The Dark-Hunters (200 page)

“Good. Keep them stirred up. If they’re busy worrying about hurting you, then they can’t concentrate on hacking me into pieces.”

“Good point.”

As he started for the door, Cassandra stopped him. She pulled him tight against her and held him close. “Come back to me, Wulf.”

“I fully intend to. God and Odin willing.”

She kissed him, then let him go.

Wulf took one last look at his wife and the baby who was sleeping on the floor completely oblivious to what was happening tonight. Oblivious that if Stryker had his way, Erik would die and the world would end.

How he wished he could be so ignorant.

But he couldn’t. He had a job to do and too much to lose if he failed.

In the back of his mind was the one repeating thought … How had Stryker found out about Cassandra’s father?

Could Urian have betrayed them? Would he?

Part of him wanted to believe it was a coincidence. The other part of him couldn’t help wondering if Urian had changed his mind about helping Stryker after all. The man was his father …

He and Kat left the apartment and met Phoebe at the main entrance. She held out a necklace to him and placed it around his neck. “This will allow the door to Elysia to open when you return. I couldn’t get in touch with Urian and that concerns me. I only pray they haven’t learned of his helping us.”

“He’s all right, Phoebe,” Kat soothed. “Believe me, he’s a great actor. I had no idea he wasn’t a complete asshole. I’m sure his father doesn’t know either.”

Phoebe looked peeved by her words.

“It was a joke, Phoebe,” Kat said. “Lighten up.”

Phoebe shook her head. “How can you be so nonchalant when you know what’s at stake?”

“Unlike the rest of you, I know I’ll live through the night, one way or the other. Unless the earth is destroyed or they hack me to pieces, I’m in no danger. My only fear is for all of you.”

“Then make sure you stand close to me,” Wulf said, only half-jokingly. “I need some Teflon-coated armor.”

Kat shoved him toward the exit. “Yeah, yeah. Big Viking defender hiding behind me. I’ll believe that one when I see it.”

Wulf led the way out of the city, up to the surface. The truck they had arrived in had been moved to a nearby cave that housed several vehicles they kept just in case one of their people went Daimon and needed a link to the human world.

It was sick, but Wulf was grateful just this once for their “care” of the Daimons.

The spring thaw had started and the ground wasn’t as frozen as it had been before.

Shanus had given him several sets of keys so that he could choose the automobile most likely to get them there quickly. Wulf chose the navy blue Mountaineer.

Kat got in first. He looked back the way they had come while his thoughts returned to his family.

“It’ll be okay, Wulf.”

“Yeah,” he whispered. He knew it would be. He was going to make damn sure of it.

Wulf got in and drove them back toward the city. His first stop would be his house. Or what was left of it. He wanted to be fully armed for this conflict.

They drove for well over an hour before they reached his estate. Wulf pulled into his driveway and hesitated. There was no sign of battle here anymore. His garage, his windows were all intact.

Even the front gate was standing.

“Did Stryker repair it?” he asked Kat.

She burst out laughing. “Not his style. Believe me. He never repairs the damage he does. I have no idea what happened here. Maybe your Squires’ Council?”

“No. They didn’t even know about this.”

Wulf keyed the lock for his gate, then pulled toward the house slowly, expecting the worst.

As he neared the front door, he stopped suddenly.

There in the shadows beside his house, he saw movement.

The mist from the lake was thick, swirling. He cut the lights so that his vision wouldn’t be impaired by them and reached for the retractable sword under his seat.

There were three very tall men dressed in black walking toward them slowly, arrogantly, as if they had all the time in the world. They were united in power and strength, and their eagerness to fight bled from every pore of them.

All of them were blond.

“Stay here,” he warned Kat as he got out, ready for battle.

The fog swirled around the three men as they came closer.

Probably no more than six feet three, one of them was dressed in trousers, sweater, and wool overcoat. One side of the coat was pulled back to show an ancient scabbard and sword of Greek design. The one in the middle was two inches taller. He, too, wore wool trousers and a sweater along with a long black leather coat.

The third one had short hair, a shade darker than the other two. Dressed all in biker leather, he had two braids that fell down from his left temple.

And in that instant, Wulf remembered him.

“Talon?”

The biker broke into a wide grin. “From the way you’re holding that sword, I was wondering if you were going to recall me or not, Viking.”

