Fallen Stars by Morgan Blayde

Author:Morgan Blayde [Blayde, Morgan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-04-09T22:00:00+00:00

19. BATTLEFIELD

Lucas ran through the gathering gloom of evening, the sun a broken smudge of red on the western horizon to his left, seen between skyscrapers on the far, western bank of the Red River. Beyond the Boardwalk, past the Margaritaville Casino, he made better time on the open terrain, following the ghoul as a human.

His wolf would have been faster, but he didn’t want to take time out for a shapeshift. The shift would have shoved his human side out of the driver’s seat. And his wolf would be left to starve from the calorie burn and more than a little dangerous, even to his allies. Besides, the ghoul was a new type of threat. Lucas wanted to keep his human intelligence in the game even though his wolf’s innate cunning was as formidable as his claws and fangs, and his unnaturally fast healing.

He slowed a bit once to use his phone’s Wi-Fi. Google Maps gave him an idea of the terrain up along the river. They were coming to a place where a sharp turn created a triangular block of empty land between the river and a last cluster of streets to the east. Trees lined the river and roads were absent. This was a perfect area for a battle with little to be damaged except a few fields and maybe an agricultural shed.

Lucas ghosted on through the dusk, phone in his pocket, his hiking boots sinking in the squishy, spongy turf. With only twilight cover, he increased his stride and speed. His human nose lacked some of his inner wolf’s keenness, but the scent of dead, rotting flesh was very distinct.

It’s time to overtake this thing and put it down—somehow.

If nothing else, he had his enchanted Bowie knife, a gift from his Dwarven godmother. It occupied its own little pocket dimension, waiting for his mental call to pop into his hand. It had a keen edge and a thirst for blood. At times, he wasn’t sure if he used it, or if it used him.

Not really much difference.

The thickening scent was his only hint of warning. The ghoul had found a depression in the ground just beyond a gentle rise and had wallowed in mud, using claws to cut away the turf. Lucas saw all this in a flash as the ghoul surged to catch him by surprise, but the ghoul only had human speed. The bestial power of Lucas’ inner wolf let him duck under a slash of claws, rolling aside.

Lucas drew his Bowie knife from thin air and let it trail behind him, slicing across the ghoul’s ribs as he passed. Reversing his motion, Lucas spun back and drove the point between two ribs, into a lung. He kicked the ghoul off his knife, hanging onto the handle.

Lucas noticed that the ghoul had shifted some of its mass around, replacing its lost head with a smaller oval of sludge that had no features except for a slash of a mouth. The ghoul plowed that face into the soggy turf, mud flying off of him.

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