5. Viktor #2
This one was even worse than average, in my opinion, as it had clearly been built at different times, in different sections, and while they were all currently painted white, it had been poorly done, without proper base coats and primer, things Cash had taught me well the importance of during our years working together.
It was clear that the house had once been multiple colors, and someone had tried to hide that by simply slapping a coat of white atop them all.
So one section was vaguely gray, and one had hints of green peeking through, while another was streaky and red-orangeish. The result was a hideous pastel nightmare.
When I came around the corner, I paused there.
It was a huge garden, which wasn’t . . .
a surprise, exactly. Witches always kept plants, since they used lots of them in their concoctions.
But a garden didn’t offer me as much cover as I wanted.
I considered going back around the other way, but it wouldn’t help, since that direction would reach the guardhouse before this direction.
I hadn’t seen a single open window yet, and the basement windows actually had fucking bars on them, which . . . well, again, not a surprise. They’d held Altair down there for centuries, hadn’t they?
That was a good and sobering reminder. This wasn’t trying to break into a human’s house looking for a meal like I’d done many times in the escape from Russia.
This was witches, who had a history of holding Altair prisoner, and had even killed at least one of my own, though I had rarely considered Grant’s minion Avery “mine” in any meaningful way while he’d been alive.
I should be cautious, though.
Especially when they had my wolf.
“Hey there!” came a shout from the edge of the garden, and damn it all, my choice was made for me.
Another guard came rushing out of the hedges on the other side of the garden, running in my direction. This one was considerably more impressive than the ones in the building off the road, young and in good enough shape to actually be running.
He was also pulling a weapon out of a holster on his hip. A taser, I thought, so not too scary. Even though it was a professional model, he had a limited number of shots with it.
Plus human weapons were always fallible, because they had to hold them, and if hit in almost any part of the arm, the hand’s first instinct was to drop whatever it was holding.
I dodged the first shot, tucking and rolling, coming back up right in front of him, taking him by surprise, before snatching the taser from his hand and using it on him. He fell into a huge bed of lavender, shaking and jolting with the force of the thing.
I considered leaning down and simply breaking his neck, but . . . well, he was just a guard, wasn’t he? He hadn’t stolen my wolf. He might not even know they were witches, let alone be complicit in their evils.
Still, I had to deal with him.
Conveniently enough, he had a pair of handcuffs on his belt. So I pulled them off and cuffed his hands behind his own back, and shoved him face down in the dirt next to the plant.
“Where are the witches?” I demanded, hissing the words, trying to avoid further attention.
He turned his head and glared at me. “That’s a pejorative. They’re just . . . eccentric people living in a commune outside the city.”
I blinked at him in shock for a moment.
Yes, I’d thought maybe he didn’t know, but . . . he really didn’t? That was bizarre. How could they perform their magics without their guards even knowing what they were up to?
I didn’t have time for this, but also, missing my wolf, so many of my usual weapons were lost to me.
I hissed in frustration, but instead of losing patience, I reached down and grabbed the sleeve of his uniform, tearing it up one side, then off the shirt entirely, and finally in half.
I used one half to tie his legs, and the other half to gag him so he couldn’t shout a warning.
“You are wrong,” I told him while I worked.
“They are not harmless. They attacked my people. Stole my . . . dog. I must get him back before they harm him.”
His eyes went wide at that, then narrowed, more in confusion than anger. He had to realize that I could have hurt him worse and was wasting time by not killing him.
Or perhaps I was the only one who automatically thought of murder.
He didn’t struggle much, though, and when I turned away, his taser back in my hand, he didn’t try to stop me. I’d have rolled my whole body forward trying to knock me down, if I were him.
But clearly, he and I were not the same.
I went back to the side of the house, trying to find some small measure of cover, even though there simply wasn’t any. Shockingly, the witches hadn’t built their house with the intention of people hiding nearby.
The first open window I found was on the second floor, in a turret, and too damn close to the front of the house for my liking, but it was a good entry point, so I tucked the taser into a pocket and reached up to grab a piece of poorly painted siding.
The second I laid a hand on the house, though, I ripped it away again. The sawdust Ermengarde had replaced my wolf with had turned electric and started screaming in warning at the tiniest touch.
No no no, bad, wrong, warning. Alarm!
Fuck me.
I’d set off some kind of silent alarm just by touching the house.
A moment later, the guards from the front building came rushing around the side.
It was easy enough to tase one and drop the other by smashing his head into the side of the house, dodging their mediocre attempts at taking me down.
I took a moment to bash the first over the head as well, since a tasing wasn’t going to render anyone, even a weak human, unconscious.
Clearly, they were trained guards, but they had never been trained like I had. Never been forced to defend themselves day and night, hours at a time, from more and more attackers as they improved, until it was all they could do to stand up one more time, accept one more attack.
It was my problem, really.
I hadn’t ever given up.
My biggest weakness, Ivan had always told me, smug and irritating. My unwillingness to simply die like the weak creature I was. The fact that I wanted to live, wanted to survive, wanted to win every fight.
It was what made my whole life a fight.
A witch came rushing out the front, and I tased her, pulling out one of the new guard’s tasers and shooting her a second time for good measure. It might kill her, since witches weren’t quite human, but their bodies were similar to them.
Killing witches had been part of the plan when I’d come, though, so I didn’t worry myself on her account. She’d have done the same to me in an instant, given the opportunity.
There was a shriek nearby, and more witches started pouring out of the house. Damn it. This had not been the plan.
I shot a second witch with both tasers at once, rushing up onto the porch and slamming the screened door into the head of one trying to come out of the house. She fell back inside, and I wedged my foot into the door, so no more could come out.
Not that they were less dangerous inside, but I had to try to stem the tide somehow.
I turned to the next witch who had managed to make it out, and hesitated.
It was the redhead.
The one with my wolf in him.
I’d learned better. I’d been taught over and over that hesitation was death, and those lessons had been taught in pain.
But still, for some reason, I hesitated to grab him and twist his neck around. He had my wolf. Of course I hesitated.
And as I’d always been warned, that hesitation was my undoing.
The smell of ozone preceded a massive force to the side of my head, and then blackness swallowed me whole.