The Night's Champion Collection: A supernatural werewolf thriller trilogy

by Richard Parry

  So hungry.

  He pulled himself to his feet, yellow eyes looking through the gloom. A small shaft of light led above ground where the lightning had burned to Maynor’s body, taking him back to wherever they went when they died. The sword Stroke was still here, white blade catching the light. It was stuck into the ground on an angle, blade clean, like it had drunk Maynor’s blood.

  “Ah, Maynor,” he said. “When we tricked you before, you were so angry. But you didn’t learn. You gave me a sickness I can’t die from, and tried to kill me with another sickness. You must get better plan.”

  Maynor didn’t answer, because there was nothing left of him here. He wouldn’t be back for a little while. How long was difficult to know, but until then, Maks had his sword.

  He gritted his teeth, grabbed the hilt of Stroke, and tore the sword from the earth.

  We hunt.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-FOUR

  The rumble of thunder sounded from somewhere, faint, but still there. A moment later, another rumble.

  Adalia watched Kaylan look up at the stone ceiling, Death’s face going blank. She was beautiful like Liselle, but terrible too, and Liselle wasn’t terrible. Liselle was soft and caring and good, and shouldn’t be a Horseperson at all. Pinned here against the wall by her throat — held there by Death herself — Adalia could see what it meant to be a Horseperson.

  “Uh,” said Adalia, having trouble getting the word out. It sounded more like hrk than uh. “Sounds bad, yeah?” Srds bd hrk eh.

  Kaylan’s head snapped towards her again, dark, perfect eyes examining Adalia. Almost like she was being dissected with them. “Only for you,” she said.

  It was time for courage. Not the kind of courage that Uncle John had, where he just talked until people got confused, or the kind of courage her mom had, where she would stand against a wall of fire and scream at it. Or the kind of courage of Val, who would hold you behind him so nothing could reach you. Not even like Rex, who was tired of other people not having courage, or Jessica, who wanted to save someone who was already dead. And, sadly, not like Melissa, who would stand still while a hundred people cut her again and again, because someone had to stand there, and if being cut was what it took, then she’d stand there and be cut. And then punch them. It was time for courage like Adalia, except she didn’t know what that was.

  Mary might know, if she were here.

  “Kaylan,” she said, “there should be no lies between us.” Klrn urk. Thurk shld be urk nnnn urk lees urk b tween urks.

  A smile played against Kaylan’s face, and it reminded Adalia of one of those video games of Uncle John’s, where some graphic artist doing 120-hour weeks had tried to make a human face smile, except they were jacked up on caffeine and hadn’t seen their kids in about a year. That artist would be sitting there thinking God damn but I need this face to smile, except I don’t remember what other people look like because I’m in this stupid cubicle, but fuckit, it’s just got to ship, we’ll fix it in post, and made this thing on the screen smile like Chucky, not just nasty but wrong. “Why ever not?” she said. But her grip slackened, just enough for Adalia to be able to speak easier.

  “Because it’s a waste of time,” she said, and knew Mary would be pleased with that kind of answer. “You know I can tell. You’re really only lying to yourself. Which just shows you don’t really want it.” Adalia paused. “Also, you should put me down, because you’re not going to kill me, because you would have already if you were going to, which means you’re not. This is just awkward, like family photos at weddings, which you won’t have been to, and I haven’t either, but I’d like to.”

  Kaylan let her slide down the wall, turning away. She spoke to Anatolie. “Vay' chay'pen 'aHa'ba lulegh ngeH.”

  “Ta' 'oH,” said Anatolie, slipping from his chair. He started giving orders to the vampires around him.

  “That is a weird language,” said Adalia.

  “You will give me what I want,” said Kaylan, “or I will tear the life from you, and put it back, only to do it again.”

  Mary would have huffed here. “Kaylan, no lies.”

  “I mean it,” said the avatar of Death. Which was unusual, right, to be having an actual conversation with the avatar of Death, one of the four Horsepersons. If Adalia hadn’t met Liselle, it might have been hard to swallow, but she’d seen how Liselle looked at Uncle John, and knew what that meant. It meant they weren’t all terrible, and weren’t all perfect, even if they looked like it.

