Angelic Blood (#5): Alpha Warriors of the Blood (The Blood Series)

by Tamara Rose Blodgett

  Gas-Food, it blinks. Well, part of it blinks. The G is missing in the first word. It's creepy. Tessa is somehow reminded of the Psycho movie from the 1960s.

  She was a whelp in those days. Sometimes, Tessa doesn't think the longevity of being a Were is all that hot—like now, when she's hungry, tired, and broke.

  She'll have to steal soon. Tessa hates that routine.

  Just because she can take from the humans doesn't mean it sits well with her.

  The gravel crunches under soft tires that need air. Tessa squints. Dawn is rolling over the Olympic Mountains, wrapping them in the sherbet tangerine of daybreak.

  She can't believe the place is open. She parks by the air pump. Swinging the door wide, she begins to exit the low-slung car. “Ah!” Tessa turns to pop the glove box and rummages around.

  The air pressure gauge in hand, she measures each tire. She fills all four tires, her eyes ceaselessly scanning her surroundings. Things are quiet for the moment as the hush of dawn adds to the false stillness. Tessa suspects the quiet before life begins a new day, is present for another reason besides daybreak.

  Standing, Tessa swings her long ebony braid over her shoulder and jams a hand in the front pocket of her jeans. She extracts a crumpled ten dollar bill. She opens her hand, where a fifty-cent piece glows. As she holds it, the flesh of her palm begins to burn as if she’s waving her open hand over a candle flame. Turning, she sets it on top of the roof of the vintage Impala. Carefully, using only her fingertips, she flips it.

  The coin has the year engraved on it: 1964.

  Silver.

  Figures. Tessa can't wait to pass it into the currency of America. She’s amazed it didn't burn a hole through her jeans.

  Silver is poison to her kind, but Alpha females have some immunity. If she'd been male, the silver would have behaved like a burning ember inside her pocket.

  Maybe their immunity had something to do with the importance of young. Tessa is always partially immune to silver while in quarter-change form.

  Female Were are not plentiful, hence, her nomadic lifestyle. As soon as Tessa came of age, her pack began a bidding war for the right to mate her.

  Knowing they would fight over her like what they were—a pack of wolves—Tessa decided to split before they had the opportunity. Now she's been rogue for two decades.

  She's killed more males that she wants to admit.

  Still, they were all deserving of death. Most were rogue like she was. But that did not give them the right to force her to mate with them.

  Tessa trusts no male.

  She exhales in a harsh burst, blowing the tendrils of hair that escaped from her braid out of her face. She can't allow herself to think of her slain packmaster father. He would not have allowed the bidding war.

  Sadness tightens her body.

  He would have given his only daughter a choice.

  Her pack had robbed her of her freedom, along with her grief over his death. Tessa didn’t have the luxury of mourning her father. He'd been challenged as packmaster by the one male who presumed victory would kill two birds with one stone. Tramack believed he would rule… with Tessa at his side.

  As though I could ever forgive my father's murderer.

  Tessa touches the heels of her palms to her drenched eyelashes and breathes deeply until she calms herself from a memory that is twenty years old.

  The pain never seems to lessen.

  It could, if not for Tramack's endless pursuit. His scouts seek her incessantly. Tessa manages to stay out of their sight for two years at a maximum before they find her again.

  She lowers her hands and stares at the gas pump without seeing it. Finally, she punches in the pre-paid amount at ten dollars and fifty cents. She slams the old-fashioned lever and begins to pump the gas, her All-Star bright-red sneaker resting on the concrete curb that holds the pumps.

  The gas pump chimes really quickly when all you have is ten bucks. Too quickly.

  Tessa sighs, slipping the nozzle back into the holder, and shoves the lever down. A light breeze lifts the small hairs on her forearms.

  A bird cries a warning.

  Tessa's head jerks up, and her nostrils flare. Tendrils of hair swirl around her face, obscuring her acute vision.

  The tiny hairs that humans ignore as a warning to imminent danger rise at her nape.

  She ignores nothing.

