Wildfire (Hidden Legacy #3)(27)

“This is an armored car. You’re safe here.”

“I’m not staying behind. I have to at least try to be useful.”

“I thought animal mages had no power over summoned creatures.”

“I never tried to make friends with one.”

“I don’t think they want to make friends.” I was pretty sure they wanted to kill us and devour our corpses.

“I’d like to come,” Cornelius said. His mouth was a thin firm line. His jaw muscles were locked. His gaze was direct. I knew that look. I’d seen it before on Rogan, Leon, and my own father. It was the look of a male who’d made up his mind and would not allow logic, reason, or arguments to interfere with his chosen course of action. If I left him in the car, he would follow me. I couldn’t really stop him and I had no time to argue.

“Stay behind me.”

He nodded.

I slipped out of the car, brought my gun up, and walked to the door, forcing myself to pay attention to the bodies. The guards were dead. Very dead, beyond all help. Someone had taken their weapons. The odor of blood hit me, salty and awful, mixing with something else, an odd stench that reminded me vaguely of ozone during a storm. I swallowed down bile and stepped over the corpses into the brightly lit foyer.

Blood marred the expensive marble tile, bright red against the soft cream hues. A few long, fading out smudges—someone had slipped frantically in his own blood, trying to get away. A bloodstain with feathered edges, as if someone had pressed a paintbrush against the floor—someone’s bleeding head met the marble tile. A long swipe—whoever had fallen here was dragged into the living room and he or she had tried to grab on to the floor with bloody hands. Please don’t let it be Rynda or the kids. Please.

I padded along the wall, avoiding the bloodstains. I was so glad I dumped my pumps for the sneakers. Best decision of the night.

The vast living room opened in front of me. The overturned Christmas tree lay on the floor, pointing like an arrow toward the center of the room, where, twenty feet away, two creatures crouched on their haunches over another dead body splayed out on the Oriental rug. About five feet long from head to the base of a prehensile tail, they had the build of a sleek greyhound, but there was something simian in the way they sat on their haunches, picking at the body of a young man with their black paw-hands armed with long white claws. Their stiff, greyish-blue fur stood straight up like bristles on a boar. Their heads, round and crowned by bat ears, swiveled toward me.

The man they were eating looked barely twenty. Death had frozen his face into an expression of utter horror. He had known he was about to die. He probably felt it as they ate him alive. Anger swept through me. They wouldn’t be eating anyone else.

Summoned creatures or not, they looked similar enough to our animals, which meant their eyes were close to their brain. Brain was an excellent target.

I fired.

The gun roared. The first shot tore into the left creature’s muzzle. Missed. The second took it in the right top eye. The bat-ape stumbled back.

I turned and fired at its friend. Bullets punched into the second beast’s face, ripping through bone and cartilage.

Two shots.

Three.

The bat-ape collapsed facedown.

The first beast jerked on the floor, gripped in spasms, painting its own blood onto the rug. I carefully stepped over the body and put another bullet into the back of its skull just in case it decided to get up. Six rounds gone.

Cornelius touched my shoulder, pointed to the right, toward the kitchen, and held up one finger.

Something thumped above us. Echoes of faint voices floated down.

If we went up the stairs and the thing in the kitchen decided to follow, we’d be in a lot worse shape. Being attacked from the rear wasn’t fun.

I moved into the kitchen, slicing the corner. A dark shape leaped at me from the kitchen island. I squeezed off a single shot before the bat-ape landed on me. My back slammed against the floor. All of the air rushed out of my lungs. The beast tore into my shoulders, pinning me down. The awful mouth gaped open, the needle teeth like the jaws of a trap about to enclose my face. The odor of ozone washed over me.

Something smashed into the beast, knocking it off me. I rolled on my side. Cornelius stepped over me and bashed the beast’s head with a frying pan.

The bat-ape tried to rise.

He bashed it again, then again, bringing the frying pan down like a hammer. Blood splattered the walls. The bat-ape shook and lay still.

Cornelius straightened. I got off the floor and looked at the mangled corpse. Cornelius hefted his frying pan, pondering the body.

“But you don’t like guns?” I whispered.

“This is different,” he whispered back. “This is how an animal kills. This feels more real.”

My new employee was a closet savage, but I wasn’t going to complain. I would take this surprise savagery and be grateful. “Thank you.”

He gave me a solemn nod.

I left the kitchen and crept up the stairs. Cornelius followed me.

“Any luck with making friends?” I whispered.

“No. Their minds are very primitive. It’s like trying to bond with an insect. All I feel is hunger.”

Ahead, the staircase turned in a grand sweep. A low eerie growl came from deeper within the house. All of the tiny hairs on the nape of my neck rose. A voice floated back, urgent, female, but too low to make out the words. Rynda.