Dimitri doesn’t question me once about whether we’re heading in the right direction, and when he inhales, I realize why.
He’s been following Joe’s scent.
“He’s in the front room,” he mutters quietly.
We share a dark look. I’m going to show Dimitri more of my magic than I have even shown the others, but I somehow know he will keep it to himself.
As I said before, I trust him.
It’s not that I don’t trust the others, and I’m not sure why it’s different when it comes to Dimitri. Maybe it’s because I can sense how on edge he is. I’m pretty sure that he is in a state of constant readiness. He could strike at any moment, and he clearly doesn’t shy away from taking lives. I know that he won’t blink twice at my harsh nature, whereas I’m not entirely sure of that when it comes to the others.
A quick sweep with my senses and my magic tells me everything that I need to know.
“We’re alone,” I say, my voice barely a whisper.
Dimitri nods, “He’s not being watched.”
We don’t knock, and we don’t try to break in quietly. His cabin is on the edge of the village, and thankfully, there isn’t anyone living in the house closest to his.
How fortunate.
For us.
The door splinters, the boom loud in the darkness.
“What the fuck!” Joe yells from the living room.
He rounds the corner, his expression full of indignant rage as he opens his mouth no doubt to curse us out for entering his home unannounced.
Then he sees us, stopping dead in his tracks, he snaps his mouth closed and pales as recognition lights his eyes before panic quickly obscures it. He holds his hands up and starts to back away, but the low rumbling of a ragged growl freezes him in place as he stares at Dimitri in horror.
Dimitri’s image wavers, and I realize with sudden clarity that he’s a creature of legend.
A hellhound.
They have many terrifying abilities, but one of them is to flicker their image between their forms. Hellhounds have several forms, which makes them stand apart from regular shifters who only ever shift into one form. Amongst those forms, they have their human form, fully shifted canine form, and their underworld form, which is usually absolutely fucking terrifying and induces insanity if looked at for too long by anyone other than another hellhound.
It's that form that Dimitri is flickering between as he stalks toward Joe.
I avert my eyes, I’m already crazy enough, I don’t think that it would be a good idea to add that to it.
I’m not ashamed to admit that the glimpse I got was enough to give me nightmares for a while. There’s nothing in all of the realms like a hellhound's flicker.
When he speaks, his voice is low, gravelly, and full of dark promise, it shouldn’t make me grin, but it does.
I like Dimitri even more now.
“Hello, Joe,” Dimitri says as we both begin to circle him, and Dimitri’s image stops flickering for the moment. “Did you really think that we were going to let you get away with touching what’s ours?”
“H-h-he already took my fingers!” Joe exclaims, his voice shaking with fear.
“Merely a gesture,” I reply, with a sharp grin that flashes my fangs. I shrug, “It was not nearly punishment enough.”
He starts to babble incoherently, and Dimitri growls, his image flashing again and making Joe drop to the floor in a whimpering heap as he hides his head and his whole body begins to tremble.
Dimitri turns to me, “As much as I would love to torture the fucker until he’s begging for death,” he starts, and the guy's whimpers become even louder. Dimitri rolls his eyes, and I try not to chuckle, “As I was saying, as much as I would love to do that, I think it may cause some tension between us, or rather all of you and the gargoyles. It would be unwise to do that, the gargoyles are important allies to have, and I fear that we may need them at some point.”
“What do you know?” I ask my eyes narrowed, as I place my boot on Joe's leg to stop him from crawling away, grinning when the snap makes him scream. He’s a supernatural, he will heal that by the morning.
