forward again, he was in his hulking two-legged form. “There is no trap they can set that will do them any good,” he growled.
“Can you be so sure? Why are you holding the others back?”
Liam glanced in the direction of the low growls emanating from the Half Breeds that had followed them this far. Shifting his eye to Paige, he growled, “Because they’ve had all the fun tonight.”
A rustling of branches announced Minh’s arrival. Unlike the other two, she wasn’t content to remain hidden. She exploded from the trees and landed about ten paces from where Bill stood with his shotgun. The Skinner reflexively fired a shot at her when Minh leapt at him. At the apex of her jump, the Full Blood was intercepted by a lean figure that barely disturbed a leaf when it pounced to wrap his arms around her upper body. Both of them landed in a heap, and Minh scrambled back up to all fours to knock Kawosa aside. He hit the ground, stopped his slide with an outstretched leg, and then used his other leg to push forward so he could clamp his jaws around her throat. Minh grunted with surprise, and by the time she swiped a paw at the elder shapeshifter, Kawosa had already moved out of her reach.
Unlike the Full Bloods who shifted to stand upon two legs, Kawosa seemed more comfortable on four. He scampered away from Minh, planted his paws so his chest was lower than his hindquarters and turned his head toward Nadya, to spit something petulantly in her direction. The charmed metal projectile, still smeared with Minh’s blood, hit the dirt and rolled until some of the Amriany markings glinted in the moonlight.
“Feel better, girl?” Kawosa asked.
Minh shook her head to clear whatever had compelled her to blindly chase the charmed device gripped tightly in Nadya’s hand. Although she wasn’t about to recklessly throw herself at Nadya anymore, the promise in her glare was sharp and spiteful.
“Even while I was locked beneath Lancroft’s floor, I knew what our biggest weakness had become.” Kawosa snapped his eyes toward Liam and said, “You are all too damn loud.”
“You want peace and quiet, trickster?” Liam grunted. “You can crawl right back into that hole where you were caged and forgotten.”
Paige glanced at her companions. Although they weren’t fighting for their lives at the moment, there wasn’t anywhere for them to go that didn’t require passing dangerously close to one of the werewolves. In fact, as more seconds ticked by, the panting breaths of encroaching Half Breeds from the nearby town drew closer.
“I gave you a gift,” Kawosa said. “And I passed on knowledge of how to use it. Instead, you either disappear into the forests or bay at the moon like common dogs. Pathetic.”
This time Minh was the one to step forward. “Pathetic? The Torva’ox moves through our veins like never before. You must feel it as well.”
“I do.”
“And you have us to thank for it. Without taking steps like the ones we’ve taken here, we would have simply watched another Breaking Moon rise above cities infested with humans and leeches, above mountains that look down upon lands that are being torn apart by machines. We bay at the moon because we are choking on air that sticks in our throats while the old ones like you are either too far removed to notice or buried too deep to care.”
Kawosa settled into a seated position, looking like a twisted version of a large dog waiting calmly for its supper. While the Full Bloods needed to change their physical shape to speak clearer, his voice was smooth and slippery regardless of the mouth that formed the words. “Interesting that you should mention the leeches. While the human armies now mass to strike against you, the Nymar have taken residence in comfortable businesses and homes after dispatching with the Skinners. Isn’t that right, Paige?”
Having been content to fly under the shapeshifters’ radar, Paige felt her nerves clench when one of them called her by name. Before she could respond to the challenge, Bill stepped forward and said, “We aren’t letting the bloodsuckers get away with what they’ve done. There’s more goin’ on than anyone here knows about.”
“So,” Kawosa said, “there is more than anyone knows. More than, I assume, your so-called friends here even know? Go on, you must tell me.”
When those words slid from the coyote’s mouth, Paige could feel the chill beneath her scars slice even deeper. She turned to Bill and said, “No, you don’t have to tell him anything!”
But the other Skinner shoved her aside in his haste to step forward. “I don’t take orders from fuckin’ Gypsies and I sure as hell don’t take them from someone who favors working with bloodsuckers and Mongrels over her own kind. When the Full Bloods get cleaned out, so will you.”
“You’ve come this far,” Kawosa urged. “Might as well go all the way.”
Nadya drew a breath and stood by Paige’s side. Milosh stopped her from going any further by grabbing her arm and shaking his head. Whatever information Kawosa was pulling out of Bill, he wanted to hear it as well.
“The Vigilant will take it all the way, asshole!” Bill roared. “What was started by locking your ass in Dr. Lancroft’s cell will be finished once we collect our own piece of this pie.”
“What pie?” Kawosa asked as his brow furrowed and the smug look on his bestial face drifted away.
“He means the Breaking Moon,” Liam said. “They know.”
Bill nodded triumphantly. “Hell yes, we know. Some of that juice that flows through your veins goes through Skinners as well. The difference between Vigilant and the rest is that we ain’t gonna squander what we’re given, like the Skinners that have been stepping up to get killed over the last year.”
Kawosa nodded and smiled. His eyes shifted from unnaturally clear silver orbs into things that looked to have been stolen from the skull of a mischievous child. “Go on.”
Behind her, Paige could hear water lapping against the shore. It hit the land, rolled back, and was hit by another wave too impatient to wait for the first one to recede. The reservoir churned, and when she turned to look, she could see the first hint of a green glow emanating from just beneath the most turbulent spot on its surface.
“Is this all you’re after, old man?” Liam asked while stalking forward in a two-legged form that easily towered over all the humans. “Talk, talk, and more talk?”
“The Breaking Moon is almost fully risen,” Kawosa replied. “What better way to pass the time with our Skinner friends than calmly standing here and waiting for the Torva’ox to visit us?” Looking over to Paige, he added, “See what I mean about taking the quieter path? These hunters have been pacified with some talk, just as the rest of the humans can be diverted with words instead of actions that endanger us all. Now they can all see what we’ve become before being torn to pieces by the legion that surrounds them.”
Half Breeds snarled from the shadows cast by the trees surrounding the reservoir.
Paige had no vehicle to get her out of that untenable position, no time to get to the survivors huddled in the basements and panic rooms of Atoka, and no way of knowing if any of Quinn’s pack remained. From what she’d heard, the only Skinner in sight didn’t care if she lived or died. Milosh was wounded and Nadya seemed to be out of tricks.
“What’s troubling you, cutie?” Liam asked as he stepped forward and locked his eye on her. “Waiting for that nymph magic to sweep you away?” He drew in a deep breath, craned his neck and licked his lips. “Yes, the nymphs do make good allies. Still, you gotta be quick enough to cross their bridge before I can get to you. Think you’re up to it?”
By the time the scent of freshly cut timber and pine hit Paige’s nose, all three of the shapeshifters were coiled like springs and ready to launch themselves at the first one to take a step in the wrong direction.
Paige took a sideways stance so she could glance back and forth between the Full Bloods and the reservoir without letting either out of her peripheral vision.
The water churned until it began spraying up from the rippling surface. Instead of the shimmering glow she was used to seeing through the beaded curtain of a Dryad temple, Paige watched as droplets of water froze several feet above the surface of the water, as if they’d spattered against a window suspended in midair behind her.
Liam smiled. “Better run, Skinners. Just to keep it sporting.”
The crackle that came from the glistening smudge in the air sounded like a static charge preceding a lightning strike. Cole emerged from the dim green glow as if he’d been thrown through it. He grunted in agony and dropped straight down into the cold waters beneath his feet.
Liam drifted between an amused smirk and a surprised grimace.
Minh raised the hackles on her back, preparing for whatever came next.
Kawosa sat calmly and watched.
