Deadly Descendant (11 page)

His eyes went even wider, and I had the feeling he hadn’t even seen me until I’d spoken.

“Help me!” he cried desperately as he pumped his legs even harder. Then he came to an abrupt stop, practically falling on his ass as he ground his shoes into the grassy earth that bounded the cemetery.

Just like I saw nothing to explain why he was running, I saw nothing to explain why he’d stopped. Until he screamed, that is.

A shadowy shape coalesced out of the darkness, leaping through the air. The shape was little more than a blot in the darkness until it crashed into the victim, when it became a medium-sized dog that looked like a small wolf. A coyote, maybe. It clamped its jaws around the guy’s arm, and even a solid blow to its muzzle didn’t dislodge it.

Another shape flew through the air at him, and I fired at it. The creature went insubstantial again in midair, and my bullet passed harmlessly through where it had been. The other, however, had a firm grip on the victim’s arm, snarling and shaking its head as he screamed in pain and terror.

I took aim at the creature … coyote … whatever the hell it was. Despite knowing my aim was infallible, I hesitated before pulling the trigger, afraid to shoot at something that was so close to the victim, but I figured I didn’t have much of a choice. I couldn’t see any more of them coming, but I
knew
they were there, that we would soon be overwhelmed.

I squeezed the trigger, and this time, the coyote stayed nice and solid. The bullet hit it square in the head, and the man was finally able to shake it off his arm. The coyote landed limply on the pavement, but I saw no sign of blood except for that on its muzzle.

The man climbed to his feet, breath sawing in and out of his lungs as blood soaked the arm of his coat. I hurried to help him, knowing he had to be in dire pain. I kept a careful eye on the coyote as I slipped past it. Its eyes were closed, its tongue extended through bloodied teeth.

It wasn’t a coyote, I realized. It was a jackal.

I couldn’t remember ever seeing one in person before, but I’d watched enough nature shows to know one when I saw it. I supposed it made sense for a descendant of a jackal-headed god to have a pack of them at his beck and call.

By the time I reached the man and put my arm around his waist to help support him, the jackal had become insubstantial again, just a vaguely dog-shaped shadow against the grass.

“What the hell?” the dazed victim murmured as the shadow lost its shape and dissipated into the darkness of the night.

I didn’t have time to contemplate the latest dose of weirdness before something slammed into the guy’s back, knocking him to the ground despite my arm around him. When he fell, there was a jackal on his back, its jaws clamped on his shoulder. I pointed the gun, but even with supernatural aim, I had no shot. Anything that hit the jackal would hit the man, too.

Another jackal coalesced out of the air in midleap, landing at the victim’s feet and grabbing hold of an ankle. The one on the guy’s back could have torn his throat out by now if it wanted to, but it settled for sinking its fangs into the flesh of his shoulder. His screams were swallowed by the emptiness of the night and the silence of the dead.

Two more jackals appeared and dove at the victim, jaws snapping and releasing as the first two maintained their grip, holding the victim down so the rest of the pack could attack with impunity. I still had no
shot at the one on the guy’s back, but I took aim at the one holding his leg. My bullet hit it square in the head, knocking it back, but it was a Pyrrhic victory, because another immediately took its place. Shooting the jackals was like chopping the heads off the Hydra, so I whirled around, looking for the
Liberi
who controlled them.

He was standing about twenty yards away, leaning against a lamppost, watching the action. He looked like a homeless dude, with lank, greasy hair, filthy sweats, and tattered Windbreaker. He was so skinny it was a wonder the light breeze didn’t blow him away. His breath steamed in the night air as he stared at the jackal I’d just killed, his expression one of rage, madness, and, it appeared, raw grief.

I took aim at his head. Because he was
Liberi,
I couldn’t kill him. However, I could incapacitate him, and hopefully if he lost consciousness, the jackals would go
poof
.

