A Draught of Ash and Wine, page 7
Hesper tapped her chin. “By coach or by boat.”
While the succubus appeared to have no quarrel with them, they hadn’t established any substantial trust. Who knew who her loyalties extended to, other than herself? But Vic answered without hesitation, as if conversing with an old friend. “Well, the river of course. I’d rather avoid taking John through the city. We need to shake these Society louts on our trail. I need to get him further inland as soon as possible.”
Hesper’s mouth tightened at mention of the Society. Johnathan glanced between them. What the hell was Vic doing? “Vic—”
“What’s waiting for you there?” A sing-song quality colored her tone. She trailed her fingers over the swell of her breasts. Her honey vanilla scent remained muted but her voice made his ears ring.
“A safe p-place,” Vic stuttered. He tried to choke back the words. A fine sweat broke out across his brow.
The world throbbed against Johnathan’s temples. A flashfire raced through his veins. He stood before Hesper in a blink. His hand closed around her throat, claws sinking into the tender skin of her neck. Johnathan lifted her body off the bed and slammed her against the wall. The human guise vanished, exposing her dark red skin and horns. A long thin tail lashed between her calves. Her fear tasted spoiled and sickly sweet, while she whimpered under the pressure of his hold. “Please, I’m sorry,” she pleaded, “I over stepped. I’ll leave. Please.”
His grip tightened. “Who is your master, Hesper?”
She tried to shake her head; the movement stunted. Her head thudded against the wall. “It’s not like that,” she gasped. “I promise, it’s not like that. I had to know what you were bringing here.” Her gaze slid to Vic and back, a frantic edge to her words. “You don’t understand. You can’t trust him. His kind will ruin you.”
Johnathan wanted to shake her. Even with his hand cutting off her air, she tried to set them against each other. Whatever power her scent or voice held over Vic, he was immune to it. “Stop your manipulations.” The words emerged as little more than a growl, fire rising beneath the surface of his skin. Smoke streamed from his lips.
Hesper’s eyes were wide as saucers in her face. “It’s not a manipulation. I swear it, I—I—” Her words dissolved into incoherent babble.
Vic’s fingers closed on Johnathan’s wrist. “Let her go, John,” he said.
Instinct screamed at Johnathan to end the threat. To dig in his claws. Hesper hadn’t been a threat before, not to him, not until she tried to use her influence on Vic.
“She’s terrified,” said Vic. The softness of his voice that cut through the warring urges in Johnathan’s mind. He snatched his hand away. The succubus sucked in air, clutching her neck.
His breath came in short gasps, the Hound close to the surface. “I’m sorry,” he said. Johnathan craved fresh air, desperate to clear the foreign rage from his system, but he didn’t dare leave Vic alone with this demon, no matter how defeated she appeared.
“Do not apologize to the cunning little witch.” Vic huffed at the succubus. “I think it’s best if we part ways, my dear.”
Hesper nodded, scurrying past them. She paused at the door, glancing back at Johnathan, the bruised skin of her neck already faded. Longing and regret etched in the lines of her lovely face before she escaped. The sight of those bruises swamped him with guilt. Johnathan was a brute. This was the first hand he laid on a woman before, having trained with several female Prospectives. He’d hunted at least one lady vampire, but he hadn’t intended to hurt Hesper. The violence of his reaction agitated him. If Vic hadn’t interfered, he would have killed her.
“Are you with me, John?” Vic cupped his cheek, a touch to soothe the rising beast. Inside, the Hellhound laid down and showed its belly. Johnathan didn’t know how to perceive that reaction.
Nodding assent, he stood mute while Vic hustled about the room, gathering the remains of Johnathan’s scattered clothing. The memory of their intimacy was far too distant in the wake of the succubus’s departure.
“I’m sorry,” Johnathan repeated; useless words, but it was all he could think to say.
Vic took his wrist leading him to the chair rather than the bed. “You didn’t even eat,” he chided, pushing Johnathan down on the seat and shoved his feet into the boots.
“I can do this myself,” said Johnathan. Vic batted his hands away.
“Eat. Put your gloves on,” he said. “We shouldn’t stay here for the remainder of the night.”
That was Johnathan’s fault too. Cool fingers pressed against his open mouth.