  Tessa moves away from the pumps, her eyes scanning the pocketed shadows of forest that are everywhere the eye can see. The gas station’s yellow fluorescents cast a sick glow on the sidewalk that creates an uninspired strip at the entrance.

  She sucks in huge lungfuls of crisp mountain air, closing her eyes and isolating her senses to just those of scent.

  Tessa holds herself still.

  Layered and comprehensive, the smells of cedar and Douglas fir needles, rich earth, lichen, asphalt, humans, and small forest animals drift over the olfactory regions of her nose.

  Tessa chuffs in little bursts of air then parts her lips, taking breath through both her nose and mouth simultaneously.

  The radar of scent surges out like big ripples and pings out at the odor of the large animals—felines, elk, and mountain goat.

  Beyond that, the Pacific Ocean cleanses her palate, and she exhales.

  Inhaling more deeply, she holds the air inside her lungs, and on this exhale, she smells something out of place.

  Mud.

  Her eyelids flip open.

  Two men exit the forest. Tessa takes their measure, her heartbeat ticking faster. Her nose flares frantically.

  She smells only the mud.

  Then she sees them clearly. Beyond the black border of the forest and in the first light of day, Tessa understands why she can't scent them. She would laugh if the situation weren't so dire.

  The Were are covered in the mud of the tidelands. That was why the smell of the sea was so strong.

  If she hadn't been so busy cataloging, she would have known the ocean shouldn't smell so close. Tessa had become complacent. She hadn't been thorough and got caught with her panties down.

  “Hello, Tessa,” says one of the two.

  They're obviously guards.

  Tessa slouches against the car, crossing her sneakered feet at the ankle.

  “Hey, boys.”

  The one who spoke raises a brow. “We're glad we could get a chance to talk to you.”

  “I'd think my answer would be obvious by now. Or did the other two dogs I put down not let you know my thoughts on the subject?”

  He scowls, casting a glance at the dumb pup all but wagging his tail beside him.

  “Byron,” he says, twirling a finger in the air. The quiet one moves wide, making it impossible for her to see them both straight on.

  Dammit.

  The handle of the car door is a foot away from her hand. Tessa's palm itches to touch it.

  Or her palm itches because of the silver coin she held for a few seconds.

  The silver coin!

  Tessa's finger twitches. The Were who thinks he can just swoop in and take her notices.

  “Clever camouflage.” She says to distract him, but she means it. She had almost no warning. Birds were sometimes helpful.

  Tessa frowns and glances up at the tree for just a moment, catching sight of a snow-white bird. Her frown deepens.

  Strange. But Tessa doesn't have time to think about the bird. The two Weres are closing in.

  Her gaze finds Byron, who is half her age, inching closer. She looks for anyone who can help her.

  The human at the cash register glances outside.

  Their eyes meet.

  She hasn’t paid.

  Don't come out here, she screams inside her head. Of course, he doesn't listen.

  About sixty-five and portly, he shuffles out. “Hey, miss?”

  “Yes?” Tessa replies without taking her eyes off the Weres.

  “You gonna pay?”

  “Yup,” she answers. But she's not a hundred percent on that.
/>
  Byron inches closer.

  Talkative looks at the heavyset cashier and narrows his gaze on him.

  Some people don't have any instincts of self-preservation. This human is definitely one of them.

  The cashier's eyes widen. What he sees is a six-foot-three-inch man covered in mud. To Tessa, he reeks of rotting sea vegetation. A human at that distance would have only his sight.

  And the Were is a pretty weird view.

  “What's going on here?”

  Oh boy.

  “What's going on, human, is you're going to march your fat ass back into that dilapidated store and pretend you didn't see us.” A cruel smile lights his face like an old-fashioned camera bulb exploding.

  Tessa's pulse quickens, and Talkative's nostrils flare as his face briefly turns in her direction.

  She's had calls that were closer, but not by much.

  “Listen, you're on my property. She hasn't paid, and I'm not letting two thugs who don't know what the inside of a shower looks like get in the way of me getting gas money owed. Go pack sand.”

