“Aren’t you going to get dressed?” Elain whispered.
He’d been picking at one of his fingernails. “Nope.”
“Why not?”
He grinned, his white teeth gleaming in the dim light. “Because I’m a lot more frightening as a tiger than I am as a human. They see me walk up with a gun, they think, ‘Ooh, Raj from tech support is here,’ and laugh their asses off before they try to shoot me. They see a huge Bengal tiger walk up, they tend to forget they have a gun in their hand because they’re too busy pissing themselves and running.”
Lina shouldered her pack, where his clothes were stashed. “Okay, if you say so.”
“I do.”
“We ready?” Kitty asked.
After everyone nodded, she pointed out directions and sent two groups of three shifters, including Blackie, out after the lookouts. When they returned five minutes later, they grimly nodded.
Elain leaned in close to Brodey. “I didn’t hear any shots.”
He just nodded.
“Ah.” Elain kept her handgun pointed at the ground, safety on and careful to keep her finger away from the trigger. In the back pocket of her jeans she carried several extra magazines. She knew she could use the gun, but she wanted the satisfaction of killing one of the fuckers bare-handed.
The same six shifters went out again, this time to circle wide around to the other side of the farm. After what felt like forever, they saw a flashlight wink three times at them before going dark again.
“Okay, that’s Blackie’s cue,” Kitty said. “They’ll work their way down to the house from there.”
Oscar shifted back into his tiger self. Elain admitted if she didn’t know he was on their side, he might make her piss herself.
Especially if he was coming after her. Thank goodness he’s on our side.
Brodey stayed next to her. She knew he carried a gun as well but suspected he would be more interested in protecting Elain’s flank than killing cockatrice.
Elain knew she was to follow the front-line shifters, the ones led by Kitty who’d been in situations like this before. Lina would stay with that group, carrying no gun, but able to use her magick to neutralize any threats.
On her other side, Mai wore a grim expression. “You all right?” Elain asked her.
The younger woman nodded and leaned in close. “My dad taught me how to shoot.”
“Then you’re better off than I am.”
“Shh,” Brodey warned.
They swept down the hillside to just inside the woods. Below them, the farm lay dark and quiet. Kitty motioned to several shifters, who headed around the back side of the house. Three others broke away and hurried around the front. Two more headed for the barn. Elain spotted Blackie and the other shifters moving down from the far side of the property to rejoin them. She lost sight of Oscar, who seemed to melt into the shadows.
That was when all hell broke loose.
The door to the barn burst open before the shifters heading there reached it. Four gunmen appeared, likely cockatrice from the stench wave that blew out ahead of them. Lina, who’d been several yards in front of Elain and Mai and on her way to the house, whirled around and threw both her hands up in front of her.
“Down!” Brodey yelled, grabbing both Elain and Mai and forcing them onto the ground.
Time seemed to slow, just like she’d always seen it happen in movies. Razor sharp, her senses took in every single sound, smell, sight.
From the direction of the barn, they heard the sound of gunfire. Lina let out a burst of words in a language Elain didn’t understand. Just above Elain and the others, a thick, vertical sheet of ice appeared in midair and she heard several loud thunks. Chunks of ice rained down on them, followed by something small, hard, and warm dropping onto her head. When she reached her hand up to feel what it was, she realized it was a smashed bullet that had hit the ice barrier before falling.
A chilling, inhuman scream ripped through the night. Everyone turned, including the four male cockatrice, as Oscar leapt from the top of the barn. He landed on one on the end, the cockatrice’s screams dissolving into wordless, wet gurgles as the tiger ripped the man’s throat out.
The cockatrice on the far opposite end took off running for the woods.
Lina waved her hand, dissolving the sheet of ice and sending several more bullets showering harmlessly down onto Mai, Lina, and Brodey. A fireball appeared in her right hand. With her lower lip clamped under her teeth, she pitched the fireball as skillfully as any MLB big-leaguer. It caught the man between the shoulder blades, sending him flying through the air with more screams as he hit the ground again.
