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"Run, run as fast as you can, we have to get out of here and off the astral!" Kaylin spun around, dragging me behind him on a breakneck race for the portal.
"But we haven't rescued them--"
"They'll kill us if they catch us!" He yanked me between the oaks and the jolt stilled the protest lodged on my tongue. We headed toward Rhiannon and Leo.
"We don't have time to come off the astral easy," Kaylin said. "This may hurt so get ready!"
He threw his arms around me and there was a numbing flash as we tumbled, bodies solidifying, the smoke of our shadows dissipating. It was like flying, then being yanked out of the sky by an anchor of flesh.
I blinked hard as I tripped and went sprawling in front of Leo, who hurried to help me up. Kaylin, right behind me, was motioning toward the path.
"We have to get out of here. They spotted us!"
"Oh shit." Leo grabbed up our packs and tossed them to us while Rhiannon headed toward the path.
But it was too late. There was a noise from behind us, from between the Twin Oaks, and three men jumped from the portal. They had pale skin and a cerulean cast to their countenance. Vampiric Fae. Shadow Hunters.
I started to run, but in my heart I knew they were faster than we were. They'd catch us and they'd feed on us and that would be the end of everything.
"No!" Rhiannon's voice echoed through the air. She stopped, turning.
"What are you doing? Run!" I reached for her but she waved me off.
"I won't let them hurt us . . . I won't let them take us like they took my mother!" Her eyes flared dangerously and sunbursts writhed around her, struggling to free themselves as she pulled out one of the firebombs.
The men slowed, staring at her warily, but still heading in our direction. They glanced at the rest of us and I could tell they were trying to figure out just what the hell we were up to.
"Don't come any closer. I'm warning you!" Rhiannon's voice was close to breaking. And then, tears running down her face, she raised her arms. "I told you to stop . . ."
The next few seconds were a blur. She tossed the firespark in the air, held out her hands, and screamed one word--I couldn't catch what--and a wall of flame came writhing out of her palms. Green and gold and red, a beautiful, deadly burst of fire aimed in their direction, exploding the bomb into a shock wave of flame.
The men shouted and turned to run as the jets licked at their clothing, catching their gossamer tunics alight. The bushes around the portal began to smoke as sparks flew off, sizzling against the snow.
"Rhiannon, pull it back! Pull it back!" I raced over to her side, not sure how to help her restrain the fire that had so long been repressed. She was screaming now, as the flames licked out of her hands, and her eyes had gone wide like a deer caught in the headlights.
"Move!" The voice came from the huckleberry bush to the right, and Chatter emerged. "I'll help her."
He pressed one hand against her arm and she gave him a dazed look. As he began to whisper to her, the flames lessened, and within a few seconds, she sucked them back into herself.
"Now, run--you've bought yourself time, but you've got to get out of here." He bit his lip, looking at all of us. "I can help--I can take one of you. I can run a lot faster than any of you."
"Take Rhiannon. Now!" I shoved her into his arms and she complied, still dazed. He turned and, in a blur, they were gone. "Kaylin, you get out of here on the astral."
"What about you two? I can take one of you--"
"I'll take her." Grieve emerged from the bushes, near where Chatter had been. "You take Leo and I'll bring Cicely."
I stared at him, open-mouthed. "How'd you find us?"
"I followed Chatter--did you really think I'd leave him alone with that crew from the Barrow around? Now shut up and get over here. We have to move before they come back through the portal." He opened his arms and, without another thought, I walked into his embrace, and then we were off in a blur of motion, with my Grieve holding me tight.
Chapter 17
Grieve swept me up in his arms, and pressed me against his chest as we made a beeline through the wood, faster than I could have ever imagined. While neither vampire nor Fae walked the astral, they could run like the wind--a blur of speed and movement.
I leaned against him, breathing in the intoxicating scent of autumn dreams and bonfires and old ink and pungent earth. The cadence of his heartbeat was different than my own, but he was still alive and breathing. The Vampiric Fae of the Indigo Court scared me speechless, but Grieve hadn't started out as one of them--and I still didn't believe he had been totally won over by his new nature. He wouldn't be helping us if he had been.
We flew through the trees; they went past us in a blur of snow on boughs and gnarled branches and the steady fall of flakes softly drifting down from the clouds. Wind whistled through my hair, streaking it back as we ran. A bevy of whispers whistled past, a flurry of voices buffeting my ears as we raced through the forest. I tried to catch what they were saying but the cacophony was too loud, and finally, I gave up trying.
