Chapter Twenty-Two
Baz
I slowly move from the bed and out of the room, being careful that I don’t wake up Raiden or Reed. Both of whom snore, which I find surprisingly calming and not annoying like I probably should.
As I quietly make my way down the stairs and through the cabin to the front door, I make a plan.
I still can’t kill the fucker. We need help from the gargoyles, and we won’t get it if I kill one of them.
Plus, this is Griff’s family, and it would definitely make things weird if I killed one of them.
I don’t imagine that we would get invited back.
Although Michael did seem surprisingly okay with me taking Joe’s fingers, so he might understand my reasoning.
It’s unlikely though.
However, there are other things that I can do that will satisfy my need to punish him without taking it too far in the eyes of the other gargoyles, should they ever find out that I paid Joe another visit.
“I thought I might find you out here,” a voice comments quietly the second that I step foot through the front door.
My sword is at his neck before I’ve even turned to look in his direction. However, as soon as my eyes land on him, I lower it.
“Dimitri?” I ask with obvious surprise. He is the last person that I thought I would have to worry about catching me sneaking out. “What are you doing here?”
Dimitri smirks, “Coming to help you pay that fucker a visit.”
I shrug and can’t help but smile at the simple way he phrases it. “Let’s go.”
Maybe I should question him, maybe I should ask him how he got here, and how he knows what I’m up to, but I only have a small window of opportunity to pay Joe a visit and get enough sleep before tomorrow.
Besides, I like Dimitri, and he is as much a part of this family and team as I am, even if the others haven’t quite figured that out yet. It’s more than obvious to me. I also know that he was having a hard time holding back earlier too.
“Can you come along without ripping his head off?” I ask, as we stalk through the darkness.
I can always find my prey when I’m hunting.
Joe was supposed to be under strict surveillance at the infirmary, but we’re heading in the opposite direction.
Even if they have him under surveillance at home, it’s not going to stop me.
He got off easy earlier, it really is that simple.
I am happy to take whatever consequences my actions may bring upon me, and to make sure that the gargoyles know that none of the others were involved.
Dimitri flashes sharp teeth in my direction, “Can you?”
“Touche,” I reply with a smile.
We don’t bother talking from that point forward. There’s no point.
Weirdly enough, I trust that he’s got my back and I have his. It's as if we have been fighting alongside each other for decades rather than having only met a handful of times before.
Finally, after moving silently through the streets of the village, we come across a little cabin, which is smaller than the one we’re staying in and could do with some work. It’s certainly not one of the better-looked-after cabins, that’s for sure.
Dimitri doesn’t question me once about whether we’re heading in the right direction, and when he inhales, I realize why.
He’s been following Joe’s scent.
“He’s in the front room,” he mutters quietly.
We share a dark look. I’m going to show Dimitri more of my magic than I have even shown the others, but I somehow know he will keep it to himself.
As I said before, I trust him.
It’s not that I don’t trust the others, and I’m not sure why it’s different when it comes to Dimitri.
Maybe it’s because I can sense how on edge he is.
I’m pretty sure that he is in a state of constant readiness.
He could strike at any moment, and he clearly doesn’t shy away from taking lives.
I know that he won’t blink twice at my harsh nature, whereas I’m not entirely sure of that when it comes to the others.
A quick sweep with my senses and my magic tells me everything that I need to know.
“We’re alone,” I say, my voice barely a whisper.
Dimitri nods, “He’s not being watched.”
We don’t knock, and we don’t try to break in quietly. His cabin is on the edge of the village, and thankfully, there isn’t anyone living in the house closest to his.
How fortunate.
For us.
The door splinters, the boom loud in the darkness.
“What the fuck!” Joe yells from the living room.
He rounds the corner, his expression full of indignant rage as he opens his mouth no doubt to curse us out for entering his home unannounced.
Then he sees us, stopping dead in his tracks, he snaps his mouth closed and pales as recognition lights his eyes before panic quickly obscures it. He holds his hands up and starts to back away, but the low rumbling of a ragged growl freezes him in place as he stares at Dimitri in horror.
Dimitri’s image wavers, and I realize with sudden clarity that he’s a creature of legend.
A hellhound.
They have many terrifying abilities, but one of them is to flicker their image between their forms. Hellhounds have several forms, which makes them stand apart from regular shifters who only ever shift into one form.
Amongst those forms, they have their human form, fully shifted canine form, and their underworld form, which is usually absolutely fucking terrifying and induces insanity if looked at for too long by anyone other than another hellhound.
It's that form that Dimitri is flickering between as he stalks toward Joe.
I avert my eyes, I’m already crazy enough, I don’t think that it would be a good idea to add that to it.
I’m not ashamed to admit that the glimpse I got was enough to give me nightmares for a while. There’s nothing in all of the realms like a hellhound's flicker.
When he speaks, his voice is low, gravelly, and full of dark promise, it shouldn’t make me grin, but it does.
I like Dimitri even more now.
“Hello, Joe,” Dimitri says as we both begin to circle him, and Dimitri’s image stops flickering for the moment. “Did you really think that we were going to let you get away with touching what’s ours?”
“H-h-he already took my fingers!” Joe exclaims, his voice shaking with fear.
