Wolf Moon: Lia Stone: Demon Hunter - Episode Two (Dragon-born Guardians Series Book 2)

by Austin Hackney

  Moratu tore away the mask. The tree still flamed behind him - although the flames must have been supernatural because the tree wasn’t consumed. The fire turned from orange and red to a white flame, like the color of the moon itself; still, full and silent in the sky above, just glimpsed between the scudding clouds and the swirling fog.

  Eyes wild and exultant, Moratu gazed around him at the bodies, a few of which still writhed in the final throes of their transformation, the rest now shifted. And instead of a circle of messed up teenage girls, Moratu stretched out his arms to thirteen uber-powerful, hulking, hungry, murderous werewolves.

  Well, they say you can tell a person by the company they keep.

  But I’m too late, I thought, my heart almost thudding to a standstill. I’m too late to save them. Too late to save Sam. And I dreaded the part they would play in the invocation of Anubis if Grandma’s description of the rite had been correct. The result was, she’d said, a bloody mess.

  I should stop the demon manifesting. But how the freaking hell am I supposed to do that? I was alone, inexperienced, and I didn’t have the sword: Excalibur, the Demon-Slayer, forged by magic for the Pendragon. I have to try. I’m the Guardian, like it or not.

  The title was Guardian, yes - but the role was demon-slayer, right? If I had to wait until the demon was manifest, so be it. But then I had to slay it. If I’d not been so pig-headed with Joe, and I’d believed him about how much might be at stake, I’d have Excalibur with me now. But there was nothing for it, I needed to find out what would happen next and pray and pray and pray that I wasn’t too late.

  I didn’t know if a human could carry the sword, but I figured I might ask Joe to bring Excalibur. Grandma could open the psychic seal on the cabinet.

  I switched out my smart-phone, but before I’d finished punching in the numbers, I froze to the spot. Moratu’s eyes locked on mine.

  But they couldn’t, could they? He couldn’t see me hidden down in the dark? But I realized what a fool I’d been. I backed away down the steps.

  He grinned.

  I should have thought. Goddamn greenhorn! He knew I was there - he was Dragon-born like me. He’d toyed with me. He’d meant to draw me here all along. As I backed down further, out of his sight into the mausoleum, knocking the statue of Anubis over as I pushed past the altar and turned toward the entrance, I remembered how he’d wanted Dragon blood for his last try at sacrifice, to the demon Azazel.

  I had to get the sword! I turned and ran, but skidded to a halt straightaway.

  The hunched, snarling bulk of a werewolf blocked the doorway.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  THE WEREWOLF RIPPLED WITH MUSCLE, the writhing sinews of its supernatural flesh visible beneath the thick swathes of coarse fur. Its eyes glowed emerald green and in the cold air, breath streamed from its wet nostrils, jetting between its yellowing fangs like steam from an engine.

  The beast emitted an intense heat. It smelled, too, sulfurous and acrid. I had the strong impression of it as a machine: powerful, mechanical, predetermined for a single purpose. And that purpose was my destruction.

  I backed away to the other side of the altar.

  My heart thundered. The cold prickle of sweat broke out over my body. I had to be very, very careful.

  Hard as it was to believe, looking at the monster which lurched into the chamber, I had to remember this was a girl, a young woman, one of my university peers.

  I couldn’t just hack and slay - even if I’d had the sword. Somehow I had to get out of this mess with all my bones intact and all of hers, too.

  Moratu’s voice called from above, back in the green circle beneath the Cedar of Lebanon. He laughed and shouted, “Go! Hunt! Hunt! Bring blood for the Master!”

  The other werewolves scrambled from their places, leaping over walls and tombs, heading off, I could sense, in all directions over the city.

  But if I’d thought the werewolf in the mausoleum with me would turn and follow the call with them, I was wrong. Her muscles tensed. I caught the subtle downward shift in her body that told me she would pounce.

  She came at me straight on, arms outstretched, talons spread wide for the kill, saliva spraying my face. Icky! No messing with you, sister.

