“I prefer hunting in the dark.”
Truth is I still don’t feel a hundred percent healed from my little stunt with Vuk. Hand’s still numb where it went black. Arm feels heavy. Sluggish. I hard swallow again. Fuck sakes. Eyes on the prize, Prez. But a part of me’s wondering: maybe I’m making bullshit excuses? Dithering because I’m afra—
“I can’t wait anymore,” Lily says, her voice cracking. “Pimniq and my son…”
I follow Lily’s gaze upward. Circling through the clouds above us are several dozen giant black vultures.
“Lachlan,” I say, trying to keep the loathing from my voice. He’s a wildcard in my plan. The creepy Stricken kid has his father’s blood in his veins. Lily’s son has to die if the Stricken are to be stopped. But I know she has other, more motherly ideas—
“Shiori and the rest know we’re here. They’re not attacking,” Lily says.
“Why not?”
“They can’t risk harming Vuk.”
Bastard must be loving this, I think. Not long. Not long until the kill—
I squeeze the fingers of my right hand into a fist, making sure I’m turned away from Vuk so he can’t see me if he opens his eyes. I know he’s listening to every word we say. Fingers feel okay. Fuck it. Lily’s right. Time to get this show on the road. Another reason I’ve been delaying…been trying to think of a way I can keep Lily away from the battle zone. Yeah, just like Phoenix. But there’s no way.
“Good. Fucking excellent, in fact. Get that idiot bear brother of yours and lets roll.”
Lily squares to me. Holds her ground. Gives me a tight-lipped look.
Shit. I know what that look means.
“I need you to swear, Aaron.”
Oh fuck.
“Swear you won’t harm my son.”
A mother’s love. She makes it sound like her son’s on the fucking honor roll. Helping old ladies cross the street. Not rolling ram’s horns and a razor beak with an AKA like the Carrion Cloud. Lachlan’s a Stricken. Pure and simple. A black-blooded abomination.
So what do I do? I lie.
“I won’t harm Lachlan,” I say.
Lily’s eyes blaze. She’s not a fool. But she’s rolling with me anyway. Why? Because she needs me to do her wet work. That’s the cold truth. Needs me to be the lethal strength she’ll never be.
The remorseless killer.
It’s who I am.
And whether or not she’ll admit it, it’s partly why she loves me.
Listen, I never played at being a saint. Hell no. Lily’s known what I am since day one. An outlaw. A fucking apex predator. If I can’t turn Lachlan like I couldn’t turn Vuk, and the creepy vulture-kid lives, the One War continues in his name. The Stricken will rally around him as heir to the First Fallen’s empire.
I won’t let that happen.
Lily knows it.
So she’s washing her hands of the whole thing. Making me offer a promise she knows I can’t possibly keep. That way when I rip out her sick fucking son’s beating black heart she can be pissed at me and still feel okay about herself.
Is it fucked? Yes. Normal? Bet your ass.
Lily reaches out and holds my forearm. I try and ignore how electric her touch feels. My wolf’s pacing his cage, yearning for his bloodmate, but she’s not answering—
“Do you feel my animal’s mistrust?” Lily asks.
I nod.
“She sensed what you did to Anik. How you banished the bear. She fears you. You should have told me, Aaron.”
“I wasn’t certain.”
“How close do you need to be?”
I lean against my Harley and light a smoke. “Close enough to kill.”
“Could you banish my animal right now?”
“I think so. Yeah.”
Fear clouds Lily’s face. She swallows hard.
“What? Thought you wanted her gone? All you’ve done is hate on her.”
Lily’s eyes flash. Man. Sometimes I think I say shit just to piss her off cuz she looks so good angry.
“When we get to the pyramid, make sure Tornarsuk isn’t around,” Lily says. “I’ve seen what the bear does when Pimniq’s threatened.”
“Goes apeshit.”
“Bearshit?”
I grin. “Yeah. Anik’s gunna hate me for banishing his animal again.”
“You’ll be saving his life. A lot of lives. As long as we hand over Vuk and get Pim back from Shiori no one has to die.”
“Except Shiori,” I say, real quiet.
Lily’s jaw tenses. “Except Shiori.”
“You can say it, you know.”
