One of the prisoners stuck her arm out, clotheslining a passing Huntsman. Nicholas was right, we had an army behind the bars. I grinned at her. She cradled her now-broken arm, grinning back through the pain.
Since Nicholas seemed to be channeling a vampire ninja and I was out of stakes, I hurried to the nearest iron gate. I went through the key rings again, until I found the one that fit the padlocks. The first prisoner stumbled out, squinting in the artificial light. Sores and frostbite scars coverered his bare arms. He must have been here for weeks. I swung open gate after gate and humans and vampires emerged blinking like half-blind moles.
The vampires went straight to a fridge powered by a humming generator, ripping into blood bags. A woman tore through a camping bag full of protein bars and beef jerky.
When more vampires and Huntsmen came out of a passage on the other side of the small murky underground pond, the prisoners swarmed them. They weren’t particularly strong, having been starved and shackled for so long, but they were enraged. The ones doing most of the biting weren’t even vampires. There was a kind of frenzy in the air that made my mouth go dry.
Nicholas kicked a Host, breaking his thighbone, and I shoved him as he fell, sending him into one of the dank cells. I slammed the gate shut, locking it. “We can’t stay here,” I said to Nicholas. “Let’s lock them all in and stop Hope.” I thought, before this turns into a bloodbath. I had to shove an old man off a Huntsman before things got really ugly and the Huntsman choked on his own fang necklace.
Nicholas stood over Dr. Frankenstein, his boot pressing lightly on the other man’s throat. The doctor gagged, his eyes bulging with fear. “Nic, stop.” I grabbed his arm.
“You don’t know the things he’s done. He’s a monster.” He pressed down just a little harder. Veins bulged in the doctor’s forehead. He clawed at Nicholas’s ankle.
“Don’t let turning you into a murderer be another one of his crimes.” I tightened my grip on his arm, holding on as tight as I could. “Don’t let him break you, Nicky.” I shook him. “Lock him up so we can go save the rest of your family.”
He moved his boot just as I was wondering where my Nicholas had gone. He leaned against the wall, wiping his face with a trembling hand. “Shit,” he said. “Shit, Lucy.”
“Let’s just get out of here,” I said gently. “Take my hand.”
Everything was getting too ugly, too fast. Nicholas wasn’t the only one who’d reacted to the miasma of fear and the memory of torture. The vampires who had fed were now prowling the perimeter of the cave, snarling. Hunters lay in pools of blood. Violence had a coppery smell, like burning pennies. “I need a tranq gun,” I muttered. There was a box of them next to the other crates of weapons but the way was blocked.
“I’ll get it,” Nicholas said, staking between a Host vampire and a Huntsman, and tossing them both apart as if they were toy soldiers. He plucked one of the guns out of the pile, checked that it was loaded, and then tossed it to me. It looked like a pistol and fit easily in my hand. My first shot went wide as I got used to the new weapon. Unfortunately, it didn’t go so wide as to hit the wall; instead a dart hit one of the prisoners in the butt. She fell over, curses slurring as she fell asleep. “Oops.” I stared at Nicholas, wincing. He just shook his head at me.
My next shot was much more accurate, felling a Host vampire after two darts. “I need the vamp stuff,” I called when the vampire stirred after just a few seconds of unconsciousness.
Nicholas crouched over Dr. Frankenstein. “Where’s the vampire sedatives?” he asked darkly. “I know you have some.” Dr. Frankenstein started to babble, trying to protect his neck with his arm. Nicholas leaned in closer, pupils dilated. “Tell me.”
“In the small fridge,” he finally said as the pheromones slipped under his defenses. “The bottle with the blue labels.”
“And?”
He gulped. “And there’s a box of preloaded darts t-there . . . under m-my work table . . .”
Nicholas didn’t look away as he grabbed the box and slid it to me. Then he pulled the whole table down, dumping beakers and test tubes and microscopes onto the floor. Broken glass and dented equipment skidded in all directions. “Oops,” he said, echoing me.
