Moonshadow (Moonshadow #1)(35)

Large bright eyes blinked at her from the shadowed darkness. For a brief moment, as she looked at Robin, she caught a flash of something else. Something that wasn’t a dog. Blinking rapidly, she tried to see it again, but the vision was gone.

The moonshadow had offered its magic to her again.

“Is it wrong to pet you as if you really were a dog?” she asked, holding out her hand.

Even though she didn’t live the kind of lifestyle that was good for a dog, she was going to miss the dog she had thought Robin was. He sniffed at her fingers and didn’t seem to mind as she scratched him gently behind the ear.

Smiling to herself, she started the car and turned on the interior light to inspect the raised blisters that ringed his neck. They were completely healed. He was indeed feeling better.

She switched off the light and headed back down the drive. When she pulled out between the gateposts, she didn’t see a car parked on the side of the road, so Nikolas must have already left.

Even driving the unfamiliar roads slowly and carefully, the drive back to the pub took less than ten minutes. As she pulled into the parking lot and opened the door, the sound of screaming split the night.

The screaming came from inside the pub. It was a woman’s voice.

Maggie.

This time adrenaline hit hard, and the only imperative it gave her was fight.

Stupid. Crazy.

She lunged out of the car and sprinted for the pub, straining with every sense to glean information about what was happening inside.

The screaming came from the front. From the pub side. As she rounded the corner of the building, a gun went off. One shot.

A monkey leaped and ran beside her, shrieking at her.

A… a capuchin monkey… a monkey?

Her stride faltered, and she stared at it. As it yelled at her, she saw in the light of a nearby streetlamp the monkey had no tongue. “Go back to the car!” she ordered.

Instead, Robin jumped to hang on her leg. He dragged at her, clearly trying to stop her from going forward.

She tried to brush him off as she charged toward the front door. Toward what used to be the front door. The door itself was in shreds, a piece of wood still hanging from the hinges.

Ignoring the monkey hanging on her leg—at least he had stopped shrieking although his hard little monkey fingers pinched at her thigh painfully—she slowed, walked along the edge of the building quietly, and peered in.

There was blood everywhere, with furniture knocked awry, body parts and playing cards strewn everywhere, and monsters.

Huge, very werewolf-y looking monsters. One monster savaged a body. As she stared at it, Arran stood up from behind the bar and fired a hunting rifle point-blank into the face of a second monster that rushed toward him. It fell but just as quickly rolled onto its feet.

Aw, damn. It was never a good sign when bullets didn’t faze a creature.

She didn’t pause to think. Instead, she acted. Lunging toward the monster that was getting to its feet, she slapped the confusion spell onto its back. It faltered and looked over its shoulder at her.

For a breathless moment she looked down a massive, bloody muzzle with long, sharp teeth meant for rending. The monster turned toward her, and it kept turning in a circle… and turning. Its growl changed to a puzzled whine.

Arran was dead white and shaking. “What the fuck is wrong with it?”

“Doesn’t matter.” She gasped. “It’ll do that for hours.”

She felt a rush of air. The monkey had climbed up her body and shrieked an earsplitting warning in her ear. Arran jerked the rifle up to his shoulder and fired just behind her. Whirling, she saw the first monster already climbing to its feet.

She had two confusion spells, one on each side of her hand; two telekinesis spells, again, one on each side of her hand; and the corrosive defensive spells on her forearms. Before the monster could scramble to its feet, she slapped it with the second confusion spell.

Another scream split the night.

Arran said, his voice shaking, “Maggie.”

“Call for help,” Sophie told him. She grabbed the puck, pulled it off her back, and flung it to the area behind the bar where it could take cover, then she raced to the back game room with the dartboard.

Pausing on the doorstep, she took in the details of the room at a glance. Dead body parts, check. Blood all over, check. One of the monsters was in the process of tearing apart a closet door while Maggie screamed from inside it.

Really bad situation, check.

Oh man. If the gunshots didn’t keep one of these monsters down, would her telekinesis spells do much better?

She couldn’t stand by and watch it rip Maggie to shreds. Striding forward, she delivered a roundhouse punch to the monster’s broad, powerful side. The blow lifted the creature into the air and slammed it into the opposite wall. It crashed halfway through the plaster and hung suspended in the hole it had created, half in the room and half in the kitchen behind it.

Sophie turned and, ignoring the painful tearing pull in her weak side, hauled Maggie bodily out of the closet. The other woman was hysterical, sobbing and babbling. Sophie grabbed her by the shoulders.

That got the other woman’s attention. With a hiccup, Maggie stopped screaming to stare at her.

Behind the other woman, Sophie could see the monster pulling itself out of the hole in the plaster. She told Maggie, “Run.”

As Maggie raced out of the room, Sophie didn’t wait to watch the monster finish extricating itself from the ruined wall. Her spells called for close quarters and being proactive. Striding forward, she swiped at the monster’s shoulder, activating the corrosive spell and skipping back several paces.