The Dark-Hunters (374 page)

Terra wiped her hands on her apron before she looked back at Ravyn. “Now where were we?”

“Coffee.”

“Coffee coming right up.”

Impressed by Dorian’s mate, Ravyn watched as she made her way over to the counter where the coffeepots were set. His brother’s mate was an interesting beast. She didn’t look like Dorian’s type at all. And for some reason, Ravyn’s curiosity got the better of him. “Are you bonded to Dorian?”

She paused in filling the mug to look up at him. “Yes. Unlike Phoenix, he isn’t a pussy.”

Ravyn laughed in spite of himself as she returned to filling the mug, then she pulled a thermos out and filled it, too. “How long have the two of you been mated?”

“Seventy-five years.” She placed the mug and thermos with a small container of sugars and cream on a tray for him.

“How long have you been bonded?”

“Nosy much?” Her gaze burned into his, and to his surprise, she answered. “Seventy-five years. Dorian never wanted to come home and find his mate dead after what all of you had been through. He said that the Fates joined us for a reason and that his place was to be by my side, even in death.”

A newfound respect for his brother welled up inside Ravyn. But more than that, he remembered the horror of the night his village had been destroyed. When the men had started falling around them, the assumption had been that those who were standing had mates who’d survived.

They’d rushed back home only to find out just how many of their clan hadn’t bonded to their mates.

The hardest blow for Ravyn had been his mother. Given how much his parents supposedly loved and respected each other, he’d just assumed they were bonded. But apparently his father hadn’t loved her enough.

“Thanks, Terra,” he said, taking the tray.

“Ravyn?”

He paused to look at her.

“Dorian thinks about you all the time and he holds himself responsible for not stepping up to defend you against Phoenix.” She looked around as if embarrassed that she’d confided that to him. “I just thought you should know.”

Ravyn’s throat grew tight. So he did have a brother who still loved him. Not that it changed anything. Dorian was still too much of a coward to stand up to the others or to let Ravyn know that he didn’t agree with the pack about his banishment.

So be it. He’d lived these past three hundred years without them, he could certainly live longer.

He inclined his head to Terra before he left her to return to Susan, who was gnawing her pencil to a nub.

“You’re going to break your teeth on that.” He set the tray down beside her.

She appeared baffled by his words. “What?”

He pointed to the pencil. “Are you hungry?”

She looked at it and laughed. “No, it’s a bad habit I started in grade school. My old boss used to say he could tell whenever I was on to something good by the number of teeth prints in the pencil on my desk.” She set the pencil aside and reached for the coffee.

“I assume by the state of the pencil that you’ve found something.”

She poured the cream in and added sugar. “Yes and no. Apparently the chief of police’s wife died a couple of months ago while visiting Europe with her son.”

“Really?”

She nodded. “I’ve pulled up a few photos of her at various social events, but nothing that leaps out at me.” Cradling the mug in one hand, she held up a piece of paper from the folder where Leo had written a small note:
Makes the Mad Hatter Look Sane.
“I think Leo was right.”

“Well, so much for that.”

His phone rang. Ravyn pulled it out of his pants and answered it. “Ravyn here.”

It was Otto’s voice. “Hey, Ravyn, we have a bit of a situation we need you for. Can you meet us at Post Alley?”

“When?”

“Fifteen minutes?”

“I’ll be there.” He hung up the phone to see Susan’s quizzical stare. “Otto wants me at Post Alley.”

“Why? I thought you were supposed to be lying low.”

Ravyn shook his head. “Otto didn’t say why, but it must be important though for him to call.”

Susan nodded in agreement. “Can I hitch a ride over?”

“Why?”

“Curiosity. C’mon. You’re a cat. Surely you, of all people, can appreciate that.”

“I don’t know.…” Ravyn hesitated.

“Oh, don’t take that tone with me. Either I go with you or I find my own way.”

“And if I don’t want you to?”

She gave him a miffed stare. “You know, you’d look really weird in a dress and high heels.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means you’re not my mother. Now stop arguing and help me find my shoes.”

By the expression on his face she could tell he wasn’t happy, but he did help her search out her shoes, which were buried under a pile of Jimmy’s papers.

