Her fingers closed around the hilt just as another explosion shook the building, this one closer, sending chunks of concrete raining down around them.
But Raziel had his own problems to contend with. Namely, Nabrisi. He charged toward her, using the chaos as cover. She fired her gun, but he dodged. The shot went wide, sparking off the wall inches from his head. Then he was on her, his good hand closing around her throat, his fangs bared in a snarl of fury.
“Nadi!” he shouted. “Go! I’ll hold them?—”
“Like hell!” she shouted back. He couldn’t look to see what was going on. But whatever was happening, she was mired in her own brawl with Asha. “I’m not leaving you here!”
“This isn’t a debate!” He dug his nails deep into Nabrisi’s throat and into the flesh. She howled and screamed. But she was strong. “Find Kalo. Make him explain himself. I’ll find you when?—”
Asha screeched.
There was a crash.
With a snarl, Raziel slammed Nabrisi’s head into the ground once, twice, three times, trying to smash her skull to splinters. But she kicked him off her, sending him crashing into the wall.
Just in time for him to watch Nadi sink her blade into Asha’s shoulder, slicing through fabric and flesh. But Asha barely seemed to notice.
“Fast,” the vampire acknowledged, circling. “Faster than I expected. But I’ve been killing things for two hundred years.”
“And I have made a career out of killing your kind.” Nadi was panting, but she seemed uninjured for the moment.
Another explosion. Closer still. The whole building groaned, metal shrieking as support structures began to fail. Somewhere, Raziel could hear shouting—fae voices, vampire voices, all mixed together in a cacophony of violence.
Asha’s eyes flickered toward the sound, just for an instant.
“Raziel!” Nadi scrambled to her feet, her blade dripping dark blood. “Now!”
He heard her. Of course he heard her. Even in the chaos, even in the darkness, even with Nabrisi’s hands clawing at his face and her fangs snapping inches from his throat, he heard her.
With a snarl of effort, he drove his knee into Nabrisi’s stomach and threw her against the wall. The impact cracked concrete, and the vampire slumped, momentarily stunned.
He had her gun in an instant.
Two silver bullets to the skull was all it took.
Nabrisi was dead. Eyes wide. Blood splattered on the wall behind her.
Asha screamed.
Another explosion and it was clear they were out of time.
A shame they didn’t have enough time to finish the other sister. Grabbing Nadi’s hand with his blood-slicked fingers, he took off running again—past Nabrisi’s crumpled form, and toward a door at the end of the corridor that hung open on broken hinges.
Freedom. Maybe. Possibly.
If they could just make it a little farther?—
They burst through the door and into the night.
The loading dock was the aftermath of a warzone. Bodies littered the ground—more vampire than fae. They didn’t stop running until they had made it to the edge of the buildings a few blocks away to catch their breath.
Raziel leaned back against the stone wall of whatever abandoned building in whose shadow they were taking shelter, and held Nadi close. “I?—”
The click of a gun next to his head had him letting out a long, heavy sigh.
“You’ll be coming with us,vuampi.It is time the Serpent faced justice once and for all.”
Kalo.