One of the more recent prisoners, judging by her lack of cuts and bruises, hauled the now-weeping Dr. Frankenstein into a cell. She broke his wrist doing it, but none of us much cared, especially when he kept wailing about his “work.”
“He used to be one of us,” she said, disgusted. There was a Helios-Ra sun tattoo on her arm. I reloaded the gun just as one of the prisoners sailed past me. Nicholas caught her before she landed in the broken glass.
I shot three more vampires. They sank to the ground as if they were suddenly made of water. When there were finally only three Huntsmen left, I grabbed one of the emergency foghorns from a metal shelf piled with signaling devices. I pressed the button and the sound bounced off the stones. Everyone stopped, grabbing at their ears. One vampire tried to hide her head under her sweater, gnashing her fangs. Nicholas swung his head to stare at me. I added another blast for good measure.
“Lock them up!” I snapped in that military-school tone Hunter was so good at. “Now.”
There was some grumbling and someone called me a rather uncomplimentary name but the majority looked relieved to shake the violence off and have some kind of direction. We dragged the limp bodies into the cramped dungeons. Nicholas punched one of the Huntsmen who refused to move, even with a vampire sedative aimed at his head.
“We have to go,” I said to the Helios-Ra woman before the echo of the clanging gates had faded. She seemed the most capable and definitely the most stable. The old man was laughing to himself and peeing along the line of gates. I shuddered.
“Can you keep them calm until morning?” I asked her as Nicholas sorted through the crates of weapons.
“We’ll build a fire out on the edge,” she said. “And keep warm. That’ll stop most of them from freaking out further.”
“I just want to go home,” a college student muttered.
“If you go now you’ll just get lost in the forest and be even worse off,” I told him.
“She’s right,” the agent agreed. “We’ll keep guard, call for help on one of the machines and wait until first light.”
“League headquarters are under siege,” I warned her, hanging a miniature crossbow off my belt. “You might not get an answer right away.” I slung a regular bow over one shoulder and added two quivers of arrows. They were much faster to reload than a crossbow. I took three more tranquilizer guns as Nicholas dumped the stash of vampire sedatives into a pack. I added at least a dozen stakes all over myself, from pocket to pant cuff. If I tripped and fell I was in very great danger of puncturing a vital organ.
Nicholas and I were finally ready to leave the caves. Nicholas shoved the last Huntsman on the ledge right off the side. He swore all the way down, even though it was only a drop of a few feet. Huntsmen really were drama queens. Nicholas leaped down and then turned to steady me as I climbed after him, with far less grace. I clung to weeds and rock.
“Did you just cop a feel?” I asked when he let me drag down the length of his body. His smile was so quick I nearly missed it.
We ran down the trail, passing two prone hunters, a pile of ashes, and several broken saplings. We found Solange and Kieran back to back, fighting off Host vampires. Just this summer, he’d been threatening to kill her, and now he was trying to protect her and her whole family. If Solange could ignite change in vampire society, maybe Kieran could do the same for the League.
Solange disarmed one of the Host and claimed his sword. She was mostly blocking savage blows. She kept leaning in to whisper softly.
“What’s she saying?” I asked Nicholas.
“She’s telling them to get lost.”
The vampires, taking the order literally while under the influence of her pheromones, wandered away dazed. When Kieran was knocked over by a particularly vicious ja
b and nearly eviscerated himself falling onto a tree, Solange kicked back. She was fierce and confident; the Solange I knew so well but few ever had a chance to glimpse.
She extended her arm, cracking the vampire across the jaw, then spun on her foot and smashed the hilt of her sword into his face. Buffeted by blows, he staggered. She finished him off with a pheromone-soaked suggestion that he give up a life of crime and survive off rats.
“We’ve reclaimed the caves,” I called out. “And stuffed the evil asshats into the dungeons.”
She ordered the next vampire to give himself up and peacefully allow himself to be locked up. The last two vampires decided it was more prudent to abandon the fight and tear off into the dark forest.
Solange pushed her long black hair off her face. “Everyone okay?”
I hugged her tightly. “You saved us. All of us.” I pulled away, wrinkling my nose. “Did Kieran catch you up?”
