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“We have been watching you for weeks now. You and your lady friend; we know what she means to you. Another one of your cat trophies no doubt,” the last one finished off the ramble. “Now step aside or you are going to die with her.”
“I find that event highly unlikely.” He said, straightening up to is full height. They were directly under the shade of several tall trees, which blocked out the light of the moon. Lucius had not picked this spot lightly, and now his eyes shone like clear glass set in the air. “Can any of you see in the dark?” he asked as the three bear-shifters charged towards him.
Ordinarily this would be an uneven fight largely to his disadvantage. Bears are phenomenally strong, even among shifters. To fight three angry shifters would have been suicide. But in taking out the headlights of the car in this carefully chosen spot, he had thrown them all into darkness. It was still an unfair fight, but it now lay largely in his favor. Something these bears were too young, and inexperienced to realize.
Lucius ducked underneath the blind swerve of the first to reach him, grabbed his shirt, and heaved upwards. The bear-shifter, the biggest of the bunch flew, screaming, high up in the air to land among the branches up above. And then there were two.
All this had happened in a flash, and the others were left confounded for a moment. Lucius passed, light as wind, quick as quicksilver between their upturned heads, and bounded toward the car. He ripped the door open, sending Yuri into more panicked screams. He flipped her over, and tore away her bonds, making sure not to tear her wrists apart in the process, and then he took the cloth bag off her face. It all happened in a flash, and Yuri could only see his retreating back as he bounded back into the fray. She could not see anything clearly, but the grace of movement told her it could only be one person. She could tell there was some sort of fight going on, but she could not tell between whom. Had Lucius just rescued her? The hands that had grabbed, and abducted her were as strong as his but lacked a certain element of control. They had been rough and callous. She started when she heard a scream in pain, and cursing. Someone had broken a leg. While she desperately wished that Lucius was okay, another forceful and angry part of her wanted him to make those men pay if he could.
The bear shifter in the trees had jumped down, hoping to land on Lucius, in a bid to knock him out. The plan had back-fired. Lucius had seen him coming, and gingerly stepped aside. The bears realized to their dismay that they were easily losing the battle. But bears are nothing if not brave, and they kept on with the fight. The driver, and the biggest, being injured, was shunted to the back, shielded by the other two. It was here that Lucius saw how the fight was going to end. He allowed them to come close, stepped aside from a direct kick to the torso, but held on to the foot nonetheless. Heaving, he tossed another up to the branches screaming.
The final one was faced with a dilemma. He had the fight before him, which every bone in his body wanted to finish despite the fact that he was now alone, but coupled to that he had to protect the injured behind him. The renowned empathy of the bears won out as he retreated back towards his fallen comrade.
“There is no need to continue fighting,” Lucius said, almost invisible in the darkness. “You know your friend’s leg will be healed in a few hours. I just want what is mine.” Lucius was sidling now towards the car, but facing the seething bear always.
He ran to the car, and grabbed Yuri, mounted her on his back, and sped off at what she was sure was close to a hundred miles per hour, maybe more. Whether because of the calm after the storm, or the fantastic nature of some of the things she had heard, she passed out again on his back, the air, by now cool because of the late hour, easing her passage to oblivion.
Chapter 7
Yuri awoke with a start. Her jaw throbbed terribly in pain, and she felt feverish all over. She had a headache that would have sent two people screaming to the aspirin bottle. Plus, she had just had the strangest dream. One look around the room she was in however, told her that she had not been dreaming at all. Lucius sat lightly on a chair in the corner. Her eyesight slowly adjusted, and his features slowly came into focus across the room.
