‘Yes,’ Chrysabelle answered, ‘but you can home in on her heartbeat, can’t you?’

Silence for a brief span. ‘I can still do that.’

‘Then that’s the plan. All right, break this door down and let’s go.’

‘Stand back,’ Mal said, taking her fingers in his hand and pulling her to the side.

She moved a few steps away and Mal dropped her hand. Something scurried over her foot. The suffocating blackness closed in. She refused to acknowledge the childish fear knotting her belly. Instead she stroked her fingers over the daggers at her wrists and concentrated on what lay ahead. The pressing dark receded enough for her to breathe.

‘Doc, take the top hinge, I’ll take the bottom,’ Mal said. ‘Dominic, grab the door as soon as you can slip your hands through the opening to keep it from falling. Ready?’ A brief pause. She assumed the other men nodded. ‘Now.’

The sharp hiss and acrid smell of silver-burned flesh filled the air. Dominic cursed in Italian, and Doc let out a feline spit.

‘Solid silver,’ Mal growled. ‘Bloody hell.’ ‘Watch out.’ She pulled her sacre free. The weapon hummed in her grasp, grateful to be free, eager to taste flesh. She pointed it at what she thought was the door.

Doc snorted. ‘What are you going to do with—’

‘Aim me toward the hinges and get out of the way.’

‘A little more left,’ Mal said. ‘Now forward. A little more.’

The tip of the blade scratched the door, catching the seam between door and frame.

‘Right there.’

‘Stand free,’ she cautioned them. When the sounds of their movement stopped, she rammed the blade halfway into the seam and jerked upward. The structure screeched in protest. A spray of sparks illuminated the line of warped silver left behind as she drove the blade higher, severing the hinges. Her shoulders ached with the effort. Sacres were designed to cut through any material, but flesh and bone were far easier than metal.

Finally, she tugged the weapon free. Fuchsia spots danced before her eyes as the sparks died and the darkness returned. She blinked to clear them.

‘So much for the element of surprise,’ Doc said.

‘Let’s hope Tatiana thinks it’s her staff.’ Chrysabelle sheathed her sacre, then kicked the door down. It crashed forward, sending curls of dust into the dimly lit stairwell beyond. Faint phosphorescence outlined a decrepit railing, warped stairs, and the trio surrounding her.

Doc wore his in between face, his eyes green-gold with full-blown pupils to combat the sheer darkness, his nose and cheekbones more pronounced. But it was the almost saber-tooth overhang of fangs that sent a shiver down her spine. Teeth that big would leave dime-size holes. Good to know the varcolai was on her side.

She went first, carefully picking her way up the steps. The second from the top gave beneath her foot. She grabbed the railing. Flakes of rust coated her hand. It grated loudly as the bolts stressed and the entire length bowed out into the air. Unbalanced and about to fall, she released it and struggled to right herself. Mal caught her wrist. His palm sizzled against the silver mesh, but he held on until she stood firm.

‘Thank you.’ She pulled her tunic back over the armor.

He flexed his twice-burned hand and shrugged. ‘Pain brings clarity.’

She nodded. ‘Then I think we’re all about to get really clear.’

Chapter Thirty-two

Fi struggled against the vampire she recognized from Velimai’s replay as Mikkel, but her efforts were useless. He held her at arm’s length and the black magic hand that had clamped onto her at the cemetery still squeezed her into a state of numbness. No matter how many times she told herself to fight him, willed her legs to kick or her arms to strike out, her body stayed limp. Even trying to go ghostly had lost what little effect it had had.

She had only just become real again, and now she was going to die for the second time. At the hands of a freaking vampire. If she came back as a ghost again, she was going to make this one’s life truly miserable.

She just hoped dying wasn’t going to hurt as much as it had the first time. She shivered inside and wished for Doc.

Mikkel carried her through a set of double doors and dumped her on some fancy Oriental rug. She winced as she hit the floor. Momentum rolled her faceup, enabling her to see the back of another vampire, this one female. Please don’t let it be—

The female turned. It was. Fi’s numbness turned to a bitter chill, and the niggling feeling that she knew these two beyond what Velimai had showed them at Maris’s house filled her again as it had that night. Where had she seen them? Even her mind felt numb.

‘Look what I brought you, my sweet,’ Mikkel said.

Tatiana wiped the blood off her knuckles with a towel. ‘I’m too busy to eat.’

That good news was tempered by what sat behind Tatiana. There, tied to a chair and looking like a bloody rag, was another comarré, her gilded face swollen and bruised, her clothing torn and dirty. Chrysabelle’s aunt? Fi almost hoped not. The woman looked half dead, but maybe she was just sedated.

Mikkel frowned. ‘I found her in the kine cemetery.’ His lids lowered and the corner of his mouth perked up as though he was about to reveal some great tidbit of info. ‘In the company of some fringe and a pair of fae, one I didn’t recognize. But one I think was the shadeux fae who took down the Nothos in the hangar.’

Tatiana’s face blanked. ‘You’re sure?’