Blood Rules (25 page)

He uncoiled himself from behind the stone thing. I think he'd been trying to push his buddy forward, and he'd just given up on trying to move it.

“Could you come with me to the lab to find cures for were-creatures?” I asked, way too politely. I had no idea where the civility had even come from.

The chimera seemed to have some dignity, with his beard and steady glowing gaze. “Cures? Surely you jest. Here, they study us, not help us. If there's a cure, I failed to recognize it.”

Then he reared back on his coiled tail. I got the hell out of the way as he shot down the corridor, landing next to Chaplin, who dodged, too, his hair standing on end.

The man-serpent roared, then pounced to other monsters who had begun to mill about. “Let's go!”

There was a whispering sound nearby, and I saw the reason for it. A woman—I knew she was a doctor or high-level person because she was talking to herself in Old American—cowered against the wall, dressed in a full-bodied suit with a mask hanging down from her head. She must've seen my glowing eyes, because she raised her taserwhip.

I smacked it away from her. “Cure. You're going to take me to that lab of yours and show me where I can find cures for werewolves, vampires, and dymorrdia.” I didn't want to waste time riffling through every bottle, test tube, or computer file that Jo hadn't had access to.

“No cures,” she said, voice shaking. “Not for any of you.”

Chaplin made a “hmm” sound.
I think she's telling the truth.

The dog was no slouch in judging people, so I took him at his word.

I cuffed the woman across the face. I'd meant to do it gently, just to get her out of her funk, but I left a deep scratch, and she cried out. The scent of blood made my head spin, but I hung on.

No dummy, she obviously knew that I'd kill her if she didn't level with me. Good thing bad guys were usually cowards when called out.

She pointed down the corridor. “No cures, but . . . last cell . . . Subject 562 . . . we questioned it a lot . . . experiments. Other asylums said it has important blood . . . most powerful . . . could help—?”

And she passed out from the fear of me. I suppose I would've, too, back in the day.

Chaplin was already running to where the employee had indicated, and I wasn't far behind. My pulse took everything over—my near-blue sight, my chest, my mind—but I didn't change. Not now.

When Chaplin got to the barred cell, he scuttled backward, as if he didn't like what he saw. That should've given me a clue, because when I got there, even I almost backtracked.

It wasn't because of Subject 562's hideousness. Not at all. Its pale arms were marred from fresh scratches, but what was more disturbing was its . . . stillness. Only Gabriel had exhibited this type of utter, eerie tranquillity during his worst vampire moments, and this preter could give off that kind of balefulness even with its back turned.

It was facing a corner, as if it didn't realize what was happening outside the cell. But, somehow, I knew that it had a bead on every little thing that was occurring.

Most powerful,
the employee had said.

Was 562 an old were-creature or vampire? Would it know history and, perhaps, a location or formula for a cure outside this asylum? Was that why the employee had directed me to it?

I looked at the silver coating the bars, then at Subject 562. “We're not here to hurt you—we're getting you out.”

It didn't move except for a slight tilt of the head, as if it recognized my warped voice.

But it couldn't have.

Chaplin got right behind me and pushed.

As adrenaline cut through me, I hoped my human side would hold long enough for me to articulate what needed to be said. “A group of us—we need some help and that's why we're here. We're looking for cures.”

Slowly, the creature turned its head, almost as if it didn't have neck muscles. Its long silver hair hung over its face, but I could see two slits of red through the strands, just like Gabriel's own eyes when he was worked up.

Vampire?

But there was a hint of softness in that gaze, even though it burned through the hair. Again, I almost thought it knew me.

“Please. Would you come with us to the lab, show us where we should look? Or maybe you could give us information. Either way, we don't have much time—”

Subject 562 moved so quickly that I didn't get out the rest of my sentence.

As if it had no bones, it just sort of dart-slumped its way to the opposite corner of the cell.

I heard barking from somewhere in the asylum, and I turned to Chaplin.

“Intel Dogs?”

No,
he said.
From the sound of them, these are government-issue beast dogs. They're just as strong but not as smart. They don't have the capacity to rebel as the Intels started to.

So the asylum workers were fighting back, leveling their own playing field with weapons that hadn't been affected by the power blaster.

Time had run out.

Subject 562 was looking up at the ceiling now, and Chaplin seemed to understand the gesture.

He said,
Who knows when the government will know something has happened here? They'll send a Dactyl if we don't get out soon.

Dactyl drone planes had been in use before the world had changed. The government could've built up their stocks again since China had started manufacturing them in bulk. The craft had bombs, lasers, and blades that could pinpoint a target on the ground from miles away. It was even quiet enough to assassinate an unknowing entity from ten feet yonder. Hell, it could get here from outside the range of our power blaster real fast, and because of that, it'd be fully functional.

“Will you come?” I asked Subject 562, not wanting to kidnap the monster, even if I could get past that silver on those bars. But if I had to, I would. It seemed like the only option I had.

The barking got louder, and Chaplin began to pace. He was smarter than the beast dogs, but we'd be outnumbered. And what if there were more of those sentinels, too?

I heard howls and preterlike screams from the bowels of the asylum. Monsters versus sentinels and beast dogs? But there were human yells, too. Death keens.

Subject 562 hadn't answered my question. It just kept staring at me with those slit eyes as my body began to lose control, unable to hold off any longer, my bones and muscles shifting, making me even taller, my wolf hair longer.

God-all, here I went....

As I writhed with pain, still fighting for as long as I could, 562 suddenly just sped forward, blasting through the door in the bars. The entire bank clanked to the floor, and without paying much attention to the whimpering the creature was making—because of the silver?—I grabbed it under one arm and Chaplin under the other, finally bursting into my full form.

