White Wolf (Sons of Rome Book 1)

by Lauren Gilley

  Nikita studied the road ahead and went slow, to keep from jostling the wolves in back, and because he had to, the road illuminated only by the full moon. It was lights-out across the Eastern Front; no one wanted to create a target in case the ever-present threat of German planes finally descended upon them. Tomorrow would bring more duties, more higher-ups to impress, more lies to tell, but for now, he enjoyed a quiet, dark road, and the happy sounds of the young ones talking about unimportant things.

  Sasha withdrew into himself again, though, once they reached the city limits, and by the time they were parked in the alley behind the house, he’d gone stiff and silent.

  “Sasha.” Nikita shook his shoulder lightly. “Come on inside.”

  “Okay,” the boy said, blank-faced and passive.

  Nikita shared a worried look with Pyotr, but there wasn’t much they could do…short of driving a stake through Rasputin’s heart.

  If that even worked. He was fast learning that all the myths from legends were just that – myths.

  The landlady – who Nikita suspected had indeed been magicked, probably by Philippe – had given him a key and said she’d be in bed at eight sharp every night. So when he let them in, he was surprised to see the dim glow of a single oil lamp burning in the room they all referred to as the library, its shelves full of dusty Soviet-approved books no one would have ever wanted to read.

  He was flat-out shocked when he saw Katya and Philippe sitting across from one another in a pair of matching, tattered wingback chairs.

  Katya was still dressed, unlaced boots lined up on the floor, sitting stiff and prim, staring at a spot on the wall, hands twisted together in her lap.

  Nikita was on instant alert. “Katya? What’s wrong?”

  When she didn’t respond, he went down on his knees beside the chair. There wasn’t much light, just the single flickering lamp, but there was enough to see that her eyes were dilated.

  “I think I’ll take the young ones up and leave you to it,” Philippe said helpfully, getting to his feet with a pop from each knee.

  Nikita twisted around. “What’s wrong with her?” She still hadn’t responded, sitting passive beneath his gaze, his touch.

  Philippe looked at her a long moment, something like sympathy in his eyes. “I would recommend staying here after we leave, at least for a little while. She’ll need your company, I think, captain.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  But Philippe didn’t answer. He herded the boys upstairs and left them alone.

  The second he was out of sight, Katya slumped forward with a low, pained-sounding groan.

  Nikita caught her by the shoulders. “Sweetheart. What is it?”

  Her hair was down, and it fell around her face, shielding her. He got the impression she was trying to hide in it. She was trembling all over, shaking under his hands.

  He gripped her tighter. “Did he do this to you? Philippe, has he–”

  “No,” she gasped, lifting her face, and again he was struck by the size of her pupils. The rosy blush high along her cheekbones. The way her bottom lip was wet and pink, swollen, like she’d been chewing on it. She looked…

  “Katya,” he said, and this time he wasn’t just angry, but afraid, too. Afraid of what she might tell him.

  Her voice came out low and throaty. The voice she used right in his ear when he was inside her. “I had a dream, and when I woke up, I was – God, Nik, I know how he does it. Rasputin. With the women. He makes them want it.”

  Cold terror washed through him. “Jesus. Did he touch you? Did he - ? I’ll kill him, I swear–” He started to stand, and she grabbed his shirtfront and pulled him back, nearly on top of her. He had to grab at the arms of the chair to keep from falling.

  “He didn’t – it was only in my mind, he – I ran down here, and.” She was panting. “Philippe helped keep me calm. But.” Her nails felt sharp even through the shirt, trying to bite into his skin. “Nik, I’m scared.” Her voice wavered. Tears filled her eyes.

  He tried for a moment, poised over her, not to be jealous. Jealous of a damn vampire. He really tried. But he knew he sounded jealous – and scared, and furious – when he said, “You want him?”

  She made a frustrated sound. “No. He made me want. In general. And I want you.”

  “Damn him.”

  “Nik. He’s inside my head. Fuck me so I don’t have to think about him. Please.”