“What?”
“That you want to kill her. That you’re psyched to murder the creepy little bitch.”
Lily gives me an odd look. “I’m not psyched about killing anyone.”
“What about your brother?”
Lily shakes her head. “With Shiori dead he’ll never Become. He’ll live out his days as a Skin. I’m going to imprison him. Let him live as an example of…”
Lily’s voice trails off. She’s looking down, fidgeting with her fingers. She was going to say forgiveness. Maybe mercy. But she suspects I think it’s bullshit.
She’s right. It is bullshit.
Vuk’s going to die tonight.
And his son too, if I can’t turn Lachlan’s black blood red.
“What about our blood challenge?” I say. “That shit is real.”
“Vuk won’t Become,” she repeats, like she’s trying to convince herself. “It means nothing for you to murder a Skin. You have to let that go.”
Lily stares into my eyes. She can’t read me. But she knows me pretty damned well. If she’s having second thoughts—
Her eyes harden. Then she leans forward and kisses me, a long, tender kiss that makes me kind of sad for a reason I can’t explain, and when our lips part she smiles and says, “After you, Mr. One-Eight-Seven.”
I give Lily a wide grin, then loose a roar, boot my Harley to life and turn toward the stinking valley and the asshole Vuk’s shitty lair. The Pyramid of the Sun. What a bunch of self-aggrandizing bullshit. Vuk’s just another fascist wannabe with self-esteem issues.
I’m fucking trembling with the need to tear out his heart.
But as Lily and Anik fall in behind me a frown flickers across my face.
There’s something I’m not telling my bloodmate.
A change of plans I know she’s not gunna like—
***
First blip in the plan comes when we’re about a mile away from the pyramid, close enough to see the moat filled with blood and the steps glistening red-black and the mountain of beheaded corpses piled at the base. Up on the pyramid’s platform there’s a weird wooden pole altar-thing like the one that burned me alive in the mental hospital. I look back and scowl at Vuk. The bony little bastard. He gives me a narrow, hooked smirk that makes my claws drop—
Next to finding my bloodmate, killing him might be the high point of my life.
I’m riding out front, picking my way through the rubble and corpse-strewn city streets. It’s slow going. Most of the buildings have been burned to the ground. Their gutted husks are still smoldering. It’s deadly quiet.
I keep expecting a Stricken army to roar down on us.
But there’s nothing.
The hair on my neck sands on end. I glance up, through drifting yellow haze. The vultures are with us.
We’re being escorted to Vuk’s lair.
Every nerve in my body’s on fire. All my senses are focused razor-sharp. I scent the destroyed city, the chaos and suffering. Cataclysms happen. They’re natural. Asteroids strike the earth. Volcanoes erupt. But this…slaughter? No. There’s nothing natural about. This is forced extinction. Genocide.
I dodge around a lime green Volkswagen bug. One of Mexico’s City’s famous taxis. Most of the cars we pass are burned out and wrecked, but this one is oddly pristine. Still shiny from when the owner waxed it. I see my face reflected in the metal as I roll
by. My wolf’s half out, my brow thick and my mouth stretched wide and long to make room for my fangs and my hair bunched up all wild on my head. The turquoise amulet the skinwalker gave me catches the light and shines on my chest. I got a Glock tucked into my belt, more out of habit than any real hope it’ll do any good—
I pass the Volkswagen and cast a wary glance over my shoulder. Vuk’s sitting up straight on Lily’s bike. He looks…larger somehow. His movements faster. He’s getting stronger the closer we get to the pyramid.
Good. It’s no fun crushing bugs under my heel.
I want a fair fight.
I need the fucker’s ugly mantis head mounted on a pole when I ride back to my crew. The end of the One War. That will solidify my territorial claim and cement me as the Age of Discord’s unrivaled apex alpha—
Something’s not right. I scent the air. Yeah. Something’s off.
I slow the bike even more, then wave Lily up at my side. I want her close. I want Vuk close. Anik’s been commanded to guard the rear. Trish is sitting behind him, one arm wrapped around Anik’s waist and the other cradling an AK. She looks mean as hell. Hardened. Damn. Respect for the Skin girl. She’s made it this far—
A heavy black cloud of smoke swirls up from a sewer grate. At first I think it’s just something burning, but then the smoke runs sideways along the street, straight at us, in a way that no natural smoke ever could. A rumbling growl bursts from my lips.
