with more than enough strength to send pieces of broken cement clattering to the ground below. It slowly shifted its head to take in the sights with eyes that sparkled like two out of the millions of stars hanging motionless above it. Large pointed ears pricked up at the sound of approaching sirens.
From the corner of her eyes, Paige could see the flashing blue and red lights of police cars that rounded a corner and sped toward the parking structure. She didn’t see the solitary man that had been running ahead of the cars until his feet clapped against the cement path leading to the garage’s entrance. It was Edward, the third of Misonyk’s bodyguards. Unlike the previous times Paige or Cole had seen him, he now had his coat open to reveal several pistols and a few MAC-10s hanging from large rigs beneath both arms. Edward also had a small machine pistol in each hand and a wild look in his eyes as he quickly soaked up the carnage in front of the garage.
She didn’t need to read minds to know the gun-toting bodyguard wasn’t happy with what he saw. As soon as he spotted the dead Nymar strewn on the ground, Edward raised both guns to extract some payback. The fact that Paige was standing in the middle of all those bodies sparked a bit of fire in his eyes, but the sight of the Full Blood snarling at him from on high was enough to push him right over the edge.
Edward bared his teeth as all three sets of fangs extended from his jaws. He fired both guns in his hands and leapt for the parking structure’s second floor.
Letting out a quick, panting breath, the werewolf streaked along the top of the garage and practically flew off the side so he could collide with the Nymar in midair. The Full Blood hit the bodyguard in the chest with both front paws and sent Edward to the ground with a resounding thump. Even as the bodyguard’s spine snapped against the pavement, he emptied both of his weapons into the Full Blood’s chest. Teeth the size of dagger blades sunk into the Nymar’s shoulder, allowing the Full Blood to toss the bodyguard into the air with a snap of its head. The creature reared up on its hind legs while its body shifted to accommodate the new stance. Canine limbs became longer and more human, bringing him up to well over seven feet tall. Its front legs extended into massive arms just in time to swat the airborne bodyguard squarely in the chest. Edward flew away from the parking structure to land in the street within a few yards of the approaching police cars.
Tires screeched against the pavement. Police shouted to each other. A few cars nearly ran into Edward, who had yet to move after his rough landing. All the while, the Full Blood watched with the closest thing to a smile that his wide, tooth-filled mouth could manage. Turning to face the parking structure, he leaned forward and let out a roar that was filled with more than enough fury to scatter the few lingering Nymar in all directions.
Paige stood her ground and tightened her grip on her weapons, knowing all too well that trying to run from a Full Blood would do her as much good as flapping her arms after stepping off the side of a cliff.
The werewolf stared at her as strings of saliva dripped from fangs that had retracted but were still longer than her fingers. Even crouched over far enough to scrape his knuckles against the ground, it was several feet taller than her. Its long ears came up a bit as sections of its coal-black fur bristled from a passing breeze. Heavy, bellowing breaths quickened into a dog’s panting as the Full Blood twitched to look at a single figure that ran toward the garage instead of away from it.
Cole rushed to Paige’s side, brandishing his weapon in both hands. The closer he got to her and the Full Blood, the more he cringed at the fiery sensation that shot through the wounds where the weapon’s thorns had pierced his skin. “Jesus,” he muttered. When he realized what he was facing, his mind lost the ability to form any other word. “Jesus!” he said more sharply.
“O Holy Night,” The Full Blood mused in a voice that rumbled within its massive frame like thunder rolling over an empty prairie.
While Cole was dealing with the fact that the creature in front of him had just spoken, Paige leaned toward him and asked, “Is that the one that killed Gerald?”
“No,” Cole replied with a shake of his head. “That one was brown and…hell, I don’t even know if that helps.”
“It does,” Paige replied.
About a hundred yards to the north, where the park stopped and the rest of the town resumed, police cars were gathered around the Nymar that had been batted into the street. Officers went through the motions of stripping away Edward’s guns while trying to figure out how the hell he’d gotten there. The bodyguard must have had a spark of life in him, because he began to put up a fight before more gunshots crackled through the air.
