by Morgan Hawke
A horrific and agonizing bellow came up from below.
Belus lost his smile. “What in hell’s name was that?”
Something huge, with one glowing golden eye, dragged itself up the stairs. Its breaths wheezed painfully from its chest, and it stank foully of dog, hot engine oil, and rot. It stopped at the top of the steps and growled.
“Oh, my god….” Thorn’s heart slammed in her chest, and her stomach churned with revulsion. Her entire being, wolf and human, rejected it utterly. It was an unwholesome, unnatural, twisted thing. It was a thing that should not live. It was a thing that needed to be wiped from existence. And yet there was a trace of something familiar in its scent. “It’s Max.”
Yaroslav stiffened. “That…thing?”
“Gaaa!” Belus tugged out a handkerchief from his sleeve and covered his nose. “Is it supposed to smell this…dead?”
The doctor lifted his hand, palm open, to the thing on the stairs. “Alas, Max is no longer the man he once was.”
Max crawled from the stairwell, pulling himself along the floor. His head and jaws were misshapen, caught between human and beast. His one wolf yellow eye gleamed, reflecting the light, and the eye still human reflected nothing. His back was hunched, and his legs had lost all trace of human shape to become the haunches of a beast. The knobs of his warped spine showed plainly through the patches of red and gray fur that covered him sporadically. And, still, he had no tail.
Light gleamed on metal.
Metal? Thorn frowned, using her wolf’s eyes to pierce the shadows. That couldn’t be right….
Max’s right arm had been replaced entirely by a geared machine that ended in blades instead of fingers.
She sucked in a sharp breath. “What did you do to him?”
The doctor sighed and shook his head. “It seems Max took a silver bullet in the hand. I’m afraid my attempts at…repairs were not quite as successful as I could wish. I was forced to replace his entire arm.” He set a gloved hand on Max’s filthy, disfigured head.
Max looked up at the doctor and whimpered. “Home? Ma…ster?”
The doctor shook his head slowly. “Not yet, Max. I need you to get something for me.” He pointed his silver cane past the gleaming threads.
Max turned to look toward Belus, Yaroslav, and Thorn. He still had one plain brown human eye, and it was swimming with tears.
Thorn cringed. He was in pain. A lot of it.
The doctor stroked Max’s warped head. “Bring the little wolf to me.” He smiled. “You may eat the others.”
Belus rolled his eyes. “How very melodramatic!” He took two steps back to his abandoned chair to collect his silver serpent walking stick. “What is this, a penny dreadful?”
Yaroslav frowned and drew the pair of long knives buckled at his hips. “I am indeed seeing a resemblance.”
Max moved out from under the doctor’s hand and approached the gleaming threads. He sniffed. “Bad….”
The doctor lifted his chin. “Max, use your new hand.”
Max raised his metal arm and raked it down the threads. The wires sparked, stretched, snapped, and wrapped around the metal arm. Electrical current danced along the wires. Several whipped out to slash his shoulders, leaving long, vicious cuts.
Max jerked his head back, releasing a scream of pain and fury.
Yaroslav eyed Belus. “Ariadne’s thread was a good idea.”
Belus scowled. “Was being the operative word.”
Max bit at the sparking wires wrapping him. He yelped, and his mouth came away bloodied.
Thorn took a deep breath. “I’ll take care of Max. You two can have the lunatic doctor.”
Yaroslav and Belus looked at her sharply.
Yaroslav shook his head. “Absolutely not!”
Belus laughed. “Are you insane?”
“No, I’m not.” Thorn jerked her thumb toward Max. “He is. You don’t stand a chance of fighting something like that.”
Yaroslav scowled. “And you do?”
Thorn snorted. “I am a wolf. I’m faster than he is and experienced at taking down large prey. He’s just a dog, a scavenger used to taking down weaker prey.”
Belus waved his hand toward the lumbering Max. “Excuse me, but in case you hadn’t noticed, you are not even half his size!”
“So?” Thorn scowled. “Size has nothing to do with it.” She dropped the coat from her shoulders. “I’ve killed grizzly bears before.” She smiled, showing all her long teeth. “And eaten them.”
