Chapter 14
With a crossbow armed and ready by her side, Glenna kept watch from the tower window. She’d considered the fact that she’d had very little practice with that particular weapon, and that her aim could be called into serious question.
But she couldn’t just sit up there, unarmed and wringing her hands like some helpless female. If the damn sun would come out, she wouldn’t have to worry. More than that, she thought with a little hiss, if the McKenna boys hadn’t wandered off—obviously to snarl at each other in private—she wouldn’t have these images in her head of them being ripped to pieces by a pack of vampires.
Pack? Herd? Gang?
What did it matter? They still had fangs and a bad attitude.
Where had they gone? And why had they been out, exposed and vulnerable, so long?
Maybe the pack/herd/gang had already ripped them to shreds and dragged their mutilated bodies off to... And oh, God, she wished she could turn off the video in her head for five damn minutes.
Most women just worried about their man getting mugged or run over by a bus. But oh no, she had to get herself tangled up with a guy at war with blood-sucking fiends.
Why couldn’t she have fallen for a nice accountant or stockbroker?
She had thought of using her skill and the crystal to look for them. But it seemed... intrusive, she decided. And rude.
But if they weren’t back in ten minutes, she was going to say screw manners and find them.
She hadn’t thought through, not completely, the emotional turmoil Hoyt was experiencing, what he missed, and what he risked. More than the rest of them, she decided. She was thousands of miles away from her family, but not hundreds of years. He was in the home where he’d grown up, but it was no longer his home. And every day, every hour, was another reminder of that.
Bringing back his mother’s herb garden had hurt him. She should have thought of that, too. Kept her mouth shut about what she’d needed and wanted. Just made a damn list and gone out to find or buy supplies.
She glanced back at some of the herbs she’d already bundled and hung to dry. Small things, everyday things could cause the most pain.
Now he was out there somewhere, in the rain, with his brother. The vampire. She didn’t believe Cian would attack Hoyt—or didn’t want to believe it. But if Cian were angry enough, pushed hard enough, could he control what must be natural urges?
She didn’t know the answer.
Added to that, no one could be sure more of Lilith’s forces were not out and about, just waiting for another chance.
It was probably silly to worry. They were two men of considerable power, men who knew the land. Neither of them were solely dependent on swords and daggers. Hoyt was armed, and he wore one of the crosses they’d conjured, so he was hardly defenseless.
And it proved a point, didn’t it, the two of them being out, moving freely? It proved they wouldn’t be held under siege.
No one else was worried, particularly. Moira was back in the library, studying. Larkin and King were in the training area doing a weapon inventory. She was, undoubtedly, worked up about nothing.
Where the hell were they?
As she continued to scan, she spotted movement. Just shadows in the gloom. She grabbed the crossbow, ordered her fingers to stop shaking as she positioned it and herself in the narrow window.
“Just breathe,” she told herself. “Just breathe. In and out, in and out.”
That breath came out on a whoosh of relief when she saw Hoyt, Cian beside him. Trooping along, she noted, dripping wet, as if they had all the time in the world, and not a care in it.
Her brows drew together as they came closer. Was that blood on Hoyt’s shirt, and a fresh bruise spreading under his right eye?
She leaned out, bumped the stone sill. And the arrow shot out of the bow with a deadly twang. She actually squealed. She’d hate herself for it later, but the purely female sound of shock and distress ripped out of her as the arrow sliced air and rain.
And landed, just a few inches short of the toe of Hoyt’s boot.
Their swords were out, a blur of steel, as they pivoted back-to-back. Under other circumstances she would have admired the move, the sheer grace and rhythm of it, like a dance step. But at the moment, she was caught between mortification and horror.
“Sorry! Sorry!” She leaned out farther, waved her arm frantically as she shouted. “It was me. It got away from me. I was just... ” Oh hell with it. “I’m coming down.”
