by Karen Lynch
White-hot rage exploded in my brain, and my Mori cried out happily as we came together. Its power roared through me, saturating every muscle, every tendon, and bone. I lifted my eyes to the vampire as the world sharpened into brilliant focus around me.
I don’t know who was more surprised – the vampire or me – by the fist that slammed into his nose with a satisfying crunch. He howled and put a hand to his bleeding face. A few seconds later, his mouth twisted into a snarl and he came at me again. He was fast, but not fast enough.
The world slowed down around me, and I watched his clawed hand swipe at my face before I tilted to one side to evade it. I kicked out and my booted foot struck him squarely between the legs.
He wheezed and sank to his knees, and I grinned with malicious pleasure to see that Nikolas had been right about the effectiveness of a well-placed kick. Before the vampire could recover, I spun and my other foot connected with his face.
The vampire flailed as he flew backward, right onto the blade in Jordan’s hand as she came up behind him. His eyes widened in shock, and he made a choking sound before he fell face first into the snow.
“Liv!” Jordan dropped her knife and ran to Olivia. The rage drained out of me as I went to kneel beside our fallen friend. As soon as I touched Olivia’s face I knew her life force was gone. My eyes met Jordan’s and I shook my head, unable to speak.
“Can’t you help her?” Jordan begged desperately.
“She’s gone. I’m sorry.”
Jordan’s eyes filled with tears for the first time since I’d met her. “You idiot,” she whispered hoarsely, brushing Olivia’s hair out of her face. “How many times did I tell you to always carry your weapon?” Her breath hitched, and she looked at me. “I always teased her, but she was my friend.”
“I know, and she knew it, too.” I stood and grabbed Olivia’s arms.
“What are you doing?”
“She should be next to Mark.” The two of them had finally admitted they were a couple last week, but everyone knew they were crazy about each other long before that. They had died together, and it was only right that they lie beside each other in death.
Jordan got up and took Olivia’s legs, and together we carried her over and laid her at Mark’s side. I closed his eyes, and Jordan put their hands together. Then she wiped her eyes on her sleeve and cleared her throat. “Come on. We can’t stay here.”
I cringed at the screams coming from behind us, near the main building. We were out of sight for the moment, but we were stuck between the battle and the woods. An attack could come from either direction, and we were looking a bit worse for wear with only one weapon between us. Using my Mori’s strength had left me tired, and our dunk in the river hadn’t helped. I wasn’t sure either of us would survive another attack.
“Which way should we go?”
Jordan found her knife and wiped it on the snow, leaving bloody streaks behind. “I don’t know, but we’re sitting ducks out here.”
“Lead the way,” I said, waving in front of me. Pain shot up my arm, and I grunted loudly.
“Ah shit, did he get you?” Jordan lifted my arm to examine it, and I saw for the first time, the long tears in my coat sleeve. There was blood on my sleeve, but it didn’t look too serious. It just hurt like the devil.
“I’ve had worse than this. Let’s go.”
“Sara!”
I turned at the sound of my name, and my lips parted in a trembling smile when I saw Chris sprinting toward us from the main building.
“Chris,” I yelled hoarsely, running toward him, relieved to see he was okay.
“Behind you!” Jordan shouted, and Chris and I looked at the same time to see two vampires run at him from behind. Neither of them looked older than sixteen, and their slower movements marked them as newly made. Chris brought up his sword and cut them down with little effort. I couldn’t help but feel a dull pang of sorrow for the two teenage boys whose life had been cut so short.
Chris waved us toward him. “Let’s go. We have to get you two out of here.”
Jordan and I were twenty feet from Chris when he suddenly stopped, his body going rigid like he’d been shot. I screamed his name as his face twisted in agony and he sank to his knees. A second later, my eyes were drawn to a slight figure emerging from the woods to our right, walking with purposeful strides toward Chris. It took me another few seconds to recognize the white markings on the person’s dark face.