Belus’s brows lifted at Thorn. He turned to Yaroslav. “She’s terribly bloodthirsty. Are you quite sure you can handle her all by yourself?”
Yaroslav bared his teeth. “Thorn…!”
She ignored him and let the white fire take her, only this time she asked for all of it. The feral half of her soul roared outward in a blaze of pure glory, but this time it did not stop at a wolf’s body. She expanded further, taking on mass, breadth, and height. Her forepaws remained closer to clawed hands, with forelegs muscled like human arms, and yet her haunches and tail were that of a wolf.
Thorn shook her body and lifted her entirely wolf head, and her ears flicked forward. The room looked so…small. Both Yaroslav and Belus seemed tiny.
Belus’s brows rose, and he stepped back, away from her. “All right, now I am impressed.”
Yaroslav stepped back also. “Thorn, I did not know you could do this.”
Thorn turned her long muzzle toward him. She couldn’t speak this way, so she reached for her connection to the vampire. Neither did I. She shrugged.
“Ah, you are loud.” Yaroslav winced.
Belus pointed at Thorn. “She did not do that before?”
Yaroslav moved around Thorn’s haunches, keeping a careful distance from her huge tail, and stood by Belus. “I suspect I may have rebuilt her aspect a bit too well.”
Bleeding and wounded, Max growled and hunched down.
Thorn focused on Max. He was going to jump. She laid back her tall ears and bared teeth the length of knives. Her growl echoed low and deep. He was still larger than she, but not by much.
Max jumped, his clawed hands out. Saliva and blood dripped from his wide-open mouth and crooked teeth.
Thorn launched herself at the monstrosity that was once a man. Arms out, she caught him around the chest, biting down on his left shoulder, sinking her long fangs into flesh and bone. Her momentum slammed him back against the far wall.
Dr. Townsend shouted and ran for the staircase.
Thorn twisted her head, tugging at the foul-tasting fur and flesh in her mouth while digging in her claws.
Max screamed and dug his claws into her sides. His natural claws barely reached through her dense fur, but his metal claws scored long, vicious cuts down her ribs.
The brick wall crumbled under the combined weight of the two struggling werewolves. They fell out and one story down onto the debris-littered ground below.
Thorn landed on top of Max and jumped away. She shook herself and felt the burn of cuts. She turned to face him again.
Max rolled over and pushed upright on his warped legs. He looked from side to side, taking in deep sniffs, and then focused on her and screamed, spread his misshapen arms wide, and ran at her.
Thorn bared her teeth in a wolf grin. Nearsighted idiot. Four legs were far superior for speed and balance. She darted in and ducked low under his charge to grab his ankle in her jaws. She bit down, snapping the fragile bones, and kept going, dragging him facedown through the snow.
Max screamed in fury, but there was a high-pitched note of terror in his voice as well.
She dropped him and turned.
Max flipped onto his back, kicking out with his one working foot.
Thorn trotted out of range and circled, grinning for all she was worth. If she could get behind him, she could break his neck. And then she would eat. She was far too hungry to care how foul the meat tasted.
Max scrabbled onto his hands and limped toward her, slashing with his claws. His mechani
cal arm wheezed and steamed with his motions. The armpit stink of fear rolled off his skin.
She dove in, her jaws open to grab his other ankle. She closed on the bones and crunched.
Max threw himself backward, his mechanical hand slashing at her, scoring long cuts on her shoulder.
Thorn reared back, his ankle in her jaws, throwing him onto his back. She released his ankle and lunged back in to bite down on his upper leg, hunting for the big artery that ran up the inner thigh.
Max howled out his terror and grabbed at the thick fur around her neck.
Thorn twisted her head sharply, pulling her head free of his claws and ripping his leg open in the process. Blood spattered the snow and steamed.
Max somehow pushed upright and crawled back, away from her. His screams became sounds of utter terror.
Thorn dropped low and stalked after him. Max was about to die, and he knew it. She licked her black lips. Dinner was about to be served.