She left the weapon where it was, vowing to take a full hour of practice with it before she shot at anything but a target again. Before she set off in a run, she heard the unmistakable sound of male laughter. A quick glance showed her it was Cian, all but doubled over with it. Hoyt simply stood, staring up at the window.
As she swung down the stairs, Larkin came out of the training room. “Trouble?”
“No, no. Nothing. Everything’s fine. It’s nothing at all.” She could actually feel the blood rise up to heat her cheeks as she dashed for the main floor.
They were coming in the front door, shaking themselves like wet dogs as she sprinted down the last steps.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“Remind me not to piss you off, Red,” Cian said easily. “You might aim for my heart and shoot me in the balls.”
“I was just keeping watch for you, and I must’ve pulled the trigger by mistake. Which I wouldn’t have done if the two of you hadn’t been gone so damn long and had me so worried.”
“That’s what I love about women.” Cian slapped his brother’s shoulder. “They damn near kill you, but in the end it’s your own fault. Good luck with that. I’m going to bed.”
“I need to check your burns.”
“Nag, nag, nag.”
“And what happened? Were you attacked? Your mouth’s bleeding—yours, too,” she said to Hoyt. “And your eye’s damn near swollen shut.”
“No, we weren’t attacked.” There was a world of exasperation in his voice. “Until you nearly shot me in the foot.”
“Your faces are all banged up, and your clothes are filthy—ripped. If you weren’t... ” It came to her, when she saw the expressions on their faces. She had a brother of her own, after all. “You punched each other? Each other?”
“He hit me first.”
She gave Cian a look that would have withered stone. “Well, that’s just fine, isn’t it? Didn’t we go through all this yesterday? Didn’t we talk about infighting, how destructive and useless it is?”
“I guess we’re going to bed without our supper.”
“Don’t get smart with me.” She jabbed a finger into Cian’s chest. “I’m here worried half sick, and the two of you are out there wrestling around like a couple of idiot puppies.”
“You nearly put an arrow in my foot,” Hoyt reminded her. “I think we’re quits on foolish behavior for one day.”
She only hissed out a breath. “Into the kitchen, both of you. I’ll do something about those cuts and bruises. Again.”
“I’m having my bed,” Cian began.
“Both of you. Now. You don’t want to mess with me at the moment.”
As she sailed off, Cian rubbed a finger gently on his split lip. “It’s been a long while, but I don’t recall you having a particular fondness for bossy women.”
“I didn’t, previously. But I understand them well enough to know we might as well be after letting her have her way on this. And the fact is, my eye’s paining me.”
When they came in, Glenna was setting what she needed out on the table. She had the kettle on the boil, and her sleeves rolled up.
“Do you want blood?” she said to Cian, with enough frost in the words to have him clearing his throat.
It amazed him that he actually felt chagrined. It was a sensation he hadn’t felt in... too long to remember. Obviously living so closely with humans was a bad influence.
“The tea you’re making will do, thanks.”
“Take off your shirt.”
There was a smart comment on the tip of his tongue, she could all but see it. He proved himself a wise man by swallowing it.
He stripped it off, sat.
“I’d forgotten about the burns.” Hoyt examined them now. There was no longer any blistering, and they’d gone down to a dull, ugly red. “If I’d remembered,” he said as he sat across from Cian, “I’d have put more blows into your chest.”
“Typical,” Glenna said under her breath, and was ignored.
“You don’t fight altogether the way you used to. You use your feet more, and elbows.” And Hoyt could still feel the aching result of them. “Then there’s that leaping off the ground.”
“Martial arts. I have black belts in several of them. Master status,” Cian explained. “You need to put more time into training.”
Hoyt rubbed his sore ribs. “And so I will.”
Weren’t they chummy all of a sudden? Glenna thought. What was it about men that made them decide to be pals after they’d smashed their fists into each other’s faces?
She poured hot water into the pot, and while it steeped came to the table with her salve.
