Guardian (4 page)

Blood spurted as I ripped the blade out, angling the removal of it so it opened up his carotid artery. Gurgling, he fell backward into one of his companions. While those two were occupied, I went for the third guy.

He snarled at me in Russian and I did the best I could, responding in sign language known the world over.

Roaring, his teeth bared and spittle flying (as if suddenly that was going to intimidate me), he rushed me, his lips moving in what I knew would be a spell, but it didn’t matter. His magic slid off, his eyes widened, and I slammed the blade into his belly, twisting it until the hilt snapped off.

Three down and one to … I turned to see the last guy running for his life. I didn’t bother to go after him. The explosions were fading and the screams of the werewolves no longer rent the air.

The hunter who I’d only knocked out was slowly coming to. I went to him, flipped him on his belly and yanked his arms behind him. Using his own belt, I bound his hands tightly, wishing he could understand me. Wishing I could tell him what a fucker he was and have him know he was likely going to die when Peter and Liam got back.

“Let me go,” he said, his voice thick with his accent, almost unintelligible, but it was still English.

“Are you fucking serious? Let you go?” I laughed and yanked him to his feet, my lower back twanging unhappily at me. That one blow over the kidneys was going to leave a bruise for sure, though I knew I had been lucky. Next time they showed up, they’d come prepared for me.

“Yes, let me go. I cleanse land of evil.”

Oh, shit. This was one of those stupid ass cults who thought they were called on by some deity to rid the world of the bad guys.

“Wrong wolves, you idiot.” I pushed him ahead of me, past his fallen comrades.

He stumbled and I caught a look at his face. The shock and horror of seeing his friend splayed out on the ground, lifeless. “You kill them?”

“Yup. And you’re going to be next, big boy.” I back handed him hard enough that he went to his knees. I didn’t care; all I kept seeing in my mind was Elena’s little girl, her neck and head flopping bonelessly, like a rag doll in her mother’s arms. I could only hope I was wrong, that the little girl was just knocked out, or maybe her werewolf abilities were strong enough to allow her to heal.

In my heart I knew I was grasping at straws.

As the smoke cleared, the hunters were gone, all except the one I had on his knees in the middle of the clearing behind the homes. The werewolves who survived slowly made their way back to the village to lick their wounds and fix their broken homes. Or so I thought.

No, they were packing up.

“Hey, where are you going?”

Eyes swiveled toward me and I realized then that while Peter’s pack was peaceful, there was a serious drawback.

Elena shook her head, her little girl cradled in her arms. “We leave. Run.”

There was no fight in any of them. They were just getting their belongings to go somewhere else; somewhere the hunters wouldn’t find them. At least for a time.

“They run. We hunt,” the hunter said, then snorted a heavy glob of bloody snot onto the snow.

My jaw clenched and tightened. This couldn’t be allowed to continue; these were the most peaceful wolves I’d ever encountered, why would they be targeted over those who actually caused harm?

The answer came to me slowly as I replayed the fight in my head. As soon as the tables had turned and I’d killed some of the hunters, they’d fled.

They were cowards looking for easy kills, and what was easier than a group who wouldn’t fight back? Even if they were werewolves, they sure didn’t act like it. Fucking hell, this was bad.

“Where do your hunters live?” He didn’t answer me so I wrapped my fingers around his neck and squeezed. “Tell me.”

“You kill me no matter what I say.”

Elena walked by us her child still and silent in her arms. I squeezed harder as the anger roared through my veins. It took everything I had not to choke him right there. “Yes. But how much it hurts depends on how much you tell me.”

His eyes, dark blue and shadowed with fear, rolled up so he could look at me. “You do not have balls to torture.”

That was where he was wrong. So very, very wrong.

Chapter Four

T
hey were almost
back to the village when Liam caught the first whiff of smoke. The wind had been blowing away from them for most of the day, but with a shift, the scent of burning wood and blood filled his nostrils. Peter said nothing as they both broke into a sprint, covering the ground in leaping strides.

All he could think about was the fact that Rylee didn’t have her weapons. He’d convinced her this would be a vacation, that nothing would go wrong.

That he’d keep her safe.

“Shit.” He growled through his teeth, furious with himself for being so naïve. He knew better, especially when it came to Rylee, knew better than to think things would go smoothly.

Ahead, he could just see the tree line that separated the village from the forest. A few more strides and they were on it, but he struggled to understand what he was seeing. The edge of the village opened up into a mass of chaos that stopped him in his tracks. Every single home was on fire, and blood stained the few places where the snow had been left, where the ground hadn’t been torn to pieces. There wasn’t a single person left to be found.

“RYLEE!” There was no answering call from her and his guts tightened with fear. She had to be here. He couldn’t lose her.

