Free Bound (Dark Reflections Volume 1) by Dean Murray Page A

my forward momentum, it was definitely enough to slow me down. It felt like the barrier hadn't been intended to stop as much force as I'd generated. Rather than a plate of steel, it now felt like a block of wood. I could feel my claws catch on imperfections in the surface as my talons sank into my opponent's flesh.
    He'd set himself and was trying to bring his axes back around to take advantage of the edge that his telekinetic shield had bought him, but the combination of my talons in his belly and the force of me slamming into him, even slower than I'd intended to, was enough to knock him off balance and break his concentration.
    As his head slammed into the warehouse's hard concrete floor his shield disintegrated and my claws tore into his chest. Mindful of just how hard of a time Jasmin was having putting her vampire down, I put my other hand through his heart and then rolled back to my feet.
    Jasmin and Jess were still working their fallen vampire over, so I sprang at James' opponent. I was coming in from the side and slightly behind her, so there was no way for her to have seen me, but somehow she still started around, almost managing to bring her sword up fast enough to impale me through the heart. I managed to slap the blade aside at the last second, claws screeching against steel, and then I was within arm's length of her.
    She blocked my first strike with her hilt in a masterful display of swordsmanship, but James grabbed both of her arms in his claws and a second later she was dead despite all the advantages that her hardy vampire constitution gave her.
    In the end the pyromancer vampire started another of Jack's wolves on fire, but Jasmin ripped his throat out before the blaze managed to really get burning hot. I visually checked the vampires over as I walked towards Jack, confirming that none of them were a threat anymore.
    "What next?"
    Jack looked at me and shook his head. "We need to get the wounded into the vans and start first aid on them. I'll start dousing the vampires in oil and we'll torch them before we go."
    "Where is the oil? I'll go grab it."
    Jack grabbed my arm, his lethal claws gently stopping me from turning away without breaking the skin.
    "You need to get into the van with the rest of the wounded. We don't have much time and I'm not eager to have to carry you there if you pass out and don't shift down to your normal form."
    "What do you mean? I'm fine."
    Jack pointed at my right side and I looked down to see that my first opponent, although off balance and disoriented, had still managed to sink both of his axes into my side before I killed him. I made it four more steps before my knees started to buckle. I passed out about the same time as I hit the floor.

Chapter 5
    Alec Graves
Clean and Tidy Chain Hotel
St. Louis, Missouri
    The clock said it was eight a.m. when I woke up in what was obviously a modest hotel room, but there was no way to know for sure how many days I'd been out. I pulled my sheets back and gingerly probed the bandages that had been liberally applied to my side. They didn't hurt, which was a good sign, so I stripped back the corner of the biggest bandage back to verify that the flesh underneath had knit back together.
    The wounds had scarred over already and were starting to trade in the pink of recent scars for the white of old scars. Given that Kaleb had wanted us down at the border less than twenty-four hours after we arrived in St. Louis, that was bad news. Normally I'd have said that it would take roughly twenty-four hours to swing that much healing, but that didn't match up with it being morning rather than evening.
    The only answer was that I'd been more injured than I'd realized and I'd been down for at least thirty-six hours. I'd heard plenty of the older members of the pack quietly complaining that Kaleb's troop deployments never seemed to include any leeway for injured people, so I already knew that he'd be pissed that we'd missed our scheduled flight down to