Standing Before Monsters (Vorans and Vampires) (21 page)

Knocking on the door, his radar was enough to feel two of the three moving about though neither went for the door immediately. One moved forward towards the wall that the entry was on, but quickly veered to hurry down what he assumed was a hall. Listening closely, the voran heard a rapid tap on a far off door and the complaint of a female voice.

The third aura moved towards the front door cautiously as if waiting for backup from both of the others.

Nick knocked again as if he had no idea of their awareness of him. The closest one grew bold and cracked the door open revealing a chain at about their eye level.

“What do you want?” the Indian man known as Shedu asked from the relative safety behind the heavy wooden door.

“Shedu Kalan, I have come to discuss your night business,” he said being both vague and obvious to the hunter.

“I don’t know you,” he said before sniffing at the air. His eyes narrowed as he caught the scent of vampires and probably werewolves on him.

“We nearly met two Saturdays ago, now unless you want to risk a nosy neighbor stepping into the hall and wondering about our conversation, perhaps you will let me in. You can smell who I represent on me, I am sure.”

The door closed and Nick heard the chain being slid out of the security slide. When it opened, the voran took in the Indian before him. Slightly taller, the man was slender and not as muscular as the voran. Nick guessed that he outweighed the man by almost thirty pounds, but size didn’t necessarily mean anything in their world.

“Who are you?” Shedu asked still being blunt and wary.

Closing the door behind him, Nick answered, “I am someone like you in a way. I’m a hunter of vampires that can’t control their appetites.”

Eyes narrowing as the man sniffed at him once more, Nick guessed that he was both trying to check the voran’s scent and trying to buy time for his people to join him. Footsteps in the hall revealed the first, the other man who looked more ready to attack than listen.

“I smell vampire on you... and I don’t think it is their blood.” Wrinkling his face, he looked confused as he added, “Do I smell dog as well?”

“Werewolf,” the voran answered casually moving into the room as he took in the Spartan conditions. A couch and table, a folding chair and a floor lamp created an uncomfortable setting. The kitchen was simple and held no surprises. “I have a few staying at my apartment until we can get them into their own home. They left their pack and had nowhere to go.”

The second man shook his head, “Werewolves are almost as bad as vampires and I smell one on you as strong as the dogs.”

Shrugging, Nick replied, “That’s my girlfriend. She’s quite a lovely girl. You could have met her last week also before you killed the stray we were tracking.

“You three really do leave quite a bit of a mess behind, don’t you? Are you new to this? A good vampire hunter makes sure to leave as few clues about himself and his quarry as he can to avoid the normals from ever finding out. It’s a good idea to hide who killed one of them in case they’re part of a larger coven as well. Their kind tends to want revenge.”

The second man launched himself at Nick, declaring, “Thrall! I knew it!”

With movements no better than an athlete to counter, the voran sidestepped the attack and raised his right hand in passing. A flicker of light struck the man’s right shoulder bringing a cry of pain, though Nick knew that it was little more than a shock in truth.

Turning as he bumped into the couch to stare down the voran, Alad reached for his right shoulder as his arm hung limp and numb. “What did you do to me?”

Shedu looked ready to attack as well, but had noted two things. The stranger was incredibly fast, like a vampire in fact. Second, he had noticed the flash of light from his open hand and the apparent affect on Alad’s shoulder. Like a taser had gone off, the kasha was stunned, but only locally in the shoulder. This was no thrall.

The third presence tried to sneak up from behind and launched at him. Nick turned to look her in the eyes surprising the woman as she thought herself stealthy. Dressed in shorts and loose short sleeve shirt, the girl’s wet hair was wrapped in a towel. His left hand redirected her momentum to his right letting a flicker of his aura zap her arm at the elbow.

Slapping her rear as she passed by, a second flick of his aura froze her right leg causing her to collapse to her right. Nick gave enough of a shove to redirect her path wide of the low table letting the girl flop onto the couch.

As he stood calmly facing Shedu, Nick continued his introduction, “As I was saying, I know you are vampire hunters and I am in the same field. I don’t just go around killing arbitrarily and apparently you have a similar code. You had a chance to attack my friends the other night and just drove them away to escape.

“Again you didn’t cover your tracks very well. We had to use silver blades to dust the corpse for the wind to blow it away. Then you left your identity to be found on video all the way to your car. The only thing I don’t know is whether you are a feline version of a werewolf or some other creature I don’t know about. I saw the hybrid forms, though not how you change. At least no humans should stumble on that part and I erased the more sensitive parts as well.”

They looked unwilling to answer and he asked one more thing, “Is that all the faster you are in an attack in your human forms? If so, I can’t imagine how you killed any vampires or survived the mess you walked into Friday.”

So surprised by his knowledge was he, that Shedu exclaimed without thinking, “Were those your friends as well?”

The other two looked ready to attack as best they could as they jumped to the same assumption. Nick shook his head saying, “No, I deduced that from what my cop friend told me of the incident. Silver nitrate dust all over an alley, feline blood on the scene and I can smell the old blood here as well.

“I didn’t have to go there to figure out a thing.”

Alad’s eyes started to glow and Nick waited curious to see what the change would be like. He had watched the werewolves turn in full and in part, so what they had in store made him wonder since they seemed nowhere near their cat strength in human form. Werewolves were almost as strong either way, but their claws and teeth were powerful additions in a fight.

Reaching to his back, the man pulled a mask that had been tucked in the belt of his pants. He placed it near his face in a quick movement and everything began to change. The smell of feline filled the room, but his smell didn’t cause a voran to sneeze or falter in any way. In seconds, tiger fur and head drew Nick’s attention. He had claws and his legs bent differently as well. Unfortunately for Alad, his right arm remained unresponsive, but the tiger still attacked thinking his speed and strength enough to take the man in front of him.