“Be calm, we will track those who have fled the hunters,” Peter said, his voice soft.

Liam spun toward him. “Hunters?”

“Yes, there are those who would see all the werewolves dead, even though we stick to ourselves and harm no one.” The old man let out a sigh. “As peaceful as we are, they know we will not fight back.”

“Rylee would have fought back.” He strode into the village, scenting the air as he went. Finding individual smells under the heavy flood of smoke was difficult, but he picked up her unique perfume as he drew close to the home they’d been assigned.

Following her steps, he tracked her scent to the far edge of the village. Her smell mixed with someone with large boots, according to the prints in the snow, and looked to be forcing said large boots ahead of her. A sigh of relief slipped out of him; she was alive and likely very, very irritated. “She’s got a prisoner,” he said to Peter as his mentor stepped up beside him.

“Why would she do that?” Peter seemed genuinely curious.

“To get information, to stop this from happening again. Or they just pissed her off.” Liam looked at Peter, and then waved at the village. “This isn’t the first time a raid has happened, is it?”

Peter shook his head as they began to track what was left of the village. It took them three hours of hard running to catch up to Peter’s wolves and Rylee. They were hidden in the crook of a river, their backs to a steep rock wall where ice had formed and slid down in five-foot long icicles. Temporary shelters had been propped against the rock; lean-to’s made of tree branches and dead fall. The steady rush of the river hid the noise of their approaching footsteps. Not exactly a place where you would see your enemies coming. At least, not without a sentry or two. Of which there were none.

He struggled to understand what he was seeing. Why wouldn’t they fight back? It wasn’t like the wolves had started the fight. And surely if a few fought back, the hunters would give up on attacking them. The wolves weren’t even setting up any defensive measures. None of it made sense.

Worse, though, was when he got a good look at the wolves that were left. Half of them were in wolf form, their fur singed in places all the way down to the raw skin, which had been blistered and oozing down their hides. The other half still in human form were beaten and bloody, chunks of skin missing and bruises covering any visible skin. They were healing, but slowly, far slower than he would have. Maybe it was because they were on the move, unable to rest and recuperate—the reason didn’t really matter. The brutality of their wounds was hard to stomach.

Their eyes darted away from his, lowered to the ground as they all dropped their bodies to the snow, even those still in human form, and they weren’t in much better shape to be moving around. Broken bones, cuts, and gaping wounds littered all who had escaped the hunters.

Peter let out a shuddering sigh. “They have only taken six lives this time. That is a miracle.”

Wrong thing to say. Behind the remainder of the pack, Rylee stepped out in all her furious glory. Her auburn hair was in tangles, twigs twisted into the snarls and soot covered her right cheek, but she was far from looking defeated. She strode toward them, saw Liam, softened a little and then saw Peter. All the softness faded.

“Only six? What the fuck is wrong with you? Your wolves are spineless. They let those hunters kill them! They didn’t even try to fight back!” Her tricolored eyes flashed and sparkled, and she didn’t stop until she was right in Peter’s face. “What the hell is going on, old man? You can’t tell me you let this shit slide?”

Liam literally sided with her so he could face Peter. “Tell me she’s wrong.”

Peter shook his head. “Peace. That is what we seek.”

“Peace will get your asses handed to you, and your children slaughtered,” Rylee snapped, going so far as to push Peter in the chest, her eyes glittering with what Liam knew were tears, but she kept them in check. Peter stepped back with her shove, but nothing else.

Liam saw she was trying to provoke the old man. “It won’t work, Rylee. He won’t get riled up.”

She snorted, but there was a glimmer in her eyes that spoke of some serious hurt; something had happened, something bad besides the obvious slaughter of the wolves. “I watched one of your children mowed down by these assholes, killed before she saw her third birthday, and you’re not going to do anything?”

Ah, that was why. If there was one thing that would galvanize her, it was the death of a child. Not that he expected anything less. Even if there hadn’t been the death of a child, there would be no rest for Rylee until she saw this set right. It was just how she operated and one of the strengths he loved about her.

“She is not the first child we have lost to the hunters. Nor the last.” Peter reached out to put a hand on her shoulder and she ducked away from him. As if his touch would sting her. Or more likely, she was trying not to punch Peter in the face.

She sucked in a sharp breath. “Then you are no different than those hunters. You might as well kill each other, save them the fucking effort.”

Without another word, she spun and strode back the way she’d come. Liam jogged to catch up to her. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, the hunters aren’t good fighters. They only got one punch in on my kidney, but that’s fading already.”

Liam forced her to stop, fear rising through his throat. “Let me see.”

“Liam, later.”

“I said let me see.” He put a little of his power into the words and felt her waver. Though she wasn’t a wolf, she was his mate.

