Page 81 of Blood Magic

He didn’t get too close as he led me through the now silent, injured vampires. Some of them would heal. Some of them wouldn’t. I cared about none of them. And even when a vampire was too slow to move out of my way and I shoved my palm against him, I could only watch with slight curiosity as he melted before my eyes, then fell to the floor, dead. Irreversibly dead.

The other vampires dropped to their knees and bowed their heads, cringing, crying, terrified. I was the councils’ hand, and their immense, ancient power flowed inside me.

But for how long? I couldn’t know that for sure, but even as I strode through the room, following Bastien, I felt it wane.

Perhaps it was a one-time thing, put in place to show what I could do. It would keep the vampires in line, even if that power never grew inside me again. The threat of it would be enough.

For a while.

I believed that was correct. Along with their power, I believed I had some of the council’s knowledge. But it burned through me quickly, and suddenly the psychopathic creature was gone, and I was once more exactly as I had been. A woman, a wolf, and a person who wanted only to save the life of a friend.

But Axton had seen, and he now understood—or thought he did—what I was. When I flung the doors open and rushed into his dungeon, he was already gone. He’d fled, because he knew that I was bringing his death, and suddenly, three months in the ground seemed more like protection from me than punishment from the council.

Too bad for him that I wasn’t going to let it go at that. If I had to, I would dig him up to kill him. Bastien would be County Master, and he would be a good one. Axton’s time was over.

But none of that mattered overly much. Not right now. Now, all that mattered was the man, the human man, lying on that table.

Bastion had not managed to grab my clothes in the melee, so I turned at the door and pointed at one of the vampires. “Give me your jacket.”

He didn’t hesitate. He shrugged off his long coat and tossed it to me, unwilling to get too close. I put it on, then turned to Bastien and held out my hand. After a long, searching look, he slapped my blade into my palm, then broke the unconscious detective’s bonds, scooped him off the table, and draped him over his shoulder.

“Follow me,” he said.

Maybe it was my imagination, but to my sensitive ears, he sounded just a little less friendly. “Wait,” I told him. “I need to get Remy.”

I went back to the doorway, then yelled, “Remy, where are you?” I got no reply, but I couldn’t believe that he was dead. No. He was Remy Simon, and he was legendary. He wasn’t going to die in a roomful of vampires. “Where is he?” I asked the vampires. Many of them had already dispersed and left the room, but a few remained. The humans had disappeared not long after the fighting had begun.

“He went back out the way you came in,” one of the vampires told me reluctantly. She was a tall brunette, and she didn’t look me in the eye as she spoke. “He was injured.”

“Kait,” Bastien called, impatient. “This man will not last much longer.”

I gave one more sweeping look around the room, but finally, I jogged after Bastien. It was only when he let me take the lead and I found myself in a dimly lit tunnel that I remembered what was waiting.

The fight wasn’t over yet.

We still had the trolls to get through.