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The earth trembled in a shower of dead leaves ripped from branches. Flames roared over an aviary exhibit. A third thin streak exploded the near the heart of the fighting. The world flared into a brilliant summer dawn of rot and red; then the body parts rained down.
A paw sizzled in the weeds beside me. The grass burned in frenzied fire, sheets of ember and flame whipped into the air.
Winnie pushed herself onto her feet.
August lifted a single paw, hesitant, as if perhaps he thought or hoped the wound had not been fatal. In that moment Caelan struck him in the throat, unrelenting in his grip as August bit down at the top of his head and shoulders, until he’d backed his older brother up and into the exhibit pit.
Come home, baby doll.
The tone bypassed my ringing ears.
Green-eyed, Winnie extended a paw to help me up. I refused her hand, but nodded. “Take me,” I instructed, and what emerged from its mouth was a perfect copy of the woman’s voice in human skin.
“Oh, I will, little lamb.”
In great, bounding strides the werewolf raced through the flames and into the aviary. The building's roof sagged in a wave of cascading embers. After a glance toward the fray and a skeptical assessment of the ceiling, I followed it into a burning corridor.
Flames dripped behind exhibit glass in silent spectacle, falling onto abandoned floors. A dead sparrow slapped against the panels several times before finding a crack into smoking, navy starlight.
The air filled with smoke, swallowing the werewolf's shape, but we were close. Thick plumes poured through a distant exit. I stumbled out the other side, coughing.
A dark mass slammed into my stomach. I tumbled forward, swatting at the shape of a muzzle and smacked a panting Caelan across his snout. He nosed me onto my feet.
The remaining roof caved. Smoke and dust rose over the landscape and we stood alone from the fray.
Another meteoric streak colored the tips of the dead trees, but this one splintered mid-air. Heated metal fragments poured down in glittering trails, following the curve of a second invisible barrier, this one sturdier than the first.
We were close.
A metal plaque thunked onto the root-bound sidewalk. Across the barrier, Winnie stood behind a faded information board about lions. She winked one green eye and leaped into the purported lion’s den.
I had started after her when Caelan snagged the hem of my shirt. Though he couldn't speak, I understood the basics of canine posture, let alone the unsettled look in his eyes.
“We've got this,” I told him, pulling away.
The mottled blacks and grays of his throat brushed my shoulder with every step as the wolf kept an even pace. Flames died in the weeds near the edge of the barrier. We stepped over them and passed unhindered to the brink of the enclosure.
Twenty feet below stretched the remnants of a moat. Beyond the exterior perimeter were boulders and overgrown grassland, young trees and wide swatches of dirt. Though the animals were dead, their paths, paced day in and out, lingered on as deep depressions. The far wall, where keepers would've accessed the animals, was layers of rock with a tunnel built into the base.
In one of the dirt stretches, stood a man guarded by bipedal werewolves, including Winnie. Green fire burned in a stone ring before them. Their shadows reached toward the stars. Those still possessing eyes, and even those without, turned their pointed snouts our direction.
Their master did not. His eyes were clouded, the muscles in his face expressionless. Drool glistened on his chin, and yet I knew in my bones he saw us.
Ingram Hayes was a tall, dark-skinned man who had been handsome once, and his ageless face still held the echoes of an attractive nature. He stood shirtless, thick muscles tattooed with names and patterns indiscernible at our current distance. One side of his head was shaved and similarly tattooed; the rest was pulled into black dreadlocks which tumbled off his shoulder. A macaw feather brushed his neck, hung on a jade earring carved to resemble a two-headed serpent.
Bound to the restrictions of a wolf's vocal chords, Caelan growled.
Another blast of fire exploded overhead. The earth surrendered a mighty shiver.
Color, a rich mahogany, returned to the necromancer’s eyes. “Climb down, girl,” he commanded in a tone smooth and cool. The cold of his beckoning numbed the pain in my shoulder, muffled the ringing dread in my ears. “Be part of something larger than life.”
I didn't want to take a single step nearer, but I had to. There wasn't any other way. Still, I waited, counted the werewolves. Six, plus the newly formed Winnie. I looked over at my companion. Scabs covered his snout. He was a good fighter, but seven and the wendigo?
Gently, I touched the wolf’s cheek. “Stay here, Caelan. Please.”
He shook my hand off and set his claws on the exhibit edge, amber eyes intense and focused. Never had I considered Caelan’s death beyond the initial moment of shooting him, but on the threshold of the lion's den I found myself terribly afraid for him. After spending his entire life trying to climb out of a pit, he was gonna die in this one.
Counting to ten, I tangled my fingers in his fur. The night was in its prime, but as dawn broke, whatever happened would have played out. In just a couple hours, minutes, really, everything would be resolved. I just had to get there, start the process. Just survive, a little at a time.
