“That's the problem with treaties. They get broken all the time, and usually when it's most inconvenient,” she said with annoyance.
“What the hell do they want?” Winn asked. “They're just holding back.”
“Why don't you ask them?” the contessa growled through her fangs.
A loud howl broke the standoff. Winn didn't wait another second. His Hunter training kicked into gear, taking over both his body and his mind, making his movements as automatic as breathing. He shot down three of the werewolves in quick succession. The
thwang
of the crossbow jolted up his arm with each rapid release of the bolts.
Thunk. Thunk, thunk.
Three of them fell. The others kept coming, a blur of movement.
Winn cranked the bolts into place and shot off three more. The contessa leaped forward into the fray, fangs at the ready. For an instant Winn's heart forgot to beat as he watched a bolt graze past her, shearing off a lock of her hair. An inch closer and he would have hit her square in the head. She tore every werewolf within reach with her bare hands, sending fur, muscle, and skin flying as she ripped away limbs.
His heartbeat returned twice as hard, and Winn turned away from the grisly sight to glance in the direction of Van der Hoff and his men. The Hunter hacked and slashed at anything with fur that came within striking distance. Winn's chest burned. His blood was pumping hard. The fighting had turned hand to hand now, wolves and men in mixed battle. Winn swung his crossbow to his back and pulled the bowie knife from his boot.
A great gray wolf coiled his back legs a split second before he launched into the air, seeming to sail toward Winn in slow motion. The dinner plateâsized paws connected like a solid punch to the solar plexus, knocking the wind from him and leaving him gasping as he fell backward into the fir needles of the forest floor. But he didn't need to breathe to act. Winn pulled hard and fast, slashing the blade of his bowie across the exposed throat of the wolf looming over him.
Hot blood splattered Winn's face, and the weight of the enormous dead wolf crushed down, smothering him. Winn's lungs burned as he scrabbled to lift the huge beast off of himself. Cries of anguish and pain from Van der Hoff's men were followed by sickening crunching sounds and abrupt silence.
“Winchester!”
Winn managed to shift the weight enough to crawl out from beneath the wolf carcass. The contessa was surrounded. He scrambled up, hacking a bloody path to her. He and the contessa stood back-to-back against the ten remaining werewolves.
The growls of the largest wolf shifted and warped into words Winn could comprehend, stunning him. “Slayer, cease your resistance. Rathe wants you taken alive, but he didn't say unharmed. Put down your weapons. Come with us now, and we will let the vampire live.”
Winn twisted the handle of the bowie in his extended hand, still brandishing it against the werewolves. Tessa was snugged up tight against his back, her derrière brushing the backs of his thighs. “Let me get this straight. You expect me to just give in and come quietly?”
“Yes.”
Winn let out a brittle, caustic bark of laughter. “Clearly you've never met an American Hunter before. We don't quit, and we sure as hell don't give in.”
“Are you certain about this, Winn?” Her voice shook slightly. “There is nothing wrong with admitting a defeat when one is outnumbered at the hands of the enemy.”
“It ain't their hands I'm worried about. I ain't letting Rathe use me like bait for my brothers.”
“I see. Very well.”
“You sound kind of hopelessâlike we ain't got any options.”
She gave a mirthless laugh. “We don't.”
“Don't give up yet. Nobody's told you how ingenious American Hunters are.” He pulled Marley's water shooter from his holster and pumped it up hard and fast. “Here's a little gift, courtesy of my friend Marley,” he shouted at the wolves. Under pressure, the stream of holy water shot surprisingly far. The wolves howled in anguish as they dropped to the ground in surprise, rubbing their faces against the dirt and only succeeding in peeling away more of their bubbling, crisping flesh.
“Hot damn. It worked!” He didn't wait to find out how things turned out. He grabbed Alexa and ran like hell.