“No!” Power seared my throat and tongue as I sprinted forward and threw my body on top of Chris’s to shield him from the Hale witch. My hands found Chris’s face, and I opened myself to rip the witch’s magic from him before it could burrow inside his mind like a cold maggot. Revulsion filled me when I touched it, but unlike the old magic that had festered inside Desmund, this was new and much weaker. This witch was nowhere near as powerful as the one who had attacked Desmund or the witch who had come after me.
I ignored the cold nausea as I pulled the dark magic into me. It seemed to take on a life of its own, fighting to escape as if it knew its impending fate, but I was a lot stronger than I’d been two months ago when I encountered my first Hale witch. My power incinerated the magic. I heard a scream nearby, but all I cared about was Chris.
“Chris? Chris?” I rolled off him and tapped his cheek a few times before his green eyes opened and he gazed at me in confusion. “Hey. You with me?” I asked him.
He groaned and rubbed his brow. “That is some war cry you have, cousin. What the hell happened? I feel like I have a killer hangover.”
“Hale witch.” I glanced over at the witch who was lying on his side, facing away from us. “Come on, we have to get up.”
“Up?” He blinked in confusion. “Why are you so wet?”
I tugged on his arm. “Long story. Come on. Get up.”
“Shit!”
I looked up in time to see Jordan dive away from the attack of a snarling female vampire who had probably been a college freshman a few weeks ago. Jordan rolled in a ball and came to her feet with Chris’s sword in her hand.
“This is more like it,” she said fiercely as she brandished the weapon with ease. The vampire skidded to a stop and stared at the sword warily. Jordan leapt forward in a burst of speed and sliced off one of the female’s arms at the elbow.
“That was for Mark,” she shouted over the vampire’s screams. “And this is for Olivia!” The sword whistled and the vampire’s head separated from its body.
Jordan stood over the corpse, shoulders heaving and silent tears running down her face. Then she spun with the dripping sword in her hand and stalked angrily toward the fallen Hale witch.
“No.” I pushed to my feet and caught her arm. She tried to pull out of my grasp, but I held firm. “Trust me; you don’t want him in your head. I’ll handle this.”
The witch had his arms wrapped protectively around his head. I nudged his back with my boot, and he moaned loudly.
“If you can’t take it, don’t dish it out,” I told him pitilessly. “Get up.”
He rolled onto his back and uncovered his face. I sucked in a sharp breath when I saw that he was only a boy, maybe sixteen, if that. How young did these guys start in this business?
“Please,” he whispered brokenly. “Please finish it. Kill me.”
“What?” I took a step back. “I’m not going to kill you. I just wanted to stop you from hurting people. Did you hurt more of my people out in the woods?”
The boy nodded, and I swore furiously at the thought of the warriors lying out in the woods in pain. “You better hope they’re alive,” I ground out. More screams pierced the air around us. “If we survive this, you are going to show us where they are and then you are going to fix whatever you did to them. You understand me?”
“Please.” He sounded more like a young boy than a powerful witch. “They took my mother and my sisters, and they will kill them if I do not do as they ask.”
“I’m sorry about your family, but I’ll do anything t
o protect my family, too. You can sacrifice yourself later if you want to, but not until after you help the people you hurt. Now get up.”
He stared at me for another minute before he sat up. His strained expression told me that was as far as he could go on his own.
I was loath to touch him, but I could not leave him here and give him the opportunity to escape. Reaching down, I grabbed his hand and pulled him to his feet. He wavered unsteadily and I called Jordan over. “I don’t think he has enough juice left in him to try anything, but if he does, you can kick his ass.” I gave the boy a hard stare. “You hurt anyone else and you’ll deal with me.” I had no idea if I could hurt him, but he didn’t know that. He nodded submissively.
Jordan gave the boy a warning glare before she took his arm. I hurried back to Chris, relieved to find him sitting up. “Can you walk? We can’t stay here.”
Shouts reached us before he could answer, and I turned to see Erik and three other members of his team racing toward us. The warriors sped around us and intercepted a group of six vampires advancing on us. My heart thudded when I realized how close we had come to being taken by them. Surrounded by so many vampires, I had a permanent lump of ice in my chest, which rendered my vampire radar useless.
