Chapter 1
"Niko, seriously, I can go by myself. It's only a couple of miles."
Maybe Cal hadn't meant to inject quite so much sheer teenager into his tone, but it had the same effect as if he'd been trying his damnedest to cause trouble.
Niko Leandros raised his eyebrows slightly, intently studying his own fingernails as he replied to his brother's assertion. "You know I'm not going to let you go even that far on your own."
Maybe it was the raised brows; maybe it was the light tone in which the words were spoken. Either way, Cal seemed to realize that he was pressing his luck, because he immediately softened his tone.
"Look, Nik, you and I both know that this isn't about the length of the trip," he said quietly. "If I were going next door we'd be having this same argument."
"You're right, we would," Niko agreed. "I'm pretty sure the man next door is a serial killer."
"Ha, ha. Look, let's just talk about what we're really talking about, okay? You're afraid that the Grendels will take me back to that place if I leave here without you."
It was the truth, stated so baldly that it took Niko aback, silencing him for almost two seconds.
"They took you from your room last time," he said quietly. "They took you while I was right there—it will be twice as easy to get to you if you're completely alone."
"I know. And I'm scared of that, too," Cal admitted. "But it won't happen like that this time, Niko, and that's why I have to go. So that we can both start getting over this." He paused as if to give his brother time to reply, but when no answer was forthcoming he went on. "Okay, what if I promise to run all the way there and back? I'd make it in half the time and be doing that whole exercise thing you obsess over all the time. And then we'd have…taken a step. Not a big one, considering that the store is two miles away, but still."
Niko was quiet for a long time, but then he looked up and said, "Fifteen minutes. If you're not back in fifteen minutes, I'm coming after you."
And so for the first time in months, Cal left home alone, and nothing terrible happened.
Then.
XXX
Niko swung his katana and felt it connect with a wet squelching sound before it sank into bone and stuck there. He wrenched it out and the creature dropped. Without checking to see whether it was dead, he stepped over it and up to the door it had been guarding, the hilt of his unsheathed, bloodstained sword still clutched in his hand. Without hesitating, he pushed open the door and stepped into the room beyond.
The room was dark, but he'd expected that, and so his only reaction was to raise his sword a little and listen carefully while his eyes adjusted, or until something happened.
It wasn't long before something did.
"Well, bravo."
The voice was human, cool, and coming from somewhere on the left. Niko swung in that direction, raised his sword higher, and said calmly, "Bravo for finding you, or bravo for getting past your guard?"
"Why, both. Of course, it's rather unfortunate that you had to kill her, but if you hadn't you wouldn't have gotten here in the first place, I suppose."
"Besides, you'll have an adequate replacement for her," Niko filled in when the voice fell silent.
"Well, yes, there is that. Now, would you like me to turn on a light or would you prefer to keep talking to the wall?"
"I'm not talking to the wall," Niko replied instantly. "I know very well that I'm looking straight at you—if not into your eyes, at least into your face—so no games, please. However, if you would prefer a light it won't bother me. Whatever makes you more comfortable."
There was a moment of surprised silence and then the vampire Gabriel said, "Well, well, you are unusual, aren't you? Promise did say you were when she contacted me. I assume she's the one who warned you about my girl out there?"
"She is. Did she tell you what I want from you?"
Gabriel paused for a moment, then said slowly, "Yes, she mentioned that you might need some help, and asked me to do what I could."
"And?" Niko asked tightly.
"And…I have nothing for you."
"Nothing?" Niko asked, so disappointed that some of it actually showed. "No information at all? Not even a friend of a friend who might be able to help?"
"I'm sorry," the vampire said, sounding like he even half meant it.
But Niko didn't answer. He was already halfway out the door.
XXX
Cal went missing for the first time ever when he was three years old.
Niko had only been nine at the time, but he'd already learned to watch his little brother with the hawk-eyes of the most watchful parent. Had already figured out that if he didn't take care of his little brother, protect him from all the big, bad things in the world, no one would.
But he was still an eight-year-old boy, and there are some things eight-year-old boys can't ignore—like the local park's ice-cream booth.
He only looked away for thirty seconds—at most—to watch the vendor pile chocolate sauce on top of chocolate ice cream for a blond teenage girl who was staring at the cone with delight.
Thirty seconds at most, and when he turned back there was no sign of Cal anywhere.
As it turned out, of course, Cal had not been taken. He had simply done what so many children do at some point—he had followed his playmates out of sight without telling his guardian. And if Niko had been a little older, a little wiser, he probably would have figured that out. He probably would have taken a step back and looked at the facts with an eye that would later become incredibly perceptive and concluded that he shouldn't jump to conclusions.
