Taint of Shadow

by Cassandra Moore

  She shook her head. “No, no one’s picking up the shop line. She should still be open. It’s not that late.”

  “Try her personal line.” He shifted his grip on the steering wheel.

  “Nothing. That’s odd. Maybe she left her phone in the bathroom. I’ll give it a minute.”

  Thoughts ran in circles in his mind. When he forced them into order, one question fell out of the mental rubble. “You said that when she lost her center, her magic went off-kilter, too.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “So why would she be off-center now? Vampires following her home should be small potatoes to someone like her.” He’d dismissed it too easily before, but it bothered him now.

  By the downward quirk of her lips, he could tell it bothered her, too. “Moira’s really capable. I’d kind of assumed she’d just gotten too little sleep, and the whole thing had startled her. I startle people.” He could hear the unspoken guilt in the thought: I thought I’d shoved her off center by showing up.

  Frantic theories spun themselves out from his concern, spurred by her words. She startled people; she’d even startled him when he saw her in the alley. That prickly, edgy sense of intuition had warned him but hadn’t prepared him.

  Wait. The pins-and-needles crawl that had alerted him to the shadow wolf in the parking lot. The same sharp itch that he’d felt in Moira’s shop.

  The truck’s tires shrieked against the pavement as he jerked the wheel hard to the left. He stomped on the brakes, and blue smoke rolled up from the streaks of rubber on the road. Horns blared, but he ignored them. His foot hit the floor with the accelerator pedal. More screams as the tires spun, caught.

  “What the fuck are you doing?”

  “There’s a dark wolf at Moon Blessings.” Adrenaline, necessity gave him iron control over his beast. He grabbed his inner wolf by the neck and demanded its power. It surrendered, submissive to his will, and he felt his eyes shift. The night took on new colors, sharper edges, better depth. With inhuman reflexes, he wove through the traffic, heedless of stares and angry gestures.

  “What? How do—”

  The back of his truck fishtailed as he took a turn at breakneck speed. “I felt it there. I just now realized it. It’s inside. That’s what drove her so batshit today. She can feel it but doesn’t know what it is.”

  “But she felt me.”

  “Not for very long, and I’ll bet she put up some personal defenses against the energies you give off. It took me this long to figure it out. I’ve been with you the whole time.”

  “And she thinks the shop is safe. Turn there!”

  They slid, wheels whirling for purchase, as he hauled to the right. “She said it left just before dawn. And you sleep during the day.”

  “Oh fuck, Noah. It’s awake.”

  “And she isn’t answering the phone.”

  Kayla sprang out of the truck before it fully stopped. Passive mystic protections kept the energy of the shop bottled inside, but errant arcs of it leaked through the unseen barrier. Wild, uncontrolled magical voltage spun out, dissipated, lashed out again, contaminated by that black, foul aura she knew too well.

  Loud clanging bounced off the walls as she ripped the door open. The bell fell from its hook and onto the floor. Chaotic power hit her like a wall. Her control wavered, almost broke, as the discord ran riot through her senses.

  Kill. Shift. Kill, hurt, break. Howl-smash-kill-blood...killkillkill.

  No.

  A growl set her hair on end, and she barely realized she’d made the noise herself. Noah’s hand rested on her shoulder.

  Kill!

  No!

  “Kayla?”

  “Don’t. Touch. Me.”

  Incense smoke like ashes on her tongue. Smells had tastes, tastes tempted. Ashes, sharp ozone, fear. Darkness. Blood.

  Blood. Thick. Sticky. Fresh.

  Primal desire clawed through her. With blood came meat to rend and tear in her teeth. Her muzzle would drip with it as she gorged. Could she find the meat? It still lived. The blood still flowed through it. She could snap the bones in her teeth, suck the marrow out.

  “Back down, Kayla.”

  An alpha wolf gave an order. His voice snapped with command. She fought free of the thick haze that fogged her mind, given traction by that mandate.

  The smoking censer fouled her nose. She pitched it out the door. It crashed through the window of a car parked across the street. But now she could find the scent she wanted. A musky shadow smell. “Not in here.”

