How dare they come into my pack house, onto my fucking territory, and attack my Loup.

How fucking dare they.

“Fee, the vamps!” Cora grabbed my arm, and we jumped to outside the garage where more super vamps were dragging the refugee vamps out of our garage.

I charged and tackled the nearest one at the waist, lifting him off his feet and then slamming him into the side of their getaway van. There was a snap, and the vampire howled and collapsed to the ground, his body limp. His spine…I’d broken his spine but not his spirit. He hissed at me, and I caught a good look at his face.

Mother fucker. I knew that face. It was more filled out now, less on the pasty side, but even though I’d only met him once at the Dominus quarters when he’d come to deliver intel on the Dread hangout, his face was etched into my memory.

“Fee, watch out!”

I turned my head in time to catch the sight of a black baton headed for my shoulder and hear the fizz of electricity a moment before my body lit up with pain, twisting and contorting.

I lost control of myself and hit the ground in a convulsion.

Cora’s scream was eclipsed by a roar of rage, and then I was being lifted off the ground. Dean’s cedar scent filled my head as he dragged me backward. My senses were coming back online. The pain receded as my body dispelled the effects.

A huge golden wolf attacked the super vamps spilling into the yard in a frenzy. Blood sprayed, howls ripped the air, and throats were torn open.

Grayson was in his own version of berserker mode, and fuck was he glorious, but he needed to stop. We needed intel. We needed one alive, and I knew just which one.

I grabbed Dean’s shirt by the collar and pulled myself to my feet as Grayson came to a standstill, his powerful golden body spattered with blood. Vamp parts were strewn around him. My pack growled and snarled in triumph as Grayson turned on the vampire crumpled by the van. His haunches bunched as he prepared to attack.

“NO!” I blur-ran, coming to stand in front of the super vamp.

Grayson’s jaws snapped closed inches from my face, his eyes wide with shock at what he’d almost done. He fell back, and I dropped down beside the vamp and grasped his jaw, forcing him to look at me.

“We’ve been looking for you, Kristoff.”

The vamps we’d been protecting were back in the garage, snug and safe. The dead bodies of the super vamps had been piled into our van, ready for disposal, and Kristoff was chained to the post in the pack house with the rest of us gathered around him. His spine had healed, so the chains were a necessary precaution.

“This is your hybrid witch-vamp contact?” Dean asked. “Are you sure? He isn’t what you described.”

Thin with a Béla Lugosi vibe? No, he wasn’t any longer.

He was bulky and muscular beneath his combat uniform, which strained against his biceps and thighs. They’d changed him. Whoever they were.

“He looks different. I mean, his body…It’s bulkier than it was before, but it’s him.”

Kristoff stared straight ahead, ignoring us.

Grayson stepped into his line of sight. “Who are you working for?” he asked.

Kristoff’s expression remained impassive.

“We should make him talk.” Bastian cracked his knuckles. “I’ll do it.”

Kristoff didn’t even flinch.

I joined Grayson in Kristoff’s line of sight. “I don’t think that’ll make a difference.” I snapped my fingers in front of his face, and he didn’t even blink. “I don’t think he’s home.”

“He’s in lockdown,” Cora said. “Some kind of shutdown.”

“She’s right,” Uriel said. “Those vamps were trained professionals, sent here with an objective, and that mission was compromised. This…Whatever it is that’s happened to him, must be some kind of failsafe. A way to prevent anyone getting intel.”

“Why not just put in a kill switch?” Dean pondered.

“Maybe there is one,” Grayson said. “Maybe it’s on a timer.”

“No.” Uriel crouched by Kristoff, his eyes narrow with speculation. “A kill switch would have been activated by now.”

“Maybe they’ll send more super vamps after him,” Dean said. “They didn’t get the cargo they came for. They could attack again.”

“They might,” Grayson said. “But would they risk losing more soldiers?”

“But they know we’re onto them now,” Dean said. “I doubt they’ll just let that go.”

He was right. “We need to fortify the house and call in the civilian pack to act as guards.”

“To guard refugee vamps?” Bastian snorted. “You think they’ll go for that?”

I pinned him with a glare. “They’ll do what their fucking alpha asks of them.”

As much as I wanted to run my pack as a democracy, there would be times when an alpha had to pull rank, and now was one of those times.

“I’ll send out the bat signal,” Bastian said.