“Lina!” Kitty barked from behind them. “I said don’t burn stuff down yet!”
“Chill. I didn’t set fire to the barn.” She grinned down at Elain and Mai. “Yet,” she muttered just loudly enough for them to hear.
The other two cockatrice were quickly subdued by the wolves.
Predictably, the disturbance in the yard attracted the attention of the residents of the house. The back door burst open and five men poured out. Meanwhile, they heard the sound of gunfire on the other side of the house.
“Shit,” Brodey muttered as he started to climb to his knees. He stuck his gun back into the holster clipped to his belt.
Kitty took out the first cockatrice through the door by nailing him in the chin with a kick that crumpled him to the ground, presumably unconscious.
“Damn,” Mai said.
“Girl’s got game,” Elain agreed.
The barnyard dissolved into a battle. When Elain tried to scramble to her feet and head toward the house, Brodey grabbed both her and Mai by the arms and dragged them back toward the barn.
Elain tried to shake free. “What are you doing?”
“Protecting you,” he growled. “If you haven’t noticed, things are under control.”
They were midway between the barn and the house when Elain caught sight of two more male cockatrice sliding out of the barn. Immediately, a loud whomp thundered through the night as a wave of heat erupted from the barn.
“Lina!” Kitty screamed.
“I didn’t do it! Sheesh.” She ran back toward the barn, past Elain, Mai, and Brodey. Brodey was now dragging them away from the house and the barn, toward the woods.
Elain also realized Lina didn’t see the two male cockatrice, and the wolves were too busy guarding the cockatrice they’d already captured, dragging them away from the now raging inferno, to notice them either.
“Shit!” Elain dropped her gun and shifted, breaking free of Brodey and bolting across the yard, running right out of her clothes.
Muttering another incantation, Lina unleashed a frosty cloud that steamed and sizzled as it hit the flames, but within seconds had begun putting the fire out. Elain knew she couldn’t get both men, who were momentarily shocked and distracted by Lina’s powers and stood with their backs to Elain. As she prepared to launch herself onto the one closest to Lina, about twenty feet from her friend, she spotted Oscar running from around the other side of the barn and cutting off the escape path of the second man.
Her target spun around as Elain made contact, the force of the impact knocking him to the ground. Her jaws clamped around his throat and pinched off his scream, cartilage and bone crunching between her teeth. Beneath her his body convulsed, twitching, his blood pumping over her tongue.
He tasted horrible, like a foul, rotted piece of fish soaked in sour milk and left in a tank of shit for a month in the hot Florida sun.
And he stank like a motherfucker, even worse than he tasted.
Sitting up, she shook her head, trying to spit the disgusting taste out of her mouth.
Brodey and Mai ran up. A few yards away, Oscar had eviscerated the other cockatrice and now sat next to him, staring at the others.
Elain shifted back and climbed off the dying man, retching and spitting into the dirt.
“You all right?” Brodey asked.
“No, I’m not fuck
ing all right! Please, pee in my mouth, or give me a cup of gasoline to drink, or…something. Gah!”
He snickered and reached down to help her stand. “Yeah, we should have warned you, they’re pretty nasty.”
Mai had collected Elain’s clothes along the way. “Here.” The coyote wore a smile.
“Thank you.” She pulled on her shirt. “And it’s not funny!”
Mai pressed her lips tightly together.
“You okay over there?” Kitty called out.
“Yeah, we’re good,” Brodey answered. “Elain popped her cockatrice kill cherry.”
Elain was busy pulling on her underwear and jeans when Lina finally got the fire put out and walked over. Clapping Elain on the shoulder, she said, “Thanks for having my back.”
Mai pulled a bottle of water out of her backpack. “Here.”
“Thank you!” She snatched it from her friend’s hand and gargled it, rinsing and spitting, trying to get the worst of the disgusting aftertaste out of her mouth.
Biting into one of those damn things isn’t something I’ll do again anytime soon.
