Page 50 of Blood Bearon
Something moved in the dark behind the truck, and the ground trembled again. The purple mass kept moving, but they didn’t stop at her. In fact, their heads were all pointed in the same direction as hers now.
The shadow moved, and so did the demons.Awayfrom it. Rachel had a fraction of a second to be confused before atruedemon burst forth from the shadowy, unnatural darkness that surrounded the truck. It was huge, bigger than anything in the crowd around her, and as it landed on all fours, the truckjumpedfrom the impact.
Rachel was spilled to the ground, preventing her from seeing what exactly happened next, but shedidsee a mangled purple corpse go sailing over the truck, its body split open from neck to navel by four huge lines.
Nervously, she peeked over the lip of the truck bed, watching as the giant grizzly bear ripped into her attackers with a fury. Mashed and mangled bodies fell aside as the terrifying thing went on a rampage of death and destruction.
All around her, shapes faded into the darkness, backing away with howls, yips and shrieks that sounded like so much gibberish to her, but seemed to give the attackers a semblance of coordination to their retreat.
In seconds, she was alone with the bear. It spun to face the truck, eyes reddened with fury.
“Easy,” she said, holding up both hands. “I’m a friend.”
The bear shied backward.
Frowning, she looked at her hands, only to realize she was still holding the knife Khove had dropped in her right. Hurriedly, she dropped it into the truck.
“See!” she called, waving her open palms. “Friend. Khove, it’s me. Rachel. Come on back.”
Slowly, the bear seemed to calm, and reason returned to its eyes. Moments later, her stomach heaved as she watched the creepy, jarring transition. A few seconds later, a thoroughly naked and bleeding Khove stumbled toward the vehicle. Hopping down, she ran to his side, getting an arm underneath him.
“Come on,” she said, easing him to the truck. “It’ll be okay. Come on.”
“I’m alright,” Khove said, gasping for air. “Just. Need. Rest. Air.”
She settled him down into the driver’s seat and stayed with him as he tried to get his breathing back under control.
“Trust me, I’m fine,” he repeated, sounding less strained this time. “Nothing serious.”
“You’re covered in blood.”
“Yeah, that tends to happen,” he agreed. “But you can check me out if you like. It’s not like I can hide anything from you right now.”
She eyed his nakedness for a split second. “This is true.” Sobering, she looked behind them to where the creatures had faded away. The darkness still closed in, preventing them from seeing overly far.
They were alone in the middle of nowhere, without a working car, and precisely one knife and one exhausted bear shifter to defend them. The odds, to put it bluntly, were shit.
“Khove,” she asked nervously, finding his fingers and gripping tight. “What do we do now?”
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His brain was taking its time to focus.
“I don’t know,” he admitted, still breathing hard. “But we need to prepare. Before they come back.”
“So, theyarecoming back, you think?”
He nodded. “Yes. They’ve been driven off, but they’ll be back, and in greater numbers too.”
“Lovely,” Rachel grumbled, kicking dirt. “And we have no plan.”
Khove thought. “Well, what do you have in your bag of tricks?”
Rachel frowned. “Me? Why do you thinkIwould have any plans? I don’t even know what the hell those things were!”
“Fae,” he informed her. “Faeries. Summoned from another plane of existence.”
“Oh. Lovely. Tinkerbell is trying to murder me.”
