Ashes To Ashes (Wolf Guard Book 2) (12 page)

Chapter 16

Panicked eyes swept right to left. A pure kind of fear that poured melted gold through liquid nitrogen and gave a rush of heat to blood that flash freezes and drips in icy burns.

I reveled in my violation. I forced these twisted beings to feel so violently and such power consumes unconditionally. It was a heated lurch in my stomach, something buried beneath the wolf that forced a way through its confinement to spread like a rapid illness through each and every vein. In the fifty years I'd been alive I was many things. Perhaps this would be the confirmed worst - to relish so wholly in another's fear. How I became the abuser, became the villain so readily and without complaint.

Like a black mist of smothering foreboding, that creature leaked it's way from every pore and melted across the barren ground. Black smokey fingers grabbed at tiny tufts of brown and wilted grass that survived the harsh winter and pulled itself along. Not two hands of curling fog, but many. That mist covering the floor in seconds to become one giant sheet of smoke and ash with creeping fingers hauling the mass along. It reached the line of pack wolves quickly, dodging heavy feet with clawed tips and one set of wolf paws so similar to my own it proved there was one other old wolf currently residing in this pack. I'd have liked to look upon the coat and muzzle, pure curiosity for a wolf so alike my own, but the black smoke disallowed my vision to roam anywhere other than forward. I stayed within my wolf, close to the pack house, forty feet or so from the fighting line. Only that mist traveled closer with its reaching fingers, taking a small part of my subconscious with it - enough to give it a semblance of life.

It passed the female line, separated into groups of those that held the barrier to the pack house and those that joined their Alpha in beheading the invaders, splitting easily between their large feet to avoid touching the wolf's toughened skin. I didn't like touching wolves this way when I didn't know them - I usually felt more than I'd like to on contact.

Searching fingers finally found Lane's giant feet, clawed with talons black as the smoke that swirled effortlessly around him. Without my consent, a few of those fingers stroked reverently across his instep. I shuddered at the feelings that poured uncontrollably along that mist and all the way back to my wolf's figure standing guard at the house. Rage was overpowering, a suffocating amount that seemed currently directed at the creatures he fought. Each forward step from his wolf as he battled to gain ground over the snarling mutants only begged to have that smoke follow like a pet to its master. Joy reached through the mist next. Utter exuberance for the fight and the blood he spilled so easily - a drenching pool that overflowed at his feet, causing the fog to dance out of reach of every drop that sprayed to paint the floor crimson.

The noise was muted in this release. The hacking coughs of twisted beasts and throaty growls of angry wolves that faced such depraved creations. The smoke continued on, pulling itself further into the breach and coiling around shrubs that grew haphazardly through the broken dirt. Using the wasted foliage for handholds to tug and heave itself along. All while that one hand in coal vapor clasped a hold of the Alpha's thickened calf and wormed it's way over his solid muscle. Stretching and releasing in grasp, gently working around the wolf's skin until it wrapped itself tightly around one leg, holding on in a vice like grip that seemed inadvisable to remove. I usually had control over this mist. A tenuous one most definitely - it fought for dominance as frequently as I fought to keep it smothered. But normally it would bend to my will, I assume because my will would usually coincide with what the empath wanted - to induce fear in my enemies. This was a new struggle, one that I didn't think I'd win. It had apparently decided that Lane belonged to it as well - something I hadn't foreseen. I knew the wolf would claim ownership at some point, I hadn't realized my hidden demon would also place a stamp upon the man like he was property.

I was unnerved by this new awareness. Not only was it currently clinging to the wolf like a shackle it also truly loved the emotions emanating from Lane. Wanted to sink into his skin and luxuriate in the rage and pleasure he felt simultaneously. Draw from the wolf until it was sufficiently sated and then draw some more, glutton itself on the feelings it hungered for like they were some prized and precious stone. I worried for the time when I'd have to recall the smoke, wondered for a moment if it would release the masochistic wolf. His own hunger for pain showed readily in the gleam that shone brightly in that prevailing amber, as he took stab after stab from each mutant that rushed forward to ravage him, how he allowed each claw to draw blood before wrapping his own talons around a scarred neck and removing it's throat. He wasn't once distracted by the mist that tied itself to his skin, in fact it seemed to produce a infinite well of pleasure from him, as if he enjoyed the touch. It was an odd concept that I had no idea how to approach - if I should attempt to yank the black fingers away from him or allow the vice like grip. It definitely seemed a problem to be debated another time - perhaps when the Alpha no longer attempted suicide by throwing himself at the beasts he fought.