“I would’ve said three weeks to heal with what I can do, considering the extent of the burns.” She sat, slicked salve on her fingers. “I’m amending that to three days.”
“We can be hurt, and seriously. But unless it’s a killing blow, we heal—and quickly.”
“Lucky for you, especially as you’ve got a mass of nice bruising to go with the burns. But you don’t regenerate,” she continued as she applied the salve. “If, say, we were to cut off one of their arms, it wouldn’t grow back.”
“There’s a gruesome and interesting thought. No. I’ve never heard of anything like that happening.”
“Then if we can’t get to the heart or the head, we can go for a limb.”
She went to the sink to wash the salve from her hands, and make cold packs for the bruising. “Here.” She handed one to Hoyt. “Hold that on your eye.”
He sniffed at it, then complied. “You shouldn’t have worried.”
Cian winced. “Bad tact. Wiser to say: ‘Ah, my love, we’re sorry we worried you. We were selfish and inconsiderate, should likely be flogged for it. We hope you’ll forgive us.’ Thicken the brogue a bit as well. Women are fools for brogues.”
“Then kiss her feet, I suppose.”
“Actually, you aim for the ass. Ass kissing is a tradition that never goes out of style. You’ll need patience with him, Glenna. Hoyt’s still working on the learning curve.”
She brought the tea to the table, then surprised them both when she laid a hand on Cian’s cheek. “And you’re going to teach him how to deal with the modern woman?”
“Well, he’s a bit pitiful, is all.”
Her lips curved as she lowered her head, brushed them over Cian’s. “You’re forgiven. Drink your tea.”
“Just that easy?” Hoyt complained. “He gets a pat on the cheek and a kiss with it? You didn’t nearly put an arrow into him.”
“Women are a constant mystery.” Cian spoke quietly. “And one of the wonders of the world. I’ll take this up with me.” He got to his feet. “I’m wanting some dry clothes.”
“Drink all of it.” Glenna spoke without turning as she took up another bottle. “It’ll help.”
“I will then. Let me know if he doesn’t learn fast enough to suit you. I wouldn’t quibble with being second choice.”
“That’s just his way,” Hoyt told her when Cian left the room. “A kind of teasing.”
“I know. So you made friends again while you were bloodying each other.”
“It’s true enough I hit him first. I spoke to him of our mother, and the garden, and he was cold. Even though I could see what was under that cold, I... well, I lashed out, and... After, he took me to where our family’s buried. And there you have it.”
She turned now, and all the pity in her heart swirled into her eyes. “It must’ve been hard for both of you to be there.”
“It makes it real to me, that as I sit here now, they’re gone. It didn’t seem real before. Not solid and real.”
She moved to him, dabbed her tincture on his facial bruises. “And for him, to have lived all this time with no family at all. Another cruelty of what was done to him. To all of them. We don’t think of that do we, when we talk about war, and how to destroy them? They were people once, just like Cian.”
“They mean to kill us, Glenna. Every one of us that has a heartbeat.”
“I know. I know. Something drained them of humanity. But they were human once, Hoyt, with families, lovers, hopes. We don’t think of that. Maybe we can’t.”
She brushed the hair back from his face. A nice accountant, she thought again. A stockbroker. How ridiculous, how ordinary. She had, right here, the amazing.
“I think fate put Cian here, this way, so we understand there’s a weight to what we’re doing. So that we know, at the end of the day, we’ve done what we had to do. But not without cost.”
She stepped back. “That’ll have to do. Try to keep your face from walking into any more fists.”
She started to turn, but he took her hand, rising as he drew her back to him. His lips took hers with utter tenderness.
“I think fate put you here, Glenna, to help me understand it’s not just death and blood and violence. There’s such beauty, such kindness in the world. And I have it.” He wrapped his arms around her. “I have it here.”
She indulged herself, letting her head rest on his shoulder. She wanted to ask what they’d have when it was over, but she knew it was important, even essential, to take each day as it came.
