I climbed up on the railing, one hand holding the chain, the stronger arm steadying me on the narrow iron barrier. And I picked out Jack’s second. A lone vamp stood to one side, the circle of vamps bowing out around the ground she held. Shoffru’s heir. She was tall, muscular, with a small waist and broad shoulders, her hair cut short to the scalp. She was armed to the teeth, and those teeth included fangs two inches long. She also had two long swords, one on each hip. And she had a nose ring.
In an instant, I put it together—the reason the scents had never worked for me. The reason the timeline hadn’t worked for me. It wasn’t Shoffru who took Molly. Who took Bliss and Rachael. Jack had used his heir, pulling strings in the background, letting his heir, Cym—Bancym M’lareil, I realized—do the dirty work. Sending a woman to host a party. To approach women. To take them away. And it was the woman who smelled of the Damours’ lair, and who had been working with Adrianna, maybe for a long time. I remembered the look they had shared at Leo’s party, long and full of desire. The woman had been working for and with Jack all this time. Jack hadn’t been working alone, just by himself. How sexist of me was it that I had never once considered a woman as the culprit? And, for sure, she was part of the magic that was hurting Leo. Somehow she assisted it. I narrowed my eyes and focused Beast’s night vision on her. She was holding a sword in her right hand, the naked blade reflecting a streetlight. She held something else in her left hand, something small. Something shiny.
Blood Challenges are formal things. They almost always, depending on the language of the issuing challenge, required a second. They always had rules. And witnesses. I didn’t know enough about them to say if using magic was against the rules. I didn’t know if what I was about to do would cause me problems in the future. Or problems for Leo. And I just didn’t care. Not anymore. I sought out Shoffru’s second, aimed my body at her, and shouted. “Hey, Cym! You want some of this?” And I leaped.
Beast flooded me with her power. In midair I swung the chain over my head. It whirled. And wrapped around her as I landed. With a clank-snap, the end of the chain, tacky with Eli’s drying blood, caught her. Secured her. Holding to the end of the chain, I rolled, seeing the vamps scatter around me, the ground absorbing the impact of my landing. And I pulled the chained vamp with me. End over teakettle. She dropped whatever she had been holding and I grabbed it up. And I started to burn. Three red motes scuttled through the flesh of my palm and under my skin. Into my blood.
Beast screamed. Her scream shrieked through my own throat, tearing. I tasted blood. I rolled to my feet. With my weak arm, I let go the chain and pulled a stake. Rammed it into the second’s heart. She went still. Maybe true-dead, maybe not. But true-stopped. I pulled a throwing knife, my arm aching. My flesh on fire. And I threw it.
As knife throws went, it sucked. The blade flipped in midair, losing power and trajectory. And hit Shoffru in the back, just below his neck on the right side, nicking the muscle before it tumbled to the ground. Shoffru whirled to me. He was vamped-out. Fangs like tusks, eyes like the pits of hell. Terrifying. He let go of the pull on Molly’s magic and whipped back his sword to take my head.
Beyond him, in the irregular circle of vamps and their dinners, Leo dropped to his knees. He was bleeding everywhere. Red motes of power scuttled like roaches under his skin. He was dying. Eli was dying. Rick was gone. Molly was as good as gone.
I laughed. It was not what Shoffru was expecting. He hesitated. Just a moment, a fraction of a second. And from somewhere close, I felt the first touch of death magic.
Black and soft as cashmere yarn, glistening with black stars, it settled on Jack, just as the spell on the throwing knife started to work. From every cut, slice, graze, and scratch on his body, blood began to flow. Bliss’ spell combining with the death magic. And as the blood welled, it blackened and fell like ashes on the night air. The two spells working together, evolving.
Shoffru’s eyes went wide. He grabbed something on his neck. The lizard. It came away from his body, limbs reaching, mouth open. Throat extended. Glowing red. Pulling red motes out of the air and into his mouth.
Dang. A magic lizard. My laughter bellowed out over the yard. But from my hand, the three red motes reversed course and flew from me, into the lizard. And through its skin and into Jackie Boy. Shoffru landed on his knees, mirroring Leo’s fall. His blood ran faster, graying and thickening, taking on texture and form, becoming semisolid, a gel, instead of blood. Beginning to pile on the ground at his knees. He turned to Leo, holding out the lizard, and the red motes inside Leo began to fly back, through the air, hurtling into Jack. He was trying to recall his magic, to heal himself from the spell. Trying to draw power from Cym.