Hotbloods, Coldbloods, and the Creatures In Between

#37. Victoria

I let Bradley leave without saying a word to him; it would have been a wasted effort. He doesn't care about the words of a creature. With one witch dead and another necromancer out of the room; my wards have held up long enough. I can't hear Tess, but I feel her. This is what she wanted. I am not the one she chose to kill Bradley Pickett.

I stand to face the necromancer one-on-one, but I catch a bullet in the shoulder. "Fuck!" I shout, the pain stammering. The last of my wards evaporate; soak through the ceiling, out the broken windows and get lost in the wind above the parking lot. Seamus fights the necromancer's hold, but she's talented and I'm too distracted by the pain in my shoulder.

"Ry!" I shout, and he peeks from behind a steel pillar. "Now!" I say, and his shift begins with his nose, then shoulders, and legs. Within a moment, the lycan stands, crouched over to avoid hitting the ceiling. Possessed vampires rush Ry and he swats them out of the way, sending them crashing into computers, desks, through windows and into the parking lot below. Seamus and Emie, both under control, are struggling to wrestle him to the ground, but he reaches up to pull Seamus down and pins him to the ground. He fights the urge to kill the vampires; the natural reaction of a lycan to an attack.

I stand to face the necromancer again. Four vampires against a lycan; I reach out and grip my fingers around the necromancer's magical hold on them; tight and unforgiving. Emie notices I'm forcing my way into the necromancer's magic and leaves the three vampires to deal with Ry. She approaches quickly and I refocus my attention to the necromancer's hold on Emie. She winces and her eyes roll into the back of her head as the disruption causes pain.

I pull the gun from my holster and fire at the necromancer, but her vampires are too quick, taking the lead for her. A white figure flashes in front of me, then to the corner of the room. Tess's silhouette stands without a face, without a solid body. "Fire." She whispers. "Fire." I aim at Tess and unload a round as Emie approaches. Through the struggle, I can hear the hissing of leaking gas lines.

I hear the grunting of a man. Ry is fighting the necromancer's magic, unable to shift as the vampires struggle to pin him to a desk. Seamus's fangs are sharp and he raises them into the air, like a whale breaches the waves for a breath, before plunging into Ry's throat.

"Do it." Emie says,"Now!" I reach for another round and click it into place. She grins as I raisemy gun again to the Xerox machine by the wall where Tess had been and unload itinto the machine and neighboring outlet. Sparks dance across the floor and thecarpet catches a flame for just a moment, before a forceful explosion spreadsthrough the fifth floor, pushing desks, cubicles, and computers out of the way,before the necromancer catches alit, before Seamus burns, before the glassshatters, and flames push Emie and I against the wall.8?S