Bound (Dark Reflections Volume 1) (20 page)

My beast was ready, eager even, to exchange blows with the werewolf, but despite my words earlier, part of me was busy thinking about the repercussions of what we were about to do. Puppeteer was brutal when it came to enforcing the prohibition against killing the earthborn. He didn't manage to punish every single offense, and I was pretty sure that most of the people who ended up punished were already on the chopping block for other reasons, but even so killing a werewolf risked having half a dozen werewolves under Puppeteer's control showing up one night to execute you.

Juan eased any concerns with a single sentence a split second before he closed with the werewolf. "We have no way of knowing whether or not our contact from the Coun'hij has been dragged into this fight already."

It was a slightly threadbare excuse, but it was the kind of thing that kept people alive when the Coun'hij got around to reviewing the results of some fight. The fact that we could say we'd been sent to neutralize any threats to our contact from the Coun'hij should be enough to shield us from the Coun'hij.

That all flitted across my mind as I crossed the three remaining steps to the werewolf and then there wasn't time for any thoughts that didn't relate directly to my immediate survival.

The werewolf slashed at Juan as the lights flickered again, but Juan lunged to the right in a blindingly explosive move that kept him just out of reach of the werewolf's deadly claws. It was an impressive display of speed that I'd never seen bettered by anyone else before.

I was only half a step behind Juan so I hit the werewolf on its right side, digging my claws into its arms in an effort to slow its turn as it tried to follow Juan around as he flanked it on the other side. I felt strong, stronger than ever before, but I still wasn't a match for the sheer brute strength that the werewolf commanded so casually.

Despite my best efforts the werewolf pulled its right arm free of my claws. The action left bloody ribbons where my claws had ripped through the werewolf's flesh, but there was no sign that the pain slowed my opponent in the slightest as it reversed directions connecting with an elbow to my face that threw me back into the side of the building behind me.

I had a brief instant to be grateful that I'd been struck with the werewolf's elbow rather than the razor-sharp back edge of its claws, and then I hit with enough force that I saw stars as my head connected with one of the metal structural members hidden in the wall.

If the werewolf had just been facing Juan and me, we would have lost the fight right then and there, but a chorus of yips and growls told me that the girls were in the fight now too. My vision cleared just in time to see Juan take four long slashes to the chest as he tried to dance back out of range after an aborted attack that had probably been intended to distract the beast so that the girls could spring.

Juan's attack served its original purpose, if not quite in the way he'd intended for it to. Jasmin used the fact that the werewolf was momentarily focused on Juan to jump and clamp her jaws down on the back of its right arm roughly where the triceps muscle would have been on a human.

Jess and Alison latched onto the back of the creature's legs, ripping with their jaws for nearly a second before they and Jasmin all three had to drop away and try to dart back out of range of its counterattack.

Jasmin and Jessica were just fast enough to dodge out of the way of the werewolf's claws, but Alison was a few inches too close and got slashed all the way from her shoulder down to her back leg. She was bleeding profusely and I could see bones showing through in a couple of spots, but Alison gamely spun around and prepared to spring at the werewolf again.

I'd managed to pull myself back to my feet while the werewolf had been busy savaging Alison, and I hit it from the side. I couldn't generate enough force to knock it over, but I did jostle its arm enough that its next attack missed Alison by several inches.

More importantly, the werewolf's momentum from that last swipe at Alison meant that it couldn't spin back around fast enough to stop me from sinking both claws into its back and getting my right foot set into the meaty part of its leg.

The werewolf spun around as I jammed the talons on my right foot into its other leg, but it was a heartbeat too slow. It had allowed me to get set and I was holding on for everything I was worth. Juan came in from the left side, grabbing the werewolf's left arm with both of his claws at the same time that Jasmin sank her teeth once again into its right arm.

Between the two of them and me the werewolf was carrying an extra eight or nine hundred pounds and even its unnatural strength wasn't up to doing that without slowing down noticeably. I felt the werewolf change directions again, spinning to the left in an attempt to bring Juan into reach of its right hand and its fangs, but this time I used the brief instant when it had no momentum to lever my right foot up higher on its body.

I felt Jess hit the beast a second later, tearing into its leg in an effort to hamstring it. Juan dropped away only inches ahead of the claws that would have opened him up from stomach to chin if he'd tried to continue to control the werewolf's left arm.

With the werewolf's left hand free Jasmin was in increased danger, but she let go and danced back just before the werewolf could savage her. Alison joined Jess in an effort to damage the creature's legs enough to bring it to its knees, but it swiped at the two of them and the only thing that saved them from serious injury was that they were partially shielded from the attack by the werewolf's own bulk.

I used the distraction they provided to move my other foot higher as well as going for a new hold with my left hand. It was risky and I knew it as I made my move, but I could tell that the girls especially were tiring. Faced with the choice between potentially being bucked off of the werewolf or moving too slow and watching one of my friends die, there really wasn't any option but to move more quickly and hope that I could manage to hold onto the werewolf for just long enough to kill it.

My claws must have hit a particularly sensitive spot because the werewolf suddenly howled and threw itself back into a wall in an effort to dislodge me. It probably would have succeeded except for the fact that Juan charged forward and hit the creature hard enough to spin it around so that its right shoulder took most of the force of the impact with the building.

The werewolf's roar brought answering howls from two more of its kind and my breath caught as I realized that I'd completely forgotten about the other werewolves that we'd known had to be in the area. The werewolf we'd been fighting had just given away our position and we probably only had seconds before we'd be up against three or even possibly four of the things. We needed to disengage now, but that was going to be almost impossible with Alison hurt and me stuck on this werewolf's back.

Times were as desperate as they were likely to get. The werewolf's vulnerable head and neck seemed to be miles away from my current position, but I knew that wasn't the case. The distance was only a matter of feet, but it was feet that I was having to cover slow inches at a time.

