Changing quickly, she gave a squeak as he grabbed her and tugged her against him, his hands squeezing her backside as he kissed her with a particular roughness she liked.
Meeting his hunger with her own, she kissed him with a passion she had never tapped into before, a driving urge growing inside her that she had to squash down when she felt his hunger. It was not a sexual hunger, and she growled her frustration before she pulled away from him, dressing quickly.
They headed out of the city without issue and when they were free of it, they burst into a run that got them both moving.
Thanks to his youth, he had strength enough to almost keep up with her and she grinned as he ran with her, their bodies working hard to keep up the speed.
They came across the village silently and the two humans seemed to vanish without a trace as the pair snatched them from the street, dragging them away into a clearing.
They died without much fuss and while he drained their blood, she consumed their flesh and she felt him watching her, lust blazing in his eyes.
But then it changed to one of confusion and she felt the breeze shifting slightly behind her, turning, her eyes widened as she found the furious, almost murderous crimson glare of Vincent staring down at her.
"How did you…?" she started to ask, but she didn't manage to finish the question as he reached for her.
Rolling sideways, she threw herself up off the ground and snatched Malik's arm as she ran, the vampire immediately falling into step beside her.
"Come here!" Vincent snarled, his anger a visible aura on him. His hand was bleeding, and she knew she would be captured if he got a single drop on her.
How had he managed to find her after all that time? It had been what? Almost a month? And then suddenly he was on her like he had known all along where she was?
He wasn't a runner though, and dread filled her as she tried to think who he would bring along to try to capture her. She could only hope he didn't try to bring Kai to catch her. That wouldn't end well for her.
He didn't bring Kai, instead he brought a very large, very black wolf that she hadn't expected and had never seen before.
The beast came streaking for them from their right. Throwing Malik from her, she rolled, narrowly missing the sharp claws.
Flinging herself back up onto her feet, she looked back to see Vincent staring after her, his black mask shining in the dying light and the wolf was on her tail again.
"Go!" she screamed to Malik, and he sprinted away, swearing at having to leave her side, but she didn't know how else to keep him safe. The wolf was just as fast as her and she swore, trying to sort through what gear she had on her that had been returned.
"Etani!" Vincent roared, but she refused to stop, the patter of wolf paws right on her tail. How the man had convinced a wolf to come after her was a mystery, but given its eyes were pure white and smoking, she could only assume it wasn't a normal wolf and it wasn't Catherine, so she had no idea who it might be.
Finding the knives she wanted, she slid her fingers into the loops and spun, the wolf realising he had no time to react and the three throwing knives slammed into his chest.
The wolf howled, and she turned, coming to a skidding halt that left gouges in the ground.
Even with her trying to stop, she still didn't have enough room to stop, and Vincent looked down at her, his hand lifting and his fingers curled around her throat even as her arms lifted, trying to stop the collision with him.
Wrapping his free hand around her back, she whimpered at the sticky feeling of his hand and jerked back from him, only to find him refusing to let go.
"There's no running now, Etani," Vincent growled.
The wolf padded forward, whimpering and crying, but then he was swearing, and she looked around to find Hunter on all fours, naked and bleeding.
"That was unexpected," she said to the man.
He huffed out a laugh, pulling the knives from his chest. "So were the knives," he wheezed.
Vincent jerked her, and she looked up at him, his furious glare nearly melting her face.
"Don't take me back… I can't go back there, Vincent," she whispered.
His anger faded slightly, his eye narrowing as he considered her and then Hunter.
"No one said we had to bring her back, only find her," the werewolf hybrid said and slowly Vincent let her go.
Looking down at his hand, she waited a breath and then she bolted.
Both men swore while she grinned, sprinting full speed to get out of the range of Vincent's magic.
She had to wash the blood off, and she pulled up her shirt, wiping furiously at the blood, but it was difficult to tell if there was any left on her skin.
Evidently there was, and she screamed when fire exploded through her as he stepped through reality mere feet ahead of her.
Staggering to a stop, she slumped to her hands and knees and tried to breathe through it as the pain faded, leaving her trembling and her head spinning.
Vincent's fingers curled in her hair and he yanked her up, looking at her neck and then her shirt.
"Difficult little bitch…" he growled as he pulled back his hand and her world went black with a slam of pain into her temple.
***
Waking up face down in the grass, she was immediately blinded by sunlight, and she clenched her eyes shut, the light stabbing through her brain to give her an instant migraine, or perhaps that was the result of the punch to the temple, she wasn't sure.
"What do we do with them?" Vincent asked, pacing back and forth near her head.
"It's not like we have to take her back. We could just go with her wherever she's going."
"It was implied that we take her back," Vincent snarled, angry still.
"It was only a matter of time before we caught her."