The Full Blood’s eyes shifted in their sockets toward the commotion, but he didn’t seem overly concerned by it. The mass of its frame settled in on itself and his entire body shifted into a more compact form. Once he’d taken a shape that was just over six feet tall and roughly that of a man, he focused all of his attention upon Paige and Cole. His heavily muscled body was still covered in black fur, but his snout had gotten a bit shorter and was marked with a spot of white close to his nose. With his ears pulled in tight against his scalp, the creature’s face had a definite canine quality, but its eyes were those of a man.
Slowly reaching for her earpiece, Paige said, “Hold your fire, Walter.”
The Full Blood nodded. “Smart call,” it said in a voice that rumbled less, but still turned Cole’s blood into ice water. “You did well tonight. Killing Misonyk and all these leeches proves your hearts are in the right place.”
“There’s more Nymar where these came from,” Paige said. “They’ll be out looking for all of us after a night like this.”
“Spare me,” the Full Blood grunted. Crouching down to Henry, he said, “Through this one, Misonyk has been shouting his thoughts to us for months. We have always known the Nymar were weak, diseased, and pathetic. Now we also know they are fractured, confused, and just dangerous enough to warrant extermination. Perhaps the humans are as well.”
“Skinners have always played their cards for everyone to see,” Paige said. “You know we’ll honor the old arrangement if everyone sticks to the old deals.”
“There was no arrangement!” the Full Blood roared. Hearing him bellow made Cole and Paige grip their weapons tight enough for the blood to drip from their hands. The Full Blood sniffed the blood on the air and then leaned forward so he was sure to be heard over the sound of the approaching cops. “There were no deals,” he said in a more reasonable voice. “Since you Skinners have done my work for me this night, we’ve decided to give you this warning. You cannot win a true fight with my kind, no matter how many Skinners you pool together or how many Blood Blades you dig up. As for the rest of the humans, they won’t know what they’re facing until they’ve already fallen.
“We will no longer be hunted by lesser animals,” the Full Blood declared as he lifted Henry up to set him carefully upon his feet. Although the wound was still gaping open in Henry’s side, it was already smaller than it had been a few moments ago. The Full Blood with the charcoal fur stepped in front of Henry, making it known that Paige or Cole would have to go through him if they wanted to finish what Brad’s charmed blade had started.
“Henry comes with me and will tell us everything he’s learned,” the Full Blood said. “No longer will we step back and kindly let you infest our territories. We will reclaim all of our lands, even if that means cleaning out all of your cities. As a courtesy, I give you this warning to spread amongst your kind: when we arrive, you’d be wise to clear our path and find new lands to sully.”
With that, the Full Blood’s body exploded outward into a mass of muscled flesh and a full coat of thick black fur. Massive paws clawed at the ground and a large, wet nose stole Paige’s and Cole’s scent in much the same way as the creature Cole had met so many nights ago in the middle of a stark, Canadian nowhere. When the Full Blood bared its fangs, it let out a roar that melted into a howl as the creature lifted its face to the sky. Henry loped away, and the other Full Blood dashed ahead of him to blaze a trail that quickly took both werewolves out of Cole’s sight.
Walter drove his van toward the parking garage. He hadn’t even come to a complete stop before leaning out and saying, “We’ve got to get out of here. Those cops are ready for war. If this town has a SWAT team, they’re probably on the way too.”
Cole held onto his weapon, feeling very much like a child wielding a plastic bat. Paige cursed under her breath and jumped into the van. Once Cole was inside, she slammed the door and hung on as Walter burned through a few layers of tire rubber in his haste to get back to where the used Cavalier was parked. Paige kept quiet as Cole looked her over. The body armor was gone, but it had protected her from everything other than a whole lot of bumps and scratches.
The moment they got back to the car, Cole slid in behind the wheel and Paige dropped into the passenger seat. She had injected herself with some of the Nymar antidote before Cole even hit the gas. “You all right?” he asked as he followed Walter’s van toward the highway.