“Not another apology, John,” said Vic. “Neither of us could have predicted we’d run into another demon.” Vic gave an exaggerated eye roll. “One encounter in five hundred years with a demon, now they are coming out the woodwork like startled mice.” He brushed his fingers along the curve of Johnathan’s lip. “Don’t you dare try to shoulder the blame for this.”
“I didn’t think,” said Johnathan. “I shouldn’t have brought her up here. I shouldn’t have left the room.”
“Liar.” Vic snorted. “You constantly over think. It’s one of your charms.”
Johnathan bit his lip against a smile. Vic made it easy to forget the foolishness of his actions. “She didn’t feel dangerous.”
Vic remained silent while he finished lacing Johnathan’s boots, his brows knotted in thought. For his part, Johnathan forced down the cold stew. It smelled fine, though it tasted bland on his tongue and stuck in his throat like glue. He managed half the bowl before he gave up and pulled his gloves on. The smoldering embers of his irises were exposed, but at least the claws were concealed. It was a blessing no one noticed them when he first confronted the succubus downstairs, another amateur move, worse than a newly recruited Prospective.
“I don’t think she was dangerous,” said Vic, rising to his feet. “Not to you.” He smoothed his hands down his coat, somehow remarkably unrumpled. “There is an open storehouse dockside we can wait until dawn.”
Johnathan ambled after his far more chipper companion, glancing mournfully at the tub as they exited the room. He feared it would be a dreadfully long time before he had another hot soak.
CHAPTER SIX
The downstairs emptied since he’d taken Hesper to their room. The wall lamps were dimmed to nothing, the room lit by the dying glow of coals in the hearth. Vic headed straight for the door, but Johnathan lingered, scenting the air for any trace of the succubus. What remained was faint, suggesting she’d fled the premise. His feelings concerning the female demon were a complex knot. Not a wink of trust, but he hadn’t intended or wanted to dislodge her from her hunting ground. Her attitude regarding feeding seemed to align with Vic’s, to do as little harm as possible. Though, if the Society did follow Johnathan and Vic to this town, better she fled before their arrival. He had the distinct impression Luthor and Sister Wilhem would destroy Hesper rather than capture her.
Johnathan fell in behind Vic, eyeing the set of his shoulders. Feeding remained a sore subject between them. There was a worrisome pallor to Vic’s complexion, an unmistakable sign the man hadn’t fed. He knew Vic preferred his fastidious method of needles and tubes, but surely, he would feed like any other vampire to avoid starvation? Though he itched to broach the subject, after he ruined the safety of their accommodations, he refused to stress Vic further. They walked down the quiet street, Johnathan ruminating what their encounter revealed. Hesper’s manipulation exposed Vic’s fears, ones he hadn’t shared with Johnathan. What could he do to gain Vic’s confidence? Why hadn’t he shared his worries?
Distracted, he didn’t notice the faint chiming until they arrived at the dock. His gaze swept the surrounding night, failing to penetrate the pitch-black darkness between moonset and dawn. Had he imagined it? Johnathan held his breath, listening. The store house jutted up through the darkness, a shadow within a shadow. A spare structure of rough wooden beams thick as weathered bones, the walled space gaping with a deeper blackness ready to swallow them up.
Vic realized he’d fallen behind, pausing in the ominous open front of the waterfront storehouse. “John? What’s wrong?”
“Do you hear that?” Johnathan whispered.
“I don’t hear anything.” Vic frowned.
The only sounds Johnathan heard were the river, swirling and snapping against the shore, and their uneven breaths. The air scented of nothing at all. Unnatural. Apprehension flushed through his system. Not a hint of mud or the heady undergrowth, the faint musk of animals and vegetal decay, but a void. The signature of masking.
Wind rushed at his back. Johnathan spun sideways. Years of training and enhanced reflexes took the blade in the arm rather than his spine. He staggered with a grunt of pain.
“John!”
He ignored Vic’s shout, frantically searching the dark for their assailants. How did they find him so fast? Johnathan yanked the knife from his arm and tossed it into the river. Better to whittle down the Agent’s supply of blades than to blindly throw it back.