  On silent feet, they edged around the counter to the back of the store. The shelves stood upright, undisturbed. “The ladder’s down,” he whispered.

  Now, they could hear voices from above. “Where are Kayla Schinn and Derek Anderson?” a male voice snarled.

  “Go to hell.” Female. Pained. Familiar.

  Air gusted down the stairs, laden with the smell of him. She knew him. He had gone over to the vampires, the last of all those who had broken, but he’d surrendered all the same. Moira’s distinct perfume mingled with his scent. And blood.

  “Kayla Schinn is right here,” she called as she walked up the steps. The scene didn’t encourage her. The shadow wolf knelt over Moira, his hand around her throat. A partial change had given him mass, had lent his face a strange, alien cast.

  It had also given him claws. Gashes stood out against Moira’s pale skin. Brutal, deep swipes that didn’t bleed as freely as they should. The unnatural coagulation came from the werewolf’s curse, an evolutionary measure to keep the contagion inside the body. There it could spread until it took hold and showed itself with the moon’s first fullness. Most werewolves survived the change.

  But Moira was not young, and this wolf was not like the others.

  The wolf smiled, a feral expression that did not belong on a human face. “You’re almost late for the party again, aren’t you, Kayla?”

  “It’s a habit I need to break,” she answered while she edged up the steps. “Kiplinger finally let you off your leash?”

  “He wants you on it instead.”

  “I’ll just bet. The man doesn’t like to lose his toys.” All of her wolfish nature told her to bare her teeth and start the fray. She did her best to ignore it. In both size and experience, the man had the advantage. But the thought of his blood on her hands persisted.

  He grinned, more a vicious display of teeth than a facial expression. “How’s it feel to have your friends hurt for you? Should have just stayed, and none of this would have happened.”

  Blatant provocation, but it almost worked. “Fuck off.”

  “The city’s ours. The world. Why not? Kiplinger’s right.” He let go of Moira’s throat and stalked toward Kayla. “It’s our time.”

  “You remember what they did to us, right?” Where was Noah? There were too many possibilities here, too many ways for this to go straight to hell. Could normal werewolves get infected when bitten by someone like her? Until they knew for certain, she couldn’t risk him in a fight. That left her.

  “They did us a favor.”

  Now or never. A roar of a growl tore from Kayla as she rushed him, white fur sprouting over her body. The wood of the ladder creaked under her weight, for she had gained height, mass. A howl answered her, and she could see a blur of her enemy’s gray pelt before they collided.

  Crates rained down on them, the corners like knives, but she barely noticed. Her opponent tried to roll her onto her back. She scrambled to gain the momentum to turn over on him again, claws shearing into the fur on his back. He was big, with plenty of muscle to spare. For a heartbeat, she was beneath him, his nails in her shoulders.

  Her powerful back legs wedged between them. She dug with her claws, shredded his hide, shoved him away. He flew into a stack of boxes.

  Blood trickled down her arm. It didn’t matter. She lunged up and bounded across the room. His impact with the boxes stunned him for just a second, long enough for her to slash her knife-like claws across his face.

 
; An ear-splitting howl rent the air. Red fluid poured down his muzzle from his eye. Now, he was really mad.

  From somewhere, a voice shouted. Rage drowned it out. Her enemy burst suddenly up, missing her jugular by a narrow margin as she fell back. Strong, heavy wolf fell onto her, all teeth and claws, but she was faster. He landed on the wooden floor.

  “Kayla! Drop!”

  Because he was her mate, she heard him. Because he was her alpha, she obeyed.

  Sharp cracks hurt her ears. Her opponent gave a terrible howl and made a mad scramble for the stairs. More shots split the air, but he moved too quickly. Shelves from below crashed to the ground as he careened away, wounded but in full flight.

  She wanted to give chase. Before she realized it, she had feet on the steps. What ran got hunted down, and he was prey on the run.

  “No! Stay with me! Moira needs you!” Noah yelled, the words cutting through the predator’s drive.

  She crouched down, forced herself to stop.

  Glass shattered. He had gotten away.

