“Go away, Ernie. Just go away.”
“Alena, I am trying. I don’t want to lose your friendship. But I don’t want to get killed either. Can you understand the position I’m in?” His voice was about as dejected as I’d ever heard it. I lifted my head and wiped my eyes. His brow was wrinkled, and he wrung his hands over and over. I didn’t want to lose another friend. I sniffed once and held an arm out to him. He flew into me and grabbed me around the neck.
I hugged him, patted him lightly on the back. “I don’t understand, Ernie, but at the same time, I’ve seen Hera; I wouldn’t want to go up against her for anything in the world.”
He hiccuped a sob, surprising me. I pushed him back gently. “Why are you crying?”
The words spilled out in a tear-soaked rush. “You’re too damn nice, Alena. You shouldn’t forgive me, even though I want you to. You should probably never talk to me again, because there will probably be a time when I have to work for her or get my wings removed.”
I blew a raspberry with my lips. “I’m not that nice. Remember Achilles?”
Ernie shook his head. “You were protecting your brother and Remo. Theseus”—he grimaced and then leaned in closer to me, his voice dropping to a whisper—“he won’t make that same mistake. He knows you won’t fight for yourself. He won’t attack your people until after you’re dead.”
I sat back and opened my mouth, ready to ask a question when a knock on the front door grabbed my attention.
I looked at Ernie. “Are you expecting company?”
He shook his head. “No. Zeus has gone underground; he’s the only one who might show up from my end of things. I left him a message, but his answering machine said he was going out of town. No one has seen him since that night at the club.”
Zeus. Another issue I had a feeling I’d have to face at some point. I stood and walked to the door, taking a deep breath as I drew close. The sweet scent of vampire musk, licorice, and blood whispered across the air.
“Remo,” I breathed his name and jerked the door open even as I realized I’d made a mistake. Remo didn’t smell like other vampires. He smelled of cinnamon and honey. Not blood and licorice.
Santos grinned at me, flashing his fangs fully, something I knew from Dahlia was a sign of aggression. Like a baboon flashing its teeth right before it attacked. I slammed the door shut and threw the dead bolt.
“Alena, behind you!” Ernie shouted the warning and I spun, dropping into a crouch with instincts I didn’t know I had. A weapon of some sort blurred as it shot over my head.
“Well, well, so she has a feathered friend too? Roast chicken along with the snake tonight, boys!” The vampire right in front of me grinned up at Ernie. Which took his attention completely off me. They seemed to be coming in from all sides: the kitchen, the front door, and there was even a pair sliding down the banister.
“You leave him alone!” I shot forward with both feet and kicked him in the shins. He screeched and slammed to the floor on his belly, a gust of air shooting out of him.
The door behind me burst inward, and I scrambled away from the flying splinters. Really, it was more the vampire I was trying to get away from.
“Oh, you aren’t going anywhere, little snake girl,” Santos crooned. “I’ve got something special for you.” He laughed, and I did not laugh with him.
I rolled onto my back and scooted away. Which sent me right into another set of legs. I looked up, way up, at a mountain of a vampire, one that easily topped seven feet. He had shaggy, long red hair and a full bright-orange beard.
“Viking?” I couldn’t seem to help the one-word question.
He roared down at me, fangs exposed and spit flying. He spread his legs as he lifted a huge ax over his head, no doubt to chop me in half. I scooted between his legs and shot a fist upward as I passed his family jewels. The crunch under my fist brought an instant groan from all the vampires in the room.
“Alena, get the hell out of here, they’ve got a snake catcher!” Ernie screeched.
A snake catcher? What in all that was holy was that?
There was no time to discuss just what a snake catcher was, but I found out anyway.
I made it into the kitchen and pushed to my feet when a thin metal wire flipped over my foot and wrapped in tight to my jeans, cinching shut like a noose around my ankle.
A sizzle crackled through the air, and I stared at Santos on the other end of the noose. The long wire was attached to a five-foot-long steel rod. Like a dog catcher’s favorite tool. It had to be what Ernie meant. I tugged hard with my leg, and the pole was ripped out of Santos’s hands.
