A Guardians Passion (38 page)

“Yes, alpha.” At that very moment, a terrible, high-pitched wailing resounded throughout the mansion. Coming from beneath them, the cry was half howl, half ululating call. Freya shivered at the thought of creatures she had never seen, ones she knew nothing about. Were they stronger than the males? Weaker? Quicker? Could they teleport? As if things couldn’t any worse, her cub woke inside her, giving a vigorous stretch inside of her womb.

At the sound of fabric tearing, Freya noted Ezra in the beginning throes of his transformation.

She had no words as she watched him complete his shift, changing not into the man-wolf form but into a beast upon four legs. It was all the best for speed. Ezra was no warrior, but he was a damn good messenger.

The floor beneath her feet began to shake, yet Freya’s thoughts were on her mates. She truly couldn’t wait for them to return.

Chapter Twenty-One

She had never seen a female asprega, and while in a prior assumption she might have alluded to them looking something like the males, Freya was still stunned by the creatures before her. They were much, much larger, both in height and in weight. Brutes upon two legs, five in all, were pear-shaped models of destruction with ice-blue skin and various colors of hair. They looked clumsy with small, pointed tits, and narrow waists were out of proportion to hips easily three times the width of their upper bodies. Breeders for certain. Instead of being off balance, however, the females were superbly sure and swift, the talents of born killers.

It was the females that broke the floor apart, making way for the unit that erupted outward. Shattering concrete and the wood that lay over it, the beasts sprang up inside the command center. They were outfitted in bikini tops and bottoms that left very little modesty for beings that didn’t seem mature in the slightest. Thick shock collars with battery packs flashing bright emerald lights hung about their necks, and Freya could see from the occasional twitch that they were indeed being stimulated.

Even among the loud shrieks of gunfire, the screamed curses, and the rumbling roars of chaos, Freya was not so consumed with rage that she could not see the creatures for their vulnerabilities. Their large green-gold eyes were filled with fear. Even as they brought the entire room to alert with their shrieks of destruction, Freya did not fear them.

Bullets could not pierce their flesh, and the asprega could easily knock firearms from the grips of weres. They moved just as quickly as the males, vanishing from one spot to the next in a flurry of movement, subduing Cole within seconds, knocking Vaegar back into a wall, and actually yanking the arm from one of Vaegar’s men.

Freya stood behind her mother and Gaea, the only two making any headway with one of the creatures. Gaea had her hand axes. Geraldine had a hammer with the width of a tree trunk, and working together, the two had suppressed one of the females. The two matriarchs had voiced their demands for Freya to stay back and behind them.

So if none saw how the asprega female cowered under the weight of Gaea pinning her to the ground, preventing her from teleporting, how she whimpered as Geraldine brought the hammer down over her flank, Freya did.

And she felt for them, hulks that they were. She clutched the handles of her metal whips in her hands, ready to strike the first thing that approached her but knowing that her only concern had to be for defense rather than offense. Bun came before all pity.

Yet the asprega female had curled up into a ball within Gaea’s hold. She raised an arm, trying to shield herself from another of Geraldine’s blows, one that was heading down to her chest.

“Ma! Hold up.” The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them.

“What?” Geraldine paused midswing. Fury was blazing in her eyes.

Suddenly a flash of pale blue appeared behind her mother. It was another asprega female appearing.

“Watch out,” Freya snapped, but it was far too late as the creature tackled her mother to the ground.

Freya let fly with her whip, cracking the length forward and wrapping it around the neck of the beast that grappled with her mother.

“Get the fuck back, girl!”

Freya ignored her mother. She planted her feet hard and held on with all her might as the creature fought for freedom. “Why don’t you get the fuck up first, Ma?”

Geraldine scrambled backward, using Freya’s distraction to slide from beneath the beast. Her mother fumed all the while but bounded to her feet just as the creature freed itself of the coils. Geraldine made her transformation within seconds, tearing through her clothing with a roar. Freya knew her mother preferred to fight in human form, but it had become clear fast that, just like the males, the females needed to be dealt with close and bloody.

