“Look what we have here,” the one in the middle said. All three wore sunglasses, even though it was night. But Orpheus didn’t need to see their eyes to know they were glowing. He could feel it. Just as he could feel his own eyes begin to glow in response.
Damn it. And damn his target for running straight for them.
“Looks to me like he has plenty to share,” the one to the left said, the one with the shaved head and double gold hoop earrings. “We’re hungry too, brother.”
Oh, Orpheus didn’t doubt these three daemons were hungry. Atalanta, their leader, may be trapped in the Fields of Asphodel, but her new breed of daemon—monsters who looked human but weren’t—lived on. And they needed to feed to regain the strength they were no longer getting from the Underworld. What Atalanta didn’t know was that she couldn’t control hybrids the way she could her army of ordinary daemons. They weren’t brainless soldiers. They were part human, and as such retained that human characteristic that all the gods hated—free will.
Yeah, Orpheus knew that better than anyone, didn’t he? Cursing his luck all over again, he scanned the trees, focused on his senses. Didn’t pick up any other threat around them, which meant these three dickheads were alone.
“Look, guys. The chick and I were just about to get nice and friendly, so why don’t you just turn right around and go find some unsuspecting sheep to toy with. I’m sure that’s right up your alley.”
“Come on, man. You don’t need two. We’ll take the blond.” The leader licked his lips and stepped forward.
Skata. Stupid human with her stupid curiosity. Behind him he heard the female he’d been chasing shuffle backward. She obviously knew what they faced, but the human probably didn’t. In a minute though—unless he figured a way out of this mess—she was going to discover just what kind of nightmare she’d wandered into.
Man, his day was heading right for the shitter.
He reached back for the blade he kept sheathed against his spine beneath his coat, the one as long as his forearm. The one that had belonged to his brother and bore the marking of their forefather on the handle. Then he whispered, “Run. Take the human and run.”
“That,” the male to the right growled, taking a step away from the others and puffing up his chest, “is an unwise move, daemon.”
Yeah, no shit, Sherlock. But Orpheus was out of options, as far as he could see. If his target died, he was screwed, and daemon hybrid himself or not, he didn’t want to see the stupid human female get eaten either. Maybe because she was hot and he didn’t like seeing hot chicks sliced and diced. Maybe because he still felt like he knew her from somewhere. Either way, it meant she was a burden he just didn’t need. And the sooner she got gone, the sooner she’d be someone else’s burden.
He gripped his blade with both hands. While he wasn’t thrilled with his odds against three blood-starved beasts, he was pretty sure he could take them. If he shifted. He just hoped it didn’t come to that.
“You boys have been warned,” Orpheus said.
The leader chuckled and pulled his sunglasses from his face. His eyes were already glowing a blinding green that lit up the small clearing.
A whir echoed near Orpheus’s ear before he could move. The leader gasped, his feet stilling midstep. His eyes flew wide. He looked down at the arrow protruding from the middle of his chest. With shaking hands he grasped it, pulled it free with a grunt. Blood gushed from the wound as he slumped to the forest floor.
Stunned, Orpheus glanced over his shoulder and saw the blond standing with her boots shoulder-width apart, a bow she’d pulled from somewhere in that obscenely tight getup poised at her shoulder, her hand already gripping and aiming the next arrow. “He told you to leave. I suggest you listen.”
Growls echoed in unison. Clothing ripped, bones cracked. The other two hybrids morphed and shifted, growing in size until they were at least seven and a half feet tall. Claws sprouted from their hands as their faces twisted and transformed. The human features disappeared until what stared back at Orpheus in the dark was a grotesque mix of cat and goat and dog, with protruding fangs.
Shit. Go time.
Blade in hand, Orpheus dropped back four steps and grasped the dark-haired female by the arm, shoving her in the direction of the amphitheater they’d just come from. “Run!”
He reached for the blond, tried to push her back too, but she stepped away from him, lined up another shot, and released a second arrow. It sailed through the air with a deafening whir, struck the beast on the left with a thwack. The daemon growled in response, stumbled, but then roared and found his footing.
“Sonofabitch,” Orpheus muttered, lifting his weapon as the daemon charged. “Get back!”
Another whir sounded. This arrow embedded itself in the chest of the charging daemon. The blond released two more arrows in rapid succession as if she’d done it a thousand times. The daemon stumbled. The blond moved her weapon to the left and hit the third daemon near the shoulder.
Her expert marksmanship meant Orpheus might get through this without shifting after all. Instead of questioning who she was and why she was there, he jerked the knife from his belt and hurled it end over end toward the daemon with three arrows sticking out of his chest still trying to get to the blond. Then he arced out with the blade in his hand and struck the other advancing daemon, catching it across the chest. Blood spurted, the daemon howled. Again Orpheus yelled, “Run!”
The first hybrid, the one still in human form, lay writhing on the ground. Two daemons Orpheus could handle—they weren’t trained warriors; they were scrappy fighters—so long as the females fled. He chanced one look over his shoulder as he fought against the monsters, couldn’t see his target. She’d obviously taken off, but the blond was still there, lining up her arrows and pulling a throwing star from her waistband, then hurling it like a pro.
Throwing stars? Who the bloody hell was this chick?
Not his concern, he told himself as he sliced out with his blade, used his legs for leverage, knocked one beast to the ground and whirled on the other. If she wasn’t going to listen and split, he couldn’t be responsible for what happened to her. But he kept her at the edge of his vision just the same. Made sure the daemon close to her stayed on the ground. Blood spurted, howls echoed, and just when he thought the fight was almost over, the hybrid she’d originally hit with her arrows—the one who hadn’t yet shifted—let out a bone-chilling scream and morphed from human form into the biggest damn daemon Orpheus had ever seen.
The blond cursed. Orpheus looked just in time to see the daemon closest to her scramble to his feet, then backhand her across the face and send her sailing twenty feet. Her body slammed into the ground. Her bow and arrow went flying. The throwing star in her hand became a whir of silver as it ricocheted against a tree trunk. From across the clearing, the big daemon—the leader—growled, “She’s mine.”
Orpheus had a split second to decide what to do.
He let go of his daemon. The glow consumed him. Clothing ripped, bones cracked, and another roar echoed through the forest, only this one, he knew, came from him. From that part hidden deep inside. The part he rarely let out. The part he’d been cursed with from birth. The part that, even now after three hundred years, he couldn’t totally control.
Beast replaced man. Instinct overruled logic. Through hazy vision he watched the blond scramble backward on the moss-covered ground, her violet eyes wide and fear-filled. And though déjà vu filtered through his turbulent mind as he looked at her, his plans, his one true goal, what he was doing out here in these woods to begin with, began to slip out of his grasp. Only one thought spiraled in, swirled, and took hold, replacing everything else.