Monster Born (Northern Creatures Book 1)

by Kris Austen Radcliffe

  Yellow and black police tape crisscrossed between his shadowy body and where I stopped fifteen feet away. He stood on the beach in the exact spot where he’d killed the man who’d taken the video of Akeyla.

  She stood in front of Brother, her hands clasped to the chest of her pale pink hoodie and her eyes and face equally pale from terror. “Uncle Frank,” she said.

  Brother grinned and lifted his hand to set it on her shoulder.

  I may lumber, but I am fast. I whipped the axe at his head.

  Akeyla screamed and, thankfully, ducked. She immediately bolted under the police tape and ran up the beach toward me.

  Brother twisted. The axe flew by his head and directly into pallet of siding. He twisted back and reached over the tape for Akeyla.

  He snagged her by the hood. She screamed again. I ran forward fully intending to tackle him to the ground.

  Akeyla’s hood ignited. Flames leaped from the fabric to my brother’s hand and he snatched back his fingers.

  “You little brat!” He swung his fist at her head.

  I hit him at a full run and we tumbled across the beach toward the pallet and the axe. The police tape wrapped around us as we rolled and punched, but it didn’t seem to be hindering my brother’s hits.

  He slammed my shoulder into the ground. “What’s more delicious? You watching me drain her, or her watching me drain you?”

  His fangs appeared. Brother raised his head to bite into my neck.

  The protection spell along the side of my head kicked him in the teeth. His head snapped back and he rolled off me.

  Akeyla slapped at her hood but stood her ground. “Leave Uncle Frank alone!” she yelled, and slapped at her hood again.

  Brother jumped to a squat and wiped blood off his lip, then swatted at the police tape still coiled around his legs. “I can dislocate your shoulder but the spells won’t allow me to break your skin?” he said. “Fascinating.”

  The shadows around Brother deepened. He was about to jump into The Land of the Dead.

  I shot up and reached for the axe.

  The police tape around Brother’s legs ignited.

  “Yes!” yelled Akeyla. “Go away!”

  Brother howled and slapped at the flames. The shadows tightened. He vanished.

  “Akeyla!” I yelled as I pulled the axe from the pallet. “Come here, honey!” He couldn’t snatch her if she was right next to me.

  She ran down the beach.

  Brother appeared directly between us. Directly in front of the running Akeyla. She screamed and did her best not to skid on the pebbles but I knew she wouldn’t be able to stop. He’d have her again.

  I lifted the axe to swing, but it refused to leave my hand. “What…” I said.

  A small black-and-violet canine body leaped from the top of the pallet.

  “Jaxson!” I yelled. “Down!” If I got the axe in the right place, I could take off my brother’s head.

  Jax latched onto Brother’s ear and shook his head.

  Brother swatted at the young wolf but Jax was too fast. He landed between the monster and Akeyla, Brother’s ripped-off ear in his mouth.

  Jax spit out the ear and growled loudly.

  My brother touched the side of his head. “Well, well,” he said, and slowly picked up the ear. He looked at it, then placed it back where it belonged.

  I could not reassemble myself. Not like that.

  Brother grinned. “Guess I’ll kill them both.” He snatched for Jax.

  The kid snapped at his hand and danced out of the way.

  “Leave Jax alone!” Akeyla yelled. A bit of stray construction timber on the shore caught fire.

  Brother looked down at the wood, then at Akeyla, then over his shoulder at me. “She’s as much of a monster as you and I.”

  If I threw the axe, he’d dodge again. The axe agreed.

  “Put that axe down, dear brother,” he said. “Set it on the pebbles and step away from it.” He rolled his shoulders. “It won’t kill me, but that damned thing does hurt.” He chuckled. “I kind of like it.”

  Jax inched around so he was between Brother and Akeyla. I nodded toward the house, hoping that the kids would understand.

  My brother, thankfully, ignored me.

  I set the axe on the ground. “You need to go red now,” I whispered, hoping the gloves and the axe were listening.

  “Oh, I started red, dear brother.” He sniffed and made of show of looking bored.

  Behind him, Jax nuzzled Akeyla and she turned to run for the house.

