Page 2 of Broken Moon

Nowmy wolf smelled it—andthem.

I saw eyes widen and mouthsgape as the trio of assholes realized they were being rushed by a crazy person,but the girl on the altar never moved. She was aware—I smelled her fear and herblood, which coated the side of her face and matted her blonde hair—but shestayed quiet and calm as the events unfolded.

The ones who stood over her,though, they were not calm. First they were shocked, then afraid, and then,their fear turned to rage.

“Kait,” the restrained womancalled. “It’s okay.”

I gaped.“Lucille?”The youngvictim was Lucille Shannon from my favorite bakery. The woman had a gift forcreating food—baking, cooking, slapping together a sandwich—anything she madetasted like it was blessed by the gods. “What the—"

“It’s just a fucking girl,” oneof the guys yelled. He was a tall skinny man who looked barely out of histeens, with long, dyed black hair and black clothes—they all wore blackclothes, as though wearing black was a prereq for evil and badassery—relievedonly by the gleam of silver jewelry and blades he probably had no idea how touse.

I stood not two yards away,breathing hard—I’d been running full out for a half a mile, at least—my bodyjerking beneath the pain of my hobbled shift, my mind dark. I smiled, somewhateagerly, I was sure, and cracked my neck. Fighting was always better thanrunning for getting a girl’s mind off her problems. “Just a woman,” I said.“And that’s going to be plenty enough to kick your skinny punk asses.”

They looked at each other,their black-rimmed eyes uncertain, more from the mystery of being invaded by astrange running woman than fear that I might actually be able to overpower andkill them all—but before they could open their mouths, something else happened.

Something much worse than atrio of young people in the middle of the woods performing some ritualisticsacrifice of a human girl…

Yes. Worse than that, even.

A demon came.

And just that quickly Irealized exactly what they’d been doing, and I understood from their shrieks ofshock and awe that they hadn’t thought it would work. They’d summoned a fuckingdemon. Worse, a powerful one. A demonboss.

“Shit,” I whispered. Oh well.Good thing I had the energy of an agonized wolf racing through my body. Atleast that lent me a little extra something.

The demon wasn’t massive, buthe was tall.Iwas tall, at five feet ten inches, but this guy had atleast eight inches on me. And he had a demon sword. A short one, more of a fancydagger, really, but still.

I pulled my own blade from thesheath at my hip, but I knew that against a powerful demon, it wouldn’t do asmuch as it might against a lesser demon. Notnearlyas much. Didn’t meanI wasn’t going to try, though.

“What do you want here?” Iasked, as I gripped my knife and faced him.

“Want here?” he roared. “I wantnothing here. I wassummoned.”His voice was like glass and gravel,sharp and crunchy, filled with contempt and heat and death.

“Not by me,” I assured him. I noddedtoward the now cowering trio without taking my stare from him. “They calledyou. Maybe concentrate on them and let me and my friend slip on out of here.”

“Oh no,” he growled. “I’ll killyou all and take the soul offered me.”

I hefted the knife. “Her soulwas not theirs to offer. You won’t be taking it with you.” I glanced at thethree assholes. “Theirs, however, are up for grabs.”

“Really?” one of the young men demanded.“Really?”

“Shut up,” I said. “You calledthis thing. You have no right to outrage, my friend.”

And finally, the girl tied tothe makeshift altar began to cry. “God! Don’t let him take me,” she begged.

I didn’t know if she wastalking to me or to actual God, but I answered her anyway. “Not planning on it,Lucille.” I didn’t add that with a big angry demon to fight, I might not havemuch of a choice. No sense being pessimistic.

The demon didn’t take the bladefrom the sheath at his side. I was sure he didn’t think he’d need it, even witha pain-wracked woman brandishing a blade of her own.

He opened his mouth, smiled,and released a red-tinged curl of smoke at the three human-sacrificingassholes. They simply stood there, frozen, and watched the smoke slowly advanceuntil abruptly, it shaped itself into a screaming face and whizzed through theair, then changed into a red rope that began to snake around their bodies.

The trio broke suddenly andwith a quiet scream from the lead guy, they turned to run. But it was too lateto run. The demon left them there, caught in his circle of unbreakable smoke,and turned back to me.

“You’re going to make me fightyou, aren’t you?” I asked. I didn’t think my voice wobbled. Much.

He leaned slightly and peeredat me through narrow golden eyes. “Why the pain, little girl?”

I clenched my knife and myteeth. Nothing irked me more than some big strong man calling me a little girl.Fucker. “Maybe I like pain,” I growled.