His nostrils flared in anger. “I’ll kill her slowly. I’ll make you watch her suffer.”
“I’ll be dead either way,” said Rory.
Krag jerked her head, making her gasp in pain. “Shut up! You are an animal. Meat.”
False bravado was hard in the face of evil like him, but Hope didn’t know what else to do. Logan was getting closer, and unless he had an army with him—one he wouldn’t have had time to gather—once he was here, he was going to be another pawn for Krag to use against her.
Hope squared her shoulders, carefully keeping her gaze away from Sister Olive’s body. She shoved as much strength as she could into her words. “Let Rory go or you’ll never get what you want.”
Krag released her and stalked over to loom over Hope. “Are you saying you’ll give me what I want? Unquestioning obedience?”
“I won’t hurt anyone. You can never make me do that.”
“We’ll see,” he said, confidence dripping from his words like the bloody saliva from his teeth. “But I accept your bargain. The meat will go free and you will be mine.”
A crushing weight slammed down onto her, driving the breath from her lungs. She didn’t know what he’d done to her, but she wasn’t going to live through it for long. She sucked in a wheezing breath. Dark spots formed in her vision. Krag jerked her to her feet.
He bent over her. His stench made her gag. She couldn’t breathe. She felt his hot breath hit her neck and a moment later, all she felt was pain as his teeth ripped into her skin.
Searing cold slid through her veins, burning them as some kind of toxin sped through her. Her heart slowed. Sweat broke out over her limbs and she started to shake.
Krag shoved her head back until her spine felt like it would snap. With a deep growl of anger, he pulled back, his teeth coated in her blood.
Revulsion shook her to her soul and her stomach heaved. Hunger twisted his face, and she knew that while he may have been able to stop himself this time, the next time he might not.
Hope couldn’t face the thought of dying by his hands like that. Her blood was Logan’s. Letting this monster have even a drop felt like a deep betrayal. Not that she could stop him from doing it again.
Rory was led away by a human. She was screaming something Hope couldn’t hear over the roar of her own heartbeat.
Dizziness weighed her down. Krag’s horrible face filled her field of vision. He was smiling, pleased with himself.
He lifted his hand and placed his reptilian fingers on her temple. A cold, searing pain whipped through her head, like being stabbed with knives made of ice.
Dark, twisted images flickered through her thoughts. Sinister, alien impulses invaded her. The urge to hunt and kill surged inside her, making her legs twitch with the need to run. Her senses sharpened until she could hear the heartbeats of every creature nearby. The pumping rush of blood through their veins made her mouth water and her hands flex in preparation for digging her nails into their flesh. Hunger bore down on her, hollowing out her insides until the need for blood writhed inside her, demanding to be appeased.
“That’s it,” she heard Krag whisper over her thoughts. “My vicious, hungry bride.”
Chapter 29
Logan was close. He could feel Hope, smell a faint hint of her skin on the breeze.
She was inside the run-down factory across the street. He’d circled it, making sure he’d pinpointed her location before wasting time breaking in.
Nicholas was in bad shape. Logan had managed to patch the worst of his injuries, but the blood he’d needed to take had left Nicholas drained and weak—too weak to stand, much less fight. The warrior was sweating and shaking, but Logan thought he’d at least saved the man’s hand from amputation. It was a long way from usable, but was the best he could do under the circumstances.
“You can’t go in there alone,” said Nicholas, his voice trembling with fatigue.
“I don’t have a choice. Sunrise is coming soon. I can’t wait for reinforcements.”
“Paul and Andra are on their way. So are others.”
“They won’t be here soon enough. There’s no end to the damage Krag could cause in the time it would take them to get here.”
“So you’re going to go in alone and die?”
“No. I’m going to scout out the situation. If there’s an opportunity for me to grab her and run, I will.”
“You’re not a fighter,” said Nicholas.
“For her I am. I’d do anything for her. Be anything for her.”
Nicholas nodded. “Keep your phone with you. I’ll be able to track your movements.”
Logan made sure it was silenced, then shoved it into his jeans pocket. He found a spare sword stashed in back with the rest of Nicholas’s supplies. It wasn’t a Theronai blade. It wasn’t imbued with any magic he could sense. It was common and simple, but it was better than nothing—certainly better than relying on what little power he had left in his blood.
“I plan to go in from the west. This close to sunrise I’ll probably only have human guards to contend with.”
“You can’t kill them.”
He could. His vow to protect humans ended where the threat to Hope began. “Killing them would draw too much attention. I have better ways to dispatch them.”
Logan made sure the engine was running and Nicholas had some bottled water nearby. If Hope made it out without him, at least she’d have a way of getting free.
Once the sun was up, Logan was trapped indoors with the Synestryn until sunset. Assuming he lived that long.
