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I keep my focus on my brother. Because it is my brother. It has to be.
“Leif!” I call out as I jog toward him.
Leif stops and looks at me in confusion just as another person exits the same building, walking toward us quickly.
“Do I know you?” Leif asks, brows furrowing.
“Uh…”
He gives me a puzzled look and then keeps walking toward the docks, glancing over his shoulder at me, then over at Valtu, as he goes.
“Rose,” Valtu hisses.
“Hey!” the guy approaching me says and I look to see who I assume is Atlas Poe. I’d never met the witch, but I knew of him. He looks like a pale, sniveling moody motherfucker, dressed all in black but not making it look half as elegant as Valtu does. “What do you want with him?”
“That guy? Oh, he, uh, he just looks like someone I know,” I say, staring at Leif as he walks off in hopes he somehow remembers me, but of course he doesn’t have any idea who I am. We’ve never met before.
“Then how did you know his name?” Atlas asks, his eyes narrowing and growing hard. Suddenly he breathes in sharply through his nose and the hardness in his eyes turns to flint. “Vampire,” he seethes.
Oh fuck.
I turn to run but Atlas is on me with such force that we go flying through the air.
“Rose!” I hear Valtu scream just as Atlas slams me back against a building across the street, the plaster crumbling from the impact, and he whips out the glowing silver and blue blade ofmordernesfrom inside his coat.
And so this is how I die this time around, I can’t help but think, the irony not lost on me, even now.
I scream, trying to struggle, but Atlas is fast and he plunges the blade right into my chest where it glows blue and hisses and burns and I’m screaming again, bloody murder.
Then Valtu is there, tackling Atlas to the ground with a primal roar, and then suddenly it’s just Valtu, Atlas having disappeared completely beneath him.
“What the fuck?” Valtu cries out, searching for Atlas and finding nothing, then gets to his feet and staggers over to me. “Rose,” he says tightly as he grabs my shoulders, helping to hold me up. I already have my hand around the hilt of the blade. I remember it like it was yesterday, how easily it was to wield this thing as Dahlia and I’m aware that I probably should be dead right now. The blow is instant when it comes to vampires.
“Oh god,” Valtu whispers his face wrought with horror as he stares at the blade. “Rose, Rose.”
“I can pull it out,” I say, wincing hard as I try to yank it out of my chest. It’s not budging. The pain is excruciating, hot tears spilling over and streaming down my face. But underneath the agony I can still feel my heart beating. “I think he missed,” I manage to say.
Valtu’s eyes fill with hope and he puts his hands over mine and with one sharp tug we manage to get the blade out of my chest.
I grip it hard in my hands, the handle seeming to fuse to my palm, while he takes off his leather jacket and presses it against my chest to staunch the bleeding.
My eyes are locked on the blade in my palm, glowing blue, the handle silver and intricately carved, and I know every slayer’s blade is different but it looks similar to the one I used to have.
“Stay with me Rose,” Valtu whispers, keeping the pressure on. He looks around but in this dim and industrial area there’s no one else around. Both Leif and Atlas are completely gone, like they were never here at all.
“I’m okay,” I assure Valtu quietly. “I think I’m going to be okay.”
“Are you sure?” He lifts away the jacket and the blood has spread across my top but it’s not pouring out anymore. “I can’t lose you, Rose. I can’t.”
“You won’t,” I reassure him, turning the blade over in my hand, relishing the feel of it.
He doesn’t seem to believe me. He looks around and then puts his arm around my waist. “We’re going to try teleporting,” he says.
“What, now?”
“We need to get out of here.”
“And run from a fight? They came from that building. Bellamy is right in there!”