With the rapture of transformation, Geraldine sprouted deep chocolate fur, bulging muscles, and a lengthy tail. Her snout was wrinkled with aggression, and she had white fangs bared. She lunged toward the asprega’s throat and dug in. She yanked her head and came away with a huge chunk of flesh.

Freya sprang back, knowing and trusting that her mother had shit under control. She looked to Gaea, who was free of her combatant yet covered in blood. She turned to the direction of gunfire sounding behind her, but before she could get a good look at who exactly was attacking her mother-in-law, Ezra was knocking her aside.

She fell to the ground, protecting her belly as Ezra took the gunfire meant for her. In full wolf form, he landed before her wounded but prepared for a defense that wasn’t needed as Gaea threw one of her axes and landed it directly in the center of the gunman’s head.

From her spot on the floor, Freya could see the entirety of the firefight. The female asprega had not come alone. Di’Amanda stood boldly at the edge of the hole in the floor, protected by the largest of the females. She had brought more than just pets. Spread throughout the ruins of the room were vampires armed to the teeth. Many had guns, but a few brave souls carried blades. Vaegar had two dead vampires at his feet and had just thrown an asprega to the ground.

Freya got to her feet just as one of Di’Amanda’s troops sprang forward with two handguns pointed directly at Cole. Now was her turn to act.

She flicked her wrist outward and watched the whip wrap around booted feet. With her other whip, she slashed a line across the attacking female vampire’s face, tearing open a deep horizontal gash. She tugged hard on the end of the whip attached to the vampiress’s feet, taking the vampiress down. One of the gunwoman’s weapons flew out of her hand. Freya used her free whip to ensnare the wrist that held the other.

The woman was fumbling with a shoulder holster, seeking another firearm.

Freya released the whips and rushed toward the fallen vamp. She grabbed hold of the gun still within its sheath. Her hand closed on steel and leather alike, and she jerked them free of the woman’s body. The female attempted to reach for her. Freya gave her something else instead. Using the gun and the holster, Freya punched the vampiress in the face over and over. Fangs and teeth shattered first, then the jaw, and then Freya cracked the skull, each blow punishing the vampiress for daring to think of ever attacking a wolf!

“Enough, enough! I said enough!”

Freya looked over to Di’Amanda, prepared to laugh her ass off at the demand, but true to their mistress’s call, the asprega were the first to obey. Those that had been in the midst of combat vanished from where they stood to appear at their mistress’s side. Even the vampires pulled back to the center of the room.

The weres stood firm, Freya included, curious as to what new terror or audacity might be about to occur. She kicked the twitching mess of a vampiress away from her and retrieved her whips, seething with fury at the vampiress’s return.

Di’Amanda smiled broadly, her lips gleaming like fresh-picked cherries. Her hands were clasped demurely before her as she did her best to look as if she weren’t the cause of a war in its beginning stages.

Vaegar snarled, moving forward.

“I did say enough,” Di’Amanda repeated. She cocked her head at the big black wolf upon two legs. Another asprega appeared behind her with an extremely familiar captive in hand.

Benna stood in the captor’s embrace, haggard and weary. The Sohon looked as though she had been through hell.

Vaegar’s rage could be felt throughout the room as he bolted forward, crying his niece’s name.

“Uncle, no! Don’t worry about me,” Benna shrieked, feigning bravery that her eyes could not affirm. Her clothing was torn and bloodied. Her usually perfect red hair was matted with blood and dirt, and she looked pale, as if she had been the beverage of some vamp. Freya’s skin crawled, and she wondered what horrors the child could have endured.

Di’Amanda struck Benna with the back of her hand, drawing roars of threat from not only Vaegar but from half the room. A couple of wolves bounded forward but were immediately reprimanded by Vaegar. He had lost his sister, and Freya doubted that he would risk his niece, even though Freya herself wanted nothing more than to lunge forward and rip out Di’Amanda’s throat.

The vampiress gloated. “That’s right. Behave, little wolves, and hear me out. You will stop your attacks upon all of our covens, or your niece will only be the first of our casualties. Just as easily as we got to Copper here, I could get to any one of your precious curs. So if you have any daring assault attempts planned, I just want to inform you that no sooner than we snap this one’s neck, I can find another and another.”