  One fight had ended. The other raged inside her, that drive to move to the next kill, the urges of a rabid wolf caught in the throes of its curse. Outside, the moon was high and bright, and she hadn’t tasted blood yet to quench that dark thirst.

  Do you remember why you’re here? What you have to do? No eyes to slash here, no stomach to claw, just a fight for dominance in her own head. She pushed until the wolf retreated, until the fur receded and the thirst for blood faded away.

  Wood bit into her hands and knees. The back of her shirt stuck to her, pasted by the blood from her wounds. Hair fell across her face as she looked up.

  Noah knelt next to Moira. The woman’s bleeding had stopped far too soon, and she looked sick, weak. Angry black tinged the ragged edges of her wounds, a sure sign the lacerations had infections of the worst sort. Kayla still didn’t know if the man bitten by a shadow wolf had survived his first full moon.

  “The first aid kit has wolfsbane in it,” Moira told him weakly. “Just bring the box.”

  Noah hurried downstairs. Behind where he’d sat, Kayla could see a pistol, the slide back, chamber open. Silver bullets. Moira’s protection gun.

  “Are you okay?” she asked as she moved to take her friend’s hand into hers.

  “We’ll hope so,” came the breathy answer. “They’re looking for you, girl.”

  “I’m so sorry, Moira.”

  The older woman shook her head. “No. I told you it was time to make a choice. Choices come with consequences.”

  “But—”

  “Shh. Listen to me. He got in the back door and hid here until I came to the attic. He wanted to know about you and Derek Anderson.” Her friend groaned. “Augh, I can already feel it. How do you live with this day after day...?”

  Noah thudded up the stairs, a metal box in his hands. “You have to let me call 911,” he said as he knelt next to the women. “You need medical help.”

  “And tell them what? I had a feral dog in my attic?” She wheezed half a chuckle. “Too many questions to answer. They don’t need to know about werewolves.”

  “Then we call someone from the pack. Ben. He knows first aid.”

  She grunted in disagreement. “Ben will call Peter.”

  Tears stung Kayla’s eyes, but she forced them down, froze them into the block of ice that held all her worst memories. Now was not the time to break down. It would serve no purpose. “We’re burning time, Noah. We have to hurry. If the police don’t show up from reports of gunshots, then Kiplinger’s people will.”

  He wracked his brain. “Then we get her out of here. Moira, where are your keys? Your car has more room than my truck. We’ll get on the road and decide where to go from there.”

  “Take me to Vincenzo Pirelli.”

  Moira’s words shocked them both. “What?”

  The Irishwoman fumbled into the box until she found a dark brown glass bottle. “Drops of this into the wounds, please. Then I’ll give you directions as we drive. The keys are on that table.”

  “We are not leaving you for vampires!” Noah protested as Kayla took the bottle and unscrewed the lid. The liquid inside smelled vile.

  “I understand now, Noah.” Moira cried out as the clear elixir hit the wounds and foamed. “Hellfire and damnation, that hurts. But I can feel it, and I haven’t even changed. This has to be stopped.”

  Noah’s brow furrowed. “Not Pirelli.”

  She nodded. “He has resources you can’t imagine, and if those don’t work, he’ll know what to do.”

  Neither liked the finality in the statement.

  “I’ll bring the car around the back,” Noah told them. “Wait here.”

  Kayla stroked her friend’s hand while he grabbed the keys and dashed out. “You look like shit.”

  “I feel like shit, thank you. That man is stubborn.” A ghost of a smile flickered over her lips.

  “I like him that way.”

  Her friend hissed as Kayla dropped more wolfsbane into the wounds. “If you had told me how this felt, I never would have believed you.”

  She knew to what Moira referred. Not the change of lycanthropy, which might have happened had another werewolf bitten her, but the horrible darkness of the shadow wolf’s infection. No words of comfort came to her lips, only honesty. “I used to think my wolf was untouchable. No matter what happened in my life, it was always there, and it would never change. It was my identity. My sanctuary, sometimes. I was never a wolf’s wolf. But now and then, I would turn on the news and there would be another school shooting. Or a suicide bombing. Those days, my wolf felt like the purest refuge. It was right there at the heart of who I was, and I believed in it. That’s what they took from me.”

