“Heather, get ready.”
He could see the Alpha’s eyes far below. They were shining like golden headlights. The mass of the super- werewolf was taking up a large portion of the shaft. He was climbing straight up, throwing himself upward, yards at a time, claws striking deep into rock and steel. It was like standing at the end of a tunnel with a freight train coming right at you.
There was nothing big to drop down the shaft. Heather tossed a wrench, then kicked in a rusty toolbox. The Alpha didn’t even blink when they hit.
I’M COMING TO GET YOU, HARBINGER.
Earl had three shots left in the Mosin before he had to reload. Aksel had written that he’d struck Koschei right between the eyes. Earl aimed. Fired. There was a brilliant flash of silver light, and the Alpha roared. The headlights blinked twice, then started back up.
“That didn’t work?” Heather shouted. “What now?” She threw over a tarp, looking for something else to toss down the shaft. “What happened to shoot him in the head and say the magic words? Shit. Shit.”
KOSCHEI WAS WEAK. HE HAD NOT FED THE AMULET LIKE I HAVE.
Earl chambered another of the Baba Yaga’s rounds. He aimed carefully. The old gun seemed to be perfectly zeroed. This time he picked a glowing eye.
YOU’RE NOT EVEN A WEREWOLF? I TOOK YOUR SOUL. YOU ARE NOTH-FUCK!
The Alpha shrieked as the silver bullet obliterated his eyeball. “Felt that one, huh?” Earl shouted as he worked the bolt, chambering the last cartridge in the magazine. There was only one beam of yellow light now. It danced wildly inside the shaft as the Alpha shook his head. He resumed climbing.
OH, IT IS ON NOW.
Heather had found an oil lantern. She hurled it down the shaft. The light fell, then shattered on against the Alpha. The oil ignited in hissing flames. The burning werewolf kept ascending.
The fire was dying fast. “Got any more of those?” Earl asked.
“I think the rest are battery-powered.”
“Aw, hell.” Last shot. Earl aimed, trying to time the blinking of the Alpha’s massive eyelids. At least the target was getting bigger…Too bad that meant he was closer. “My, what a big eye you have,” he muttered. Smoke and the stench of burning hair boiled out of the shaft. He pulled the trigger. The other light went out, plunging the pit into smoky darkness.
AARRRGGGHHH! The roar was in Earl’s head and against his ears.
THEY’LL GROW BACK. I DON’T NEED TO SEE TO EAT YOU.
Earl pulled a stripper clip of five of the magic rounds and began to thumb them into the open action of the Mosin-Nagant. He hadn’t used one of these particular rifles since a mission during the Korean War. There was a trick to not getting all the cartridges wedged up against their rims. There. He closed the bolt.
And the Alpha came out of shaft.
Somehow, he seemed even bigger than before. He had to duck his head to get under the cable wheel. WHERE ARE YOU? His nostril holes, which were big enough to fit a grapefruit in, flared. The head turned toward Earl, and the jaws opened. Each tooth was the size of a combat knife. THERE YOU ARE.
The jaws snapped forward, wide enough to completely consume a man. But they snapped shut on empty air.
Earl hit the ground rolling, entangled with a mass of dark hair. They came to a stop, and for a moment, Earl thought that Heather must have saved him. But it was Nikolai in werewolf form. His teeth were only inches from Earl’s eyes, and for the briefest of moments, Earl would have assumed that the fearsome beast, his mortal enemy, smiled. Nikolai turned, snarled, and charged, loping toward the Alpha.
PETROV. Blind, the Alpha swung one mighty arm, ripping thousand pound girders right out of the concrete. Nikolai spun through the chaos and landed on the Alpha’s neck, tearing and biting.
Earl had lost the Mosin. It was a few feet away. He scrambled for it.
Heather, fully changed, joined the fray. She came at the Alpha from behind and attacked his leg, trying to rip through a hamstring. The giant lashed out with one leg, and a paw knocked Heather across the room.
