“Indeed.Go for it,” he urged.“Though wouldn’t it be better to teleport them to a bath of acid or something?”
She made a face.“Then I’d have totouchthem.”
“Good point.”
“Can’t you control their minds?”she asked.
He looked at the Zradum and felt his gorge rise.They were worse than he’d realized.And their minds were nothing like Meffy’s quick and lithe predator one.
“I’d have to touch them mentally,” he explained.
“Oh.”She looked more horrified.“Then definitely don’t.”
“Squish away.”He turned to Elgar.“Let’s go help your Grandsire, shall we?”
“Is he not only Christian’s Grandsire?”Elgar asked.“You turned me in your old form, which was not turned at all, unlike your current one.”
Elgar actually half asked the skull and half asked Balthazar.Balthazar considered this progress and he considered what Elgar had said.
“While I see your point, this relationship is more than blood, Elgar,” Balthazar answered.
“I see then I shall eagerly accept him as that,” Elgar answered.
“Excellent.Now let’s go before he kills the students.Or the students kill themselves.Hard to tell, which is more likely.”
He and Elgar swept towards where Caemorn had set up a brilliant blue, translucent barrier to keep students and Zradum separated.Balthazar was reminded of tragedies at concerts where people were so tightly packed together that they were crushing the others in front of them.Every time that seemed on the verge of happening, Caemorn released the students, only to reassert the barrier.But that meant the students were getting nearer and nearer the Zradum.Not to mention, that a few times the ones in front were shoved so violently by the pressure of those in back that they nearly fell down, which would have led to them being trampled by their fellows.
“You’re here.Finally,” Caemorn added dryly.
“Yes, well, there were things to discuss and I was sure you had it in hand.Oh, dear, her face looks quite smooshed against the barrier, doesn’t it?” Balthazar leaned nearer the barrier to look at a student who had pressed themselves so tightly against the barrier that their lips were creating smudges with their lips, teeth and tongue.
“My natural powers are not geared towards protecting people from themselves,” Caemorn pointed out.“Ripping their souls from their bodies, I can do.”
“If you did that, Grandsire, could you put them back in again?”Elgar asked.
Caemorn lifted an eyebrow at the title, but just said, “Not without damage to them on a deep level, Elgar.”
“Ah, we must find another way,” Elgar said.
“What we need are some Ashyr Vampires to hold them in place,” Caemorn said.“And then you could work on them all you like.”
Balthazar touched the minds of the Ashyr, Dani especially.“They are coming, though some are headed to the dorm to look after Grayson.They are not pleased with us using him as bait for the Marrowstalker.”
“I am certain they are not.I knew that without reading their minds,” Caemorn replied a little sniffily.
“Are you getting tired or something?”Balthazar asked.
Caemorn who had his arms up to direct the power from the soul gem to create the barrier didn’t give him an answer to that.At least not one out loud.Balthazar tried not to laugh.
“All right, I think we can send them into sleep, can’t we, Elgar?”Balthazar asked.
He felt Elgar’s senses sweep outward to the crowd.“Yes, but a light sleep, Master, is best.Otherwise you risk harming them.”
“Yes, well, we can't have that.At least, the press are not here,” he muttered as he sent a wave of sleep over the students.
He watched as faces beyond the barrier went lax.The students sagged into one gigantic pile of sleeping, snoring, twitching humans.The stomping behind them continued. Caemorn had the barrier encircle the humans.Balthazar turned back to look at the carnage of the Zradum.
“This was definitely interesting, but I expected more,” Balthazar said.
