He slowed, kicking off his boots, just before he began to run on all fours. Eventually he skidded through the snow, halting in the density of the woods to let the transformation take over. He pushed it. He didn’t savor it. And in a flash, he was staring through the eyes of his wolf with his wider peripheral vision.
He contained the growl he wanted to unleash but didn’t for fear of losing the element of surprise. Kiyo instead left behind his tattered clothes and ran.
He soared through the woods with such speed, even if it had been daylight, all anyone would have seen was a blur so fleeting, they would be sure they imagined him. The wind whipped through his fur; the snow barely had time to soak his paws he was so light across it. He felt the violence building within him at the thought of The Garm harming Niamh Farren.
She was his charge.
She was his job.
His to protect.
And Kiyo did not like to fail.
Hearing voices ahead, his ears twitched as a male voice asked in a thick Russian accent, “What do we do with her?”
“Kill her,” another grunted in exasperation.
“But she’s … she’s seizing or something,” a female said. “Maybe she’s already dying.”
Seizing?
The word caused Kiyo more than a flicker of unease.
Rose said Niamh’s visions physically incapacitated her. She said she resembled someone in the midst of a seizure.
Niamh couldn’t even protect herself.
“Take that piece of iron and kill her!” the exasperated male ordered. Kiyo could see the man through the opening ahead. Tall. Burly. Another wolf.
Kiyo leapt out of the trees at his back, jaw open, and clamped his teeth into the man’s neck. The force of his hit took them both to the ground. He tore out the wolf’s throat, hearing the surprise from his companions as he rolled off to face the others.
His eyes darted to Niamh. She was collapsed in the snow, eyes wide and staring unseeingly at the night sky as her body convulsed.
Rage blasted through him as he turned his attention to the two vampires and two werewolves who bared their incisors and canines at him. Only cowards with no honor would take down Niamh while she was in no state to fight back.
He would enjoy this hunt.
The female wolf came at him first. Kiyo lunged to meet her. She was so distracted by his open jaws, she missed his claws. As she triumphantly punched him with impressive force in the muzzle, Kiyo pushed the change, his front forelegs shifting back to his human arms as he slashed her across the belly with his wolf claws.
As her howl of agony lit the air, momentarily disconcerting her companions, Kiyo made the full shift. Uncaring of his nakedness, he spun back to the female as she dropped to her knees, retracted his claws, and punched through the solid cage of muscle and bone in her back.
The force of the hit shuddered up his arms as his hand clamped around the hot, wet muscle of her heart.
He yanked it out and she sagged lifelessly to the ground.
A roar of fury filled his ears as the remaining wolf and the two vampires sped toward him. Claws out again, Kiyo ran at them, leapt into the air in a spin to give his body enough momentum and force so that when he brought his arm around, his clawed hand out, he cut through the wolf’s neck like his hand was a blade. His teeth rattled with the impact, but the wolf’s head rolled from his body with satisfying results.
The sight caused the two vampires to stare in disbelief.
He doubted they’d seen many werewolves decapitate someone with their bare hand.
Realization that Kiyo wasn’t at all what he seemed flooded their expressions, and the male and female vampire shared a concerned look.
Self-preservation was a typical characteristic of a vampire and they shot off into the woods. Kiyo couldn’t let them get away and back to The Garm.
The less The Garm knew about Niamh, the better.
He raced after them, catching up to the male first. He tackled the vamp to the ground but felt hands wrap around his neck and throw him backward.
Kiyo hit the ground hard but the snow cushioned the impact. He glared up at the female vamp who had surprised him by coming back for her companion. That was something he could respect.
He lunged, canines out, misleading her as he had her werewolf counterpart. She was a blur of movement, lashing out to grab him around the throat and hold off his teeth from her neck.
But Kiyo wasn’t aiming for her neck.
He punched through her chest, up under her rib cage, gripped her heart, and squeezed it until it popped.
She burst into a thick cloud of dust, speckling his face and body.
He grunted in annoyance, stepping back from the ash cloud as a blur moved behind him.