Ray could likely hold his own, but if Conan drank my blood, it would be disastrous.
I turned and glanced around the dirty cell.
The two emaciated vamps hissed at me from their respective corners. It seemed they hadn’t fed in … years.
I was fresh meat.
The only light in the cell came from one lone torch hanging precariously from the seeping stone wall. It appeared in jeopardy of going out. “I didn’t realize your Queen was so sadistic. This is hard-core imprisonment. How long have they been in here?”
“That’s no concern of yours. Now put on the chains. The cuffs are spelled so you won’t be able to get free.”
We’d see about that.
I walked over to the chains dangling from the far wall.
The good thing was they weren’t silver, so they wouldn’t burn my skin. The bad thing was they were several inches thick and likely made from reinforced wolfram, one of the strongest rare metals on earth and extremely hard for a supe to break out of, hence the name.
Anything with pure natural qualities was tough for us to defeat.
I picked up a single shackle and glanced behind me at the two vamps. Defeating them and freeing myself at the same time was going to take some skill. I tried not to be too regretful of my decision to acquiesce to the Queen’s wishes. We have to be on our best game here, I told my wolf. We break the chains as soon as possible and keep the vamps from drinking us at all costs. She growled her agreement. She was laser focused on the two bloodsuckers. They were so gaunt their faces appeared permanently skeletal.
“I said put on the chains,” Conan snarled from the kiddy window. “But then again, I am getting pretty thirsty.”
“I’m going, I’m going,” I said. “And you better stay away from Naomi and Ray if you know what’s good for you. If I find out you’ve hurt them, or partake in a single drop of their blood, I’m coming after you.”
He laughed ominously. “You aren’t getting out, wolf. Meet Yuri and his wife, Alana. Our resident cave dwellers. They will rip you to shreds and leave you wishing you were dead, most likely before I can walk back to my office. This is the end of the line for you. Only the worst offenders are put here. Welcome to hell.”
My eyes darted to the vamps as I clicked both shackles around my wrists. I needed Conan to leave quickly. The vamps seemed to be waiting for him to leave, too, because they hadn’t moved. But it was hard to tell by their vacant stares. They were each slumped in a corner opposite me. I lifted my arms and wiggled the chains at him to prove it. “I’m in. You can leave now. I’m sure you have pressing business to attend to.”
“I might just stay and enjoy the show,” he said.
As the weight of the wrist cuffs settled on me, I felt the spell. It had the same weird signature as the door, but this spell had a taste, which was even more bizarre.
The two vamps perked up once they saw I was secure, rising to their knees on the dirty ground and starting to gyrate like a couple of snakes in the grass. Jesus, they’re completely deranged. It looks like they’ve been down here for centuries and get to drink only when they have naughty visitors. We need Musclehead to vacate the area. I’m going to throw some power into my words and see if I can send him away. If not, we’ll have company before we’re ready. You focus on breaking the spell or we’re going to be vamp dinner.
As she sent power into the spell, it manifested strangely in my mind. It was honey colored and tasted sour. It wasn’t nearly as powerful as what we’d tackled with Selene. The cuffs rang with it, but it hadn’t penetrated farther into my body, which was a bonus.
“I think your Queen is calling you, Lurch,” I said, throwing strength into my words, aiming it right where his face sat pinched in the window. “You better scurry away and see what she wants.”
His head tipped back, glancing down the hallway.
“Yup, I just heard her again.” I pushed outward, filling my mind with bright golden light, making each word count. “You better go and see what your Queen wants. Could be important. We don’t want a repeat of last time, do we?” This guy had “inept” written all over him. Once I successfully got him to leave, the power I’d used to urge him would evaporate, but I hoped he’d be gone long enough for me to do what I needed to do, which was escape. And just maybe he would forget to check on me again, because he was that stupid.
He turned and grumbled, easing away from the window. His footsteps finally echoed down the tunnel, and I joined my wolf in trying to break the spelled cuffs.
