“Copy that.” “Copy that,” Thema and Lincoln said in concert, accents dueling.
I raced for Giovanni but stopped just short. She and Bruiser were locked in silent combat. Staring at each other. As I watched, her hand lifted and touched Bruiser’s shoulder. Onorio powers worked much better when the aggressor was in contact with the defender. I didn’t know what to do. How to help. If I beheaded her while she was in his mind, would that scramble his mind, like most anamchara when one of them died? Would it kill him?
From the corner of my eye, I saw Thema’s sword rise and descend with finality, beheading a vamp on the ground.
Bruiser was sweating. Monique Giovanni said, “Yes. Tell me about your love.”
I muttered, “Stupid staring contests.” I stabbed my bloody vamp-killer into a true-dead body so I could find it easily and, with my off hand, pulled a nine-millimeter semiautomatic handgun.
I shot her.
CHAPTER 2
I Kinda Suck at Royalty
I took it all in, in an instant as Bruiser fell beside her, shaking, confused, and exhausted. The physical battle behind us seemed to be over. Already. Real battle is seldom as long or picturesque as Hollywood makes it. It’s usually fast, bloody, and over with, too late to change anything.
Lincoln pointed to two of his vamps, saying, “Feed the Consort.” No one addressed Monique’s wounds. Onorios were made of stern stuff, and though she was gasping and bleeding, she wasn’t dead yet. Around us, other vamps were healing themselves by feeding upon healthy humans, others feeding injured humans, including some of Lincoln’s blood-servants.
One injured and dying human was hauled off to the front of the house, a vamp’s fangs in her throat, the forced change to Mithran already beginning. Meaning I had been wrong. Some of Lincoln’s people had died or were nearly dead, and his people were having to save them the only way they could, by turning them into vamps.
“Crap,” I muttered.
I checked on Bruiser, who was feeding from a vamp’s wrist. There was a trickle of blood in his beard, which made Beast perk up. Good mate. Good pelt on face. I kinda liked it too. Especially when—
At my back, the fence crashed to the ground. I felt Koun step between the downed fence and me. His voice fierce, Koun said, “Blood challenge. Here. Now. You will not escape me again.” That sounded personal. He and a female vamp met in the middle of the backyard, swords flashing in the dim light. Battle wasn’t over yet after all; there was a second wave. Or the first wave was just a feint. Whatever was happening, Koun needed to take a head to clear past grievances.
More vamps came through the gap in the fence. Goodie. I needed to hit something.
Into my earbuds, I heard Bruiser gasp something, but his mic cut out. All I heard was, “There’s . . . house . . . -ap.”
Alex chattered, trying to reestablish contact.
Kojo and Thema took out three more ambushing vamps and raced for the house. Moving Beast-fast, I stepped into cover provided by a narrow column, and slid the shotgun into the spine holster. Changed out the left nine-mil’s magazine for a fresh one, color-coded to show it was loaded with silver-lead composite hollowpoint rounds, which would shred inside a vamp’s body and poison them from the inside. The weapons were too small for my big fingers, but I could make do if necessary. I holstered it and removed the vamp-killer from the headless body, cleaned it on the dead vamp’s clothing, and sheathed it.
As I worked, Lincoln’s vamps took out several more attackers. Again it looked as if the attackers were finished, but Bruiser had said something about the house.
I wrenched a sword from a dead vamp’s hand and tested it. “Not bad,” I muttered. My sword skills sucked, but I could stab a vamp in the back with the best of them. Blades instead of bullets meant that there would be no collateral damage. As Koun finished and beheaded his enemy, I slipped quietly toward the house and took down two vamps from behind, first with the vamp-killer, then with the sword: stab, behead, stab, behead. It was messy and bloody but efficient. It also ruined the wallpaper and the rugs.
I raced indoors. Ducked behind the counter and pulled the nine-mil. Shot a human who came around the corner, raising a weapon at me. Another. I was hyperventilating, hiding behind the counter, under halfway poor cover. I slowed and sucked in breaths. Stood and dashed through the house. Shot two vamps, young ones, based on the way they fell with the silver shot, and beheaded them. Whirled. Sought the corners. Listened. Sniffed the scents on the air. Everyone was down. I was alone.
The light seemed too bright, too sharp. Everything had taken on a strange, muted silence—muffled moans and gasps, barely heard, distant conversation. For my human form, I had micro-gated headphones that kicked in at the first soundwave to preserve my hearing, but since my ears were all over the place in half-form, they didn’t fit my various ear positions. I was deaf from the firefight, short as it had been. I took a slow breath of the stench of open wounds and death. Was it really over?
In my earbud, Alex’s tinny voice was demanding that all our people check in.
“Yellowrock here. Inside. Safe,” I said.
Eli and a human woman were kneeling over a downed man, an injured human. Eli, who had somehow beat me inside, shoved a tampon into a gunshot wound. That meant he was out of XStat syringes to stop bleeding.
“You okay?” I asked him.
“Younger. Clear. In kitchen with injured humans. Call medic,” he said, though I was halfway reading his lips. To me, he added, “We got DBs everywhere, twelve more freed injured humans, none of whom signed papers to be blood-servants, and, if I understand Bruiser right, we also have four vamps in a hidden room in the basement with more human hostages.” He indicated a door a few feet away. “Down there. We need some vamps alive to find out who and where the clan Blood Master is. And we need someone up here who can cover me while I stabilize the injured.”
“Okay. Got it. You keep the humans safe. And you stay safe. Liz will kill me if you get scratched.” Liz Everhart and Eli had hooked up and somehow stayed hooked up for months. They were officially an item.
Eli chuckled, snapped off his gloves, and pulled on a fresh pair, applying pressure to a different human’s wound. “She won’t kill you, but she might turn you into a toad. My girl is freaky powerful, and she thinks I’m adorable.”
I raised my voice. “Shaddock? Tex? Eli needs backup at my location! Koun? Kojo? Thema? To me!” With little puffs of air displacement, my vamps were instantly at my side. I told them what needed doing, and before they could bubble-wrap me and make me stay safe upstairs, I kicked open the basement door. I could have turned the knob, the door wasn’t locked, but kicking it felt so good.
Inside me, Beast screamed with joy. She shoved her gifts into me, and I/we leaped out in a controlled fall down into the dark. Cat leap. I/we landed at the bottom of the stairs on a small concrete pad. Took it all in. The basement was finished with a low, dropped ceiling. Carpeted floor. Once white walls with rust-colored swirls.