“Tezcatlipoca,” Vuk whispers in a way that’s filled with hatred and fear.
“Your most loyal servant,” Lily says dryly.
“Not in this age,” Vuk corrects. “He betrayed me.”
“You must be terribly disappointed.”
“More than you can imagine, sister.”
The smoke narrows to a fine point, then slowly rises from the ground, becoming a spear suspended at the level of my throat. I roll the Harley to a stop. The spear doesn’t move. It’s about ten yards away.
“Nice fucking trick,” I say, not knowing if whatever’s making the smoke can hear me. “So now that we’re all impressed and shit, why don’t you come out and say yo?”
“He wants me dead,” Vuk says.
“No shit? That’s a shame. Too bad I’m first in line.”
“Aaron…” Lily warns.
I give my bloodmate a conciliatory wave. I’m thinking about summoning the shadow-wolves. You know. Parlor trick against parlor trick.
Suddenly the spear shoots forward, so fast it makes a hissing sound as it slices through the air. A few weeks ago it might have got me. But now? I’m too fast for the motherfucker. I duck to the side and the smoke-spear hurls by, bringing a rush of cold air with it.
I have a split second to pat myself on the back for dodging the fucker when I realize he isn’t aiming for me.
He’s aiming for Vuk.
The smoke-spear shoots past me toward Lily and Vuk. Lily screams, unleashing a wave of shimmering heat that slams into the spear, and suddenly there’s a man hurting through space…or not a man exactly. He has his animal out, a massive spotted leopard. His skin’s covered in spots. War paint? No. Tattoos. His head’s shaved. He’s wearing only a loincloth. And now he’s roaring through the air straight at my bloodmate and my kill—
All right. So it’s on.
***
The spotted dude screams as Lily’s heat washes over him, but he’s still leaping through the air, his mouth open to reveal row after row of wicked feline fangs, his arms held out straight in front of him, his claws shining—
I send two of my three shadow-wolves to take the guy out. They materialize at Lily’s feet and leap into the air, blocking the fucker’s pounce. The leopard dude collides with the wolves and looses a loud grunt, then spins through the air over Lily and Vuk and lands on the pavement right in front of Anik and Trish. One of my wolves gets a nip of him and I taste his red Risen blood and then I see his animal prowling through dappled jungle sunlight, the Spotted Stalker, the one who remained loyal to Vuk after the Atrocity.
Seems he’s had a change of heart.
The leopard leaps to his feet.
Stares at Anik. Blinks. Trish levels the AK. Anik’s shoulders swell and bulge, which is very bad news—
Something hisses past my head. Are there two of the fuckers?
I catch movement from the corner of my eye and instinctively swipe a paw out. A metal-tipped spear clatters to the pavement.
I scent them now. A sewer-stink so strong my nose wrinkles.
“Skins?” I say, still not certain.
“La Mugre,” a cool female voice says from real close. Damn. I whirl just in time to see a tall, lean-muscled Latino woman with a shaved head and a necklace of animal teeth hurl a spear at my chest.
The spear might as well be moving through mud. I step easily to the side, the throttle the Harley and plough through the Skin woman, knocking her ass over teakettle. Then I crank the bike in a tight u-turn and gun for the Spotted Stalker. He hears the Harley’s roar and turns to face me, and in that moment Anik looses some of his bear and swipes the spotted fucker in the side, sending him slamming to the pavement.
Fucking hell. I close my eyes and will Tornarsuk away.
Anik screams in rage when he feels his animal being banished—
More spears arc through the air and then I see them, hundreds strong, an army of weirdo skins, all with shaved heads, their bodies strangely long, their eyes too large in their heads, their faces pierced with metal rings and rods—
A shadow swoops overhead.
“Down!” I shriek at Lily.
The horned vulture screeches as it buzzes only a few feet from my head. Collides with Vuk. Lifts him off the seat—
Fuck sakes.
The best laid plans.
