Rhyannon Byrd - Primal Instinct 04 (32 page)

“Then tell me how many of you there are,” he growled,
taking an aggressive step forward. He wasn’t going to cower before this
bastard, even if he didn’t know how to kill it.

“Wouldn’t you like to know.” It laughed, clucking its
tongue.

“You won’t be able to take the Merrick, if that’s what
you’re after. They’re too—”

“Who said anything about wanting the Merrick?” it
asked, cutting him off, its yellow eyes burning with purpose and passion. “It’s
the pets we want. You and the other Watchmen. That’s who we’re after. At least
to kick things off.”

“And just what do you have against the Watchmen?” he
demanded, keeping his hands loose at his sides. He was ready to release his
claws the second it attacked, which he expected to happen at any moment.

“What don’t we have against you?” it murmured,
slithering along one of the ancient walls, its claws clicking against the pale
stone. “I mean, you ratted most of us out to the Consortium. Hunted us down.
Killed us. Convicted us to hell. Nosy bastards, the lot of you. Always meddling
in things that don’t involve you. You can’t imagine how long we’ve been waiting
for payback.”

Kierland jerked his chin toward the creature and
snorted. “If you want sympathy, you’re looking in the wrong place. In my
experience, things end up in hell because they belong there.”

“Do you want me to tell you how it’s going to be?” it
asked, the sharp bite to its words telling him that he’d gotten under its skin.
“You see, while the Merrick and the Casus are busy ripping each other to
pieces, it won’t be the meek who inherit the earth. It’s going to be us. The
ones who feed on misery and pain, thanks to our time in the pit. Once we remove
the Watchmen, there’ll be no one to go tattling to the Consortium when we’re
naughty. We can kill amongst the various clans, picking them off one by one,
making it look like the work of their enemies. And their pride, their conceit,
will keep them from asking for help. But they’ll seek revenge. They’ll war,
reviving the ancient feuds. And while the world bleeds, my brothers and I will
feast on the spoils.”

Ah, there it was. The thing that might finally help
them piece this madness together. Kierland and the others had been racking
their brains, trying to determine if there was any truth to the claims Ross
Westmore had made to the Collective Generals about a time of anarchy coming to
the clans. They hadn’t seen how such a thing could be possible, but he could
see it now. Could see the chaos that would overtake the clans if this crazy son
of a bitch’s words proved true.

It made him furious—the fact that Westmore had known
this was coming, while the Watchmen had been left in the dark. But that was the
problem with the Consortium. Everyone was so concerned about their political
clout that half the knowledge got locked away as secrets, allowing important
information to fall through the cracks. Westmore had obviously garnered his
information through his involvement with the Deschanel, and it occurred to
Kierland that Gideon could be an excellent source of intel, if he were willing
to talk.

And are you actually thinking of buddying up with a
Deschanel and making a deal?

Kierland curled his lip, but didn’t bother denying it.
Desperate times called for desperate measures, and he was man enough to own up
to the fact that they needed help. There were still too many unanswered
questions, the least of which being how this “creature” had escaped from hell,
if his claims were to be believed.

“I can see the wheels turning in your brain, Lycan.
You’re trying to figure it out, but you won’t.”

“And why’s that?” he muttered, wanting nothing more
than to wipe the smile off its smug face.

“Because you’re out of time,” it whispered, and before
Kierland could so much as blink, it attacked. It got in a lucky shot that
busted his lip on its first charge, but he parried with a swift swipe of his
lengthening claws that caught it perfectly across the throat, the same thick,
black ooze that Aiden had described spraying out in a wide arc. With a sharp
hiss, it came at him again, this time catching him on the shoulder as it sped
by, its claws digging deep, though he managed to spin away before too much
damage was done. Panting hard, Kierland spun in a circle, trying to pinpoint
its location, his fangs descending as the wolf punched against his insides,
eager to join the fight. A movement off to his left caught his attention, and
he readied himself, striking first as the creature charged through the fog.
This time he managed to rip his claws across its white chest before it punched
him with a crushing blow to the side of his face, his nose cracking from the
force of the impact. Ignoring the blood pouring down his face, Kierland gave a
bloodthirsty growl and aimed for its throat again. But the creature was too
quick, and he found himself swiping at air.