I left the one smokey hand in place and pushed the others back to their clawing forward, into the mass of bodies that writhed for purchase on the ground and to escape the clutches of their own heaving crush. Each faint touch of roughened, course skin resulted in shuddering tremors, their desperation and crazed rabid natures a wonderful torment to the empath that burned inside. I disliked the touch and yet I forced myself to take that skin contact, willing to endure pleasurable agony only so far as I could turn it around and unleash it straight back to them. I receded from the beasts in front - their minds so chaotic and rabid, inducing fear would only increase their need to fight. A thin balance remained in these creatures, so polluted by blood that wasn't theirs to live with they'd become mad with a need to only claw and bite. I redirected to the ones behind, perhaps younger in their transformation and not so overwhelmed in their basic responses to fight or flee. I touched the inner core of several, tightening my grip on fierce blood-lust and turning it to panic with blackened fingers of ashen cloud. Twisted their minds into panic and retreat, pouring trembling cowardice through the connection that we now shared. A tiny smile lit my face within my animal's form, feeling that horror as it bled quickly through their entire body, turning limbs to shaking jelly and ruined hearts to frenzied drum.

I found a deep satisfaction in twisting these beasts, as their legs forced a quick backwards retreat and the beasts that forced their way forward dwindled to two thirds of the mob, I enjoyed success and a calming kind of happiness. From beast to rabid beast I stretched that fog, finding something akin to rapture at the ease with which I turned the vulnerable minds to despair. I was forever aware of just how dangerous a person I could become, so easily I could slip into the madness that ruled Duncan, such a similar pleasure we found in destruction.

I spotted Conall leap over the mass of beasts. Huge feet landing heavily on snapping jaws that arched to bite at his flesh as he made a bridge of their heads, using one twisted creature after another as his stepping stones. His heavy thighs bunched in motion, putting power into his steps as he landed solidly and crushed a few skulls as he made his own path over the creations. He finally flew off the end of the mob, close to the gate and the barrier between the escaping fearful beasts and their freedom. They'd not be allowed to escape into the forest beyond, not to be unleashed into the town and the humans that had no hope of containing them. I sent more creatures his way as he disposed of the first wave, five at a time as his arms swung deftly around him, catching throats on his fierce claws and one or two between his bright, white teeth.

Ty was focused entirely on one section of the invading mob. Sending two or three to the ground struggling for air as the females crowded around the fallen bodies and dragged them away to render them in pieces, scattering limbs on the blooded ground as carelessly as fallen branches. His eyes glowed frozen blue ice and drew several rumbling glances from the females he provided the flesh for. I rolled my eyes inside my wolf - figures he'd garner respect and lust from the females and I'd no doubt just given them more reason to hate me.

A roar swept my vision back to Conall, one panicking beast had gotten through those huge biceps that guarded his chest as his range had kept them at bay. A distorted hand buried within Conall's stomach, the creature kneeling on the floor at his feet as the Irishman held the wrist tightly to prevent it sinking further into his skin. Blood ran freely down his pelvis, hard to see against the black tarnish of his toughened skin but enough of him glistened with wetness that it worried me with the size of the hole he'd be left with once he removed the hand punching through his gut. My wolf responded with a howl, an hour or so had passed and yet she'd felt no need to set her own teeth to these creatures so far - content enough to guard the house and watch as her smoke drifted forward and rent the air with thickened illusions of fear.

She now recalled that smoke with an anger I'd not seen very often. The fingers whipping along the ground in their haste to return, swaying drastically like speeding cars so intent on their recoil. She met the mist in its return even as she pounded forward, furious anger contorting her features even as she saw Conall rip the head off the creature with his one free hand. He stumbled and righted himself, swayed slightly and blinked his wolf eyes slowly. His massive head shook side to side as twisted beasts crawled closer and sniffed higher in the air at the blood saturating the wind with promises of death.

Eyes snapped to Lane. He stalled in his mission to work his way toward Duncan, the presence standing proudly on the wall watching his creations fall and writhe in twisted glee. I leapt over the females, turning my body slightly to slip between shoulders packed tightly together. I caught one creature as it fell towards me, it's throat an easy target as it landed heavily on my tongue to spill black blood and wash my mouth in rotting corpse. They tasted vile, like decomposition at its most fetid stage.

But I continued to chew my way to Conall. Leaving the females to hold the line and trusting Ty to not let them get through to the house.

I'd just found a friend - a little bit crazed and a little bit delusional but the wolf was not prepared to lose this one so soon.

Chapter 17

One hand held his stomach in.

I assumed the deep wound was closing slowly behind the claws that covered it, but the continuous pouring of blood was worrying to my wolf that stood at his injured side. I protected his flank while he knitted together, allowed him a moment to lean against the wall in support until his body could regenerate the blood that had escaped and left him slightly lightheaded.

