The Lycan Rebirth (The Flux Age Book 3) (14 page)

BOOK: The Lycan Rebirth (The Flux Age Book 3)
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“Stand firm,” Yasmin said. “The next wave is coming.”

Perhaps buoyed by Yasmin’s presence, the troopers formed a tight knit defense. A high-pitched wail pierced the air as the ghouls pursued their attack. The flames outside were already diminishing, allowing the ghouls to make it through with minor burns only. Yasmin saw a charging line of sweating, frothing ghouls through the smoke as she automatically activated one her powers.

Blood mist
. It was a complicated maneuver and Yasmin had only discovered she was capable of it by accident. After an uncomfortable few seconds in which her body felt like it was being turned inside out, Yasmin was
moving
across the plaza in the form of a white mist. It would appear innocuous enough to the enemy but the mist was actually laced with long, razor-sharp strands of her hair. She had no idea if blood mist was capable of killing ghouls, but she hoped it would slow them down at the very least.

The results were spectacular. The ghouls bounded headlong through the mist and it seemed at first they would make it through to the state troopers. By the time they reached the far end, however, they found that they had actually been sliced into lateral sections by Yasmin’s cursed air. Heads, arms and torsos slid neatly to the ground. It seemed the ghouls, famous for their recuperative powers, were no match for a vampire queen.

Yasmin felt herself weakening slightly but wanted to see how far she could push the blood mist. The best thing about it was how it killed silently, so the ghouls that perished at the front of the attack force weren’t able to warn others behind them.

Yasmin glided forward in a peculiar way that gave her a sense of direction without actually being in one spot at one time. The mist rolled with her until she felt too weak and drained. At the top of the stairs outside she felt herself coalesce into solid form once again, the mist spinning around her like water down a plug hole. Thankfully, she still had her clothes on.

When the mist had gone completely she could assess the trail of carnage she had created. The station plaza was littered with dismembered ghouls, the concrete slick with foul ichor.

Yasmin had destroyed an entire battalion in a single attack. She almost laughed at how absurdly powerful she felt.

Tomas appeared by her side and shook his head in wonder.

“I saw the mist coming and bolted,” he said. “No way I was hanging around.”

“You might have survived, being a vampire and all,” Yasmin said dryly.

“We need to test that,” Tomas said seriously.

Yasmin smiled. The scientist had never been as endearing as he seemed at that moment.

“Where are the others?” she asked.

“I had them conceal themselves in the side alleys and alcoves,” Tomas said. “Just in case this isn’t over.”

The doktor was right - the battle
wasn’t
over. Crossing Broadway at the base of the stairs was a support battalion. Only this time a larger ghoul marched at its head. It was green and scaly, with long limbs and a hideously spiked spine that protruded from its neck and back. It carried a peculiar weapon that Yasmin had only seen in books about the medieval age. The weapon consisted of a straight handle, a chain and a spiked ball attached to the end of the chain. It was jet black and pulsed with some kind of purple energy.

“What’s that thing?” Yasmin asked Tomas. For some reason it struck fear into her heart.

“Stay away from that, queen,” Tomas said, his eyes wide with fear. “That’s a dark morning star.”

There was no time to ask Tomas what a ‘dark morning star’ was. The huge ghoul bounded up the stairs three at a time, showing no fear of Yasmin whatsoever.

“Finally, a chance to smoke the bitch,” the thing growled in slightly accented English.

Yasmin recognized the voice even though it was several octaves lower than usual.

“Herr X,” she said, trying to keep her voice calm. “It’ll be a pleasure to kill you so early in the battle.”

“You can try,” came the arrogant reply. “But I think you’ll find that ghoul kings make for perfect vampire killers.”

Herr X began swinging the morning star above his head as he climbed the last few steps. The sheer speed of the attack caught the waiting vampires off guard.

Not even Yasmin’s unnatural senses could prepare her for the king ghoul’s next attack. The spiked ball seemed to speed up as if drawn to her fragile frame. The next thing she knew Tomas was throwing himself across her body and there was a wet, meaty sound. The doktor was sent sprawling across the concrete, his chest a mass of blood.