  My brother blinked. He snarled and stepped toward the kids.

  The magic around my hands lifted off. Sigils cycled. The mechanics of compatibility switched from elf to whatever made the dagger, and I reached for the towel in my waistband.

  I threw the dagger at my brother’s heart.

  He twisted again, but not fast enough. The dagger lodged in his shoulder.

  “Go!” I yelled. Akeyla and Jax ran for the house.

  My brother howled. The magical bolt-scar on his neck and shoulder brightened again. All his muscles tensed and he dropped to all fours.

  He tried to grab the hilt. He tried to pull it out, but like me, he couldn’t touch it.

  The magic of the dagger would not allow him to remove it—but it hadn’t killed him, either.

  He roared again. His ash tightened around his body but the bolt-scar flared and it dissipated.

  I kicked him in the head.

  He grabbed for my leg but I dropped my knee and swung my fist down toward the dagger.

  It wouldn’t allow me to touch it, either. I couldn’t pull it out. I couldn’t push it in. It had lodged next to his collarbone with only the hilt sticking out and no one was going to move it.

  Brother grinned yet again. “Looks like we are at an impasse.” He pushed me down and ran for the house and the kids.

  Akeyla and Jax wiggled between two beams and disappeared into the building. Brother pulled up short. Neither he nor I could wiggle through anything and unless he figured out how to vanish with the dagger in his shoulder, they were safe.

  “Will you let me pick up the axe again?” I asked the gloves.

  No, they couldn’t. Not without a recharge from an elf.

  I’d have to kill my brother with my bare hands. What killed vampires? Sunlight. Stakes in the heart. Beheading. Fire. The moon was high, but he didn’t like any direct source of light. I pulled Dag’s phone out of my pocket and turned on the light.

  He howled and shaded his eyes. His hand came down on the temporary door’s lock. The metal groaned, then snapped.

  He whipped the lock at me.

  I ducked but he was through the entrance and into the house before I could pull him away.

  The phone’s light blasted a bright tunnel through the lower-level shadows as I followed him inside. The kids had a lot of piles of debris to hide behind, but the house was as open and shiny inside as it was outside and offered few nooks in which they could hide.

  “Out the front!” I yelled. “Both of you! Go!” They needed to get out.

  No sounds of them scurrying. No sounds of Brother, either.

  Jax howled, then yipped.

  I swung around a short wall into a narrow hallway that ran from the lake side of the house toward what looked like a set of bedrooms. Dust swirled in the air, and shuffling echoed off the bare sheetrock.

  I checked the first bedroom. Nothing. Same for the second. I held out my light and checked the third.

  My brother stood in the middle of the room. Jax lay on the floor, thankfully huffing, with Brother’s foot on his neck. Brother held Akeyla by the arm.

  “Turn off that light,” he snarled and shook Akeyla to make his point.

  I turned off the light.

  Brother straightened. “Which one first, dear Frank? The boy?” He pressed down on Jax’s neck. “Or our little fire starter?” He looked down at Akeyla.

  I threw the phone. It bounced off his temple.

  Brother
staggered just enough to allow Jax to get away, but Akeyla yelped as he grabbed her by the neck.

  “Jax! Go! Get your parents. Now!” I yelled.

  The kid rolled to his feet. He yipped and looked up at Akeyla. “Go!” she said.

  He dipped his head and ran out of the room.

  “What is a pack of werewolves going to do?” Brother lifted Akeyla into the air so they were eye to eye. “Parts of me have dealt with werewolves. Parts of me have dealt with elves.”

  “Let her go,” I said. He wouldn’t listen. His anger was as focused on the elves as it was on me, but I had to try.

  “You are such a tiny thing,” he said to my niece.

  Akeyla kicked. Her little foot came up and she kicked him in the shoulder.

  She hit the dagger.

  He gasped. She dropped the four feet to the ground as he tried to swat at the wood he still could not touch.

  Akeyla hit the floor hard. Her leg crumpled and her head bounced off the concrete. She yipped much like Jax had, then groaned.

  Brother’s foot pulled back. He was going to kick.