As soon as he’d gone, the male vampire, whom he addressed as Yuri, scuttled up the wall Exorcist style. Without stopping, he clawed his way along the ceiling, making his way to me from above. Jesus! That’s the creepiest thing I’ve ever seen. We need to break these chains quickly. My wolf threw all our power into the spell. It was a more technical spell than we’d encountered before, kind of like picking a lock. She yipped at me anxiously as she went. I took that as a Please try to stall the creepers if you can while I focus on the hard stuff.
“Listen, buddy,” I told the specter, who clung upside down eyeing me, his dirty hair dangling from his head in greasy hanks, his eyes a dead, listless black. “You don’t want to mess with me. If you come at me, I’ll have to kill you. Do you understand what I’m saying? You’ve managed to survive down here for, what, a hundred years? You don’t want to die now at the hands of a wolf.” I knew I could put these two out of their misery fairly easily. “Or maybe you do?”
Before I could say any more, the female, Alana, lunged at me from the corner.
Without thought, I extended my arms fully, flexing my wrists hard on the chains while I arched my back against the cold stone and swung both legs up like a gymnast balancing on the rings. My feet connected with her squarely in the chest, right as my body morphed into its Lycan form. It all happened in less than a heartbeat. She flew with a screech into the wall across from me, hitting it hard, and tumbled to the ground. Dammit, she’s not down. She rose immediately, albeit on wobbly legs, and shook herself off while Yuri hissed at me, enraged I would dare hurt his female. He primed himself to spring, bending his arms and snarling.
My wolf continued to work feverishly on the lock spell, unable to aid me with the vamps. You have to speed it up. I can’t fight them both in chains. She gave me an irritated bark. I couldn’t use my feet against Yuri, because he was coming at me from the wrong angle. Instead I primed my right fist, bringing it up to my ear, and waited. He’d have to be almost a foot from my face before I could act. And once I did, I would only have so much room before the chain expired, culling my punching radius down to two feet at the most.
He dove.
My wrists were coated in fur, the unforgiving metal gouging into my new larger frame. Once Yuri was within a foot of me, I smashed my fist into his cheek with so much force the entire chain snapped out of the limestone—bolt plate and all. Yuri flew into the stone wall across from me and crashed to the ground in a jumble of arms and legs. He lay there unmoving. Thank goodness. He wouldn’t stay down forever, but he’d hit the wall harder than his bride and since he was so starved, it would likely take him some time to heal his injuries.
I turned to inspect the holes where the chain and bolt plate had pulled out. I don’t get it. How could we pull the entire thing out of the wall? It should be spelled. Or maybe it was and we’re just stronger? No time to contemplate because Alana gurgled from behind me. Let’s pull the other plate out and use the chains to our advantage. I lifted my left arm and jammed it downward in one quick motion. The second bolt plate snapped cleanly from the wall and sailed in the air. I turned, flicking my wrist at the last moment and directed the chain toward Alana.
The corner of the plate took her in the forehead.
It landed there and stuck with an ugly thunk. She wheeled backward, clearly not used to this much resistance from a prisoner. Right as she spun from the impact, my wolf broke the spell and the shackles on both wrists snapped open. Alana crumpled in a heap, taking
the rest of the chain with her, the plate still lodged in her head.
Well, that was horribly gruesome.
I glanced from Yuri to Alana, both looking like nothing but bags of bones piled on the floor. I kind of feel sorry for these two. I turned back to the wall and scratched my head. Breaking out of those chains was too easy. Eudoxia would never allow her restraints to be broken so readily. Something’s up. My wolf perked her ears in agreement. I don’t hear anyone coming. Let’s see what we can find.
