Especially Venom. The son of a bitch who ruined our mother’s DNA and fucked up her babies.
Well, not all of them. Mad Dog’s twin came out fine. So did mine. It was us that were left to suffer the consequences, cursed to live rejected forever. Mad Dog with the tinge, and I… Well, had you seen a reindeer with claws and fangs before? If you had, it was me.
I was born half reindeer, half wolf shifter. Not separately—that would have been awesome; a reindeer when I felt cute and a wolf when I wanted to teach assholes a lesson, but no. This was not the case.
I shifted into both animals at once. A fucking reinwolf. A terrifying beast that even his family wouldn’t love or accept.
How would they? I ‘d been nothing but an embarrassment since I was a kid. As accustomed for all reindeer shifters parents, they dressed as Santa and rode a sleigh dragged by their reindeers to cheer the clan’s children, but the poor fucks were terrorized thinking I was Santa’s ride from hell sent to take the naughty ones.
Sometimes I wished for my brother’s madness instead. At least, it was only triggered by massacres, and with the help of time and Slasher—a vamp with a steel will that was no longer controlled by bloodlust—would be caged.
“I have to go…Venom…” Mad Dog banged his head. “Two… Mate…”
I ran to hold him. The back of his claw hammered on my temple. My head lashed to the side, but I shook the pain off and grabbed his arms. “Hey, easy, Bro.”
He snaked his neck and his eyes widened at me. “Venom…Vampire… Bitch… Two…”
“What are you talking about?” I held him tighter. “You gotta calm down, Bro.”
“No,” he snarled and pushed me back until I hit the oak tree. His arms slipped off my grip, and he grabbed at the knife in the leather sheath tied around his leg. Before I knew it, he spun and held it at my neck.
My beast rumbled, but I held back its impatience, waiting my brother’s psychotic break out. “Pulling a knife on me, Bro?”
His breaths fell heavy on my skin, and the blade seared my neck. Like Dasher’s cross medallion, it was made of iridium, silver, and Vetala steel. A mix lethal to the supernatural.
“Mad Dog, it’s me, Terror.” I said. “Put the knife down.”
“Terror,” he growled, his arm over my throat hard, the edge of the blade pricking my flesh. I thought about shifting, but it might get him to shift as well. Out of his mind like that, his wolf would hurt the helpless boy.
“Carter, I’m your brother, Luke. Snap out of it.”
His racing breaths hit lower on my shoulder, and he pulled back, dropping his knife.
I twisted with one swift move and yanked the knife out of his hand. He snarled again, but I raised my hands in the air. “I’m not going to hurt you. You’re safe here. We’re just waiting for Slasher.”
His chest heaved, his eyes yawing from me to the boy.
“No. Just look at me. You’re Carter, my brother. I’m here, and I love you. We all do.”
Flaming ambers stared at me as his attention shifted from the boy. “Terror.”
“Yes. That’s me. We’re waiting for Prez. He’s out there, catching him for you so you can kill the motherfucker.”
The tension in his stance faded, his breaths calmer. Then his claws and paws retracted to a more human shape.
“That’s it, Bro. Come back to me. You’re Mad Dog, a Blood Demon. You don’t kill little boys. You don’t kill your family. Only ugly bastards…like Venom.”
“Venom,” he howled all of a sudden. “Don’t come after me.” In a flash, he shifted, his clothes flying off him in shreds, and disappeared into the foggy woods.
Shit. What the fuck had I done?
I glanced at the boy. I couldn’t just leave him here and go after Mad Dog. And if I rode, I wouldn’t catch him in time. He was much faster. Damn it.
I pulled my phone out fast to call Slasher. It boomed in my hand as he beat me to it. I tapped the screen and put it on my ear. “Mad Dog is on the loose. He shifted.”
There was a pause. “Venom is nowhere under the sky, but we found another vampire.”
My eyes narrowed. “Let me guess, a woman?”
