Crimson Moon - Never Cry Werewolf Part 18

"Better stand back a moment," Garth warned Shogun. "Sometimes the combination sputters a bit. .. the demon gook is such a nasty element to work with. We don't want you splattered by the silver in the mirrored globe. We will call you over when it is your time to speak."

Busily working on the shimmering miasma, the Gnome opened the vial and shook a few globs into the sigil on the floor. Immediately green tendrils snaked out from the small glob, bullwhipping the area inside the circle and releasing a putrid sulfur stench. Searching for something to grasp on to, it quickly encircled the miasma, turning the shimmering metallic surface a cloudy green and causing it to wildly spark before absorbing into it.

"d.a.m.n, that's wicked," Crow Shadow murmured.

Garth cut him a scowl. "Once we begin communication and Shogun begins to speak, you will have to control yourselves. No matter what she says, you must allow her to think that he's in the room only with a witch from her coven or she will sense an ambush. Understood?"

"Understood," Hunter said, giving Crow Shadow a look.

Crow Shadow held his hands up in front of his chest. "No problem."

"Are you ready?" Garth asked, looking at Shogun.

Shogun nodded.

"And you've rehea.r.s.ed what you'll say?" Sir Rodney landed a hand on his shoulder.

"I'm ready."

Shogun stepped forward and the Gnomes began a low, unintelligible chant while pointing and moving their wands as though conducting an invisible orchestra. Slowly but surely, Lady Jung Suk's face filled the center of the shimmering globe. She'd been sleeping peacefully and then suddenly her eyes snapped open, glowing green. Her cat-eye pupils elongated and a large leopard face quickly filled her once lovely mouth.

"You have not learned your lesson, little squirrels. One blinding was not enough?" She hissed and stood, sweeping off her exquisitely embroidered chaise lounge and heading down a long corridor.

Sasha studied the house as Lady Jung Suk's silk robes billowed out behind her. Just pa.s.s something recognizable, Sasha's mind begged. Anything, so that if the night plan didn't work, she could hunt that arrogant b.i.t.c.h down and kill her.

They all watched silently as Lady Jung Suk flung a heavy oak door open and entered what had to be her conjuring room. She angrily yanked a knife off a small, black lacquered table and hurried to a place on the floor where a black cat was feeding from a dead fish. She shooed the feline away with a hiss, causing it to scamper into hiding with a protesting growl. The fish was in the center of a blood-created pentagram, its eyes already caved out.

Flinging the fish to the cat, she reached out her hand, and a frightened squirrel immediately filled it. Poised in the center of the pentagram, she held the struggling animal in one hand and the point of the knife in the other, lifting them above her head as her lips moved in a silent, deadly chant.

Garth motioned to Shogun. He nodded and began the game.

"You'll only blind yourself this time," Shogun said. "I am behind a mirrora"warm blood won't help you, nor will squirrel eyes!"

His aunt flung the clawing animal away. It immediately escaped her and the cat out an open window.

"So . . . you have learned. You have a stronger witch helping you this time. How interesting. But that still will not help youa"you've ruined your chances to rule the United Council of Ent.i.ties."

"But you will never rule any Were Federation or council." Shogun shouted. "You are a slave ... a weak slave to the Vampires and the Unseelie queen who gave you your new body. Even that doesn't belong to you." He laughed. "You picked a weak little girl. You should have at least picked a true warrior. Your vanity, Aunt, has always been your downfall."

"I'll show you how weak this young woman's body is one night, trust me, nephew!"

"Then why not tonight, when we can both be our true selves. One on one, you call your leopard and I will call my wolf. . . and we will see if you made the wise choice."

"I would be honored to be your master," she said in a low, cat growl.

"Teach me, old, old one . . . show me what you could not show my father or his people." Shogun laughed again. "No matter how many bodies you steal, you are an old hag. Why would I even waste my time fighting you?"

"Afraid, nephewa"a coward like your father?"

Silver Hawk put his hand on Hunter's shoulder when he tensed.

"I've never been afraid of you, Aunt. The worst that I've ever done to you was pity you. But now I see why you were banished. It had less to do with the family scandal than with what you chose to be."

"And what I chose to be," she shrieked, now turning in circles clutching the small dagger, "was victorious! I chose to be more than seconda"unlike you, who sit whimpering in your den over a shadow b.i.t.c.h you cannot have! Second to your brother in all things, and you have the nerve to challenge me?"

