“So what do you think, Nick?”
“Beautiful. You look great in it. Let’s buy it and go home,” he finished with a chuckle. They had been there less than ten minutes and he knew this venture was unlikely to end soon. Such a beautiful model made the time worthwhile though.
The girl giggled, “You wish, but it looks good?”
“Every guy at the bar will be unable to look away, which is likely to get a few men killed… by their girlfriends, I mean,” Nick clarified seeing as she might think he was implying she would kill someone. As far as he knew, Nicola hadn’t lost control since Mike and that man had been more an attack for a mate than for food. She had been using his blood to control her thirst almost from the first day Marek had turned her.
In some ways, Nicola and most of Marek’s vampires were almost not true vampires. In the way a dog differed from a wolf or coyote, perhaps they were almost tame vampires. Voicing such a theory to any of them would probably get his face bashed in, but given a chance to let the idea sink in, they might agree. These people used small portions of his blood to avoid becoming something much darker. His blood gave them a humanity that they would have lost long ago without its unique affects.
The parade of outfits continued and he played the dutiful boyfriend as she modeled one after the other. Finally, Nicola settled on the red dress and a light weight black skirt with a button up, long sleeve, royal blue, satin blouse. He wasn’t free of shopping yet, as she dragged him off to a shoe store next.
While Nicola shopped for shoes, Nick felt a feeling that he had never felt before. The girl stopped her looking a moment later, standing back straight, she looked to be sniffing the air. The hairs on the back of her neck seemed to stand up straight as well to his eyes. The voran stood as well. His sense of smell was yet another sense that was heightened beyond that of human and, on the air circulated by the heaters of the mall; he caught a scent that seemed like nature captured. It was animalistic and also carried the smells of the forest he had been in only hours earlier.
Nicola moved towards Nick. Worry was etched on her forehead as she moved close to him pretending to kiss his neck. “Do you smell that?” she asked.
He nodded.
“I’ve only smelled the like once before and that time we ran into a werewolf. It seems that at least one has wandered into this mall.”
Nick wrapped his arms around her and leaned closer as he tried to decipher the danger involved, “Are you sure? I think I smell what you are talking about, but are you sure that’s what we’re smelling?”
The girl backed away shaking her head slightly and answered, “I can’t be positive, but I am pretty sure that’s what I smell.”
The cashier, who was pretty close to them, glanced away. She had noticed their public display, but was probably used to such things happening in the store. The woman simply didn’t want them to know that she had watched.
Ignoring whatever opinion might be in a stranger’s head, Nick moved closer to the door. Nicola pretended to look at more shoes, but he could tell her mind was no longer on that task. The smell was getting stronger.
His sixth sense seemed more accurate than his sense of smell, however, as he almost felt the exact position of where they must be in relation to him, just as he could feel Nicola without looking for her. Nick figured a voran must be wired to know the monsters that lurked in the night. The thought made him no less uneasy. If they showed themselves, this would be the first werewolves he had ever met.
And there they were across the mall path. The tiled floor held nothing more to separate him from the three monsters hidden beneath mortal flesh. They looked human enough, but he could sense the power of the creatures hidden beneath their skin. His eyes could almost get past the illusion to see the wolves with his supernatural senses.
Nicola gave up the pretense of looking and moved to his shoulder. They said nothing to one another even as the werewolves looked at them not bothering to hide that they had indeed hunted down the scent of the vampire. The three wolves must have sensed her at least as soon as Nicola had smelled them. The only question in Nick’s mind was, did they know about him?
The wolves’ human forms were diverse. The human forms of a pack mattered little to them. It was their kindred nature that brought the creatures together and their innate need to share a pack kept them together. A large Asian male, his black hair colored in streaks of a bright red and wearing black sunglasses, wore a black leather jacket with jeans and shirt partially shredded. A Caucasian girl, her auburn hair a bit wild and untamed, smiled at Nicola basically dismissing Nick. Fur lined her brown jacket. The hood and sleeve cuffs revealed the light brown hair more obviously though the jacket was unzipped to reveal a red shirt similar to Nicola’s. The third, a black male of midsize, kept his hair short though lines shaved to the skin made him look more savage. A tattoo peeked above the collar of his leather jacket creeping up his neck into the hair. He also wore sunglasses though the light of the mall hardly warranted it.
