“I tired.Scales dull.Claws worn out.If my time gone, living long time to meet Katy worth it.If Katy not here, I not either.”~Otto
Gage stalked through the empty halls of the Kingdom of Venom mansion, his senses primed for any sign of his quarry.Azure had recently walked this same path.He could smell the viper’s stench.His wolf snarled inside, eager to rip out the snake king’s throat.They would end this tonight.
Rounding a corner, he spotted light shining from beneath a closed door.Gage paused, listening intently.The murmur of voices reached his keen ears, Azure’s hissing baritone unmistakable.Muscles coiling, Gage burst through the door with an explosive roar.Azure whirled from his place by the fire, yellow eyes widening.
“You!”he spat as Gage shifted.But the attacker didn’t change into a mere wolf; he morphed into the beast that Visata created him to be—half man, half wolf, but bigger and stronger than both.“How did you get in here?”Azure spat.
“You made a mistake taking my mate,” Gage rumbled, his voice calm despite the anger boiling inside of his veins.“You made an even bigger mistake by thinking to use her in your dark magic.Now you answer to me.I am the Dire Wolf of Visata.The arm of justice for our Creator, and your time for judgment has come.Justice will be served this night.”
With blinding speed, he lunged across the room.His claws sliced through the air where Azure had stood a mere heartbeat before.The snake was fast, darting away and shifting into a giant cobra.
Gage tensed, circling warily as Azure reared up, his hood flared in aggression.This time when the cobra struck, fangs glistening, Gage was ready.He twisted away, feeling the breeze as death narrowly missed him.
Lashing out with a kick, he connected with the cobra’s sinuous body.But Azure absorbed the blow and came at him again, weaving hypnotically.Gage shook off the effects, refusing to fall prey to the snake’s tricks.
When Azure’s heavy tail whipped toward his legs, Gage leapt and landed on the snake’s broad back.His claws tore through shiny scales, digging in deep.Azure thrashed and coiled, trying to dislodge him.Gage held on.He bit into the snake king’s hood, his jaws clamping down to rip away a chunk of flesh.Blood, hot and sickly sweet, filled his mouth.The snake screamed in rage and pain.Twisting like lightning, his fangs sank into Gage’s shoulder.
Agony lanced through the wolf as venom entered his bloodstream.Gage roared and ripped himself free, falling and rolling back to his feet.They regarded each other warily across the dim room, both leaking blood, the air thick with their hatred.
“You can’t defeat me, wolf,” Azure sneered, though his breath came in pained gasps.“My power runs deeper than our Damarian roots.I cannot be killed.”
“Yet here you are, bleeding, which means you’re not invincible,” Gage spat out.He blinked back the creeping darkness trying to claim him.“You should have stayed in Damaria five hundred years ago, snake.And if I had been at the portal, I would have made sure you hadn’t gotten through.”
Baring his fangs, Gage lunged again, only to meet the empty air.Azure slid aside and made for the open balcony.The wolf pursued, shaking off the venom weakening his limbs.
He burst outside a second after the massive cobra.Gage shifted to his true dire wolf form, racing full out, but Azure had already slipped over the edge, disappearing into the darkness below.
Gage skidded to a halt at the railing, bellowing his rage.He searched the ground below but saw nothing.The snake had already vanished into the shadows.Gage wanted to leap to the ground and rip up every tree by its roots until he uncovered the serpent.But he couldn’t.He needed to find Katy.Gage growled and squinted at the darkness.His enemy—the man responsible for causing Katy pain—had escaped.Gage knew the Snake King would slither into hiding to nurse his wounds and plot revenge.Azure would never let this go.That was okay with Gage.Azure’s days were numbered.He’d live looking over his shoulder, wondering not if but when Gage would attack.
Panting harshly, Gage shifted back.He clutched the balcony edge as his shoulder blazed with pain, trails of fire branching under his skin from the cobra’s cursed venom.Gage grimaced, clenching his jaw against the agony.He lifted up a prayer to Visata to purge the poison from his body.He still needed to get to Katy.Slick had let him know where they could be found, and now, with Azure gone, his beast was urging him relentlessly to move.Now,the beast demanded.
Gage took a minute to sniff the air, searching for the Queen of Venom.It wouldn’t be wise to forget about such a powerful enemy when he’d just attacked her husband.But Gage caught only a small hint of Zeena’s scent, which meant she, too, was gone.
He had failed tonight.But it wasn’t over.Next time, he would finish it for good.The dire wolf had tasted his prey’s blood.It only made him hungry for more.
Staggering inside, Gage found a jacket hanging on the back of the door.He tore it into strips and used one to bind his wound as best he could.The venom coursed through him, its evil magic seeking out his soul.But he could feel his body fighting it with supernatural speed.Visata had answered his prayer.He would not fall or fail his mate.
Katy’s beloved face flashed in his mind, casting back the shadows.She was his light.He was only just realizing how dark his life had been until now.When faced with real darkness—evil darkness—he needed her.He needed the love of a mate.
With stubborn resolve, Gage put one foot in front of the other, struggling down the long hallway.Step by painstaking step, he moved closer to the door, to Katy.
He had challenged the viper in his lair and survived.Gage bared his teeth in a defiant smile, blood dripping down his arm.This wasn’t over.The snake king’s days were numbered.Vengeance was coming for him, and her fangs were as sharp as Gage’s own.
Azure would regret the day he provoked the dire wolves’ wrath.Yet even if Gage fell, Katy would finish it.Of that, he had no doubt.A female so brave and fierce, her enemies would come to dread the name of the dire wolf’s mate.
His legs nearly buckled as the door finally came into view.Gage swallowed back a howl of relief.He was almost there.Katy was waiting.He had to make it back to her side.
The Dire would not be defeated so easily.Invigorated by his mate’s strength, Gage pushed forward.One step closer to her.And one step closer to their revenge.A massive explosion went off, and Gage nearly laughed.He’d run into some of Taras’s warriors, and they’d agreed to assist with a diversion.Thankfully, they’d waited long enough for Gage to confront Azure.Now, any warriors that thought to stand between him and his female would be running for the hills.
* * *
Otto kept one of his hands pressed against the pulse in Katy’s neck.He needed to feel her heartbeat, needed to know it still pounded, even if it occasionally skipped a beat.Her body wasn’t as warm as it had been when he’d first snuggled up against her.And her breathing was much more shallow.How long had she been laying here?
Lifting his head up, Otto peeked out from under her hair.He blinked several times, attempting to clear his vision.Slick sat in a chair next to the table to which Katy was tied.Otto scurried to his feet and bared his teeth at the snake and hissed.
“Easy.”Slick raised both hands.“I’m here to protect her.”
Otto kept on with the hissing sounds because they were the only sounds he could make while in his beast form.If he wanted to properly curse Slick out, he’d have to shift back to his non-beast form.But that made him feel vulnerable.He was much faster in his beastwalker shape, and all his senses were more intense.
