Louisiana Moon (30 page)

The vase, a creamy, milky hue, looked as if were made from bleached bones. Knowing the Thrones, it likely was. Human or otherwise. He unscrewed the lid and extracted several small pouches then handed a couple to Ryant, who examined each bag, weighed them in his palms and glanced at Kris.

“Tonight, we will make history in the Darkworld. Let us serve our queen and our brethren well.” Thore pointed toward the sky as his voice roared.

Kris followed the gesture. Twinkling lights caught her eyes. In the balconies each fae turned transparent, then flashed, almost like tiny stars and shot to the ceiling. They disappeared. Fae on the sand floor followed their sisters and brothers. Vampires slowly faded, turning to clear, wavy substances and vanished.

Despite the thrill that rushed through her at their demonstration and enthusiasm, she gazed at the sand floor. A pair of black combat boots stepped into sight.

“Are you worried, my love?” Ryant whispered.

Channeling every bit of anger she held inside, her jaws gave a tic. “Just take me where I need to be. When this is over, we will look for Stanley and Rita, and I don’t know after that.” Kris squared her shoulders and met Ryant’s hard stance.

Right now, despite her feelings for him, she wasn’t sure she could ever look at him without either seeing him and V or a reminder of the marks and what they meant.

“If you wish.” His voice held a hint of uncertainty. “I am truly sorry.” He wrapped his arms around her.

She knew he was but right now that didn’t matter. Bitterness lurked in her mind, in her mouth. Yet, she would turn these emotions to her advantage and destroy the demons. The Soulscapes were after her blood, and they would pay. Then she would decide about Ryant.

The air hummed. Her body tingled, and in a white flash, they disappeared.

31

They transported to the east side of the hell house property, inside the dark forest. In the lengthy distance the house, sitting in its gloom and gory, came into sight—in between them, Hallow’s Peak Cemetery as she’d learned the cemetery was called.

The full moon overhead shone bright, illuminating the graveyard’s densely populated headstones, crypts and crosses. The wind blew from the south. The air was thick and whipped the scent of marsh and rotted trees around them. Calls from bull gators growled in the swamps. The bugs were thick tonight, buzzing their heads, making the night perfect for them to feast on death.

In a straight line across the forest edge, soldiers stood geared for the fight, ready for battle. Adrenaline strummed through them. Each one breathed heavily, their chests rising and falling. Their legs couldn’t keep still as they swayed from side-to-side, shaking their hands.

“Are we ready to do this?” Darin asked from behind her.

Kris wished V would have left him behind in the safety of the death ring. Yeah, she got the irony but at least the ring would keep him protected. A mere mortal couldn’t handle this war. Veering her gaze, Kris stared at V, who looked ahead.

“Kris, I’m good. I want to be here,” Darin said. “It’s my battle too.”

His expression told her he truly did want to be there. The conviction in his gaze was just as strong, just as determined as the rest. If this didn’t get respect from her fellow preternaturals, maybe she didn’t want to be associated with them.

She gave him a smile and nod then focused on the leaders. Despite Darin’s strength, she’d keep an eye on him. Now that she’d found him, she didn’t want anything to happen to him. She had far too few friends.

Felix raised a hand then closed his fingers into a fist.

Obviously a signal the soldiers, resembling wild predators on the hunt for prey, prowled forward, peppering the moonlit landscape and reaching the edge of the cemetery iron fence in no time. She followed, leaving her gang to join the footmen’s warpath.

“What are you doing?” Ryant shuffled behind over leaves and grabbed her wrist, turning her to face him. His brows creased with concern.

Was he kidding? “This is a battle, Ryant. I’m following them to fight, to find Rita. Let me go.” She could have hissed the words, but what went on between them wasn’t for everyone’s eyes and ears to witness.

She thought she was going to have to get physical with him. He must have heard it in her mind since he let loose. As she walked away, she could see his anger and fear in an equal mix, directed at her. She didn’t care. She was not about to stay on the sidelines and let others fight. If he didn’t want her involved then he should never have involved her.

After she turned from him, she whipped out her pistol from the backside of her pants and fell in behind Darin and V who were already far ahead. Where would she find Rita in the house? And in what condition would she find the woman?

With the others, Kris hopped the fence and entered the hallowed ground. Uneasiness settled in the pit of her stomach. Maliciousness tugged at her nerves, making her senses go into overdrive as she tried to sort through the scents to learn who was the source of the evil.

Ryant, tell the leaders to make them all stop. There’s something very bad here.

A few seconds passed before she heard his voice.
Soulscapes?

Maybe. Hard to tell for sure but stop them now.

Several anxious seconds passed. Kris planted her feet and didn’t move. To those ahead of her, she whispered, “Stop right now.”

Four men in front of her halted and looked confused.

“Ryant, hurry up, damn it.”

While she waited and the others pressed on, she glanced at her surroundings, her gaze continuing to stray to the graves. She’d stopped between two headstones dating back to the mid seventeen hundreds. In front of her, crypts the size of short buses loomed, ghostly under the moon’s light.

When Ryant spoke in her head, she jumped.
The warning calls have been passed to the soldiers.

Good. Make sure they’re all still so I can listen.

Okay.

Crickets chirped in the far distance, on the outskirts of the cemetery. But this wasn’t the noise she searched for. She waited for the echoing screeches. Like the first night at the hell house.

