“You seem to have been handling yourself pretty well so far,” Daniels said. “But don’t push it. Those tendrils will punish you if—”
“I know all about that,” Cole cut in.
Daniels nodded and completed another line of ink. Since he wasn’t going for anything artistic, it wasn’t a long process. Even though he’d taken his finger off the button that made the machine buzz, he left the needle in Cole’s arm. “You know, it’s not unusual for the newly seeded to be squeamish.”
“I’m not seeded,” Cole grunted. He wanted to pull his arm away but couldn’t.
“Maybe not with a spore, but you’ve still got Nymar elements inside of you.”
“Making it sound clinical doesn’t help. Now get that damn needle out of me before I rip it out and put it somewhere you won’t like very much.”
Either Daniels had been around Paige too long to be frightened by threats or was too determined to give up talking that easily. “However you want to put it, those things need to be fed.”
“I know. I’ll deal with it.”
The needle was jammed just far enough into Cole’s skin to catch his attention. When his eyes narrowed into a deathly stare, Daniels held his ground and said, “You need human blood and I know you’ve tasted it.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because you’re still alive.”
“Nymar blood seems to do the trick just as well,” Cole said in a threatening snarl, even though there was some truth to Daniels’s words.
To his credit, Daniels remained steady. “That’s because Nymar used to be human. Half Breeds used to be human as well.”
“Are you suggesting I feed on those things?”
“Better that than die. Times are hard, right? Isn’t that what everyone’s saying?”
“It sure is.”
“Then you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do to survive. You and Paige are doing more than surviving. You’re helping the rest of us to survive, and we can’t lose you.” The pressure of the needle in Cole’s skin eased up but didn’t subside. “And what’s so bad about what I’m suggesting compared to what you guys do all the time? I mean, you wear Half Breed skins, for God’s sake. You had an up close and personal relationship with the thing that used to wear the leather that coat was made from, right?”
Cole didn’t say anything to that. The fighting outside had died down for a moment, which only meant it would soon intensify.
“The Half Breeds may not be human anymore, but there’s human blood inside them,” Daniels said. “There’s plenty of it around and it may take the edge off.”
“But . . . Jesus. I mean skinning them is one thing. Using their claws or teeth is easy enough. But drinking their blood?”
“Being a Nymar may be a lot of things, but sanitary isn’t one of them. Just keep it in mind, okay? Think of it as another way of using what they give you so you can keep fighting the good fight. That’s what Skinners do, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. Speaking of that, I could use some of the healing serum if you’ve got any.”
Daniels’s eyes narrowed as he removed the needle. “I’ll administer it when this is over. You need to stay sharp.”
Even though Cole wasn’t hurt and he could produce a certain amount of the serum within his own body, he didn’t hold back when he grabbed Daniels’s wrist and twisted until the Nymar let go of the tattooing machine. “You’re not my doctor. Give me more serum.”
“I’m your friend,” the Nymar replied through gritted teeth. “And I’m also like you more than you care to admit. I know what I’m talking about, and it’ll take more than brute force to make me do what you’re asking. The Nymar were putting me through a hell of a lot more than that before you ever knew what they were. Now would you rather waste more time or do you want to let me work on the next tattoo before all of us are overwhelmed?”
Outside, the IRD had launched multiple attacks to keep the Half Breed packs divided. The price of that strategy was paid by the loss of more soldiers than Cole cared to think about, as they were either ripped apart or turned by Esteban’s howls. He let go of Daniels, kicked open the Humvee door, and allowed George to crawl into the back.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Even though George’s weapon didn’t have a blade, it must have been charmed in a similar fashion as the other Amriany edged weapons, Cole decided, because it did just fine against the Half Breeds. George and he took the lead as Milosh, Paige, and Nadya covered their backs. Thanks to the ink introduced to their bodies, their blows landed with enough force to sever limbs or knock Half Breeds aside completely.
Farther out, IRD guns still chopped into the encroaching werewolves without putting much of a dent in the overall Half Breed population. For every creature mowed down by excessive large caliber gunfire, another ran in from another part of the city. As the night wore on and Esteban continued to howl, Shreveport slid even closer to the abyss. Cole knew better than to mourn for the things he hacked apart with his newly upgraded weapon. His blade hadn’t been the one to kill those people. That was Esteban’s doing or the fault of the creatures that had been set loose. All that was left to do now was see to it that the Full Bloods were prevented from finishing what they started when the Breaking Moon had risen.
A helicopter swung in low to hover over the Skinner and Amriany team, but before its gunner could find his mark, the aircraft was attacked by half a dozen Half Breeds responding to a guttural bark from the Full Blood perched upon the edge of the roof. As the NH-90 swung out and away from the electronics store to try and shake the werewolves off, Cole could hear the pilot screaming in pain. By the time it crashed, George was smashing his way into the store with the weighted end of his weapon.
The inside of the building was identical to any number of places Cole had visited. There was a group of carts next to the entrance, which he and the others ran past before skirting two rows of cash registers. As they rushed between rows of newly released DVDs, a Half Breed leapt at him from atop a large metal shelf designed to hold plasma screen TVs. Cole caught it with the forked end of his spear, diverting the creature until it slammed down to crack several floor tiles with its body. He removed its head with one swipe of the Blood Blade.
More Half Breeds leapt through and over the shelves, knocking over the single television set that hadn’t already been trashed. George swatted one away and went to work on the others by spinning his iron weapon like a propeller. The weighted end pulverized already broken bodies, and the claw opened wounds that wouldn’t be healed. Any Half Breeds that tried to get up were finished off by Paige, Nadya, and Milosh.
The parallels weren’t lost on Cole when he sent a Half Breed flying into the video game aisle where it demolished a display of
Blinking quickly to make sure the drops she’d put in before breaching the store were soaked in, Paige pointed toward a section of flooring that had been crudely ripped away. “Right here, I think.” She looked straight up and then tightened her grip on her weapons. “Yep. This seems like the right spot.”
“You sure?” Cole asked.
Pointing up to a massive hole in the roof, she replied, “Again . . . yep.”
Since the power hadn’t been on for a while, there wasn’t a huge difference in temperature when Cole stood next to Paige to get a look at the hole that showed him a cold winter sky. Grit from outside sprinkled down, along with chunks of cement and plaster, as a figure loomed above the hole to peer down at them. An explosion from the battle between the IRD and Half Breeds illuminated enough for him to see a snout, a clawed hand, and part of a furry chest. Then Esteban lowered his face to fix his white eyes upon them, his lips parting to display rows of uneven fangs.
“You have shown yourselves too late to do anything but bleed,” the Full Blood said in a rich Spanish accent.