Shogun lunged at the miasma, but Bear Shadow and Crow Shadow silently caught him before the silver could touch him. He angrily shrugged out of their hold and pointed at the shimmering globe.

"Tonight we finish this, Aunt! In the bayoua"where it all begana"on the grounds of the UCE courthouse in the swamp under the full moon!"

Lady Jung Suk pressed her hands together with the dagger between them and bowed with an evil smile. "Tonight, nephew. Zai jian"

CHAPTER 21.

Leaving Shogun exposed in the moonlight left her unsettled. Even with Sir Rodney and his expert archers downwind in a treetop position, and she and Hunter and the other clan members just inside the shadows, there was still so much that could go so wrong.

"Aunt! Are you afraid of battle?" Shogun shouted. "Have you changed your twisted mind?"

A hurdling silver crossbow arrow whizzed past Shogun's arm, tearing the fabric of his shirt as he did a quick sideways move and allowed it to pa.s.s his chest.

"Of course you couldn't come to fight me alone," he shouted while Vampire human helpers quickly ran to take up a new position as the wind shifted.

"I saw no reason to harm this beautiful new body," Lady Jung Suk cooed as she stepped into a pool of moonlight beside Duval Hempstead. "You have been a very bad dog, and I have some friends who would like to train you."

A Vampire army exited from behind trees, their sneering laughter creating a Doppler of echoes in the night.

Duval held out his arm with a toothy smile, and Lady Jung Suk did a slow pirouette. "You like? She's beautiful, isn't she?"

"Yes ... she is," Shogun said angrily. "And she should be returned to her mother and father."

"Forgive my nephew. He is so sentimental." She glared at Shogun with hatred br.i.m.m.i.n.g in her cat-green eyes. "Put him out of his misery. Kill him."

As soon as Duval left her side, Fae archers dropped the silver net on Lady Jung Suk. Hunter came out of a fold of shadow and began dragging it out of the heat of the battle toward where Silver Hawk had appeared. Sasha leaped out of a shadow, covering Shogun with a machinegun burst of hallowed-earth hollowpoints, exploding Vampires in the air, while Sir Rodney kept the crackling white Fae electrical charge focused on the net.

Shedding their human forms, Shogun, Bear Shadow, and Crow Shadow fought off vicious Vampire attackers. They had to keep them from the screeching, twisting ent.i.ty in the mesh. Shadow-jumping from tree to tree, Sasha held back her wolf. Now more effective in human form, she exited a shadow, released a short burst of gunfire, and then disappeared before an attacker could lay a hand on her.

Archers kept up the pressure from above, forcing the Vampires to remain earthbound. Each time they went into a funnel-cloud spiral to get above the fight, archers sent silver arrows into the whirling tornado, causing it to sputter to a stop with Vampire ashes and red embers.

But the battle was far from over as the Vampires began to retreat. Amy Chen's face had distorted into that angry, fanged transition of Lady Jung Suk.

Muscles bulging, Hunter strained to hold the mesh with Silver Hawk while the Were Leopard pulled itself out of the young woman's face, hissing and roaring.

"Drop the mail!" Sir Rodney shouted. "Let her out!"

Immediately Hunter and Silver Hawk complied, but rather than run for safety, Lady Jung Suk went right for Hunter's chest.

Hunter fell backward as Silver Hawk hit the ground and then scrambled to gather the ends of the mesh to quickly begin dragging the girl away. Shogun turned just in time to see Duval send a thick branch in his direction, and he ducked, heading toward Hunter, who was locked in a ground roll with a two-hundred-pound Were Leopard on his chest.

Panic stung Sasha's nervous system. There was no way to get a shot off without killing Hunter. Silver Hawk gathered the girl in his arms and began running, a few Fae archers and Crow Shadow following orders and going with him. But Bear Shadow and Shogun circled the combatants on the ground, Shogun finally able to leap in and rip off Lady Jung Suk's ear. She let out a roar that cut through the night.

"Fall back!" Sir Rodney shouted.

The moment Shogun released the big cat, she leaped off Hunter, and went airborne to attack Shogun. Bear Shadow hit the ground, covering the fallen pack alpha with his huge wolf body. Sir Rodney caught the Were Leopard in the air in the charge, slamming her against a tree and holding her there with all the might of Garth's wand.

