Unleash The Moon (The Preternaturals Book 6) (9 page)

Noah. Now the tears did fall. It wasn’t as if she
thought about him all the time anymore, but lately, seeing the wolf
in the next cube every day was too hard. It brought back too many
memories. She hadn’t been allowed to play with him for a while
before he disappeared. She didn’t know why her father and Noah’s
dad had started their feud, but the result was that they couldn’t
play together anymore.

She’d cried in her room for weeks after that, but it
was nothing compared to the night she’d overheard that he’d gone
missing. It wasn’t until that night that she’d known she’d never
see him again. She’d refused to leave her room for a month after
that.

The wolf in the cube next to hers
glared at her, then stared expectantly at the door waiting for
exercise time. He seemed extra amped up tonight. It had to be the
moon. She feared she wouldn’t survive out there with the moon full
and everyone shifting. There were only a couple of other vampires
in this group, and they were unlikely to protect her from any
threats out there. They’d probably been waiting for an excuse to
join in on the killing.

“
Number 5857B,
Please prepare to exit your cell for daily exercise,” the happy
robot voice said. Sydney knew some of the messages were
pre-recorded, but sometimes when the voice spoke it still sounded
robotic, but sentient. She wondered if it was artificial
intelligence or if someone typed into the machine what it should
say.

It wasn’t as if she exercised out there. She mainly
just tried to stay out of everyone else’s way until it was time to
come back inside. The glass door slid open.

“
Please follow
the glowing arrows to the exercise yard, and remember to play nice
with your friends.”

She was pushed aside by several therians racing to
get outside under the full moon, so she was the last out. She
missed the frenzied shifting. By the time she reached the yard it
was like a zoo. Cheetahs, panthers, wolves, bears. There wasn’t
yard big enough for the insanity.

Sydney looked up. The moon was red. Aunt Greta once
told her about the blood moon and how powerfully strong it was for
therians. Great. Just what she didn’t need.

She tried to disappear next to a nearby wall as the
shapeshifters ran and started fights and burned excess energy under
the moon. A wolf leaped at her, but a second wolf body slammed him
away from her and started to snarl and snap at him. The wolf that
had come at her was bleeding now and slunk off to lick his
wounds.

The smell of therian blood got to the other two
vampires and they joined in the fray to try to get a taste of the
blood being spilled left and right in the fighting. The blood was
getting to Sydney, too, but she knew if she listened to that urge
she wouldn’t come out of it alive. The other vampires could hold
their own out there.

The robotic voice chirped happily over the loud
speakers. “I think that’s enough excitement for today, please make
your way back to the building.”

It was extremely short for an exercise period, and
Sydney knew why. The blood moon had been more than they’d
anticipated. There were more guards than last night, but it still
wasn’t enough to contain it all.

As they moved back inside away
from the influence of the moon, therians began shifting back to
their human forms, and Sydney found herself surrounded by a bunch
of naked people who still seemed way too keyed up to be in an
enclosed space with. A hand latched onto her arm.

She turned to find a very naked
5856 looking at her with an intensity that unnerved her.

“
We have to get
out of here, Sydney.” He’d used her name. He’d
remembered
her
name. Why had he just used her name? The other night he’d made it
perfectly clear that she was an identifying number—a cog in the
machine—and nothing more.

He dragged her down a secondary hallway, not the one
with the arrows, another, darker hallway with more glass cubes. But
this area wasn’t used; the lights were out. Sydney could barely see
here, but she knew the wolf could see just fine in the dark. His
eyes were glowing an eerie yellow.

All kinds of fucked-up thoughts went through her
head. She tried to pull free, and then a guard appeared and helped
her get out of his grasp, but the wolf let out a savage growl and
snapped the guard’s neck. 5856 dragged Sydney down a couple more
side hallways. One of them was dimly lit with flickering lights
that hissed. They ran right into the lady in the lab coat who’d
given Sydney her test results. The wolf grabbed her like he might
kill her too, but then he let her go.

“
Don’t make me
regret it, Kristen.”

She shook her head and ran in the opposite
direction.

At the end of the hallway was a steel elevator.

“
Thumbprint
required for entry,” a recorded voice said out of the box next to
the elevator.

He shifted partially and used his claw to rip open
the box. He tore out a few wires and pressed a bunch of buttons on
the keypad in quick succession.

“
Thank you,” the
computer said as the doors slid open.

“
Come on,” he
snarled, dragging her into the enclosed space with
him.

Sydney moved into the back corner of the elevator as
if she could go invisible. He was obviously attempting to break out
of here, and he’d get her killed doing it. Why had he brought her
with him? Was she a hostage?

The elevator went down what felt like thousands of
floors but was probably only about thirty-five. The wolf was still
naked, his clothing lying somewhere out in the exercise yard with
all the others. She shrank back when he turned to her.

“
I don’t know
the whole layout of this place, but my guess is the security bug is
throughout the building. At least I hope it is if we need to go
through anymore thumbprint scanners. When we get outside, I’ll
shift again under the moon. I can’t stop it. Whatever you do,
follow me, and when we get to the edge of the city, run for the
desert and do not stop. I’ll be right behind
you.”

“
Why—”

But the door opened on the ground level, and he
grabbed her arm again.

The happy robotic voice said, “5856 and 5857B are
out of their rooms, please stop them and bring them to the courtesy
desk if you see them. Thank you.”