I gathered power to myself and sent it outward, trying to sense if there were any other spells or signatures around me. The two vamps had surprisingly strong magic pulses when my energy cascaded over them. They must be very old. Almost as old as Eudoxia, but not nearly as strong. Conan had said the male’s name was Yuri. That sounds Russian to me. Maybe we should shackle him up and try to wake him? If he’s been around that long, he must know something. My wolf growled, undecided. What else are we going to do? I don’t feel any other power signatures nearby. I want to know why she put me in here with these two, because I don’t think this was a mistake. She knew they would be easy for us to defeat. Something was definitely up and that was puzzling. I was missing something big. I’m beginning to think there was trouble brewing all along between her and Valdov and I’ve somehow propelled us right into the middle of it. I glanced at the still-unmoving Yuri. Let’s find out what he knows. We don’t have a better option.
I didn’t wait for my wolf to agree. I walked over to the crumpled Yuri and crouched next to him, not wanting to touch him yet. I peered closely at his face. It was beginning to heal, but it was going to take a while. I stood and paced over to the free chain that had dropped off my arm—the one that wasn’t currently tethered to Alana’s forehead.
I couldn’t look at her without cringing.
We’ll have to deal with her next. I’ll have to secure her before I pull the plate out so she can heal. Gross. When I do it, we pray she doesn’t wake up. Of the two, she seems the most deranged. Yuri may be our only chance of getting any good information.
I grabbed the chain and went back to Yuri. I bent over and gingerly picked up one of his dirty feet and tugged him by the ankle toward the wall where the chains had hung before. I’m going to try and twist the bolts back in. He’s not that strong, so they may hold. I don’t want him to come after me once I wake him up. I stopped in front of the wall, resting my hand on the stone and running my fingers over the holes. They were completely torn open. There’s no way the bolts are staying in there. Let’s look for something else. I eyed the room critically and spotted a piece of rebar sticking out of the far wall. Bending the rebar over the chain might work. I made my way over, toting Yuri behind me. I reached up and hooked the end of the link on the rebar.
Now we just have to bend it.
This was going to be straight out of a superhero movie.
I knew I was strong enough, but actually doing it was another matter. I went on my tiptoes and palmed the end of the steel and pushed upward. We can’t break it off, so watch the angle and go slow. My wolf channeled power into my hand and the muscles hardened to aid me. The metal began to move. I slid my hand down and wrapped my entire palm around it so I could mold it like clay. It totally worked.
It was kind of badass bending metal with my bare hands.
Once I secured the rebar over the chain link, I slid Yuri in front and hooked his ankle with the shackle, snapping it shut. He hadn’t woken, but his face had improved. The chain didn’t quite reach the ground, so his leg hung in the air a few feet above the floor. It was an awkward position, but it would help him stay put.
Now we just have to wake him up.
I went to the opposite wall and sat down, wanting to be clear of him just in case he awoke in a rage. I laid my back against the cool stone and called, “Yuri, can you hear me?”
No response.
“Yuri, it’s time to wake up.” I tried to infuse power into my voice.
Nothing.
He’s too badly damaged and malnourished. He needs more power. But in order to transfer power directly, as Tyler had done to me when I was in Stasis, it meant I had to touch him.
I really didn’t want to touch him.
Resigning myself, I crawled forward. Transferring power was coming more easily to me, especially after I’d done it on Selene, and most recently on the Porsche. As I moved, I gathered gold strands in my mind, concentrating them as I settled next to Yuri. We give him one burst and move out of the way. I rested my palm on his forehead and released the accumulated power. It shot straight into Yuri with a jolt, making my hands tingle. I retreated backward quickly.
The old vamp jumped like he’d been defibrillated.
His eyes blinked open.
“Hello,” I said once I settled back against the wall. “My name is Jessica McClain, and I’m sorry I had to smash your face in, but I think you’re going to heal. You may want to rethink your attack modes in the future, however, to avoid another massive head injury.”
He hissed at me, shaking his leg, struggling to right himself.
“I don’t think you can get free, but if you do, I’ll just knock you out again and try something else. So instead of trying to get free, how about we just make some kind of a deal? I need information and you want out of this cell. Right? If you tell me what I need to know, I’ll release you and … your bride. Does that sound fair?”
