If someone were to ask her what she wanted to do with her summer, Saya’s response would likely have something to do with lying on the beach and enjoying the sand and the heat.
Instead of being in the Namibian summer, though, she was here, in Sheremetevo Airport, bundled against the cold, feeling the closest thing she could to hate. The worst part of this wasn’t that she had to go to Russia in January. The worst part was that she wasn’t sure why she was in Russia in January. But the fact was that there was something itching in the back of her head, making her feel something like she owed someone something.
The first werewolf she smelled was twenty minutes after she landed. The second one was ten minutes after that. And now, almost three hours later, she couldn’t get the smell out of her nose.
She split up, then, infecting Moscow with brown recluse spiders, but even then she couldn’t shake them. She holed herself up in her hotel room, and they found their way to her. She was about to go into the umbra, to flee that way, when she heard someone outside her room. “You’re all idiots if you think she doesn’t know you’re here,” she heard, in gutteral Russian. Saya’s Russian was good enough to know that, although she wasn’t sure she could produce it.
But the voice-
She remembered that voice, from somewhere. She went to the door, flung it open, and immediately spit, venom flying. The man in front of her moved out of the way, knowing too well that it was coming. It landed on the wall, and the caustic venom left a stain that would never come out. “You haven’t changed,” he said.
“Your majesty,” she said.
“You’re taller. And curvier,” Nic said, and one of the other werewolves with him stared at her. She was still beautiful, even though she was a spider. It’s not always enough for knowledge to overpower hormones. “And your eyes are brown. What the hell happened to you?”
“You smell,” she replied, simply.
He grinned. “It’s good to see you too.”
There’s a growl behind him, and she just looked over. “I’ll bite, dog,” she said, and the growl got louder until Nic snapped and it stopped. “You could have called on the phone, you know,” she said. “I don’t appreciate the spiritual invitation.”
“And made it comfortable? Don’t be absurd,” Nic laughed, and he touched her like he wasn’t afraid, and it was different, but there was something pleasant about it.
Nic and Saya; The hunter becomes the hunted
Instead of being in the Namibian summer, though, she was here, in Sheremetevo Airport, bundled against the cold, feeling the closest thing she could to hate. The worst part of this wasn’t that she had to go to Russia in January. The worst part was that she wasn’t sure why she was in Russia in January. But the fact was that there was something itching in the back of her head, making her feel something like she owed someone something.
The first werewolf she smelled was twenty minutes after she landed. The second one was ten minutes after that. And now, almost three hours later, she couldn’t get the smell out of her nose.
She split up, then, infecting Moscow with brown recluse spiders, but even then she couldn’t shake them. She holed herself up in her hotel room, and they found their way to her. She was about to go into the umbra, to flee that way, when she heard someone outside her room. “You’re all idiots if you think she doesn’t know you’re here,” she heard, in gutteral Russian. Saya’s Russian was good enough to know that, although she wasn’t sure she could produce it.
But the voice-
She remembered that voice, from somewhere. She went to the door, flung it open, and immediately spit, venom flying. The man in front of her moved out of the way, knowing too well that it was coming. It landed on the wall, and the caustic venom left a stain that would never come out. “You haven’t changed,” he said.
“Your majesty,” she said.
“You’re taller. And curvier,” Nic said, and one of the other werewolves with him stared at her. She was still beautiful, even though she was a spider. It’s not always enough for knowledge to overpower hormones. “And your eyes are brown. What the hell happened to you?”
“You smell,” she replied, simply.
He grinned. “It’s good to see you too.”
There’s a growl behind him, and she just looked over. “I’ll bite, dog,” she said, and the growl got louder until Nic snapped and it stopped. “You could have called on the phone, you know,” she said. “I don’t appreciate the spiritual invitation.”
“And made it comfortable? Don’t be absurd,” Nic laughed, and he touched her like he wasn’t afraid, and it was different, but there was something pleasant about it.
If she understood things like pleasure.