“We should work.” She drew back. “I’ve got some ideas about creating a safe zone around the house. A protected area where we can move around more freely. And I think Larkin’s right about sending out scouts. If we can get to the caves during the day, we might be able to find something out. Even set traps.”
“Your mind’s been busy.”
“I need to keep it that way. I’m not as afraid if I’m thinking, if I’m doing.”
“Then we work.”
“Moira might be able to help once we have a start,” Glenna added as they left the kitchen. “She’s reading everything she can get her hands on, so she’d be our prime data source—information,” she explained. “And she has some power. It’s raw and untrained, but it’s there.”
While Glenna and Hoyt closed themselves in the tower and the house was quiet, Moira pored over a volume on demon lore in the library. It was fascinating, she thought. So many different theories and legends. She considered it her task to pick them apart for truth.
Cian would know it, or some of it, she concluded. Centuries of existence was plenty of time to learn. And anyone who filled such a room with books sought and respected knowledge. But she wasn’t ready to ask him—wasn’t sure she would ever be.
If he wasn’t like the creatures she read of, those that sought human blood night after night—and thirsted not just for that blood, but the kill—what was he? Now he prepared to make war against what he was, and she didn’t understand it.
She needed to learn more, about what they fought, about Cian, about all the others. How could you understand, and then trust, what you didn’t know?
She made notes, copious notes, on the paper she’d found in one of the drawers of the big desk. She loved the paper, and the writing instrument. The pen, she corrected, that held the ink inside its tube. She wondered if she could smuggle some of the paper and pens back to Geall.
She closed her eyes. She missed home, and the missing was like a constant ache in her belly. She’d written down her wish, sealed the paper, and would leave it among her things for Larkin to find if it came to pass.
If she died on this side, she wanted her body taken back to Geall for burial.
She continued to write with thoughts circling in her head. There was one she kept coming back to, nibbling at. She would have to find a way to ask Glenna if it could be done—if the others would agree to it, if it could.
Was there a way to seal off the portal, to close the door to Geall?
With a sigh, she looked toward the window. Was it raining in Geall now, too, or was the sun shining on her mother’s grave?
She heard footsteps approach, and danced her fingers over the hilt of her dagger. She let them fall away when King came in. For reasons she couldn’t name, she felt easier with him than the others.
“Got something against chairs, Shorty?”
Her lips twitched. She liked the way words rumbled out of him, like rocks down a stony hill. “No, but I like sitting on the floor. Is it time for more training?”
“Taking a break.” He sat in a wide chair, a huge mug of coffee in his hand. “Larkin could go all damn day. Up there now, practicing some katas.”
“I like the katas. It’s like dancing.”
“Just make sure you’re doing the leading if you’re dancing with a vampire.”
Idly, she turned the page of a book. “Hoyt and Cian fought.”
King took a drink. “Oh yeah? Who won?”
“I think neither. I saw them coming back, and from their faces and limps, it seemed to be a draw.”
“How do you know they were fighting with each other? Maybe they were attacked.”
“No.” She traced her fingers over words. “I hear things.”
“You got big ears, Shorty.”
“So my mother always said. They made peace between them—Hoyt and his brother.”
“That eliminates a complication—if it lasts.” Given their personalities, King figured a full truce between the brothers had the life expectancy of a fruit fly. “What do you expect to find out in all these books?”
“Everything. Sooner or later. Do you know how the first vampyre came to be? There are different versions in the books.”
“Never thought about it.”
“I did—do. One is like a love story. Long ago, when the world was young, demons were dying out. Before, long before that, there were more. Scores of them, walking the world. But man grew stronger and smarter, and the time of the demons was passing.”
Because he was a man who enjoyed stories, he settled back. “Kind of an evolution.”