In front of her, a few soldiers neared the gate and house.
No.
They needed to back away, head to the forest. Ducking low, she walked backward toward the iron fence. As she passed Ryant, he stared at her with confusion.
What’s going on, Kris?

Before she could answer, the sounds of rock sliding from the crypts turned her blood to ice.

“Soulscapes,” Kris screamed.

All around her, time seemed to freeze. Then with a flurry of action and war cries, vampires and fae sprang into action, yanking out their weapons. Screeches bloomed in the midnight air, the dogwatch hour.

Whooshing fluttered overhead and swooped low. She bent closer to the ground near a footstone. Demons plunged into statues of angels, guardians holding lanterns, mothers holding babies and lambs. The ground shook beneath her feet.

A hand latched onto her ankle.

She shouted and jerked away only to stumble on another footstone and fall. She hit the ground and rolled onto her back. From the grass in front of her, a zombie rose. Half in the dirt, it snarled at her. Glowing with eerie green, hungry eyes fixed on her and sharp teeth gnashed.

She leaned on her shoulder blades, raised her weapon and shot the zombie square in the forehead. Its grip let loose, but stayed locked on her ankle. Its head slumped, face planted in the dispersed dirt. She shook her leg, freeing herself, and crab walked away, seeking as much distance between her and the dead thing.

At the sounds of battle all around her, she turned to witness men with drawn swords clashing with cement statuaries. Soulscapes’ shining eyes replaced what once were objects meant to soothe the living at the lost of their loved ones.

She jumped to her feet and surged into the fray. The first zombie she reached had a fae backed against an obelisk. She shot the fucker in the head and smiled as the zombie fell to its knees and collapsed on the ground with a lifeless thud.

The fae gave a silent nod of thanks.

She went for the next.

An angel statue ripped a vampire’s head off and threw it to the ground. The head rolled and hit her boots, mouth wide open, fangs shining in the moonlight. She moved around the decapitated head as the statue turned to her. Bastard.

She squeezed several rounds off at the statue’s chest. No bullet punctured the fucking thing. Backing away, she emptied the clip, and reached in her boot to pull another out in time as a zombie barreled toward her from the right. She shot at its chest, into its dead heart. Not fazing the zombie.
Damn it, Kris, focus. Shoot the head!

She jabbed the barrel into the zombie’s forehead and pulled the trigger. Pieces of bone and splatters of other organic material she didn’t want to identify pelted her head and arms.

Zombie handled, she turned to the more serious threat. The statue kept trudging forward. She shot several rounds into it hoping it would shatter but still nothing. Fuck.

A dark shadow from her left appeared. Kris caught her breath; it was Ryant. He moved forward, wielding a sword and separated the angel’s head from its shoulders. The statue stopped, wobbled then crashed to the ground as the demon inside slithered toward the sky.

Ryant grabbed the bag Thore had given him. “Here, this will stop them forever.” His hand dipped in the bag and withdrew what looked like nothing as he reared back, throwing a rock at the demon struggling for release. The rock hit the demon and burst into dust. The demon sizzled and melted into metal then solidified.

She stepped over the body while the earth continued to shake beneath her feet. Freed soul demons inhabited more bodies, and zombies crawled from graves and straight for her with a single-minded determination she would have admired had they not been coming to kill her.

Fuck this.

Not caring who saw, Kris stripped off her clothes and the werewolf transformation began.

Muscles detached from bones. A searing, knife-like slash, ripped her from scalp to toes. Fingers elongated into razor-sharp claws. The muscles over her body bulged into massive lumps. Her spine cracked, throwing her forward onto all fours. While lying on the ground, her neck stretched as her snout protruded.

She howled and her eyesight crisped with night vision. Death lingered in the air as thick as molasses. Swords sliced like grinding metal against stone.

Ryant snatched her pouch and ran for the next demon.

Let him handle the demons; she would take the zombies. Hoping he heard her thought, she kept on his heels then surpassed him with the need to kill. Powerful hindquarters propelled over her the ground, sending her into zombies. With no pause and mouth open with ripping canines bared, she ripped heads from shoulders. Ryant did the same to the demons but also tossed the dust rock, destroying the Soulscapes before they could reform in another statue.

Ten zombies and three demons down; they seemed to only have hit the tip of the iceberg. Many littered the ground but so did large numbers of fae and vampires. She growled with frustration.

When the number of zombies dwindled, she trotted to her discarded clothes. The transformation back to human took less time. A sticky residue enveloped her naked body once she’d morphed to human form. She yanked on her clothes. Now came the moment of truth.

Ryant, I need the pouch.

He materialized and tossed it to her.

A sword lay near a fallen fae, next to a crypt. She stuffed her .40 in her pants as she raced to retrieve it. The back of a guardian statue came into view. She pointed the sharp tip at it and rammed dead center, making it buckle to the ground.

As she reared back to the side, she chopped off the head. The demon squealed with its forced exit and she threw a rock. Just like the others, the demon froze, melted then turned solid. A movement ahead caught her attention just in time to see a black robed figure dart between the solid cement structures. Just like in her dreams.

Holding the sword tight in her hand, she ran after the figure and found herself in a maze of crypts. Just like her chase dreams, she felt as if she moved through molasses and couldn’t gain ground fast enough.

Soon she lost the figure completely. Tossing her head back, she howled into the night sky. Where had the fucking thing gone? A sound not far from her spun her around. She slid into a narrow alley, staying close to the walls and pulled out her weapon. With a sword in one hand and her gun in the other, she swung around the corner to find… Nothing. Nobody.