"It's been over a month!"
"With her on the ocean where none of us could find her, and then the mages? We have her now, it's fine. Unless you killed her."
"She's not dead. But what do we do? Do we take her back? Do we let her run? What?"
"You could let me go…" she groaned.
Both men turned, but she couldn't open her eyes, and when she tried, she found she couldn't move her arms either. "Seriously, Vincent?"
She strained to move her arms, but they refused to come apart.
"If you didn't run, we wouldn't have to restrain you," the man growled, and she rolled onto her back, her face screwed up in the light.
"Can you turn down the sun?" she complained. The Hunter obliged her, moving forward so that his shadow fell over her face. "Thanks…"
"Where were you going and why did you bring the baby vampire?" Hunter asked, meeting her eyes as she opened them hesitantly.
"Anywhere," she said evasively.
Vincent growled when she ignored the second half of his question. "You had everyone up in arms ready to tear that city apart looking for you until that boy found the note," he raged while she watched him, her brow lifted.
"I left to get away from you lot," she sighed, earning her a boot to the ribs.
"Was that really necessary?" Hunter asked while she wheezed, curled up on her side and trying to suck in a breath.
"You shut up," Vincent snarled in response. "You left because you're a coward!"
"Fuck you, Vincent. You don't know anything!" she yelled back, anger burning inside her at his words.
"You're a coward and you ran way like a scolded bitch with her tail between her legs!"
Pushing herself up, she glared up at him as he planted his boot against her chest and forced her back down, crushing the air out of her lungs.
"Oh, poor Etani, so many men chasing after her, what a poor little creature," he sneered.
She jerked, trying to shove him off her but he refused to move.
"None of you would even look at me without hostility! No one wanted me there and so I left! All any of you want to do is control me and make me into your world creating sex slave and I'm sick of it!" Shoving herself up, she drove the point of her boot into his lower back, and he dropped. Rolling onto her knees, she struggled to her feet and followed after him, driving her boot into his ribs again and again. "I'm not your whore! I won't be used for your sick pleasures, and I won't be used for my abilities! I won't belong to any man, and I refuse to be treated like a tool for the Gods!"
Hunter wrapped his arm around her ribs, and she got one more shot off on Vincent's side before the hybrid dragged her backwards.
"I'm not a whore!" she screamed, tears welling in her eyes. "I'm not…" she whimpered a moment later, her eyes clenched shut as she tried to convince herself just as much as she was trying to convince them. "Just let me go… I don't want to go back there… please…"
Vincent stood, his face hard as he stared at her and then looked up at Hunter, the two men communicating silently.
Vincent sighed and moved forward, wiping away her tears with his clean hand.
"Come on, you're stronger than this. We both know you are. You've gone on this long, why are you now giving up?"
"I don't want to fight any more. They keep beating me down and I just… I can't fight any more."
"That's crap, and you know it. You love the fight."
"Not this fight. It's too hard. I can't take the abuse any more…"
Vincent frowned at her and then he pulled her into his arms and hugged her painfully hard.
"I'm not going to let them do that to you again," he growled in her ear.
"Me neither. Never again," Hunter growled.
"Just let me go…" she pleaded; her face buried in Vincent's chest.
"You promised to come when I called you," he said.
She pulled back, looking up at him. "You didn't…" she said, not understanding.
"I am now. We'll keep you safe and I can finish my work," he said, his anger fuelling his determination. "We'll keep you safe, and we'll get your magic back."
"Daemon will find me."
"He can't," Vincent said with a wicked grin. "He is furious with Sobek, because your binding means he can't sense you."
"He can't find me… but what about when you don't find me?" she asked, her mind working on the possibilities of being able to hide away from the world and focus on getting her magic back.
"We will tell them we are still looking. It will give us several months."
Staring up at Vincent, she searched his face desperately for a hint of a lie, and when she found none, she turned to Hunter, doing the same to him.
"You'll keep me hidden? Do you swear?" she demanded of them, hope flooding through her. She couldn't go back, and when she had her magic, she could hide better from them all.
"We promise," they both said.
She slumped forward into Hunter's chest, her eyes shut and relief flooding through her.
"Bring the baby," Hunter growled.
Looking around, she found her poor Malik bound up like a stuck pig with a wad of fabric in his mouth.
"That's Malik, my scion," she explained.
Vincent jerked, shocked by the news.
"Etani, what did you do?" Hunter murmured, half fascinated and half horrified.
"I couldn't let him die."
"You turned a human? Why did you turn a human?"
Good question. Why had she decided to save the man? He was food, yet she couldn't stand the idea of him dying.
"Come on, welcome to the world of chaos," Vincent sighed, ignoring her glare.
"Do you swear you won't take me back?"
"I promise," he said.