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The whole group is kids, I realize. The new adult shadowbloods have sent out the ones they know we’re least likely to kill.
No silver bands show on their wrists. They must have figured out how to get Balthazar’s manacles off.
Nadia steps to the front of the group, her chin high, her hands balled at her sides. “What are you doing? Get out of our way.”
Riva shakes her head. “You can’t go around killing people all across the country. That’s just as wrong as what they were doing—and you’re going to make everyone else even more scared of ‘monsters.’ How does that fix anything?”
A tremor runs through Nadia’s body with a strange mix of revulsion and irritation. “Maybe we don’t want to fix anything. Maybe we’re tired of being expected to be a solution, and we just want to break everything that’s wrong in this world.”
“Which is a fuckload of things!” one of the other kids snaps from behind her.
Next to me, Zian scowls. “So, what, you’re just going to break everything as things get even worse?”
“If we want to,” Nadia retorts. “We have the power now. We can do whatever we want.”
Riva splays her hands pleadingly. “Nadia, you know that’s not the life you wanted before. You could still have something normal. We want to make that happen for all of the shadowbloods.”
I catch just a flicker of hesitation. Then the girl’s eyes narrow. “Really? Even the new shadowbloods Balthazar made? Cutler and them have been looking out for us, you know. They could have ditched us, but they didn’t.”
“Because you make a convenient shield,” Rollick remarks in the deeper, eerily resonant baritone of his demonic form.
Nadia shivers when she looks at him, but she draws herself up straighter. “Why would any of us need a shield? What are you really here to do?”
“They want to slaughter us all like we’re the real monsters,” someone hollers from the pickup truck.
Sorsha crosses her arms over her chest. “We don’t want to hurt you. We only want to stop you from hurting anyone else.”
Nadia’s eyes flash. “And what happens if we say no?Thenyou kill us?”
I raise my voice. “Not if we have any other choice. That’s the last thing we want. We’re angry too, shadowbloods. But weareblood, all of us—the six of us Firsts have always said that. We only need you to meet us partway.”
Jacob lets out a hoarse laugh. “Yeah. And then we can destroy whatever needs destroying together.”
A firm command rings out from the SUV. “Get back in the van, kids.”
Nadia glances over her shoulder, uncertainty darting across her face. “Are you sure, Cutler?”
I get a brief glimpse of the man she’s talking to behind the wheel when he leans toward the open window—the shaved head with the skull-and-snake tattoo. The guy the others described to me who seemed to be leading the criminal shadowbloods.
He pulls back into the shadows behind the glow of the headlights before Riva would have had a chance to latch on a killing shriek. And any larger attack on the SUV would risk everyone inside.
Given their strategy so far, I’d be incredibly surprised if they didn’t have at least a couple of the kids in each of the vehicles as leverage.
“There’s no point in talking with these assholes,” Cutler says. “We’ll just get on with business.”
Nadia only hesitates for a second before hustling back to the van with the other kids. We all exchange a glance. Are they figuring they’re going to smash right through our blockade?
Riva lifts her voice in what serves as a warning. “We’re not going to let you keep rampaging around. The slaughter stops now.”
The teens keep clambering into the van. I don’t see any sign that the wayward shadowbloods care about her implicit threat.
I breathe slow and deep to steady myself. Wecanstop them. We’ve got the shadowkind on our side here when they couldn’t help Riva and the others in the forest. There’s no way this group can match the power our allies can bring to bear.
I just hope we don’t have to hurt many of the kids in the process.
“Take out the tires,” Jacob mutters under his breath. “Fuck up the engines. That way they can’t get anywhere but we’re not murdering anyone.”
Riva nods. Without another word, most of my companions leap forward.
