Black Dog(36)

He could not see Ethan or Harrison at all, but even in the midst of wild rage and bloodlust, even while he lunged to attack one of the Zachariah’s opponents, Alejandro found himself astonished at the number of intruders who had been torn apart and lost their shadows and now, in death, dwindled back into their human bodies.

But there were still too many enemies and too few, far too few, Dimilioc wolves. Grayson had not made it back to his feet. Maybe the Master was dead – there was no choice but to fight; he knew that and his black dog knew it, and he closed with one of the strangers. They crashed against each other with a shock that shook the world, claws lengthening as they both reared to slash, each of them using his weight to try to bear the other down, jaws snapping. Alejandro’s claws scored across his enemy’s chest, missing the belly stroke he’d aimed for. His enemy twisted and closed a crushing grip around Alejandro’s shoulder, forcing him off balance and down, and though Alejandro tried to tear himself free he could not get loose–

The flat crack of a pistol shot snapped out like a whip stroke, loud even across the ugly clamor of battle, cutting alike across the roars of enraged black dogs and the screams of those whose wounds were too terrible to be absorbed by their shadows. Another shot. Then a third. Alejandro’s enemy reared up and tried to shake him as a dog would shake a rat, but the strength of his grip was already failing, his body already writhing back toward his human form as Alejandro tore out his throat and flung him away.

The pistol cracked again, and after a careful, stretched-out pause, again. And again. Alejandro took longer than he should have to realize the shooter was now targeting Ezekiel’s opponents. The pistol cracked once more, and then again, and, as the attackers hesitated, Alejandro found himself actually at leisure to watch Ezekiel fight. The black dogs attacking Ezekiel had found him a terrible enemy even without the support of the gunfire, and now, freed from the hard press of crowding enemies, Ezekiel lunged forward with astonishing speed and tore one of them almost in half.

The Dimilioc executioner fought almost casually. He showed no sign of the bloodlust and rage that engulfed Alejandro, which Alejandro had assumed always consumed any battling black dog. That deadly calm was not the only advantage Ezekiel’s formidable control gave him. As Alejandro watched, Ezekiel flickered from black dog to human form and back again between one stride and the next, using the change to slide between baffled opponents, then tear into one enemy after another. With a toss of his head, Ezekiel flung part of a recent opponent’s torso thirty feet through the confused shadows and smoky light, contemptuously dropping the rest of the body, then leaping, with an air of lazy ease that almost disguised his speed, to tear once more into the pile of attackers that hid Grayson Lanning from sight. One black dog spun away to the left and another to the right, a third flung his head back, screaming, and Grayson surged at last out of the horde of his enemies.

Dark blood and black ichor clotted the Master’s shaggy pelt; smoke streamed from his gaping jaws, and actual flames flickered, dark crimson edged with blue, in his mouth and along the edges of his terrible wounds. He twisted his head down and to the side, drew breath, and roared at his attackers, and two of them contorted helplessly back into human shape, though plainly they tried to hold onto their black dog forms. Grayson instantly tore those two apart, and the rest fled backward, a wavering retreat that yielded a lingering pause in the midst of the violent battle.

For a long moment, Alejandro thought that the Dimilioc wolves had, against all possibility, actually won. Just like that: so fast. Fully half of the intruders were down, some with wounds that were closing, but many more dead or near death. He even believed the Dimilioc wolves might destroy Vonhausel himself, and they would all be rid of him – so fast.

Then Vonhausel, well back from the fighting, lifted his head and howled, a long terrible cry that echoed and re-echoed around the icy forest. All across the cleared land before the house, snow exploded into steam. Fire, the crimson-edged hellfire that burned black at its heart, licked out across limp winter-brown grasses. Three pines at the edge of the forest burst into flames, burning with incandescent violence, and the momentum of the battle shifted again. There were still a lot of black dog intruders to rally to that burning cry – fifteen, maybe twenty, and every Dimilioc wolf except Ezekiel staggered under wounds there had been no time to shed. Alejandro did not see Harrison Lanning, maybe he was among the dead or hidden by the smoke; Ethan, one forelimb crippled, stalking back and forth on three legs, the frozen earth charring where he stepped.