“What was that?”

He softened his tone. “Rylee, let me see for myself that you are okay.”

She grimaced and slid out of her jacket, then lifted up her shirt. A large purple bruise had bloomed over the right side of her back. Liam swallowed hard and wrapped his hands around her waist with as much care as he could.

“What, you know how to heal now?”

“Just be quiet for a minute,” he said, and then held his breath. It took him a moment before his ears picked up what he was looking for and he was finally satisfied she really was okay.

She half-turned to him, her eyebrows hitched upward. “Happy?”

“Yes, just try not to get beat up anymore.” He leaned in and kissed the non-sooty side of her face. She smiled, but the edges of the smile faltered.

“They didn’t even try. That’s why the hunters are after them. Because they are
prey
. I don’t understand how they can all be so fucking submissive and not be like Alex, trapped between shapes.”

“I don’t know, either.” That was the weird thing here; none of these wolves should even be able to shift, not with the way they acted. Yet, every last one of them
could
shift.

He grunted, frustrated by his lack of knowledge, and pointed her in the direction they had been headed. “I believe you have something to show me? Someone with big boots.”

“Yeah.” She gave him a grin that was anything but soft. “Come meet my new friend.”

My newest, bestest buddy was tied firmly to a tree, his hands bound and stuffed in a bowl of salt water.

Liam took a quick look at the hunter. “Salt water on his hands? Are they witches?”

The hunter, whose name I still hadn’t bothered to inquire about, spat at us. “Witches are stories to scare children. We are real; we are hunters of devil’s children, given power to cleanse Earth.”

I glanced at Liam and then back at the hunter. “See what I’m dealing with?” For good measure I kicked out, landing a solid blow to the hunter’s gut. He couldn’t double over, tied to the tree as he was, but I admit to taking some serious satisfaction in the way his face lost color and then began to go purple as he fought to catch a breath.

This was why coming out as a community to the general human population was such a bad idea. There would be those who accepted the new and wildly different beings who had shared the world with them in secret for thousands of years. And then you’d get assholes with a serious need to kill things, and suddenly they would have an outlet to blow up shit. To kill innocents. That couldn’t happen.

Liam beckoned me, pulling me out of my thoughts, and we walked far enough away that the hunter couldn’t hear us.

“Peter won’t let you torture him, you know that, right? Even though this hunter is one of those who has killed and tormented the pack, they won’t allow you to hurt him.”

No surprise there. “I didn’t think he would. But play along. I have a plan, just follow my lead,” I said and Liam’s eyebrows shot way up. He visibly struggled to not smile. “I’m not that bad,” I grumped.

“Yes, you are. But it is one of the things that makes me love you. You leap before you look and that usually works. But it is so damn sexy to hear you say you have a plan.” He swatted me on the ass, his fingers grabbing a cheek for good measure.

The heat flooding my body had nothing to do with embarrassment. Shit, one touch and I was melting into a useless puddle. “Enough of that. Later, if you’re lucky.”

He laughed under his breath as we walked back to the hunter.

“What’s your name?” I asked.

His mouth clamped shut and I beckoned Liam closer. “Where should we start? If he won’t even give us his name, this is going to be fun.”

“Hmm. Should we peel his hide first, or leave that for after the hot irons?” Liam asked, leaning in to nuzzle my neck. The hunter’s eyes went wide. Yeah, the combination of blood and torture being an aphrodisiac for your captors was as freaky as if we were cold and menacing.

“I was thinking”—I leaned into the hunter and pressed his head against the tree—“that we should start with his eyes. That won’t kill him, but bursting them is so very, very satisfying. Like popping grapes.”

“Agreed,” Liam said. “You take the left one, I’ll take the right. But, ladies first.”

I lifted my hand to the hunter’s left eye and, with the other hand, held the eyelid open. “I don’t want you to miss a single thing,” I whispered, doing my best to keep my voice seductive.

The hunter struggled, but he couldn’t get free, his hands were useless and Liam pinned his head against the tree.

“This will hurt,” I said, then smiled at him, feeling my guts twist at the thought of what I was going to do if he didn’t break first. “A whole fucking lot.”

I put my thumb against his darting eye, the slick surface making me fight a full body cringe. Applying pressure slowly, his eyeball wasn’t able to move and he stared at me as I pushed harder. He let out a scream.

“Dimitri! My name is Dimitri.”

I stepped back and put on a pout. “Damn, just when it was getting fun.”

He swallowed hard and Liam let his head go.

“Oh, look, he can be scared into talking; this is going to be so satisfying,” I murmured, my voice just loud enough for him to hear me. He paled, his skin going a pasty, awful white that clashed badly with his blond hair.

“Dimitri, we are going to have a long, long, chat—”