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“Oh, don’t be so dramatic. It is not as if the dead still need their souls.”

“You kill for sport, and then feed off their souls.”

“How did you feel, drinking in a demon hunter’s soul?”

“Like I could fly.” Eryn closed her eyes as she remembered the rush of even the taste of Bennett’s. Flashing to Vann dying in her arms. That urge. Nothing in the world would ever satisfy her as well as absorbing Vann’s soul. “You knew I loved him. You knew I wouldn’t be able to resist.”

“Oh, I adore you, sister. My heart of hearts.” Testing her. Bitch was testing her. She searched Eryn’s facial expressions, her posture. Sniffing for lies. “To absorb a soul as it cleaves from a body. There is no better feeling in this realm or the next, when that soul closely mirrors your own.”

“Is it a want, or a need?” Time, dammit. She needed more time.

“Would it change anything?”

“Everything.”

Why the fuck had he agreed to let her go in alone?

The team flanked the house. Ready to ignite. To rush the house as soon as Eryn gave the signal.

From a hill away, Vann and the others watched her walk into the lion’s den. Eryn and Tisiphone shared a bottle of wine like sisters enjoying an evening together.

“Something’s wrong,” he snarled.

Before the moonlight was interrupted by their shadows, he knew.

Bennett ran straight for him and knocked him to the ground. Claws dug into Bennett’s back, scraped over Vann’s sides underneath his friend.

The vampire bashed his head back and slammed the wyvern in the face.

Adair’s flutter of throwing knives downed it enough for Bennett to throw it off him.

Blayk stalked over and impaled the wyvern.

A pair of furies grasped at Vann, eyes wild as they tried to lift him, to fly off with him.

The wolf jumped and ripped one apart.

Bennett smacked his shield into the other, straight toward Blayk, and the pure-blooded vampire beheaded her midair with a swift slice of his blade.

Vann rolled onto his back, sword drawn, and searched the sky for another attack.

Four furies changed course and flew toward the house instead of attacking. Dammit. They knew they were stronger together. Guess the plan to separate the furies was a bust.

Bodie shifted back to the man. He shook off the fight that had ended quicker than it started. “Definitely a trap.”

No more in the sky, Vann pushed to his feet. Ambushed, yeah, but a glimmer of hope tingled over his skin. “That felt like an invitation to join the party.”

Bennett braced his hand over his injuries and grimaced at his own blood on his fingertips. “Sure I can’t convince you to sit this one out?”

Vann shook it off. “We need to buy Eryn more time.”

He sprinted down the hill. Three vampires and a wolf. They could have outrun him by a mile, but they paced with him.

Down the steep slope. Bare branches lashed across his body. He leaped over fallen logs. Skidded down loose soil.

Fucking full of lead. Aching from head-to-toe. He was a liability in this fight, not an asset.

In the light radiating out from the house, dozens of winged furies lashed with blades. Four wyverns were already down, bodies contorted in death, their green blood oozing over the driveway.