Lili St Crow - Defiance

Sergej’s nose almost touched mine. A gush of hot black pattered softly to the floor. I had him pinned, the spear driven through his chest and into the wall behind him. He twitched, hot breath touching my cheek, and my stomach cramped hard.

I’ve heard that if you get it going fast enough, even a straw can punch through steel plate. If you get going fast enough, even a plain old iron lampstand can go through a vampire’s chest. Up on the left side, too, a heart-shot.

Did I do that? My hands gave an amazing flare of rubbed-raw pain. I stumbled back, tripping and saving myself with an instinctive sideways leap. It was a good thing, too, because the spear tore free of the wall with a screech and Sergej fell, his claws slicing empty air. He would have landed right on me if I hadn’t moved. The lamp pole hit the ground and he toppled sideways, landing with a heavier thump than I would’ve thought possible.

The world caught up with a subliminal snap . My sneakers slipped, I was falling, couldn’t stop myself, and training shrieked inside my head to stay on your feet, goddammit, he might get up again, it’s never sure with a sucker, stay UP—

Graves’s hand closed around my upper arm. I let out a half-shriek and he ducked, the punch whooshing past his filthy hair and my claws scything free. Claws, that’s why my wrist was hurting, it’s the claw structures building in there. Go figure. Hooray for me.

“Easy!” he yelled. “Easy! Friend! Friend! ”

My heart triphammered, even my throat and wrists pulsing hotly. The shriek died halfway; I swallowed and blinked. “Jesus,” I whispered finally. My fingers tingled as the claws slid back out of sight. The urge to throw up or pass out rolled over me in a big black wave; I held it off with grim determination.

“Nope.” Graves set me on my feet. His eyes blazed now, and how could I ever have thought they’d darkened? They were emerald lasers now. “Dude. You killed him with a lamp .”

Sergej twitched. Both of us jumped nervously. Leon had slid down the wall, spilled off the bed, and landed sitting up. His eyes were closed, mouth ajar, and a trickle of red slid down from his nose. Another trickle traced down his chin. The side of his chest looked funny. Bashed in, like a stove stroked a good one by a massive sledgehammer.

He’d hit Sergej pretty hard. Something that hard, going that fast . . . dear God.

He’s not getting up anytime soon, Dad’s voice whispered inside my head, soft and flat, telling me what was what. Get movin’, Dru-girl.

Anna coughed. She scrabbled weakly against the floor, her shoes scraping a little. Sergej twitched again, and I flinched. My throat was on fire with the bloodhunger, my ears alive with little scraping whispers and the thudding of Graves’s pulse, galloping along and somehow shouting loup-garou, loup-garou . Anna’s pulse was high and fast, slightly further away, murmuring her name over and over as it echoed through her flesh. An-na. An-na. An-na.

The scraping sounds were vampires, and they were all over the house. There were a lot of them.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” I whispered. The electric glow from the corridor still stung my eyes.

“No shit. You think?” He dropped his hand and coughed, rackingly. Under the mask of bruising, his face was alight. “Jesus, Dru. With a lamp .”

It was all I had. I cleared my throat. Looked again at Leon. He didn’t look like he was going to move, either, but I didn’t want to take any chances. My legs felt like rubber noodles. The rest of me felt like it could light a match just by standing too close. Even my hair tingled.

I tested my knees, found out they would hold me up, and stepped cautiously toward Anna. She was making a hurt little sound in the back of her throat now, like a kitten knowing it’s about to be drowned.

Leave her, Dad might’ve said. She’ll slow you down. You look out for you first, Dru-girl.

Yeah. Looking out for number one had made Anna into what she was, hadn’t it.

“What the—” Graves grabbed for me, but I shook him off. “Dru!”

“We can’t leave her here. She jumped him , she’s svetocha .” And I am not like her. I took another step, my foot slipping in a lake of thin greasy black crud. Sergej was producing an amazing amount of fluid. No heartbeat from him, too. If I’d hit him in the heart, it might immobilize him until one of his buddies pulled it out.

Or maybe not. He twitched. The iron spear made a little skreek sound as its tip dragged along the floor.

“Dru.” Graves sounded like he’d been punched. “What about him?” His finger jabbed out, pointing at Leon.

I can’t carry more than one, dammit. “I don’t know. Can you carry him?” I felt bad even asking it. He was bleeding all over, and I’d made it worse.

Graves snorted, green eyes now so bright they almost cast shadows of their own. The Other looked out through those eyes, and if I’d been less worried about a ton of other stuff, I might’ve been a little, well, concerned.

Because the Other didn’t look like he really cared what happened as long as he got to hurt someone.

Graves shrugged. Halfway through the motion he stopped, as if it hurt. “Don’t know if he needs it. He smells dead.”

I didn’t ask how he knew what dead smelled like. “Then leave him.” The words stung my throat. “Worry about the living first.” It was the same tone Dad used when he didn’t want me to argue. Had it burned when he said it, too?

Graves looked at me like I’d just made some sort of embarrassing bodily noise, but he helped me heft Anna up from the floor. She didn’t even fight, just hung between us like wet washing. I swayed, so did Graves, and the chances of us getting out of here were so not good.

Especially since Sergej picked that moment to move again, the iron spear scraping harder. Still no pulse from him, though. Maybe it was his nerves dying?

Oh, God, way to get the gruesome going, Dru.

I aimed us for the door, and Graves and I started dragging Anna. The pointy toes of her boots slid along the hardwood, and we had to lift her over the threshold and into the brightly lit hall. I blinked, my eyes stinging and watering.

The scream came out of everywhere, a wall of noise so massive it was almost soundless. It shook the hall, dust pattered from the low ceiling, and I almost dropped Anna because I wanted to clap my hands over my ears. It wouldn’t do any good—the sound burrowed inside , scraping and twisting.

It came from the room behind us. I knew, without knowing quite how, that it was Sergej.

The king of the vampires was probably pretty pissed.

The noise stopped all at once, as if someone had hit the pause button on a CD. The house quivered above us, dust settling. It was a short hall, and at the end were stairs going up. Blank doors on either side, marching away; we were down at the very end. No other exits.

Shit.

But then I saw a long dark shape on a brass hook, and I breathed out in wonderment just as the entire house above us exploded with the soft scrapings, brushings, weird tapping footsteps of vampire activity.

Graves’s coat. My bag. The malaika harness and the malaika I’d been wearing. All hanging right there next to another iron-bound door.

I slipped out from under Anna’s arm, made it there in three long strides. “Amen. Amen , hallelujah, and pass the friggin’ butter!”

“What?” Graves, left with Anna, almost went down in a heap. I grabbed my bag, flipped it open, and checked it. Extra ammo, no gun. But there were the rolls of cash and everything else. I ducked through the strap. “Hey. Is that my coat?”