  But I’m quick, and I was a step ahead of her. By the time she landed, crashing across the altar and the broken statue of Anubis, I’d already ducked, dodging to the right and slipping by her to make a break for the door.

  I’d have made it out into the bright, crisp, moonlit night and been pelting it helter-skelter along the avenues of Highgate Cemetery toward help and home, if there hadn’t been something blocking the doorway.

  And it wasn’t blocked by anything easy like wood or stone or iron. It was another werewolf. And this one was even bigger and stronger looking than the other. I reckon until you’re locked in a mausoleum with two werewolves, one behind you and one in the doorway, with no-one to watch your back, you can't guess what it feels like. But let me tell you, even with the powers I have, I was crapping myself.

  There would be no dodging this one. And werewolves have a kind of hive-like mind. They think and work together on the hunt, like all pack animals. This wasn’t so much like being up against two monsters as one monster with two bodies, four legs, and four sets of claws, and two jaws’ worth of sharp, carnivorous teeth. Not nice.

  There was nothing for it. Much as I didn’t want to inflict harm on the girls, I had a fraction of a second to weigh up the choice I had between a host of evils, and I’d be lying if I said the instinct for self-preservation had nothing to do with my decision.

  Sensing the first wolf pounce onto the altar stone, I sank into a spring, and then flipped backwards, heel-over-head, landing a double-booted blow right into the monster’s jaw.

  A crack of bone and the splatter of fresh blood across the whitewash let me know my senses had served me well, and my aim had been spot on. But I landed badly, missed my footing, and ended up sprawled prone on the floor.

  I didn’t have time to let my eyes widen in shock before the second beast was on me, its thick slobber dripping onto my face as its claws closed around my neck, the sharp points of its talons threatening to puncture my skin.

  It swung back its head to give a howl of victory. I saw rows of razor-sharp teeth, dripping and ready to plunge down, to sink into the tender flesh of my neck, rupture my jugular vein, and bleed the life out of me.

  I so totally freaking panicked.

  My vision focused. I was looking at a huge, roving Adam’s apple rising and quivering as the beast howled. Pulling one of my hands free from beneath its muscular thigh, I aimed a punch straight at it.

  The mausoleum echoed to the sound of cracking bone as my fist sunk deep into the beast's flesh. Shit, I thought, I’m not supposed to kill these goddamned things. They’re my freaking classmates! But I had no time to worry or regret. Stronger than any moral constraint - or even the burden of my appointed role in stopping this whole demon thing going on - was my desire to survive the next few minutes.

  I guess at that point, alone in that crazy situation, I was only holding on to my reason with the slenderest grasp.

  For good or ill, the monster slumped, and slid from me, spewing green slime mixed with blood, which choked up from its throat and spilled through its jagged teeth onto the floor. The life went out of its eyes, and it fell away.

  I pushed myself up, springing to my feet, and turning to face the other werewolf.

  But it had gone.

  Whether it had passed us both, off to the hunt on the assumption I was already a goner or… or what? At that point I didn’t know, and I didn’t much care. I was just relieved I didn’t have to fight it. One last time, I checked for any hidden surprises before I turned my back, my eyes flicking through the shadows of the mausoleum. There was nothing. Besides, if there had been, I’d have been able to sense it.

  I shot out of the door of that terrifying place like a bullet from a gun. My legs burned and my lungs strained with the ef
fort I put into running. But within seconds - I mean, I’d got, what? maybe a couple yards down the avenue back toward the Egyptian portico - I felt my crystal burning up again against the skin, and the deep alarm I get in my senses when there’s something mean and nasty hot on my tail.

  I didn’t need to look back to see what it was. I knew.

  And I figured that werewolf was maybe smarter than the rest because it had left the mausoleum only to hide in wait above. It had leaped down after me as soon as I’d bolted. I guess if I’d been a human and had only human strength and speed, I’d have been meat already. And while I could outrun any mortal beast, the thing on my heels was a preternatural monster; and not only, but a preternatural with a mission.

