Shadows Past: A Rune Alexander short. Book 5.5 of the Rune Alexander series. by Laken Cane

Chapter One
    Fucking Christmas.
    It was the holiday season during which Shiv Crew saw the most darkness. Murders, violence, and suicides climbed steadily from November to January.
    And on Christmas Eve, they were right in the center of the black, swirling cloud that lay over Spiritgrove and spat sharp, evil darts at everyone who lived in the city.
    Rune blew out a long sigh and her breath hung before her like a curious wraith, white and solid beneath the streetlights.
    “You guys feel that?” she asked her crew, as they strode through the city and back to their waiting cars.
    “What’s bothering you, sweet thing?” Z, walking beside her, reached out to catch her hand.
    Maybe because the dark eeriness of the night was getting to her, or maybe because his hand was warm as it clasped her cold one, she didn’t pull away.
    “Don’t call me sweet thing,” she said, out of habit. Then, “This time of year fucks with me.”
    He squeezed her fingers, gently. He said nothing. There was nothing to say, really. Her crew—Raze, Jack, and Z—had her back. They kept her sane.
    Sort of.
    She stiffened suddenly, narrowing her eyes as she caught sight of a huge, hulking shadow standing still and sinister at the mouth of the alley they were about to pass. Her stomach tightened immediately.
    “Berserker,” she muttered. She pulled out of Z’s grip and touched her familiar blades, barely resisting the urge to slide them into her eager hands.
    Strad Matheson awakened something primal inside her. Primal and fearful. He shouldn’t have—he was, after all, Jeremy’s man. Technically, he was on her side.
    But there was something about him. Something terrifying. When she looked into his eyes, she saw nothing but a chaotic rage and the desire to kill.
    He was a fucking…berserker.
    And he scared the hell out of her.
    As she and her men strode past him she couldn’t help but look at him. And even in the dark shadows his eyes glittered. He caught and held her stare.
    It seemed as though she walked in slow motion, caught in the snare of his gaze for an eternity before finally she was past him.
    She shuddered.
    “You good, Rune?” Jack asked, and when she glanced at him, she saw that he hadn’t resisted his urge to fill his hands with silver. His blades flashed as he pushed them back into their sheaths.
    They were all suspicious of the berserker.
    “Yeah,” she said. “Of course I’m fucking good.” And if her voice was a little angry, they understood. Rune Alexander didn’t like people to see her fear.
    Raze’s voice rumbled suddenly into the frigid night air. “Trouble.”
    As one, they pulled their shivs, each of them on sudden and familiar guard. Were they ever not on guard? No. Not really.
    Their lives were violent and bloody and every day was a fight to make it into the night as they battled the bad guys.
    They were Shiv Crew.
    And that was what they did.
    “Fuck,” Raze muttered. “Rats.”
    “Hang back, baby,” Rune said. “We’ve got this.”
    Raze’s terror of the rats was well known. His phobia had no reason. It just was. They understood it, and they respected it. It didn’t make him less. It just made him human.
    “No,” he said.
    Rune sighed. He’d go after the rats with a vicious and desperate horror that meant the rats would not escape death even if they tried to run.
    Raze would kill them.
    And when she saw what they were doing, she was fine with that.
    With Raze’s yell of disgust and rage leading them, they waded into the group of wererats.
    A skinny teenaged boy knelt in the middle of the shifters, his hands—one of which was covered with a huge, bulky glove—held out in front of him. As she watched, he dug at the bound hand furiously, trying to get the stubborn glove off.
    His face was bloody from the rats’ lethal claws. His clothes were too thin to keep him warm, and the rats had managed to make them even worse by shredding them to rags.
    They’d been playing with the human before going