When Monsters Bleed (The Monsters Among Us Book 2), page 1
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Other Books by Debbie Cassidy
About the Author
Copyright © 2023, Debbie Cassidy
All Rights Reserved
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, duplicated, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior written consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
Cover by Covers by Juan
Chapter 1
RUE
There were monsters in my world. I’d evaded them all my life. Survived by using my training and brought back supplies for my settlement. These monsters were predictable because they hadn’t pretended to be anything less than they were.
There’d been some comfort in that.
But in the last few days, everything changed.
The word monsters grew to apply to creatures we believed to be our saviors. The word monsters now felt wrong when applied to the beasts that I made a bargain with a few short days ago. So, I was forced to ask myself: what is a monster?
Had we been wrong all along?
“Rue, Rue snap out of it.” Shem’s voice was an abrasion to my senses, drawing me out of the soft haze I’d retreated into. “We’re about to land.”
The beat of his wings registered along with the sting of cold night air. Two figures flew up ahead—Tumiel with Bastian in his grip and Sarq beside him. Zaq trailed behind us, watching our six.
Panic squeezed my gut and the reality of our situation—the reality I’d been shoving to the back of my mind—surged to the forefront.
The celestials were after us. They’d killed a bunch of my people.
Purged them.
Burned them to ash along with Javier and… I sucked in a sharp breath as pain lanced through my chest.
“Dammit.” Shem’s grip on me tightened. “They won’t follow us. Not this far into the deadlands.” He sounded certain. Like he wanted to reassure me.
He thought I was afraid of them. Afraid for my life.
He had me so wrong. “I wish they would follow.” The words tasted bitter as I spat them out. “I wish they’d come so I can kill them.”
His chest vibrated against my back. “A noble thought, but pointless. You’re no match for them, and right now, neither are we.”
I knew this. I fucking knew it, but I needed to feel powerful. I needed to feel like I could make them pay for what they’d done. What they’d taken… My breath caught and twisted in my chest. Fuck, it hurt. I pushed back tears and blinked away the image of Jamie’s face the moment before he—
“We’re not strong enough now. But we will be.”
“Yes, Rue. Once we have the pieces of the relic, we’ll be strong enough and we will bring them down.”
I had to believe that. I needed to believe it. I owed it to my people. To my friend Javier and to Jamie, the man I would have loved with all my heart. My chest hollowed and filled with a fresh wave of pain at the thought. I blinked back tears.
Focus. Javier and Jamie were gone but Bastian was alive, and the watchers had urged some of the humans to run, which meant—shit. “We have to go back.”
“What?” Shem asked.
“There are survivors. We’ve got to find them.”
“We can’t risk going back.”
“I thought you said the celestials wouldn’t come this far?”
He made a sound of exasperation. “It’s not the celestials I’m worried about. The sun has gone down. The skies are dangerous. We must minimize how long we’re exposed.”
Of course. They needed me alive so I could help them locate the pieces of the ancient relic that would give them back their celestial light. I was vital to that plan, and the plan was vital to saving our world. A few weeks ago, I may have agreed with Shem in his philosophy of sacrificing the lives of a few to save the many. But I’d seen too much death and pain since then. Lost too many loved ones. The few humans running scared out there were all that was left of my past. My home.
I wouldn’t leave them to die. “We had a deal, Shem. You vowed to protect my people.”
His grip on me was suddenly crushing. “Yes, we had a deal, and you broke it by wielding Michael’s sword. You brought them to us.”
My heart sank. He was right. I’d made the call that resulted in the Purge.
“You’re right. All the deaths were my fault. I fucked up. But I’m not running away now. I have to go back and—”
“What? Atone? You think putting your life in jeopardy and risking the fate of the world is atonement?”
The scout part of my brain agreed. Agreed and accepted. But the woman, the daughter, the friend, the human was stronger right now. “Shem, please…” My voice cracked. “I need to save them. Help me save them.” Save somebody.
His wings beating the air punctuated the silence. I held my breath, waiting. Finally, he let out a low growl of exasperation. “Damn you, human. I fear you’ll be more trouble than you’re worth.”
He called out something in his watcher tongue.
Tumiel glanced over his shoulder, emerald eyes glowing slightly in the gloom. Then our whole troop veered left, rising a little before swooping as we turned back to scout for our missing humans.
It was dark below us. The moonlight was anemic, and my night vision was shit. I had to rely on Shem and the others to scope out the terrain. We flew east of the tracks in the general direction my people had run, hoping to intercept them, when Sarq spotted something.