“Idiot, you think you can outmuscle me?” I snapped at him. Though I was terrified, I wasn’t going to let him know it. I wanted them to believe me dangerous, even if I struggled with the concept.
“I can smell your fear, Alena. And I like how it tastes,” he purred.
Poop on it, so much for my bravado.
I backed up farther as I wiggled my foot in a vain effort to get the noose off, but it was stuck tight to my jeans as if it had magnetic properties of some sort. I kept my eyes up, reached the kitchen sink, and groped behind me. I came up with a frying pan in one hand and a large cookie sheet in the other.
The vampires circled in tighter, laughing. “Look out, boys, she’s going to brain us with her kitchen wares!”
“Five against one, that’s not very fair,” I said.
“Oh, it isn’t five against one.” Santos grinned. “I have a crew outside too, just in case you manage to slip”—he made a snake-wiggling motion with one hand—“through our fingers.”
Another sizzle crackled in the air, and the smell of burning material tickled my nose. Heat suddenly erupted on my leg where the noose had hooked in tight.
I screamed as I went down, writhing with an intense burning pain, not unlike an oil burn I’d had when I’d made my first attempt at deep-frying apple fritters. Only this was a thousand times worse. I couldn’t think past it, couldn’t make myself care that I was surrounded by enemies.
“See, I told you that potion would work,” Santos crowed, but I barely registered his words; I had to get the noose off. I scrabbled at my leg, but every time I touched the noose, my fingers burned, scalding.
“Grab the handle,” Santos instructed, “and I’ll get on top of her.”
This was going down faster than a stack of pans off the top shelf. I had to do something now, or I was going to end up in more trouble than I’d been in so far in my new world.
And that was saying a fair bit.
CHAPTER 6
With my teeth gritted tight, I reached for the noose as one of the vampires reached for the long handle. I grabbed the metal wire, crying out with the pain in my hands that mimicked the unreal pain in my leg, and loosened it just enough to slide my foot out.
I jerked away from the noose as though it were a snake. Scratch that, as though it were a snake catcher. I pushed myself to my feet and climbed onto the kitchen counter.
“What, you can fly too?” Santos laughed up at me, his dark eyes filled with anything but humor. “My, my, Remo is going to be upset when he sees the damage on you.”
Breathing hard, I struggled to think straight. The pain encompassed every aspect of my mind and thoughts. I wanted away from the vampires; I needed somewhere dark and quiet and cool to heal my wounds. Somewhere to hide.
I turned my back and dove for the tiny window over the sink. The shattering glass didn’t hurt me except where it landed on my hands and leg that had already been damaged, leaving me open to yet more injury.
Shouting erupted all around as I hit the ground with an unladylike splat. I pushed up and took off, running as fast as I could, doing my best to ignore the intense pain as it spread up my leg. I’d had burns before and worked through them; I could do it now too. The snake in me urged me on, self-preservation kicking into overdrive.
A flutter of wings drew my attention to the left, and I followed Ernie, blindly, unable to see through
the wash of tears.
“Get into the water!” Ernie seemingly appeared at my side, and I stumbled to a stop. “Get into the water, you’ve got to wash it off!”
The sound of flowing, gurgling water drew me to it. A haze of pain coated my vision, so I followed the sounds until I was standing knee deep in a fast-flowing current. I sank down, burying my hands into the ice-cold water. A shuddering breath escaped me.
Ernie was in front of me; I could feel the wind off his wings as he trod air. But I kept my eyes closed, swallowing down the nausea that rose even while the pain eased a little.
“Alena, talk to me.” He touched the side of my face, and I slowly opened my eyes. The world shimmered and slowly solidified.
“I feel like I’m staring through a bowl of gelatin.” I shifted my leg and groaned as the pain spiked again. I let it float back down to the rocks on the riverbed and forced myself to remain still, the flowing current pulling whatever had been on the snake catcher’s loop away from me.