“Fate of the world,” she said. “Betrayal, battles, blah, blah, blah.”
“Just like old times.”
Chapter 35
Solange
We ran for a long time.
Lucy and Kieran were slowing down, pressing their sides. Not so long ago I would have felt the same painful stitch under my ribs, the same burn in my lungs and legs. Now I could run all night. Well, until dawn anyway.
“I’m out,” Kieran panted at his uncle, having called him on my cell phone. “Whatever you’re going to do, do it now.” He paused, snorting incredulously. “I’ll tell her but you’re nuts if you think she’ll listen.” He hung up and glanced at us. “He’s going to call the cops on Hope’s unit,” he explained even though I’d heard every word as if it had been spoken right into my ear. Lucy probably couldn’t hear over her own heartbeat right now. It was loud enough to sound as if she’d smuggled a rapid-fire shotgun under her shirt.
“The cops,” Lucy echoed. “Can we do that?”
“The other alternative is to fight through the siege at the headquarters, and then people will die. They can’t even sneak out through the secret passageway since all the Helios-Ra agents there already know about them. “But,” he said, smiling darkly, “hanging around a house filled with highly suspect weapons is still totally illegal. And downright crazy if you start talking vampires.” He dialed the phone again as Lucy leaned weakly against the nearest tree.
“Go on ahead,” she said, taking slow, deep breaths.
“No,” Nicholas and I both said.
“We’ll catch up.”
“No,” Nicholas repeated calmly, handing her a bottle of water from the huge pack he’d taken out of the caves. It was stocked with supplies for the average hiker and vampire killer.
“Hunter,” Kieran said into the phone. She started bombarding him with questions, orders, and threats almost before he’d finished saying her name. “I’m with Lucy,” he cut her off. “We’re fine. Hart’s fine too. He says that under no circumstances are high school students allowed to fight this battle.” He rolled his eyes, looking younger than the blood on his sleeve and the bruises on his face might suggest. “I already told him that. Where are you now?” He checked the GPS on my phone quickly. “We’re not far. See you soon.”
“You know, one day we’ll go on a double date without swords or stakes of any kind,” Lucy said cheerfully, slinging her arm through mine.
“Oh, right, just as soon as my boyfriend and I stop having to save each other’s lives.”
My voice carried farther than I’d planned.
Kieran’s head turned sharply in my direction. Lucy grinned at me sympathetically as I realized just how loudly I’d spoken.
My words hung in the air like giant neon balloons. I swallowed, feeling a flush creep up my cheeks. “I mean . . .” I looked away, mortified. “We should go.”
I ran so fast they had no chance of catching up with me. I stopped and waited for them, once I’d stopped feeling like I might choke on my own stupid embarrassment. Luckily, by the time they did, we had more pressing problems. Nothing like a little war to distract you.
I couldn’t even look at Kieran as we waited for Hunter and the others. When they showed up there was a small group of them, including Quinn. Hunter rattled off her friends’ names: Chloe, Jason, Jenna, Drew, Griffin, Kelly, Regan, and Tyson, among others. They exchanged wary glances, sticking close together. Other than Hunter, only Chloe and Jason didn’t seem particularly fazed.
“Is it true you overthrew the monarchy?” Chloe asked me. She looked disappointed when I nodded.
Despite not being able to look at Kieran, I also couldn’t quite stop myself from sneaking little glances at him. He was standing close enough that his sleeve brushed mine when he shifted.
I forced myself to stop being an idiot.
“Between Chloe and Connor, we intercepted and tracked the call to ambush the camp,” Hunter was explaining. “All landlines to headquarters are down. I managed to get a hold of Spencer and he’s going to mobilize whatever Bower vampires are willing to go in with us.”
“Sebastian, Marcus, and Duncan are still inside the camp with our parents and aunt and uncle,” Quinn added. “Logan’s gone to see if he and Isabeau can rally any of the Hounds to help us, and Connor’s with Christabel trying to get the Na-Foir to fight too. Not convinced on that end, I gotta say.”
“Well, Saga likes a good fight,” Lucy put in. “So that might help.”