“I see someone.” He dropped in altitude, beelining for a crop of trees. We followed. I spotted a flash of white in the foliage followed by movement.
There was something in the tree.
Not something. Someone. Several someones.
“Clever,” Shem said. “Maybe your humans aren’t a lost cause after all.”
They were hiding in the trees, and as we got closer, they looked up with smudged, frightened faces. Clara held her son, Sam, tight against her side as they huddled beneath the canopy. Nial had his son, David, pressed back against the tree, shielding the boy with his body.
We dropped closer and I caught sight of Sissy clinging to bark, her dark hair in disarray and a huge grin on her face.
“I knew you’d come back for us,” she called out.
These people trusted me. Even after—
A tree on the outer edge of the cluster rustled, the branches shivering. “Shem, did you see that?”
“Eyes on the tops,” Shem called out. He pulled up, hovering in the air, wings beating to stay above the treeline, arms wrapped around me, anchoring me to his powerful body.
More trees shivered, creating a wave that moved closer to the cluster where my people hid. “What is it? What’s in the trees?”
“Rue?” Sissy’s eyes were all eye whites. “Rue, what’s happening? What do you see?”
“I count three,” Sarq called back.
“Three what?” Nial yelled.
Panic tainted the air.
“We have to get out,” Clara shouted. “We need to run.”
“Do not move,” Shem ordered. “If you run, then you’re prey. Right now, they’re simply curious.”
“Who?” My voice was a whisper because I didn’t want my people to hear. I didn’t want to fuel the panic. “Who’s in the trees, Shem?”
The canopy shivered again, and Clara cried out in alarm.
“Fuck this!” a man I didn’t recognize cried. He had to be from the group we’d saved. “I’m getting out of here.” He grabbed a branch and swung his body outward, eager to climb down.
“Don’t,” Zaq warned just as something exploded out of the adjacent tree and leapt at the man.
What was that? It looked like a naked child except children didn’t have spines on their backs. They didn’t have such long, thin fingers, and they certainly didn’t have tiny white horns. The creature hit him in the chest, propelling him back against the tree trunk. He connected with an ompf and stared dum
The creature pulled back his horned head, made a weird gargling sound, then bit off the man’s face.
Chapter 2
MICHAEL
Too much death. Too much destruction. The Purge always comes with a cost. I see it now in the piles of human ash seeping into the earth. The horror of it settles on my shoulders like a shadowy shroud. The rain batters my wings, creating a melody of sorrow as I walk amongst the dead.
So many dead and for what?
I did not get what I came here for.
The human female is gone.
Shem has her, which means we are all in grave danger.
“Michael, over here!” Agnus raises a hand to gain my attention.
I stride toward him, boots sinking into the earth with each step. “What is it?”
“Look.” He points at a pile of ash untouched by the rain. It glows with ethereal light as it comes together to take the form of a man.
“What is this madness?” Agnus says. “No human can withstand the Purge. Only a celestial can.”
But I know what this is. “A celestial, yes… Or a sweeper with the serum fresh in his veins.”
Agnus makes a gruff sound and shakes his head. “Ah, makes sense, then.”
The male takes form. I have seen this face beside hers at base fifteen, and I saw the way he reached for her tonight. The way she screamed for him. The shroud of responsibility presses down harder on me.
If I could have halted the Purge…
But what is done is done.
“What do we do with him?” Agnus asks.
There is only one thing to do. “We take him with us.”
He is important to her, and I can most definitely work with that.
Chapter 3
RUE
Achild’s shrill scream battered my eardrums, but it was overshadowed by the crunch of bone and wet squelch of fleshy chewing as the creature ate the man’s face. The guy’s body jerked, his arms shooting out, hands splayed starfish-like before slumping against the tree, surrendering to his fate.
The child screamed again.
The trees around us shivered and terror filled my veins with ice.
“We have to get them out of the trees!” Shem yelled.
The little monsters weren’t curious any longer, they were in full attack mode.
“Get out of the trees,” Bastian echoed.
People began to look for a way to scramble down.
I glanced across at Bastian, held tight in Tumiel’s grip, his jaw tense with frustration. Where was his sword? Gone? Fuck.
He met my eyes briefly, and I saw my pain echoed there. These were our people. We were responsible for protecting them, but right now, the only people who could save them were the watchers and we… We were a burden.
“Put me down.” I shoved at Shem’s arm. “Put me down and help them.”
He gripped me tighter and growled.
“Dammit, Shem. Will those things come for us if we’re on the ground?”
