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Abovethe rooftops and leaped, clearing the gap between two buildings The starlight caught it for a heart-stopping second, illus, and the dark gray mane The hair on the back of ht itself had opened its jaws and spat out a prehistoric creature, so in the dark I only saw hie imprinted itself in nized that he was predator and I was prey I’d known him for three years now, and the instinctual response still hit every single time

The beast landed, turned north, and vanished into the night, heading toward Northlake

Instead of running away as fast as I could like any sane person would do, I nudged Cuddles, hurrying her until she broke into a gallop One doesn’t let her fiancé fight a horde of ghouls by his were just not done

• • •

THE EMPTY EXPANSE of the Lawrenceville Highway spread before h a shallow hill here, and stone walls held back the slope on both sides I parked myself at the mouth of the hill, just before it ood a place as any to make a stand

I stretched my neck slowly, one side, then the other I’d left Cuddles tethered to a tree half a mile back Ghouls normally would have no interest in her, but she sht try to rip her neck open just out of spite

Thethe fields The night sky was ih, the stars like dia atof March, and the onset of spring was sudden and wars

The last time I was this far froest shapeshifter organization in the South That was behind h without backup Lucky for me, I had the best backup in the city

When I had clai had created a boundary I felt it fifty feet in front of one to inspect the boundary sooner, but I’d been busy trying to separates would run outBut pretending that the clai hadn’t happened had done me no favors

So moved in the distance I focused on it The htly A few breaths and the ripples broke into individual shapes running in an odd loping gait, leaning on their ar into a quadrupedal run

Wow, that’s a lot of ghouls

Showtime I reached for the sword on my back and pulled Sarrat out of its sheath The opaque, aled and razor sharp, the blade was a cross between a straight sword and a traditional saber, with a slight curve thatSarrat was fast, light, and flexible, and it was about to get a hell of a workout

The distorted shapes kept co theallop toward you was cohthe world sharper, and melted into calm awareness

Thin tendrils of vapor rose fro up et s?

I walked toward them, sword in my hand, point down I had few social skills, but intihouls saw me The front ranks slowed, but the back roere still running at full speed The ainst a rock and finally screeched to a halt just before the boundary We stopped, theic divide, me on the other

They were lean and , spadelike hands, each finger tipped by a short curved claw Bony protrusions, like short knobby horns, thrust through their skin at random spots on their backs and shoulders The horns were a defensive houl out of its burrow, the horns would wedge against dirt A olf arth would have a difficult tirow as long as four inches, butthis crowd barely reached half an inch Their skin was dark gray on the chest, neck, and face, the kind of gray that was e Small splotches of muddy brown dotted their backs and their shoulders If not for the watery yello of their irises, they would’ve blended into the road completely