“Sh!” Errata cocked her head, listening.
Talia strained her ears. Footsteps in the passageway. Silently, Talia got to her feet and slipped around the corner to see who was nearby.
She saw a man up ahead wearing a vest with the crossed-sword design. Max. What’s he doing by himself?
Errata was behind her. “Isn’t that your brother? The one who shot Perry?”
“Yeah. I need to talk to him.” He risked himself to save me.
“Are you sure he wants to talk to you?”
Her words sliced through Talia. “This might be the only chance I’ll ever get.”
“And after that?” Her words were cool.
Talia didn’t answer. Half of them might not make it home alive. She wasn’t going to make promises.
With vampire speed, she closed the distance between herself and her brother. When she was a few steps behind, she paced him, step for step, letting the emotion that jammed in her throat crest, and then drain away. She blinked hard, clearing her vision before she spoke.
“Max.”
Her brother wheeled, bringing his rifle to his shoulder with the speed of long practice. Then he fell back a step, his mouth falling open.
“Talia.” Her name came out in a croak. “Get out of here.”
“We have to talk. I’m still your sister. We played on the snow hill together. We sat at the same table every breakfast and dinner.” Until Dad effing stole my chair.
Max’s face twisted with fear. “Talia, for the love of God get out of here. If Dad finds you . . .”
Talia heard a scream, half-human, half-enraged feline. Errata! She whipped around, her gaze searching the tunnel. She couldn’t see the werecougar, but there were more figures wearing the Hunter symbol on their clothes. The Hunters were converging on the spot Talia had left Errata. They have her!
Perry’s face flashed through her mind. They’d show no mercy to a werebeast, and what they could do to a female was even worse.
Max pushed past her, running toward the group and leaving her alone. He wasn’t brave or foolhardy enough to be caught talking to the enemy, even if it was his sister. Damn him!
Talia took a deep breath, shifting her grip on the Airlite. She wasn’t leaving Errata at their mercy. She started running toward the Hunters, her mind scrabbling for a plan.
Hard hands grabbed her from behind. “What are you thinking?”
“What the hell!” Talia twisted around. An enormous vampire loomed there, wearing a leather jacket and a ferocious scowl. Where had he come from?
“If you don’t stop and think, they’ll have you, too,” he said grimly, his ice-blue eyes so pale they looked almost white in the gloom. “Come on.”
He dragged her down the tunnel, not stopping until they reached a hollow in the stonework where they could take cover.
“Who are you?”
“Darak.”
So this was the mysterious rogue from the Empire. “Aren’t you supposed to be fighting topside?”
“I did my bit there. I had a promise to keep about dragging your ass out of the fire. Now I know why. You’re a bloody cowboy.”
“Lore made you promise?”
“No. Michelle.”
A sick feeling burned her. He talks to ghosts. “Was she all right?”
“Yeah. And she loved you.” His voice had the finality of a slamming door.
Talia turned away, hiding the tears that choked her. “Thanks. I guess..”
He grunted.
They were close enough that Talia could count the men. There were four, including Max. She knew all of them by name. One had been her neighbor.
Another was her father. Tall and lean, his gray hair shaved close to his skull, Mikhail Rostov was definitely in command. He turned her way for an instant, and Talia caught sight of his face. Deep lines cut from his nose to the corners of his mouth, emphasizing his unbending expression. Waves of anger and longing sang through her. She wanted to smash that expression off his face, to make him bend. In an anguished part of her heart, she wanted him to hold her and tell her she’d been a good girl.
She’d killed Belenos, but just seeing her father was infinitely worse.
Cold sweat trickled down the small of her back. There would be no reconciliation. The only thing she could do was make sure that he didn’t hurt her friends. She hoped that meant capturing him, but it might mean more.
“Are you okay?” Darak asked, studying her face.
“Yes,” Talia said, hearing her voice shake. “I used to be one of them.”
Talia realized what she’d just said, and felt her whole body turn to ice. This is where he fights me, or we fight the Hunters together.
But Darak seemed undisturbed as a block of granite. “They’ll kill you. You know that, right?”
“Yeah. I’m a monster.”
He gave her a piercing look. “Only if you want to be. Being a vampire gives you power. How you use it is up to you.”
Talia couldn’t take her eyes from her father. “I want to pull their plug.”
The huge vampire made a satisfied noise. “Got a plan?”
“The Hunters will use Errata as a living shield. They’ll make their way to the exit assuming we’ll hang back, but they always kill their hostages at the last minute. The only chance we have of saving her is to get close enough to take out the Hunters before they know we’re there.”
Darak looked at her, a crease between his brows. “How do we do that?”
“Just get me one of their uniforms.”
“You sure about this?”
Frustrated, Talia snatched her sleeve, pulling it up, exposing the Hunter tattoo. “I know what I’m doing.”
“Okay, then.” Darak gave her a mock salute. “The killer babe is in charge.”
“Damned straight.”
“Stay here.” He slipped out of the hiding place, seeming to vanish once he reached the corridor. For such a huge man, that was impressive.
She leaned her head against the cold stone wall, simmering with impatience. Every memory of her long years of training flooded back to her. Planning what to do next took less than a minute. Most of the rescue would have to be improvisation, based on what she knew of the Hunters.
The hard part was turning on her family. It should have been easy, but right and wrong was for the brain. Going against the loyalties drummed into her from the cradle was going to break her heart.
But, sooner or later, she had to decide who Talia was. She wasn’t the soldier her father had left on the battlefield, or the monster he’d banished from his table—and she sure as hell wasn’t the scared girl who followed his orders even though her conscience screamed every time they went out on a hunt.
And none of that would mean a thing to him. Whatever she did next had to be done because it was right, not because it settled a score or proved a point. She would never change the way her father thought.
Darak returned with a Hunter’s vest, utility belt, and two rifles. “There were dead nearby,” he said tersely, thrusting the gear at her but keeping one rifle for himself. “I’ll lurk in the shadows. They didn’t have anything in my size.”
“You don’t need to come with me,” Talia said. “I can do this alone.”
“Sure you can,” he said, watching her pull the vest over her blood-spattered clothes. “Shut up and tell me what you’re going to do.”
A surge of gratitude loosened the knot of apprehension in her chest. “I catch up to them. The uniform will fool them for about a second, but hopefully that’s all I need.”