The jackal I’d shot disappeared, and the
Liberi
’s eyes snapped to mine. The feral smile that shaped his lips gave me about half a second’s warning, but it wasn’t enough. I tried to dodge and shoot at the same time, but the jackal slammed into me so hard even my supernatural aim couldn’t compensate.

The gun fired into the ground as the jackal grabbed hold of my arm with crushingly strong jaws. White-hot pain drew a scream from my throat, but I kept my head enough to transfer the gun to my left hand. Gritting my teeth as my eyes watered and I fought desperately to stay on my feet, I fired at the jackal
from point-blank range. It let go, but another one was instantly on me.

I knew the jackals couldn’t kill me. I was
Liberi,
immortal. I’d seen Jamaal recover from being decapitated. None of that logic did anything to quell the primal panic that coursed through my blood as I fell.

Another jackal came at me, its jaw clamping down on my left wrist, shaking me until the gun fell from my limp fingers. I slammed my other fist into the side of its head. My body was fighting on autopilot, the pain and terror overwhelming conscious thought. The jackals were everywhere, winking in and out of their solid forms as they darted in for attacks.

I was sure I was about to find out exactly what it felt like for a
Liberi
to die. The magic of the
Liberi
meant that I would revive, but logic is no match for panic. The jackals were going to rip me into bloody shreds, devour me, and they were going to take their time about it.

But all at once, they disappeared.

I lifted my head and saw their master give me a mocking salute before he, too, faded into the night.

Seconds later, a collection of shadows drew together, and Jamaal emerged from their depths. It looked for a moment like he was going to take off in pursuit of the killer, but it was pretty damn hard to follow someone who was invisible. And as big and powerful as Jamaal is, I don’t know if he’d have had any better success against the phantom jackals than I had.

I was bleeding from bites on both of my arms and one of my legs. I was pretty sure I’d broken a finger
or two punching a jackal in its hard skull. It would all heal in a matter of hours, but goddamn, did it ever hurt.

The poor man I’d been trying to help was in considerably worse shape. He lay facedown on the grass, blood seeping from about a dozen wounds. I could tell he was still alive, because his back occasionally rose and fell with a breath, but I didn’t think he would stay alive much longer if he didn’t get immediate medical attention.

I forced myself into a sitting position, the pain almost making me black out, then scooted nearer to the victim. I got a better look at him and wished I hadn’t. There was a lot of blood, and so many wounds I didn’t know which one I should try to put pressure on first. I glanced up at Jamaal, meaning to snap at him to get over here and help me, but the words died in my throat when I saw him.

He was not himself. Literally. I mean, yes, it was
Jamaal
standing there, but not the Jamaal I knew. The small crescent-moon glyph in the center of his forehead was glowing with a golden light, as were his eyes. His expression was of a man in a trance, seeing nothing of the world around him. He took one slow step toward the bleeding man, then another. His hand rose as if guided by an invisible puppet string, reaching out toward the victim.

I hadn’t the faintest idea what to do or say. Jamaal wasn’t easy to reason with even when he wasn’t out of his mind, and I wasn’t sure he knew I was there at the moment, his attention entirely focused on the victim. I
wanted to at least put myself between the two, but my own pain was making me light-headed and wobbly.

The victim’s eyes flew open suddenly, but, as with Jamaal, there was no sign of human intelligence in them. Jamaal’s reaching hand tightened, fingers curling into a fist. He was still about five feet away from the victim, not within touching range, but I knew he was doing
something
. Something not good.

The victim’s eyes stayed open, but even so, I could see the moment his life slipped away. I couldn’t have told you what was different about him. His eyes were no more vacant than they had been from the moment he’d first opened them, but he was dead.

I looked at Jamaal in horror. The glow in his eyes and his glyph faded, and for one moment, I saw an expression of clarity on his face, like he’d come back from wherever he’d been. Then his eyes rolled up into his head, and his knees went out from under him.