Logan slipped around the building to the back. He smelled dozens of Synestryn nearby, within the building. There had to be a way in and out for them—one that probably involved a simple hole through the steel siding.
Instead of a hole, he found a dock door partially open, the entrance covered with heavy rubber flaps. The stink of demons clung to the area and there were trails of mud, blood, and filth staining the concrete below.
He held his breath and listened. The sky had lightened to a pale gray, signaling dawn. His instincts screamed at him to rush inside and escape the sun, but haste now could get him killed.
Logan parted the rubber flaps with the tip of his sword. A few feet away from the opening was a tall stack of wooden crates—likely a screen against any possible rays of sunlight that might filter in. He saw no signs of demons or humans. He could smell them, he could even hear the heartbeat of at least two humans nearby, but that was all.
He eased himself up and through the opening. He crouched behind the crates, listening for signs of guards. After a few seconds, he was able to locate those heartbeats. They were on the other side of the crates. Definitely human.
Logan shielded himself from sight and scratched on the wood.
“Did you hear that?” asked one of them.
“What?”
A man came around the wall of crates, squinting into the darkness. Silently, he urged the man forward.
He was young, maybe twenty-five. His clothes were dirty and his hair hadn’t been cut in months. He was too thin, as if he’d simply forgotten to eat. Ragged bite marks marred his throat where he’d been fed on by demons.
The question was, did he contain any of their blood? If so, feeding from him would only weaken Logan further. But if the man was blooded and his blood was clean, he could give Logan the strength he needed to help rescue Hope.
Logan scratched again, luring the man forward. Two steps later, he was in reach.
Logan dropped the shield and caught the man’s gaze. Pale light spilled out over the young man’s face, accentuating the gaunt hollows under his cheeks.
The other guard’s heartbeat picked up. “Jeff?”
Logan held the man still and silent while he willed him into a deep sleep.
The second guard came around the crates. This one was bigger, healthier. He had only one bite mark on his neck and it was recent. He hadn’t been here long. Perhaps not long enough to become infected.
Logan was visible, and as soon as the man saw Jeff lying at his feet, he pulled in a breath to raise the alarm.
Logan was at his side in an instant, cutting off that scream with a tight grip on his throat. Panic hammered inside the man’s chest, giving him added strength.
Before it was too late, Logan took hold of the human’s mind and control over his body. Inside the man was screaming, but outside he was still and compliant.
Logan scored a small cut on his neck and breathed deeply.
He was blooded. Clean of Synestryn infection. He would do nicely.
Logan bit deep and sucked the man’s blood into himself. There wasn’t much power here to be had, but every little bit would help.
He took enough to render the guard unconscious, then eased him to the ground next to Jeff. The two of them would remain here for hours.
Logan shielded himself from sight again and eased around the wall of crates. There was a brief maze of twists and turns, but with every step he drew closer to Hope.
Someone approached from around the next turn. Logan stood still and held his breath.
A woman rounded the corner and came to an abrupt stop. She was wearing a strip of dirty lace wrapped around her hips and nothing else. Her skin was pale, streaked with red from infection. Puffy bite marks covered her neck, arms, and breasts. The smell of rotting skin nearly gagged him.
“I know you’re here,” she said. “The master knows you came for the woman.”
Logan said nothing, refusing to reveal his presence.
She jerked, then stiffened, and her eyes turned black and her lips curled back from her teeth. “Show yourself, leech,” she hissed in a voice not her own. “We shall bargain for your woman.”
Someone else was controlling her. Krag.
Logan hesitated. The woman’s eyes cleared and she shook herself. Tears slid down her dirty cheeks. “Please. Don’t defy him. He’ll kill her.”
Logan couldn’t let that happen. He released the shield. “What do you want in return for her freedom?”
The woman’s mouth stretched obscenely around a grin. Her eyes blackened and that hissing voice vibrated out of her mouth. “Your blood. All of it.”
Logan had expected no less. He was more than willing to trade his life for Hope’s, but he had to be careful that his sacrifice wasn’t in vain. All he really needed to do was buy enough time for the Theronai to arrive, kill Krag, and release himself from any bargain he made. Of course, staying alive that long was going to be difficult.
The woman doubled over, coughing, and spat blood onto the floor. It was too dark to be fully human blood. She’d been tainted, the same way Hacksaw had.
When she spoke, her words were slow and halting, her breath wheezing out of her lungs. Black swirled in her eyes, and Logan could sense some kind of internal struggle going on within the woman. Krag was controlling her—using her to communicate—and she didn’t like it.
Her mouth opened as if someone had pried it. “Surrender yourself and I will free the woman.”
“Unharmed,” demanded Logan. “She goes free before you take so much as a drop of my blood.”
The woman shuddered and clenched her head between her hands. “Agreed.”