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Camil e shook her head, blinking, as Morio yanked her out of the way.
I turned at a scuffling noise behind me and saw Chase wrestling with one of the shadow creatures. I poised myself to leap on it and help him when he let out a shout and the thing rebounded back. I couldn’t see what he’d done to it, but the thing went poof and vanished.
“Are you okay?” I ran to his side and yanked him to his feet as he raised his hand for help.
“Yeah, I think so.” Chase dusted off his suit and nodded toward Vanzir. “He’s got the last of them, it looks like.”
“Yeah, he does. I think.”
Just then, Vanzir drained the shadow men dry, and they vanished. Panting, he turned around to stare hungrily at Camil e, and she took a step back. He stepped forward, then stopped himself.
“Don’t ever get near me again when I’m feeding.” He gave her a stark look. “You have too much life energy and stand out like a lol ipop in the middle of a bunch of broccoli. I don’t think I could help myself.”
Morio let out a low growl, but Camil e put her hand on his arm. “Stop. He can’t help it—it’s his nature.” She nodded at Vanzir. “Understood. I’l try to keep my distance when we’re in a fight.”
He gave her a bleak smile. “Babe, you’d better.”
“Now what?” Chase asked.
“I think the question should be, what did you do to that creature?” I stared at him. “You couldn’t just knock it out with a punch to the kisser.”
Chase looked at me, bewildered. “I don’t know, to be honest. I just . . . I reached out and pushed.
I remember thinking, Get off me, and I . . . shoved and it vanished.”
“Shoved . . . do you know if you touched it physical y or with your mind?” Camil e swung around, eyeing the detective.
He shook his head. “Don’t know. I real y don’t remember.”
I gave Camil e a warning shake of the head. Chase was obviously opening up in his abilities, but what they were, and what they would become, we didn’t have time to find out standing here below the streets of Seattle. “Wel , whatever you did, it worked. As to what next . . . hel , I don’t know. We could explore each of those passages, but I’m afraid we might get lost.”
“Why don’t we head back to the main tunnel and see where it leads?” Vanzir nodded back toward the way we’d come. “This area seems too dangerous right now.” He seemed antsy.
I stared at him. “What’s up with you?”
He blinked. “Nothing. I just don’t want anybody hurt.”
Camil e shrugged. “He may be right.”
“Okay,” I said. “The tunnels leading out of this chamber look too dark and too narrow anyway.
And our flashlights aren’t working in here.” I led them back through the narrow passage, hurrying to get us back out to the main tunnel. Once we were there, our lights came back on.
“I don’t like it down here,” Camil e said. She drew close to Morio. He put his arm around her shoulder. “I hate being underground.”
“I know. Let’s get a move on.”
We fel back in formation again. We’d been traversing the passage for another ten minutes when I stopped and looked up. Slivers of dim light filtered down.
“Wait here,” I said, then slid my gloves back on and headed up the iron-rung ladder again. As I came to the top and cautiously slid the manhole cover aside, I blinked, surprised to find myself smack in the middle of the park in which I’d found the girl’s body. About ten yards from where I’d found her body, to be exact. That meant our serial kil er was probably using this tunnel system to come and go. If I was right, he had built himself a nest down here somewhere.
I scrambled back down the ladder. As I jumped the last five feet and turned to tel them what I’d found out, there was a loud shriek and a laugh, and one of the broken slats from the wooden floor sailed into the air, directly at me. Morio was standing nearest and he leaped to push me out of the way, but as he did so, the splintered end of the board lodged into his side. Deep. Blood began to flow heavily from the wound and he groaned, sinking to the floor.
“Crap!” I leaped to his side. Camil e was already there, kneeling by him as Vanzir and Chase looked in vain for the attacker. The next moment, a hail of pebbles rained down on al of us, including a few stones as big as my fist. They hit hard, and we were al under attack.
“What do we do?” Chase yel ed, trying to shield Camil e and Morio.
Vanzir pushed Chase out of the way. “Get the kitsune above ground,” he said. “I can’t take him.