  He couldn’t be in your head if I put a bullet in his, he thought. But she was reeling, and clinging to him. And vulnerable. And she was asking him.

  “Yeah, baby.” He cupped her face in both hands, thumbed away the tear tracks on her cheeks. “Okay, yeah.”

  She grabbed him by the back of the neck and tugged his head down. The kiss was a collision. Bruising, teeth crashing together. She made a hungry sound against his mouth and he was lost to it.

  He knew they should have tried to find a bed, a solid door to hide behind, some scrap of privacy. But she bit his lip and he tasted blood, and all worry faded. She wanted him, needed him, and she could have him. He wouldn’t ever refuse her.

  She tackled him to the rug, assaulting him with kisses. They tore at their clothes, awkward and gasping. Katya bit at his throat, raked her nails down his chest. When he got her pants off, he found her hot, and swollen and dripping wet between her legs.

  He rolled them, braced above her, and she was chanting “please, please” when he sank inside her without any preamble.

  No foreplay, no grace. Just desperate fucking on the carpet.

  Her need was infectious. He left hand-shaped bruises on her hips, sucked love bites into her neck, and the whole time she asked for “more,” scoring his back and shoulders with her nails.

  The sound of their ragged breathing echoed off the bookshelves. Faster, faster, faster –

  He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move, couldn’t think when he came. A sweeping tide of sensation that left him hollow and weak as a kitten.

  He must have rolled off of her, because when awareness returned he was on his back, staring up at the ceiling, her sweat-damp face pressed into his throat.

  She sniffled, and he realized she was crying.

  He lifted one heavy hand and cupped the back of her head, pulled her in tight to his side. “God, did I hurt you?”

  “No,” she said, and choked back a tiny, pained cry.

  Nikita shifted onto his side and gathered her close in both arms, trying to catch her eye. She stared at his chest, her hand splayed over his heart. There was blood under her nails.

  “Katya.”

  “You didn’t hurt me. You did exactly what I wanted you to.” She lifted her other hand and dashed at her eyes. “Nik, I’m sorry. He – he–”

  “Shh, no. I’m sorry.” When she tucked her face into his throat, he stroked her hair, the trembling line of her shoulder. He didn’t know how to comfort her, and he felt helpless. Helpless, and, as always now, guilty. “I’m sorry,” he told her. “If I hadn’t asked you to come with us, you wouldn’t be here now. With him.”

  “You stupid man,” she said with a deep, watery sigh. “I’m upset. He made me want him. So yes, I’m upset. But I love you, you idiot. You didn’t really think I was going to let you go off and try to save Russia without me, did you?”

  He wanted to cry, but he wanted to smile, too, so that’s what he did. “I’m still sorry,” he murmured.

  “Stop thinking you can control everything. You can’t.”

  They lay there a moment, sweat cooling, little chills creeping over them.

  “How are you feeling?” he finally asked.

  “Can we go for a walk?”

  “Absolutely.”

  They got up slowly, wincing, realized just how badly they’d savaged one another in their passion. Their clothes were sticky with dried sweat, but they pulled them on anyway and slipped out the back door, into a muggy night that smelled of river water, and a day’s worth of lingering smoke from the tractor factory.<
br />
  They walked slowly down the alley, toward the main road. Nikita thought maybe they should have been worried about being set upon, but he knew they’d left the scariest thing in this whole city behind in the house. He took Katya’s hand and she laced their fingers together. He traced the gun calluses on her palm with his thumb.

  In that shivery post-coital state after a good orgasm, tired, sick of all the talk of war and plans and monsters, he didn’t stop to question the words that built on his tongue. He let them out. “Will you marry me?”

  She barked a surprised laugh and knocked their shoulders together. “Where would we find a priest to marry us?” she asked, like she thought he was teasing.

  He halted, and their linked hands forced her to also. “I’m serious.”

  She studied his face in the full moon a moment, expression going from amused, to confused, to dumbfounded. “Nik…”

  “But maybe you don’t want to.”

  “No! No, I do. It’s just.” She squeezed his hand. “When?”

