CHAPTER 172.

Dominil looked up and laughed. "You're not smart, Albermarle. You're an idiot."

"An idiot? I'm the one who trapped you here! Maybe I should just pull this trigger!"

"If you weren't an idiot, you'd have done something better with your life than hunt werewolves."

"Werewolves deserve to be hunted!"

Dominil almost smiled. "You didn't seem to think that when you kept asking me out."

"I didn't know you were a werewolf then."

"Maybe if you put your efforts into finding a girlfriend instead of hunting werewolves, you wouldn't still be obsessed with me."

"That's it," cried Albermarle. "Now I'm really going to kill you." He pointed the gun but lowered it again. "You know I'm more intelligent than you. You just won't admit it."

Dominil tried again to become a werewolf but failed. She wondered if she could possibly keep Albermarle talking till the spell wore off. If it ever wore off, something about which she had no evidence. "I've never counted an encyclopedic knowledge of comics as a sign of intelligence," she said.

"I know a lot more than that!"

"Really?" The music floated over the parking lot. "What's this aria?"

Albermarle looked uncomfortable. "Opera was never my strong point."

Dominil laughed, though the effort hurt her.

"You just think you're so superior, don't you!" yelled Albermarle. "Well, you're not. And no amount of changing the subject to opera or comics alters the fact that I won. I trapped you here. I'm smarter than you." Albermarle drew himself up to his full height. "And you know what? I'm over you, Dominil MacRinnalch. I don't care how intelligent or attractive you think you are. You're nothing. You've got no emotions. You're going to live your whole life and never love anything. At least I know what loving something means." Albermarle put his gun back in his concealed holster. "Not only am I smarter than you, I'm superior. You see, I'm capable of changing. I'm not a robot like you. I can change my mind. And now I don't care enough about you to even kill you. Go on, be a werewolf. I don't care. I outsmarted you, and now I'm leaving. You can spend the rest of your life being miserable and caring about nothing. You'd have been lucky to get a date with me. You don't deserve it."

Dominil dragged herself to her feet. "Leaving would be a good idea. If you stay here, I'll kill you."

"You'll kill me? Not very likely. I've got a gun, and you can barely move."

"Maybe so. But I'm Dominil MacRinnalch, and I'll tear your arm off before you can pull the trigger."

Albermarle hesitated. "Rubbish. You can't turn into a werewolf."

"I'll do it anyway." Dominil bared her teeth.

Albermarle took a step backwards. "You're nothing. I'm over you. I'm leaving."

He turned to go. A dark shape dropped from the sky, coming from the top of the truck. It landed on Albermarle. He screamed as Kalix bit into his neck. They crashed to the ground together, but such was Albermarle's strength that he managed to drag himself to his feet, and stood for a moment with Kalix hanging onto his neck, her feet right off the ground. Then he succumbed to the terrible pressure of her jaws. His arteries ruptured, and he collapsed to the ground, dying in seconds. Kalix disentangled herself, rose to her feet, and growled.

"Bad hunter." Kalix turned her blood-soaked snout towards Dominil and snarled. "Transform."

"I can't."

"Yes, you can. It's night. Make the change."

Dominil struggled to rise. "I can't change. Some sort of spell. I don't know why it's not affecting you."

"You have to change!" yelled Kalix.

"Why?"

"So I can kill you."

CHAPTER 173.

The Fire Queen limped back to Earth, arriving in the gardens of Andamair House to the unexpected sight of the enchantress cradling the dead body of her lover.

Malveria gasped at the sight. "Thrix! What happened? Did you find him cheating on you? Did you have to take such brutal revenge?"

Thrix raised her eyes, which Malveria noted, were caked with tears, to the detriment of her makeup. "Captain Easterly was a werewolf hunter."

"Preposterous! I introduced him to you."

"Thanks for that."

Malveria stared at Easterly's body, very offended that he'd turned out to be a werewolf hunter. "What a mournful occurrence. It's a sad day when one is forced to slaughter a lover. I myself-"

"I didn't kill him."

"You didn't?"

"No. I broke down in tears and sobbed like a baby."

"Oh." Malveria looked dubious. Easterly had clearly died from a werewolf bite.

"I was still crying when Kalix arrived. She killed him."

"Ah. Was he about to kill you?"

Thrix shook her head. "I don't think so. He loved me too. Or so he said. We never got the chance to discuss it fully."

"Kalix is not one to let romance stand in the way of a good massacre."

Thrix started to cry.

"Dearest Enchantress, I sympathize greatly with your pain. But I cannot console you at this moment, nor let you weep. I need your help, most urgently, or my kingdom will fall."

"What?" sniffed Thrix.

Malveria apprised her of the situation. "So you see, Kabachetka and Distikka have outsmarted us completely. Distikka will soon take control of the Great Volcano and the realm."

"Can she really do that?"

"If she is a blood relative, as she claims, then yes."

Thrix let go of Easterly.

Malveria helped her to her feet. She glanced at the blood on her hands and clothes and shuddered.