“Waaast do you want? … I”—his voice was broken with a strong Russian accent—“need…”
It was clear Yuri hadn’t spoken or dealt with anyone in a very long time.
“You need what? To escape this place?” I prodded.
“More … power…” He hissed. It was paining him to speak. He had healed more, but it was still going too slowly. What we won’t do for information. My wolf yipped in agreement. I crawled back over to him, mostly because it was easier to stay on his level.
“I’m here to help you,” I cautioned as I moved closer. “But if you lash out, I won’t hesitate to defend myself. After I give you power and you heal a little more, we are going to make a deal. Nod if you agree.” I looked down at him, wondering if I’d receive anything coherent back. “And once you make that deal, I’m going to hold you to your word.”
He nodded once.
I placed my hand over his forehead and pushed more power into him. His head arched under my grip, his eyes fluttering. They went from dead black to a hint of normal flecked with silver. “Ahhhh…” he moaned. “Haven’t … felt … in too long…”
After a moment he went still and I brought my hand off his head and moved back on my heels, but stayed where I was. He blinked a few times and then glanced up at me.
“How long have you been down here?” I asked curiously. “Did Valdov put you here? Or was it the Queen?” I had so many questions, but being in the shape he was, he may not be able to answer all of them.
“Valdov,” he managed, “has doomed us … the Queen can do … nothing.”
I sat up a little straighter. “Valdov is in charge?”
“He wields … much power … over her.” His eyes flickered in earnest now, mostly staying free of black, his face almost fully healed. What he really needed was blood, but he wasn’t getting mine. That was not an option. “My niece … will not rule … much longer … have to … stop him.”
Niece? “You’re Ivan the Terrible’s brother?” I gasped, jumping to my feet. “How did you get locked in here? If you’re Eudoxia’s blood-kin, this is even worse than I first imagined.”
He shook his head, his eyes rolling back in his head for a moment. I understood. It was too much to tell me right now and we needed to move on.
“Listen”—I crouched onto the balls of my feet—“what I really need to find is a way out of this dungeon without raising attention. I’m beginning to think I’ve been put in this cell for a reason. All this can’t be a coincidence.” His eyes were focused back on me. “I’m searching for a vampire named Naomi. Do you know where they mi
ght keep her? She has something valuable in her possession, and if Valdov has already gotten ahold of it, it may be too late for your Queen.”
“You are not … in a dungeon…” He gasped. “It is trickery. We are in a crypt … behind the mansion. Below us … is only one way out. There are … tunnels below.”
“What?” I exclaimed as I stood. I had not expected that to come out of his mouth. “The muscle vamp took me down steps and we never came back up. We have to be underground. That can’t be right.”
“It is an ancient ward … few can sense…”
The strange signature I’d felt was a ward? It had all been an elaborate illusion. Damn. “You said the only way out was tunnels beneath us. How do I find them?”
He lifted his hand and pointed to the corner.
Right where Alana was lying like a corpse.
“It is below…”
I peered at the corner skeptically. “So we’re actually in a crypt aboveground? And below us are underground tunnels. Is that what you’re saying?”
He nodded. “There is a vast … graveyard on the grounds. Each crypt is connected … by a network … of tunnels.”
It was hard to wrap my mind around it, but I had no reason to doubt him. There was an easy way to find out if he was telling the truth. If there was no access to a tunnel in the corner, he was lying. “If I free you now, will you stay away from me?” I asked. “I need you to tend to your bride so I can uncover the tunnel. I knocked her out, but she should heal—I have to warn you it’s a little gory.”
“I will not attack,” he managed. “But you will … promise to … honor your part…”
“Of course I will honor it,” I said. “Once I find my friends, I will come back and break you out of this horrid prison.” I had no idea what freeing him would do, or why the two of them were kept here, but I didn’t care.
“It’s been too long…” He sighed. “We will finally … have our retribution.”
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