Night Series Collection: Books 1 and 2 (46 page)

Blinking, I began to realize that I should do something, should move. But when the enemy descends on a camp that should be impenetrable, a certain level of shock keeps you rooted. This shouldn’t be happening. I saw it, but my brain was having a helluva time recognizing it as fact.

Until I spotted something that made my blood run cold.

I wasn’t sure who was on the ground, but it was one of mine being feasted on by a group of twenty, if not more, and a red haze of fury poured through, me snapping me instantly into action.

My demon screamed. There was no thought, no reason other than to kill and hurt and make that which hurt us
bleed… bleed… bleed
!

Pestilence filled me, stretched me. My claws became daggers, my teeth sickles. I embraced death and jumped the zombies, scattering them like bowling pins with the ferocity of my surprise attack.

Only one remained, the one straddling her, making a feast of the severed end of her neck, slurping at her veins like they were straws. Shoving my claws through its middle in punishing strokes, I hissed at it. Now aware of my presence, it turned. It was a woman with half her face ripped off, displaying the bone beneath. Her breath whistled through the exposed cartilage of her nose, and with a roar, she sprang at me.

We crashed on the ground, rolling over each other in our desire to gain top position. Around me I became aware of the movement of my brothers and sisters joining in this fight, helping to keep the horde at bay.

With a grunt, I flipped her over and when I had her pinned, I drove my hands through her neck. Her fingers clawed and scraped at me. She was chomping her teeth in a mindless mania to feed her habit.

“
You will die
.” My voice was guttural, full of fire and brimstone. I had my prey and I wanted to toy with her, kill her slowly, but there were too many. Already I felt the putrid breath of another over my shoulder.

Grabbing her head, I yanked it off her body. She convulsed and flopped like a chicken recently decapitated.

I didn’t have a moment to breathe or even relax as another zombie grabbed my wrist, and before I knew what was happening, its teeth were sinking in.

I screamed from the fiery pain of blunt teeth ripping through my flesh. Blood bubbled out as it chewed through an artery.

Grabbing it by the neck, I flipped it over my shoulder. Not easy to do from a squatting position, but fury lent my beast power. I fought so damn hard to contain Pestilence—he was screaming, shredding my soul with his claws to join in the fracas, but there were still humans present and until they were contained, I refused to let him play. My teeth clacked from the arctic cold building deep inside my bones as he slinked and slithered through me angrily.

The zombie still had its teeth in me. Grunting, I reached down my bra and yanked out the katana fan blade I always kept tucked there. It popped open with a
zing
and I drove it straight through the bloody bitch’s neck.

The head was still clamped on and I realized I was actually sweating. The novelty of it made my stomach churn with the first waves of anxiety. I didn’t feel right and it had nothing at all to do with my ravaged wrist.

Zombies aren’t at all like popular mythos would suggest. Even cutting off one’s head or driving a stake through its brain couldn’t kill it. Nothing could but fire. They were just easier to contain when the head and body weren’t attached.

Stumbling back into a tent, I braced myself against a support pole, then shoved the zombie head onto my knee so I could finally gain the leverage I need to pry its jaw open.

It hissed and growled, snapping with fury as it once again tried to get back at me. Panting, I tossed it to the ground and then hugged my lacerated wrist to my breast. The thick spread of blood coated the front of my dress and its warmth was oddly soothing. I was shivering now from the bone-deep cold and grimaced when I moved my arm and realized my ulna and radial bones were crushed. I could feel their sandpapery bits gouging at my muscle from the inside.

“Oh shit,” I murmured when I saw another zombie fast approaching. This body was definitely better preserved than the others; in fact, it looked fresh. As in just a few hours, no more than a day, fresh.

My fan was still on the ground. I never did that, was never so sloppy. But my head was spinning like a top and every breath was like icy flames licking at me with each ragged inhalation.

I wasn’t going to reach it in time. This was going to hurt like a mother.

But just before it barreled into me, a massive body shoved it to the ground. Red glowing eyes highlighted the rugged, frightening beauty of Bubba before he tore into the zombie’s back. Not with his hands, but his mouth.