I blinked up at Ernie, a sudden thought making my adrenaline surge once more. “Did I lose them? Do I have to run again?”
He flew straight up into the air and stared back the way we’d come. “I think they gave up. You were moving too fast, even injured, for them.”
I lay back in the water. “Tell me if they come.”
He stayed where he was, but he kept glancing at me. “How bad are you hurt?”
“I don’t know, it’s like I dipped myself in oil and set it on fire.”
He grimaced and looked out around us again, doing a slow circle. Where was Remo when I needed him? Dang it all, this was kinda his fault; he could at least have the decency to show up when . . .
I lifted one hand out of the water. My fingertips were seared right through both my human skin and the snakeskin underneath, showing muscle and even a hint of bone. I shuddered, and not from the icy water. My snakeskin could take a rocket launcher. Santos had said the potion would work. Was that what had done it, or was it a special kind of metal on the snake catcher? Whatever it was Santos had used cut through me like fat-nosed Colleen going through a cheesecake. “Ernie.”
“Yeah?”
“What kind of material was that he had? It was like my kryptonite, wasn’t it? Silver, maybe? Could I be reactive to a metal like some other Super Dupers?”
He dropped like a stone, his feet dipping into the water, his whole body shaking. “They found you. You have to run again.”
I lurched to my feet and stumbled out of the water. “Where?”
Ernie did a quick spin in the air. “The Supe Squad could take them, even unorganized as they are. If you can make it.”
I slogged out of the water, limping hard. The burn had faded, washed off in the river. But the open wound was anything but pleasant. At least it didn’t make me lose my mind like the . . . whatever it was that had cut me open.
“You lead, I’ll follow,” I said. “I can’t think past moving.”
“Hurry, this way.”
I could only hope that he didn’t lead me straight to Theseus. Or worse, Hera. I forced myself to work through the pain. When I’d burned myself baking, I’d still had to bake, I couldn’t stop. This was the same. Work toward the goal through the hurt, through the sharp stabs. Hard breaths slipped out of me through clenched teeth, and I tried not to think about the warm blood sliding down my leg.
“The blood, that’s how they’re finding me.”
Ernie groaned. “As long as they don’t stop and lap any up, you’ll be okay.”
“Deep-fried dog turds, that . . . would be bad,” I whispered and forced myself to a higher rate of speed. I’d not even thought about the vampires getting a boost of power if they stopped and took some of my blood. They wouldn’t, though, would they? They wouldn’t know that my blood gave a vamp the increased speed and power that didn’t normally come to them even if they had lived thousands of years.
A streetlight flickered into view, and suddenly I knew where we were. Three houses down on the right was Merlin’s place. The windows were dark, though, and the door was boarded up. Not that I thought he’d help anyway, no matter what Yaya said.
“Ernie, I can find the station from here. Go get Remo. Please.”
Ernie flew backward in front of me. “Are you sure?”
“Please, find Hermes and get Remo. I can’t fight them like this.” I wasn’t sure I could fight them at all.
I ran down the street—okay, limped quickly down the street. From the corner of my eyes I saw movement between the houses, the flitting of shadowy forms.
They were surrounding me. With a whimper I forced myself to move faster, ignoring the stab of pain with each step, ignoring the hard ground beneath my bare feet.
Two vampires shot out from either side of me, and a new burst of energy fired through my veins. I dodged them, but only barely, as they reached for me. One of them had that damn snake catcher.
Shouting erupted all around, and their cries drove me forward. Something slammed into my knees, and I was sent flying through the air. I hit the ground hard, a large body on top of me. I stared up into the red beard.
“Viking.”
“Ball-crushing bitch,” he snarled.
I shouldn’t have laughed, I knew it. But I did anyway. I burst out laughing, unable to contain the hysteria, the fear driving it more than anything. Funny enough, Viking did not laugh with me.
He grabbed me around the neck and hefted me up, strangling me with one hand. I clawed at his arms and, slowly, consciousness faded.
As my awareness slipped, the Drakaina in me woke.