  He’d kill her. A kick to her gut would do enough damage that no elf’s healing spells could save her.

  I dropped my shoulder and ran directly into his side. Breath left us both, as did our footing, and we fell against the bare framing of the room’s inner wall.

  “I will rip you down to your component parts,” my brother snarled. “I will dissemble your body and I will destroy your soul. I will feast on—”

  The dagger hilt—the red-stained bit of wood sticking out of his shoulder—caught fire.

  I let go. Brother swatted at the dagger but still couldn’t touch it. Couldn’t stop the flames. I scrambled back.

  His face changed. Not his strong-jawed features, but the way he held the muscles underneath. “Where am I?” He blinked, and his expression changed again—as did his accent. “Oh, mate….”

  Was my brother disassembling?

  The wall framing around him burst into flames. He yelped and swung his arms.

  I scrambled toward Akeyla. “Honey…” I said. “No more fire, okay?”

  “What, Uncle Frank?” she said. The wall on the other side also ignited.

  The wood crackled. Smoke wicked from the framing. The paper on the wall board at the back of the room lit, and dust puffed into the room.

  The house burned. Heat rose. My brother coughed. The dagger smoked, though it no longer burned, but whatever Akeyla did still affected his mind. He looked down at Akeyla, then at me. “Who are you?” Then he ran from the room.

  I gently picked up Akeyla. I had to get her out of the house. I had to get me out of the house. But all the walls burned. All of them. Flame sputtered and heat singed my eyes and…

  The rage wanted to surface. It bubbled up from deep in my gut, from a shadow place like my brother’s portal into The Land of the Dead. The terror and the agony and the blame. Was I paralyzed? Was I flailing? How could I be both?

  If I didn’t move, Akeyla would die in here.

  She coughed and curled her arms around my neck. “I’m sorry, Uncle Frank,” she said.

  I patted at the protection enchantments on my scalp. “Come on,” I said. “Please.”

  They expanded around us, but the fire wasn’t magic. It was real flame in a real house. The enchantments offered some protection from the smoke, but not the heat.

  In the great room, down the hall and between us and the lake-side exit from the house, a beam shattered. The crack of the rupture reverberated through the entire house. The floor shook.

  We were trapped. I hadn’t moved fast enough. I hadn’t pulled my little niece to my chest and run through the flames to safety.

  But I wouldn’t rage. I couldn’t. Not if there was some chance I could save Akeyla.

  “I can’t breathe,” she said.

  “Can you make an enchantment?” I said. “Something that gets you air?” Maybe she could save herself. “Don’t worry about me, honey, okay? You breathe.”

  “I didn’t start that fire in the café,” she said.

  “I know,” I said. “The man who attacked us did.”

  She held on as best she could. “My head hurts.”

  I dropped down to the floor and tucked her as close as possible to keep us below the smoke. “Please honey. Stay—”

  A tongue of magic poked through the flames. It curled outward and touched Akeyla, then flicked over me. Then it disappeared back toward the lake.

  Elves. Someone had come.

  “We’re back here!” I yelled. The fire roared and the smoke choked, but someone might hear us.

  A wave of magic burst through the flames. Ice blues danced before us. Greens swirled. Purples shifted and slid and pushed back the smoke. The air cooled.

  My protection spells reached out and a tunnel opened through the fire.

  I lifted Akeyla and pushed off the floor. I would not look at the flames. I would ignore the heat and the soot. I would not be deterred.

  I hopped the downed beam and carried Akeyla out the broken door onto the lakeshore.

  And right into a mundane recording his burning house.

  Chapter 29

  “What are you people?” Aaron Carlson yelled. He waved his phone. “Who was that huge guy in black who ran out?” He pointed at me. “Did you do this?”

  I took in the shore. Dag stood by the water, her arms out and her magic holding back the flames. Maura ran toward us. Both elves still maintained their glamours, but were obviously engaged in an activity Carlson did not understand.

  “Akeyla!” Maura reached for her daughter.

  Her nose and face were swollen, but she wasn’t bleeding anymore. Dag looked ghostly white. Moving her broken elbow to perform the magic needed to open the tunnel must have caused a level of agony that would have dropped a lesser elf.

