The City on the Edge
Thirty-six

Hellhounds. Their red eyes smoldered like the embers of a fire. Cracks, fiery and angry, burned across their skin. It looked painful, like the splitting char of roasting meat, but it didn’t seem to bother them. The odor of ash curled from their skin like smoke on the wind as they widened their circle, stalking back and forth, attempting to surround them. Liva stood calmly. She was their mother. They were her children. She had nothing to fear from them.

One stepped forward, pointing a finger at Sebastian. “I knew I smelled a human on the wind. Give him to us.” The tips of his black hair waved when he moved, ethereal and transparent, as if formed by smoke. After a moment, Ronnie realized his hair was indeed smoking.

Liva stepped aside with a sly smile. “You want him, Ignis? Take him.”

“What?” Ronnie snapped at her.

The hellhound strode forward and snatched the front of Sebastian’s shirt in his claws. The fabric immediately singed and smoked in his hand. Ronnie lashed out with a snarl, meeting the threat, her claws raking across the hellhound’s face. He released Sebastian with a growl and stepped back, putting a hand to his cheek. Ronnie’s fingers burned. She looked down at the brilliant orange blood coating her claws like molten rock. She shook her hand, sending the hot blood to the ground. It hurt, but she didn’t back down.

Protect. Fight.

The animal in her surged to the surface, instincts screaming that another predator was threatening what belongs to her.

“Ignis? Are you okay?” another hellhound, probably the youngest by the look of him, asked.

Ignis pinned Ronnie with an amused smile. “Oh, I’m fine.” He pulled his hand away and Ronnie watched the deep gouges she’d made sizzle and vanish, completely healed. “You’re good, shifter, better than I’ve seen in a while. But I’m not leaving without that human.” With a thundering howl, Ignis tipped his head back and burst into flame. His clothes burned away like dry kindling to an open flame, falling off in clumps of ash and cinder.

“Over my dead body.” Ronnie gnashed her fangs at him.

“Tell me that a fine shifter like you isn’t wasting time with that weak sack of yellow-haired flesh.” He rolled his shoulders, stepping to the side. Ronnie followed him and soon they were circling one another slowly while the others stood back to watch. “Is it serious between you two? You could be the future mother of my sons.”

As Ronnie made to slash at him again, something whistled through the trees, sending a fall of dry leaves drifting down to the ground. They caught fire like meteors when they reached Ignis’ fire. Another whistle. It sounded like the wind, but Ronnie knew it wasn’t. Something else was up there, circling them.

“Enough of this, she is not Alura,” Liva said firmly, her amusement gone. Ignis went stiff at her words. “Leave, Ignis, and return to your home, before the nightmares come for you.”

“You mean that prison you keep us in?”

Another whistle shrieked through the branches. The other hellhounds backed away, their faces turned upward. Whatever lurked in the trees frightened them. Ignis looked up as well, hesitating before his flames extinguished in wisps of grey. He stood nude before them, a silver chain glinting around his neck, decorated with what Ronnie was sure were fangs, though of what, she couldn’t tell. He took a few steps back.

There wasn’t a trace of shame on his face as he opened his arms wide and bowed low. “I guess that’s it, then. For now.” He righted himself and smiled wide. “How about a kiss before I go?”

“Absolutely not.” Sebastian ground out between his teeth. Ronnie felt his anger churning hotly in her gut.

She snarled at Ignis. “Get the hell out of here.”

He spun on his heel and retreated through the trees with the rest of his pack, taking off at a swift run once his feet left the sharp rocks of the lagoon shore. A high pitched whistle surged past Ronnie, carried on an chilling gust of wind that threatened to topple her as it passed. Shadows, blacker than black, raced across the ground after the hellhounds. Ronnie brushed at her bare arm to replace ice crystals had formed on the fine hairs.

“What are those?” Lorna asked.

“Nightmares.” Liva’s tone was grim. “The elves created them during the war to help control the hellhounds and keep them from fighting. They still linger here in the forest, confined within the trees. I haven’t been able to destroy them, only contain them.”

“The hellhounds seem afraid of them.” Sebastian noted.

“The nightmares are manifestations of grief and regret. Hellhounds have those in excess.” Her voice contained a sadness, a mother powerless to help her ailing children. “Did you know that hellhounds are born aflame? Their mothers never survive, burned alive from the inside. It’s a terrible tragedy- a mother who will die before she holds her child and child who will grow up knowing he never knew his mother’s arms. Hellhounds are such tragic creatures.”

If you come across the hellhounds, try to convince them to join our cause. They are invaluable fighters. An asset.

Ronnie stared at the trail the hellhounds had taken, repeating Alukorra’s words in her head, debating if it would be worth the hassle. Ignis was an ass. It took less than a minute for Ronnie to never want to see his face again, but Alukorra believed they could be useful. For whatever reason, she wanted Ronnie to recruit them.

She looked over at Sebastian and knew from the reluctant look on his face that he was thinking the same thing. He shrugged. “What’s more important?”

Her pride or Alukorra’s cause?

Ronnie heaved an audible groan. “Liva, where do the hellhounds live?”

Liva smiled at her, not the least bit surprised at the question, as if she already knew what Ronnie would do. Maybe she did. “Past the lagoon on the other side. You’ll see it. Don’t worry about the nightmares. They aren’t after you.” She turned, done with them now, and disappeared back inside the hollow tree.

Ronnie stomped her way over to the trail and stepped over an overgrown root, irritated before they even began. “Let’s get this over with.”