• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

“Pull your wolf off my zombie and it stops here.”

“You think you can take us?” Cassandra said.

“With this many dead, I know I can,” I said.

Stephen’s face crumpled, almost like he’d cry. “You’d hurt us.”

Shit, I’d forgotten. I was their lupa now. I’d threatened to kill Raina if she hurt Stephen again, and here I was about to feed him to zombies. There was a logic gap somewhere.

“If I’m supposed to protect you all, then you have to obey me, right? So Jason gets the fuck off my zombie or I beat the hell out of him. Isn’t that pack protocol?”

Richard turned to me. There was a look on his face I’d never seen before: anger and arrogance, or something close to it. “I don’t think Jason really expected you to demand his obedience. I don’t think any of us did.”

“Then you don’t know me very well,” I said.

“Mes amies, if we kill each other, won’t Marcus be pleased.”

We all turned to Jean-Claude. I said, “Stop.” All the zombies stopped at once like a freeze frame. One tumbled to the floor, caught in midshuffle, rather than take that last partial step. Zombies were terribly literal.

The giant wolf tore another piece out of the zombie. The dead man made a small involuntary cry. “Drag Jason off of it now, or we are going to do this dance. Fuck Marcus. I’ll worry about it later.”

“Off of him, Jason, now,” Richard said.

The wolf reared back, tearing at the zombie’s arm. Bone cracked. The wolf worried the arm like a terrier with a bone. Blood and thicker fluids flew in a spray.

Richard grabbed the wolf by the scruff of the neck, jerking it off its feet. He grabbed the front of its furry throat and turned it to face him. The muscles in his arms corded with the effort. The wolf’s claws scrambled in the air while it strangled. The massive claws raked Richard’s bare skin. Blood flowed in thin crimson lines.

He threw the wolf across the room into the waiting dead. “Never disobey me again, Jason, never!” His voice was lost in a growling that turned into a howl. He threw back his head and bayed. The sound rose from his human throat. Cassandra and Stephen echoed him. Their howls filled the room with a strange, ringing song.

I realized then that Richard might avoid killing Marcus, but he’d never control the lukoi without brutality. He was already casual about it. Almost as casual as Jean-Claude. Bad sign or good sign? I wasn’t sure.

Jason scrambled out of the dead. He turned pale green wolf eyes to me, as if waiting for something. “Don’t look at me,” I said, “I’m pissed with you, too.”

Jason stalked towards me on paws bigger across than my hands. The fur at his neck rose in a prickling brush. His lips curled back from his teeth in a silent growl.

I pointed the Firestar at him. “Don’t do it, Jason.”

He kept coming, each step so stiff and full of tension that it looked robotic. He gathered his body, legs squirming into position for a leap. I wasn’t going to let him finish the movement. If he’d been in human form, I’d have aimed to wound, but in wolf form, I wasn’t taking any chances. One scratch and I’d be alpha female for real.

I sighted down the barrel and felt that quietness fill me. I felt nothing while I stared down the gun at him. Nothing but a cool, white emptiness.

“Stop it, both of you!” Richard growled. He walked towards us. I kept my eyes on the wolf but had a peripheral sense of Richard moving closer.

He kept coming, easing himself between Jason and me. I had to aim the gun skyward to keep from pointing it at his chest. He stared at me, his face thoughtful. “You won’t need the gun.” He knocked the great wolf to the floor with his fist. The wolf lay stunned. Only the rise and fall of its chest showed it was still alive.

When he turned back to me, his eyes were amber, and no longer human. “You are my lupa, Anita, but I am still Ulfric. I won’t let you do to me what Raina has done to Marcus. I lead this pack.” There was a hardness to his voice that was new. I’d discovered his male ego at last.

Jean-Claude laughed, a high, delighted sound that made me shiver. Richard hugged his bare arms as