It didn’t take them long to reach the alley, which wasn’t far from Pike’s Market.

They’d just gotten out of Phoenix’s Porsche and walked over to it when they heard Zoe’s aggravated voice in the darkness.

“Don’t make me run up that hill, Daimon, and spill my coffee. If I do, I can assure you that you’ll suffer unmercifully before I kill you.”

“I strangely like that woman,” Susan said to Ravyn as she followed him toward Zoe’s voice.

They’d only taken a few more steps before they ran into Dragon.

“What are you doing here?” he asked them.

“Call from Otto,” Ravyn said.

Dragon paused. “Me, too. How weird that he’d want us both here. Out in the open.”

That
was
odd. Susan looked back and forth between the men. “Did he say what he needed?”

“He didn’t,” they said in unison.

Dragon and Ravyn exchanged a wary stare. “Is it just me,” Ravyn asked, “or do you suddenly have a bad feeling about this?”

They heard Zoe let out a war cry.

The men took off at a dead run up the hill. Without thinking, Susan ran up after them, but as they crested the hill and she saw Menkaura, Cael, and Belle also there, she realized this was a trap.

And they’d all fallen right into it.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Ravyn cursed as he realized what was going on. Susan had been right. The Daimons had put them together while their powers were weakened knowing that this would drain them even more—which would make them easy pickings for the Spathis. Dammit, they should have listened to Nick. He’d even warned them about the phones. Who knew the crusty bastard had been telling the truth?

And of course, Nick was the only one of them not here.…

“We need to separate.” The words had barely left Cael’s lips before bolt-holes began opening all around them, trapping them in the narrow, grungy alleyway.

Spathis were emerging from the top and bottom of the hill.

“Oh, we’re screwed,” Belle said as she pulled the whip off her belt and snapped it in the air before her. “Anyone got a bright idea?”

“Yeah,” Zoe said as she pulled a knife from the top of her boot, “we learn to teleport.”

They all looked at Ravyn. “Wish I could help, folks. But that power was stripped from me when I died.”

Belle made a face at him. “Well then, what good are you, leopard?”

He didn’t know at present. This was a bad situation and they all knew it.

His adrenaline rushing at the prospect of a fight that would most likely be to his death, he turned to Susan. “We need to get you out of here.”

She scoffed at him as she gestured toward the top and bottom of the hill where the Spathis were gathering force. “No offense, Catman, unless you know something I don’t, I don’t think the Daimons are going to let me out.”

As much as he hated to admit it, she was right. Angry that he’d allowed himself to be caught like this, he manifested a stake in his hand. “You know the legend. Stab them in the heart and they’ll die.” He handed her the stake.

Susan’s eyes held a degree of fear as she wrapped her hand around the stake and offered him a brave smile. “Call me Buffy. I’m even blond, but don’t ask me to wear a halter top.” She glanced over to Zoe. “Or corset.”

Ravyn lifted her hand with the stake in it and kissed the back of her knuckles. Standing there with his death imminent, he felt a wave of respect for her the likes of which he’d never known. More than that, something sublimely tender touched his heart.

Whatever happened tonight, he only hoped that she got out of it in one piece.

Susan offered him an encouraging smile before she stepped back. Reluctantly, he let go and turned around to fight.

As the Daimons came toward them slowly, the Dark-Hunters formed a circle with their backs to one another.

Ravyn tried to put Susan behind him, but she wouldn’t go. “Susan, get in the middle.”

She met his gaze without flinching. “Get your head in the fight, Ravyn, and don’t worry about me. I’m the only one here who isn’t having my strength depleted right now.”

Zoe scoffed at her bravado. “You’re also the only one of us who has a soul they can steal and blood they can drink.”

Susan opened her mouth to respond, then snapped it shut. “Very valid points.” Then she literally hopped behind him.

Ravyn reached around his back to assure himself that she was as far from harm’s way as she could be for the moment.

Dragon whipped out his nunchakus while Menkaura wrapped a strange golden chain around one fist.

The Daimons didn’t attack right away. Rather, they crept toward them as if savoring the picture of them crowded together.

“What are they waiting for?” Belle asked.

Ravyn ground his teeth as he realized the answer. “For us to grow even weaker.”