Applause thundered inside Andamair House as Felicori completed another aria, and the sound rolled over the grounds outside.

"Felicori is singing beautifully tonight." The Fire Queen looked wistfully towards the great mansion. "Now help me break through Kabachetka's barrier and return home."

"I don't have any power. Kabachetka's eclipse spell has robbed me of my werewolf power, and it seems to have weakened my sorcery as well." Another tear rolled down Thrix's cheek. She stared forlornly down at Easterly's body. "He was going to take me to Milan in the summer-he had a house there."

Malveria wasn't listening. She was wondering what she could possibly do to save her throne. She'd counted on Thrix lending her strength to the attempt to break through Kabachetka's barrier. It seemed that that wouldn't happen now. She'd have to fight her way through herself. Malveria knew she wouldn't make it in time. By the time she burned her way through the blocking spell created by Kabachetka, Distikka would have overrun the Great Volcano and taken control. When Malveria finally returned, all she could expect would be to be blasted out of existence with the full force of the volcano.

"But I will take her with me if I can," she muttered, "and as many of her traitorous supporters as possible. The Fire Queen does not admit defeat and will go down fighting."

CHAPTER 174.

The fundraising event had gone splendidly. Felicori was in excellent form, and the audience thrilled to his rendition of favorite arias mixed in with operatic obscurities of his own choosing. There had been a brief interruption when several members of the audience appeared to sicken simultaneously. A stout gentleman in a box, Baron MacPhee, was taken ill quite suddenly and had to be helped outside. Several other distinguished-looking members of the audience also left, but the interruptions were minor and didn't spoil the occasion.

In the front row, Verasa MacRinnalch felt extremely ill and remained upright through force of will alone. Along with the other werewolves present, the Mistress of the Werewolves had suffered the baleful effects of Princess Kabachetka's spell, but she had refused to show any sign of suffering. She'd heard some noise behind her, as if other members of the audience might have left, but was unable to turn around to check for fear of collapsing. Verasa's first thought was that some major outbreak of food poisoning had occurred, which would be bad for her event. But as the concert proceeded without major interruption, she realized that this was not the case. It was a relief, though at present she felt too ill to fully appreciate it. The seat beside her was empty, Markus had not come into the auditorium, and the annoyance she felt about that still remained, even in her sickened state.

Markus was prowling through the undergrowth, on the trail of Beatrice and Heather, when the sickness struck. He gasped, sank to his knees, and wondered how it was possible that there should be an eclipse of the moon at this moment, for Markus recognized the symptoms. But an eclipse was impossible of course, no matter how bad he felt. He might have remained where he was had he not at that moment caught the sound of another person being sick.

"Beatrice," he thought immediately, recognizing the sound. He'd heard Beatrice being sick before after she'd overindulged at a clan celebration. He crawled forward. Though his senses were dulled, he knew she was behind the next bush, with Heather beside her.

"This is going to be a strange reunion," he thought and attempted to drag himself forward. At that moment, another sound appeared, the sound of two men approaching through the trees. Two men who were trying to go quietly and failing, by werewolf standards.

Orion and Pictor came out of the fog in front of Heather and Beatrice.

"They look sick," said Orion.

"They must be werewolves."

"Are you werewolves?" demanded Orion, a little dubiously.

Neither of the distressed young females answered. The two hunters both drew weapons.

"Albermarle wasn't so stupid after all," said Pictor.

Markus attempted to transform, despite his illness. He was startled to find that he couldn't. For a second, he quailed. To be suddenly unable to transform was a terrible experience for a MacRinnalch. The hunters raised their guns. Then Markus succeeded in doing what other werewolves that night had failed to do. Telling himself that he was the Thane and could not just let two clan members die without doing anything about it, he raised himself to his feet and jumped past the bush, directly at the two hunters, whose guns were pointing at Beatrice and Heather. Markus crashed into them. All three tumbled to the ground, and a gun went off, but as the hunters scrambled to their feet, Markus realized he couldn't rise. The leap had used up all his energy, and he couldn't move. He, Beatrice, and Heather were now easy prey for their foes.

CHAPTER 175.

Vex came out of the sky like a shooting star and crashed to Earth right on top of Captain Easterly's body.

"Ew!" She dragged herself to her feet. "What's all this blood? Why is Thrix crying?"

"Probably because you landed on her recently deceased boyfriend, imbecilic niece," replied the Fire Queen.

"Oh. Sorry about that." Vex's eternal good humor had finally been worn out by the rigors of the journey. It was cold and hostile in the teleporting space, especially to one as unused to it as she. Her shoulders drooped. "I bumped my elbow," she said, sadly. "And I think I lost my mittens."

Malveria loomed threateningly. "Explain yourself. Didn't I instruct you not to come to Scotland? Did you go to see the werewolf band?"

"Definitely not! I'm looking for Kalix."

Malveria glanced at Easterly's body. "You're in the right place. Why are you looking for her?"

"Because she's going to kill Dominil."

"Ah." Malveria nodded. "So she found out."

"Have you seen her?"