33 TALIESIN
A silver wind blows alongside me as I run.
Rory.
Her shifted form is beyond any comprehension, but no surprise there. We’re talking about Aurora Drakeward after all.
No way she’d have a common animal as her innate beast like me, nor something ugly and fucked up like Francois.
No.
She’s all the myths and legends come to life.
Gods. The way she shifts and whirls is so similar to the way she dances.
Is that a coincidence, or are our personalities rooted in the innate DNA we’ve all carried along with us?
Fuck knows.
Philosophy really isn’t my thing, but when wonders happen right before your eyes? I guess even someone as mundane as me gets to questioning shit.
As if London can read my mind, his eyes track her ethereal form as it whistles by again. “Ours is not to reason why, ours is but to do or die…” he chants over and over.
Exactly.
My paws drive into the earth, as I keep every sense I have fully alert. Scents are everywhere, ranging from earthy slugs and fungi to the sweaty sulfur stink of terror.
Within each whiff of that panicked smell, I look for traces of Sky, but find none.
Beside me, London’s legs move like pistons in an engine. Strong, fast, unstopping. I race beneath the branches, but he just tears a path for himself, his faun-hands seemingly oblivious to pain.
Rory swoops down from the canopy and is off in another direction before I can even fathom the turn. She’s tuned into something.
What?
Then I smell blood…tears.
It’s not Sky, but Rory has gone in that direction. No doubt to help.
The suffering of the unknown girl makes me thank the Gods that Rory’s new form makes her virtually invisible. Whatever happens today, she won’t be caught. If London and I are taken down, she’ll be alright.
My scent receptors snag a new scent.
Sniff.
Fuck…danger.
DANGER!
I skid to a violent halt, my claws digging deep trenches into the forest floor. My ears swivel and rotate as I lift my muzzle further into the air.
“Tally?” London pants, slamming into a mossy log beside me. “What?” He stops, eyes widening. “Bad vibrations.”
Agreed.
He cocks his head on one side. “The mutant doggies we saw earlier—it’s them isn’t it?” London slings an arm around my body and leans close to my ear. “They’re heading this way, but don’t worry, I’ll heebie their jeebies.”
I step in front of his body, making him pause before launching off. Flaring my nostrils, I sort through the overlapping layers of odors in the air. The scent-matrix is so fucking tangled, but currently the predominant note is the rancid stench of the monstrous hound-shifters.
But under that, I detect the merest trace of a completely different profile. It’s cold and acidic with the metallic sting of intense magic.
Francois.
The basilisk is near, but not at full strength. Is he hurt?
Pack.
My fur bristles. I sense someone with him. Human and almost familiar. Not Sky though. Nothing like her.
“Um, tick-tock, Burt. You look like you’ve gone into a nose-trance.”
Decisions.
OK. I incline my head so that London will follow me, then veer at an angle. If Francois is out here looking for Sky, we shouldn’t be on the same search grid, that makes no sense.
Before I’ve gone a dozen feet, a deafening crashing sound explodes from the briar bushes directly ahead of us. London lets out a bleat, his hands flying up to the nearest branch as he swings himself up and above the danger.
I flatten my weight, ready to spring, my jaws parting to tear into whatever mutated guard dog is about to break through the brush.
The thicket splits open and fifteen-feet of basilisk shoots toward me— with someone riding his back.
Like the snake is a fucking donkey.
Francois swivels into a sudden stop, the rider getting flung off in the process. My eyes dart between where the stranger landed in the bushes, and the snake, whose slitted eyes stare at me darkly.
“Shane!” London shrieks, leaping down from his perch, and instantly wrestling his embrace around the monster. The scales ripple, as de Vaux shudders at the affection. I’d laugh, but once again I’m drawn to the person crawling out of the brambles.
A hollow-cheeked man in a threadbare jacket—and a matte-black shock collar locked around his neck.
Behind me London is basically sobbing. “Missed you so much, mate. It’s been bollocks without you.”
The ragged man lifts his head and for a moment I can’t believe what I’m seeing.
Instantly, I shift back.
“Tally?” the man whispers, his voice shaking. “Tally Bevan… is that really you, boy?”
I step forward and grasp Layla’s dad, helping him to his feet. “Fuck, Jim. What happened to you?”
The reunion is brutally cut short.
The rancid stench of the dog-shifters surges into even my human nose. They're closing in fast. From the corner of my eye, I see London grab Jim, pulling up the tree to the high branches. Good.
Now it’s time to fight.
My wolf explodes back to the surface, and I let animal instinct take over as the two hounds burst into the clearing. Drool hangs in long strings as they bound, snarling and snapping, towards us. I dive straight in, aware that the basilisk is doing the same thing. I take left, he takes right.
These monsters are unnaturally strong. As we collide, their burning saliva splatters across my shoulders, singeing my fur and stinging like pure acid against my skin.
No matter. We roll and roll, each desperate to wrap their jaws around the other.
I can’t tell if Francois is having more success, but my particular match is far too even for my liking.
And amidst it all, London’s voice pierces the mayhem.
“HERE! SKY! SHE’S HERE!”