Chapter 14
Winn and Alexa ran blindly through the forest, away from the Russian werewolves and the slain Bavarian Hunters. The cold air knifed through his lungs each time he inhaled and came out in white gusts as his sides bellowed in and out. In contrast, Alexa flew over the ground, her limbs nearly a blur. 'Course, she didn't have more than fifty pounds of weapons strapped to her back either, Winn thought.
He ground to a halt and bent double, his hands resting on his thighs, as he struggled to breathe. Alexa stopped. Bits of twigs and leaves were tangled in her hair. Her face was paler than usual in the filtered moonlight, but he realized that she had a fine layer of dust on her skin.
“You've got a bit of something ... just there,” he said, indicating the corner of her mouth. It was red, dark, gory matter, and he didn't want to think on it too much, nor wipe it away himself. Certainly it had been a battle, which was never pretty, no matter who was fighting, but to see her in full-out fighting mode still came as a shock to his system. He also became aware of the sticky blood on his own face and wiped it as clean as he could with his shirttail.
His mind couldn't reconcile that the incredibly beautiful woman who was so soft and pliant beneath his hands was the same vampire who could tear apart another being with such horrifying efficiency. She was like some twisted female version of the ancient two-faced god Janus. Two very different beings in the same sensuous package, and he hadn't the faintest idea how to separate them. One he was definitely attracted to and the other he inherently found repulsive.
Her features had returned to normal. She rubbed at her mouth with her sleeve. Hardly ladylike, but then he suspected there weren't many ladies who had to battle werewolves with just their bare hands and teeth, either. “Sorry,” she murmured and looked away as if embarrassed.
“Nothing to be sorry for. A fight is a fight.”
Her face crumpled. She fisted her hands and hit the nearest tree. “How could I have been so blind? Stupid, Alexa, absolutely idiotic of you.” Her chest lifted with a heavy sigh, her gaze connecting with his. “Now that they have the piece of the Book, they want you as well. It was a mistake to bring you here.”
“There was no way you could have known.”
She shrugged and leaned up against a tree, her head tilting back to look up at the small bit of starry night peeking through the dark branches overhead. “I've lost my bearings. I don't even know in which direction Castle Barranoch lies. The stink of those werewolves still fills my nose and has completely eroded my sense of smell.”
Winn straightened up against the protest of his screaming muscles and gave the misty forest air a tentative sniff. Wood smoke and the smell of roasting meat perked him up. He scanned the trees, looking for the telltale glow of a campfire. There in the distance he saw the slight shift of the light and the faint wisps of smoke. Winn pointed. “Where there's smoke, there's fire. That's got to be a camp. Perhaps they'll know where the castle is.”
The contessa swiveled, looking in the direction he'd indicated. “How could I have missed that?” She shook her head, holding the heel of her hand to her temple. “They must have hit me with wolfsbane powder.” She rubbed her sleeve over her face.
He would have mistaken it for just the dust had she not been acting so strange. “Are you all right, Tessa?” Winn grasped her upper arm to steady her as she swayed.
“I will be,” she assured him. “Perhaps I just need to eat.” Winn stiffened slightly, but didn't remove his hand. While he still didn't trust her completely, he certainly knew her well enough by now to know she didn't mean to eat
him
.
“I don't know if going to the camp is the best idea,” she continued. Her pupils were beginning to dilate, even in the dark of night. His eyes narrowed as he scanned her face. Her smooth skin was growing even more waxen and paler than that of a normal vampire.
“Why?”
“There are a lot of things in these woods besides just the Darkin.”
Winn huffed out an irritated breath that ruffled the edges of his mustache. Her cryptic responses were setting him on edge. Every minute they didn't get closer to the Book, they were lowering their odds in the fight against Rathe. “Like what?”
“Fae. Elves. Dragons. Trolls. Gypsies.”
Winn scanned the thick forest, remaining vigilant for any sign the werewolves were still following them, as they walked toward the source of the smoke and light. “Well, out of those, I'm thinking only one uses a campfire, and right now gypsies are the least of our worries.”