  Talkative growls, and his skin shifts like liquid. His bones morph into a melting candle wax of sloughing skin as his face changes into wolfen.

  He shakes like a wet dog, scattering clumps of tideland mud, both dry and wet.

  Tessa's eyes tighten in pain as she performs her own quarter-change from the sloppiness of her human form. She dropped it once she arrived at the gas station, letting her guard down.

  Instantly her ears, nose, and eyes become more. More sights reach Tessa, who can now pick out seaweed as small as a thread clinging to the Were.

  She can smell the soap he uses underneath the sea muck.

  His wolfen gaze falls to her as if she’s his prey. The slow spin of yellowed irises rotate faster as he believes his quarry is almost his.

  The cashier takes a hard look at the shit going down and hightails it back inside the store.

  Smart man.

  Talkative turns to her, now seven feet of striated muscle in motion. A coat of nutmeg-colored hair covers every bit of him as his short snout lifts, snuffling a few times to gather more of Tessa's scent.

  A bell jangles, and the man comes back out and cocks a shotgun.

  Tessa intuits everything. Action. Consequence.

  “No!” she screams.

  She thought he'd agreed and retreated, finally seeing the potential for his death by their hands.

  But he's a typical human. Have gun, will kill.

  Talkative can't move fast enough. The buckshot does, riddling the Were like a seven-foot-tall slice of Swiss cheese.

  Talkative slows but doesn't stop. He launches himself at the porky cashier and tears out the man’s neck upon landing.

  Blood shoots up like water from a broken fountain, and bloodlust momentarily distracts him.

  Tessa's head snaps to the right as Byron rounds the gas pump island. She moves quickly, snapping her fingers up to the coin on the roof of her car. I might only have one chance.

  In quarter-changed form, Tessa has increased senses, speed, and strength. She uses that now, when only the car's length separates her from Byron.

  She sprints to the trunk as he's at the hood.

  She launches the coin with everything she has, and her hand-eye coordination is perfect in her changed form.

  The edge of the coin slams into the middle of his forehead, and he howls. Instinctively, Tessa slaps her hands over her ears.

  The coin burrows, doing the work for her as his skin parts to the most abhorrent substance to a Were. Tessa watches his skin burn, the edges blackening and folding open like the petals of a dying flower.

  She backs away as blood spills.

  His brains are next, and the coin doesn't disappoint. Like a horrible flat missile, it keeps seeking its target. There's no great healing that can arrest its progress. Male Weres can't heal from silver damage.

  “Oops,” Tessa breathes out as the river of what was inside his skull flows down his face. She begins to back away. Someone suddenly grips her upper arms from behind.

  Smelling rancid mud, she slams her head backward. She's almost six-feet tall in her quarter-change form, and she uses that height, hopping as she flings backward. Tessa headbutts Talkative.

  He staggers backward and she runs.

  Tessa slips in all the blood and falls on her ass so hard her teeth snap together. He lurches toward her, and she rolls to stand.

  A snowy bird that looks like a dove but isn't glides down in a loose spiral. The bird is a spot of purity in the blood that covers the asphalt. Talons splay.

  Tessa grips the asphalt. The congealed blood is thick under her short fingernails. She pushes off, trying to put distance between herself and Talkative.

  The bird screeches, high and brilliant, above and forward of her position.

  The talons are sharp and big in Tessa's vision as it swoops closer. She ducks, and the bird flows over her head, lifting the loose hairs on her head and missing her by inches.

  The screaming tells Tessa it has found its mark.

  She stumbles forward and glances over her shoulder.

  The bird's white feathers are covered in blood, and it carries an eyeball hanging by a gruesome tail of sinew.

  The bird caws, slinging the orb off its talon. It spins in the crisp morning air and lands with a thud on the pavement. Puke threatens, but right now, it’s survival of the fittest.

  Talkative grabs the bird’s body, and it cries in alarm. Tessa rushes the Were, who tracks her with his one good eye.

  The bird dips its beak and takes his other eye while he's distracted by Tessa's approach.