  And she’d done it in front of a mundane holding a camera.

  I handed Akeyla to her mother. “I think she has a concussion.” Then I grabbed for Aaron Carlson’s phone. “Give me that.”

  He danced out of the way. “Why?” He continued to hold up the phone. “My wife saw you kill that man!”

  “A vampire thralled her to see what he wanted her to see!” I roared.

  He blinked. His mouth rounded. “You are crazy!” he said.

  Maura carried Akeyla toward her mother. “They’re out, Mom! You can stop.”

  Behind me, the tunnel collapsed. Dag dropped to her knees on the edge of the lake.

  Aaron Carlson gasped. “How are you doing that?” He pointed at me. “What are you?” he asked again.

  Jaxson bounded out of the shadows toward Maura and Akeyla.

  Aaron Carlson pointed. “That’s a wolf!”

  A huge silver-and-black dire-wolf-like werewolf and a graceful blue-black smaller wolf followed Jax out of the shadows. Gerard and Axlam had heard their son’s calls and must have brought Dag and Maura.

  “Oh my God,” Carlson breathed.

  Three more adult werewolves followed.

  I grabbed him by the collar and hauled him away from his burning house. “They’re the Alfheim Pack,” I said. “They don’t take kindly to mundanes threatening their children.”

  Jaxson nuzzled Akeyla.

  “Jax,” she said, and hugged him. “I knew you’d get help.”

  Off in the distance, sirens blared. Fire and Safety would be here in moments.

  “Where’s Arne?” I asked. Did Brother hurt the King of Alfheim so badly he couldn’t step up for his people?

  “Arne Odinsson? The mayor’s husband?” Carlson pointed at Dag. “Her arm is broken but she did something. I’m going to—”

  “If you release any video, if you tell anyone about any of this, I will rip off your head,” I growled. I didn’t murder. I wouldn’t murder. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t intimidate.

  Aaron Carlson stepped back. “Are you threatening me, Mr. Victor—?”

  Magic appeared around his head. He gasped, a
nd froze in place.

  The shadows parted. Arne Odinsson hobbled out of the trees, Remy at his side, and made his way toward his wife.

  He leaned against Remy. He’d bled a lot from a wound on his leg, which I suspected made him more ornery than woozy. But like Dag and Maura, he still maintained his glamour. “You used magic in front of a mundane with a camera?”

  Dag pushed herself to standing. “He was already here when we arrived. Neither Maura nor I were in any shape to silence him or send him away.”

  “You repeated the mistakes of earlier?” Arne said.

  He’d have to send away his wife now, too. And the wolves. And me. There was no other choice.

  Arne wasn’t any more likely to kill Aaron Carlson than I was.

  He walked toward us and plucked Aaron Carlson’s phone from his frozen hand. “Did you upload any video?”

  Carlson tried to speak. Arne frowned and waved his hand. Some of the magic around the mundane’s head loosened.

  “We have an automatic security system. I turned it on after what happened last night. That’s why I came out here.”

  Arne looked up at the burning house. The lights of the fire truck were visible now along the road. He pointed at the woods. “Take the women and the pack and stay in the trees,” he said to Remy. “When the EMTs arrive, make sure they get help.”

  The big wolf nodded, then lifted his head and howled. The pack quickly surrounded Dag, Maura, and Akeyla, and led them toward cover.

  Arne extended his hand toward me. I offered my arm. He nodded once and steadied himself. “Do I kill him?” he asked.

  Carlson gasped.

  “I don’t know if that will help, Arne,” I said.

  “You have no idea how many people you will hurt if you tell the wider world about us,” Arne said to the mundane. “Akeyla. Maura. Jax and his family. Half my town. Frank here. Nor do you understand the threats from which we protect you and your kind.”

  “That man you saw running from the house? He’s a vampire,” I said. “A powerful vampire who is as likely to find you in The Cities as he is here.” I pointed at the burning house. “Without our protection, he will eat your family.”

  I lied. Arne knew it, but Aaron Carlson did not.