Uri was still studying Kristoff. “If they don’t come for him, then he might reactivate at some point and try to run. Or maybe this is it for him. He’s been abandoned and will remain locked in his own head.”

But we needed the information in his head. We needed someone who could crack the code and get inside.

Shit. “We need Conah. He can read memories of the dead and the living.”

Cora nodded. “I’ll jump into the Underealm and find him.”

“No. It’s too dangerous with Mammon so close to Imperium. It’s safer to send a phoenix. It’ll find him, and if he can get away, he’ll come. In the meantime, contact Vi and see if there’s any witchy shit she can do. I’ll fly back to quarters and send the phoenix.”

“Fee?” Uriel said tentatively. “Do you know how to send a phoenix?”

Crap. “You better come with me.”

Grayson pulled me into a hug and kissed my forehead. “Stay the night.” He locked gazes with me. “If…if you want to.” He looked to my left to where Uri stood waiting.

“Grayson…”

“I love you,” he said. “All of you.” He released me. “Take care of her,” he said to Uriel. “The rest of you, let’s clean this fucking place up.”

With a final look at our trashed home, I headed out the busted front doors.

I had a phoenix to send.

Chapter Twenty-Six

It was strange entering the Dominus quarters, knowing it would be empty of the guys. But Iza was there to greet us.

“Fee, you’re back.” She looked so happy to see me that I didn’t have the heart to tell her I wasn’t staying. “I put fresh sheets on your bed,” she said. “Will Masters Azazel, Malachi, and Conah be back soon too?”

“I don’t know, Iza. I think things will be…quiet around here for a while. In fact, I think you and the others should take some time off.”

Her eyes went wide. “You want us to leave?”

“Just for a few days. Go see friends and family. I’ll send a message to the tavern when things are…normalish.”

“So, the rumors are true…” She wrung her hands. “Lilith has been taken.”

Oh shit. Now was the time to lie to her, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. “Iza, can I trust you?”

She looked offended that I’d asked. “Have I ever given you cause to doubt me?”

I bit back a smile. “No, which is why I’m going to tell you the truth.”

She held her breath.

“Lilith was taken.”

She let out a sharp cry and staggered slightly. Uriel caught her, and she shook him off indignantly and flung herself at me.

I hugged her to my thigh. “It’ll be okay. Azazel, Mal, and Conah will find her, and everything will be fine, but you cannot tell anyone, do you understand? We can’t add fuel to the rumors, or it will incite fear and panic.”

She tipped her head up, eyes brimming with tears. “Our poor queen. Taken by the usurper.”

Oh, God. I hadn’t realized how dramatic imps could be. “I promise you we will fix this. But you need to keep this to yourself. You’re in the circle of trust now. You mustn’t break it.”

She shook her head vehemently. “I vow it.”

“Okay, good. Gather the others and take a holiday, tell them…tell them it’s a boon for doing an excellent job. You’ll be paid, of course…double pay.”

She nodded. “Yes, Fee.”

“Good. But before you go, do you know where the guys go to send a phoenix?”

She stared at me in surprise. “Please don’t tell me the Masters haven’t shown you the aviary.”

We had an aviary?

The aviary wasn’t an enclosure, it was a garden on the other side of the quarters set on a ledge below the roof. It was a huge space with a dome over the top to keep out the elements. It was heated with windows here and there to let in the phoenixes, and what wondrous creatures they were.

Majestic birds that came in shades of red-orange and black, they ranged in size from the size of my forearm to the size of my thigh.

I stood amidst the blooms and the flora, staring at the creatures whirring up ahead. One moment they were there, the other, they winked out of existence.

I gripped Uriel’s forearm, my gaze still on the spot where the birds had just been. “What just happened?”

“They cloaked themselves,” he said. “They can do that. Wait. Watch.”

A gust of air brushed my cheek, and then a phoenix landed a meter away from me. It stood watching me.

“Wait,” Uriel said softly. He crouched and made a soft tutting sound.

The phoenix opened its beak, and a low whistle echoed around us.

“What does that mean?”

“It means it’s ready for your message. There should be scrolls and ink here somewhere.”

I found the items laid on a table to our left, which was almost obscured by plants, and wrote out a simple note asking Conah to come to the pack house if he could spare the time. There was a metal container designed for the scroll, so I rolled it up and pushed the paper inside.