together to come and help.

  It didn’t matter.

  It was done.

  I kept looking and saw at each end of the block, cop cars were angled in, their lights flashing, the cops out, bracing their weapons against hoods and roofs, using the cars as shields.

  “Are we sure how long Lilah’s light will hold?” Callum asked.

  “We’re not sure of anything,” Abel replied.

  “Then incapacitate them and contact The Council,” Callum ordered the phantoms.

  They nodded and most floated off.

  One remained behind and shared, “The Council is aware of your location. Reinforcements will be here within five minutes.”

  “Little late,” Cain muttered.

  I sighed.

  The phantom drifted away.

  “How can they incapacitate them?” Leah asked while leaning heavily against Lucien.

  “They feed on energy and sometimes they can be…greedy,” Callum answered. “In this instance, it might make them ill.” He jerked his head to the scene behind us as phantoms swooped down on the motionless supernaturals who then dropped to their sides or backs like they were narcoleptics. “All that negative energy. But they can purge it when they get to somewhere safe where it will dissipate and not infect another being.”