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Which meant that, maybe, all she had to do was look for signs of recent use around the mine entrances. But where to start?
She bit her lip for a moment, then swung left. Dust stirred under her boots, swirling through the air. She sneezed.
"Bless you,” a cold voice said to her right.
Nikki jumped and swung around, but she resisted the impulse to flick a knife into her palm simply because she recognized the voice.
"You spying, Kinnard?” She eyed the old man warily as he walked from the shadows of a small lane alongside the barn.
"Of course.” He hawked and spat. Nikki quickly shifted her boot to avoid the blob, and suspected he did it purely to piss her off. Kinnard grinned. “The emotion of sexual awareness is almost as drink-worthy as anger. You and that vampire of yours fairly set the air alight."
"I'm happy for you,” she muttered. “What do you want?"
"I came to remind you that dinner is now being served." He came to spy, more likely. Obviously, he was Dunleavy's eyes and ears, and he had probably followed her simply to see if she was playing the game or not.
And maybe following Kinnard should be her plan of attack once she'd rescued the rangers. It might be the only way she was going to figure out where Dunleavy was. If he was a vampire, as Seline had said, then she should be able to sense him the minute she got near him. But he was also an adept of magic and would probably be wearing some form of concealment—if he hadn't totally changed shape. After all, his twin had been a shapeshifter. There was every chance that Weylin was one, too.
"I'm not eating tonight, thanks,” she said.
"Ain't much but beans in the store, you know. And they're worth a King's ransom.” His gaze skated down her. “Of course, for a pretty thing like you, I'll do a special price." Revulsion stirred. “No, thanks."
Kinnard raised an eyebrow. “Too good for me, huh? Well, that'll change. It did last time." Meaning Seline had slept with this wizened old maggot? Somehow, Nikki doubted it. She stepped back.
“If you'll excuse me, I have rangers to find."
"Ah, yes.” Humor lit his pale eyes. “That reminds me—I've been sent to give you a hint and a warning. Wolves prowl the eastern rim. Get past them, and you might just find your rangers." Might not, too, she suspected. “And when I free the rangers, Weylin promises to release them?"
"Gotta like a woman with confidence.” He gave her a stained smile. “They can join the miners in the bar, but they can't go free."
No one can. The unsaid words hung in the air between them. Nikki swallowed to ease the dryness in her throat. “He'd better keep his promises, Kinnard."
He snorted, “And what are you going to do if he doesn't, girlie? This is our game, and you're playing by our rules."
"Rules can change.” Would change, if she had anything to say about it. “And remember, old man, neither you nor your master know as much about me as you think you do." Chew on that, she thought, spinning around and walking away. His gaze burned a hole into her back long after she'd turned a corner and headed for the nearby hills. Once she'd passed the last of the old buildings, she stopped. The hills rose above her, dark and silent expanses of dirt and sage bush. To her left, halfway up the hill, stood the Standard Mill, which had once processed ore from the Standard Mine, the largest and most profitable of all the mines in the area. A series of wooden poles led from the mill to the hilltop, the remains of a gondola system that had once carted the ore from the mine to the mill. She couldn't see the mine entrance from where she stood, and she had no intention of going there tonight. But that was where she'd have to go come the night of the new moon.
Her gaze came back to the mill. Kinnard had suggested that the rangers were being held in the eastern section, but she didn't believe him. The mill was certainly far enough away from town to hold prisoners, but as one of the few, almost whole, structures that remained outside of the town, it was also a very obvious hiding spot.
Would Weylin do the obvious? Probably not. But instinct was pressuring her to check out the mill, and right now, all she really had to go on was instinct.
Picking up her skirt, she walked toward the mill. The wind stirred, brushing cold fingers across her cheeks even as it teased long strands of hair away from her ponytail. It was still somewhat jolting to see blonde rather than brown, and she was damn glad there'd been no mirrors in the old house. It was an unreal sensation to look in the mirror and see someone else's reflection staring back. She wondered why Seline and Michael had never been intimate. While she knew, from comments that Camille had made, that Seline wasn't actually blonde but dark haired, Nikki very much suspected the rest of the image she wore was pretty much the real Seline. Put dark hair with the green eyes and voluptuous figure, and it was pretty damn amazing that any man, vampire or not, had resisted her. And from comments Michael had made in the past, she knew Seline was not one to shy away from intimate situations if the chance presented itself. So, why had the two of them never been more than friends? It was curious, to say the least. And though she'd asked Michael, she'd never got more than his standard
‘because'.
Maybe this was her chance to learn more about him and the past he was still reluctant to talk about. While she could hardly talk to him about Seline, there was lots of other information she could mine. Centuries of it, in fact. The Michael who'd been in the stable was the Michael she loved—and yet, at the same time, he wasn't. Seline had warned her that he'd be rougher, darker. Harder. And in some respects, he'd been all of those. But he'd also seemed a whole lot more talkative, too. Her Michael played his cards very close. Maybe it was something he'd learned from Seline. Maybe they'd had no other choice once the Circle had begun making serious dents in the fields of bad guys. The mill loomed. She slowed and swept her gaze across the nearest buildings. There were a good half dozen smaller buildings surrounding one larger cluster, which she guessed would probably be the main mill works. Most of the buildings were clad in sheets of corrugated steel, but there were a few that were all wood. It was to one of these she found herself walking towards. That fact bought her up short.
Was it instinct that had bought her here, or something else?
She stood still and listened. Sheets of metal rattled on the roof of a nearby building, and the wind whispered through shattered windows, a forlorn sound that chased goose bumps across her skin. A takeout container rolled along the well-worn path that ambled through the buildings, blown in from God knew where.
No one seemed to be here, and yet ... something was.
She licked her lips and took a step back.
A rumble of sound rose from the night behind her.
She froze, knowing she'd fallen into Weylin's trap.
The wolves weren't patrolling the eastern perimeter. They were right here in this mill. With her.