Max’s body shimmered and shrunk to something that very nearly resembled a human. His mechanical arm became a weight too heavy for him to move. Max grabbed for it and fought with the weight that held him pinned but couldn’t budge it from the snowy ground. He stared at her, his eyes wide, and shrieked. “Doctor! Doctor! Save me!” Tears streaked down his misshapen yet very nearly human face. “Please…please…somebody help me.”
Thorn stopped and crouched low in the snow. His fear should have been music to her ears, but it wasn’t. It was pitiful. Her growls died to silence. Max had been an educated man before someone else had made him into a monster. Someone else had made him something that could never return to being human.
Thorn took a deep breath and released it. There was no hope for Max. None at all, but he didn’t need to suffer. Clearly he had suffered enough. She rose to her paws and moved toward him.
Max froze, his screams silenced by pure terror.
She moved to his side and licked his cheek. He tasted awful.
Max shivered and then blinked up at her. “You’re going to kill me.” It wasn’t a question.
Thorn nodded slowly in the human manner.
Max blinked rapidly. “I…I haven’t been quite myself lately.” He grinned, but there was too much fear in it to be a true smile. “Actually, I haven’t been myself in quite a…while.”
Thorn shook her head. No…no, he hadn’t.
Max swallowed and shivered hard. “I can’t go back, can I?”
Thorn’s ears lowered. No, he was long past that possibility. She slowly shook her head again.
Max closed his eyes. “I…see.” Tears spilled. “If I think about it, I…I really don’t want to live this way…anymore.” He opened his eyes and looked over at her. “Can you make it, um…” he took a shaky breath, “quick?”
Thorn nodded.
Max swallowed again and then nodded. “All right.” He leaned back, lying out in the snow. He stared at her. “You’re very beautiful, you know. Even like this.” He raised his nearly human hand and wiped at his cheeks. “I was never…” he sucked in a breath and winced, “I was never anything more than a monster.” He closed his eyes. “Okay, enough drivel. I’m ready.” He lifted his chin. “Do it.”
Thorn rose, silent in the snow. She dropped her head in a fast lunge and crushed his entire neck in one bite, snapping the bones and killing him instantly.
Thorn released Max, and he fell back in the snow.
She lifted her muzzle and howled, long and sweet.
29
Yaroslav came running out of the shattered factory, his coat on and flapping open around him. “Thorn!”
Thorn turned to look and moved toward him. Her great beast form dissolved until she had only her human body. The tears welled up and exploded out of her. She dropped to her knees in the snow. “I killed him.”
The vampire threw off his coat and wrapped it around her. “I know, I saw.” He pulled her into his arms and held her curled up against his pounding heart. “It was a mercy. He was in great pain.”
Thorn nodded but couldn’t stop crying.
A hideous scream echoed from within the factory.
Thorn stiffened. “What was that?” She wiped at her cheeks and looked up at the factory.
Lightning danced behind the shattered windows.
Yaroslav looked up at the factory with her. “That would be the doctor receiving just punishment for creating one such as Max. Not to mention a plague of the dead.”
Thorn frowned. “Belus?”
“Oh, indeed.” He turned and carried her away from the factory toward the road. “Dr. Townsend will not die. However, by the time Belus is through with him, he will wish he had.”
Another scream rent the night, and then another.
Thorn shuddered. “What is he doing to the doctor?” She shook her head. “Never mind, I probably don’t want to know.”
Yaroslav snorted. “For his incurable habit of meddling in the affairs of others, Belsarius Svorsa was cursed into becoming a lamia, a creature that feeds on the blood of humans, but he also feeds on magic. By the time he is done, the doctor will never be able to work another spell again, so long as he lives.” Yaroslav stopped. “Well, now, this is of interest.”
“What…?” Thorn turned to look.
On the road before the factory was a steam car.
Yaroslav grinned. “This is most excellent. Now we do not have to walk into town!”
Thorn blinked. “You can drive one of these?”
Yaroslav lifted his chin. “I have some idea of how one works.”
Thorn rolled her eyes. “Never mind. I’ll drive.”
Yaroslav frowned. “You…?”
