Chapter 27

Asire.

It was surprisingly difficult to leave the security of my bedroom. I don’t know how long Loki and I were talking, but night had fallen outside. Now that I was paying attention, I realized that the other Orphans had returned. A handful, those who worked the nightshift, were gone.

I hadn’t told Loki anything that was too revealing, but if we had continued, I think I would have. The look on his face while he tried to pry words out of his mouth just now… He was gonna tell me something that would hurt him. It only made sense that I do the same. So Reggie’s interruption couldn’t have come at a better time. For both of us.

Then, there was the other thing. In the privacy of my bedroom, it hadn’t felt as intimate as I suddenly realized it was. Frightening for me, since I had a tendency to keep people at arm’s length. What was it about our conversation that made it seem we were the only people in the house? Legions had very good hearing, but the chaos of the house would have kept the others from listening in. But it was like neither Loki nor I realized that someone could possibly hear us.

Dangerous when you had secrets.

Downstairs, most of the Orphans were convened in the living room. It was the only room big enough to hold everyone. There were three or four missing and I guessed they were taking care of the children.

Reggie clapped her hands together once when she saw us at the bottom of the stairs. Silence fell over the room, though there hadn’t been much talking to begin with.

All the legions were dressed for business. Shorts or jeans with t-shirts or— for the girls mostly —tank tops. Most of us can fight in work clothes, such as suits, but it really isn’t pleasant. The biggest trouble I have is with my hair. When I got out hunting, like tonight, I tie it back in a ponytail, but it can still be grabbed. I should probably cut it, but…I had reasons that I didn’t.

Reggie grabbed the map that she and Henrik had been working on and set it down on the coffee table that she had brought home a few years ago. The pins in the map were still there, but none of us were paying attention to them anymore. The Annihilists had abandoned all patterns and were attacking whenever they could. So they didn’t know where the safe house was.

Reggie started grouping all of us together and giving us destinations to patrol in. She was putting everyone in groups of fours and fives. It wouldn’t be as easy to move around, but it would be safer. I was grouped with Billy, Loki and her. Regory would be going with a couple of the other Orphans and Dovie. He didn’t look happy about being separated from Billy, but it was habit from Reggie to keep the mated pairs apart during this kind of thing.

In this kind of city, no one would be surprised if the mated pair left everyone to die if it meant keeping their mate safe. We weren’t allowed to group together officially and the unofficial ties we had weren’t enough to keep us from abandoning each other. I never would, but I’d had it happen to me. Luckily, I was scrappier than people thought I was. I loved being underestimated, so much better than being overestimated.

“All right,” Reggie said, after everyone was getting ready to leave. “The four of us are headed to Beacon Hill. I figure there’s a fifty-fifty chance they’ll be there. On one hand, it would be easy to hide from us, but on the other hand that’s one of the few places that it’d be obvious for them to go.”

We headed off in my truck.

There was another group of Orphans that would be circling the area we were in. Seattle was a big city and we only had about seven groups of people patrolling it tonight. The chances of finding anything helpful were not good. But if we didn’t look, then we were basically leaving Millie in the hands of the enemy. We’re the ones our race feared, but that didn’t mean we were soulless.

“How do you think they’re hiding?” Reggie asked, just as I was parking.

“It’s either a spell or a legion power,” I said. “However, I don’t know if a legion with this kind of power could stay hidden without any rumors popping up around them. I’ve had rumors following me around my whole life and I’ve been pretty harmless since I was three.”

Reggie rolled her eyes. “You’ve had less power,” she said, “But only a truly moronic person would call you harmless.”

“Not the point. Everyone knows I don’t have a lot of power, but they still make rumors about me.”

Reggie tapped a fake nail on my truck’s upholstery while she thought. “At the same time,” she thought aloud, “If there was a spell that could disrupt our tracking, wouldn’t there be rumors about that?”

“I guess so,” I said.

She sighed and got out of the truck. The rest of us followed her. “Ya know,” she said, hands on her hips, “we could take care of all these problems by killing them all. We just have to find them before they recognize your ratty truck,” she said with a gesture that encompassed my vehicle.

I glared at her in immediate offense. My truck was an old Tahoe. About the same age as me, as a matter of fact. Twenty-one might be young for a person, but it was old for a truck. However, mine didn’t look old. I took great care of her. Reggie smirked and walked away. I pat the hood of my truck and said, “It’s okay, sweetie. When you get your revenge, try not to crash.”

I glanced up and found Loki smiling from the other side of the truck. There was amusement in his eyes. “What?” I said. “It’s not my fault she doesn’t realize you shouldn’t insult a car.”

“Of course,” Billy said, from next to Loki. “You should always be polite to things that could kill you until you’re no longer in their power. And we need to drive that truck back to the safe house.”

Loki held his hands up. “I didn’t say anything.”

“Good,” Billy and I said in unison.

“Are you people coming?” Reggie called from down the street.

I had parked behind a closed store. I had put my truck in shadows so that no one would see it. The choice didn’t sit well with me, because I liked parking directly under lights. It’s harder to hide around a black truck when there’s a light on it. However, it would be conspicuous in an empty parking lot.

Just in case, I threw my senses out. It was pretty useless, because the legions I sensed could just as easily be friend as they could be foe. After a couple of minutes of wading through signatures, I gave up and dropped it. Even if I sensed Millie, I wouldn’t be able to tell it was her. Billy was also tracking, so she would pick up on the kid. She didn’t have her hand extended, because that looks odd, but her fingers were twitching.

