Sorsha released me as the vampires pounced, and I just managed to avoid one lurching vamp as the princess resumed her lethal dance.
A crash of glass drew my attention, and I looked over in time to see Adriel’s elbow smash through the top of the case. My stomach lurched as he withdrew two disembodied hands and tossed them in my direction.
By some miracle, I caught the hands — and nearly dropped them.
They were cold to the touch, stiff and withered with age. I gagged and clutched them to my chest as Adriel whirled to stake a blood-drunk vampire who was lurching toward him with a frenzied expression.
A few feet away, Sorsha moved in a swirl of gold and blood. Her long locks were already matted in the tarryblack substance, and her beautiful gown was soaked in gore.
“There are too many,” she called to Adriel, not sparing a glance in our direction as she speared a vampire through the heart, then planted one high-heeled foot on his chest and shoved him off her stake.
“What do you suggest?” Adriel growled.
“Take Lyra and the hands and get out of here. I’ll be fine.”
“You’ll be dinner.”
Sorsha’s scream was right on cue as another vamp took her to the floor, one pale hand clamping around her throat as the other snaked up her thigh.
Adriel hurled himself across the chamber, leaping over an open sarcophagus and kicking the vampire in the head so hard I heard the crunch of bone.
They landed in a sprawling heap, and the royal guard plucked Sorsha off the ground without so much as breaking stride.
The princess was heaving for air, her bloodied hands trembling. Power and fury radiated from Adriel as he held her close, raising a stake as he circled to face the other encroaching vampires.
This was it. We weren’t going to make it out of here — not the way we’d come, at least.
“The pool,” I called, though my voice came out broken and raspy.
Adriel’s eyes met mine across the chamber before refocusing on his opponents.
He was ludicrously outnumbered.
“It’s a doorway to the in-between.”
The royal guard’s expression tightened. I saw thecalculations flash through his eyes, saw him weighing the dangers that awaited us in the in-between against the dozen or so vampires prowling closer.
“Fuck,” he bit out, setting the princess on her feet and rushing the nearest vamp.
Sorsha lurched after him, and I realized he hadn’t released her hand. They sprinted across the chamber, stakes slashing as they went, and my stomach wobbled as I turned toward the fetid water that lapped at the sides of the pool.
My body remembered the horrific journey to the in-between, even if my mind had blocked it out. Everything inside me fought against getting anywhere near that churning black water, but the vampires had us surrounded.
Legs shaking, head spinning, I climbed up onto the low stone wall and plunged into the pool.
Chapter
Five
KADEN
Pain lanced through my scalp as Fleshtalker pulled me upright, his long, pale fingers fisting in my hair.
“I simplyhateseeing you like this, Your Highness.”
“Oh, you love it,” I growled, glaring up at him through the blood oozing into my eyes from a deep gash along my brow. “You and Xadorsch have been waiting for a chance to knock me down a peg since I was born.”
Fleshtalker didn’t answer. He just hauled me over to the back wall of the chamber and drove his fist into my gut.