Sydney froze in the face of the melee. There were
too many people in lab coats running toward them. Some had weapons.
The wolf’s eyes darted around as if he were doing math equations in
his head, then he grabbed her and tossed her in a big laundry bin
nearby. She landed on a soft pile of freshly laundered white
clothes and peeked out to see him shift again. He moved faster than
she could track, dodging bursts of light that came out of the
weapons. He ripped out throat after throat until dead bodies
covered the floor with little room to walk.

“
Unit B, please
report to the lobby,” the voice said. Sydney wasn’t sure if she
imagined the voice sounding somehow less cheerful and upbeat this
time.

The wolf shifted back to his human form, ran for her
and lifted her out of the bin. He carried her, running to the
doors. “Remember what I said.”

Outside he set her down and immediately shifted,
then he began to run. Sydney ran behind him. She didn’t have the
kind of stamina he did, and she’d had bagged blood. She was going
to lose him, but she pushed and ran even though her lungs burned,
because if she didn’t they’d kill her tonight. There was no way
they’d bother with her any further when she’d proven to be so much
trouble. She’d seen action movies, ancient and outdated though they
were.

The lights of the city were practically blinding.
Loudspeakers were everywhere and the same cheery robotic voice
she’d heard every day inside the building was speaking, only this
speech was intended for a very different audience.

“
Everyone likes
a good citizen. If you see something strange, please report it to
one of the officers so that we can help keep everyone safe. Please
stay far away from the perimeter. We can’t protect you out there.
There is no need to fear the wilderness. Only bad people go there.
You’re a good person. You would never do anything
wrong.”

Sydney saw the perimeter and ran.
There was a giant red sign that read
Turn back, wilderness less than 500 feet.
She ran straight for it, and a few seconds later
crossed into the open space outside the boundary of the city. She
turned back to see the wolf bounce off an invisible barrier. Why
had she gone through but he bounced off?

Because you’re not a real vampire.

Except this time, for once, it might have saved her
life. The wolf began to dig, and she kept running.

When she reached the desert, she stopped short at
the sight of a wall of vampires and werewolves all in their wolf
form. The wolves growled.

“
Pretty thing
all alone outside the city,” one of the vampires said leaving the
line of them to approach her.

When he got closer, he sniffed the air, and his eyes
narrowed. “You aren’t a human.” He grabbed her by the shoulders as
if to shake her. “What are you,” he demanded.

A wolf jumped up and bit him on
the arm, and the vampire let go of her. It wasn’t one of the wolves
from the group. It was her cell neighbor. He put himself between
her and the others and growled something to the other wolves. They
growled back. And Sydney might be going crazy, but it seemed like
they were actually talking to each other instead of just making
random angry sounds.

One of the wolves struggled to
reclaim a human form. It was a female wolf. She had a black snake
tattoo that wrapped around her upper arm, slithering all the way
down her forearm. Not that the smirking vampires were looking at
her tattoo. She was attractive and naked, and occasionally vampires
could be pigs.

The woman rolled her eyes. “Shut up.” She turned to
Sydney. “Sydney?”

“
Umm, yes?”
Sydney wasn’t a hundred percent sure she wasn’t in her cube
dreaming all this.

“
You guys come
with me. I’m going to take you some place safe. You can stay with
my pack.”

“
We aren’t just
letting them go,” the vampire that had grabbed Sydney said as if he
were upset his only entertainment of the night was being taken from
him. “That
thing
shouldn’t even be alive.”

Her wolf—because it was all Sydney could think of
him as, now that there were about twenty of them all standing
around snarling—growled at the vampire. But then a second vampire
said, “Shut up, guys. There’s a LOT of dinner coming right for
us.”

The vampires lost interest in them as unit B showed
up. They and the remaining wolves converged on the humans as the
female wolf shifted to lead Sydney and the guy who’d inexplicably
saved her life, to the den.

Chapter Five

The makeshift den was only about five miles outside
the city’s perimeter, but Sydney felt like she might drop at any
moment. The sun would be up in a few hours, and she couldn’t
remember ever feeling this exhausted.

The den was an old train station
that looked to have been converted into a hotel and restaurant
before it became a werewolf den. A large connected building rose
behind the main lobby that no doubt had accommodated human guests
at one point. When they got through the first set of doors into
what had once been the station, the two wolves shifted back,
neither of them concerned with their nudity.

“
This guy is
staying with us while he forms a plan to get his girl back to their
place. I’m sorry, what was your name?”

Sydney hadn’t cared what the surly werewolf’s name
was a few hours ago. She’d only hoped she never had to interact
with him again. But now it was getting a little weird. She couldn’t
call him “5856” or “Hey you”. And if she called him “her wolf” in
front of anybody else for lack of a better naming convention, she
might just go greet the sun in her embarrassment. Better to roast
to death than to have to suffer through his nasty sneer again.

Before mystery wolf could reply,
several other people—werewolves—filed into the main lobby. “What
the hell is
that?
” one of the males asked,
pointing at her.

When she’d spent all her time in
the compound, she’d known she was weird, but it hadn’t been driven
home just
how
weird, until everyone else in the outside world seemed able
to pick up on it instantly. And whatever they were picking up on,
they didn’t like.

The woman who’d brought them caught a pair of pants
and top mid-air when they were tossed at her and began to dress.
“They are our guests until tomorrow night. They need some place
safe for when the sun comes up.”

“
Oh, no,” the
guy said. “
That
is not staying here.”

Her wolf, now in his human form and very very naked,
growled and moved into the other wolf’s space. “She is mine. She
goes where I go.”

“
Oh
yeah?”

The female wolf stepped between the posturing males.
“Cool it, Rafe. This one is strong. You don’t want to challenge
him.”