"Sasha, now!" Sir Rodney yelled, straining against Lady Jung Suk's strength. "Do whatever you humans do to send the b.i.t.c.h into the Light!"

Torn, Sasha ran headlong toward the struggling beast. She didn't know what to do, really, and only her dead mother's face came to mind.

"Please, G.o.d," Sasha said, glancing at Hunter's lifeless body and the limp girl that Silver Hawk was working on. "She's killed enough innocent peoplea"don't allow her to take any more. Get this thing away from that poor young woman who hasn't even had a chance to start her life. Take this evil thing into the Light and make it no more. Amen!"

A supernova white light with what felt like the impact of a daisy cutter lit the swamp, felled trees, and put everyone on their faces in the dirt. Black Were soot floated to the ground, making everyone cough except Hunter. Sir Rodney had been knocked out of the tree, and he and all his archers were on the swamp floor, dazed. Duval and several henchmen were holding their charred faces, screaming and running blindly into the night.

Shogun ran to his brother as Bear Shadow slowly peeled himself off the clan leader's body. Sasha skidded to a halt, went down on her knees, and rolled Hunter over. His Adam's apple didn't move and in panic she put her ear to his shredded chest and then made a fist and pounded on it.

"No! You come back here, Max Hunter!" she shouted, between heavy thuds.

"I am not getting the girla"I'm losing her," Silver Hawk called out. "She is too afraid. She doesn't trust me!"

Tears br.i.m.m.i.n.g, Sasha looked from Hunter to Silver Hawk. "Come save him!" She got up and ran toward the girl, sliding down into the dirt beside her. Hugging the girl in her arms, Sasha began to rock her. "Amy, please, Amy, come back," she said quietly, panic and strain making her voice hitch. "A good man may have died for you . .. your parents need you, your mother is so upset, she is crying .. . she lit candles for youa"the wolves are good. They chased away the leopard. You can come back. It's safe."

Rocking harder, Sasha kept her gaze on Silver Hawk's ministrations. Hunter hadn't let the Were go ... he'd held its vicious jaws away from his face and had wrapped his legs around its waist tightly to keep its powerful hind legs from doing damage, but its front paws had torn at his arms, back, and chest. He'd lost so much blood . . .

Sasha nuzzled the girl's hair and wept for all the losses and all the pain that now flooded her heart. "Shogun!" she cried. "Tell her in her language. She doesn't understand me!"

She watched Shogun struggle between standing at Hunter's side while his elderly grandfather worked on him and coming to the aid of the young girl he didn't even know. Shogun dropped to his knees beside Sasha, careful not to touch the silver mail.

"I will try in Mandarin . . .," he said, looking at Sasha. Then he spoke softly to Amy Chen. "Do you speak Englisha"ni hui shou ying wen ma? I am sorry, dui bu qi, for what happened to you. Qing gei wo.. . please give me ... a chance to take you home. Wo mi lu le . . . wo bu zhi daoa"I am lost, I don't know what to do." Shogun hung his head. "I don't know if she can hear me and my brother is dead because of me again."

A short gasp and a m.u.f.fled cry made Sasha quickly lower the girl from her embrace. Her large, startled eyes immediately filled with tears as Sasha took the mail off her face. Amy's delicate features crumbled into weeping and Sasha quickly uncovered her body, gaining help from the Fae archers who'd gathered around. But she handed her off to Shogun, then got up without a word and jogged to Silver Hawk's side.

Her hands worked with the elderly shaman's covering gashes that went down to the bone. Sir Rodney knelt beside Hunter and looked at both Sasha and Silver Hawk.

"We have to get this man to the sidhe, where our healers can a.s.sist your efforts. He's lost so much blooda""

"And has saved us the trouble," Elder Vlad said, coming out of a dark fold of night.

Canines ripped everyone's gums as the old Vampire laughed. Sasha looked along the ground for her weapon, only to see Elder Vlad standing on it.

"I call the UCE!" Sir Rodney said, glancing around at his diminished forces.

Elder Vlad shook his head as the court building began to rise in the distance. "You're early and don't have evidence gathered . . . but I guess it is wise to go for a civil alternative where the executions can be limited to the wolves, thus saving your cowardly Fae hides."

"The book must register our findings as interim .. . we still have almost ten days, maybe eleven," Sir Rodney said quickly as the wolves in his party gave him skeptical glances.

