Yeah, it was a good plan, a perfectly Kin plan.

If it had been her only plan, things could’ve ended better.

Cabal didn’t waste any words. Raising his hand, he motioned imperiously for Delilah to join them. He was in his mid- thirties with what was probably thick silver hair, wolf silver, shorn short. In the moonlight, it, like everything, had an orange tint. He had a thick build, with broad shoulders, and large hands that could strangle the life out of two people at once without changing form. I couldn’t make out the color of his eyes, but as I didn’t plan on staring into them soulfully and asking him on a date, that didn’t much matter. In spite of his build, he looked as if he’d be quick-quick and lethal. That wasn’t a guess. It was a fact. He wouldn’t be Alpha if he weren’t. But he wouldn’t be the first Alpha I’d had a hand in killing and that Alpha, Cerberus, could’ve eaten this guy in three bites with one head while conducting Kin business with the other. You really hadn’t seen anything until you’d seen a two-headed Wolf.

Delilah shook her head at her Alpha’s beckoning. “I fight the cute foxes, Cabal. The Auphe, he is yours. A challenge. My gift.”

Her words were phrased so Cabal couldn’t refuse, for if he refused this “gift,” he would lose his pack’s respect. And if he lost that, then Delilah wouldn’t be the only one jumping at the chance to replace him. Every member of the pack would look at him with different, dubious, opportunistic eyes. No Alpha could afford that. He bared human teeth and growled. It was a signal to his pack and they flowed forward, side by side among the Ördögs. It was a companionable joining. The Ördögs had their objective and it was the same as the Wolves. It was too bad for the Wolves that they didn’t realize what might be waiting for them if they did kill us. While they had to smell Suyolak, they apparently had no idea how much worse he was than I could be.

For now.

Not that that would happen, a Wolf taking me down. Delilah was right. Suyolak might be too much for me, but I was too much for your average Wolf. Whether Cabal was above average or not, we’d see-if the Plague of the World didn’t get me first.

I shifted my focus back to the healer battle. Both Rafferty and Suyolak were dripping with blood, but Rafferty was wavering, weaving as if he were drunk. He was fighting and having to protect us all at once… and he wasn’t as good as Suyolak. He’d told us so. Now he was showing the toll of doing double duty. But he’d also said he could stop the bastard. Right now we didn’t have any other choice but to believe him.

The Ördögs and the Wolves were seconds from sweeping over us. I aimed the Eagle with one hand and tugged Niko’s braid with the other. He didn’t need to have his attention sidetracked by double duty the same as Rafferty. “I’ll be fine, Cyrano. Only adult, responsible decisions.” Allowing Delilah along had been adult-the rated XXX kind of adult, and perhaps not the most responsible thing. I thought she’d wait until it was all over to make her move, not in the midst of it. Although the move had turned out to be for me instead of against me, it was damn inconvenient all the same-and truthfully, the move was more for her than for me. Whether her pack died or I did, she still won.

“I know you will.” The response was prompt and confident; his sword was between him and the leaping horde.

“Because you’re my brother or because you’ll kick my ass if I don’t?” I shot two Ördögs in the head, fifty or so feet out. They fell so quickly, their eyes so instantly empty, it was hard to picture them having been alive at all.

“Both,” he answered matter-of-factly before continuing. “Don’t forget either option. Goodfellow, keep Catcher out of this if possible.”

Keeping a Wolf, especially one with only the loosest hold on his mind, would’ve been a trick, but it was one Robin didn’t have to pull off. It was too late; the Catcher we knew was temporarily on vacation… gone… and the body that had held him was gone as well-into the midst of the Ördögs and the other Wolves, ripping and tearing flesh right and left. It could’ve been worse. He could’ve gone after Suyolak. Delilah was a fraction of a moment behind him. She’d shed her leathers for fur in seconds and was as caught up in the fight as Catcher. Luckily he was the only red Wolf in the mix. That could’ve been awkward. Shooting your ally’s cousin. Rafferty wouldn’t be any more forgiving of that than I imagined I would be if someone took out Nik for being one of too many blonds in a crowd.

I hit the ground as two Ördögs sailed over me, missing me by inches. I heard them hiss and mutter in annoyance. “Food. Food gone. Food hide. Food like rabbit.” That was fine. Insult me all you want in a fight. I did it too, but it was only worth doing if you were the one walking away afterward. As they turned, literally in midair before landing-bodies slithering into a serpentine U-I shot them both. Other than bleeding and dying in the next breath, they had no further comment. In that same moment I was hit from the side by a big gray Wolf. When you couldn’t get your gun up in time, there was one move to save your throat from being ripped out. I’d done it before, but it didn’t mean I looked forward to doing it again. It worked, but it hurt like hell.

I rammed my forearm into the Wolf’s open jaws, back to the teeth that ground bone, not the ones up front made for tearing the meat. It kept my throat in one piece and let me put one bullet into its right eye. Werewolves were tough and could recover from most wounds, but the brain and the heart were as vulnerable as a human’s. Lead also did the job fine and was a whole lot cheaper than silver.

I kicked the body off me and was back up a split second before going down under three Ördögs. You wouldn’t think at the time, Christ, this was not my damn day. A murderous antihealer, a failing good healer, werewolves, Ördögs, and give a guy a break already. No, you might think that later… if you survived… while lying in bed nursing your wounds, because that was easier to swallow than what you actually thought at the time, which would be more of a less manly “Shitshitshitshitshit.” But that didn’t sound quite as macho, so you ran through the things you would’ve thought, might’ve mentally said, if you hadn’t been A) fighting for your life and B) not to be repetitive, but fighting for your fucking life.

My other hand already held my favorite revenant slicing combat knife. I sliced one sleek black body from jaw to tail and the fact it moaned, “No. Hurts. Hurts,” made me hesitate for less than a second before shooting the other two. I made it to my feet again, wearing a good deal of the Ördög I’d all but turned inside out, and this time, instead of being a target, I saw another one. A brown Wolf, a damn big one even by Wolf standards, was in midleap toward Niko’s back. Nik was taking care of four more Ördögs facing him and two more to the side. That didn’t mean he wasn’t aware of the Wolf and it didn’t mean he couldn’t take care of the Wolf, but he had a lot on his plate. I didn’t like to take chances if I didn’t have to, not when I had so few to take. I hit the Wolf from the side and rode it to the ground while pulling the trigger and putting one in its heart.

“Your charity, not that I need it, is appreciated.” Niko’s back hit mine as I climbed, again, to my feet. We were ringed by Ördögs and three more Wolves. We’d faced worse… not more times than I could count. I could in fact count the times our asses hadn’t been quite so far up the creek, but there had been a few worse, and I didn’t doubt we could handle this… until I heard the gunshot. I looked in confusion at my finger on the trigger on a gun that abruptly felt heavy. My finger hadn’t moved. I hadn’t fired the shot, and no one else was carrying a gun.

And how had I gotten on the ground? I hadn’t lost my gun. Never lose your gun. Over and over, Nik had told me that, because I wasn’t like him. I wasn’t Bruce Lee with an honorary license to kill from Her Majesty’s Secret Service. I was… I coughed and tasted blood. I was a good fighter hand to… shit… hand? Tentacle? Paw? Whatever I was up against, I could give it a run for its money, unless it was human, and then I could kill it without much effort. I’d never killed a human with my bare hands… not yet. I could, though, but I’d never be as good as my brother and he knew it. Always hold on to your weapon, he told me, and there was that shitshitshitshit again when I finally realized.