He made an angry sound and whirled away from the trees. “Stay put or I’ll make you pay.” He descended low enough to drop me safely. I hit the ground in a crouch and Bastian joined me a moment later.
We spun to take in the carnage behind us where the forest seethed with deadly intention, muffling screams of horror.
Above us, Zaq beelined for Clara and Sam. She shoved her son into his arms. “Keep him safe, please.”
Something shot out of the shadows toward her. Pale and hungry.
The boy cried out in shock, but Zaq acted fast, grabbing Clara’s hand and hauling her out of the tree. The creature slammed into the trunk and let out an angry wail, gnashing its needle-like teeth. Head-on like this, there was no mistaking it for a child. Its head was a triangular shape with angry slits for nostrils and black almond eyes. The rest was all mouth, unhinged jaw and teeth—so many gnashing teeth.
Shem shot up into the air with one of the fuckers hanging off his arm by its teeth. Shem grabbed its head and squeezed until it popped like a grape. The creature fell back into the trees.
I caught sight of the wound on his arm, dripping with blood, before he dove out of view. Panic gripped me.
“He’s all right,” Bastian said. “He’ll heal. They heal fast.”
I nodded, swallowing to moisten my dry mouth, eyes tracking the trees, looking for movement. Looking for him. For the watchers.
A few people ran out of the forest. Sarq appeared carrying Sissy. He dropped her by us and headed back into the trees.
Shem reappeared a moment later with Patrick, dumped him, and headed back.
Someone let out a blood-curdling scream.
Another victim.
My gut heaved, and rage burned a path up my throat.
Bastian took my hand and squeezed. “Keep it together.” His voice was low. “They need us.”
The sound of my people’s sobs finally made it past the pounding and whoosh of blood in my ears. Their horror-stricken faces smeared with dirt and blood registered. I counted four of my original group—Sissy, Patrick, Clara, and Sammy—and five from the group we’d saved from the Nuckelavee—Nial, his son David, and three others whose names I didn’t know.
Nine.
Was that all that was left?
The watchers emerged empty-handed from the trees, wings catching the air to take them higher then flattening out to coast and bring them down toward us.
No more humans.
This was all that was left of our group.
Just us.
Eleven humans in total.
I couldn’t lose anyone else. I wouldn’t.
Jamie, Javier—all the loss and the grief would have to wait. I had a job to do.
The watchers landed around us, and my gaze zeroed in on Shem’s bloody arm. The wound had healed. I focused on my people, guilt a burn in my chest for checking on him first.
“Is anyone hurt? Does anyone need immediate medical attention?”
Bastian had a small med pack strapped to his waist. It was all that was left of our supplies.
People shook their heads, peering up at me with dull eyes. Bastian crossed to Shem, speaking to him in a low voice. What were they talking about?
Sissy approached and pulled me into a hug. “Thank you. Thank you for coming back.”
My eyes heated and pricked. “Always.”
“Listen up,” Bastian said, breaking away from Shem. “We have some lethal territory to cross and there’s nowhere to shelter. The… attack…” His throat bobbed. “It’s put us off course. Added a day to our trek. We’ll be traveling by night, which is the most dangerous time, but we can make it if we stick to three simple rules.” He nodded in Shem’s direction, handing him the floor.
“Three rules,” Shem said. “Stay together. Do as I say. Move silently. Break any of those rules and we will leave you to die.”
Clara began to sob, and Sammy looked up at Tumiel. “You’d leave us?”
Tumiel’s gaze softened. He opened his mouth to speak but Shem cut him off with a growl.
“No exceptions.”
The boy whimpered, and Zaq shot Shem a disapproving look.
Tumiel’s nose twitched, but despite the fact he seemed to have developed a bond with the boy, he didn’t correct his leader.
“Am I clear?” Shem asked.
Murmurs of assent drifted over the group.
“Good. We should reach shelter by dawn. You’ll have ‘til midday to rest, then we’ll continue our journey. If all goes to plan, we’ll reach the colony before sundown tomorrow.”
Shem strode over to me and took my arm. “You stay with me.”
I opened my mouth to argue then snapped it shut again because right now, with threat looming around us, right beside Shem was the safest, sanest place to be.
After all, I had to stay alive to make Michael pay for his crimes.
Shem’s intimidating frame towered over me as we walked. His crimson skin looked dark gray in the moonlight and his bat wings were inky black and folded like daggers against his back. The road we walked was bordered by empty fields overgrown with weeds and wildflowers, defiant of the changing season.
There could be monsters hiding in the fields. Tracking us.
“We’re safe, for now,” Shem said softly as if reading my thoughts.
