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Mircea, I mouthed, because I couldn’t seem to draw a breath. But he started walking forward anyway, slightly off course, but in the right general direction. And every step he took parted the darkness more, like a curtain being drawn back on a stage. Until I could see again.
The light behind him resolved itself into the dim view of the harbor that I was really beginning to hate. But it was also the only way out. And if I could reach it…
And maybe I could. Because, suddenly, I wasn’t being attacked. I struggled up on my good arm, broken, bleeding, peering around for an assailant that wasn’t there anymore.
Maybe because she had found a new target.
I looked back at Mircea, just in time to see him stumble. And a bloody slash, like the cut of a sword, appear on the front of his formerly white shirt. He ignored it, moving forward another few feet, only to be hit again. And again. I watched, horrified, as gashes that looked almost black in the strange light appeared on his face, his hands, on the arm he held out in front of him, across his eyes.
And then a massive blow sent him staggering.
“Mircea!” It was barely a whisper, practically inaudible, even to me. But never underestimate a vampire’s hearing. Because his head jerked up, and the wedge of light around him narrowed, focused—and spilled all around me.
It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen, a glistening pale blue lifeline.
Or maybe not.
Because Mircea wasn’t getting much closer. He should have been able to cross the distance between us in a heartbeat. Instead, he was barely walking forward, and getting shredded in the process, his coat already a tattered mess, his shirt drenched red. And a panic gripped me like nothing I’d ever known.
Because I’d never seen him injured so easily. Because it didn’t look like he could see me, or knew exactly where I was. But mostly because he wasn’t fighting back.
And then he stumbled again, going down to one knee.
“Go!” I croaked, because I couldn’t scream. But if he heard, he gave no sign. And he wasn’t leaving.
Of course he wasn’t, I thought savagely, dragging myself to my feet. When had he ever been anything but a stubborn son of a—
My knee collapsed, dumping me on the floor. Stupidly, I tried to stand again, and for some reason, it worked that time. Every step was agony, my ears were ringing too loud to hear anything and I couldn’t fucking breathe. And the light from the small wedge that Mircea had opened kept moving around, like it was playing keep-away, although that was probably more from my wildly zigzagging course.
But I was up.
I was moving.
And so was he.
How he was doing it I didn’t know, but hearing wasn’t the only thing you sh
ould never underestimate about master vampires.
Or dhampirs, I thought, gritting my teeth while spots danced in front of my eyes and one of my own ribs stabbed me in the side and the damned leg collapsed again. So I crawled, because there was nothing between me and my goal but pain and fuck pain. Because Mircea might not be defending himself, but he was doing a good job of keeping the bitch’s attention on him.
Too good of a job, I thought, as he collapsed to both knees, his clothes a bloody mess, his face unrecognizable.
I didn’t cry out again, because I didn’t have the breath and because it wouldn’t have helped and because I wasn’t going to give her a warning. I was just going to kill her. I didn’t care what it did to me, I was going to fucking kill her, I thought viciously, as the light flickered and the wedge narrowed and Mircea didn’t look at me.
He still didn’t, even as the most savage beating I’d ever seen continued, throwing him around the sparkling blue light, crushing limbs and shattering bone and sending splatters of blood arcing into the air like rubies as I crawled and slipped and closed the gap. But not completely. Not before the bitch somehow got a clue, a dark shadow turning my way as she suddenly remembered that, oh, yeah, I wasn’t dead yet.
Not yet, I snarled to myself, getting my good leg under me as she flew my way. And then falling and rolling and lunging and grabbing—
A hand slick with blood and cold, too cold.
And then falling again, into nothingness that suddenly bloomed into light so bright that it tore a gasp from my throat.
Or maybe that was Radu. I couldn’t see him because there was something in my eyes, but I identified his cologne. And then he was pulling me back and I was flailing and fighting and not getting anywhere because I had no strength.
Until he abruptly let me go, and I dropped like a sack of sand, hitting my chin on something I identified as the edge of the bar. But I managed to swipe a shaking hand over my eyes in time to see Louis-Cesare, lying unconscious on the floor; Marlowe, yelling at the half dozen guards who had just flooded the room; and Mircea—
Mircea in a widening pool of blood—eyes, mouth, ears, nose, all gushing bloody streams onto his dark suit and the pale sofa and—