Erik quickly sized up our pathetic group. We had one sword, an injured witch, and our seasoned warrior was down. “Get out of here,” he shouted at us. “We’ve got this.”
I glanced around us frantically. In every direction, I could see fighting, hear screams and shouts. Until now, we’d kept away from the main battle, but it looked like it had found us. There was nowhere to run.
“You’re going to have to help me up, cousin,” Chris said, and I wished I had some of his fortitude. I took his hands and helped him to his feet, putting one of his arms over my shoulders so I could support him. He shook his head to clear it, and despite my fear, I felt the urge to grin at him.
“See, Dimples, I knew I’d end up having to save your ass someday.”
He tried to scowl but couldn’t quite pull it off. “If I remember correctly, you said it would be from all the women. You didn’t say anything about almost getting my brain turned to mush.”
“Beggars can’t be choosers.”
He stumbled, and I shifted to take more of his weight. Damn, Mohiri warriors were not light.
I looked around us. “Where to?” I asked Chris, trying to keep the fear from my voice.
“That way.” He pointed to the cluster of low buildings a few hundred yards away on our left that housed the garages. “If we can make it there, we’ll be okay.”
“If we make it.” I took a deep breath to steady me and started in that direction, trying not to stagger under his weight as we moved as fast as we could. I looked straight ahead so I didn’t see the battle around us, but there was no way to block out the sounds of fighting and dying. If I survived this, those sounds would haunt me for the rest of my days.
“Sara, we will make it.” The arm across my shoulders squeezed me. “Nikolas will be so proud of you.”
“Have you seen him? Where is he?” I asked anxiously.
“We were coming back from town when someone raised the alarm. We found the main gate open and ten vamps waiting inside. The two of us were holding them off when Desmund showed up to help. Nikolas asked me to come find you.”
“You left them there?” My voice rose when I thought of Nikolas and Desmund alone and outnumbered five to one.
“Don’t worry about the two of them. Desmund is as good as Nikolas with a sword, and he actually looked like he was enjoying himself. Trust me; he and Nikolas are safer than we are right now.”
A menacing growl behind us made the hair on the back of my neck stand on end, and I spun us around, fearing for Jordan who followed us with the witch. My breath hitched at the sight of the black werewolf ripping apart a vampire less than twenty feet from us. Roland made short work of the killing then dropped the body and bounded toward us with Peter close behind him. Both of my friends looked like they’d been through more than one battle tonight. Their fur was wet and dirty and bloody. Peter was limping, and Roland had a nasty cut above one eye that looked like it was already starting to heal.
“Phew, you guys really do smell like wet dog,” Jordan declared, stumbling when Peter brushed against her.
Roland came up to me, and I would have hugged him if I wasn’t supporting Chris. I put a hand in the rough fur on his back, and he leaned against me.
“I’m so glad to see you guys.” I wanted to sob with relief, but now was not the time to break down. My friends were safe and their arrival greatly improved our odds of survival, but we were far from out of danger. We picked up our pace with renewed energy. Roland walked beside me, and Peter took up the rear to protect us from a surprise attack.
“Roland, once we get to the garage, will you go find Nate and keep him safe? Please?” My voice broke on the last word. I hadn’t allowed myself to think about Nate, but seeing my friends made me painfully aware that he was the only one whose whereabouts were unknown. I also knew Roland and Peter would not leave me until I was safe, even to help Nate.
Roland growled softly and nodded his large head.
When a high-pitched cackle echoed through the woods a few seconds later, my bladder almost gave away and my heart threatened to break through my ribs. Chris stiffened and tried to stand on his own. Roland’s hackles rose as Peter came racing back to us. We all turned to stare at the trees.
“What is that?” Jordan asked.
“You don’t want to know,” I said through numb lips. “We’ve got to go – now.”
We broke into a run, going as fast as we could with two injured people. I tried not to think about what was out there, but it was impossible to not picture the grinning mouths and the six-inch claws that could rip the roof off a pickup truck.