He was indeed much quicker, but the voran wasn’t surprised. Telegraphing his attack with the change left the kasha open for a strike to his left arm as he swung wildly. Dodging the blow, Nick moved inside swiping across the tiger’s abdomen crossing his waist with an extended aura blade.

Alad hit the floor unable to move his legs any more than he could either arm. Shedu looked at the human looking man, who couldn’t be just human as he disposed of two of his team so easily.

“What are you?”

“I think I asked you first, before your friends tried to attack me,” Nick replied moving to the couch where he helped Lam slide over to give him space. Half immobilized, he had little fear that the girl would mount an attack of any sort, though he was playing it a bit cocky with the Indian still standing confused near the door. He had barely taken a step since the scuffle began.

“We are known as kasha,” Shedu responded. “Like a werewolf we can change our forms to that of the cat family we are linked to, though that is where the similarities end. We hunt evil spirits and set them free of their dead flesh when they refuse to move on by their own will.”

“The burned out corpse?”

“One of our powers is to pull the animating spirit from the undead, which tends to leave the shell a burnt out husk,” the Indian replied moving to the fallen kasha. Sitting Alad up and leaning him against
the island counter, their leader spoke calmly as he continued to appraise his chances if he was to try to take on this strange human, who wasn’t just human.

“What is with the mask? I saw his eyes change before hand, so I don’t think they are where your powers come from,” Nick asked trying to find answers.

“They are magical talismans holding a portion of our essence to assist in hiding what we are from the creatures of darkness. It let’s us hide what we are.” Shrewdly he turned the conversation with a question of his own, “How do you hide what you are? I notice lingering smells on you, but you appear human.”

Glancing to the man on the floor still covered in tiger fur with the head of a tiger as well, Shedu asked, “Alad, do you smell anything different about him beyond what is on him from those he says he knows?”

The tiger shook its head.

“I am a voran,” he said moving his attention between the two men and the woman beside him with a nod. “Though I’ve only met two others, I am told that is what my people who understand our gifts decided to use as our name. We are merely humans who have been attacked by supernatural creatures like vampires and werewolves. Nature causes us to have a reaction as if a vampire’s bite is a catalyst to change us slightly.

“My senses are on par with theirs. My speed and strength are less, but paired with skill, I can keep up even with elder vampires, though those are quite a handful. I wouldn’t recommend you testing a truly old vampire without a great plan, because it took a vampire, werewolf and I to take one down. I don’t think tricks like your silver nitrate smoke grenades or your cat allergens will stop one of those.”

It was Lam next to him who broke her silence in surprise and curiosity, as she asked in awe, “You fought an elder vampire? How old was he?”

“In his bragging of superiority, I think he said six centuries or so. My aura blades, which can stun or kill, could barely hold him long enough for my allies to kill him with silver blades. There were lieutenants in his army nearly as old I would guess. They didn’t go easily and their fires as they died could kill a man or vampire standing too close.”

Shedu frowned and shook his head at the thought before he said, “Barong sent us here because of noticeable activity in the city. If you killed their sire, then why are we still seeing so many strays and now this pack to the north; if you won?”

It was Nick’s turn to frown as he breathed out in disappointment, “We were out numbered even using a pack of werewolves and full coven of vampires. When Cyrus died with his lieutenants, his mind control ended. A few joined the coven helping replace those we lost. The rest ran and we were too worn down from losses and wounds to pursue them before the police and firemen rolled into the area.

“We’ve been trying to clean up the strays before anyone got the idea to band together again, but from what happened to you Friday, I am guessing that has already begun.”

The room went silent until Alad complained from his spot on the floor, “Will you remove this paralysis already?”

Spreading his hands, the voran replied, “It’s like a sedative. On a werewolf it wore off after about ten to fifteen minutes or so. Your first arm might be getting the feeling back pretty soon. Though that was with werewolves, and you said that you’re different; so I can’t be exactly certain.”

He stood and looked thoughtful as the man added, “Why did you spare the vampires from my clan, if I may ask?”

Shedu’s eyes shifted warily once more, but his shoulders sank as if defeated and he confessed, “Our senses not only discern the smells of the undead, but evil. Our powers draw out evil spirits. When I sensed the one chasing us with you, I couldn’t figure out what you were and that one smelled different as
well. I didn’t sense evil from her or the trio of hunters chasing the one we took out before driving them from the roof.”

Grumbling, Alad complained, “I told him they were vampires and should be dealt with the same way.”

Lam shook her head and began to shake the forearm incapacitated by Nick’s aura as tingling began in her fingers like a limb that had fallen asleep. “That’s why Shedu’s the leader and you aren’t, idiot. If it were up to you, we wouldn’t use the masks to hide our scent and you’d kill anything that wasn’t human.”

Becoming indignant, Alad was able to move the first affected arm as the effect started to wear off. “I know the smell of undead. When have you ever found one that wasn’t a cold blooded killer?”

Nick clarified for the man, “The vampires I help use a small amount of my blood that I donate to keep them sane. They eat like humans and their emotions are similar. I can help the eleven and maybe a couple more without harming myself. They confine their killing to destroying the monsters that have gone rogue. We kill the strays and try to prevent the disease from spreading to others and keeping people safe.”

Alad didn’t look convinced as he asked one more question, “Do your creatures drain the strays like reapers as well then?”

Surprised by such a question, the voran shook his head replying, “I can’t say I’ve ever run into a vampire that would kill another vampire for their blood. My coven certainly doesn’t. They use silver laced swords to kill the strays which burn them to dust. The remaining piles can be kicked to scatter the ashes or a strong wind can spread them instead.