The trio moved closer as a group. They were slightly spread out, allowing for support while not appearing overly aggressive. They also prevented escape. Nick doubted they would attack in a public place like this, but their wild nature made them less predictable and he had no idea what kind of control they had.
“What are you doing all alone, little girl?” the Asian questioned Nicola disparagingly. “Just a flesh puppet to help you? Don’t you have any friends?”
After a brief humph, Nicola retorted, “I have friends, fuzzy, but I didn’t know that I’d be sharing the mall with your kind tonight. Don’t you have a forest to go run in or something? Maybe you could go water a hydrant like a good doggy?”
Nick looked to the employees and patrons of the store to see if their words were going unnoticed. Their voices had not been raised yet. It might still resemble a simple meet up of friends.
“Does your boyfriend even know what you are?” the wolf girl asked curiously. A bit of a sneer formed on her mouth as she added, “Is he your happy meal?”
Nicola kept her eyes on the three before her looking ready to spring into action. “Leave my pet out of this,” she said trying to keep Nick’s true strengths hidden. He knew this but the words still stung a little. The voran was no one’s pet. “This doesn’t have to get ugly between us and none of the normals need to be witnesses or casualties. I have no beef with you.”
“Hmm, beef,” the Asian pretended to bite the air. “I wonder if you’d taste more like chicken.”
“She seems pretty chicken anyway,” the girl added with a laugh to her pack mate.
“Don’t be stupid,” Nicola snapped testily even as she lowered her voice in a threatening way. “There’s no one that would win if we fought here. We’d all lose when it got out that our kind is in this world.”
The black man sniffed the air towards Nick. “He has their stink all over him. I don’t think he’s one of them though.”
The girl sniffed the air and leaned towards Nicola. “I smell his blood on her breath. He is a snack then.”
Nick broke in, “Does your pack roam into the woods near Palos?”
The men exchanged slightly surprised glances even as the woman tried to push the question away. “Keep quiet, Lunch-able. The big kids are talking now. If you’re lucky, we’ll kill her before she kills you.”
Nicola stepped in front of Nick as if to protect him. They both knew that not only could he take care of himself, he was probably the more powerful of the two. Her ruse was to keep the focus on her as the vampire. If the wolves did try something, he wondered what kind of fight it would be and how would he hold his own.
“I am here to shop and have a nice time with my boyfriend,” Nicola stated defiantly. “Why don’t you three go bother someone else? Better yet just go home and leave everyone alone. You do have homes to go to, right?”
The black man spoke again saying, “We’re not bothering these people. We came to see the bone bag that was bugging our noses. The fact, that gett
ing rid of the stink might be more desirable than smelling it, could lead to us doing something about it. You shouldn’t hold it against us.”
Nick moved beside Nicola forcing her to glance to him worriedly. He could tell the bullying wasn’t going to end. They thought like wolves. When an animal was separated from its’ group like a cow from its herd or a sheep separated from the flock, it became prime prey. Nicola was a vampire. She was alone and outnumbered, but unlike a simple herd animal, the vampire had teeth.
“We were simply out for a nice night out. Why don’t you go somewhere else before things get uncomfortable for everyone?” Nick said quietly.
“Nick!” the vampire breathed in warning.
The werewolves laughed at him. He was being overlooked as Nicola had planned. The Asian male stepped forward telling Nick, “Get out of our way, little man. You don’t want to be a part of this.”
Swinging with a werewolf’s strength unchecked, the man planned to slap Nick aside easily. Easily sidestepping the blow, Nick used a martial arts throw using the beast’s strength against him and tossing him aside instead. Caught off guard, the wolf tumbled to the floor. The noise caused several patrons and two of the sales people to notice the commotion.