She told me once, when we were much younger, that holding her hand out makes tracking easier. She pushes her senses out into the world by doing it, because her ability is in her body, not her head. She said it was kind of like fishing. You threw the line into the water and then reeled it in. Only instead of bringing the fish to her, she went to the fish.

I don’t know how long we were walking in the quiet before Loki said, “If we find the person who’s hiding Millie’s signature, I’ll be able to stop it.”

“Will you be able to tell who’s working the magic?” Reggie asked.

We were speaking quietly, but I still looked around as subtly as I could.

Loki nodded, but then paused. “I won’t be able to tell what magic it is,” he explained. “Only that it’s being worked. However, if I encounter any Annihilists, I won’t bother waiting to see what they can do before blocking it.”

Smart of him.

Reggie smiled, indicating she thought the same thing.

We continued down the street, mostly unnoticed. Most of the normal citizens of Seattle were smart and hiding in their houses about this time. However, a few of the veterans felt safe. It wasn’t raining right now, so a few adventurous individuals were out and about.

There were a handful of people picking up late dinners and hanging out with friends. Mostly, our audience were the homeless people bundled up in old blankets and clothing with makeshift umbrellas to hide under. They didn’t bother us and they were careful not to look anyone in the eye. There weren’t many homeless because they had a tendency to get killed or picked off, but those who survived their first week in Seattle were tough.

The first hour passed without incident. We stepped under an awning of a closed bookstore so that Reggie could make contact with the other parties. We were in a busier part of town now, having wandered far away from where we were supposed to be. There were a handful of restaurants and bars. I could hear music pounding out of one of the latter. It sounded like country music.

“Henrik hasn’t found anything,” Reggie said, hanging up. “Except a couple of muggers.”

Her brow furrowed when she was in the middle of the second call. She pulled the phone away from her ear and tapped on the screen. Then waited. No one answered the second call either. “Lixa’s not picking up,” she told us. “I’ll try one more time before I send everyone to check on her.”

She put the phone to her ear one more time. We all listened to the dial tone, then Lixa’s voicemail asking Reggie to leave a message. Even her voicemail sounded hostile. Reggie tapped on her phone for a couple of more seconds. One ring, two, then Henrik’s voice. “What? Is something wrong?” he asked.

“Lixa’s not answering her phone,” Reggie said.

“On my way,” he said, hanging up.

“Let’s head out too,” Reggie said, stepping out of the safety of the awning. Lazy drops of rain were starting to fall.

Reggie got two steps away from the building we had been standing next to before I realized there was something wrong. The loud country music had drowned out most sounds of the street. I had barely been able to hear the phone calls. A second after I realized something wasn’t right, my three companions all tensed. Almost at the same time.

Growling. That’s what I had been hearing under all that country music. It had gotten lost in the low buzz of conversation coming from the restaurants. Better senses could be very helpful in a fight, but things were easily lost in the mayhem of city life.

My eyes scanned the dark street. All the street lights had been taken out, probably by teenagers trying to act tough. However, the moon was bright and there was a fresh blanket of snow on the ground. It created just enough light for me to see the werewolf hiding under an SUV about three seconds before he launched himself at us.

Reggie was plowed over by the big sable colored wolf. She hit the street and I saw her elbow take most of the impact. Our bones are tough, so it didn’t break, but her curse was loud as a gunshot.

I threw out my senses instinctively and then had to immediately drop to my knees. The cold, wet ground soaked through my jeans immediately, but the werewolf sailed over my head and landed in a tangled heap about two yards away from me. This one was reddish yellow and it looked like she landed badly on her foreleg. She was struggling to her feet, but one of them was dangling limply on the end of her leg.

There was a thud behind me and I scrambled to my feet, getting the bottoms of my jeans even more soaked the process. I could feel icy water slide into my socks.

Loki had been pinned to the building we’d been standing by. That was the last decent shot the werewolf, in person not wolf form, had gotten in. Loki had one of his arms and was twisting it so the elbow was compromised and the man was slowly losing his ability to stay on his feet.

Billy was over by Reggie, fending off the sable colored wolf with a bit of street debris. The wolf was growling and hovering, moving closer, only to be chased away. Meanwhile, the reddish wolf was back on her feet and those harsh yellow eyes of hers were locked on me. Her lips pulled back from her muzzle to show long white teeth. She gathered herself for another leap.

She leapt and I moved. I swung myself to the side, hitting the pavement and rolling with the movement until I was on my feet again, crouched about two yards from where I had been. The wolf plowed into a parked car and it went off like the most irritating toddler, deafening me to the noises of the others’ fights.

The wolf’s eyes were getting brighter and I could see some of the intelligence, the bit of her that held her human side, drifting away. The sharp scent of panic lit through the street, but I couldn’t tell whose it was.

The red wolf lowered her body in preparation. She was going to come at me, at my face, and I only had a handful of seconds to figure out how to keep her from reaching her goal.

Her hindquarters bunched and I watched her back paws dig into the concrete. Then she was in the air. Werewolves are fast. Must faster than an actual wolf and almost as fast as a vampire. They’re the same weight as their human half. Their teeth are sharper than an actual wolf’s and nails slightly more pointed. Her leap left gouges in the concrete and those teeth flashed white on the moonlight.

Unfortunately for her, legions are as fast as vampires and I was a little faster yet. The second I saw her legs gather for the move, I was sliding to the side. It was difficult keeping myself lowered, but I still managed to move away from the wolf before her teeth could sink into my fragile flesh. While slipping just out of her grasp, I snagged the knife I had hidden on my waist and slashed out. I could have killed her. I could have spilled her insides all over the concrete. It would have even been justified. However, I knew she wasn’t working on her own orders. Basil had a bone to pick with us and was using his wolves to do so.