Readying himself for its next strike, Kierland
accepted the frustrating fact that he was getting nowhere fast, but he was
determined to find some way of weakening it. No way in hell was he going down
without taking this bastard with him.

“Well, this looks like fun.” The smooth, lazy drawl
cut its way through the thickening fog, and though he couldn’t see its owner,
he recognized the distinctive voice of Gideon Granger.

“Where the hell have you been?” Kierland grunted,
addressing the Deschanel while keeping one eye on the creature, which had
scurried like an insect up one of the nearby buildings at the sound of Gideon’s
voice. Its breath hissed through its jagged teeth as it watched them from
above, black ooze still pouring from its damaged throat.

With a dry dose of sarcasm, the vampire said, “I’d
appreciate it if you didn’t take that tone with me, considering I’ve been
slumming my way through the Deschanel Court for the last two days. That place
is so oily, I feel dirty just thinking about it.”

“What’d you learn?”

“Not nearly enough. But I can tell you one thing. Your
little friend up there is called a Death-Walker, and he broke out when a portal
opened up for one of the Casus souls you and your friends sent to hell.”

Shock reverberated through Kierland’s system like a
jolt of electricity. “Are you actually telling me that thing escaped when one
of the Markers was used to kill a Casus?”

Gideon gave a slow nod. “You know what they say about
how no good deed ever goes unpunished? I’m afraid the analogy is entirely true
in this case. And it makes perfect sense, if you think about it,” he murmured.
“Whenever a door opens, there’s always a chance that something else might leak
out. The portals that open for the fallen Casus lead into the part of hell that
holds the tainted souls of the ancient clans. That’s why the Watchmen deaths
have each been slightly different. It’s not one race that’s making the kills.
The Death-Walkers are made up of souls that come from each of the clans.”

“He’s right, you know,” the creature lisped, shivering
as the wind blew down the lane in a frigid blast. “Did I tell you that this
place reminds me of home? It’s so cold it hurts.”

A bitter laugh jerked from Kierland’s lips as he slid
the creature, the Death-Walker, a wry look. “Seems to me you’d be used to
something a little warmer.”

“Ahh, see, that’s where the living get it so wrong.
Hell isn’t a place of heat. Quite the opposite, actually. It’s cold. The kind
of cold that sinks down so deep into your bones, you feel the ice moving
through your veins. And do you know why?” it asked with another eerie,
childlike burst of laughter. “So that we can feel the fire better when we
burn.”

“Speaking of burning,” Gideon drawled, pulling a small
vial from his pocket and twisting the lid off, “I think this might do the
trick.” Lifting his hand, he flung the contents of the vial across the
creature’s face, making it shriek with pain. Steam rose from its scorched flesh
as it curled its arms over its head, its body losing its definition, as if it
were retreating back into a vaporous form. Peeking beneath its arm, it cut one
dark, baleful look toward Gideon, then whirled away with a sudden burst of
speed, disappearing into the moonlit sky.

“What the hell was that?” Kierland asked, sliding a
curious, wide-eyed look toward the small vial still clasped in the vampire’s
hand.

“A little holy water,” Gideon explained, balancing the
vial on his open palm, “with some salt thrown in.”

“Will it kill him?”

Gideon shook his head, one sable lock of hair falling
over his brow as he returned the vial to his pocket. “Unfortunately, no. And
don’t ask me what will, because that’s something I’m still trying to find out.
What I do know is that the water will cause enough pain to scare them away.”