He held on to her, his arm about her waist supporting her as they went, but she faltered, leaning up against him. “Just give me a moment,” she said as she began to sag, then crumple, her knees giving way beneath her. Winn caught her before she hit the forest floor and scooped her up into his arms.
“You're definitely not all right.” She didn't respond. Her dark head lay heavy against his chest, her body limp. The heavy floral fragrance of her now mixed with far earthier scents of fir and the musty odor of sodden decaying leaves that clung to her clothing. Panic welled up, swelling in his throat. He didn't know what was wrong with her, and he didn't know the first thing about resuscitating a vampire.
She looked so damn delicate, her face smooth and slumberous, he had thought she'd be light as a pillow. But she was heavier in his arms than he'd anticipated. Not that he minded. Her curves fit perfectly against him, and he enjoyed the weight of her head resting against his chest. But he couldn't carry her all night.
The comforting smell of wood smoke grew stronger the closer they got to the camp. They might be gypsies, or they might be just common folk. Either way he bet they knew of the castle and the quickest route to get there.
He listened harder and picked out the faint sounds of shared conversation, the strum of a mandolin accompanied by the wheezing melody of a squeeze-box, shuffling horse hooves, and the clink of pottery being used to eat an evening meal. Winn adjusted the weight of the contessa in his arms and peered through the trees.
The gypsies had created a small camp from wagons, their arched tops and small window frames and doors painted in garish colors. There were no more than twenty people gathered around the larger bonfire at the center. They ate and joked with one another, passing a leather flask and pouring what looked like red wine into their mouths. His throat ached, and he swallowed against the dryness. At this point Winn only hazarded a guess. He'd seen enough in the past few days to make him question everything he thought he knew and then some. It might be wine. It might be something else.
“Don't move if you wish to live.” The deep, guttural voice was slightly slurred, speaking a Latin-based language that Winn could understand well enough. It was backed by the sharp point of a cold metallic object jabbed up against Winn's ribs. Damn.
He grunted, unable to turn to see his assailant, his arms and shoulder sockets burning as the contessa's deadweight seemed to get heavier with every passing second.
“Who are you?” the stranger asked, prodding the metal deeper into Winn's back. A knife, definitely.
Winn did his best to speak in Latin, but it was rusty. “I'm American. You've got me at a disadvantage,” Winn said with absolute calmness. One thing he'd learned as a lawman was that calm, cool heads usually prevented additional problems. “I'd like to introduce myself, but I'm afraid my arms are occupied.”
The stranger, who came up barely to his shoulder, bent around him, staring at the contessa. “You do that to her?” the roundish man, more dark hair than visible skin, demanded in clear Latin. His head was wrapped in a colorful blue silk scarf, a gold hoop dangling from one ear pirate-like.
“Why would I be carrying her if I did this?” Winn muttered, losing a fraction of his cool as his arms began to lose feeling. The knife was still jammed into his ribs, keeping him from setting her down. “Look, I'm not here to harm anybody. I just need directions and some help for my friend. We're trying to get to Castle Barranoch.”
Winn sighed in relief when the point of the blade eased back. He readjusted his hold on Alexa.
The shorter man still brandished his knife, the blade glinting along its sharp double edge. His eyes were wary. Clearly he didn't trust Winn, but then if a stranger had shown up in the middle of nowhere at his camp uninvited out in the desert back home, splattered in blood, he wouldn't have trusted the fella either. Winn could have taken him in a fair fight, but not with both hands full of unconscious female.
“You bring her to Mama Zinka. She will fix.”
Winn was urged at knifepoint into the gypsy camp. The laughing and conversation came to an abrupt stop the moment he entered the edge of the firelight. Suspicious dark eyes surveyed him, lingering on his black Stetson and the array of weapons he still had strapped to his back. Smoke scented with roasted venison writhed up from the flames, twisting in gray curls into the dark night sky. His stomach took the inopportune moment to grumble loudly.