  He hadn’t thought this through. At all. He shrugged. “We can say I do now, and make it official later. After.”

  After the war.

  After this nightmare was over.

  She grabbed his other hand with hers, a slow smile dawning. “Alright.”

  “Alright?”

  “I do.”

  His heart leapt. “I do, too.”

  ~*~

  It was almost midnight, and Dr. Ingraham’s vision was blurry. He sighed and sat back in his chair, massaging his tired eyes. He was working himself to exhaustion every day, clumsy with fatigue each morning, drinking unsugared tea cup after cup until he nearly gagged on the stuff. But there was just so much research to conduct. He’d never dreamed, back in the early days of his thesis, when his classmates were laughing him out of every toom, that he’d have an opportunity like this one. A mage, and wolf, and a vampire. The vampire Rasputin.

  He was giddy at all times. It was the thing that kept him drinking gross tea and pushing past the eye strain. The keys to human immune system response and longevity were locked in these creatures’ blood; all he had to do was find a way to use them.

  He rubbed his eyes until he saw starbursts behind his lids, then put his hands in his lap and opened his eyes. Light spots danced across his office a long moment. When they cleared, his gaze landed on the paper-wrapped package Philippe had sent.

  “Oh,” he said, excited all over again. He’d been crushed to learn that he wouldn’t be able to examine them again for a while, but the gift had softened the blow.

  He grabbed it up and fumbled the paper away, breathing rapidly through his mouth. He felt like he had as a boy at Christmas time, tearing into presents under the tree with his brothers.

  Inside the wrapping he found a small stoppered vial of dark liquid – blood! – and a note written in Monsieur Philippe’s graceful hand, in English.

  Dear Dr. Ingraham,

  Our strange band of misfits has arrived safely in Stalingrad proper and we’re settling into our rooms. It’s a shame your facility isn’t here so that, for one, you could enjoy a relatively clean, unscathed city, and for two, so that we might see one another again. But, I think you well know by now that we won’t speak again for some time.

  Given that, I think it only fair that I finally answer your question. When I told you about our plans to wake Rasputin, you asked, me, “What will a Russia led by Rasputin look like? He was an advisor to the tsar, but not a tsar himself.”

  Yes, this is true. He has no ability to lead and would make a most terrible tsar. The truth of the matter is, there’s no hope for the empire. It’s been dead a long time and will stay dead.

  The Russian empire, anyway.

  Russia is merely a stepping stone for a global movement I wish to initiate. You see, I’m afraid I’m quite ambitious. If, through virtue of being a mage, I’m to be the left hand of a powerful being, I wish to belong to the MOST powerful being. That would be a very ancient lord who slumbers still. Rasputin is to play an integral part in my campaign to wake him – I need the help of a powerful and persuasive vampire, you see.

  The time of human rule is at an end. As it should be.

  Enclosed you will find a vial of my own blood.

  Handle it carefully.

  Best wishes,

  Your Friend Philippe

  Dr. Ingraham read the letter a second and third time, uncomprehending.

  “What?” he said aloud.

  The paper burst into flame.

  “Ah!” Ingraham dropped it to his desk, but not before it singed his fingers. It landed on his blotter and curled up like an autumn leaf, the fire snuffing out almost as soon as it started, the letter crumbling to black ash. “What–”

  The little vial of blood started to vibrate. Hard. It rattled against the desk. Jumped and shook. And it…yes, the contents seemed brighter. Like there was a light inside the tiny bottle. A light growing brighter, paler, expanding. It –

  It shattered with a terrible booming sound, and the whole office was on fire.

  Oh God, I’m burning alive, Dr. Ingraham thought, and he was.

  33

  WAR COMES TO STALINGRAD

  The major general gave each of them a careful once-over, expression unreadable. He outright stared at the wolves. “I was radioed about this,” he said, finally, “but I don’t guess I really believed it. I’ll be damned.” He turned a shrewd glance to Nikita. “Why are the secret police handling this?”

  Nikita shrugged. “I’m following orders, sir. I expect my superiors have their reasons.”

  “Hmm. I was told there’d be nine of you.”

