Page 56 of Bad Moon Rising (Dark-Hunter 17)
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Fang lay in his bed as a wolf, his mind trapped by the demon powers that were warring inside him as they converted his body even more. He was only vaguely aware of the sounds of the outside world.
He now saw things in infrared while he slept. Every tiny insect in his room. Every creature that walked past his room in the hallway. He was aware of everything on a level he'd never imagined, but unable to respond. He was like an outside viewer who couldn't break through the glass case no matter how hard he struck it.
"Fang?"
Vane. He'd know that deep baritone anywhere. But in Fang's mind Vane was nothing more than a reddish outline standing beside his bed. There was a woman with him. One who smelled sweet and all human. She stood so close to Vane that she appeared tucked in there.
Fang tried to reach out to his brother, but couldn't. It was almost like he was back in the Nether Realm where only voices could reach him. Only now he couldn't understand the words his brother was saying to him. They were jumbled and malformed as he and the woman said things.
Hanging his head, Fang sighed wearily.
"Aw, what's wrong, little wolfie? Can't you get up?"
Fang went ramrod stiff as he heard the raspy voice of a demon. "Alastor." He didn't know how he knew the creature's name, yet he did.
His body went straight into the demeanor of a lethal predator. Fang lowered his head and watched the demon closely with his peripheral, ready to strike him down with deadly precision when the time came.
Small and wiry, the demon was ugly and gray-skinned. Worse, he stank of sulphur and blood. His hook nose and bald head made him look like a gargoyle. In the darkness of his dream, something silver flashed.
Fang reacted on instinct. He caught the demon's hand to see a dagger held there. Laughing at the audacity, or more to the point the stupidity, he wrapped his other hand around the demon's throat and lifted him from his feet.
The moment he did, he saw Alastor's thoughts in his mind. Heard his own mother telling the demon to kidnap Vane's mate and bring her to his mother's pack so that Bride couldn't complete the mating ritual with Vane. It was a pact his mother had made with the demon to capture all of their mates to prevent them from having even a small chance of happiness.
Or more to the point, to keep them from procreating and spreading their animal natures that his mother despised so much.
Raw fury exploded inside him.
"You rotten bastard," he snarled as his demon's bloodlust ripped through him and the demon inside him roared to life. It wanted him to rip the demon's head off with his bare hands and feast on his entrails. Never had he experienced anything like this.
"I was just doing as I was told." The whine in the demon's voice was like a chair scraping across a floor. It made the hair on the back of his neck rise and did nothing to curb his blood fever.
Before Fang even realized what he was doing, he sank his teeth into the demon's throat so that he could taste his blood.
Stop!
The sound of his conscience succeeded in reaching him. Choking on the thick liquid that tasted like warm metal, he forced himself to step back. Alastor slid to the ground, holding his neck as he pathetically begged for his life.
Part of Fang demanded he kill the sniveling beast at his feet. It was what he deserved. But the part of him that was wolf refused to kill for pleasure.
Katagaria only killed to protect or to defend. They never killed for amusement.
At least not often.
But the wolf in him also couldn't let the demon go while Alastor posed even the hint of a threat to his family-that wolves killed over without remorse. "You hunt any of us or those we love again and so help me, I won't stop until I've pulled you into so many pieces, you'll think you've been through a grinder."
Alastor bowed low to the ground as he thanked him for his mercy. "I will never hunt again, master. I swear it." He vanished instantly.
Fang wiped at his lips that were still coated in the foul demon's blood. He cursed at what he'd done. But worse was the desire still in him to cause pain and to kill.
The demon was strong within him and it was hard to resist.
"I won't do it," he snarled at himself.
Ever.
He was a Were-Hunter, not a demon, and he wouldn't cede himself to this hell. He wouldn't become one of them. Not for anything. No matter the temptation or hunger. He would stand strong.
Wake up!
He couldn't. Cold panic consumed him as he staggered through the darkness that had no form or substance, seeking something to return him to his room. Had Thorn relegated him back to hell after all?
No, this was worse than the Nether Realm. There were no caves or anything else here. This reminded him of walking an endless desert that had no sides or borders. The landscape was obsidian and there was no respite.
"Fang?"
He heard Aimee calling to him, yet he couldn't find her in the oppressive black. That was even more terrifying to him than being locked in here. "Aimee?"
"Fang? Wake up, sweetie." That precious, siren voice . . .
If only she could find him again.
"Aimee!" he shouted until his throat was raw, but she didn't seem to hear him this time.
What was going on? How could this have happened to him again?
Something struck him hard in the back of his head.
One moment he was lost in the dark, and in the next he was in his bed with Aimee leaning over him, her features contorted by her fear and worry.
Aimee started to pull away as Fang shifted from wolf to human, but the panic in his eyes riveted her. His breathing ragged, he held on to her hands as if they were a lifeline for him that he was afraid she'd remove.
It made her ache for him. "Are you all right?"
He grabbed her and pulled her into his arms where he held her in a crushing embrace.
She frowned as she realized he was shaking all over. Scared for him, she wrapped her arms around his body to help as best she could. "What is it?"
"Nothing."
But she knew better. Something had happened to him again. Something he didn't want to share.
Fang held her close, letting her scent and arms anchor him back in the world of the living. Closing his eyes, he tried to settle his nerves and his breathing. He felt like an idiot for acting like this. . . .
But the trauma of the Nether Realm was still raw and biting. He never wanted to go there again. He never wanted to go to sleep without having a way to come back.
Shell-shocked and weak, he wanted to feel safe again. But he seemed to have no control over himself anymore. No control over anything.
It was a feeling he hated.
Aimee pulled away to look at him. She placed her hand to his cheek as she searched his eyes with her gaze. "You've been asleep for two days. I was beginning to worry that you were lost again."