Where were they? Johnathan sidled closer to Vic, trying to discern any movement in the dark. His senses fired in a chaotic flare when Luthor unmasked directly next to him. There was no time to analyze the man’s worrisome level of skill. He aimed a kick for Johnathan’s knee. A last second twist absorbed the bruising impact on his thigh. Luthor’s dark gaze glared up at him, brimming with hate. He launched into a series of kicks and punches that kept Johnathan on the defensive, matching his supposedly superior speed.
Vic swore, a momentary distraction Johnathan couldn’t afford. He risked a look. A dozen Agents surrounded them, the red clad of figure of Sister Wilhem a scarlet specter in the depths of the storehouse. The glance cost him. Luthor shoved a blade into his shoulder, scraping against bone. Johnathan shouted. He clutched the handle, failing to deflect the kick to his chest. Off balance, his arms pinwheeled to keep him on his feet, an agonizing motion. The punctured muscles in his shoulders screamed, blood soaked through his coat.
“Take them alive, Luthor,” Sister Wilhem ordered, an overt threat in her voice. “I want both specimens for further examination.” The words chilled Johnathan. Her cohort acknowledged her with the barest nod, but he knew from experience alive was a flexible definition. Johnathan tore the blade from his shoulder, flipping it in his grip to arm against the other Agent.
Another blade slid into Luthor’s hand. He pressed the attack with a downward swing at Johnathan’s chest. Adrenaline flooded his system. Johnathan caught the man’s wrist, quickly stepping into his personal space to strike. He released his hold on Luthor’s wrist and smashed the heel of his palm into the man’s face. A clumsy hit, but a painful one. Luthor snarled and jumped back. Between one hit and the next, Johnathan buried the Agent’s blade in his chest, a wound to match. He tugged the blade from his shoulder in a gush of blood. Luthor stared at Johnathan, bloodied teeth bared in a feral grin.
“I don’t know what sort of fiend you are, but you fight like one of us.” Luthor spat out a mouthful of blood. Johnathan didn’t welcome the comparison. “Deadman’s blood hasn’t even slowed you down. Marvelous.”
That wasn’t a card he intended reveal, internally cursing he hadn’t noticed the poison. An ineffective poison once it hit his blood, since Luthor appeared unbothered by poison or stab wound. He brushed the wound, tasting the blood off his fingertips. His dark gaze widened. “You’ve neutralized it,” he said, a hint of chilling wonder in his voice. Johnathan tensed when that unhinged gaze focused on him.
Luthor vanished in front of him. “Shit.” Johnathan dropped into a crouch, bracing himself. He was desperate to end this fight and aid Vic, though he dared not divert his attention twice.
A blade whispered against the side of his throat. Johnathan grabbed Luthor’s arm, the Hunter reacting ahead of the Hound. He threw Luthor across the river. Soon as he confirmed the splash, Johnathan spun toward Vic.
There were a few Agents on the ground, in rough shape but alive. Far too many were on their feet, armed with spears and bayonets attached to rifles. They surrounded Vic, bleeding from a half a dozen cuts and unsteady on his feet. Sister Wilhem approached Vic out of his line of sight; a spider-silk thin, golden net laced between her bony fingers. Johnathan could guess the purpose of such a strange object, and he didn’t want it anywhere near Vic.
The Sister’s steps paused. Her milk white gaze turned to him, somehow aware of his attention. A sneer twisted her lips. “That useless idiot. Seize him,” she snapped. Half the Agents shifted their attack to Johnathan, brandishing their blades. He ignored them, panic fluttering in his chest when the remaining Agents pressed forward on the vampire. A bayonet cut across Vic’s cheek.
Rage strummed a chord through Johnathan’s body. He seized one of the weapons thrust at his face, snapping the blade in half. A flinch ran through the cluster of Agents. They fumbled their weapons, punctuated by a click and spark. A deafening crack and flash of burnt gunpowder exploded in the dark.
“I said take them alive!” Sister Wilhem’s muffled shout of protest echoed in Johnathan’s ears.
Pain splintered through his sternum. Johnathan frowned at the smoking hole in his chest, where the blood pumped from the wound in time to his pulse.
“Fuck me.” His legs buckled, the crackle of flame roaring through his skull. He hit the ground hard on his knees and exhaled a plume of smoke, Johnathan looked up, a high ringing pitch in his head drowned out the world. Flame licked the edge of his wandering gaze. The Agents backed away from him, confused.