Wulf laughed as his old friend drew near. They hadn’t seen each other in over a century. He gladly shook the Celt’s hand.

Wulf turned to the man in the middle and remembered him, too, from the brief time he had spent in New Orleans over one hundred years ago during Mardi Gras.

“Kyrian?” he asked. The ancient Greek general had changed quite a bit since the last time he had met him. Back then, Kyrian’s hair had been cropped short and he had worn a beard. Now it was shoulder length and his face was clean-shaven.

“Nice seeing you again,” Kyrian said, shaking his hand. “And this is my friend Julian of Macedon.”

Wulf knew the man only by reputation. Julian had been the one who had taught Kyrian everything he knew about fighting and battle. “Glad to meet you. Now what the hell are the three of you doing here?”

“They’re your backup.”

He turned to see Acheron Parthenopaeus joining their group. He didn’t know what stunned him most, their presence or the sight of the infant Ash had strapped into a baby harness, facing his chest.

Wulf was aghast. “Kyrian? Is that your baby?”

“Hell, no,” Kyrian said. “No way I would bring Marissa into this. Amanda would geld me first and then kill me if I even considered it.” He inclined his head to Acheron. “That’s Ash’s baby.”

Wulf cocked a brow at that. “Lucy,” he said in a mock Ricky Ricardo accent, “you got some ’splaining to do.”

Ash grunted. “Stryker isn’t stupid. Your idea of going in with a plastic baby, while admirable, would never work. Stryker would smell the plastic in an instant.” He turned the Snugli sack around to face Wulf so that he could see the tiny, dark-haired infant it contained. “So I give you a real baby.”

“What if it gets hurt?”

The baby sneezed.

Wulf jumped as fire shot out of its nostrils and almost singed his leg.

“Excuse me,” the baby said in a singsongy voice. “I almost made Dark-Hunter barbecue, which would be really sad ’cause I ain’t got no barbecue sauce with me.” The baby leaned its head back to look up at Ash. “You know fried Dark-Hunter isn’t good plain. What you need—”

“Sim,” Ash said in a warning tone under his breath, cutting the baby off.

The baby looked up at him. “Oh, I forgot,
akri.
Sorry. Goo, ga, goo.”

Wulf rubbed his forehead. “What is
that?
”

“He told you, Simi’s his baby … demon.”

All five of them turned at the deep, sinister voice that was laced with a heavy Greek accent. Another man stepped out of the shadows. He was almost as tall as Acheron with black hair and vibrant blue eyes.

Ash arched a brow. “You came after all, Z. Glad you made the party.”

Zarek snorted. “What the hell? I didn’t have anything better to do. Figured I might as well come kick ass and take names. Not that I really give a damn about their names. I’m just in it for the bloodlust.”

“So you’re Zarek,” Wulf said, eyeing the notorious ex-Dark-Hunter who had once been exiled to Fairbanks, Alaska.

His nasty attitude not only bled from every pore, but was apparent from the lip he kept perpetually curled. Billy Idol and Elvis had nothing on this man.

“Yeah,” Zarek said, sneering even more. “And I’m freezing, so can we rush this little get-together so I can kill some assholes and get back to the beach where I belong?”

“If you hate it here so much,” Talon asked, “why did you agree to come?”

In a subtle gesture of flipping Talon off, Zarek scratched his eyebrow with his middle finger, which was covered with a long, sharp metallic claw. “Astrid wants me to make friends. I don’t know why. Some weird woman thing. She’s trying to make me more sociable.”

Ash let out a rare laugh at that.

Zarek passed an equally amused, knowing look at Acheron. “I don’t want to hear it from you, O Great Ash. You’re the one who got me into this in the first place.” Then Zarek did the most surprising thing of all; he bent down and chucked the baby on the chin. “How you doing, little Simi?”

The baby jumped happily up and down in the harness. “Fine. You got any more frozen beans for me? I miss being in Alaska with you. It was fun.”

“No time for food, Sim,” Ash answered.

The baby blew him a raspberry. “Can I eat the Daimons then?”

“If you can catch them,” Ash promised, making Wulf wonder what the man knew about the Daimons that he wasn’t sharing.

“What’s that mean?” Zarek asked for him. “You being vague again?”

Ash looked at him archly. “Always.”