Mindless now, I faintly remember zooming out of the cell, out of the asylum, over the wall and down the hill, far away out of the hub to the planned meeting place where my friends would hopefully be, too.

Miles and miles away.

By the time we arrived at the old mine shaft that Taraline had recommended—a spot that was no more than a hole in the side of a rock-strewn hill—my bloodlust had eased and I'd gone back to half-were thinking mode. Maybe the asylum hadn't housed a cure, but 562 might be a mother lode of information instead, and I needed to question it.

After entering through a tunnel littered with jagged rocks, clawed pieces of old track, and a rusty pipeline, we came to a cold, larger area where we'd already planted solar-powered lanterns, which had been encased in Faraday cages that were supposed to have protected them if the power blast got this far. Taraline's clothing hung round, too, side by side with tawnyvale herb, just in case they really did throw off any scent trackers.

I set 562 on the ground. My half-were sight worked well enough for me to extract a lantern and fire it up to life. It gave light to the specks of aquamarine and smoky quartz crystals embedded in the walls, although 562's red eyes glowed even brighter, like those monsters in the closet that we used to worry about when we were children, not knowing we should've been even
more
afraid.

Chaplin watched our guest while I willed myself back to full-human form, put on my spare set of clothing against the chilliness, then set to rubbing my aching arms and legs. My joints and muscles were killing me from all the back-and-forth and holding back.

I went to 562 and offered it the last drops from my canteen. The creature didn't move, so I drank what I could.

Chaplin hadn't taken his gaze off the creature, and his hair was still standing on end. He barked at 562, just to show it who was boss, and the creature's eyes got real red.

Then it opened the biggest mouth I'd seen in my life, lined by more fangs than any monster had
ever
possessed.

My tired, yet alert body started to burst into change again, but when 562 sprang at Chaplin, the only thing I could do was howl.

G
abriel and the others were on their way back when he heard Mariah's scream-howl from a couple miles away.

Her terror made him speed up, his sight going even redder as he left the others behind while zooming to the rendezvous place under the cover of every boulder and tree he could find.

Why would she be screaming this far away from the asylum?

If she was dying, he'd never be able to apologize for forcing thoughts of Abby on her during the attack. He'd never be able to say a lot of things....

The miles passed in a flicker, and he came upon the mine shaft, where there were grunts, sounds of a struggle—

He barged inside. Mariah, in half-wolf form, fighting, pulling back on the neck of a thing that he couldn't even begin to describe except for the medical gown it was wearing, the long silver hair that covered its face, plus . . .

He barely had time to register the canine vibes that he intuited whenever he was around a dog or a werewolf as the creature reared up its head at his entrance.

The mouth—the teeth . . .

He realized that Chaplin was under the thing, flashing out with his paws and biting at it, keeping the creature at a distance with nothing but Intel Dog strength and determination.

The monster flashed its teeth at Chaplin, and Gabriel dove in, crashing against the creature and slamming it against the rock wall.

The wall shook, releasing a tiny shower of stone and dirt in front of the many saberlike teeth that gleamed right in front of Gabriel's face. The creature hissed, its teeth jutting out even more, like knife blades coming out during a street fight.

But then, just for a second, it stopped, tilting its head, as if it knew exactly who Gabriel was.

He turned on the sway in his voice. “Calm . . . calm down . . . don't attack . . .
just sit still
.”

The creature slowly closed its mouth, mostly out of curiosity, it seemed, and, through its long, thin silver hair, Gabriel could see its red eyes.

But as Gabriel continued swaying the creature, he realized that those eyes held intelligence. Questions. And something else he wasn't sure of except for the strange sense of familiarity.

Without quite knowing why, Gabriel backed off. Then he heard Mariah's hollow half-wolf panting just behind him. He didn't have to look to know that she'd stopped herself from changing all the way.

She was getting pretty good at that.

Chaplin was ready to attack the creature, but the thing had already sat down, crossed its legs yoga-style, neatly smoothing its medical gown over its knees. It had scratches on its pale arms and, for some reason, that spooked Gabriel.

“I don't know what happened,” Mariah said, her voice warped. “It went crazy.”

Chaplin kept glaring at it while opening his mind to Gabriel.
I think 562 only wanted me to know that it's not afraid. I have a feeling it would have killed us outright if it'd wanted to.

Couldn't the creature talk for itself? As it made like a Buddha and just sat there, Gabriel had to wonder.

Now Mariah's voice seemed way more human. “Your sway, Gabriel. It got to 562 like a charm. We brought him or her with us from the asylum, but that's a long story.”

Gabriel wasn't so sure if it'd been his sway or if this 562 thing had just decided to show that it wouldn't take any shit, then backed off, point made, just as Chaplin had said. Any way about it, Gabriel wasn't the one with the upper hand here, so he kept tabs on the lotus-positioned monster.

“Why do you call it 562?” he asked, almost as if it weren't even there.

Chaplin answered.
That's what the employee at the asylum called it. Subject 562.

Mariah whimpered as she began the full change back to human form. He didn't want to think about her, but her scent . . . her proximity . . .

Yet she wasn't his next meal. She was much . . . more than that. Shit, at the asylum, after Gabriel had faced the beast dogs and the bloodlust had been strong in him, he'd almost forgotten about why he was there. For her. For their connection. It'd only been after the Badlanders had scoured the outside walls for more angel-Shredders and failed to find any that they'd crept toward the asylum doors. There, he'd overheard from some panicked employees that a few of their staff had left the asylum and made a run out of the hub, toward an emergency comm station miles away. It'd brought Gabriel back to rights.

The GBVille humans would be trying to call on reinforcements, and even as the sound of beast dogs echoed in the asylum while the Badlanders had prepared to go inside, Gabriel hadn't sensed Mariah anywhere.