  All I could do was keep running and hope to come up with a better plan. I didn’t want to turn and fight again. I’d already seen the outcome of that. I wondered who I’d killed. Did I know her name? Had we sat together in lectures, chatted in the common rooms, sat at the same table in the cafeteria? If I have to deal with that stuff, though, I have to deal with it later. Right now there’s staying alive to do. Justifying the means could come later.

  Trees, tombs, gravestones, carved angels, shadows and moonlight all flickered passed the periphery of my vision. Other forms ran parallel on other paths. They were large, wolf-like, strong and fast. But I didn’t get the impression they were hunting me. One of them swerved away, followed by a scream of terror, then a sound like branches snapping and an inhuman howl of victory. The wolves were hunting, and that one had just found its quarry. In this place at this time of night it would either be a drug-crazed kid or moonlight lovers with a taste for the macabre. Either way, that was one bad trip.

  I was tiring, and I realized that I’d gotten lost; the cemetery was like a maze. I was Arachne in the labyrinth and my personal Minotaur was so freaking close now, I could practically feel its breath on the back of my neck. Another few seconds, and I’d be feeling more than its breath.

  On an impulse I dashed down through a broken archway, hoping I’d find a place I could lose the monster for a few seconds, while I got back both my breath and my bearings.

  Big mistake.

  I shot down a short tunnel and all but slammed into a wall. Where the freaking hell…? I turned around. I was backed up against the wall, chest heaving, sweat dripping from me, stinging my eyes. I’d never run so fast in my life. I was in another mausoleum. There was only one way in and one way out. And that narrow doorway was blocked by the heaving, snarling bulk of a werewolf.

  And it was pissed. Seriously pissed.

  CHAPTER NINE

  MY ORIGINAL GOAL HAD BEEN to figure out what these girls were up to and stop Moratu bringing a demon through the Gate. Now my only aim was to survive. Although I knew if I didn’t achieve those other goals, there would be precious little left to survive for.

  I backed away from the beast at the door, and struggled to convince myself that beneath the monster there was a traumatized young woman whose life would never be the same.

  I wondered who had been the first among them to disappear and return changed into a werewolf. I guessed Moratu was behind the original abduction. And he’d have instructed her to pick on the weak and desperate. What had he promised them? Love? Power? I could see the appeal for girls like that: loners, misfits, always on the outside. Girls like me, I thought, but pushed the idea away as soon as it popped up.

  I had my back pressed against the cold marble slab. At least, this time there was only one monster. Although, I knew that meant the others were out on the hunt, and most of their quarry would be an easier catch for them than I’d proved.

  These thoughts all flashed through my mind in less than a few seconds while my eyes scanned the mausoleum for an avenue of escape.

  But there was no way out. No windows, no tunnels, no stairwells, no nothing; just the single narrow door where the werewolf stood.

  The monster’s eyes glowed green in the darkness, its jowls slack, tongue lolling; thick saliva dripping from between its evil fangs; its body tense, every muscle and sinew tight with pent-up energy.

  Its rough fur bristled. The heavy bellows of its breath snorted into the surrounding blackness. I sensed the curious supernatural heat the thing exuded, and smelled its scent of animal fur, sweat and sulfur.

  Seconds had passed since I’d bolted into this place hoping to escape, only to find I’d run headlong into a death trap; an execution chamber from which it seemed there would be no escape.

  But the monster still hadn’t attacked. It stood, poised, powerful, and ready to spring forward at any moment. But it didn’t spring. Even if it could see me, and I was convinced it could, it would smell me, or sense me in other ways. In either case, the mausoleum was so small and narrow compared to the grandeur of the family tombs making up the Circle of Lebanon, it would only have to lurch forward to be sure of grasping me in those foul claws.

  So why didn’t it do what its master had bidden it to do?

  My heart beat slower. The panic of the chase subsided into thoughts other than mere survival. I remembered how much pain and suffering the girls had been in as they shifted. I guess that’s what it’s like when you have change forced on you, and you have to take on a form against your nature. You must suffer, even if you want it in some perverse way. In the same instant, another thought lit up like a cartoon lightbulb in my mind. Whether it was a guess, intuition, or just plain crazy luck I thought, I know who this is, and I know why she’s hesitating.