Thorn grinned. “Well, yeah. I’m from Long Island City. Everyone had a steam car of one type or another in their back shed. Poppy let me drive his on the back roads.” She slid from his arms. “All we have to do is get the boiler water hot and keep the pressure stable.”
Yaroslav shoved his sleeve up past his elbow. “Show me where this water is kept….”
Thorn blinked at him. “You’re going to hocus-pocus the water?”
Yaroslav frowned at her. “Hocus-pocus…?”
Thorn rolled her eyes. “Use magic on it?”
“Ah….” Yaroslav raised his hand and wiggled his fingers. “I am indeed going to hocus-pocus.” He lifted his chin. “Where is this boiler?”
The trip down the road, while full of fits and starts and quite a bit of grinding gears, was moderately uneventful. At least until Antonius came galloping up the road with six of his men.
Laughing wildly, Antonius leaped from his horse onto the coach box of the moving steam car and clambered into the seat to throw his arms around Yaroslav.
It seemed that Yaroslav’s antiserum had been released into the drinking water and dropped from the sky from balloons like rain. Apparently it worked very well indeed. Those infected but still living who drank the water recovered, and the rainfalls melted the dead on contact.
Antonius poked Yaroslav in the chest with a finger. “But you are in big trouble for leaving without telling the prince where you were going, or even that you were going.”
Yaroslav curled his lip. “It was urgent!”
Antonius sat back on the coachmen’s bench and propped his booted foot on the dashboard. “I’m sure it was, but I’m telling you right now, the prince was not amused.”
Yaroslav shook his head. “Yes, yes, I will deal with the prince’s judgment on my return….”
Antonius leaned close. “You’re taking the train, right? The royal box is waiting at the station for you, scheduled for an express transfer.”
Yaroslav scowled. “Is it so urgent I return immediately?”
Antonius nodded, and his smile disappeared. “The senate has passed another ruling.”
Yaroslav cringed. “Do I want to know…?”
Antonius smiled tightly. “Let’s just say that you and the rest of us vampires are going to be very busy for quite some time.”
“That
does not sound promising.”
Antonius shrugged. “It could have been a lot worse. For some reason, Senator Belus was missing, so a couple of the more radical possibilities didn’t even come up.” He grinned. “Thank God for minor miracles, eh?”
Yaroslav scowled. “Thank God, indeed.”
Thorn was barely awake when Yaroslav drove onto the rail station in the dead of night. The vampire carried her out of the steam car. She was wrapped in nothing but his long fur coat. He strode across the mist-shrouded platform, where a train sat already waiting.
A door was opened by a conductor, and Yaroslav stepped up into a blue velvet and gilt private car.
Thorn moaned in his arms. “This train is not going to have walking dead on it and then explode, is it?”
Yaroslav chuckled. “No, this one will not.”
Thorn got no more than a glimpse of a small dining area before her gaze was caught by the full-size, curtain-draped sleeper bed. “Wow….”
Yaroslav tugged back the blankets on the bed and set her down among the sheets. “Sleep.”
Thorn struggled upright. “I can’t.” She pressed her hands against her burning belly. “I’m too hungry. Is there any food in here?”
Yaroslav stared down at her, and his brows lowered. “There is my blood.”
Thorn grimaced. Blood, great…. She sighed. “Okay, fine.”
Yaroslav blinked. “You are not going to argue?”
Thorn shook her head. “Too hungry.”
Yaroslav unbuckled the belts to his sheathed knives around his long shirt. “I thank God for minor miracles.” He rolled his belts around the knives and set them on the floor by the head of the bed. He unbuttoned his long, dark shirt at a rapid pace, revealing his spectacularly muscled chest and belly.
Thorn stared in fascination. “You’re getting undressed?” Not that she minded in the least. He was damned nice to look at.
Yaroslav grinned and sat down on the edge of the bed. “I am hungry, too.” He tugged off his boots.
Thorn blinked. “Oh….” The warmth of excitement stirred in her belly. She licked her lips. “Okay.”
Dressed in only his pants, he sat on the edge of the bed, turned, and held out his hand. “Come to me.”