Kierland lifted his right hand and rubbed at the knots
of tension in the back of his neck. “Well, for what it’s worth, I appreciate
the help,” he said in a low voice, managing to get the words out with only a
trace of a grimace. “So, uh, thanks.”

Gideon’s mouth curled with a crooked smile. “Any
time.”

“Yeah?” A low, gritty bark of laughter vibrated in his
chest. “Huh. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t surprised.”

“You have bad blood with Ashe,” the Deschanel
murmured, rolling one broad, silk-covered shoulder, “but I’m not my brother.”
Looking up and down the narrow lane, he pushed his windblown hair back from his
face, and asked, “What are you doing here anyway?”

Kierland jerked his chin toward the fog-shrouded end
of the street, where the grating dance music could still be heard. “I was
heading for that club down there to look for you.”

The vampire threw back his head and laughed, revealing
two perfect bite marks just above the thick line of his jugular. Kierland
wondered who had fed from the Deschanel…and if Gideon had allowed his body to
be used in exchange for the information they were after. As his laughter faded
away, the vampire shook his head and snorted. “Does that sound like the sort of
place I would hang out?”

“To be honest, I had my doubts,” Kierland drawled,
resting his back against the nearest building. He used his sleeve to wipe the
blood from his face, and was about to ask how the vamp had found him, then
realized that Gideon would have simply picked up his scent at his hotel, then
followed the trail. Turning the conversation back to the creature, he said,
“Westmore told the Collective Generals that a time of anarchy was coming to the
clans. Before you got here, that…Death-Walker said that their goal was to take
out the Watchmen so they could go to work turning the clans against one
another. And once that’s done, it sounds like they plan to just sit back and
watch everything go to hell for the fun of it. This has to be what Westmore was
talking about.”

Gideon gave a slow nod as he pushed his hands into his
front pockets, the corners of his mouth dipping in a frown. “Westmore worked
for one of the oldest Deschanel families in existence. It seems plausible that
he could have learned about the Death-Walkers from them.”

Wishing he had a cigarette, Kierland blew out a
frustrated breath. “But why would the Deschanel know these things? I mean, this
is stuff that the Watchmen have never even heard of.”

The vampire arched one dark, arrogant brow. “You don’t
have a lot to do with hell, so how would you know its secrets?”

“And the Deschanel do?”

“What can I say? Sometimes it helps to be a little bit
bad,” Gideon murmured, slanting him a wry smile. “There are Deschanel legends
about things like this happening in the past, long before the Casus even came
into existence. They’re told mostly as cautionary tales, full of dark magic and
things no sane person would meddle in. But it looks as if the original
Consortium was desperate enough to do just that. According to the Deschanel,
portals like the ones being opened for the Casus can only be made from materials
found in hell itself.”

“So then you were right,” he rasped, “about the
leaders using dark magic to make the crosses.”

The vampire nodded. “It looks that way. But if it
makes you feel any better, I wish I’d been wrong.”

Pushing away from the wall, Kierland forced himself to
do the right thing and extended his hand. “You’ve got yourself a deal, if you
still want it. Westmore will be yours, in exchange for anything else you can
learn.”

“I was hoping you’d feel that way,” Gideon said with a
low laugh, shaking his hand. They exchanged numbers, and then the Deschanel
glanced at the silver watch on his wrist. “I need to get going,” he said, “but
I’ll be in touch as soon as I have something more. In the meantime, be careful
and watch your back. Until we understand more about what’s going on, there’s no
telling what will happen. Believe it or not, the advice I was given is that you
find a stone structure surrounded by water, and stay there, using it for
protection. The Death-Walkers won’t be able to get in. Not if the water’s been
salted and blessed by a man of God.”

Kierland scrubbed his hands down his face, not liking
the idea that instantly took root in his brain. Without a doubt, the others
were going to fight him over it, thinking he was stark barking mad. But if it
proved necessary, he’d find a way to make it happen—even if he had to drag them
kicking and screaming across the bloody Atlantic.

“And Kierland.”