They dragged the remaining eight cockatrice who were still alive into the middle of the yard. Kitty had brought heavy duty plastic zip ties, and they used those to bind the men at the wrist and ankles. The one Kitty had gone all Rockettes on was starting to come to. She grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled him up onto his knees.
“How many more?”
“Fuck you.”
She punched him, keeping his shirt fisted in her other hand so he didn’t hit the ground. “How many more, asshole?”
He looked up at her and grinned. “Fuck. You.”
With movement faster than even Elain’s lupine eyes could follow, Kitty drew her gun, kicked the man’s knees apart, and shot him in the crotch.
He let out an inhuman howl as she pressed the muzzle of her gun against his temple. “Last time.”
When he didn’t answer her immediately, she shot him and let his body fall to the ground.
She walked over to the second man and started out by kicking his knees apart. “How many times you going to make me ask?”
He frantically shook his head. “There were two more. Cameron and his wife. I don’t see them here.”
She tipped her head at one of the other wolves. He ran into the house, lights visible through the drawn blinds and coming on, room by room, as he searched. When he emerged a few minutes later, he shook his head.
“What’d they drive?” she asked the guy.
“Blue pickup. Ford, I think.”
Someone else walked around the house to look. “Nope.”
“Dammit.” She grabbed him by the shirt and hauled him to his feet. “Why were they here? And where’d they go?”
“I don’t know where they went, I swear! They were here when I went to bed. We haven’t even paid them yet.”
“Why were they here?”
“They set up the shit, all right?”
“The lab?”
“Yeah.”
“Where do they live?”
“I don’t know, somewhere down south. They’re not from here.”
“They’re cockatrice?”
“Yeah.”
“Then how did you find them?”
“I don’t know. Drake found them.”
“Where’s this Drake asshole?”
The man pointed to another guy, who’d started struggling.
Kitty shot the guy and dropped him to the ground as she marched over to Drake. “Drake, nice to meet you, asshole.” She pulled him up to his knees. “Where’d Cameron and his wife come from, and where are they going?”
“I don’t know, I swear! One of my cousins knew his cousin. There was some shit in Yellowstone this spring, and then they came here. We were going to pay them once we got our first big payment.”
A low growl rolled from Kitty’s throat. She pressed the muzzle of her gun against the man’s forehead, between his eyes. “Yellowstone? Anyone else here involved in that?”
“No. It was Cameron and his brother and some cousins or something. His wife, too, I think. We didn’t have anyth—”
Elain jumped when Kitty pulled the trigger that time.
She moved to the next man who stupidly tried for bravado. She shot him in the nuts and left him screaming and writhing in the dirt as she walked to the next one.
In fifteen minutes, Kitty had finished questioning and killed off the remaining cockatrice. Two of the wolves started dragging the bodies into the barn.
“Search the house,” Kitty said to several of the other wolves. “Computers, papers, you know the drill. Lina.”
Lina, who’d been standing with Mai and Elain, turned and snapped her a snarky two-fingered salute from her temple. “Yo.”
Kitty swept her hand toward the barn. “Once they get the bodies moved, the barn is all yours.” She started toward the house, but turned without breaking stride and held up a finger. “Leave the house until I tell you to, please?” She flashed a playful smile before disappearing inside.
Lina cracked her knuckles. “Now this is a party.”
“Am I a horrible person for being glad they’re dead?” Mai asked.
“No,” Elain said. “Because I know I’m glad they’re dead.” She thought about the vision Baba Yaga had shown her, of Oddr being murdered by a cockatrice so many eons before. “They wouldn’t flinch while killing any of us.”
Lina grimly nodded. “I can vouch for that.”
It was in the deep, dark hours before dawn that they finished and watched as the barn burned. The bodies of the lookouts had also been retrieved. Lina had incinerated all the bodies first, making sure there wasn’t enough left of them for any forensics teams to attempt to identify, much less determine a cause of death, before turning the barn into a cockatrice conflagration. Once Kitty cleared her to destroy the house as well, Lina grinned and stepped forward.