I wanted to sit
there on the grass and take some time to gather myself, try to make sense of what I’d seen. But I was badly wounded, sitting by the side of the road with one dead man and another unconscious one, and I didn’t have the luxury. It was dark, but not dark enough to hide the carnage if someone drove by, and though traffic was sparse, it wasn’t nonexistent. I suspected we were far enough away from the residential area that no one had heard the shots, but I couldn’t be sure of that.

With shaking hands, I pulled out my cell phone and speed-dialed Anderson. He answered on the first ring.

“Have you found him? We heard gunfire.” He was slightly out of breath, and I realized he was running. I cursed the cemetery for being so big, for forcing us to spread out so much.

“N-need help,” I managed to stammer out, my whole body now racked with shivers. I didn’t know if I was reacting to my own wounds or if I was having a well-deserved panic attack, but I was having trouble getting words out of my mouth and breath into my lungs.

“Nikki? Are you okay? What happened?”

I tried to spit out an explanation, I really did. But what came out was a gasp, followed by something that sounded suspiciously like a sob. My throat was so tight I could barely breathe, and I was shaking so hard it was a miracle I hadn’t dropped the phone.

“We’re coming, Nikki,” Anderson said. “Hang on. Are you still on Rock Creek Church?”

I managed a hiccuped affirmative that, amazingly, he was able to understand.

“Just hang on. We’ll be there soon.”

He hung up on me, which was just as well, considering I was practically incapable of speech.

I’d always thought of myself as something of a tough chick. I’d spent years in foster care, getting passed from one family to another like an unwanted present that kept getting regifted. I’d been a loner, a rebel, a troublemaker. But becoming
Liberi
had taught me in a very short time just how far I was from being the tough chick I’d imagined. Girls like me weren’t supposed to sit by the side of the road and have hysterics after a fight. No matter how horrifying the attack. No matter that they were bleeding from multiple and very painful wounds. No matter that the guy they’d
tried to save was dead or that one of the good guys had killed him while in some kind of altered state.

In the distance, a pair of headlights approached, and I knew there was no way whoever was in that car was going to miss the carnage. The strip of grass we were on wasn’t wide enough for us to huddle outside the range of the headlights, and there was nothing to hide behind—even if I could have moved both the dead guy and Jamaal. Not to mention the splatters of blood everywhere.

I was coming close to panic again, frozen where I was, my brain trying to think of what to do and coming up empty. That was when a large black dog came galloping through the cemetery, leapt over the iron fence like it was only an inch high, and landed on the grass beside me. Another burst of adrenaline flooded my system, but before I had a chance to react, the dog shimmered, and suddenly, it was Jack kneeling there in the grass beside me—stark naked, though I was too fuzzy-minded to take much note of it.

The headlights were coming closer, and we were sitting ducks, nowhere to hide. Without a word, Jack grabbed my arm, his hand fortunately not landing on one of the bite wounds, jerking me to the ground beside the dead guy. I tried to voice a protest, but Jack ignored me, forcing my hand against the dead guy’s mauled shoulder and holding it there with an iron grip while reaching for Jamaal with his other hand.

I tried to pull away, shuddering with revulsion, but
Jack turned and hissed at me. “Hold still! Just until the car passes.”

I didn’t want to. My hand was sticky with the dead guy’s blood, and my stomach wanted to rebel at the thought of what I was touching. The car was slowing down as it approached us, and I figured adding a naked guy to this scenario wasn’t doing much to improve the visuals. I cringed when the headlights hit us, hoping the driver would go shrieking off in terror at warp speed, giving us time to do … something … before he called the cops. Instead, the car cruised slowly past us. I had the brief impression of a man’s face, taking a good look at us through the driver’s-side window, then turning to face front with a grimace.

The car picked up speed as it passed, but there was no squeal of tires as the driver put pedal to metal, and it didn’t look to me like he was going more than a little faster than the speed limit.