The sound came again, much closer this time, and I knew we weren’t going to reach the buildings in time. Roland and Peter realized it, too, and they moved to take up defensive positions between us and the trees. They had a chance against the creatures, if there weren’t too many of them. All I could do was stand there and hold up Chris, who was wheezing from our short run.
Jordan let go of the witch and hefted Chris’s sword like it was made for her. She was wet and bloody and tired, yet she stood bravely to face a threat unlike anything she had encountered.
“Jesus!” she hissed when the first massive hyena-like creature stepped from the trees. “What the hell is that?”
No one answered her. We were riveted on two more creatures emerging from the woods, followed by at least ten vampires. Terror slammed into me at the sight of the three massive crocotta.
A large head swung in our direction and spoke in a perfect imitation of Jordan’s voice. “Jesus!” it said and giggled.
A second later, roars followed by screams came from the other side of the grounds. What other horrors were the warriors facing? How could we hope to survive this?
God, please help us.
The vampires held back as the crocotta advanced on us. Roland and Peter sprung forward to meet them. One of the crocotta raked its long claws along Peter’s flank. Peter howled and clamped down on the crocotta’s throat with his own powerful jaws. The two of them went down in a snapping, growling mass of fur, claws, and teeth.
Roland let out a snarl, and he and the second crocotta lunged for each other at the same time. I cried out as the crocotta’s mouth latched onto the back of Roland’s neck. They hit the ground with a loud thud and rolled over a few times in the snow before Roland was able to shake free of the creature’s hold.
I was so fixated on my friends that I forgot about the third crocotta until Jordan screamed my name. She leapt in front of me swinging Chris’s sword in a deadly arc. The tip of the sword sliced easily through the shoulder of the creature bearing down on us. The crocotta roared in pain and swiped at her. She dove to the side, but its claws hooked the pocket of her coat and threw her off balance.
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sp; Jordan landed hard on her stomach but kept her grip on the sword. In one fluid motion she rolled onto her back and slashed at the crocotta looming over her, cutting a long shallow gash in its chest. Her attack took the crocotta by surprise, but that did not last long. It struck out with a paw and knocked the sword from her hands before it reared up to strike, its mouth opened and drool dribbled between the razor-sharp teeth.
“Jordan!” I screamed. I tried to run to her, but Chris held me back.
A roar split the air, unlike anything I had ever heard. From out of nowhere, a large winged shape dived from the air, dipping so close to our heads that the downdraft from its leathery wings made my hair fly around my face. The crocotta stumbled away from Jordan, and I saw terror in its eyes before it turned to flee. It didn’t get far before it was swallowed by flames so hot I felt them from twenty feet away.
“Alex?” I whispered, too awed by his appearance to be terrified he would come after me next.
Engulfed by flames, the crocotta screamed and thrashed violently on the ground. The wyvern circled the dying creature once before taking off toward the vampires that had stopped their advance on us to stare in shock. Flames sprouted from his snout again, and I heard a vampire shriek in agony. The others scattered.
If Alex’s appearance shocked me, it was nothing compared to the sight of the golden griffin that dropped from the sky with an enraged squawk and snatched one of the vampires up in her sharp talons. The vampire’s screams lasted only seconds before he fell in pieces to the ground. I stared at the gruesome sight and swallowed several times to keep from gagging. If my sweet Minuet could do this, I did not want to imagine what an adult griffin was capable of.
Chris let me go, and I ran to help Jordan to her feet. She retrieved the sword, and the three of us watched the vampires scream and run from the endless attacks from above. The snow-covered ground turned scarlet, and I could not understand why the vampires did not run for their lives, choosing instead to be burned alive or ripped to pieces.
Growling pulled my attention from the vampires to Roland and Peter still locked in deadly battles of their own. Sharp teeth and claws tore at flesh and tried to snap bones. Blood sprayed and hot breath steamed the air. The werewolves and crocotta were evenly matched. We had to do something to help Roland and Peter.