“What the fuck do you want then?”

Di’Amanda licked her fangs, fingers steepled. “We wish a truce.”

“You’ve got to be in-fucking-sane,” Freya scoffed.

“There will be no truce,” insisted Lloyd. “You took our females, humiliated and terrorized them, and you actually came here to talk about negotiations?”

Di’Amanda barely glanced in his direction, her attention immediately returning to Vaegar. “Where were we again? Oh yes, I came back to my home, to my mansion,” she sneered in a fit of emotion, “to discuss terms with you vermin.” She turned to another of her beasts and jerked her head. “Bring me the other one as well.”

One of her asprega vanished and returned seconds later with another female were. The girl had been beaten far worse than Benna, the fight stripped from her along with all of her clothing. Her hair was jet-black and her pale-gray eyes heavy with something akin to shame.

“Kallie, I believe her name is.” Di’Amanda sighed as if she were uncertain. “Kallie Sohon.”

Everyone seemed to be holding their breaths and gazing at Vaegar. His daughter was being held by the throat, a captive of vampires. Kallie was Vaegar’s firstborn and was just as stubborn and proud as him. She had been living in Australia, running with a freedom pack that shunned humans and preferred to live poor in the light of the Sohon billions.

While she might have distanced herself from her pack and her father, Vaegar’s love for her was crystal clear as he reverted to his human form, defeated.

“As for you others, I don’t give a good goddamn what happens to you. You were content to let the Sohons lead you before, so know now that they have it in their power to decide your fate and the fate of your pups too. Trust me, a truce is actually your best option.”

“Trust fuck, bitch,” Freya spat, not believing what she was hearing or seeing. Where the hell were her wolves, she wondered. Shit was quickly getting out of hand. Vaegar’s mind was working. Freya was certain of it. She wasn’t sure, however, that she wanted to know which plans he was settling on. She looked Di’Amanda in the face. “You can trust and believe that your life ain’t gonna be worth a hot, steaming damn by the time this shit is over.”

The vampiress cocked her head at Freya, focusing like a missile. “Oh, yes. Birathan’s pet. I was wondering how you had gotten away. I was gonna get to you eventually.” She chuckled. “No matter. I will find something
else
to pimp you out to since you enjoy getting serviced by beasts.”

Freya went wild at the threat, rage boiling within her. That the bitch had even opened her mouth had caused Freya’s restraint to begin unraveling. To have mentioned Birathan, what he had done, and suggest… She clenched her hands around her whips and started to move forward, only to run into the blunt head of her mother’s hammer barring her progress. Freya stopped, ready to spew a number of threats.

The look of cold fury written across Geraldine’s face was enough to snap Freya from her own distraction. “Girl?” was the only question offered.

“What? What, Ma?”

Geraldine, still in her bipedal wolf form, shook her head, sharp teeth grinding. She was a woman of stone, shuddering with rage. “Stay the fuck back.”

Freya was about to reply when Di’Amanda commanded everyone’s attention anew. “Vaegar, I understand this must seem unfair, considering the old truce and everything, but I want to propose a new one. You would go your way, and we can go ours. You have murdered far more than we. Those wolves that remain in our custody will stay in our hold as collateral. However, negotiations for the return of your niece can proceed first, and then we could move on to your daughter, eh? We really would like to apologize for our slight to you. So what do you say, Vaegar?”

“This is madness.” Gaea spoke before swearing a blue streak in Icelandic.

“What this is,” Freya clarified, “is them trying to play us for some fools just because they have hostages and think that that is an advantage. They’ve got their minions, and without them, they’re nothing but some dried-up fucking leeches who are pissed that real dogs want nothing to do with them. Fucking crybaby, bitch-assed motherfuckers.”

Di’Amanda lowered her head and muttered to herself before raising a finger and pointing at two of her asprega. “You and you. Kill that one,” she commanded. “Now.”

Before Freya could even prepare herself, two beasts appeared in front of her. Her mother was knocked backward by one while the other struck Freya across the face. Freya lost one of her whips in the sudden shock but quickly looped the other around the throat of the first of her attackers. The other asprega slammed her from behind, jostling her kidney.