James Rollins - Innocent Blood

He tested their heartbeats, finding them slow and deep, attesting to their age and strength. Even without the strigoi, Rhun doubted that his forces would stand against these creatures for long — if at all.

Rhun swallowed once and whispered a quick prayer.

They were doomed.

As had been foretold the day he was turned, he would die fighting.

But Erin deserved a better fate.

It had to be blasphemare , too.

Jordan groaned. He gripped his machine pistol more firmly, knowing it was little better than a popgun against these beasts.

The countess drew Tommy back behind her. “Don’t paint the devil on the wall,” she told him.

What does that mean?

Tommy was equally baffled and voiced it aloud. “Huh?”

The boy looked at the menagerie hauling ass toward them. It sure looked like the devil was all around them. And this was no painting, but a slavering, howling horde in all its cinematic glory.

“It means… have hope, ” she explained.

It was odd to hear the countess talking of hope when Jordan himself couldn’t seem to muster more than a scrap of it. Still, it was nice of her to try to comfort the kid.

The strigoi horde reached the crater’s rim first and rather than flooding over the edge, they parted and swept outward, encircling the bowl, trapping them completely. Or perhaps they also sensed the holiness of this sand-and-glass valley.

The countess hissed low in her throat, pulling Tommy farther behind her. The Sanguinists moved to match the strigoi maneuver, ringing everyone in a protective circle.

Arella spoke near Jordan’s ear, making him jump, coming upon him so quietly.

“The countess speaks wisdom,” Arella whispered. “All can yet be won.”

Before Jordan could ask her what that meant, Arella grabbed Tommy from behind Bathory and yanked him toward the open mouth of the well — and pushed him into it. He cried out as he splashed clumsily into the water.

Bathory was upon her in a flash, knocking her away. But a splash from the well washed across her boots. She cried out and fell back, as if it had been molten lava.

Arella returned to the well’s edge as Tommy floundered below.

“Beware,” she warned. “Only those imbued by angels can touch these waters. All others will be destroyed. Even humans.”

With those dire words, she dove into the water, catching Tommy’s arm and dragging him below.

The countess hung back, looking stricken.

No wonder the well had been so firmly sealed and left to the sand and ages.

“At least the boy is safe from immediate harm,” Rhun consoled her.

Yeah, but what about us?

Jordan widened his shooting stance. He stared up at the horde gathered around them. Strigoi hissed and drew long curved swords. Blasphemare crowded in by their hips and shoulders. At least the bastards hadn’t brought guns — then he remembered why they didn’t carry such weapons.

They preferred to eat their prey alive .

Movement drew Erin’s eye to the crater’s edge, to where a giant in brown leather stalked forward, edging into the bowl. The strigoi was black skinned, shaven headed, pierced with steel, dragging a long broadsword behind him. He bent to pinch some of the sand and cast it away in disgust, likely sensing the holy ground. He spit where he tossed the grains, sneering and looking down at them.

At her.

A chill swept through her.

He continued another step, then another into the crater.

He didn’t come alone.

A pair of blasphemare lions padded to either side of him, staying close, their eyes searching, tails swishing grains. Their manes were black rather than tawny, ruffled by the hot desert wind. Their eyes shone toward her with a dread crimson under the ash-covered day. They snarled, showing fangs that better fitted something saber-toothed. Black claws dug deep, kicking sand back in a posture of pure feline threat.

The giant swung his sword in an easy figure eight through the air, the long blade an extension of his muscular arms.

Suddenly Erin wished she had not insisted her group come to Siwa.

Still, she pushed such thoughts down and firmed her grip on her gun. No matter the outcome in the next few minutes, she knew it was right to come here. Her guilt lay not in bringing everyone here but in failing to solve the mystery of these sands in time, the riddle hidden behind Arella’s calm eyes.

Around her, the Sanguinists had drawn their swords. Bernard carried an antique curved blade that shimmered like water, made of Damascus steel, edged with silver, likely deeply blessed. Christian brandished a curved blade, too, but his was modern, a kukri out of Nepal. Agmundr drew a longsword from a sheath across his back. Wingu raised two shorter blades, one in each hand, swinging them with grace and power.

Rhun simply had his karambit in hand, its hooked edge as lethal as any blasphemare claw.

The giant strigoi took a final step forward, drawing the lions at his hips — then stopped again.

From behind him, a familiar silver-haired figure stalked into view. Iscariot had changed out of his usual gray suit into leather armor, bleached white, tailored gracefully to his muscular body.

Jordan swung his machine pistol toward him.

Iscariot noted the motion, and a shadow of a derisive smile etched his features. The man had plainly recovered from the last time Jordan had shot him with that same weapon.

Iscariot lifted an arm and released an emerald-winged moth into the air.

The Sanguinists shifted warily, their eyes upon its flutter. How many of those poisonous creations had he brought with him? With enough of them, he could fell the entire group of Sanguinists without stirring his army.

But the moth flew only a few feet into the crater before spiraling to the ground, shattering a wing to iridescent scales as it crashed. Whether from the contamination of the ash in the air or from the blowing dust of sand, apparently its delicate cogs could not handle this harsh terrain.

Or maybe again it was the holiness found here.

No matter the cause, at least one threat had been neutralized.

Not that it would likely change the final outcome.

Iscariot’s voice carried easily down into the crater. His gaze swept over them, noticing who was missing. “It seems you have lost your two angels.”

Erin willed herself to keep her gaze fixed on the enemy and not let it twitch toward the well where Arella had vanished with Tommy. She hoped that the boy would get away, that the spring led out to some secret exit, some distant pool. Tommy’s immortality should keep him alive, even drowned underwater.

“We may have lost our angels,” Jordan called back. “But I see you found your demons.”

Iscariot laughed and gestured to the Sanguinists. “You have your own demons, Warrior of Man.”

“ Friends, ” Jordan countered. “Not demons.”

Iscariot frowned at them, clearly having no more patience. “Where are you hiding him?” he asked, leaving no doubt he was talking about Tommy.

Iscariot must know, as long as Tommy was loose, that his plan to unleash Hell on Earth remained threatened.

Silence stretched for several breaths.

Judas’s eyes settled on Erin and remained there. He lifted an arm and pointed to her. “No one is to harm her,” he called out loudly. “She is mine. She will give me my answer.”

A wave of snarling and hissing swept along the crater’s rim.