  “I know you mean it,” said Adalia. “I also know you can’t do it.”

  “I can—”

  “Look, look, look, okay,” said Adalia, patting the air with her hands. “I can see the Other Place too. I know the rules. Rules you’ve … bent … by making these—” and here, she pointed at Constanta “—things. I know that once you’ve taken someone, they can’t be brought back. I know where the dead go when they die, Kaylan. I know.” She didn’t say, I brought someone back, and it was against the rules, and I’m sure that’s why everything is wrong now.

  “What about if I kill John Miles?” said Kaylan.

  “Well that’s one option,” said Adalia, “but I feel like we’re getting ahead of ourselves.”

  Kaylan looked at her, head tilted sideways like she was wondering what manner of creature she was looking at. “Ahead? Of ourselves?”

  Adalia sighed. “This will go a lot faster if we just agree some things up front. First, I’m not all ‘wow’d’” —and here, she made little air quotes “—by you. I’ve spent the last ten years of my life, which is actually half of the years I’ve been alive, running around with a werewolf pack. I have seen vodou priests, and zombies, and vampires, and I’m sure I’ll see another ten amazing things before I die.” She took a breath, sure Mary would be encouraging her on at this point. “Second, you haven’t actually told me what you want, so going all Big Bad Wolf and threatening to blow my house down is, what, premature? So could you, like, start at the beginning.”

  “I want you to take away the terrible effects of the sun from my vampires,” said Kaylan.

  “You want me to make them unstoppable monsters that will end the world,” said Adalia.

  “Yes,” said Kaylan.

  Anatolie sauntered back in, threw a glance at Adalia, then said to Kaylan, “QaSlaH wej ghom, Ha' qoD tu'lu'. QaStaH police je QI' wovbe'. Wa'vatlh maHvaD massacred be'nI' loDnI'wI' je.” Funny, that one English word in there.

  “HoH,” said Kaylan.

  “Chay'pen 'e' Qu',” said Anatolie. “That was my whole thing.”

  Kaylan waved him away, turning back to Adalia. “Will you help me?”

  Adalia looked between Kaylan and Anatolie. “What language are you speaking? I thought I could at least grab a hold of most of them, but this one…”

  “It’s not common,” said Kaylan. “It was Dragomir’s idea.”

  “Who’s Dragomir?” said Adalia.

  “Dragomir is Viorica’s lover,” said Kaylan.

  “I think I see where this is going,” said Adalia. “Say no more.”

  “I need your answer,” said Kaylan.

  “About whether I’m going to use the Other Place to make vampires that can walk in the sun and kill everything on earth?”

  “Yes,” said Kaylan.

  “I think we’ll have trouble coming to an agreement on that one,” said Adalia. “What’s the second option?”

  “They will still kill everything on Father’s Eden,” said Kaylan, answering a question Adalia hadn’t asked. Or just making a statement, because she liked to hear herself talk. “They’re too perfect. Too good at killing, and making other vampires. And always hungry for more, because of how we made them.”

  “Mis-made, maybe,” said Adalia. “Liselle didn’t help you, did she?”

  “She is soft-headed,” said Kaylan.

  “Figures,” said Adalia. “You’d want Famine on the team to make sure the whole hunger thing worked right. Anyway. Second option?”


  “Everything still dies, but slower, and I kill you, and John Miles, to start with. Then I kill Danielle Kendrick, and Valentine Everard, and Melissa Carlisle, and Jessica Pearce. I will save Rex Aubrey for last, because he believes he has lived a good and useful life, and that will hurt him most of all. If you help me, you still die, but I promise. I’ll leave you until the very end. You will live the longest of any … humans. You will live out your allotted span. Together.”

  “Two things,” said Adalia. She really hoped Mary had her back on this one. “First, if everyone is going to die anyway, except us, who will live alone in a barren wasteland for a few more years, well, you’re not really incentivizing me here. Second, and I mean this from my heart, you’re a real cunt.”

