“For what?”
“Follow my lead.”
“I don’t like that plan.”
“Too bad.” Talia took off at a run, praying they weren’t too late.
The Hunters were only a few minutes away from the exit in the Castle alley. As Talia had predicted, her father had a gun to Errata’s head. Max walked next to him. There were two other Hunters following in the rear. She could see the red glint of hellhound eyes in the shadows up ahead, watching the Hunters as they passed, but the hounds were helpless to attack. Talia prayed the hounds recognized her as a friend, despite the borrowed gear.
Talia caught up to the uniformed men. Her father turned to acknowledge the troop joining his team, and in that split second Talia had to act. She gave a short, sharp whistle, the band’s signal for danger ahead.
As she’d hoped, every Hunter jerked their attention forward, away from her. Talia smashed the butt of her rifle into her old neighbor’s head, knocking him unconscious, then delivered a solid kick to the man on her other side.
Surprise was on her side. Talia wheeled and kicked the rifle out of her father’s hand and yanked Errata out of his grasp. “Go!” she yelled.
Errata sprinted for freedom.
Talia’s heart leaped with victory. She spun around, ready to follow, but her luck ran dry. She felt her gun hand wrenched behind her back, the sudden pain forcing her to drop her weapon. She swung her free arm, only to feel the slice of a blade so sharp it took a moment for the nerves to summon pain. A moment later, there was the cold kiss of a knife at her throat.
“How dare you show your face to me?”
The rough, hard edge of her father’s voice sawed through her, bringing a rush of confused emotions. Panic. Disbelief. Disappointment. Hatred. Somewhere under all that, the memory of loving him.
“Don’t kill me, Daddy.” She could see the tip of the knife from the corner of her eye. It was the big Bowie knife her father had always carried. Big enough to—eventually—take off her head.
“Please, Daddy.”
“I’m not your father.”
“No, don’t!” yelled Max.
She felt the knife bite into her skin. The sharp, hot pain wrenched a scream from her.
The news from aboveground was good. The queen was safe and under the watchful eyes of Clan Thanatos as well as her own armed guard.
While Lore’s hounds secured the dense south end of the tunnels, his Beta’s crew and the wolves of Pack Silvertail had tightened the other sides of the net. Many of Belenos’s vampires had been caught or killed. When the news came that Talia was safe and had killed their sire, the fight had gone out of them.
More hounds and wolves had arrived with the werebears. Baines had called them, and they arrived just in time to have a share in the final roundup. There was also a heavy police contingent aboveground, covering every exit they could find.
Lore was satisfied with the progress so far, but there were too many questions left unanswered. To begin with, where was Talia? No one had seen her or Errata since they’d been separated from Joe.
Instead, he found Mavritte leaning against a wall, her leathers running with blood. She was staring at the floor.
Lore studied her face. “Thank you for fighting so bravely today.”
“I am no coward.” She gave him a hard look. “I have not forgotten my challenge to you.”
“Even with everything that has happened tonight?”
“What has this to do with the pack? It is a war of vampires. Hellhound business has not been resolved.” She turned her face away, speaking so softly he barely heard her. “Though I see what you love in your vampire.”
That surprised him. “You do?”
“She killed her sire. She is a warrior without fear. But she is not one of us.”
“Does that matter so much?”
She looked sad and tired. “The pack leaders must put the pack before all. How can a vampire put the hounds first? It goes against nature.”
Lore was silent.
“Without a strong Alpha, there will be no future for us. No anything. The legends say there will be no young.”
“You speak of legends. Traditions. We live in a different world now.”
Mavritte poked him in the chest. She smelled of sweat and blood and gunpowder. “Do you not dream in prophecy? Do you not smell evil on the air? Are we not demon kin? You cannot believe what you want and ignore the rest.”
“I will not let tradition trample what I know in my soul to be right. And I will not fight you.”
“Then you can wage all the wars you like and remain a coward. It is the battle on the hearth that counts.” Mavritte turned away, contempt in her eyes. “If the home is not strong, the kingdom has no foundation to rest on. The Alpha must have the strongest house of all. You have no true mate. You have nothing.”
Lore was momentarily speechless.
Then they heard Talia’s shriek of pain.
Lore scrambled into the tunnel, morphing into hound form as he ran.
He looked first for Talia. She was down and bleeding from the neck and arm.
Errata stood to one side. She had a gun, but didn’t seem to know what to do with it.
One Hunter was down on the ground, but another, who was bleeding from the head, flew through the air. Darak lifted a third over his head like a sack of flour.
Lore had to get to Talia, but there was an obstacle. Two more Hunters—Talia’s brother and an older man —were wrestling on the floor and in his way. It looked like Max was trying to grapple for a knife. They both looked up to see Lore at the same time. In their surprise, the knife went skittering across the floor.
Lore gave a warning growl. The older one grabbed for a rifle that was lying on the ground. Mercury bullets. Bad news, because Lore’s strength was close to tapped out. The odds of pulling off that disappearing trick again tonight were low to none.
Rage slammed into him. He had to try. That was his mate wounded on the ground.
Kill. Protect. Lowering his massive bulk into a crouch, Lore bared huge, white teeth, his growl echoing like an earthquake down the tunnel. Someone screamed. Lore bounded forward, massive paws raised to trap and crush.
The older Hunter raised the rifle.
But Talia had lunged for the knife and thrown it a fraction of a second before, a look of deep anger in her eyes. He could still see the whirling blade, the thwopthwop of it as it spun through the air. It was the same moment as had been in his prophecy.
Lore twisted in the air, giving extra clearance for the knife’s path. The rifle fired. Lore had a moment of freefall as he waited for the tearing of the mercury bullets through his belly.
But they never did. He felt them skim by, a hot flick against his skin.
When he hit the ground, the knife had drawn a long, bloody slash down the older man’s arm. Lore landed with a clumsy thump and roll, coming to his feet in time to see the two men disappearing down the tunnel. Darak chased after them.
Talia was weeping, the harsh, racking sobs of heartbreak. Lore padded over to her. Her neck was bloody, but it wasn’t bleeding. There was a wound in her arm that was far worse.
He didn’t think it was the cut she was crying about.
Lore curled up on the ground, pushing his body against her thigh, and put his chin on her knee, peering up at her. Hellhounds weren’t known for their appeal, but he gave it his best doggy-soulful try.
She hiccupped. “Oh, stop it.”
