Thank whoever was above, there were no kids lying dead in here. Little skeletons would’ve slain her, unhinged her sanity, cracked to pieces what was left of her niceness. She was already in love with death too much—the death of her enemies.
While they ascended, the falling people had stopped going over the edge. The drone was still going to be sent up. Seeing what happened up Top—that idea had sucked them in. Nothing was stopping this.
The beaster drone operator, a male foot-soldier, was up at the front, testing the flight of the dark blue drone. The bright moonlight outlining the silhouette of the beaster made her squint; she was that accustomed to seeing in the dark.
She held her hand up to shadow her eyes, and found Vargr sauntering back, his wing tips trailing through the leftover toys and the white sheets of paper with crayon drawings that lay on the floor. Part of the left wall still held six or seven more of those drawings thumbtacked to a corkboard.
A mobile of cute plastic animals spun idly over a cot, stirred by the breeze coming in the window, andLegowas scattered over a rug nearby. Not even tough beasters dared to walk there.
Maura had really wanted to come, and Cyn had overheard her pleading with Willow. When she’d been refused, she’d told Willow she was going to inject herself with nanites. That was a startling idea, if obvious in hindsight.
Why not? If a human could say yes, why not? It would give them the beaster ability to resist the Lure, and strength, and whatever else those nanites could give.
She’d thought Willow would say yes.
But she hadn’t. Maura wasn’t even sure which nanites she would choose.
“You think about this some more. We don’t yet know what we are. Wait until we’ve at least checked through the papers in Big Daddy before you decide. You should know what you’re heading for.”
As always, what Willow had said was sensible. For now, Maura was safe with being bondmated.
“Ready?” Vargr said, waking her from her thoughts. “Happy with how you can do whatever it is you do with the Lure?”
“I’m good. Practiced and practiced, yeah.” Cyn cracked her knuckles then let her hand rest on the gun where it was holstered beside her leg. She had her golden nemesis gun back again. She really wanted to give it a name, but nothing had come to her that seemed right. Yet.
Ghoul fucker-upperjust wasn’t that catchy. A pretty gun needed a pretty name.
She wasverygood with the Lure, maybe better at weaving it than before, now she was whole. Whole apart from that limp. Willow had completed a check and no fragments remained. Neurological, Vincent had suggested.
Memory pain even.
She’d never heard of those.
“You?” she asked Vargr.
“Anything comes for you. It’s dead.” He clicked his tongue and winked.
“Thank you, Mister Bodyguard.”
He ruffled her hair then turned to look outward, the same as she was doing, standing at ease by her side. Her bodyguard, Willow had named him. She smiled, curious at her own reactions, amused even. Just a touch from one of her guys brought that happy glow.
It didn’t last long.
She leaned forward, her hands clasped between her knees, glowering at that long window section, agitated because shewanted everything to happen,now. Violence might be coming. She’d swear she could sense it. If any stinkers leaped through those windows, she wanted to shoot them before Vargr, before anyone.
The buck of her gun in her hand, the crackle as the bolt electrocuted the air, the spray as it hit bad things…
Yes.
She was the official Slayer of the Lure also. If need be. Not that it was likely a Ghoul Lord would pay a visit. The last time it had been because she’d provoked one, she figured. She was fairly sure it’d been the same one she’d cut. It’d felt the same, inside its head. If offered a second chance at one, she’d cut off another damn tentacle.
“You know you’re in need of fucking? It’s been too long.” Vargr broke her vicious reverie.
“What? No, I didn’t know, but this is not the time. How can you tell?”
As if she had a clock on her forehead.
He spread his legs in that arrogant male way, sucked on his cheek, thinking.
