Sacrificed in Shadow by S.M. Reine

knew to keep her under lights.
    Sunlight was the biggest problem for Elise, but enough artificial light was bad, too. Bad enough to keep her from sliding away on shadows, anyway. The chains on their own would have been useless, but they prevented her from walking over to unplug the spotlights, so she was, effectively, caged.
    There was one door beyond the two lights. The men spoke on the other side.
    “You know what? I’m going to get Rylie. She’ll want to see this.”
    “No, don’t bother her. What about Nash? He took it down in the first place; maybe he’ll want to question it.”
    “He says he’s not going anywhere near it, either.”
    Every time they called Elise “it,” her level of annoyance climbed a few more degrees.
    She thought she recognized those voices. The casual banter sounded like the brothers she had seen outside the sheriff’s department on the night of her arrival.
    Which meant that the man that had shot her still hadn’t changed into a werewolf—gold eyes, full moon, and all.
    Elise fingered the locks on her chains. It was fairly basic, and reinforced with silver, which had no effect on her. She could probably break free. But she didn’t try to escape. She was exactly where she wanted to be.
    The bullet was still heavy in her stomach. Elise felt a telltale surge of nausea that meant her body was about to reject it.
    Her abs clenched. Her vision blurred. Two short heaves, and she had vomited the bullet. It emerged from her throat encased in slimy black tissue, like she was vomiting a liver, and it burst when it struck the floor. Ichor sloshed over the wood, sank into the cracks between boards.
    “Do you think it’s what’s killing everyone?” one of the men went on, oblivious to Elise’s activity inside the room.
    “There’s an easy way to find out. ‘Hey, are you Satan? And did you kill six people and try to blame it on us? What’s your problem with the fur, huh?’” A pause, and then he said, “What? Stop looking at me like that. It’s worth a try.”
    “Fuck. Look…okay, fine, I’ll talk to it.” That one sounded like Seth, the younger man, the kopis. His voice wasn’t as deep as his brother’s. “Come with me, Abel.”
    The werewolf’s name was Abel. Seth and Abel. Two of Adam’s three sons from the Bible.
    “Wittle baby scared by the big mean demon?” Abel asked. Apparently, Abel was kind of a dick.
    “Ever heard of backup, douchebag?” Seth shot back.
    Definitely brothers.
    Elise pulled her legs underneath her so that she was sitting on her knees. If she needed to attempt escape, she could break the chains and stand in one swift motion. It also kept her from getting her pants soaked with black vomit.
    “If one of us isn’t going to be able to stand up against it, you think having two of us there’s going to make a difference? Nash says to leave it locked up until morning. You don’t have to like the guy, but you’ve got to admit he knows what he’s talking about.”
    A long pause.
    “Yeah, all right. We’ll wait until morning.”
    Shuffling footsteps. The men had walked away.
    After everything Elise had seen and heard during her time in Northgate, she had been forming a mental narrative of these brothers: A pair of hunters, one of them a kopis, that had been fighting werewolves together. One of them had been bitten. Changed. They stayed together. Now the kopis was trying to cover his bloodthirsty brother’s tracks—maybe by removing the hands and other identifying features of the corpses. He had also stolen files from the sheriff’s department to make sure they were doing a good enough job.
    It was a tidy narrative. A family in collusion. Sweet, really. It would be no harder to swallow two murderers than one.
    But that was quickly falling apart now that she had realized there were more people involved. Someone named Rylie, someone named Nash. An entire pack of werewolves.
    Did you kill six people and try to blame it on us?
    They might have known Elise