Zarek let out a sound of disgust. “Personally, I think we should get together and beat the hell out of you until you come clean.”

Kyrian scratched his chin thoughtfully. “You know—”

“Don’t even go there,” Acheron said irritably. He turned to Wulf. “Go get your weapons. You have an appointment to keep.”

Wulf paused by Ash’s side. “Thanks for coming.”

Ash inclined his head to him and stepped away as he cuddled the baby demon to his chest.

Wulf went back to the car to get Kat, but she was nowhere to be seen. “Kat?” he called. “Kat?”

“What’s wrong?” Talon asked as he and the others joined Wulf by the car.

“Did you see the woman I was with?”

They shook their heads.

“What woman?” Talon asked.

Wulf frowned. “She’s six feet four and blond. She couldn’t have just van—” He paused as he rethought that statement. “Never mind, she’s one of the few people who could have just gone poof.”

“Is she your wife?” Kyrian asked.

“No, she’s one of Artemis’s handmaidens who’s been helping us.”

Ash scowled at that. “Artemis doesn’t have a
kori
taller than her. Believe me. She doesn’t let any woman look down on her. Literally.”

Wulf looked at him as a feeling of dread went through him. “I hope you’re wrong. Because if you’re not, then Kat was working with Stryker all this time and is most likely off to tell him about our surprise party.”

Ash cocked his head slightly as if listening for something. “I don’t even sense her. It’s as if she doesn’t exist.”

“So what do you think?” Kyrian asked.

Ash picked his baby up as she started kicking him in the groin and moved her to his hip. The baby played with his braid, then started chewing it.

Wulf furrowed his brow. If he didn’t know better, he’d swear that baby had fangs.

“I don’t know what to think,” Ash said, pulling his hair away from the baby. “Kat bears the description of an Apollite or Daimon.”

“But she walks in daylight,” Wulf added.

Zarek cursed. “Don’t tell me there’s another Day-Slayer loose.”

“No,” Acheron said firmly. “I know for a fact Artemis hasn’t created one. She wouldn’t dare. At least not at the moment.”

“What’s a Day-Slayer?” Talon asked.

“You don’t ever want to know,” Julian answered.

“Yeah,” Zarek concurred. “What he said, times a hundred.”

“All right, then,” Wulf said, heading for his house. “Let me get my things and we’ll be on our way.”

As he walked off, he saw Talon move to stand beside Ash. “This is the part where you normally say if everyone does what they’re supposed to, everything will work out as it’s meant to. Right?”

Acheron’s face was impassive. “Normally, yes.”

“But?”

“We’re dealing with something greater than the Fates tonight. All I can honestly say is it’s going to be one hell of a fight.”

Wulf laughed at that as he left hearing range. That was okay by him. Fighting was the one thing he and his people excelled at.

*   *   *

They arrived at the Inferno just before midnight. Oddly enough, the bar was completely empty of patrons.

Dante met them at the door, dressed in black leather. He didn’t have his vampire teeth in, and he looked extremely angry.

“Ash,” he said, greeting the Atlantean. “Been a long time since you’ve darkened my door.”

“Dante.” Ash shook his hand.

Dante looked down at the baby with a knitted brow. “Simi?”

The baby smiled.

Dante let out a low whistle and stepped back. “Damn, Ash, I wish you would warn me when you’re planning on bringing your demon here. Do I need to warn the guys the feeding machine has come visiting?”

“No,” Ash said, swinging the baby lightly. “She’s only here to munch Daimons.”

“Where is everyone?” Wulf asked.

Dante glanced to the wall to his right. “I caught wind of what was going down tonight so we closed the place.”

Wulf followed his line of vision and saw the pelt of a panther mounted there. He recognized the hide by the streak of red in it. “Your brother?”

Fury darkening his eyes, Dante shrugged. “The bastard was working with the Daimons. Feeding them information about us and you.”

“Man,” Talon breathed. “That’s cold to kill your own blood.”

Dante turned on him with a feral sneer that more than betrayed the fact that Dante wasn’t human. “My brother betrayed
me
and our people. If I were as cold as I’d like to be, his hide would be on the floor so everyone could walk on him. Unfortunately, my other brothers were a little disturbed by that so we compromised with the wall.”

“Understood,” Ash said. “Where’s the rest of the pack?”