I squeezed my eyes shut but was unable to block out the chilling sound of slurping and the slippery wet noise of ripping flesh. I didn’t want to know what he was doing, but I knew. I knew. He was using his demon. Bubba was eating the zombie, and then I was bending over, dry heaving and gagging. It seemed to go on forever, the sounds of his violence, and eventually I shuddered, gasping for a breath that didn’t hurt. Pestilence was violent and furious—he wanted out too. But it wasn’t just that demon making me sick; something was swimming through my bloodstream. Something toxic and vile, moving through me like a poison-tipped tentacle.

My head swam as I tried to rise, my arms shaking so violently that I ripped a section of tent off in my hands. I fell forward, unable to put my arms out to block the ground that was a second away from smacking me in the face. Strong hands yanked me up by the hair, making me cry out. Then I was hugged tight to a barrel chest that was covered in ichor.

“Dora,” Bubba huffed. “You okay?”

His twang was sharp and full-bodied. Bubba was a big blond-headed Norse throwback. If he was feeling exhausted from this battle then I knew it was bad.

I shook my head, the dizziness passing finally. Two gulps of air later, I managed to squeeze out, “I’m fine. Bubba, you gotta get these humans out of here. Round them up.”

I felt Pestilence smile.

Bubba’s eyes glowed like flame. Covered in blood and gore as he was, I almost felt like I was in the arms of the devil himself. I had to remind myself that he was my brother, my friend. Bubba would never hurt me, but his was the one deadly sin I’d always hated.

I had to keep reminding myself it wasn’t his fault—he didn’t do what he did because he liked it. But I still couldn’t keep myself from averting my eyes, even knowing the second I did it he’d read the thoughts going through my head. But there was no time to make him feel better about it.

Screwing up whatever dregs of courage I still had, I forced myself to look at him. “You have the best glamour of us all. Scrub their minds and get them the hell out of here before the Order figures out what happened tonight.”

The pain in his eyes was instant and squeezed my heart in a vise. Bubba was an outcast—he knew it, he’d always known it—but I was one of the few that tried never to let on to that fact. He swallowed hard. The jig was up; in his heart I was the same as the rest of them now. And I hated that, but I had no time to make this right.

“All right, Dora.” Dropping his arms, he made to leave, and I stumbled for a second at the loss of his strength.

“Where’s Luc?” I asked, needing to get to him so we could work out a solution together.

“Last I saw, he was at the dart booth.” Then without a backward glance, Bubba left me, grabbing up what few humans remained like they were nothing but ragdolls and tossing them over his shoulder.

I didn’t have another moment to breathe because suddenly a mass of zombies was headed my way. It would have been nicer to fight with Luc at my back, but if wishes were fishes…

My left wrist was useless, but I refused to go down without a fight. I’d been in worse scrapes in my life. Grabbing the long-handled knife from out of the sheath tucked into the garter at my thigh, I snarled.

“Come get me, bitches!”

And they came, God did they come. These zombies weren’t stupid either, they didn’t attack one at a time like a vampire would, they came at me like a wall of decay, drowning me in the stench of their disease-riddled flesh.

My blade swung with satisfying thunks, ripping into thigh and chest muscle. But as good of a fighter as I was, seven to one wasn’t great odds for anyone. I’d only managed to put two down before the remaining five had me pinned to the ground and their teeth were all over me.

Pestilence must have realized what was happening because he didn’t give me any more time to try to work my way out of it, he just possessed me.

Turned me into a ticking death bomb.

I didn’t even fight him—I was too exhausted to even try. My heartbeats were weak, fluttery things in my chest. I was outside myself, watching as I raked dripping claws through them, biting anything that came too close to my face.

Pestilence was zealous, sinking gallons of poison into them. I knew it wouldn’t work—his venom didn’t work on zombies, they were already dead.

But I was wrong.

Because the bodies before me were starting to moan and writhe. Their limbs, their torsos, and even their heads began to glow a murky green as their guts all started to bloat and expand.

And then there was a loud explosion that made my ears bleed. But unlike Lust where feeding her powers made her stronger, Pestilence had sunk all of himself into the act of blowing up the zombie horde around us.

