“Cut fast,” Bruiser advised. “An oval worked for us. If you cut straight lines, when you turn it, you have to start over. And”—his voice hardened—“it is like cutting lightning.”
That sounded painful. With my free hand I pulled the Glob out of my pocket and held it near the energy patterns. I touched the broken tip of the blade to thehedgeand a sizzle shot up my arm. A shower of energies spat at me and I jerked back. “Okay. Trying this again.” I held the Glob at the hilt so both hands were in front of me, wrists one atop the other. I touched the blade again to thehedge, and the Glob sucked in all the spitting energies. The blade heated, smoking on the humid air. I pressed down on it and cut into thehedge. The Glob grew hotter and hotter in my already-burned, mostly healed hand. The blade blackened even more, and slivers of steel broke off and fell to the floor.
From the corner of my eye, I saw a flashlight beam. Fawn and Carmine were covering us, other people behind them, armed, ready to fight my war. I couldn’t concentrate on them, not when the hole I was cutting was trying to electrocute me.
Sweat slid down my spine, through my pelt, beneath my quivering arms as I made a large oval cut with the blade that carried its own prophecy about death. When I reached my starting point, the energies in the middle sizzled away. Holding the blade carefully, I backed to the side, remembering other glimpses into the future that had made no sense. “Koun. Prick my wrist. Sip. Hurry. Hold my blood in your mouth. Step through.”
“Yes, my Queen.”
He started to slice my skin and I added, “If I’m wrong, you could die crossing over death energies.”
Koun smiled placidly and rested his pale eyes on me. “I’ll not die breaking into abloodyChristian church with a skinwalker queen. I’ll die in battle or live forever.” He cut me and I flinched, just enough to notice that the crucifix was no longer burning. I’d put the other two amulets away, and the connection was broken. New info. Good.
Koun lapped up my blood and stepped through the oval hole to stand, weapons out and ready, on the other side. Tex, then Leo, came through, each sipping my blood, and all three slithering like lizards. Carmine and Fawn entered, no blood needed.
Eli went after them, touching my shoulder. His dark calm flowed into me, his nearness spreading that cold pool of tranquility. His eyes met mine and I tried to let him know what I was about to do. His pupils, already large, widened more. In the vision that had made no sense. I was next in line.
Bruiser took the hilt and gestured me inside thehedge. I hesitated. I had hoped the team behind Bruiser wouldbe next, but the lack of space meant there would be no breaking in line or cheating the timeline. Our numbers would be lower than I had hoped.
I duckwalked through the opening and reached back to take the hilt so Bruiser could get inside. He lifted a leg to insert it and I shoved off, backward, into the room behind me. The oval hole in the energies closed. I landed in Eli’s arms and he stood me upright.
Bruiser’s eyes were shocked. “Jane?” he whispered. Then fury flashed into them. “Jane!”
I shook my head. “You being in here with me means you die. You being out there means you live and you can take care of Leo, Koun, and Eli after. I... Ineedyou alive. Do you understand? Alive, not crisped like bacon or”—I took a breath and said—“or dead by my hand. And if you come in here, Mainet will have Leo and you. And I’ll have to shoot you.”
“In one of your futures? You saw me betray you?”
“I saw us blending our magics to fight Mainet. We were winning. And then you were pulled in, under Leo’s blood bond. If you are inside, Mainet gets you, Leo, and me. Everyone dies.”
Bruiser stood and walked away. As if my words had betrayed him.
“Whimper later,” Alex said. “Weird shit’s happening inside.”
Eli and I met eyes and said together, “Language.”
We moved silently through the dark, the vamps clearing the space in front of us, me holding the Mughal blade, what was left of it. I was sandwiched between them and Eli. The door ahead was open and the sound of a drum beating came through. The tempo was like a heartbeat layered over more heartbeats, the reverberation due to the size of the sanctuary creating echoes. The overlaid rhythm had an odd effect on my own heart rate, making it speed. I was certain the outcome was intentional.
Eli touched my shoulder. He shared that dark, calm pool of his battle readiness. I inhaled deeply and let the breath go. Right. Breathe. He dropped his hand and led the way through the dark, closer to the doorway. The people at the front had to know we were here but they didn’tknow we had gotten through the inner ward. I hoped. The vamps with me stopped as if they had been transformed to stone midstep. As one, they all stepped back. Another. They stopped again and turned to me. Their movements were measured, in cadence to the drumbeats.
Koun took a breath himself and said, “This is as far as we can go, My Queen. My flesh was burning, even in a desecrated church for a God I do not worship.”
I leaned and caught a whiff of burned vamp. Softly I asked, “Mainet’s vamps got inside. Was it because of the runes over the other door?”
“We will seek that path. But you will be alone until we can find a way to enter the place that was once holy.”
“Not alone. I’ve got Eli.”
The three vamps moved along the hallway, Koun and Tex, holding Leo by an arm. Carmine and Fawn covered Eli and me. I slipped to the open doorway and eased my head around.
In the sanctuary, the circle had been activated. There were three witches, three vamps, and Aya, sitting, or in my brother’s case, lying, at the outer ring. In the center of it, Mainet and Sabina/Gramma stood together. Lachish was on the altar, and from this angle, I could see she had been cut from breastbone to groin. The cut wasn’t deep, more like a scoring, a pattern for a future, deeper cut. It also didn’t look as if it was a single line, but rather something more complex. Maybe the rune for death. She was still alive.
The heart rate, drummed by Endora, increased in speed slightly. It was air magic, and it resonated in my chest cavity, making my breath shudder. A slight tremor caught at my fingers and climbed up my wrists. Eli touched my shoulder again. Our heartbeats synced. So did our breathing.Calm. Calm.
The smell of smoke rose on the air. Woodsmoke and rosemary.Gramma...
The doorway was wreathed in shadow. I slid my head farther into the room to get a better view and saw a redheaded vamp standing to the side of Sabina. I had seen her before. Ka had taken her form. But why? Why here now as a vamp? I had thought she was here to be a sacrifice, but—
And then it hit me. Gramma and Ka were helping Mainet bind an angel and take its power at the same time as Mainet did whatever he was going to do with the heart to take the final power of the Sons of Darkness, and negotiate with or bind a demon that had already been summoned. I pulled back in to the dark so I could think.