  Moira squeezed her hand. “I believe in you, Kayla. You and Noah. Stop them before this spreads further.”

  Breathless, guilty, wracked with turmoil, she nodded. I never meant for it to come to this. It was supposed to be so simple. Come into town, kill the people responsible, leave. No one but me would be hurt. Of course, it never would have happened that way; she knew it, but the pain of remorse kept her immune to the true wounds she couldn’t salve away right now.

  Black streaks discolored the veins that lead from her friend’s slashes. Born in corruption, the shadow wolves defiled all they touched. How could she stop it before it spread further? She was part of the problem.

  “We’ll find a way to fix this,” Kayla promised. “We’ll stop them. There won’t be a shadow wolf left in the city when we’re done.”

  “I hope there’ll be at least one,” Moira said, and caught Kayla’s gaze.

  Before Kayla could reply, Noah called up the stairs to say he had the car in place. It was just as well. She didn’t know yet what to say.

  Moira called Pirelli from the car as Kayla sat with her in the back seat and spoke to him in quiet, pained Gaelic. Whatever she said had effect. The gate to his driveway was open when they arrived, and the man himself stood in front of the door. Kayla had never seen the lord of the local vampires, and she was not disappointed.

  Long black hair spilled, unbound, down his broad back. Smooth, perfect skin still kept its Italian tone, and dark brown eyes held the slightest trace of a vampire’s usual red tint. They had caught him on the way out somewhere, for he wore leather pants that hugged without binding and a black shirt that outlined a perfect chest.

  More powerful than his flawless form, however, was the aura of charisma that surrounded him. He carried himself with an undeniable command, a self-assurance that few men possessed but many imitated without success. If vampirism had a poster boy, it was Vincenzo Pirelli.

  “Get her inside,” he told a waiting trio of vampires, his accent thick with concern. “A medic is on the way.”

  “Thank you for your help,” Noah said as the three lifted Moira with a surprisingly gentle strength and carried her through the door. “If we can help at all...”

  The vampire’s eyes met Kayla’s, deep red-brown to her
purple. “She has the help I need, I believe. I do not know what it is that we fight, Miss Schinn, and we have no time for long explanations.”

  Her skin crawled with revulsion, but worse, with a need she had hoped to forget. The sharp sting of fangs, the delicate draw of blood from a punctured vein. Paul had made certain all his creations knew the rapture that came with a vampire’s bite. After the conditioning he’d forced on her, she understood why humans bared their necks for the touch of teeth.

  “What do you mean?” Noah asked, eyes narrowed.

  “He means he needs a drink of my blood,” she answered. “He can’t cure Moira unless he knows what the problem is.”

  His expression hardened. “I understand,” he said through clenched teeth, “but you won’t mind if I watch.”

  Neither expected Pirelli’s gentle smile. “So this is the woman who nearly brought you to war against us? I have never cared for your methods, but I have always respected your motives. I will not harm her. I need only a drop.”

  He’s good, Kayla thought to herself, as some of the tension eased out of Noah’s posture. No wonder he’s lived so long. He’s a silver-tongued devil.

  With a gentleman’s manner, Lord Pirelli took her hand into his. Although undead, his skin remained warm to the touch. Kiplinger had felt warm as well, but never held the radiant quality that the lord’s fingers did. He was more than alive; he was vibrant.

  He was dangerous.

  Heat enveloped the tip of her finger as he took it into his mouth. She hardly noticed the prick of his fang but felt the feather-light stroke as the tip of his tongue touched the wound. His eyes slid closed as the smallest shudder passed through his body, and he savored that drop of blood with all the pleasure of a connoisseur.

  Reluctantly, she removed her finger. Even after she’d put her hand into her pocket, she could feel the phantom warmth of his tongue.

  “We must speak again,” Pirelli told them when at last he opened his eyes. “This is something which concerns both your people and mine. I will do all that I can for her. I vow that to you.”

  “I know you will,” Noah told him with more confidence than she knew he felt. “I’d like to offer you my apology, Lord Pirelli. I thought your people had taken Kayla, and I was wrong.”