Sister Wilhem watched him expectantly, her gaze lit with dark excitement. They locked gazes. Whatever she saw in Johnathan’s face caused her to blanche and recede into the darkness. She vanished without warning the other men. Eyes wide, Vic staggered.
Johnathan fell forward on his hands and knees. A hoarse cry tore from his lips, his back bowed, punctuated by the snap and crack of his spine. His veins ignited. Bones burned to brittle ash, ground to dust from which new growth swelled. His body twisted into unfamiliar angles, parts of him turned inside out. Another scream ripped out of him. Bones protruded through his back in a gruesome display, receding beneath the swell of the Hound’s muscles and the prickling ripple of thick black fur. His final scream ended on a mangled note; a mouth no longer capable of human sound protruded from his jaw, settling with a clack of sharp teeth. This was nothing like his first transformation, every agonizing second seared into his mind until at last he rose on all fours, staring at the gaping Agents through the Hound’s burning gaze.
The Hound growled; a low threatening rumble, fire sparking between his teeth. The group took a collective step back, except for the man in the middle, anguish in his silver eyes. The Hound took a step forward, the ground charred beneath his paws. Several of the Agents fumbled with their weapons, metal and wood slipping over sweaty palms. The bitter stench of their fear drenched his tongue, stoking the rage that burned at his core, an endless white-hot blaze. It spurred him on, demanding a tribute of violence. He salivated for the taste of blood, of flesh torn beneath his teeth. The sound that rolled from his mouth was a call from the depths of the Nether, a promise of Hellfire and death. The stink of urine stained the air. The Hound sank down, powerful thighs bunching and launched him at the nearest man. His jaw closed around the man’s throat, cutting off his scream. Hot blood splashed down the back of his throat. Teeth scraped bone. He tore his mouth free.
The man collapsed, a final breath gurgled through his torn throat. Blood poured from the hole into a swollen pool of dark liquid. A lull descended over the remaining men, ensnared by their terror, witnesses to the violent demise of their companion. The quiet burst in flurry of panic, the men in a mad scramble to escape, to fight, to survive. The Hound swung his massive head, the need to rend and tear unsated.
Through the tunnel of blood and fear, the Hound connected with a silver gaze. An alluring stillness in the haze of fear and frenzy. The muscles of his jaw taut with distress. Pale hands reached for him, palms up, defenseless, submissive. “John, look at me,” the man whispered, his voice soothed, a calm amid the shouts of others. “Come back to me.”
The name made him pause, both familiar and foreign, tugging him forward. The Hound hesitated.
Gunshot split the air. The silver eyed man clasped his arm with a hiss. The Hound tasted the trail of bitter burnt gun powder, wheeling on the shooter. A young face, a terrified face, the pistol fell from his trembling fingers.
“No, Johnathan, wait, don’t,” a voice gasped, swallowed by the roar of flames. The edges of his vision flared in bright red-orange hues. The world narrowed, an ashen tunnel that ended with his jaws sinking into the young man’s flesh.
The Hound burned, bound to the call of claw. To rend the souls of the living. And he answered. Their fear coated his tongue, sour against the coppery taste of blood and seared meat. The Hound released his victim with one final violent yank, the body still on the ground. A howl rose from the depths of his chest. The sound broke over the remaining men, a visceral reminder their death loomed. They attempted to flee, scattering in either direction, but the Hound gave chase. He fell upon them, ran them to ground. They cursed and flailed, unable to accept their fate. Limbs scattered across the ground, the air soaked by the coppery tang of blood and foul stink of viscera. The Hound gorged, drunk on their fear and sweet, toothsome flesh. He drank down their deaths until he finally quelled the hungering rage. The inferno subsided, fur and flame yielded the man.
Johnathan’s awareness returned with a vengeance, crouched on all fours at the center of a massacre. Blood drenched his hair and naked skin. The knife wounds and bullet hole in his chest were completely healed, without leaving a hint of a scar. Foul muck clung to his fingers; the ground saturated by gore. Panting, he sat back on his haunches, gaze locked on the scene around him. “Oh god,” he rasped. His gorge rose, the overwhelming scent of death coated the inside of his mouth.