“What about the two that got away?” Elain asked. “Are we going to look for them?”
“Not tonight,” Kitty said. “I’m exhausted, and they have too much of a head start on us if they left by vehicle. I’m sure they’ll show back up again eventually.”
Elain and Mai had started to follow Brodey back toward the woods when Lina called out to them. “Hey, come here.”
Elain and Mai turned. “Who, us?” Mai asked.
“Yeah, you two. Come here.”
Elain and Mai exchanged an uncertain look but returned to Lina’s side. “I want to try something,” Lina said, holding out her hands. “Grab on.”
They clasped hands with Lina and each other and looked to Lina. “What now?” Mai asked.
She smiled. “Let’s wipe that house off the map.”
“How are we supposed to do that?” Elain asked.
Lina’s eyes dropped closed. “Just think it with me.”
Brodey warily hovered a few yards away. Elain exchanged one more concerned glance with Mai before closing her eyes.
Mai’s fingers tightened around Elain’s as Lina began a low chant. The sound of it reverberated through Elain, and she knew it was making a complete circuit through Mai as well. Then, she instinctively started chanting it in time with Lina, even though she had no idea what they were saying. Mai started repeating it as well.
In her mind coalesced a vision of the house simply disappearing, leaving only the foundation and basement behind. The more Lina chanted and they repeated, the sharper the image grew in her mind.
She felt that same tingle she had in Yellowstone, like liquid wasabi sauce filling her veins from the feet up, growing, flowing through the three of them, until she had to force it out and into the space in the center of the three of them or risk feeling like she was going to explode.
Loud, creaking noises split the air, louder than the sound of the barn burning. Wooden beams screamed in agony as the Triad’s power rent them from the foundation. Glass broke, things crashed and upended.
“Son of a bitch,” Brodey said, his
voice sounding weak. Some of the others swore or gasped.
After a moment, when the sounds ceased, Lina said, “Done.”
When Elain opened her eyes and turned to look, she involuntarily stepped back and let go of Lina and Mai’s hands. “Where’d it go?”
Lina wore a serene smile and crossed her arms over her chest as her upper lip twitched and wiggled. After a second, she frowned and dropped her arms. “I never could figure out how to wiggle my nose like that lady on TV.”
The house was…gone. Just gone. No wreckage, no debris…nothing. Just a slab and a hole leading down to the basement.
“Holy…fuck,” Mai breathed next to her, grabbing onto Elain’s arm for balance. “What the hell did we do?”
Lina brushed her hands together as if she were dusting them off. “We wiped it off the face of the map. Just like I said we were going to.”
“But…” Elain turned to her. “Where?”
Lina flicked her fingers in the direction of the slab, as if shooing away bugs. “Away.”
“Away where?” Mai asked, a tinge of hysteria in her voice.
Elain didn’t blame her. She wasn’t too sure of her own sanity at that point.
Lina shrugged. “Don’t know, don’t care.” She grinned. “I always wanted to do something like that, but I didn’t have the power to do it by myself.” She draped her arms around their shoulders and turned them away from the slab. “Let’s go home.”
They caught up with Brodey, who still stood wide-eyed and staring at the slab.
Elain pulled free from Lina and stopped in front of him. “Are you okay?”
He slowly nodded. “Um, yeah. Sure. I’m good.”
Fear trickled through her. When she reached for him, at first he didn’t respond and for a brief moment she worried he’d pull away from her.
Maybe even be scared of her.
Then he seemed to shake it off and grabbed her, drawing her tightly into his arms. “I love you,” he whispered into her ear. “I’ll never be afraid of you or what you can do, I swear.”
A relieved, shaky sigh escaped her.
Chapter Forty
The next morning, Cameron left Aliah at the cheap-ass motel where they’d grabbed a room. He took the chance to go back to the farm, but knew he couldn’t risk just toodling up the driveway. He didn’t want to run into human cops or the wolf vigilantes.
A Wolf in the Fold Page 32