"No ..." Elder Vlad said with an evil grin. "You cannot ask for a continuance on a matter such as thisa"you present now, or you present later. If you decide that it is later, I'm sure you know that we will exercise our right to retaliate on the spot for your offenses in the glen tonight. I suggest that you, as they say, man up, and swallow your medicine."

"I call the book. This man cannot be moved," Sir Rodney said. "He's lost blood at the hands of Lady Jung Suk, whoa""

"Who obviously was defending herself," Elder Vlad said coolly, "but so be it. Bring the book to record."

They waited until the huge black tome exited the front doors of the rising structure and hovered between the combatants with a black quill pen waiting in the air.

"And I want the crone as a witnessa"there must be someone to keep the balance, after the verdict."

"Oh, I agree, Sir Rodney. Our community has already sustained enough of a loss," Elder Vlad cooed. "We wouldn't want another violent outburst from the wolves."

They waited in silence until the ma.s.sive building stopped rising out of the swamp and the old crone made her painfully slow way down the steps and to the clearing using her gnarled cane.

Sasha leaned her cheek close to Hunter's face. "He's barely breathing," she murmured, her gaze searching Silver Hawk's eyes.

The elderly shaman just nodded, placed Hunter's amulet over his heart, and covered it with a weathered palm before closing his eyes.

"The emergency session of the United Council of Ent.i.ties will come to order to hear the matter at handa" the disputed rule among the Vampire Cartel, the allied wolf Federations, and the Unseelie Fae," the crone screeched. "We have your complaint on record, Elder Vlad," she said, opening the hovering tome with a wave of her walking stick. "Therefore, the burden of proof that his claims are false rest on you, the wolf Federations."

"Fine!" Sasha shouted. "We know that Elder Vlad aided and abetted a fugitive from justicea"Lady Jung Suk! She then killed two people, two humans, Tanya Mays and Jim Baton, and made it look like it was a wolf savaging. He can't come to court to ask for our removal or call for sanctions against us because his hands aren't clean."

"There are two problems with this a.s.sertion," Elder Vlad said with a smile as he held up his hand. "First, the accused is no longer able to testify on her own behalf, because once again the wolves acted prematurely, primitive creatures, and just killed her. Second, human deaths have no place in this courtroom ... Who cares?"

The Vampires who stood behind Elder Vlad laughed as the book waited with the pen hovering over it.

"How do you plead?" the crone screeched.

"Not guilty," Shogun said, coming forward with Amy Chen. "I have a witnessa"the human girl my aunt tried to soul-pattern over."

Vampires erupted in angry hisses as Fae archers immediately ran forward and put the mail sheet between the girl and Elder Vlad to prevent a sudden Vampire black bolt.

"It's all right," Shogun said, holding her close to him. "You must right these wrongs by telling the truth, Amy ... so that no one else will suffer your fate."

She looked up at Shogun with trusting eyes and held on to him tightly, and then looked at the angry monsters through the thin silver shield.

"I could see everything she was making my body do," Amy said in a small, frightened voice. She squeezed her eyes shut and retched. "She killed people ... she ... she ate them. She did horrible, horrible things, and she taunted me, saying that she was going to go to a brothel and give my body to men ... but she didn't live long enough. I wanted to diea"I tried to die to escape seeing any more of it," Amy said, breaking down into sobs. "I just want to go home! I didn't do anything wrong! I never hurt peoplea"I thought Tanya was my friend!"

Shogun wrapped his arms around the distraught young woman. "Have you heard enough? Do you need her blood for the book? She's an innocenta"it will never burn!"

Elder Vlad's smile faded as his eyes burned back. "Your aunt may have s.n.a.t.c.hed a body and been a horror, but what has that to do with us?"

"Don't look at him," Sasha yelled. She got up, stood before Amy, and held out her amulet. "I block you from her mind. Amy, tell the court how you were abducted."

"He was there," she said with her eyes squeezed shut, pointing at Elder Vlad. "They all were ... the monsters with the teeth. Vampires! My friends put me in a car and took me to a club, and they gave me to one of the monstersa"they called him Ariel, and he brought me out in the bayou and gave me to that woman." Amy covered her face. "Please let me go. I swear I won't tell a soul. I have done things that I shouldn't livea"I ate human flesh, please help me ..."

"You didn't eat human flesh, that thing inside you did," Shogun said, "and on my life I will get you back to your parents."