He shoved me back to consciousness and I screamed as the pain that’d been blessedly numb before now barreled back into focus. My breath were choppy, my body convulsing. Icy needles were stabbing through my brain and then I felt a pair of hands clamp onto my ankle, and without a word of warning something ripped a huge chunk out of me.

It was like being branded by lightning.

I had nothing left and there was so much blackness and I wouldn’t stop it because I couldn’t.

Flopping like a dead fish, I prepared myself for death’s blow; never in my life would I have imagined that my end would come at the usually docile hands of a zombie.

What a cliché.

But the zombie that’d ripped into my ankle turned and disappeared back into the thick of the crowd, clutching her fleshy prize in her hand.

I was far from safe. As two more descended on me, I smiled. Because death didn’t have to be terrifying; it was only scary if you let it be. Soon I’d be wherever Kemen was, and as long as he was with me, I’d be okay.

“See you soon, Sandman,” I whispered.

A roar rolled like thunder and then I saw not one but two figures punch their way through to me. Luc moved like a death god, delivering blows to anything that blocked his way to me.

And to his left was my death priest.

He was glorious, parting the dead like the Red Sea, moving so quickly that I couldn’t see his blows, only the aftermath of one zombie after another being sliced straight down the middle and convulsing violently.

The air was thick and dark and prickled with raw power, and I knew the Gray Man was battling too, and I wanted to tell them thank you, but I was cold. So damn cold.

Lust was a coward and useless. Pestilence too tired to be of any use. And I felt more human than I’d ever felt in my life.

There might have been more bites done to me before they got there, I don’t know. I was beyond pain; I was drifting on a sea of nothingness. Strong arms hugged me tight, and then feathered kisses whispered across my bloody brow before my priest’s deep voice told me, “Everything’s okay, little demon. You’re okay. You’re okay.”

I was rocked to sleep by that lullaby.

I came to later to find a pensive Luc sitting beside me and a warm body cradling me close. Frowning, still feeling horribly jittery, I turned to look and sighed when Asher’s arms squeezed just slightly.

Somehow I was back in Kemen’s trailer, on his bed and being held by two impossibly powerful, angry men. Luc refused to even look at me, but his hand kept rubbing gently through my hair.

Asher must have sensed the shift in my breathing; he cocked his head and then a slow smile spread across his pensive face. “You’re awake,” he murmured against my lips.

“I don’t feel good,” I reluctantly admitted, clutching my stomach, which was still rolling and topsy-turvy.

Luc growled, jerking his head in Asher’s direction. “She’d be a hell of a lot better if you’d just let me feed her!”

By feed her, he didn’t mean food. Asher narrowed his eyes because he clearly understood the implication as well. “Then she can take from me.”

“God, will you two just shut up?” I squeezed my eyes closed, fighting nausea. “Go mark circles outside if you need to. I don’t want to have sex with either of you right now. What I do want is a toilet though.” I moaned as the bile churned straight up my throat. I didn’t even get a moment to warn them.

But as if sensing what was a second away from happening, Asher rushed me to the bathroom just in time, holding my hair back as I upchucked green slime. It wasn’t pretty and I just wanted him to go. I kept swatting at his arm pitifully, but he insisted on staying.

By the time I was through, I was ingloriously hugging the porcelain and wishing I’d died instead.

“It’s okay, little demon,” Asher crooned, rubbing my back. “Just get it out.”

“Go away,” I moaned, hating how understanding and nice he was being. Why couldn’t he grasp the concept of personal space?

“You heard the lady,” Luc drawled, and I only just now realized he was blocking the door, his big arms crossed over his broad chest as he glared daggers at my priest.

“Ugh.” I turned my face aside as my stomach clamped down tight. “Both of you. Don’t watch this.” That was all I had time to say before another powerful surge of glop expelled from my body.

Tears crashed out the corners of my eyes as my entire body rebelled against me. I couldn’t remember feeling this bad, ever.

“She isn’t healing,” Asher growled in frustration. “Why isn’t she healing?”

I doubted he was asking me.

“Don’t tell me you didn’t fucking do this, Priest!” Luc snarled, his bulky body shoulder-bumping Asher hard enough to make him stumble back.