His other hand still crossed over my vision, skewering scarred beasts through the brain as they flung themselves towards us - sensing a little weakness in the large Irish wolf. I was handicapped by my inability to leave Conall's side, my teeth kept them at bay or found purchase in their throats and Conall's one clawed hand picked them off as they charged yet, we would be overrun at some point. It was putting a bandage on a lethal wound - holding them off now only to drown beneath them later.

Fifty or so wolves were either running the border or had already been disposed of when Duncan had entered the forest. What was left of the pack should have been decent odds in our favor but we were left with wolves that were only basic predators - all heart and a human's hesitation on delivering that killing blow.

A hundred females stood strong holding the path to the house beyond, it was less a show of warriors clamoring for victory and more the innate need to keep these creatures from the few children hiding within the building. Wolves were a protective lot to their young, related or not, they would suffer to the death for the next generation's blood to live on. These females were hardy, proud and angry wolves that roared their fury to the shimmering sun as it judged the destruction beneath it's animated glare.

A hundred pure wolves to lesser creatures.

A hundred females that would die where they stood.

Not because of lack of soul or a weakness in their animal but simply because they'd been treated as nothing but frail women for so long that their fight was instinctual - clumsy and frenzied - an utter lack of form and purpose to a horde of beasts that seemed to have been given a warrior's knowledge in their creation by one sadistic Scotsman.

I was a scrapper. A dirty fighter that chose winning above honor and against these creatures I was well suited. Conall and I cut a swathe through the beasts turned kamikaze in their efforts to take us down. Ty brought a couple to heel at a time, his concentration solely on one side of the invader's group.

The Alpha was a machine of violence, gutting and beheading the creatures as if his claws were made of fire and their toughened skin melted at the touch. We steadily cut that path leaving husks in place of life, though more took up residence in the space left behind. They seemed a mutating thing, a bacteria that multiplied on its destructive path, a disease that converged and overwhelmed and I could see our end in their empty eyes.

I could not help the guilt that threatened to overwhelm at the sight of three smaller females being overrun by rabid animals. Dragged to the floor and bitten at in a ferocious frenzy as the made wolves found a mad kind of delight in their prey. I was left somewhat grateful at the dead that had no fathers, brothers, mates here to call their own. I couldn't stand the thought of watching someone else's grief, I had never been comfortable having to stand by and watch someone fall apart, it seemed a private moment I shouldn't intrude upon. At least for these females, their families were not here to see this.

A few days ago, I would have left. Right in the middle of the fight, when the tide turned against us and I could almost taste that exquisite end, I would have left. Taken Ty and run for the border, saved the two of us and left the pack to die. Why not? It's not as if they’d ever cared about us, ever fought for us like we were currently fighting so hard for them. And so I had to wonder on my reluctance to do just that, why I couldn't seem to leave the black wolf's weakened side. Somewhere, in between the Irishman's crazed faery tales and the Alpha's stilted speech and unnerving gaze, it seemed I've found my conscience.

I huffed at myself as I dodged a low blow from twisted claws and ducked under the beast's reach to take a chunk of flesh from it's flank. It's all well and good finding a little compassion but I'd rather not die for it.

I flicked a glance up at Conall, large wolf head grumbling between clenched teeth as he glared at the suicidal creatures. Affronted by their tactics to overwhelm like ants crawling over their sweetened treats. Blood still dripped from the wound in his stomach, some of that dark liquid splashing on my wolf's coat. Her rumbles of displeasure were amusing - in the chaos of war, she still found time to berate the other wolf for leaking all over her usually pristine fur. I took a solid minute to remember the feeling of being a single soul with a dual nature. Some blinding radiance of dawn when all the world had fallen to dusk. The single most cherished part of me, a potent animal to the human’s fragility. When we fell, I would leave the earth with final thoughts of the wolf that had carried us both, the animal that never let me down and refused to allow the human to give up. She was the best part of a hardened me.

As my thoughts turned to taking as many of them with me as I could, the Irishman fell into the same final dance as I. A last adrenaline rush as the beasts became overbearing, making my claws find their targets that much easier and my teeth ignore the fetid blood that poured between them to sink ever deeper into rancid flesh. I refused to look at the blond Alpha - he was a distraction I didn't need with muddling thoughts that threw my concentration and made my emotions churn between ingrained hate and aching possibilities. Everything became maddeningly silent in my final stand. Whatever blood he'd spilled, whatever atrocity he'd committed, I was glad to have met the man tied eternally to my own soul. Perhaps in another life, it would be an easier ride than this one.