“Maybe you should leave before this gets more public?” Nick asked of the two standing over the angry werewolf. He had a feeling that the man was fighting a change as his temper threatened to lose his control.
The other two wolves had to step in and pull the larger man back from Nick, who stood firmly before him. Nick knew that nothing too unusual had happened so far, but the wolves knew losing control would make them hunted creatures instead. His quickly put together plan to drive them away had put them into a corner in relation to their choices.
“I won’t forget this, Nick!” the Asian snarled his name having heard Nicola say it a moment before. “I can hunt you anywhere you go. I know your scent.”
“Don’t,” Nick commanded, “or you will regret it. Right now we can consider things over between us. Try to harm her or to come after me and I will show you what a lunch-able can really do. You aren’t so strong or invincible. Trust me on that.”
Growling nearly into a wolf’s growl, the man was barely restrained by the others, who also looked ready to attack them as well. It was only the bystanders and security cameras that they feared. Werewolves brought to light would mean a war that they could not win. They didn’t have the numbers the humans had or the incredible weaponry to attempt such folly. With a last few glaring looks, the trio retreated back to the mall way and disappeared from sight.
Nick’s sixth sense told him they weren’t far away, however.
Nicola asked worriedly, “Now what? You know they’re not going to let us just leave.”
Nodding, Nick replied, “Even if they didn’t try something here, they would probably follow us to try and find where you lived. I guess your two races just can’t leave one another alone in peace.”
“I’m not the one chasing them down,” the girl replied angrily. “So what are we going to do about this?”
The customers and employees were giving them too much attention for Nick’s preference. Giving up on this shop, Nick put his arm around Nicola and escorted her back into the mall. They went on shopping to see if the werewolves would tire of waiting. Nicola even bought a few more things as they discussed their best course of action.
More than an hour later, Nick could still tell the werewolves were waiting patiently.
“They’re not giving up are they?” Nicola finally asked. “We could wait all evening and they’d still be here waiting.”
Nick sighed. “Yeah, looks like these are some very patient people. I guess we’ll have to do something about them. The good news is I have a plan.”
The two spent the next several minutes discussing what they would do to escape the werewolves.
Chapter 7- Pounding Snow
The sky was dark as pavement as the snow laden clouds continued to obscure the night sky even as more snow fell. The parking lot was a bank of grey snow highlighted only by the street lamps spaced throughout the lot. There were still many cars at the mall, but traffic had been light thanks to the weather.
Sound seemed deadened with the snow. In the distance, an occasional noise from the cars and trucks on the highway dully made its way to the ground of the mall below.
It was the perfect night for an attack that would be hard to notice. The three werewolves looked to one another nodding. The vampire and her friend had finally decided to make a run for it. Their patient waiting was being rewarded.
“I’m going to kill that punk the vampire is dating,” Ray Chan, the large Asian werewolf, grumbled to no one in particular.
The black man, Lex Raymond, simply chuckled at the wolf. His large friend had been slightly humiliated by the snack’s throwing of him. Ray didn’t let friends tease him. He certainly wasn’t going to let some inferior human trash get away with it.
“Just make sure you don’t lose sight of the girl,” Aubrey Charles snapped as she brushed at her wild hair with her fingers. The woman actually worked at making her hair look like that. Strategic mussing was required to make it look the way she wanted it. “The meat bag isn’t important.”
The large man snarled angrily before acquiescing, “Yeah, I know, but we’re killing them both is all I’m saying.”
“I dunno,” the girl wondered aloud, “maybe we should follow them first and see if there are more? If she’s part of a larger clan, then we could call in the rest of the pack and kill off more than just this one.”
Lex, nodded, “Possibly, but who cares. If we kill this one, then maybe others will come looking for her and we can just kill them as they come? Then we don’t have to worry about fighting on their turf.”
