Page 129 of Memories Like Fangs
Byrd and Cooper moved toward each other. They circled each other like beasts in an ancient instinctive dance, sizing each other up.
“What have I done to you, Cooper, to deserve seeing my family suffer every chance you get?” Byrd asked.
“Other than killing my father like the fucking monster you are?” Cooper spat venomously but with that same cool severity.
Byrd growled. “Yeah, after hekilledmy mother, you stupid fuck-nugget.”
Cody and Cole chuckled at the nickname, and even I couldn’t fight my smile. Cooper ignored us both, but I didn’t miss the clench in his jaw.
“Wouldn’t it be easier to just join her?”
“Funny. I could say the same about you and your dumbass daddy.”
“I don’t mourn him. Not like you do. Your mother was weak, just like you. The only mistake my father ever made was that he didn’t kill you. He should’ve ignored his orders about taking you alive and just finished the job.”
Cole raised an eyebrow. “So, you wanted our father to ignore a direct order from his Huntscommander and kill achildinstead of maybe rubbing his two brain cells together and not chasing after a young shifter child without knowing the full circumstances of the situation? I just want to be clear that that is the fuckinglunacythat you wanted to take place.”
“This has nothing to do with Dad.” Cody snorted. “This is about Cooper wanting to be First Blade. That is what this hasalwaysbeen about. If Dad had survived and Uncle Diego had actually stepped away like he has now, Cooper would be the next in line for Huntscommander.”
“Two things can be true at once.” Cooper shrugged. “I can want my father to be alive, and also want Quinn not to be the leader of this family and run it into the ground.”
I raised my eyebrows and spat at him. “What the fuck did you just say,cabrón?”
Cooper’s sharp blue eyes narrowed onto me. “You don’twantto be the Huntscommander. Youneverhave. Yet, you want to destroy this family and the legacy that generations have worked so hard to build. You would have us no longer hunt dragons because you are too much of a fucking pussy. You haven’t even killed a dragon, and you think you can lead this fucking family?”
I’m getting real sick and tired of men telling me shit like I have never heard or thought about it before. Does he really think he can get a reaction out of me by regurgitating the same fuck shit my father had told me before, like I hadn’t said that over and over again in my own head? Please don’t actually piss me off.
I blinked at him slowly, refusing to take his bait and let him win. The most I gave him was my calm, quiet rage as I said as steadily as I could manage, “I don’t want to be the Huntscommander of a family of murderers who only care about killing for profit and don’t give a fuck about helping people. The Hesse family was originally knights who were called on by innocent villagers to save them from monsters who attacked. Wesavedpeople before we profited from the work. I want to bring that back. We don’t have to continue the same shit that has gotten people like your father killed, Cooper. It’s obviously time for a change, and we should want to leave a better legacy behind. I don’t need to kill a dragon to know how to do that and lead this family properly.”
Cooper snorted. “Yeah, right. You don’tdeserveto be a leader. Especially when your little whore killed the First Blade before you and you condoned it.”
“You killedmyfather and Aunt Max,” Byrd snarled. “Is that not enough? When will it be enough, Mr. Daddy Issues?”
“When you die by my hand.” Cooper lifted his gun and aimed it at Byrd.
Byrd hissed. “Then, you will never be happy, shithead, because that’s never going to happen.”
They clashed then with all the velocity and violence of a tornado and hurricane colliding together. Cooper shot his rifle first, the rapid fire of bullets whistling through the air, but Byrd was already a blur of crystal shimmer. She didn’t dodge so much as outpace the bullets. She flickered to the side with supernatural speed, and trying to follow her wings was like watching a dragonfly caught at a rave.
Cooper reloaded and fired again and again and again. Byrd hit the ground low, sliding across the snow-covered grass, powder and dirt flying up around her as she skirted beneath a wide arc of gunfire.
Once he emptied the clip, Byrd was up again with open wings. A jagged shard of glass snapped into her hand while she was mid-motion, and she flung it toward his face. He ducked, but it still managed to carve a bloody line across his cheekbone before the fragment embedded itself into a tree behind him.
Feeling the blood drip from the cut, Cooper yelled an angry battle cry before increasing his storm of bullets. Byrd just continued to treat the fight like she had done before, like it was a dance and she was giving an award-winning performance.
The elite hunters with Cooper came at me, Cody, and Cole like a tactical wave. Clean, disciplined, lethal, and ruthless, they moved differently and smarter than the other hunters. They split into groups against us, backing each other up and using coordinated strikes and sheer numbers to try and overpower us. Some of their unconventional weapons also seemed like they were only around to disorient us, like the one swinging a chain and one with a grenade launcher.
We had seen worse, though.
Hell, wewereworse.
Cody, Cole, and I rushed them. Cole moved like a wrecking ball. He shot a whole group of hunters mid-charge, each of them dropping to the ground and gurgling blood. Next to him, Cody’s crossbow sang, shooting arrows into the throats of another group. I weaved into the chaos like I was born into it. I ducked a flurry of enchanted throwing knives and drove my own blades through two hunters’ thighs, severing arteries, muscles, and nerves to drop them. I ripped Tina and Amy free and didn’t stop. I turned in a spin that opened the necks of severalpendejosnear me.
Above us, the dragons roared. No longer battling the lesser threats, they joined and descended with their own wrath. One scooped a hunter in their claws, while another took a hunter in their jaws. A flash of gold caught my eye as Ayrie summoned a windstorm to sweep a group of hunters up. We pushed hard together. It was an easy flow that I was all too familiar with.
Pivot, strike, defend, repeat.
And still, I kept an eye on Byrd.
