On the dolmen lay a dead human woman. He could tell from the scent alone that she’d been killed hours ago, perhaps at the last witching hour.
Kyan’s jaw ached, his teeth clamped.
Something or someonehad killed her and staged it to look like a sacrifice. Or, they’d been foolish enough to actuallytrysome kind of sacrifice.
Not that there were any gods left to hear them, now.
The altar’s stone was stained dark with blood. It had flowed onto the floor, spattering like a profane constellation. That, in itself, could reveal the killer’s inexperience. If they were going to slit someone’s throat, as evidenced by the crusted red moon of her neck, why hadn’t they collected the blood to divine from it?
He stalked closer, mind spiralling through a mental list of the creatures that might have done this, not yet discounting occultist humans. Thanks to spotty human history, many believed the Druids sacrificed humans. He’d seen attempts to replicate their rites after the rise of Celtic fascination in the 1900s.
But as he rounded the body, a thundering, too similar to the wheels of his lost people’s chariots, began in his mind. There was something written in blood on the concrete floor.
A line of ogam.
Cold sweat prickled over his skin.
One of the last times he’d used that ancient Irish writing system had been during the events of theTáin,and the battle that had killed not just his Druid family, but a piece of him as well. After he’d joined the Wake, he’d used the Latin he’d been taught as the king’s nephew. Once in Rome, he’d only ever written in ogam as a form of code.
Kyan forced himself to swallow as his eyes ran over the linear language.
Now, ogam was mainly found on a scarce selection of stone monuments. Once, it had been a part of a living, breathing world.Hisworld.
A skitter sharpened his senses and shut out the overpowering scent of blood as Kyan’s attention snapped to the creature crawling through the shadows. He wasn’t surprised at the sight of a scavenger, but this—
Kyan scowled as a Vampire skirted the strong beams of golden daylight.
It was feral, its eyes wild and blood-crazed. A flash of surprise barely made it through Kyan’s mind as the Vampire darted towards him, swift as death.
The kill scent immediately permeated the space, and Kyan’s transformation was instantaneous.
It ripped something deep from his stomach, as if folding his body in on itself. Hot strength surged as his bones groaned and lengthened. Horns broke through his scalp and spiralled up through his dark hair, the weight of them supported by new muscle threading down his neck and shoulders. His skin crackled and rustled, filling the air with the essence of moss and petrichor.
For a moment, he felt the ghost of his lost torc as a weight around his neck. Then the floor was dipping away as he grew upwards another two feet, his clothes tearing slightly.
The Vampire dived and Kyan’s new arm scythed up, transforming into a sharp, wooden spear, the bones merging and elongating into a lethal point that impaled the Vampire’s chest with a great crack. The creature slid closer to Kyan’s face, its fanged jaw unhinged and screaming.
Its mouth was bloodied, as if it had scrabbled in the blood before Kyan arrived. But what knifed through the moment was the Vampire’s double row of teeth.
In all his years hunting, he’d never seen this.
When it stilled, Kyan threw the Vampire down, gravity ripping it from his wooden arm. Dust spiralled up like wisps of magic, and in the great crimson pool, he saw himself transformed.
There were many woodland creatures, but few like this. He was either a Leshy – a Slavic forest spirit – or a Cernunnii – those thoughtto be descended from the Celtic Cernunnos, Lord of Wild Things. Seeing the horn-like antlers and feeling the ghost of a torc, he deduced the Cernunnii.
With the stop of his prey’s heart, Kyan’s Empyrean powers smoothly spiralled back into his core, taking with them anything gifted for the kill.
Immediately, the antler-like horns felt loose and his arm began to transform back, bark cracking that he brushed off like shavings. He reached up to make sure there wasn’t actually a torc around his throat.
Even after all this time, the slaking off of a transformation could make his skin crawl.
But it was chased with the satisfaction of a swiftly completed kill, even if it only reminded him of the ways he’d fucked up in Estwood. He’d let Lynch mess with his head, let himself be so overwhelmed byfeelingfor Nicole that Lynch had got too close to her. So close she had to transform—
That dangerous, icy fury returned.
His guilt over that night had become almost smothering during their time apart. He hadn’t been quick enough, strong enough, to rip that piece of crystal out of his gut and transform in her stead. No, she’d fought off two twisted creatures. They broke her leg, her ribs, stabbed her—
The knot in his chest tightened enough to make him breathless. He scrunched his eyes shut.
