He had no idea why his beast sought out Sam, and while the pain was gone, for now. It was replaced with the almost violent urge to turn back, to finish their argument until he was spent and there was nothing left. He wanted to spill all his secrets, to lay himself bare, which was a vulnerability he could never afford. Not when no one understood. They saw an addict and nothing else.
Something dark brushed against his chi, a ripple of awareness that snapped his attention to the side. The rain had turned torrential, no longer a gentle sprinkling but a sheet as it obscured his vision. But even through the heavy beads he noticed the Shadow-Veyn stalking in the dark, the hellhound opening his jaw to grin, venom dripping from its fangs.
Perfect timing,Axel thought. Crossing the street to follow the hound. He had no weapons, but that didn’t stop him as he picked up the pace, the hound scratching against the brick as it backed up with a snarl.
In any other situation he would have allowed his beast to take over, to destroy the hound, but right then he wasn’t feeling particularly happy with the creature lurking inside him.
“Come here, you fucker,” he whispered, the hound wrapping shadows around its monstrous form. Axel smirked, the glyphs he had tattooed on to his body allowing him to see through the glamour for which they were named.
The hound let out a high-pitched howl, loud enough it bounced off the surrounding stone, brick, and concrete. There were no extra bones along its spine, nor where there any scales beneath its jet-black fur that Axel could see. Its size was relatively small, larger than a wolf but smaller than a bear. It was a classification B, maybe even a C. Nothing he couldn’t handle alone.
The torturous bay ended, and for a single beat all there was, was the torrential rain battering against them both. And then, he heard them, the returning howls. Two, three, possibly more. He couldn’t be sure, not with the rain muffling the sounds. Which meant he wasn’t against a single hound, he was against a pack, and he was unarmed and without a way of communicating with his brothers.
The Fates really knew how to fuck him over.
‘Anyone out hunting tonight?’He stretched his mental connection, hoping one of his brothers were close enough to receive his call. He was met with silence, which wasn’t entirely surprising.‘Cool, so I’m about to get eaten,’he continued as if one of them could hear.‘But I’ve had a good run.’
The hound snarled, hind legs pressing against the brickwork, body tensed as if ready to pounce. Red eyes glowing in sockets, the majority of its face pure bone with bursts of matted fur. There was no nose at the end if its snout, just two ragged holes that black vapour wafted from, moving around to dance between the exposed ribs at its side.
Axel rolled his shoulders, feeling the muscles bunch before he flicked out his hand and called his chi. He wasn’t a fan of using magic, preferring to physically fight his opponents, but the warmth of pale white arcane coating his palm was comforting.
Druids in general had weak magic, born from the earth, and emphasised with the natural ley lines that ran like veins throughout the world. His chi, just like the rest of the Guardians’, was heightened, as was his strength, agility and ability to survive ridiculous damage that would otherwise have killed a normal person ten-times over.
The tattoos beneath his clothes hummed to life, giving out a matching pale light. The ball of arcane pulsed, and just as the hound leapt he threw, catching the creature square in the face. It dissipated on impact, tearing through fur and muscle to widen the exposed skull. It forced the hound to shift trajectory, coming side on rather than teeth bared. It hit Axel in the chest, knocking them both back as he felt claws dig into his skin, ripping and tearing as it tried to scramble back to its feet.
Axel wouldn’t let it, knowing that once he got a good hit in it would try to run away, at least until it had back up. Reaching up, Axel wrapped his arms around its neck, turning his face as the stench of carrion and rotting flesh assaulted his nose. Something cracked, and Axel tightened his grip until his muscles strained. The dark vapour swept out from the nostril holes, prickling against his skin as it tried to seek out any wounds and heal.
Which meant it was a classification C. Not as bad as D, but still worse than a B.
Fuck. My. Life.
Axel strained his arm as the hound flailed in his hold. Putrid green saliva dripped to the pavement as the hound struggled, hissing like acid until the rain washed it away. He needed to finish it quickly, because without a weapon he was seriously in trouble if the rest of the pack turned up. His brothers would be picking pieces of him from piles of shit for weeks.
Not the most glamorous way of going out.
Who would have thought that once he was stone-cold sober he would still be making such stupid mistakes? No sane person would have engaged in a fight without a weapon. Riley was going to have his head if he survived this.
A fang caught Axel’s wrist, tearing through flesh with a shock of agony followed by burning. His grip loosened a fraction, and it was enough for the hound to wrench itself free. It limped, left leg dislocated as it tried to knock it back into place against the brick wall.
Axel climbed into a crouch, ignoring the throbbing ache on his wrist as the venom began eating at his wound.
Lightning brightened the sky, a shock of light splitting the dawn, followed by a rumble of thunder. The rain hadn’t lightened, a sheet that drenched him to the bone. Another bolt, and with this strike the hound knocked its shoulder back into its socket, red eyes rolling freely within its obsidian hollows.
Axel tensed, the hound letting out another howl.
The call was cut short, turning into a yelp. Axel hadn’t sensed another threat, his heartbeat a drum when he turned to find Sam baring his teeth, a brick clenched tightly in his hand. He threw it, and just like the first it hit the hound in the head, hard enough a visible crack appeared in its exposed skull. Axel didn’t have time to ask what the fuck he was doing there, moving as fast as he could as he grabbed Sam around the waist, pulling him to the side as the hound roared, leaping up to snap his jaws just inches from Sam’s throat.
The hound soared past, skidding across the wet floor before twisting back around to face them both.
“What is that?” Sam shouted through the rain, hair plastered to his skin as his cat eyes reflected back the limited light.
Axel swallowed, not understanding why the hellhound wasn’t fleeing when it was wounded and outnumbered. “It’s protecting something.”
“What the fuck does that have to protect?”
Axel took a second to sweep his gaze at his surroundings, realising he had chased it to a dead-end alley. Buildings towered over them on three sides, the rain pouring from above.
The hound pawed at the ground, impatiently swinging its head from side to side. The crack in its skull had already started to close, the vapour that floated from its nostrils and ribs covering the damage.