The womenfolk tucked their barefoot young ones behind their skirts, and the menfolk rose up as a unit, almost as if they were all programmed automatons with some kind of sensory gauge that had been tripped. Winn nodded at them, unable to offer a hand to shake and not understanding the flow of quick, sharp words that they spoke to one another. But from the furtive glances, they didn't look happy to see him, that much was for damn sure.
Three men, including the one wearing the blue head scarf who'd brought him to camp, bracketed him on either side and from behind, while they marched him up to the door of one of the brightly painted wagons that stood off from the rest.
“Mama Zinka,” the blue-scarf man said, jerking his thumb at the wagon with a series of yellow stars painted over the bright blue door. Light filtered from beneath it, and Winn saw movement. The man rapped at the door.
It was opened by possibly the oldest woman Winn had ever seen. While the bits of hair that poked out from beneath the fringed silk scarf tied about her head were as white as Marley's, her face was tanned and had the wrinkled texture of a peeled apple that had been set out in the sun to shrivel. Her back was humped beneath the black sack-like dress she wore. Unlike those of the rest of the gypsies in the camp her eyes weren't dark, but instead a pale green, made all the more intense and eerie by the weathered color of her skin.
She glanced at the man, Winn, and the contessa and waved them into her cart with her gnarled hands. Winn didn't bother with the small three-step ladder placed at the bottom of the wagon. He just hauled himself and the contessa up in one step that made him grunt with the effort.
The exterior appearance of the wagon was deceptive. Instead of mustiness and body odor, it smelled of cloves, sandalwood, and the sweetness of beeswax candles. He'd expected to not be able to stand up, let alone turn around inside. But the instant he was through the narrow door that scraped his shoulders as he entered, the wagon opened up, not into just one large space but into a central room filled with wooden cupboards and a large wooden table and a black iron stove. Doors to two other rooms stood off to either side. Brightly polished copper pots hung from black iron hooks in the ceiling, and the curved wooden walls were painted like windows, draped with curtains.
Mama Zinka used a weathered fingertip to push his gaping jaw up and then tugged at the sleeve of his duster and indicated a bed set into the wall, half-hidden by deep purple velvet curtains edged in gold tassels. “Put her here,” the old woman instructed in English.
Winn was surprised, but gently he laid Alexa down in the bed, then gaped anew at the strange vast interior of the wagon. “How is this possible?”
Mama Zinka smiled wide, showing off all three of her teeth. “There are some secrets Mama shares with no one. That is one of them. Now we look at your mistress.”
“She's ...” Winn stopped himself from saying she wasn't his mistress. What was she exactly? His ally? Certainly, for now at least. His partner? Of a sort. But beyond his pa, his brothers, and Marley, he'd trusted very few people enough to partner up with them on a hunt. His lover? Not yet. Maybe not at all. Should be not ever, but then Winn couldn't help but feel somewhat tethered to her by some invisible connection. It tugged low and insistent in his gut and made his heart beat harder when her gaze caught his or she brushed against him.
He said none of what he was thinking, merely stated, “She's been feeling weak. Said something about being hit with powdered wolfsbane.”
The old woman's eyes grew shrewd and narrow. She turned to Alexa's supine form and gently lifted her upper lip, then pressed down on the pink gum just above Alexa's incisors. A longer feeding canine pressed out through the soft tissue and instantly retracted the moment the old woman moved her finger away. “She's a vampire,” she said simply. Winn was grateful there was no rancor in her tone. “How long has she been sleeping?”
“About forty minutes.”
The old gypsy grunted. Her lips moved, rubbing over one another in her nearly toothless mouth as she turned to a wall full of small, cork-stoppered bottles and fingered through them with her arthritic, bent fingers. “What she needs is vervain and mint tea.”