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‘This isn’t random,’ Kian says, voice clipped. ‘They’re coordinated. Someone sent them down here.’

It’s too late to run. We’re boxed in. A bright flare lights the tunnel, appearing so suddenly it almost blinds me. Cora again with her quick-thinking. The harsh light throws shadows everywhere, and the rogue vampires recoil from it. It buys us enough time to escape further down the tunnel. We press forward through the chaos, and I don’t bother to try to draw an arrow. I can’t see, my arm throbs, and I’m stumbling just to stay on my feet. They don’t appear to be chasing us yet, still disorientated by the flare.

Cora uses the last flare to light up the path ahead. After it fades, we’re plunged back into darkness. Unable to see, I trip over something – a limb, I think. As my eyes slowly adjust, I realise with horror that the limb belongs to a human girl who’s lying on the ground, her blood pooling out of her from slit marks on her neck and wrists. I let out a small gasp at the sight. Raya and Cora turn their heads sharply at the sound, exchanging an uneasy glance.

‘Trap,’ Kian warns. My first instinct was to go to her and help her, but he’s right. It’s no coincidence she’s here.

‘Let’s keep moving,’ Cora says as she sheathes her blade, already turning toward the far tunnel. ‘We’re exposed down here.’

Hunter helps Theo up. I hadn’t even realised he was down and my heart squeezes at the thought of him being hurt. He’s got more blood on him than not, with chunks of skin missing. Before my eyes the wounds begin to heal. I can’t help but look back at the human girl.

‘Are you okay?’ Raya says gently, stepping closer to me. ‘Catch your breath, if you need to.’

I nod. My hands are still shaking. My arm aches, and I fear my shoulder may have been dislocated, since it now hangs slightly and I feel like I can’t stretch it out to fall at my side. Kian stands off to the side, eyes scanning the darkness like he’s listening to something no one else can hear.

‘Let’s go,’ Hunter says.

It happens so fast, I don’t even register what hits me. Just a rush of cold air and the sickening crunch of my back hitting stone. I try to scream, but there’s a hand crushing my throat. The others shout. There’s a blur of motion above me. I can’t see anything clearly, just pale skin, a face warped in hunger, and eyes that burn with something feral. Like the black eyes are somehow even inkier than normal, with a red ring around them.

His weight pins me. Bone to bone, harder than anything human. I thrash, panic surging, but it’s useless – I can’t breathe and his strength is overpowering. My fingernails scrape against his wrist, drawing blood, but he doesn’t even flinch. He snarls low, dragging the sound through clenched teeth like it’s pleasurable.

Theo and the others are being swarmed again. More vampires appear out of thin air.

I open my mouth to scream again, but no sound comes out. Only a strangled gasp.

And then he bites. There’s no hesitation, no restraint. Fangs tear into the soft flesh just below my collarbone, rending through skin and muscle as if they were parchment. The pain is immediate, raw, white-hot, so sharp it doesn’t even feel real at first. Nothing like I’ve ever felt. My whole body arches, jerking against his hold, but he only tightens his grip.

He swallows my blood in thick, wet gulps, fast and desperate, like he hasn’t fed in weeks. Maybe longer. Blood pulses from the wound, warm and too fast, I feel it soaking into the back of my shirt, pooling under me. The vampire pulls back, mouth slick with red. His lips curl into something that isn’t a smile, but more like a sneer of triumph, and his eyes roll back in his skull before he slams his mouth down again, biting lower this time.

I scream. He’s latched on, feeding greedily, his claws digging into my shoulder, holding me in place. I’m shoved to the ground, and my body refuses to get back up. Blood bubbles through my mouth. There’s shouting, blades clashing. Something warm trickles down my side. A face is above me, distant, distorted.

‘Tara—stay with me—’

Arms are around me, carefully collecting me off the ground. I know the feel of his hands, the tension that coils under his skin. Theo. I blink and his face swims into focus. His hair is damp, dark with sweat or maybe blood. Can vampires sweat? His face is sharp and beautiful in that dangerous, alluring way of his. His eyes meet mine. Pitch-black and glassy.

‘You’re okay. You’re gonna be okay,’ he says, repeating it like he can make it true just by saying it enough.

‘I didn’t …’ I breathe, words slurring, the taste of blood filling my mouth. ‘I didn’t see it …’

‘I know,’ he whispers. ‘None of us did.’

I hear someone in the distance. Kian’s voice, I think, shouting orders at the others, and there are the grunts of a fight, as if the others are still dealing with more vampires. Theo brushes the hair back from my face with shaking fingers. He bites into his wrist, his other arm still cradling me to his chest, before pressing it into my lips.

I’m slipping out of consciousness, and my head is throbbing. The edges of the world are softening, and even Theo’s face is starting to blur, like I’m underwater and sinking fast.

‘Tara!’ His voice cuts through the haze, and he drops to the ground as he cradles my face with one hand, his wrist pressed hard into my lips with the other, his knee propping me off the cold ground. ‘Drink,’ he demands, like I’m sitting here idly wasting his blood. I’m drinking, his blood is hot on my tongue, but it’s not doing its usual trick.

My body doesn’t jolt. My mind doesn’t clear. There’s no surge of heat, no stitching together of broken skin or fading pain. Just … nothing.

‘Tara?’ Theo presses, his voice a broken whisper. ‘What is happening? Are you drinking?’

His wrist pulls away and he watches me, terror filling his gaze as his brows pull together, trying to understand.

‘Why isn’t it working?’ he whispers. He looks up, and I can sense the others close by, watching me fade from the world, wrapped in Theo’s arms. ‘WHY ISN’T IT WORKING?’

‘Something’s in her system,’ Kian’s voice is as cold as ice as he appears beside us, dropping to his knee, inspecting me closely. ‘I knew there was something in her blood. I could smell it. The witches have done something to her. Being back here might have triggered it somehow.’

I want to ask what that means, but the dark is pulling harder now. Everything is weightless and far away, like I’m dreaming inside someone else’s body. Voices echo and vanish before I can understand them. My limbs are lead, my chest tight.