Dust churned, choking her throat and nose. She opened watering eyes and, peering through the haze, was met with a beast of incomprehensible size and strength.
He burst through the doorway, knocking out the doorframe without hesitation. Through the haze, she watched him raise up onto his hind legs until his snout nearly touched the rafters and let out a roar so terrible, she could not imagine its like existed anywhere else in the world.
Black, blood-flecked lips peeled back from teeth the length of her hand as his forelegs crashed back down onto the packed earth. A magnificent head clothed in white fur, blocky in shape and tipped with a square black nose, swung in her direction. Wild eyes of gold fixed on her with a look of raw hunger.
It took him less than a stride to cross the barn. In what felt like a blink, he was standing over her — a monument to power, to animal magnificence.
Josephine froze. The beast in her breast held her there, perfectly still. Waiting for recognition.
And then those lips slowly uncurled from his great teeth. His head dropped. One paw, tipped with black claws the length of her middle finger, settled gently on her chest. He pinned her there with its weight alone. Even the tiniest bit of pressure might have crushed her ribcage to pulp, but he did no such thing.
A cold, wet nose snuffled at her hairline, down over her cheek, and beneath her chin. Josephine didn’t dare breathe. For a moment he was perfectly still, his breath gusting in great bellows over her bloody skin, before a familiar sound boomed from his chest.
A purr.
She exhaled, her muscles loosening, and went completely limp beneath him. “My mate,” she breathed, tears clogging her nose. “H-How is this… How is thispossible?”
Of course, he had no answers for her in this form. A hot tongue bathed one side of her face, cleaning up the blood that dripped from a cut above her temple. Tears streamed through the dirt and blood. He licked those up, too.
Josephine basked in the touch, in the relief of staring up at an animal that was so incredibly deadly. She had no idea how it was possible, nor if it would last, but she would not take this time with him for granted.
She dared to raise her hand, touching the massive paw holding her down, and sighed at the softness and density of his fur. The drawings she’d seen in her father’s natural history books didn’t do even a speck of justice to the grandeur of the creature tending to her.
The moment was broken by the sound of a man’s pained grunt. Otto’s massive head lifted and snapped in the direction she knew her father lay, broken and bleeding. She watched his nostrils widen with a deep breath. His lips peeled back from his teeth once more. Bloody strings of saliva hung like spiderwebs between his jaws when he opened them wide.
A growl like rolling thunder filled the barn as the pops of gunfire and the shouts of men came through the partially opened door.
Otto gently lifted his paw from her chest and took one menacing step toward her father before he stopped and swung his head to look back at her.
Josephine saw the question in his eyes. In the split second between meeting his gaze and opening her mouth, she recalled every horror her father had put her through, all the lives he’d stolen, and Rasmus’s screams as he realized what had been done to him. She remembered how he’d treated his shameful arrant daughter. She felt every injection, skipped meal, and prolonged period without sleep. She remembered how he’d asked Harrod about impregnating her over dinner, as if it meant nothing. Sheremembered.
It was Josephine, not the beast, who spoke. “Do it.”
Otto let out a chuff of pure pleasure before he wheeled his great body around and, with a leap of his powerful legs, descended on her father.
Josephine turned her gaze away. He hadn’t earned the dignity of a witnessed death.
He’d earned nothing but her contempt — and all the rage of a polar bear avenging his mate.
ChapterTwenty-Seven
From the WorldHealth Medical Diagnosis Handbook—
LYSSA
Definition:Lyssa (LYS-93) is a previously deadly virus spread through the saliva of infected beings, once exclusively vampires, now any being besides elves. The LYS-93 virus is most commonly transmitted through a bite but can also be transmitted via blood contamination.
Before the Wyeth mutation (WY-1860), once a person began showing signs and symptoms of lyssa, the disease was considered one hundred percent fatal. Fatal cases are now less than one percent of infected. The modern LYS-93 virus (post-WY-1860) comes in two forms: dormant and active. Infected are considered dormant when not under the influence of the full moon or endangered. Infected are considered active when they show marked physical changes, such as extended canines, shifted claws (darkened and elongated), and extreme aggression.
Like vampirism (VAM-92), it is classified as a hereditary virus and has so far been passed to all recorded offspring with no exception.
Timeline of infection:The first symptoms of lyssa usually begin within six hours of infection, but have been recorded as beginning as soon as two minutes after a bite.
Symptoms may include:fever, headache, nausea, bloody discharge from the lungs, agitation, confusion, excessive energy, inability to sleep, excessive salivation, and muscle spasms. An infected shifter will also lose the ability to change into their animal form.
Magical ability:The slight expansion of m-paths has been noted in infected beings previously unable to use magic. This is believed to facilitate the transformation of limbs, fangs, claws, etc, in the same way magic allows a shifter to transform into their animal. Some infected have reported the ability to use basic sigils and previously unknown abilities, but this is still being studied.
Relation to the moon cycle:Weres are commonly believed to be much more active during the full moon, leading to the myth that the moonlight itself creates a sort of “frenzy” in the infected.This is untrue.Research has shown that the excessive energy during the full moon corresponds to increased viral load, which reaches its peak roughly every 28 days.