Nikolai never let up to the end. He threw himself at the Alpha, over and over, tearing roast-sized chunks of meat out, spraying blood in great arcs, attacking with unbelievable savagery. One giant claw wrapped around Nikolai’s leg and pulled him away. The Alpha held the other werewolf away from his body, letting Nikolai dangle and thrash. The Russian managed to pull himself up, breaking his leg in the process to attack the tendons in the Alpha’s wrist. The Alpha roared in agony as Nikolai severed the artery.
ENOUGH OF YOU.
The Alpha reached up with his other hand and took hold of Nikolai’s arm. The limb seemed puny between the great claws. The Alpha pulled. Nikolai screamed as one arm was torn off.
Earl’s hand landed on the wooden stock of the Mosin-Nagant.
Nikolai was still fighting, still attacking, even as the blood pumped from his torso. The Alpha sunk his claws into Nikolai’s chest, and, once locked on, pulled against Nikolai’s leg. He screamed again, weaker this time, as his leg was torn cleanly off at the pelvis.
PETER AND THE WOLF. LAST OF YOUR LINE. YOU SHOULDN’T HAVE CHALLENGED ME.
The Alpha wrenched off Nikolai’s other arm. Nikolai’s head hung, weak and limp. He held Nikolai over the shaft.
LIKE YOUR EMPIRE, TO THE GRAVEYARD OF HISTORY’S FAILURES YOU GO…
Great claws pulled free of Nikolai’s body and the Russian tumbled into the dark.
The Alpha turned, satisfied. NOW, WHERE ARE YOU, HARBINGER? Still blind, the monster flared his massive nostrils as he sought the scent of his enemy.
And Earl shoved the barrel of the Mosin nearly a foot up the Alpha’s nose. He jerked the trigger.
The light was blinding. This time the message that the Alpha broadcast telepathically was an unintelligible signal of so much confusion and pain that it momentarily shorted out Earl’s brain.
The Alpha reared back, hit the pulley, did a turn, then fell. Earl dove to the side to keep from being crushed. The impact of the Alpha’s body shook the foundations.
NNNNNNUUUUUUUuuuuuuuuuuu.
Earl shook his head. The Alpha was down, flat on his back. The rifle was still sticking out of his nose. There was no time to lose. He had no idea how fast the monster could regenerate from something like this. Nikolai’s life had bought him a distraction, and it was his only chance. Earl jumped over one outstretched arm, grabbed handfuls of black, and began pulling his aching body up the Alpha’s torso.
The amulet. There. It was barely visible through the hair. There was no chain holding it. It was like the silver had turned molten and seared itself to the werewolf’s chest. It was an open palm, three claws, just like the forerunner’s skeleton, just like the dream from when his curse had been ripped away.
He grabbed the amulet in both hands, sinking his fingers into the Alpha’s skin, and shouted the words from Aksel’s journal. “Allut tvar mataw!” And he pulled with all his might.
Nothing happened. The amulet didn’t even budge.
“Allut tvar mataw. Allut tvar mataw!” Earl roared. Somehow he pulled harder. Veins stood out in his neck. “Allut tvar mataw! Motherfucker!” The amulet hadn’t moved a bit. “This is why I hate magic!”
Earl looked to the rifle. The Alpha had to be regenerating. Time for another dose of silver to the old brain- stem.
HARBINGER.
The entire body shuddered beneath Earl’s knees. “Aw, hell.”
GIVE MY REGARDS TO PETROV.
Earl tried to move, but the arm was so big, there was nowhere to go. It was like trying to dodge a wall. It hit him, and he tumbled overboard. He hit the ground hard, only to be hit again. His body scraped and banged across the gravel as the Alpha shoved him over the edge and into the shaft.
Earl was falling.
Desperate, he reached for something, anything. His hand struck metal, stone, metal, and somehow he grabbed on, for just a split second. The impact wrenched his arm from the socket. The ledge he’d grasped crumbled, and Earl fell again.
Air tore by. Earl hit a center cable. He touched it. Sliding. Then hit it again. Somehow he grabbed it, slowing
