“My brother from another mother always said stupid is as stupid does, but to be honest”—she held her hand up to her mouth like she was going to whisper, but with Liv, she never was one to do the expected—"can I be honest with you, DarkyMcSharky?” Liv asked the male and waited a beat for him to answer.
Xian was sure Rebel and Romie were trying to keep from laughing at Liv’s antics. She had a way with words he wasn’t sure was normal, yet what did they know about normal?
“Female, you’re testing my patience,” the evil male growled.
Liv tossed her hands into the air. “How rude, DarkyMcSharky Rudeboy. Fine, I’ll just spit it out. I don’t know what he meant. My brother from another mother that is. I mean, sure, stupid is stupid. For instance, here you all are, sitting around this here...pit thingy, and none of you are even telling scary stories or singing Kumbaya whatever. Do you have any idea the lost chances you are missing? Like this one with the wiggly neck. He could totally be regaling you with that one time at band camp where he shoved his head up his brother’s uncle’s ass. Which would be why his neck is all loosey goosey and all. See, missed opportunities. Scary, right?”
The demon she had been talking about released what he held, the lifeless form falling to the ground by his feet. “What is this band camp you speak of?”
“Oh, so it wasn’t band camp then?” Liv shrugged her shoulders, her steps slow and measured.
Once she was in the position they’d set up, Xian dropped to the ground soundlessly. Two slight wind shifts were the only thing that alerted him to the twins following him. Another couple puffs of air and their sisters made their descent as well. The quadruplets could anticipate one another’s move before they made it. Xian could as well, but that was because he was bonded to his crew. They all were linked like a true pack, but he’d bonded to them on a deeper level in order to keep from going insane all those years ago when he’d lost Egypt. Now, a little of all of them was inside him.
Every move they made. He felt. Every emotion they felt. He felt. Every pain they endured. He too endured. What they didn’t get was his pain, his emotions, his movements, unless he allowed them to. He refused to be a handicap to the crew. Never again. His beast growled in agreement.
In a slow, contained move, he extended his fingers not bothering to examine the freakishly long claws. From gripping the stone for such a long period, most would have been a little sore, yet Xian felt...nothing. His body took on his partial shift, eyes shifted a little more, the white parts becoming the same black as Liv’s. While the blue would be almost glowing, or so he’d been told, the entire look scared most who happened to see him. Xian had never had a chance to examine what he looked like when he took on the form of his beast, wasn’t sure he ever wanted to. The females of his crew tended to take great measures to ensure they were a good distance away from him or that one of the males were between him and their prey. It didn’t matter that he’d never hurt a single hair on their heads...on purpose.
Swirls of smoke moved around the center where the male had fallen after the demon had sucked the life from the other being. Xian didn’t feel sorry for the bastard, whoever he had been. The ones who ended up in The Mist generally came there because they were the worst of the worst, and had somehow bargained their way out of Hell, or were unlucky enough to get booted out of Satan’s home. Or, as in he and his friends’ cases, they were sucked there by some bastard who pulled some strings. Fucker.
“So, is your smokey friend going to try to ambush me, or are you all going to try and pretend that ain’t happening?” Liv pointed her finger at the moving fog, her tone never changing. A second passed then another before the crazy female let out a loud sigh. “Goddess, always with the stupid. Fine, we do it the hard way.”
A screech that was near earsplitting rent the air, stopping all movement from the mass of males, save for the dark one. Liv lifted her arms in the air, making a production of her movements like she was playing the lead in an orchestra. When her last note fell, the Shadow Demons crumbled to the ground, their thin bodies writhing, howls of pain echoing all around them. “So very boring.” Liv looked and sounded as if she’d just woken up from a nap instead of decimating several demons.
The dark male clapped his hands slowly, each clap sounded like thunder. “Quite a show, my dear. Now, why don’t you invite your friends over there to join our party, hmm?”
The air became thick around him, making his beast go still. The searching entity moved in a zigzag pattern, its obnoxious aura easy to spot. Oh, he’d known the demon wasn’t alone, as had Liv.
“Look what I found hiding behind the caves,” a female voice grated from the same direction Harlow had been stationed.
Moments later, Harlow’s angry face came into view. The entity now had a substantial form cloaked in rags with one bony hand secured around one of Harlow’s arms. It took monumental effort not to launch himself over the hundreds of yards that separated him from the thin female. He counted backward while the bitch shoved his friend into the circle. Harlow was a tough as nails female with long blonde hair and the blue eyes of an alpha female. The wolf inside her would rip the head off of most beings. She was also tiny compared to the rest of them, but the female holding her was powerful. Her brother Cannon was also blond haired and blue-eyed, but where she was small, he was a big fucking bastard with the strength of three normal shifters.
“I wasn’t hiding. I had to potty, and that was the only place with privacy, duh,” Harlow muttered and rolled her eyes.
“What is this potty?”
Harlow whipped her head around, getting herself free from the female’s grip in the process. “I’m sorry, what did you ask? You go to the bathroom, do you not?” she asked, blue eyes wide in fake shock.
Before the grating female could grab Harlow again, his friend moved closer to Liv, shaking her head in obvious disbelief. A low hiss was the answer to Harlow’s question. Xian wanted to snort, because surely, even demons and whatever the fuck these things were had to piss and shit.
Harlow placed her hands on her hips, letting out a loud sigh. “Potty is when you, as a female, have to find a place where other’s aren’t watching. That is unless of course you’re into that sort of thing, which of course I’m not, but hey, if you are, you do you. Anyhoo, as I was saying, we females, that’s you, me, and this chickadee here...I mean, I think you’re a female. Well, let’s pretend you are, even if you’re not, for my story’s sake anyhow. So we find ourselves a place to squat, release the urine in our bodies, and pray to all that we love, that the wind doesn’t blow in the wrong direction. If that happens, we’ll end up getting our shoes or feet wet. Now, if you have to go number two or three, then you best dig a hole first, and squat over it, then bury your stank. That’s the polite thing to do. However, the males of most species just have to stand and whip out their dingalings and go peepee anywhere they want. Of course, they need to watch for the wind as well, or they could end up peeing on themselves, or their friend if they went on a potty break together. Same digging rule applies for them if they go number two or three.”
“Shut up female,” the male growled. Eerie red eyes glowing brighter.