“Merely a gesture,” I reply, with a sharp grin that flashes my fangs. I shrug, “It was not nearly punishment enough.”
He starts to babble incoherently, and Dimitri growls, his image flashing again and making Joe drop to the floor in a whimpering heap as he hides his head and his whole body begins to tremble.
Dimitri turns to me, “As much as I would love to torture the fucker until he’s begging for death,” he starts, and the guy's whimpers become even louder.
Dimitri rolls his eyes, and I try not to chuckle, “As I was saying, as much as I would love to do that, I think it may cause some tension between us, or rather all of you and the gargoyles. It would be unwise to do that, the gargoyles are important allies to have, and I fear that we may need them at some point.”
“What do you know?” I ask my eyes narrowed, as I place my boot on Joe's leg to stop him from crawling away, grinning when the snap makes him scream. He’s a supernatural, he will heal that by the morning.
Unfortunately.
Dimitri shrugs, “Nothing but hunches and observations for now.”
I don’t know Dimitri very well, but I get the feeling that pushing him for answers won’t get me anywhere, and we will just end up wasting time.
So instead, I suggest, “Show him your other side a few more times, and then I’ll implant it into his mind along with a nightmare that makes him feel the pain of his fingers being taken tenfold.”
Dimitri’s smile is sharp, “Simple but effective. Give me a moment.” He crouches down next to the quivering gargoyle who hasn’t even tried to shift, and picks him up as if he weighs nothing.
The guy's eyes are wide with fear as Dimitri pins him to the wall, pictures falling to the floor and smashing, the glass scattering everywhere.
My attention becomes fixated on the glass as Joe's screams of terror echo around us.
The longer that I stare at the broken pictures, the more confusion I feel, and I wonder if I’m picking something up off Dimitri even though I’m not looking at him.
“Baz,” Dimitri says, and when I glance up at him, I realize that it’s not the first time that he’s called my name. He smiles, “Your turn.”
I shake off the confusion and grin, allowing my fangs to descend to their full capacity, and my eyes shift.
Dimitri has left him shaking on the floor, but Joe’s eyes are now glued to me.
I crouch down and smile, “Now Joe, we’re going to take a little trip, and you’re going to remember every excruciating second of it.”
He screams as I growl and launch myself into his mind. Picking it apart and adding a stronger fear and pain response to certain things.
It doesn’t take me long to do what I need to do, and when I pull back, Joe slumps to the floor unconscious.
Dimitri claps, “Impressive.”
“You too,” I reply as we turn and head out the way that we came. “I didn’t break him quite as much as I wanted to, but he will get flashbacks of fear and pain at really inconvenient moments. Especially when he’s naked.”
“Good,” Dimitri replies, as we head back through the darkened and silent streets.
“It was so much fucking easier when you could just take their heads,” I mutter.
“I imagine that it must’ve been, although the sensibilities of the Earth Realm have never really stopped me from punishing those that took liberties that they shouldn’t,” he grins at me as he pulls out two cigars and offers me one, lighting them both, I take a drag as he continues, “You just have to get creative with it, and something tells me that you are more than capable of that.”
I smirk, “Admittedly, sometimes it’s more fun to play.”
“Exactly, my friend,” he replies.
We walk back to the cabin in companionable silence, and I make a vow to talk to the others about how we can get him out of the prison and with us, where he belongs.
I know what he did, and I know why he did it, and it doesn’t sit right with me that we’re separated.
I think that our team, our family, needs to be complete, that’s when we’re the strongest, and I think we’re going to need to be at our strongest for what’s coming our way.
Neith
I slept like shit.
I can’t really say why my sleep was shit. I know I had dreams, and I know that they weren’t nice ones. So I’m assuming that’s why I still feel tired this morning and why I needed two extra cups of coffee to wake up properly.
To be honest, I’m just glad that I don’t fucking remember them.
Something tells me that they were memories that the asshole Joe managed to bring up by being pushy. I honestly thought that I had gotten away with it not triggering anything when I didn’t immediately have the memory crash over me, but I guess it was just waiting for me to go to sleep.
Lucky me.
Anyway, I had a bucket of coffee and some shop-bought pastries that were nowhere near as good as Zephyr’s are, and now here we are hiking in the pre-dawn light, with a soft, newly fallen layer of snow under our feet, and my nose feeling like it is going to drop off at any moment.
Again.
It’s really fucking cold.
Obviously, there’s snow everywhere.
Maybe I should have had more coffee.
I have to admit that the fresh air has successfully chased away the lingering icky feeling that the dream left behind.
So at least there’s that. I’ll take my nose freezing off from the cold over that feeling any day.
So yesterday, when I was all chilled and blasé about the potential of me being Griff’s true mate. Yeah, it turns out that was because the hot chocolate had lulled me into a false sense of security, the tricky little bastard.
Today, I am full of nerves and anxiety, and it’s making me want to fight something.
I’m trying to repress that urge because, well, I don’t have anything to fight.
The Voices are just making me more nervous because they seem to be thrumming with nervous energy as well, and the damn unicorn bracelet is itching, and we’re out in the open on the way to this cave, even though none of us really know where we’re going, and we’re only heading in this direction because the Chief said it was on this side of the island.