“Screw that,” Cael snarled before he let out a war cry. He ran at the Daimon closest to him.

Without thinking, Ravyn broke formation to help Cael as two Daimons ran at Cael’s back. Suddenly all hell broke loose as the Daimons swarmed over them.

Susan couldn’t breathe as she watched the Daimons go after the Dark-Hunters. There were so many of them, she wasn’t even sure if the Dark-Hunters were still standing.

She staggered back as a Daimon came at her, then paused a few feet from her. He sniffed the air in a way that reminded her of a dog who’d caught wind of something it found appealing. “You’re not one of them,” he said with a gleeful smile. “You’re human.”

“And you’re not.”

He came at her.

Susan grabbed his shirt and fell to the ground with him in tow. Rolling onto her back, she raised her legs up and kicked him over her head, away from her, then continued the roll until she was back on her feet. He landed in a heap by the Dumpster as the next Daimon came at her. She elbowed the woman in the face, then twisted around, trying to stake her.

The woman sank her fangs into Susan’s arm.

Susan hissed as the pain spread through her. “I hate to girl fight, but…” She grabbed her by the hair and yanked as hard as she could.

The Daimon cried out before Susan head-butted her.

Ravyn turned to see Susan fighting off her attackers. Stunned by her skill, he missed the Daimon coming for his back. Something hot ripped into his shoulder. He turned with a curse to punch the Daimon in the face. He staggered back but left the knife embedded deep in Ravyn’s shoulder. Pulling it out with a curse and a fierce grimace, he tossed it straight into the Daimon’s chest. He exploded into a golden shower that rained down on Ravyn.

Ravyn caught the knife before it fell to the ground and headed for Susan. She executed a
mawashi-geri
or roundhouse kick so perfectly that even Bruce Lee would have been impressed. Gods love her, she did know how to handle herself. Dragon really had taught her well.

And before Ravyn could reach her, she turned on the Daimon nearest her and stabbed him with the stake.

Ravyn skidded to a stop as she killed the Daimon like a pro. She started for Ravyn, then caught herself as she realized he had black hair.

He gave her a crooked grin. “Remind me to never piss you off again.”

“You got it.”

He started for the Daimon who was coming at her back, but before Ravyn could take more than one step, she’d elbowed the Daimon in the face and flipped him to the ground, where she pinned him with his arm twisted behind his back and with her right foot on the small of his spine.

Realizing she was fine to fight on her own, Ravyn turned to see Belle surrounded by a group of Daimons. She was wounded and bleeding profusely as an extremely large Daimon swung an ax around.

Belle caught the Daimon against his cheek with her whip. The Daimon recoiled, then snarled before he swung the ax. He narrowly missed her as she lunged to the right.

Ravyn rushed at the Daimon’s back to kick him away from Belle.

The Daimon spun on him as two more joined them. He could hear Belle cracking her whip and Dragon fighting with his nunchakus while he kept his eyes trained on the Daimon’s ax so that he could dodge the deadly swings. Ravyn dropped to the ground and rolled, then kicked the Daimon’s feet out from under him. Grabbing the ax as it fell toward the street, Ravyn arced it toward the Daimon’s chest and killed him.

And still the Daimons kept coming.

One dove at Ravyn’s back, knocking him forward. The ax flew out of his hand as he hit the ground and landed at the feet of another Daimon. Laughing, the Daimon picked up the ax and came after him.

Ravyn tried to back up, only to stagger against another Daimon who shoved him back toward the ax. Ravyn changed into a leopard at the same time the Daimon swung. He missed Ravyn and decapitated the other Daimon. But before Ravyn could think, another Daimon caught him with another ax against his back leg.

Yelping, his powers snapped from the pain and turned him back into a man against his will. He barely had time to summon clothes onto his body and roll away before they were on him.

To his surprise, Susan was there with an ax she must have taken from another Daimon. “Back off,” she snarled, driving them away from Ravyn.

Ravyn tried to stand only to have his savaged leg buckle under his weight. His strength was starting to fail him and he knew the other Dark-Hunters weren’t in any better shape. No matter what he might like, his pain would keep him in human form.

They were going to die.