He almost certainly would not have run through the park screaming Cal's name so loudly that nearby mothers began to panic for him. He definitely would not have embarrassed both himself and his brother when he found Cal by shaking him until his teeth rattled and then hugging him until he couldn't breathe. His voice would not have gone hoarse from shouting and Cal probably would not have been scared enough to promise never to do anything of the sort again, and to keep that promise.
But in the end, that was a harmless incident, quickly risen and easily resolved.
If only everything in their lives could end so simply.
XXX
Werewolves were not the easiest creatures in the world to talk to. For one thing, most of them couldn't speak coherent English, being more wolf than anything else. Then there was the fact that most of them viewed humans as having very little point at all. And if that wasn't enough, all but the most restrained of them tended to just kill you if they felt you were getting too long-winded or irritating.
All of these things combined made most werewolves impossible to interrogate.
But not all of them.
"Smell good. Like food."
The wolf eyed Niko appreciatively as he spoke, and Niko returned the cool gaze with one of his own.
"Well, heaven knows it's disgusting to play with your food, so you should probably get on with it," he said calmly. When the wolf simply stared, Niko allowed himself a slight smile. "You see, I know you won't do it—kill me, I mean."
"Why?"
"Because Delilah's told you about me," Niko said simply. "And you know I could take you. So why don't you just tell me if you've heard anything strange or unusual that could help me, all right?"
The wolf watched him for a while, and then slowly shook his head back and forth. "Nothing strange," he said. "Everything normal. Boring. Less food than usual. Nothing else."
"Less food? What do you mean, less food? Don't werewolves eat…"
"Lot of things. Mostly not humans. Eat too many humans and make a mess. Eat animals and others instead. But lately, less others. Eat more animals instead."
The wheels were already turning in Niko's head. They had not helped him to reach a conclusion of how useful this information was to him, but he filed it away anyways.
After all, one could never have too much information filed away.
XXX
"Are you cold, Cal?"
Cal burrowed deeper into the folds of Niko's coat and didn't answer—not that Niko had expected him to. Cal hadn't said a word since the beat-up old car had sped—or rather, tried to speed—away from the wreckage of their own trailer, and Niko was finding it harder and harder to tamp down the panic that threatened to overwhelm him.
"Do you want me to turn the heater on?"
Cal still didn't answer, and Niko felt the fear spike yet again. He should have been more prepared for something like this. Not exactly like this, maybe, but he should have been prepared for the Grendels to finally get to his brother. It had to happen eventually, and how had he neglected to make a plan to take care of Cal when it did? How was it possible that he, who prided himself on being careful and forward thinking, be so clueless now?
"I'm so sorry, kiddo."
Niko hadn't meant to say it—it just slipped out, which only proved how out of his control this situation was. But maybe it had been the right thing to say, because for the first time Cal didn't shrink away at the sound of anything other than the spluttering engine. Instead, he straightened up a little—though he still kept the jacket tight around him—and stared at Niko with puzzled eyes.
"I…I let them take you," Niko said in reply to the unasked question.
The puzzlement faded abruptly, replaced, not with the blank exhaustion that had been dominating his eyes all night, but by irritation mixed with understanding. Then he was leaning forward and leaning his head against Niko's shoulder, one of his hands emerging to fist itself in Niko's shirt, his eyes closing with a quiet sigh.
The show of trust made the iron band around Niko's chest loosen slightly, and for the first time he began to entertain the ides that in the end, things would turn out okay.
Maybe.
XXX
Niko shook off the memory with a sigh as he walked toward the run-down building that was the location of tonight's foray. The flashbacks hit him at the oddest, most random times, and they crippled him every time, something he could ill-afford with the company he was keeping these days.
Tonight he was seeing another vampire that Promise had set him up with, and while Promise's acquaintances didn't usually try to kill him—unlike, say, Robin's—he still had to keep his wits about him.
His tension mounted as he approached the building, not because he worried about what he might have to fight, but because….well, what if tonight was The Night? What if this time, he got actual, solid information? What if this was the night he'd been hoping for?
The tension did not fade as he pushed open the door. The room beyond was dim, but not entirely dark. He stepped cautiously inside…and several things happened at once.
First, the door slammed shut behind him with an echoing bang. Then the barrel of a gun swung into his point of view, another gun pressed against the back of his neck, and a quiet voice growled, "Drop the knife and don't move."
TBC
