The moment the one-eyed bitch and the thin fullblood glimpse over my shoulder in his direction, I dash toward the grate with Sephania right behind me.
I yell, “Best not to keep Vallan waiting, or your mother!”
Seph says nothing, fending off a few more strikes with her blades before kicking out and sending her adversary back a step.
At the grate, with the ladder in front of me and Sephania behind me, I spin and sheathe my daggers at the same time across my hip scabbards. I wrap Seph in a bear-hug, no longer willing to wait for her to get a free moment that might never happen.
With a yelp, the strong, sturdy girl stumbles into me—
And I jump backward into the black hole.
Weightlessness holds me, slowing our descent as air sweeps past us in a rush.
My feet land lightly on the damp ground of the Grimsons’ entrance, and I release Sephania once we’re steady, quickly drawing my daggers.
“You sure he’ll be okay?” she asks, her eyes wide with tenacity and fear.
“He’ll have to be. I’ve learned not to question Vallan’s prowess, lass, and you’d do best to do the same.”
She gives me a firm nod and we spin to hurry down the first hall.
The sounds of battle reverberate through the underground labyrinth. I grit my teeth and spur us on, leading the charge, aiming directly for the old alchemist’s cave dwelling. “There’s a distinct chance we may not be able to save everyone, little honey badger.”
“I’m aware, cub,” she answers through a clenched jaw.
We turn a corner into an antechamber of varying corridors jutting in three directions. I recall my beast-charm and the mouse, where I led it, and instantly place a map of this place in my mind.
Sephania knows where we’re going too because she’s more acquainted with this place than anyone. “Come on,” she says, “I know a shortcut.”
With my girl taking the lead, we continue into the bleak darkness, the ever-present dripping of water trickling maddeningly from above, and the cries and shouts of battle emerging from a distance.
We rush into a room with two vampires keeping watch on Endolf’s cave just beyond. Leaping out of the shadows, I bare down on the assassins and Sephania joins me—
Then she recklessly runs past them once I have their attention, so she can get to her mother at the cave.
“Sephania!” I yell.
The vampires hiss at me and descend. I’m pressed back, spinning from a wall so I won’t be crowded in.
I quickly hear Sephania yelling, but she’s run out of sight past me into another room and I don’t know what she’s fighting. It frustrates me. The clanging of her blades against another’s has my blood burning, my slow-beating heart picking up speed.
It takes everything I have, every skill, to fend off the assassins. Two-on-one never works in favor of a dhampir against fullbloods, but I have to keep fighting, keep my legs churning and my daggers flashing.
I feel the clay pot against my chest, bouncing in my tunic, knowing I have it as a last resort. I’d rather not cause a landslide or cave-in, however, so I fight.
A new figure joins the octagonal room through a different entryway. I recognize his short stature, his close-to-the-ground fighting style, and his shorn hair. The young man has a handsome face twisted in a fierce scowl.
The newcomer plants a silver-tipped dagger into the back of one of my enemies and the vampire instantly ignites in a conflagration that singes my cloak.
My eyes bulge. “Fuck!” I yell, as the warrior whirls his two blades—longsword and dagger—against the remaining vampire.
With the surprised bloodsucker spinning to face the Silverknight, I quickly carve deep wounds into his sides, finishing with a plunge of my daggers into his lungs.
The vampire screams, going rigid—
Giving the Silverknight an opening to thrust his longsword into the vampire’s chest. When he strikes the heart, the vampire gurgles and collapses between us.
I blink at the man named Rirth. He blinks at me.