  The Were lets go of the bird and drops to his knees, howling.

  Tessa hurtles forward, knocking him down. She grits her teeth as she slams his head into the asphalt.

  Once.

  Twice—bone shatters.

  Three times.

  His brains spill onto the asphalt.

  Tessa wrenches her head to the right and sees Byron lying in his own brains, motionless.

  A sigh escapes her, and she stands, trying not to shake. Tessa moves to push hair out of her face, and a bit of skull clings to fingers, which are covered in sticky gore with bits of dirt and granules of asphalt. She gulps.

  Her eyes avoid the bodies. Instead, Tessa looks for the bird—and sees a Were instead.

  Barely out of welphood, she stands before Tessa as naked as the day she was born.

  Breathe, Tessa.

  The day simply can't get worse. “I'm Tessa.”

  “I am Tahlia.”

  “Are you—did you?” Tessa doesn't know what to say, and it's a damn miracle there aren't more witnesses. At least there's that miracle.

  “Yes. I am a Wereshifter.”

  Tessa had heard the legends. She'd just never seen it in the flesh.

  Or feather.

  Tessa eyes skate over the gruesome wreckage then return to the naked Were.

  “You saved me.”

  Tahlia nods. “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  She smiles, and Tessa is struck by the girl's beauty. “I could scent their intent.”

  “You're naked.”

  “I am,” she gestures to herself. With a little laugh, she adds, “I had to escape something in a hurry, so…”

  “You can come with me,” Tessa gestures to the car. “I'll change the plates out at the next larger city.”

  She blinks once, very slowly. “Thank you.”

  “I have clothes,” Tessa says.

  “Okay.”

  Tahlia is stoic the entire time.

  “Do you remember what you do when you change?”

  Tessa doesn't. Once in human form, most Were do not remember what occurred while they were in their animal forms.

  She nods. “Every bit.”

  Her full, perfect lips tremble as she shivers slightly in the cool air.

  “Come ʼere,” Tessa says.

  Tessa wraps her arms around the small
er girl. “It'll be okay,” Tessa says.

  “I know.”

  Tessa tries not to feel guilty about the lie she just told the vulnerable girl.

  And she fails.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Slash

  Slash maintains the rear of their morose little expedition with ease. The Singers and supernaturals alike, who have not seen their fair share of war, look the same: shell-shocked or just plain shocked.

  The Homer cop turned Red, Karl Truman, trudges along like it's any other day. Fighting to right the wrong is all that sort of male appears to need.

  The Rare One continues on at her husband's side, and he maintains his wolfen form, as all the Were do.

  Many of the Singers needed more healing than the handful of Healers could attend to, and they remain in need of more healing, rest, and food. There won't be much of that for the next few hours, though.

  Brynn is the only vampire who remains. He’s a shifty fanged fuck if Slash is any judge. And Slash believes he's a fine judge.

  Tom Harriet still lurks in parts unknown, and he will certainly make another try for the Rare One. Julia will not be safe until the threat of the Reds from the Alaska den is over.

  And now the demonic threaten her, as well—the fey.

  And as much as Slash is loathe to admit it—the Singers are angelic. Not all, but some. Those Singers who manifested the telltale veining that pulsed like liquid gold and silver have been duly cataloged. It appears that roughly one in three are “angelic.”

  The angelic Singers were more successful during the siege of the demonic, and more of them survived.

  Slash holds in the sigh of disgust at the memory of the pyre and the thought of Tharell, like a dog on a chain, waiting impatiently for his demon master's return so he can bite the first Singer who is near.

  Slash voted for Tharell's immediate death. Whatever answers the Sidhe can supply are outweighed by the need for the group's safety. Tharell is a loose cannon. It seems more prudent to put him down like the dog he's proven himself to be than to keep him around. And the Unseelie warriors have proven tremendously hard to kill.

  Slash spares a glance at the green Sidhe, Domiatri. A thread of scar tissue remains at his throat. Slash guesses that after another day, even that will be gone. Slash didn't ask how he managed to fetch his head after it was chopped off.