  Kaylan’s slap caught Adalia on the side of the face, left her head ringing, the taste of copper in her mouth. She was on the floor, and didn’t remember how she got there, and one of her teeth was loose. More than one? Definitely one at least on the side Kaylan had hit her, and she couldn’t see out of that eye. Adalia spat on the ground, because she wanted to throw up but didn’t want to in front of Kaylan, so that was a kind of compromise she could live with, and saw a tooth and some blood there, and that wasn’t good.

  Kaylan towered above her, all beautiful and terrible. “It’s not whether they die,” she said. “It’s the manner of their death that should concern you. Death can be soft, and kind, a release at the end of a life well lived. Or it can be done alone, in terror and pain.”

  “Why,” said Adalia, “are you so beautiful?”

  “Because Death is beautiful,” said Kaylan. She turned to Constanta this time, and said, “Qem John Miles.”

  Adalia didn’t know what that language was, but she could guess at the intent. She wasn’t 100% sure what was coming next, but she did know Kaylan was still lying to her. To her!

  Death wasn’t beautiful. Not at all.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-FIVE

  The lights were too bright, the shadows too dark. Everything jarred. Just the way she liked it.

  We need to help them stay alive. Because they came here to help us.

  She growled, and the big one with orange hair took a step back. She watched him check himself, reverse and retake that step. If her face could have done so she would have smiled. He—

  Ginger. His name is Ginger.

  —didn’t lack courage. So many of the humans failed to be brave when tooth matched claw, when fangs found flesh and the hot, sweet salty hot within. It wasn’t who would win. That was always known. The biggest took the prize. It was how you won or lost that made you worthy of the hunt.

  Our daughter is small. Do you judge her by her size? She has done amazing things. She freed us from a cage made of silver—

  Hated, vile metal.

  —when we were lost. Do you remember?

  She remembered. There were many things she didn’t remember. Her memory felt like a cloak of animal skins patched many times against the cold and wet of the world. The further back she went, the less she could recall. Fragments. Some memories were too painful—

  You talk of courage, but you can’t look there. Can you?

  —to remember. Some were bright like the sun. Paws padding silent against the earth as she hunted. Teeth bared as she struck—

  Those memories are base. You can do better. Look where it hurts.

  Where it hurts? The dark place in her mind.

  Yes. The place where Volk is.

  That one was crazy. The oldest living of them by far, and it had driven him mad. To remember everything was to go mad, like that one.

  Yes. It drove him mad. But if you see how, maybe we can stop it happening to us.

  No. All she needed to know was that he had killed his Pack, and she would never do that. It was false, like wearing silver or being friends with the vampire, their enemy.

  And yet here we are. Friends with a vampire. You remember his name?

  Jeremy. The thing wanted to be called Jeremy, as if a name could change its nature, make it safe. It was walking up to her now, head tilted up to look at her. She hunkered down on big haunches, better to look it in the eyes. Which were normal, human-like eyes, not mirrored like the hated, burning metal. It slowed as it got closer, cautious, careful.

  “So,” it said. “So. Uh.”

  She waited. A low growl escaped, because she was still so hungry. One corpse did not a meal make.

  “Right,” it said. “Look, there’s a thing. The … we’re going to have to go lower, because there’s not a clear path from the, uh, sanctum, uh, to here. What would be super cool, and I mean really fucking frosty, is if you could hold the growls in and not kill anyone until they open the door. Can you do that for me?”

  She leaned forward, and it took a fearful step back. Again she wished for that human ability to smile, but she settled for showing her teeth.

  “Uh,” it said. “Cool, I’ll take that as a big ol’ yes.” It turned to the orange-headed one—

  Ginger. Is it so hard to remember their names?

  —Ginger, and said, “You got that?”

  Ginger said, “You want us to go further into this nest of monsters so we can help a werewolf get out.” He looked at his feet, then back at the vampire. “A werewolf.”

  “Yeah,” said the vampire—

  Jeremy. Jeremy. Jeremy.

  —Jeremy. “That’s what I want, because the werewolf is not the problem. It’s the young woman and her uncle that I think need our help.” He jerked his head back at her. “These things can almost take care of themselves.”