“Yeah, that sounds good to me,” Ray agreed as he crunched his knuckles preparing for war.
The girl sniffed in annoyance, “You just want to kill that human now rather than later.”
“That’s fine too.”
Aubrey shook her head. The large wolf was just too impatient. He always had been, but he was powerful and that was an asset to the pack. Ray would never be a leader though. To follow him, would be the death of them all. The girl was smarter, more patient, but she knew that in this trio the males’ urges would override any guidance she could give.
“Just don’t do anything stupid, Ray,” the girl cautioned one last time as they pushed on into the parking lot. The prey walked just ahead of them now. They knew they were being pursued and walked quickly, but Aubrey was surprised they didn’t try to run.
Looking around for the human presence, Aubrey noticed no one nearby. The weather played to their benefit by isolating the five to perfection. “Looks good. Let’s kill a vampire.”
Ray leaped into the lead and half changed. His head was that of a wolf and his arms turned to clawed, hairy versions of his human hands. His legs were shifting beneath his jeans and the strength propelled him forward at greater speed than normal.
Lex kept a more level head and allowed his hands to claw, but maintained his face as he watched for the prey to react to the larger werewolf. Aubrey ran forward but held behind the men waiting and wondering at the directness of their quarry. They didn’t act like they feared being outnumbered by werewolves. Was that ignorance or were they hiding something from the wolves?
“Go!” she heard the man snack order the vampire. “I can slow them down.”
Aubrey wanted to laugh, but then, surprise of all surprises, the man met the werewolf with a flurry of blows that drove him back. He was well trained at fighting. Surprise! The woman knew skill could throw off their plan of attack, but there was no way a mere human could take Chan.
Lex tried to run past the combatants to get the vampire girl. The human was slippery though, and knocking Ray back, he was able to land a couple blows to the second wolf’s side and head. The blow to the head actually wobbled the wolf. Aubrey’s eyes widened.
With a snarl, Cha
n was back on the man. Deflecting the wild swings of the werewolf, the smaller man shifted inside and took the fight to the wolf. His blows landed hard and Ray was driven back again, but his anger drove him back at the smaller man. When another judo style throw sent the werewolf to the ground, Aubrey was left gasping. There was a loud crack followed by a scream from Ray. His arm must have been broken or at best it was dislocated, because the werewolf struggled back to his feet, and his right arm simply dangled limply at his side.
The human didn’t follow up his attack as Lex had regained his senses. The second werewolf had let the transformation change his head to the wolf and his teeth snapped at the human fighter. The man slid to the side and hammered the side of Lex’s face causing a trail of drool to follow the arc of his falling body. With a grunt, the wolf hit the ground and rolled quickly to the side to collect himself in a crouch. Lex’s eyes were a bit glazed a moment before his gaze darkened and zeroed back in on the human.
Moving at near a blur, the human male leaped forward to tag the second werewolf with yet another powerful blow. Lex narrowly avoided another strike to the face as he rolled to the right. The two exchanged attacks in a wild flurry of blows. A few tagged the human, who seemed undeterred despite their power. Several more seconds passed before the man got the better of the exchange and laid out Lex with a mighty blow. The attack rolled the wolf’s eyes into the back of his head and the transformation reverted back to his human form by the time he hit the ground.
Aubrey gasped. “How?” she began when the girl noticed a shadow by her side.
“He’s pretty impressive, huh?” Nicola asked with a grim smile on her lips. A set of needles fired into Aubrey’s side and a debilitating crackle of electricity flowed into the female werewolf’s body. Her lungs, locked up with her body, prevented her from screaming. The ground rose up and Aubrey found herself twitching in the snow unable to react.
Her eyes watched as the man walked calmly over to Ray still in shock and holding his right arm near the shoulder. The wolf had fallen to his knees, the transformation gone in the blistering pain. All sense gone, Chan never saw the punch that leveled him.
Vorans and Vampires (Book 1): Voran the Night Guardian Page 5
