'I want that son of a bitch's heart on a stake and his head on my wall!<span style="font-style: italic">Find him</span>!'<br/><br/>Even at such a distance the Russian Master's furious timbre rang out into the night as clearly as a church bell. He had always been an impatient man, and his tendency to throw all caution to the wind in a swell of vehement frustration had provided Echo with his escape many times over. But tonight he felt would not be such a night.<br/><br/>The twin lacerations eeling their way in near perfect symmetry from the point of his shoulder to wane at the small of his back were crippling. Blood still oozed from the wounds, spilling over the waistband of his jeans and dribbling down his legs in a weir of crimson. Every moment that passed enfeebled him further, and it would not be long before the squadron of Vampires picked up the scent. Sooner still were the wind to change direction, but for the moment the frozen breeze favored him.<br/><br/>He continued to pick his way down the residential street, concealed as often as possible behind neatly pruned hedges, garden fences and trees, pausing every so often to listen for any advancing adversary. Only the blustering tread of a human straggler pierced the silence now, apparently spooked, considering the elevated thrum of it's heartbeat and the fleetness of it's gait. It was down wind from both the squadron and himself, though the noise would no doubt attract the attention of the Vampires.<br/><br/>It turned into the street behind him only moments later, trotting over the opposite side walk, it's locomotion stiff and awkward in it's efforts to diminish the slapping of it's shoes against concrete. A woman, Echo realized, watching warily as she fished loudly about her handbag. Sapphire eyes surveyed the area frantically as her head jerked left and right; a mane of billowy blonde tresses fanning about a pretty diamond face with each abrupt flux of view. Most definitely spooked.<br/><br/>Echo remained hidden, flush to the trunk of a Catalpa as the woman drew nearer, before darting silently across the street the moment she'd passed. Her perfume was strong in her wake, sweet and feminine, beneath which her own scent was the tantalizing fragrance of a healthy human woman. But there was more; not an odor, nor anything visibly inimical about her, but a<span style="font-style: italic">feeling</span>. She felt static, as if the air about her were alive, and it all but crackled in his ears as he trailed closer and closer. The crackle of twigs and the gentle whir of wings cleaving air as a Night Jar took flight snapped him from his contemplations, and Echo skirted quickly from view as the blonde woman swiveled around, magnetic atmosphere surging like a generator powering up.<br/><br/>And then the wind shifted.<br/><br/>He was on top of her before she'd even realized he was there; one arm clamping around her chest like an iron band, the other shooting up for his fingers to grip her face, palm clamped firmly over her mouth, and he drug her backwards into the overgrown scrub of the blocks only shabby yard. The growls and snarls of the Vampires were already audible in the distance.<br/><br/>'Scream,' he said warningly, his smooth tongue and elegant, foreign accent smothered beneath a snarl that bubbled thickly from his throat like boiling, black tar, 'and neither of us will live to see the sunrise.'