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A really big dog that was padding closer with every second, whose eyes burned into mine, whose muzzle wrinkled up to show its very white teeth. Who spoke to me, mind to mind, as I stood there like a bloody stunned mullet.
We’re coming for you, Felicity, it said, the voice inside my head the sound of animals shrieking and houses burning, of whimpers of pain and sadistic smiles. And that boy of yours. Of ours, really. We’ll transform him from that soft little creature…
I was treated to a rapid flicker of images, some stuttering, showing the same few seconds over and over in a loop. Kade with a transformed Rick, his hair close-cropped, a large squarish scar on the side of his head. Kade screamed at the start, trying to get away from Rick and back to me, then he just screamed.
My answering one was caught in my throat, the muscles as frozen as my body’s, unable to let it out nor let oxygen in. Rick brought him animals, the cuter and fluffier the better, his grin growing as they wagged their pathetic little tails or arched their backs, expecting to be treated well. They were quickly disabused of that. They screamed, Kade screamed, everyone did but Rick, who sliced them up with a methodical interest in making them hurt as much as possible. What had been a petty tyranny with me had bloomed into so much more. It continued, on and on, until my eyes ached from watching it, until Kade’s screams stopped and he became a dead-eyed nothingness that transformed when Rick put an older Kade’s hand around the knife handle.
It was the long howl that woke me from my nightmare, my vision snapping to the present day to see the moment the black wolf dropped down into a crouch, right as Noah lifted his head to send up the alarm.
“No…” I whispered, that old habit of keeping my cries to myself for fear of being heard as easy to slip into as an old pair of shoes. He was going to take it all away. He couldn’t let me go, let me find happiness, give my son everything I’d hoped for. He was going to come and keep on coming.
“NO!” I shrieked as the black wolf leapt.
I heard the sound of footfalls behind me but couldn’t look away as the black wolf’s jaws closed around Noah’s beast’s neck. Slamming him down to the ground close enough I could feel the impact, the black beast straddled the white wolf’s body and then thrashed his head, tearing at his throat. Blood bloomed obscenely on the white fur, but he refused to cry out, Noah’s whole body bucking and writhing as he struggled to throw him off.
Then a massive black beast, so much bigger than any of them, slammed into the red-eyed wolf’s side and sent it spinning, a grey and a white one following hot on its heels. Noah clambered to his feet, the movement an ugly combination of scrabbles and leg waving, but he got up, head hanging low and blood dripping with frightening regularity on the thirsty soil.
“No, Noah,” I pleaded, reaching out and touching his wisping fur when he turned to join the fight, now a scrambling, snarling mass of animals. “No, you’ve done enough.”
But he whined, pressing his nose into my palm, and then started to run towards the fray.
You stupid fucking bitch!
The echo of David’s words smashed into me as I just stood there, my eyes blurring with tears, but nothing could take the brutal sound of animals killing each other away.
You stand here while they die.
He’s coming for Kade, and you can do nothing.
They’re fighting for you. You. What a fucking waste.
You’ll never escape him. Never. All of this has been just a pretty interlude, but he’s gonna strike so much harder for escaping him.
Enough! my beast snarled. You let the beasts in your mind tear you in two while he does the same to your mates! We are strong.
No.
We will tear the interloper in two!
No.
He threatens the cub, the pack. Our strength comes from our number.
And as if she was sick of talking to insensible me, I felt myself shoved to one side. My body grew hot, so very hot for a moment, burning until I screamed, but what came out was not from a human throat. We howled, to alert those around of the danger, to throw our spite in the interloper’s teeth. Teeth that were wrapped around the throat of one of my mates and closing inexorably, despite the others tearing chunks from him. My paws struck the ground hard, the powerful muscles of my haunches coiling which sent us sailing forward, scouring the earth as I went and building up speed to a lightning pace, before I sent my body crashing into the red-eyed wolf’s.
I pulled up, panting, listening to the wild music of my heart as the beast went spinning in a mad flail of limbs.
No, Flick! one of my mates called.
Yes, Flick, was my reply as I stampeded on, keeping the momentum up as I landed on the still struggling wolf and my teeth sunk into his flesh. The burning taste of his blood was the sweetest thing, and I had to have more. I ripped at him, effortlessly avoiding his answering snaps, and the best came when I caught his leg in my jaws and whipped my head, the fangs spearing straight through his muscle and into the bone, and the thin lengths snapped moments later.
I saw the wisdom to this when he finally managed to get to his feet. While four-legged animals can get along with three legs, a recently broken third was enough to give me an advantage.
Imagine if we took out the second, an alien thought slid into my mind, revelling in the mental image of the beast that had threatened my mates, pinned to the ground by his own pathetic body. I saw his tail wagging furiously, his ears flat to his skull as
I stalked up to him, my burning venom dripping on the ground as I—
“Flick! We’ve gotta go!”