“A change, yes. Many demons went beneath the world, to hide or to sleep. There was more magic then, because people didn’t turn from it. Man and the faeries forged an alliance to wage war on the demons, to drive them under for once and all. There was one who was poisoned, and slowly dying. He loved a mortal woman, and this was forbidden even in the demon world.”
“So man doesn’t have a lock on bigotry. Keep going,” he said when she paused.
“So the dying demon took the mortal woman from her home. He was obsessed with her, and his last wish was to mate with her before his end.”
“Not so different from men in that area then.”
“I think, perhaps, all living creatures crave love and pleasure. And this physical act that represents life.”
“And guys want to get off.”
She lost her rhythm. “Get off what?”
He nearly spewed coffee, choked instead. He waved a hand at her as his laugh rumbled out. “Don’t mind me. Finish the story.”
“Ah... Well, he took her deep into the forest and had his way with her, and she, like a woman under a spell, wanted his touch. To try to save his life, she offered her blood to him. So she was bitten, and drank his blood in turn, as this was another kind of mating. She died with him, but she did not cease to exist. She became the thing we call vampyre.”
“A demon for love.”
“Aye, I suppose. In vengeance against men, she hunted them, fed from them, changed them, to make more of her kind. And still she grieved for her demon lover, and killed herself with sunlight.”
“Doesn’t quite hit Romeo and Juliet, does it?”
“A play. I saw the book of it here, on the shelf. I haven’t yet read it.” It would take years to read all the books in such a room she thought as she toyed with the end of her braid.
“But I read another tale of the vampyre. It tells of a demon, mad and ill from a spell even more evil than it, thirsting wildly for human blood. He fed, and the more he fed, the more mad he became. He died after mixing his blood with a mortal, and the mortal became vampyre. The first of its kind.”
“I guess you like the first version better.”
“No, I like truth better, and I think the second is the truth. What mortal woman would love a demon?”
“Led a sheltered life back in your world, haven’t you? Where I come from people fall for monsters—or what others consider monsters—all the time. Ain’t no logic with love, Shorty. It just is.”
She tossed her braid behind her back in a kind of shrug. “Well, if I love, I won’t be stupid about it.”
“Hope I’m around long enough to see you eat those words.”
She closed the book, drew up her legs. “Do you love someone?”
“A woman? Been close a few times, and that’s how I know I didn’t make it all the way to the bull’s-eye.”
“How do you know?”
“When you hit the center, Shorty, you’re down for the count. But it’s fun shooting for it. Gonna take a special woman to get past this.” He tapped a finger to his face.
“I like your face. It’s so big and dark.”
He laughed so hard he nearly spilled his coffee. “You got that one right.”
“And you’re strong. You speak well and you cook. You have loyalty to your friends.”
That big dark face softened. “Want to apply for the position of love of my life?”
She smiled back at him, at ease. “I’m thinking I’m not your bull’s-eye. If I’m to be queen, I must marry one day. Have children. I hope it won’t be only duty, but that I find what my mother found in my father. What they found in each other. I’d want him to be strong, and loyal.”
“And handsome.”
She moved her shoulders, because she did hope that as well. “Do women here only look for beauty?”
“Couldn’t say, but it don’t hurt. Guy looks like Cian, for instance, he’s got to beat them off with sticks.”
“Then why is he lonely?”
He studied her over the rim of his mug. “Good question.”
“How did you come to meet him?”
“He saved my life.”
Moira wrapped her arms around her legs and settled in. There was little she liked more than a story. “How?”
“I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Bad neighborhood in East L.A.” He drank again, lifted a shoulder in a half shrug. “See, my old man took off before I was born, and my old lady had what we’ll call a little problem with illegal substances. OD’d. Overdosed. Took too much of some bad shit.”
“She died.” Everything in her mourned for him. “I’m sorry.”