A ragged mouth latched onto my leg, a howl breached my wolf's muzzle from where it locked onto the throat in my grasp. I wrenched past the searing burn and tore the muscle through hardened skin. The creature collapsed before me, a puppet that lost its strings. I refocused to the teeth still gnawing at my leg as if I were a bone to the dog that chewed at me, crunching, snapping jaws on brittle bone that cracked under its weight. My wolf despised the pressure, hated the feel of another's teeth ripping through her skin. Her arrogance demanded death to the mutant that dared to taste her blood. With rage and vengeance her only thoughts, it became an all consuming need to kill what caused her pain. It was a red river of essence that poured through amber eyes and covered the grounds in hellish forewarning. Her will overtook my own, nothing but pure animal instinct to destroy the unnatural creature, end the deformity and prevent the reproduction of such inferiority. Her teeth tore to rend flesh from bone. Taking chunks from any part that fell into her strike range. The jaws locked around her leg were nothing but an inconsequential trap to one part of her armory, claws that would have been useful to be free.

A roar rose in the distance, a deep ground shaking call that stilled the beasts for a moment and shook the frame of the one I ripped apart, piece by rotten piece. The Alpha roared in response, equally deep and thunderous, a sound that shook my own wolf from her blood raged stupor. Chunks of flesh from the beast in my teeth spat out of my mouth as I shook my leg free from its weakened jaws. Turning quickly to find Conall standing on a felled creature and using his one usable hand to yank the head free from its neck. Another roar came rumbling back, higher than the first yet filled with a dark excitement that eclipsed the deeper one. Almost in tune with Lane's twisted, pleasure filled battle cry.

While the beasts remained confused and stilled like rabbits under a hawks eye, I clawed a path through those closest, running talons through skin as deeply and as quickly as possible. Their frozen figures were a lull in the bedlam I would take full advantage of.

Duncan's wolf let a roar of his own free, one that changed the evil satisfaction he had so far been filled with to something nearer frustration. I cocked my head to the side and studied him from my Captain’s chair, steering the wolf to look at the man so consumed with glory turned almost childish in his sudden disappointment. I'd originally thought him cowardly - bringing war to the doorstep only to stand high on the wall as if he were a king commanding his minions. Now I believed him to simply have a plan beyond his creations, that this was just testing the water and now he'd been interrupted in his games.

The coming wolves were not part of his plan, that was plain to see. I delighted in the knowledge as I turned and swiped once more at another beast, as it shook it's head as if to rid itself of the odd stupor. Conall grunted from slightly behind me and I swept my body around trying to keep the creatures in view as one eye flicked to the Irish wolf. His expression just about made me shiver in disgust, all teeth and gums dripping with bits of slaughtered remains. I think he was attempting to smile - eight foot wolves with wide crushing jaws and shark like teeth, pasted with bloody parts of animal, should not smile.

I turned my head to the gate, a scramble from the beasts clawing to clear the entrance took my attention. One huge wolf strode slowly through the open gate, his gaze fixed on Duncan's figure high on the wall, completely ignoring the rabid animals snapping at his feet as they retreated. I felt a wave of power from the black-eyed monster, heavy in the air and weighted down like rocks in the atmosphere. I kept my head high and watched him curiously as he came to a halt and growled lowly. I almost missed the sleek body slipping through just behind him, so intent on the big wolf that came through first. A large old wolf, larger than I'd thought possible. Female and with a muscled flank that tensed and released as it wove it's body around the male's legs. Rubbing slightly at his thighs when his over-sized hand came down to pat her head.

She shook her coat out at his touch, her midnight, black fur catching the sun in glimmers of crystal coal. She snapped her jaws at Duncan, an almost feral rage submerging her golden eyes until all I saw was death's reflection.

She stretched languidly for a moment, those limbs lengthening to a wildcat’s range. Her tail flicking against the male that hovered behind her. A single moment passed from wolf to wolf, a tensing in her muscles before she released in a leap, throwing herself in some sort of joyful tantrum at the beasts just beginning to overcome their moment of prey sensing predator.

The scene before me turned blurry, hazy in resolution with wavering edges. I caught a glimpse of the female catching heads within her jaws, beheading with a manic kind of glee like some sort of bloody, party massacre. My legs gave way beneath me, my stomach hit the floor with a slap of skin meeting solid ground. I looked at the pool of blood I lay in, confused at the source and the vast amount that was body temperature warm.

My vision wavered once more as I found my head slumping to the side, looking across sprays of similar blood that arched across the grounds in a fountain of red.

An Alpha stalked my way, stomping through bodies and carelessly kicking the husks to the side as he made his path towards me. My eyes flickered shut, taking pictures of the big wolf, committing his form to memory.

A frown creased my forehead as my wolf melted away to skin and the vision only grew more difficult to keep.

One lasting impression turned my frown to a glare.

High up on the Alpha's thigh, wrapped around bulging muscle, in a death grip of refusing release, that one black hand - a smokey mist of claiming touch - remained clenched tightly to the Alpha's skin.