Defiance

malaika slid free of their sheaths with whispering little sounds. Anna’s Guard moved out behind me, and I was hoping Sergej wouldn’t jump on our backs when Blaine was suddenly next to me. He let out a battle cry that scorched my ears, and we were fighting for our lives.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Dead vampire bodies littered the stairs, twitching and crackling as the curly-headed one ripped the throat out of each. I gasped, leaning against Graves, my mother’s malaika held carefully away—they were bastard sharp and dripping with thin caustic black ichor. One of the twins held Anna up, murmuring to her in what sounded like French, his lips next to her temple. The others were equidistant around us, a guard pattern. Blaine leaned against the wall, his ribs heaving and vampire blood all over him. His fingers flicked as he reloaded his 9mm, chambered a round. “We need to move,” he husked. “There will be more soon.”

“At least we made it up the stairs,” the twin who wasn’t holding Anna said, grimly but gingerly scrubbing at his face with one hand. “Thank God for the ammo. Milady.” And he nodded at me, like I’d done something unreasonably, surprisingly spectacular.

The aspect was still boiling-hot all over me, but I couldn’t get enough air in. “Thanks,” I managed, sarcastically enough to make Graves move a little, restless.

“How the hell do we get out of here?” He had vampire blood all over him too, and it smoked on his torn coat, the heavy organic material reacting to its acidic spill. He was looking even worse, dead white under the bruises. But his eyes were bright, the shadows gone, and he was hanging on.

“This way, as soon as Milady can move.” Blaine glanced at Anna. “Charles?”

“She’s fading.” The one murmuring at Anna stopped long enough to share a Significant Look with Blaine. The curly-headed one hopped up the stairs. I heard other whisperings in the warehouse, but none from behind us. That was the good news.

The bad news was every one of us was deadbone-tired and I still didn’t know where an exit was. Or if Anna’s Guard would leave me and Graves in here to rot.

Or if they would maybe help the vampires out a bit.

On the other hand, the vampires were back to choking and falling down when I got close to them, so I was actually not doing too badly. And with Graves behind me, I didn’t worry so much about getting shot in the back.

I wish I was kidding.

Anyway, there wasn’t much for me to do in the middle of a whirling dervish of fighting djamphir except keep my eyes open and step up with malaika and my toxic little self whenever any of them got into trouble.

But the ammo I’d brought was vanishing fast.

Blaine let out what could have been a sigh, if it hadn’t been so sharply frustrated. “We’ll strike for the place they brought us in. Kip?”

The curly-headed redshirt pointed down the hall, away from the skittering little sounds drawing closer all the time. “They’re getting close.”

“Let’s move. Milady?” Blaine actually looked at me, eyebrows raised. He was bleeding from the corner of his mouth and low on his right side.

“Just get us out of here.” And once we’re outside, you guys are on your own. You can take care of Anna and everything will be swell. I tilted my head, listening. The silence behind us was stupendous, massive. The skritching scratching pitter-patters in the rest of the house ran together like raindrops on a windowpane, and I had a sudden Technicolor vision of vampires slipping through halls, smears of hatred moving with eerie blurring speed. They were shocked by Sergej’s scream, maybe, and just now shaking it off? Like an anthill seething with activity while a swollen thing in its depths lay twitching and unable to direct it. The image made my gorge rise. Bloodhunger trembled its filaments all through me.

“Let’s move.” I couldn’t talk right; my fangs were achingly sensitive and I tried to keep them behind my top lip without scratching myself on them. Graves was shaking, a high unhealthy heat bleeding off his skin. Once I got him outside, there was getting off the grounds of wherever we were held and getting transportation, then holing up for long enough to recoup, and . . .

My brain trembled like a weary horse. If my thinker busted all the way now, we were dead in the water, Goth Boy and me.

I couldn’t let that happen.

One problem at a time. “Come on, Graves.” I took an experimental step forward. He came with me, his chin dipping, dirty hair falling in his face. We looked like kids after a terrible catastrophe, which I suppose was true enough except for the shadow of age in Blaine’s dark gaze. He was the only one who felt a little older, and it was weird. But I guess Anna liked the younger ones.

Easier to control.

We set out down this hall, which looked industrial in an old-fashioned way. Concrete, and full of fluorescent glare that tore into my brain through my eyes. It was a warehouse, I figured out, and felt a jab of tired pride as the touch nestled down in my skull again. The old-timey beams and plaster and golden light was behind us, and I had the sudden uncomfortable thought that the whole hall down there had been like a stage set, somewhere for Sergej to play a little game.

He seemed to like playing nasty games. So did Anna. But given the choice between them, Jesus.

Guess you made that choice, didn’t you, Dru?

The twins held Anna up, and the curly-headed one drifted behind Graves and me. I didn’t like that at all, and I kept the malaika out. Of course, he had a gun, and silver-grain ammo, and—

The touch flared inside my head. “Wait,” I whispered, and pulled Graves to a halt. He leaned on me a little harder than before, his balance moving around like he was drunk or too tired to keep himself fully upright.

That was a bad sign. But still . . . I heard something.

“What?” Blaine had halted. Anna shivered uncontrollably, her hair running with copper highlights even under fluorescents.

Go figure; that lighting makes everyone look sick, especially beaten-up djamphir. But it just made her hair look even more beautiful, even tangled and gunky as it was.

“Something’s going on.” I closed my eyes against the stinging glare. My God, the world was just too bright. If this was blooming, leave me out of it. Except the vampires falling down and choking part. That was okay.

“Dru.” A cough, and Anna tried to raise her head. “Have to. Talk to you.”

“Shhh,” the twin on her right said softly. “We’ll have you safe in no time, Milady.”

I didn’t have the heart to tell him he was lying. Maybe he knew.

“Dru.” Anna let out a soft moan. “Come . . . here.”

“We’ve got to move.” It was the same high, queer, breathless voice that was all I could use when the touch was telling me things. “They’re massing. We’re risking leaving a blood trail. And . . .” I struggled to concentrate. “Something else. Something . . .”

“Dru.” Anna coughed again. It didn’t sound good. She spat, a gob of something bright red that splattered on the floor. “Damn. You. Come. Here.”

“Milady—” Blaine eyed me like he was considering dragging me over to Anna.

Graves stiffened. I solved the problem by taking a couple of steps forward, bringing him with me. At least it might get us moving again. I was beginning to catch my breath, and the itching under the heat of the aspect warned me.

I realized I wasn’t tasting the danger candy just as Anna lifted her head. Thick red dribbled down her chin, and her blue eyes shone feverishly behind a raccoon mask of puffy bruising. The flat copper of her blood was full of carnation spice and terrible pain. I wasn’t sure how she was holding herself up, even with the help of the twins.

She inhaled, deeply. More blood slid down her chin. I tried not to stare.

“I won’t last long.” Another deep breath, and she winced as if the effort hurt down deep. The blood was