I’m off the Harley in a heartbeat, sprinting the ten or so yards toward where the vulture’s about to pluck my prey from my grasp. The bird’s in the air now, his red eyes glowing in triumph, his massive wings flapping furiously to gain loft. I pounce on the back of Lily’s Harley and leap into the sky.
Ten feet. Twenty. Real close now.
I let out a booming roar. Vuk’s laughing like a maniac. The vulture swivels its hideous head down in my direction. Its eyes widen as I clamp my claws through its black feathers, loosing a cloud of choking dust that swirls into my nostrils and scents of ancient graves and dusty sarcophagi. The bird squawks and swerves hard to the right, narrowly misses slamming into the burned-out husk of a building. Someone’s screaming below but I can’t look. It’s taking all my will just to bring the bird down—
I snap my jaws around the vulture’s wing. It shrieks in pain as its brittle, hollow bones shatter and then me, Vuk and the bird are spinning out of control toward the ground.
We land in a twisted heap. The bird’s bulk crushes into me, tearing the breath from my lungs and then he’s raking at me with his talons, trying to gut me. Vuk’s managed to free himself from the tangle.
Motherfucker’s making a run for it.
The black smoke races after my ancient enemy, and I know if it reaches Vuk before me I’ll be robbed of my prize kill.
Lily screams something like Don’t you fucking hurt my son and as the vulture’s talons slip into my thigh I’m really beginning to regret that promise. I manage to punch the bird hard enough in the head to daze him, then I’m free, running after Vuk and the black smoke, summoning my animal as I run.
Two Harleys roar to life behind me.
I pile into Vuk just as the black smoke reaches him. Drag him to the ground. Cover him with my body. He’s still laughing, loving having me caught in the middle of his fucked-up family reunion. Something ice cold pierces my back. My wolf howls as the smoke-spear drills deeper, seeking my heart. I reach back and tear the spear from me. For a second my paw burns from the cold, then the smoke dissipates and I’m left swatting at air.
“I will have my brother’s blood.”
The Spotted Stalker. Rodas.
He’s crouched in the shadow
s behind an overturned delivery truck. His eyes are swirling pools of bright yellow and black, like the rosettes covering his skin.
“Get in line, kitty,” I snarl.
Lily races between us and hops off her bike.
Her skin’s glowing red-white.
“Sister,” the leopard says, sneering.
“Leave him be, Rodas,” Lily says, her she-wolf emerging as she speaks. “Our brother is needed.”
Hundreds of Skin warriors slink from the shadows. Still more emerge from the sewers. The girl I knocked flat is walking down the street toward us, her spear held high, the warriors falling in line behind her.
“Back the fuck off!” Trish shouts, resting the AK on Anik’s shoulder to aim.
The warriors keep advancing.
I don’t give them much thought. Weak-assed Skins.
But Rodas? He’s a problem.
I lock gazes with Rodas and send my wolfmind out hunting. He scents the leopard. Moves into Rodas’ mind. A swirling mix of hatred and revenge-lust. My wolf snarls at the leopard, commanding him away.
Rodas’ glowing eyes dim. A strangled sound bursts from his lips, then he leaps behind the truck and vanishes into black smoke. The Skin warriors look at one another uncertainly.
“Seems our brother has grown rather attached this animal,” Vuk says to Lily. “Can’t say I blame him.”
I’m about to command Lily to take Vuk when the sky darkens with a vast cloud of screeching vultures. The boy. Lachlan.
Pesky little bastard.
“We need to get my brother to the pyramid. Now!” Lily says, eyeing the storm of winged death hurrying toward us.
The vultures pause over the pyramid and begin circling. A giant tornado of death, moving so quickly it brings a freezing wind down to street level. The ground frosts over. The chill seeps into my bones, so cold I feel it weakening me. The boy is strong.
Maybe too strong.
I snarl at the thought. Doubt is death.
“My son,” Vuk whispers with fatherly pride.
Lily leaps at her brother, lands inches from his face. Her wolf is straining to break free. She leans into Vuk’s face and roars. Vuk’s pale face loses even more color. I scent my bloodmate’s fury. It’s taking every ounce of willpower she has not to slaughter the sick fuck—
The All Consuming: A Shifter MC Novel (Pureblood Predator MC Book 4) Page 21