“Queen,” he gasped, a fountain of blood gushing from his mouth.

“No!” Yasmin heard herself cry as a primitive survival instinct prevented her from rushing to Tomas’s side. She was overcome with a horrible twisting sensation and then she was up in the air, her wings flapping furiously. She soared over the station plaza and landed at the base of the steps. Now she was behind the ghoul king and his battalion, which was now ascending the stairs. With a painful wrench she shifted back into human form and realized she’d been a vampire bat for a few seconds. Just enough time to save her life. Now it was time to attack.

“Night creatures!” she howled into the darkness. “To me!”

The succubi returned, screeching from their hiding place. They weren’t ablaze anymore but they swooped the ghoul ranks with undiminished violence. Fades and night wraiths surged from the shadows, their terrifying sonic powers probing the ghouls for weaknesses. Several of Herr X’s soldiers stopped short and held claws over their ears in alarm. This made it easier for Yasmin’s vampire followers to devour them. Ralph Odessa, imperious in his black cape, scythed through the confused, fearful ghouls en route to the ghoul king. Yasmin herself began drifting through the enemy pack, devouring several ghouls with lightning bites to the carotid artery. Overflowing with dark fury, Yasmin was almost impossible to strike. She felt as though she was aware of every foe on the battlefield and had all the time in the world to respond to their movements. Except for Herr X. That weapon he carried was a real concern.

Yasmin brutalized her way to the top of the stairs, leaving agony and confusion in her wake. She didn’t care if her blows hadn’t killed the ghouls outright - for now they were incapacitated and unable to contribute to the battle. If Yasmin’s dark army was victorious they could be thrown onto a huge street bonfire to finish them off.

At the top of the stairs Herr X was surrounded by eight wary vampires. The Odessa sisters took it in turns to draw an attack from the wily ghoul king, and Yasmin could see that sooner or later one of them would be hit.

“Face me, coward,” she spat venomously. The ghoul king stiffened and turned to face her with a grin.

“You can’t defeat me,” he gloated. “I can match your speed, your strength and, most importantly, your guile.”

“The Berlin Club is finished, Herr X,” Yasmin promised, waving the other vampires away. “You destroyed the Lycan Society but helped create a far more powerful entity.”

Yasmin moved in close to Herr X and leered at him with blood-stained teeth. The large ghoul swung his morning star viciously but Yasmin was no longer in its path. She was filled with so much anger that everything seemed to be in slow motion. On some crazy impulse she spat a gob of blood at Herr X and was gratified to see it splash across his beady, pus-filled eyes. In the second it took him to blink, Yasmin darted behind the ghoul’s range of attack and grabbed his throat with a small, trembling hand. She squeezed as hard as she could, pouring all her rage and grief into her hand. Herr X’s windpipe not only buckled and snapped, the blood seemed to drain rapidly from his head so that by the time he fell to the concrete it was dry and shriveled like a prune.

Her face a mask of quiet determination, Yasmin dragged the body by the ankles, lugging it unceremoniously down the stairs. She began piling the bodies of dead ghouls into a heap. Her night creatures assisted her without a word.

Once the grisly task was done, the vampire queen lifted an assault rifle from a fallen trooper and fired a single incendiary round into the corpse pile. The bodies caught fire immediately, sending a pall of acrid smoke into the seething New York night.

Her business done, Yasmin wandered tiredly over to where Tomas lay. Her heart felt like it would drip through her rib cage when she saw what she feared the most - her doktor, her faithful admirer, was dead. His chest had been eaten away by whatever substance had coated that horrible morning star.

She closed his eyelids gently and knelt by Tomas’s side. No dark creature dared say anything.

The first tear kissed Tomas’s cheek, then a second. Yasmin wasn’t sure how long she knelt there, under the art deco arch of the Lincoln Center Station, but she could only let her grief have its way.

came Florence’s voice in her ear.