  She should end it for that slight, but—

  Remember how he came into our home and tossed us around like a bunch of toys?

  —it had a point. She watched as the rest of the humans—

  Soldiers. Who could become friends.

  —who wouldn’t live to see the end of today picked up their equipment. One of them was still battered around, hurt inside—

  Lindle. Her name is Lindle.

  —but Lindle was still moving forward, still trying to help. Perhaps more than just the big one had courage, then.

  The vampire led the way, holding up a hand at a junction in the tunnel. The walls here were strange, half-rock and half of those small stones that humans set next to each other. Some of the walls were damp, and all of them felt wrong. Being under the earth, where there was no sun or moon, was not the place she wanted to be. Not the place she wanted to hunt, but they had her cub. And she would get her cub back.

  Focus.

  She shook her muzzle, tongue licking her teeth, and tried not to growl. It was hard, because everything was strange, but it would be easier to get her cub, so she kept her peace.

  The vampire was speaking to someone, or something, around the corner. “MInDu'lIj Da'elDI'.” She knew many of the languages of humans, and this one wasn’t familiar to her.

  The thing Jeremy—

  Good work. You remembered his name.

  —was speaking to around the corner — definitely a vampire, because she could hear no heartbeat — replied in the same language. “Jatlh Anatolie ngaQ vI'ogh.”

  Jeremy didn’t look back at them as he spoke. “LaH Hegh Anatolie qaStaHvIS qul. MInDu'lIj Da'elDI'.”

  The other vampire said, “Lu', lu'. cha'DIch HInob.” There was the sound of bolts being drawn, big locks of metal, and she smelled something on the air. The hated metal. Perhaps that door was lined with it — a thing other humans had done before, to keep her kind out.

  Jeremy sauntered forward, and she leapt around the corner, following his tracks. She bounced off the opposite wall, around Jeremy, and lunged at the other vampire. It didn’t even have enough time to look surprised before her jaws crunched around its skull. She suckled at the body’s blood, lapping at the neck’s stump, before crunching into the chest.

  “That is fucking gruesome,” said Mallory, walking slowly past her. She continued to chew, yellow eyes watching the soldier.

  “It’s a good so
lution,” said Jeremy. “She won’t eat us, and the fucking vampires won’t come back from the dead. Win-win, I think they call it.”

  “Not very win for the dead vampire,” said Sawyer Diego.

  “Fuck those guys,” said Finch. She was the last through after Brindle, closing the door behind her.

  She continued her meal. Sawyer Diego walked up to her, said, “Cool, fucking cool,” but not like he meant it, and then turned to Jeremy. “What language you speaking? I can order beer in at least seven and I don’t even know that one.”

  Jeremy said, “Klingon.”

  “Say what?”

  “Klingon,” said Jeremy. “Look, you get a bunch of people together who are all Millennials and ask them to learn Hebrew or Ancient Latin or whatever and you’ve got two basic problems. First, every asshole knows them. Grave robbers or, I guess they’re called archaeologists, they know those, so it’s not a great method of communication for secure conversation. Second, Millennials don’t want to learn Hebrew or Ancient Latin, but you say, ‘Yo, our secret club’s language is Klingon,’ and they’re all on board.”

  “Never thought of it that way,” said Sawyer Diego.

  “To be fair, you’ve only just heard about it,” said Jeremy. He clapped his hands. “Okay, team. Here’s where it’s at.” He was pointing to the exits from the room. “That one leads to the dorms. Don’t go down there or you’ll fucking die. That one there goes to the lounge area.”

  “What’s in the lounge area?” said Lindle.

  “It’s where we torture humans and shit,” said Jeremy. “Don’t go there either. Finally, this last tunnel—” and he gestured at a wide corridor leading down and away “—leads to the sanctum. If I was Anatolie, I would have them down there. Beyond that’s the prisoner wing, so if they’re not in the sanctum we can keep going.”

  “Hold up,” said Ginger. “We just got to hold the line. And…” He coughed, looking up at her. She had almost finished her meal, worrying at a thigh bone. “Well, so, what if they’re in the, what did you call it, the lounge area?”