  I stood forward from the wall and raised my arm. The creature growled, seeming larger than before, and stepped toward me, unblocking the entrance a little, allowing a halo of light to shimmer around its silhouetted form.

  My throat was dry and my hands trembled, but I held my ground. Somewhere in there was someone I knew.

  “Sam?” I said softly, as I might to a wild dog I was trying to tame. “Sam? Is that you?”

  Did I detect a twitching in the beast’s ears, as if she’d heard and recognized her name?

  “Listen, Sam. I know what’s going on. I know we’re all in a mess with this, but you can still change back. You can give up this crazy hunt and we can save you and the others.”

  The werewolf snarled again. Could werewolves speak? I didn’t know. I wished I’d grilled Joe for more information at the outset.

  She’d growled, she’d snarled all right, but she still hadn’t attacked.

  “Can you speak? Can we talk?” I said. The beast grunted; a weird gurgling sound. Her breathing was labored, heavy. The grunting came again as if she was trying to speak. But how could she? The vocal cords, the shape of the mouth, the tongue, the teeth and lips, were all wrong for speech. She could no more speak than a pet dog.

  But this was proof she’d understood me. She was still trying to form words, but her body was shaking. The effort was making her angry and frustrated. I was about to say something else when she strode forward in anger, and I heard the sound of fur-wrapped muscle and bone swiping through the dark; only a fraction of a second before my head rang with the force of a blow which would have decapitated a normal human.

  I span around with the force of the impact, hand slapping against the marble wall but stopping my face from smashing into it.

  I pulled around and sank down, ready for the next blow, ready to fight this time. But the monster didn’t come at me again. She delivered a blow to the side wall, and a crack splintered through the marble. She’d come further in now, and moonlight flooded the chamber. Did I see tears in her eyes?

  “Sam,” I said. “Listen. It’s not too late. I can turn you back if you’ll let me.”

  The beast grunted again and knelt down in an act of submission. I dragged myself to my feet. Geez, I thought, I hope I can do it now I’ve said so. It was another of those things I’d read about and studied, but you don’t get the chance to practice until you’re in a situation like that.

  First I had to calm my mind and focus. To be honest, I’d lost track of time. How long sin
ce I’d left Sam’s flat? How long since I’d found Moratu in the Lebanon Circle? I pushed such anxieties away and forced myself to come back to the present.

  Just deal with this, Lia. Then we’ll see about the rest.

  I stretched out my hands over Sam and, dangerous as it seemed, closed my eyes. The magic was building deep inside, a spinning vortex of pure, blue energy swirling up between my legs and into my spine. I drew the energy up into my head with the power of focused will, and let the pressure build a few seconds before muttering the word of power in the Dragon tongue, sending the power surging out in a fountain of scintillating light, infusing my aura. Then, focusing the energy again, I directed it down my arms and through my fingers. Blue sparks crackled from the ends of my fingertips, zapping into the monster.

  She fell onto her back with the force of it, the light streaking through her and around her. I followed the lines of energy with my mind, psychically seeking to enter the monster’s blood; deeper again, into each cell, into the DNA; finding, breaking, reconstructing, healing.

  Sam cried out in pain.

  It would be no less painful to be forced back than it was to be forced to the shift in the first place.

  She writhed on the floor as I worked the magic, unraveling and remaking her physical form. But the work was hard, and she resisted. My eyes snapped open, and saw a crisis even more dangerous than before: half werewolf, half girl; all monstrous.

  “Sam!” I shouted. “You mustn’t resist! We have to finish this now or you'll never be able to turn back!”

  I guess she saw the truth of it. And a minute later she lay, battered, bruised but human once again, sprawled among the leaves, dirt, and debris of the mausoleum floor.

  The magic was over. Only moonlight beaming in through the doorway illuminated her with its surreal light. I knelt down. She was cold and shivering, her teeth chattering. For a moment her eyes were screwed shut. I rested one hand on her shoulder, sending energy into her to warm her up. The last thing I wanted after all that was for her to die of hypothermia on a fall night in a London cemetery.