And she was not happy. It was like watching a movie from inside my head. I shot a hand forward, driving it into the back of Viking’s elbow and breaking his arm so badly the bone shot out the crook of his elbow. He screamed and dropped me, but I didn’t back off.
I grabbed him and yanked him forward, as if I were going to kiss him. Only I didn’t kiss him. I drove my fangs into his face, scoring his skin with the venomous tips.
Screeching, he slapped his good hand over his cheek and reeled back. I spun and caught the next vampire by his hair and twisted, yanking his neck at an impossible, bone-shattering angle.
As the blood pumped through me, I fought with my inner nature. I was not this girl; I was not this violent snake monster.
Santos approached, the snake catcher in his hand once more. “Well, well, so you do know how to fight.”
The words that slipped from my lips were not my own; they couldn’t be, because I wasn’t like that. “I will destroy you, vampire.” The husky slither of my voice seemed to curl around him. “Drop the weapon.”
He dropped it as though it were a hot frying pan.
His eyes widened and fear coursed over them, followed swiftly by a hatred so intense it all but crackled in the air between us. I swallowed hard, and the snake in me receded.
“Go back to your home,” I commanded. “And take all your vampires with you.”
The power in my voice shocked me as much as it seemed to shock him.
He snapped his fingers, and he and his vampires, even the wounded ones, slunk away into the darkness.
I stumbled back and put a hand to my head. “Oh my good grief.”
The street around us was silent as a grave, and I didn’t like that comparison. I took a step, and then another, until I was running once more. I didn’t stop until I hit the doors of the SDMP station and burst into the main lobby. I dropped to my knees, sobbing with relief.
“Ms. Budrene. What in the devil’s name are you doing here?” The hard voice had never sounded so lovely to me. I looked up into Smithy’s icy blue eyes.
“Santos and his crew. They attacked me.”
His eyes widened as they swept over my body, taking in my injuries.
“Where?”
“Near Merlin’s house.”
He swung around and barked at the men behind him. “Boys, get on it. Drive them out of town.”
With a chorus of snarls a
nd howls, the Supernatural Division of Mounted Police, werewolves to a man, rushed out the doors. Smithy did not go with them. He dropped to a crouch. “Thought you were some sort of badass Greek creature? That’s the rumor.”
A wobbly smile curled my lips. “You and me both. They had something that cut through me—badly.”
He nodded, his eyes on my leg and then flicking to my hands. “Shit. You aren’t kidding.” He let out a tired sigh. No doubt he was regretting coming into work today. “Come on, I’ll get you cleaned up and you can tell me exactly why Santos is after you.”
He didn’t hold his hand out to me, didn’t offer for me to lean on him. Smithy wasn’t that kind of man, and I was glad for it. The last thing I needed was attention from another man that I didn’t know what to do with because my siren abilities kicked into overdrive. Like Jensen.
And maybe even like Remo. A sigh slipped out of me as I limped after the larger-than-life police officer. The silence was heavy in the station without the ebb and flow of his men.
“So what happened?” he prompted.
“I . . . well, I protected Remo at the courthouse earlier today.”
Smithy glanced at me. “Remo needed protecting? Since when?”
I frowned, bristling at the underhanded insult. “Since today, when he was attacked by Santos’s entire crew with a rocket launcher in the middle of the human courthouse because our system is down with Oberfluffel missing in action.” The words snapped out of me, but Smithy didn’t appear bothered.
“And you happened to be there?”
A groan slid from my lips as I touched my fingers together, pain snapping through me. “Divorce proceedings.”
“Well, that’s like trying to paddle up shit creek with your bare hands.” He snorted and shook his head. Like I was an idiot for trying to change things, just like everyone else thought—that an actual divorce was a ridiculous dream of mine.
I wanted to smack him, and would have if my hands weren’t still throbbing and dripping blood with every step I took.
“Where exactly is Oberfluffel anyway?” I asked.
Fangs and Fennel (The Venom Trilogy #2) Page 8
