AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘That’s it?’ the ogre shrieked to Charlize. ‘You’re giving up just like that?’
‘If my father weren’t here, I’d happily kill them all. But heishere, so I have to assume that the others are allies of my family’s clan. Under griffin law, I have to lay down my weapons, so I surrender.’ She gave Gillian a cold smile. ‘I suggest you follow suit or you’ll die.’
The ogre was bleeding from half a dozen places and her clothes were scorched. The others hadn’t been twiddling their thumbs whilst we were trying to kill Charlize. She raised her mace. ‘I’m on a contract. Ogres don’t surrender.’ She sneered and charged, not at us but at Charlize.
In an instant Charlize shimmered and transformed back into griffin form. As the ogre ran towards her, she gave a few mighty flaps of her wings and in moments was in the air, preparing to dive bomb the ogre. Gillian raised her mace, but Charlize nimbly ducked away from the lumbering blows.
The griffin raised herself level with the ogre, waited until an ineffectual pass had gone by, then reached out a claw and expertly sliced the ogre’s throat. Gillian’s brain hadn’t quite got the message that she was already dead, and she swung her mace over and over again as she tried to take out her opponent. She was still swinging when she toppled to the ground.
‘Well,’ Charlize said into the shocked silence, ‘it looks like you’ll die anyway. Fool.’ She snorted disdainfully.
She is getting rid of the evidence against her,Esme murmured cynically.
She was. It was a cold, calculating move and I’d seen nothing to dissuade me from thinking that Charlize was exactly that.
‘I love it when our enemies kill themselves,’ Voltaire said smugly, stepping out of the shadows.
Esme agreed to let me deal with him and we shifted back onto two legs. I glared at the vampyr. ‘I told you to stay outside.’ My glare may have been somewhat undermined by my nudity, but I rolled with it.
‘And I didn’t listen,’ Voltaire replied.
I snarled but before I could respond there was a noise on the cellar steps. James! He was trying to make a sneaky exit.
‘To be continued.’ I said to Voltaire. ‘Greg, get the children out of there!’ I ordered as we turned towards the stairs. James was ours, dammit.
He was surprisingly quick, and we only took a moment to decide to swap two legs for four and fur. Esme was the hunter, so I let her take over. The thrill of the chase was roaring through us, our blood pounding as we raced after the succubus.
James had kidnapped Bobby, terrorised the Other realm community by snatching children, and beaten Reynard into a bloody mess. Whatever sympathy I’d once had for him was long dead. And Esme’s sympathy? She’d never had any in the first place.
He ran out of the house onto The Green. There was only a crescent moon, but our canine eyes had no difficulty making him out in the darkness. He ran a good way, casting glances over his shoulders as Esme and I followed. Esme was moving at a leisurely pace, enjoying the hunt, holding some energy in reserve should James have some hidden talent for evasion that we didn’t know about.
After a couple of hundred metres, it was clear to James that he wasn’t going to lose us. Panic was confusing him and he looped back around until he was almost outside the house again. He stopped, bent double, and turned to face us. He was panting but even in the darkness we could see his glare. ‘You’ve got it in for me,’ he accused.
We said nothing. Esme prowled a step closer.
‘I’m not defenceless this time,’ he snarled as he pulled out a gun. He clicked off the safety and aimed it at us.
We didn’t hesitate before we leapt towards him. The shot rang out in the darkness and we felt a moment of pain. Esme blocked it out, moving it to one side; pain didn’t matter now but our survival did.
We landed heavily on James and pushed him to the ground. As he fumbled again for the trigger, Esme’s sharp incisors tore across his throat like it was made of paper. Blood surged up, and his hand lowered to the ground. His eyes were open and unseeing, and it was only a moment before his chest stopped moving.
Esme wanted to rip into his flesh.
No,I objected.We do not eat our enemies.
Why not? It’s a waste,she complained.
For one, it’s frowned upon, for two, he’d give us indigestion.
‘Cool!’ shouted Bobby. ‘Did you see that? Alpha ripped his throat out. I can’t wait to tell the rest of the pups!’
Well, at least he wasn’t traumatised.
Chapter 24
Iwasbackontwo legs. Greg had pulled out some spare clothes from his go-bag and I was once again dressed head to toe in a black tracksuit that did nothing for my figure. My side was aching where I’d been shot, but the wound had already closed in the shift. I was sore, but I’d live.
Roscoe pulled me aside. ‘Thank you,’ he said seriously. ‘You didn’t have to call us in, and I appreciate that you did.’