“On it,” Yasmin said quietly, picking herself up and signaling to her people. The night creatures moved down Broadway, a gallery of dark rebellion searching for trouble.

10

 

New York City, USA

 

Florence looked out over the wreckage of Canal Street. Just three hours ago there had been a civilian riot here, and a number of cars had been flipped over and burned. The sight of a clutch of werewolves at the forefront of a swarm of spiders was more than enough to send the street gangs running. Gustav set a defensive perimeter around the main entrance to the Canal Street subway station. It was quite a sight to see so many spiders forming a defensive line at what was usually a busy New York intersection. One could be forgiven for thinking that the world had been taken over by night creatures. Florence was still nervous about exposing the spiders to attack from the general public, but for the moment they were being left well alone. A police captain was organizing quite a few officers into a ragged line behind the spiders. The valiant cops had probably been dealing with civil unrest all day and now they were expected to fight a torrent of ghouls by night. Florence didn’t expect much of them and vowed to protect the brave men and women at every opportunity.

She paced up and down at the rear of the entire formation, glancing down Canal Street every few seconds. She sensed
that
was where the attack would come. The subway behind her was one of the few known entry points to the chapter house. Right now it was only lightly guarded, which was why it was so important for Jack, Yasmin and herself to hold their positions on the street. She couldn’t bear to consider the possibility that the chapter house might be attacked a second time. Not only was their last remaining dark tissue housed there, but both diviners, Mischa and Emmaline, were waiting nervously in one of the living cells. Florence and Yasmin had been relieved to find that the girls got on very well and were already firm friends. Diviners seemed to share a special understanding, keeping each other anchored to the real world.

The city was too quiet. The gangs were long gone and there was now no sign of milling crowds further north down the street.

“What’s your status, Jack?” she said into a small mouthpiece. Her tawny fur was bristling and she knew battle was imminent.

came Jack’s deep voice.

Florence suppressed a wave of anxiety. “She was attacked?”

came the reply. wait
.>

“What’s happening, Jack?”


The radio crackled out. Florence exchanged glances with Wilson and Miss Garvey. Not for the first time she marveled at how quickly they’d responded to arachne healing techniques. Lycans really were among the most hardy of flux creatures. All three of them had received grievous injuries in the jungle battle against the aquila. Florence was certain that she was going to bleed to death after Hector attacked her. Worse still, she had been forced to watch as Julian sacrificed himself to save her. She shoved the agonizing image from her mind, unable to process it at the current time.

The rest of the jungle battle was hazy in her memory. She had passed in and out of consciousness but was aware that once Hector was dead, the aquila had lost their nerve for the fight. The big aquilan had been a spiritual leader as well as a military one, and the remaining aquilan troops had lost all cohesion after his demise. The spiders regrouped and drove them from the jungle mercilessly. Florence doubted the aquila would be a force for a decade at least. They had been well and truly decimated. Despite their resounding victory, Gustav was smart enough to know that the war wasn’t over. Once the lycans were healed using ancient arachne essences, he agreed to bring his best warriors with Florence to New York.

The tawny werewolf was extremely happy and relieved to see Jack and Yasmin again, but she carried a heavy heart filled with grief. She knew she wasn’t her normal self and might never be again.

All that mattered at this moment was the defense of the old lycan chapter house. It represented a new beginning for everyone. The Fellowship was something she knew would provide the direction and guidance she needed.

First, there would be battle. Thanks to arachne healing, her powerful lycan body was almost at full strength.

A commotion down Canal Street drew her gaze. Water seemed to be rising from the drains in the gutters. No, it wasn’t water - ghouls were crawling through the impossibly small spaces and creeping into the street. They kept coming without pause. There must have been hundreds of them. The hideous grey creatures formed into loose ranks and appeared to be awaiting orders. The spiders had spotted the formation but held their line with excellent discipline. Gustav scuttled up and down the front line, cajoling his troops to remain calm and vigilant. Cool-headed, wise and brave, he was an excellent ally to have in this situation.

BOOK: The Lycan Rebirth (The Flux Age Book 3)
8.59Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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