“Bad choices, bad luck. You gotta figure some people come into the world set on tossing their life into the shitter. She was one of them. So I’m on the street, doing what I can to get by, and keep out of the system. I’m heading to this place I know. It’s dark, steaming hot. I just wanted a place to sleep for the night.”
“You had no home.”
“I had the street. A couple of guys were hanging out on the stoop, probably waiting to make a score. I got my bad attitude on. Need to get by them to get where I want to go. Car rolls up, blasts at them. Drive-by,” he said. “Like an ambush. I’m caught in it. Bullet grazes my head. More coming, and I know I’m going to be dead. Somebody grabs me, pulls me back. Things got blurry, but it felt like I was flying. Then I was someplace else.”
“Where?”
“Fancy hotel room. I’d never seen anything like it outside of movies.” He crossed his big, booted feet as he remembered. “Big-ass bed, big enough for ten people, and I’m lying on it. Head hurts like a mother, which is why I don’t figure I’m dead and this is heaven. He comes out of the bathroom. Got his shirt off, and a fresh bandage on his shoulder. Got himself shot dragging me out of the cross fire.”
“What did you do?”
“Nothing much, guess I was in shock. He sits down, studies me like I’m a frigging book. ‘You’re lucky,’ he said, ‘and stupid.’ He’s got that accent. I’m figuring he must be some rock star or something. The way he looks, the fancy voice, the fancy room. Truth is, I thought he was a perv, and he was going to want me to... Let’s just say I was scared shitless. I was eight.”
“You were a child?” Her eyes widened. “You were just a child?”
“I was eight,” he repeated. “Grow up like I did, you aren’t a kid long. He asks me what the hell I was doing out there, and I give him some sass. Trying to get some of my own back. He asks if I’m hungry, and I shoot back something like I ain’t going to... perform any sexual favors for a goddamn meal. Orders a steak dinner, a bottle of wine, some soda pop. And he tells me he isn’t interested in buggering young boys. If I’ve got someplace I’d rather be, I should go there. Otherwise I can wait for the steak.”
“You waited for the steak.”
“Fucking A.” He gave her a wink. “That was the start of it. He gave me food, and a choice. I could go back to where I’d been—no skin off his—or I could work for him. I took the job. Didn’t know the job meant school. He gave me clothes, an education, self-respect.”
“Did he tell you what he was?”
“Not then. Not long after though. I figured he was whacked, but I didn’t much care. By the time I realized he was telling the truth, literal truth, I would’ve done anything for him. The man I was setting to be died on the street that night. He didn’t turn me,” King said quietly. “But he changed me.”
“Why? Did you ever ask him why?”
“Yeah. That’d be for him to tell.”
She nodded. The story itself was enough to think about.
“Break’s about over,” he announced. “We can get an hour’s workout in. Toughen up that skinny ass of yours.”
She grinned. “Or we could work with the bow. Improve that poor aim of yours.”
“Come on, smart-ass.” He frowned, glanced toward the doorway. “You hear something?”
“Like a knocking?” She shrugged, and because she tarried to straighten the books, was several paces behind him out of the room.
Glenna trotted down the steps. What little progress they were making she could leave to Hoyt for the time being. Someone had to see about the evening meal—and since she’d put her name on the list, she was elected. She could toss together a marinade for some chicken, then go back up for another hour.
A good meal would set the tone for a team meeting.
She’d just drop by the library, yank Moira away from the books for a cooking lesson while she was at it. Maybe it was sexist to put the only other woman next on the KP list, but she had to start somewhere.
The knock on the door made her jolt, then pass a nervous hand through her hair.
She nearly called up the stairs for Larkin or King, then shook her head. Talk about sexist. How was she going to fare in serious battle if she couldn’t even open the door herself on a rainy afternoon?
It could be a neighbor, dropping by to pay a courtesy call. Or Cian’s caretaker, stopping by to make sure they had everything they needed.
And a vampire couldn’t enter the house, couldn’t step over the threshold, unless she asked it in.
A highly unlikely event.