“So we have a secret Black Lodge of students, a handful of vampires, and some weapons?” Hunter asked. “I’m not loving the odds yet.”
“And some tranq guns,” Lucy said. “I stole three.”
“And I hid a bunch of them up a tree near the Bower,” I added.
“You did?” Quinn asked. “When? Why?”
“Lucy and I were talking and it gave me some ideas. I got some of Uncle Geoffrey’s sedative and loaded a bunch of dart guns, just in case.”
“Because of London,” Nicholas guessed quietly.
“Partly.”
“There’s the Chandramaa too,” Quinn added before the moment stretched from awkward to sad. “They’ve got Mom’s ferocity and Lucy’s aim.”
“Aw, thanks.” Lucy beamed at him.
“But they were decimated earlier tonight,” I broke in. “Their numbers are definitely depleted.” When they stared at me I just waved it away. “Vampire assassin. Long story.”
“So maybe we need a new enemy,” Kieran suggested slowly. “One both sides have to stop fighting each other to defeat.”
“Like who?” Hunter asked.
“Saga’s Hel-Blar.”
Nicholas gaped at him. “Why not just throw a live grenade and blow everyone up instead? Be quicker.”
“Those Hel-Blar aren’t quite as feral as the others,” I pointed out, agreeing with Kieran. “At least not while they’re wearing the collars.” I rubbed my neck. “It suppressed my pheromones. It does the same for them in some weird way.”
“Do we still not know how those work?” Hunter asked.
“Magic,” I said. “At least partly. So basically, no. No idea.”
We spread out between the trees, moving as quietly as we could. The students all had compasses with the coordinates Connor had sent Chloe. My brothers and I just followed the scent of the night, which was already tainted. It was faint but wrong, and very hard to describe, something between burning petals and wet, rusty iron.
I hung back, keeping pace with Kieran. “Can I talk to you?”
He stopped, turning to face me. His eyes were so dark, like a moonlit night. I tried not to stare at the faint scar on his throat. “I was hoping . . .” I trailed off, biting my lower lip. “That is, I know you’re going to the college in Scotland. But I wondered . . .”
“Solange, what are you trying to say?”
I drank in the sight of him, standing so tall and patient with the snow and the bare black trees all around him. “I’m saying I still love you,” I replied, forcing myself to be brave. If I could face the kind of fight we wer
e about to walk into, I could face this. He deserved better than my shy, awkward fear. Especially now. I wanted him to remember me, not Viola. “And I know I hurt you but I’m hoping maybe you could give me a chance to make it up to you.”
“You fought your way back to me,” he replied, just as quietly; but his smile was like an ember, catching fire to all the cold inside my chest. “That’s all I care about.”
And then he finally kissed me.
It was like a first kiss, tentative, gentle, searching. I could remember who we used to be, could follow the trail of all the nights we’d spend talking, walking on the beach, driving around. I could follow them like fireflies, like shooting stars, like sparks.
Everything melted away for one brief, beautiful moment. The kiss seared through me as he slanted his mouth over mine. Our tongues met, our fingers tangled, our bodies touched. I could have kept kissing him for hours, if we’d had the time.
We parted reluctantly and kept walking through the snow silent and smiling.
The others were silhouettes all around us, but I could still hear them. I caught the occasional glint of light off a metal zipper, the rasp of a stake being passed anxiously from hand to hand. “So you’ve changed your mind about Solange?” Lucy was asking the girl with the red hair.
“No way.” She snorted. “I’ll do this for the League and for you and Hunter because you’re sisters-at-arms, but she’s a vampire.”
“She’s a girl.”
“Who drinks blood.”
“Please,” Lucy scoffed. “I’ve seen you eat marzipan. On purpose. That stuff’s just gross.” She paused. I could hear her smirking. “So did Tyson ask you out?”
“Tell you what,” Jenna shot back. “If I don’t die horribly tonight, I’ll worry about my love life. It can wait.”
“Take it from me,” Lucy said drily. “If you’re waiting for all this drama to be over before making your move, you’ll be waiting forever.”
Blood Prophecy Page 29
