“No!” I yell.
Alacine appears from the slant of Sephania’s shadow and trips her, deciding not to stab into my mistress.
I fight back the burning pain of Alacine’s venomous blade and rush toward Seph as she stumbles along.
Alacine is too quick, and with whatever illusion or power she’s displaying—transmitting in and out of a corporeal state—we have no chance against her.
Rirth grunts behind me, a vampire squeals, and the Silverknight’s handsome face shows in the doorway. On cue, his silver dagger glints in the eerie alchemical light.
Maybe withthat,we have a chance.
Wherever Alacine is now, she must notice—
Because she appears on the other side of the room, near Old Endolf and Jinneth. “Curious where a human acquired such a powerful tool.”
Endolf barks in her face, the decrepit old man smashing a beaker of green liquid onto the ground in front of where Alacine appears. Smoke fumes illuminate the body of the Spymistress and she hisses as blisters form on her pale arms from the smoke.
“Back, demon!” Endolf barks at her.
Rirth, Sephania, and I charge at Alacine from every direction, as one.
She moves in the blink of an eye, feeling our impending attacks without needing to look over her shoulder. Enraged, the damaged woman twists her wrist and opens Old Endolf’s throat in a fluid motion with her dagger.
Jinneth wails in agony. “NO!”
Endolf staggers back into her, the protective old man spewing a waterfall of blood through the ragged tear in his throat—similar as the kind of cut Palacia suffered before being turned.
But unlike Palacia, Endolf doesn’t have the advantage of age on his side. He topples sideways, twitching and falling still in a matter of seconds—before any of us can reach them.
Just as Sephania gets there first, Alacine wheels around, disappears, and smokes into existence behind Jinneth.
I watch helplessly as my honey badger’s eyes widen to a size I’ve never seen, watching as Alacine is poised to jam her dagger through Jinneth’s back and out her front.
I toss a dagger, futilely trying to ward off the inevitable, and it whistles end-over-end inches from Jinneth’s face.
Alacine ducks, dodging it as it clangs uselessly against the wall.
“Sephania!” Jinneth screams in a tearful howl—
As thin arms wrap around her middle from the back.
Rirth gets there, swinging his blade past the human woman—
Just as Alacine Mortis grins over Jinneth’s shoulder, back-steps into the shadow of the wall, and vanishes from sight in a cloud of black wisps. Jinneth dissipates with her, a final pleading claw of her outstretched hand the last thing we see before she’s gone.
Sephania stands stock-still, arms lowering. The room falls into sudden, abrupt quietness. She says nothing, staring at the wall where Alacine Mortis and her mother disappeared into.
We don’t hear Alacine’s voice again. She’s gone.
I reach out to put a gentle hand on her shoulder, worrying she’s going to break right in front of me. “Lass?”
Quickly coming to her senses, she kneels at Old Endolf’s motionless body, already bringing her shortsword up to nick her Loreblood out of her veins and feed the man.
But Endolf’s body is actually a corpse. The old man is dead. And there’s no bringing a dead man back to life, even with Sephania’s powerful blood.
She lets out a sob. I hover over her, wrapping her in my arms. “I’m so sorry, my love.”
“She . . . She took her, Garro. She stole my mother!”