Still, she looked out the window first. She saw a young woman of about twenty—a pretty blonde in jeans and a bright red sweater. Her hair was pulled back into a tail that swung out of the back of a red cap. She was holding a map—seemed to be puzzling over it as she chewed on a thumbnail.
Someone’s lost, Glenna thought, and the sooner she got her on her way and away from the house, the better for everyone.
The knock sounded again as she turned from the window.
She opened the door, careful to keep to her side of the threshold.
“Hello? Need some help?”
“Hello. Thank you, yes.” There was relief, and a heavy dose of French in the woman’s voice. “I am, ah, lost. Excusezmoi, my English, is not so good.”
“That’s okay. My French is fairly nonexistent. What can I do for you?”
“Ennis? S’il vous plaît? May you tell me how the road it goes to Ennis?”
“I’m not sure. I’m not from around here myself. I can look at the map.” Glenna watched the woman’s eyes as she held out a hand for it—her fingertips on her side of the door. “I’m Glenna. Je suis Glenna.”
“Ah, oui. Je m’apelle Lora. I am in holiday, a student.”
“That’s nice.”
“The rain.” Lora held out a hand so rain drops splattered it. “I am lost in it, I think.”
“Could happen to anyone. Let’s have a look at your map, Lora. Are you by yourself?”
“Pardon?”
“Alone? Are you alone?”
“Oui. Mes amies—my friends—I have friends in Ennis, but I turn bad. Wrong?”
Oh no, Glenna thought. I really don’t think so. “I’m surprised you could see the house from the main road. We’re so far back.”
“Sorry?”
Glenna smiled brilliantly. “I bet you’d like to come in, have a nice cup of tea while we figure out your route.” She saw the light come into the blonde’s baby blue eyes. “But you can’t, can you? Just can’t step through the door.”
“Je ne comprendrez pas.”
“Bet you do, but in case my Spidey sense is off today, you need to go back to the main road, turn left. Left,” she repeated and started to gesture.
King’s shout behind her had her spinning around. Her hair swung, the tips of it going beyond the doorway. There was an explosion of pain as her hair was viciously yanked, as her body flew out of the house and hit the ground with a bone-wracking thud.
There were two more, and they came out of nowhere. Instinct had Glenna reaching for her cross with one hand, kicking out blindly with her feet. Movement was a blur, and she tasted blood in her mouth. She saw King slicing at one with a knife, holding it off while he shouted at her to get up, to get into the house.
She stumbled to her feet in time to see them surround him, closing in. She heard herself screaming, and thought—hoped—she heard answering shouts from the house. But they would be too late. The vampires were on King like dogs.
“French bitch,” Glenna spat out, and charged the blonde.
Her fist cracked bone, and there was satisfaction in that, and the sudden spurt of blood. Then she was once more hurdling back, and this time when she hit, her vision went gray.
She felt herself being dragged, struggled. It was Moira’s voice buzzing in her ear.
“I have you. I have you. You’re back inside. Lie still.”
“No. King. They’ve got King.”
Moira was already dashing out, dagger drawn. As Glenna pushed herself up, Larkin vaulted over her and through the door.
Glenna gained her knees, then swayed to her feet. Sickness burned its acrid taste at the base of her throat as she once more stumbled to the door.
So fast, she thought dully, how could anything move that fast? As Moira and Larkin gave chase, they bundled the still struggling King into a black van. They were gone before she got out of the house.
Larkin’s body shimmered, shuddered, and became a cougar. The cat flashed after the van and out of sight.
Glenna went to her knees on the wet grass, and retched.
“Get inside.” Hoyt grabbed her arm with his free hand. In his other was a sword. “Inside the house. Glenna, Moira, get inside.”
“It’s too late,” Glenna cried, while tears of horror spilled out of her eyes. “They have King.” She looked up, saw Cian standing behind Hoyt. “They took him. They took King.”