Underworld: Blood Enemy Read Online Free

most recent of a string of attacks on the mortals of this realm. Isolated farms and villages had fallen prey to the same ravening beasts, thus necessitating tonight’s hunt.
    Tracking down the killers was more than mere sport; it was essential to the safety of the castle and all who dwelled there.
    A Death Dealer named Casmir bent to inspect the grisly scene. He lifted a hard-carved wooden crucifix from the dirt. Contrary to the mortals’ ridiculous superstitions, the cross did not sear his flesh.
    “Milady?” he inquired respectfully. “What would you have us do with these mortals’ remains?”
    Lady Ilona sighed impatiently. “I suppose we shall have to dispose of this mess eventually and hide the bones where they will not be found.” Her voice held no sympathy for the unfortunate pilgrims, only concern that their gruesome fate might incite their fellow humans. “But not this very moment. First, we must attend to the perpetrators of this butchery.” She turned her steely gaze toward Lucian. “Lead us to your savage brethren, lycan.”
    He winced to be linked in the same breath with the barbaric monsters responsible for this unlawful slaughter. He felt a surge of volcanic anger at the renegades; it was creatures like these that made the vampires think that all lycans were without breeding and self-restraint, much to Lucian’s eternal chagrin.

    “With pleasure, milady!” he told her.
    Although the massacre obviously had taken place several days ago, beneath the light of a full moon, it was child’s play to follow the scent of the bloodstained lycans back into the woods on the opposite side of the pass. Lucian raced through the nocturnal wilderness until the smell of smoke and the din of raucous voices caused him to slow his pace and advance more warily through the brush and bracken. He crept furtively toward the noise and smoke, taking care to stay downwind of whatever lay ahead. He gestured for the vampires to move quietly as well, so that the hunting party passed through the night like specters, barely disturbing a single twig.
    The flickering glow of a roaring campfire could be seen through the tree trunks as Lucian and the vampires drew nearer. He glimpsed humanlike figures around the fire and smiled in silent triumph.
    Try as they might, the rogues could not hide from one of their own.
    Just ahead, the forest gave way to an open clearing surrounded on all sides by dense pine woods. Lucian snuck up to the very edge of the meadow and peered around the trunk of a venerable old fir. He stared, with a mixture of victory and disgust, at the quarry he had gone to such lengths to locate:
    A pack of wild lycans cavorted around the fire, which Lucian knew had been kindled merely to dispel the cold; lycans preferred their meat raw. More than a dozen men, women, and children were present, each, to Lucian’s eyes, more barbaric than the one before. Although trapped in human guise until the moon waxed full once more, the debased lycans looked almost as bestial as their wolfen alter egos. Their greasy hair was matted and uncombed. Their nails were as long as talons. Dirt and sweat caked their unwashed faces. Yellow teeth, with notably pointed canines, gleamed behind the tangled beards of the adult males. Lucian could smell the stench of the renegades’ fetid bodies from halfway across the clearing. He suspected even a mortal could.
    The lycans’ clothing, such as it was, obviously had been ripped from the bodies of their victims and donned without any sense of style or propriety. Lucian recognized the tattered remnants of the dead pilgrims’ long woolen tunics, still rent where a werewolf’s claws had slashed them and soiled with their original owners’ blood. Other lycans wore a mismatched assortment of garments plundered from who knew how many unfortunate mortals: a monk’s black robe, a jesters motley, a noblewoman’s brocade gown, hats of straw or felt, ill-fitting hose and doublets, miscellaneous boots,