The werewolf rebounded off of what was left of the wall and slashed at Juan in a blur that was too impossibly fast to follow. I would have said that there wasn't any way for her to manage it, but Jasmin somehow latched onto its wrist and once again her weight threw off the werewolf's timing and speed just enough to save Juan from being disemboweled.

I took the biggest gamble of my life and banked everything on the assumption that the werewolf was going to reverse its course once again and spin right in an attempt to put Jasmin down before she could disengage and retreat back out of range. I launched myself up and to the right in an effort to preempt the werewolf's moment and as my claws and talons all came free of the werewolf's back I saw it blur into motion as its lunge to the right combined with my leap to create an incredible amount of relative motion.

My entire world narrowed down to the werewolf's neck and the slow arc of my left hand as I fought to bring it around so that the two would meet. It seemed for a second as though I was going to miss, but then the wolf's motion brought its head down a few precious inches as it tried to sink its claws into Jasmin who'd dropped to the ground and was trying to duck the attack.

The claws on my left hand sank into the werewolf's neck just below its jaw and I felt my arm strain in protest as my momentum was abruptly redirected with my left hand as the pivot point. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Jasmin dodge the werewolf's first swipe by a fraction of an inch, and then I was sailing over the creature's right arm as inertia brought me around in front of it.

I saw something like surprise in the werewolf's eyes as both of my feet sank into its chest and then my right hand was buried in its neck as well and I used the leverage provided by my feet to rip both sets of claws through the side of its neck as I threw myself backwards.

I'd been able to feel the werewolf's claws arrowing towards my vulnerable back, and I'd half expected to die, but my clunky back flip launched me a few inches above the trajectory of the werewolf's claws. I landed heavily on my knees and looked up just in time to see the werewolf drop to the ground in a spray of blood.

"Jess, go get a first-aid kit now!"

I followed Juan's gaze and felt my throat tighten up as I saw that Alison was lying on the ground surrounded by blood. She'd transformed back to two legs, which meant that she was either critically injured or dead, but as I dropped down next to her I saw her chest slowly rising and falling.

I must have shifted at some point because when I went to apply direct pressure I did so with human hands rather than hybrid claws, but I didn't remember forcing my beast back into its mental cage in order to change forms.

"Don't die on us, Alison, Jess will be back in a minute."

My voice broke as I said whatever came to mind in an effort to keep her with us while I held her wounds closed and tried not to think about her odds.

Jasmin dropped to her knees next to me and placed her hands next to mine in an attempt to help stanch the bleeding, but I somehow
knew
it wasn't going to be enough.

Juan's voice cut through the mental haze that was rapidly taking me over.

"Alec, back on your feet. I need you in your hybrid form. Someone is fighting those things and our best hope of keeping Alison alive is to go help kill those other werewolves before they come over here and end us all."

I shook my head. The threat of the other werewolves had somehow become a distant cloudy thing when compared to the imminent death of the pretty girl who'd just spent the last few days lounging around the pool with me.

Juan's backfist knocked me to the ground. He hadn't put any real strength behind it. He was still a hybrid and I'd been in my primary form so if he had put any real oomph into the blow it probably would have snapped my neck.

As attacks went it was remarkably restrained, but my beast didn't view it as such. A surge of power lashed out of me as a transformation ripped through my body. I'd never felt my beast so enraged, but the power that had been unleashed was only a shadow of what I'd displayed in St Louis.

I hadn't been expecting the sudden flare of rage from my beast, so I hadn't been prepared for it any more than I'd been prepared for Juan's backfist. Under those circumstances I should have practically lit the area up with a power storm, but it was almost as though the power that my beast usually drew on was being funneled somewhere else.

That all passed through my mind almost as an afterthought because my real focus was on trying to bring myself back under control enough not to try and kill Juan. I succeeded, but it was a close thing. As my breathing came back under control I turned back towards Alison, but Juan lunged toward me in a move that was only half feint.

"If you go back to her then I'll kill you myself. We need to get in on that fight or we're all as good as dead."

"You don't know that."

"Maybe not, but that won't stop me from killing you."

I felt my lips draw back from my fangs but the sound of four feet sprinting back our way told me that Jess was at most seconds away from helping Jasmin.

"Fine, we'll do it your way, but if she dies then I
will
make sure you join her within minutes."

Juan's smile showed his fangs and seemed to say that his beast would likewise welcome a chance to see who was truly dominant once and for all, but after holding my gaze for a second he turned and started off towards the sound of fighting.

As I followed him I wondered if the other battle had just started up, or if it had been going the entire time and I had just been too focused on our battle to notice anything else. Our contact's reports of fighting from this area certainly suggested the latter, which was disturbing. A leader needed to be able to keep enough presence of mind to deal with the larger picture as well as the fight he was involved in or his people would eventually be outmaneuvered and killed when someone blindsided him with something he should have seen coming from a mile away.

Juan led me round a corner and suddenly we were in the middle of another battle. This one was shape shifters against werewolves also, but where there'd only been five of us and one werewolf, here there were two werewolves with what looked like another one dead a few feet away.

The battle was too fluid and there were too many figures, wolves and hybrids alike, darting in and out for me to count how many people had faced off against the werewolves, but there were a number of bleeding forms scattered around the periphery of the battle and it seemed that whatever had been gained by one werewolf being killed had been offset by attrition in their own ranks.

"We help with the one on the left."

Juan sprang forward even as the words left his mouth, but I hung back for just long enough to see how his presence would impact the fight. Juan tried to catch the werewolf from behind but it spun around and slashed at him, forcing him back just long enough for it to catch one of the original hybrids it had been fighting with claws to the shoulder.