  “One of our men is under the weather this morning,” Nikita lied.

  Feliks politely mimed vomiting.

  They’d decided that morning that introducing Rasputin to any military officer would be a terrible idea. Once whoever it was recovered from the sheer impossibility of it, he would find it impossible to believe that the starets was cooperating with the Soviets. Among his numerous faults, Rasputin was also a terrible liar. Their pass into Leningrad had read they were retrieving an “artifact.” Technically true. Even Stalin had no idea Rasputin was involved in all this.

  The major general looked unconvinced. “You expect me to put wolves on the battlefield?”

  “I can assure you they’re very obedient to Sasha’s commands,” Philippe said, smiling, and the major general relaxed a fraction. Magicked, just as Nikita had asked. “Sasha, would you demonstrate?”

  The wolves sat in a semi-circle behind Sasha. He turned to glance down at the alpha female, and after a moment of eye contact, she snorted and walked to the far side of the office, the others following her. They sat down in a perfect line, gazes pinned on their human alpha.

  “So they’re trained,” the major general said. “What good will they do against a German panzer division?”

  “Well,” Nikita said, “I don’t figure that’s for us to know. Like I said, we’re just following orders.”

  ~*~

  There wasn’t a word of a precedent for what they were. A Specialized Unit, the major general said, and handed over a small pile of paperwork, patches to sew onto their sleeves, and an arsenal of weaponry. They were to report directly to him, and it was clear he had no idea what to do with them. “Maybe you can make yourselves useful,” he said, doubtfully, and sent them on their way.

  It was a hot, cloudless day outside, the sun bright overhead, filtering through the fine layer of dust that hugged the ground so that the air around them seemed golden. The base perched on a hill, the city spread out before them, a sea of flat rooftops, the river a glittering snake at its edge.

  “What now, fearless leader?” Ivan asked.

  Nikita groaned. “I don’t–”

  “Wait,” Sasha said. They’d been walking slowly along the side of the road, and he pulled up suddenly, his wolves doing the same. All of them cocked their heads. Sasha’s mouth was open, eyes on the sky above them.r />
  Despite the heat, a chill moved down Nikita’s back. “What?”

  Sasha’s pupils shrank down to pinpricks. “I hear something. It’s…”

  “Sasha?” Katya asked.

  And then Nikita heard it too.

  Planes.

  ~*~

  Sasha knew the sirens were coming, and clapped both hands over his ears in preparation. The noise was painful to human ears, intolerable to his wolf senses.

  And here they came, that awful wailing…

  Sasha stood up straight like he’d been electrocuted. With the ear-piercing siren had come something else: clarity. For the first time in over a week, his mind was his own, without a trace of Rasputin’s influence.

  He could have laughed.

  He threw back his head and howled up at the sky, the sun obscured by a two-winged silhouette.

  “Come on!” Nikita shouted in his ear, tugging hard on his sleeve. “We have to get out of the street!”

  Yes. The Germans had finally arrived in Stalingrad.

  ~*~

  The first bomb fell when they were still sprinting down the hill. It seemed to drop in slow motion, small enough from this distance that Sasha could have shut one eye and covered it with his thumb. It landed on a street of small, single-family homes, where the factory workers lived. A flash white like sunlight. Fire. Smoke.

  “Jesus,” someone said, probably Ivan. “Oh, Jesus.”

  The thunder came after, a beat slower than the visual. The air vibrated, and the ground shook underfoot. Sasha smelled ash, and plaster, and smoke, and his steps faltered.

  A big hand – Ivan – shoved him between the shoulder blades and he rebalanced and pressed on.

  The sounds were overwhelming, because he could hear all of them. The siren. The drone of German plane engines. The confused shouts of people. Crackle of fire.

  A second bomb landed: roar of thunder, plume of smoke, collapse of walls.

  There was a ditch running along the side of the road, a deep one, and a drain pipe, the great big silver kind. Nikita dragged them to it, urged them all inside with sharp hand motions. Talking was impossible; you had to put your mouth to someone’s ear and shout above the din.