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A stranger I knew only froh the front door She was copper-skinned, like me And like me--or like me when I was prepared--she carried more weapons than a small army She was dressed in the leathers of an Enforcer, but with an old-fashioned design and enough slices and cuts in the tanned hide to be risqué The stink of old blood was on the leathers, hers and her opponents’, ripe and dense with the reek of old pain and death She smelled like the sniper, and the bole, smooth, backhand cut, she struck Bethany in the neck The priestess dropped, falling with the blade She hit the floor, her dark blood spattering the wall
Before I could blink, Gee had draords and raced at the so nearly vamp fast, but time had slowed I could see each e to blood duel was never satisfied," he shouted, his voice low and his words slurred "En garde!"
The woish The tworooht Steel clashed A cut appeared in the wall as if by ic A small table split in tith a crash I had really liked that table Not so long ago, it had been blown over when an angry air witch ca but splinters, like the side door And the front door
The Kid, who had been hiding behind the couch, grabbed me by the arm and dove to the floor with me We landed in a painful heap; I yelped and so did he The smell of mixed blood rose on the air and I foundthe stake and the way-too-s Beast’s blood to the gray place of the change had reinforced my reactions
"Jane," Alex said, his words a laborious jumble in the slo-mo of time "The people in the rental house and with the rented SUVs, ere following you, they one and the vehicles were turned back in, but there were at least twelve people living there and they had taken photos That’s one of theht
My house was full of nutso vamps, two nearly dead vaer with swords fighting a storht, evenof steel, dual circles of reflected light and the spatter of scarlet and sapphire blood on the pale walls
Into the doorway stepped a el He wore jeans and a white shirt that hung open to reveal a necklace of a raptor in flight, boots and wristbands tattooed with blue birds He shouted so and clash of steel He was the frightened boy froed rinus Grégoire’s brother
He carried a sword, a double-edged blade with a hand-and-a-half hilt He raced in and stabbed up at the arcenciel, then tossed what looked like a length of rope over it, a rope tied with soht I could tell it was quartz, not diah it Eli and Derek fired at the varinus didn’t falter He backed out of the house, pulling the arcenciel with hion flickered, dimmed, shrank to half its size, and went out The arcenciel writhed once, a snapping, supple movement, and dropped to the floor It threw out sparks of brown and black, like a dirty fire, the fla
It shifted shape In its place was a child, a skinny girl of nine or ten with cotton-candy hair and predator teeth The shooters repositioned their weapons away and down at the sight of the child Peregrinus tossed the small body over his shoulder, pressed the crystal to her, shouted sole instant, the invading kidnapper and his so breaths as I tried to put it all together, mented and confused
The light-snake-dragon The arcenciel that wasn’t Soul It had just been captured, sonoredwhile they were sniperingborab an arcenciel? How could they have knoas being attacked by one? Had Reach known there was an arcenciel around New Orleans? Had he gotten access to the attack on Bitsa, and then given the secret up to Satan’s Three? And, worse, did Satan’s Three have such access to HQ’s security systeym? I didn’t know And I didn’t kno to find out or what to do about it all
"The Devil," Katie whispered, her fangs distorting her words I looked at her There was blood on her chin and dribbling onto her evening gown The dress was pale aqua silk that shimmered into ocean blue in the shadows Her eyes, vamped out and black in the bloody sclera, stared in horror at the open front doorway "The Devil and her master were here and we still live" She crossed herself, which looked utterly wrong on the bloody-ious sentiment, Bethany hissed, reached out with one hand, and pulled Leo closer to her side She wasBut her neck was healing, the bleeding already stopped She extended her own fangs with a firm snap In a movement too fast to focus on, she buried them in Leo’s throat Gee knelt at Leo’s feet and slid his pals so his palht flowed down Gee’s arh the MOC into the priestess and Katie Katie shook herself and looked fro the roo different about her suddenly, focused and determined With no hesitation, she bit her orist and leaned in to dribble her powerful blood into Leo’s mouth
To
"Yeah You?"
"Ducky Just ducky," I lied "The Kid? Bruiser?"
"I’," Alex said
"I’ot any more plywood you can cover the broken doors with?" I asked Eli as I watched the four in a group healing, the MOC between them The MOC, whohter struggled in my throat and I sed it down It hurt, as if I’d stuffed so My stomach cramped as if I’d been kicked by an elephant, and I doubled over, breathing shallowly until the pain eased