Vanzir let out a throaty laugh, reveling in his hold on the creatures. In a way, I felt sorry for him.
He had tried to walk away from his nature but we had forced him back into it, the same as Karvanak—his previous owner—had. But at least we were fighting the bad guys.
As his head dropped back, a look of pure lust stole over his face and he opened his eyes. Like pinwheels, unfathomable colors flickered through Vanzir’s eyes. His gaze was scintil ating.
Camil e stared at him, mesmerized, and started forward.
“Get away,” he said hoarsely, motioning her back. “I can’t control myself when I feed, even if my life depends on it. If I didn’t snag you in with my feeders, I’d end up tearing your clothes off and fucking you raw.”
Camil e shook her head, blinking, as Morio yanked her out of the way.
I turned at a scuffling noise behind me and saw Chase wrestling with one of the shadow creatures. I poised myself to leap on it and help him when he let out a shout and the thing rebounded back. I couldn’t see what he’d done to it, but the thing went poof and vanished.
“Are you okay?” I ran to his side and yanked him to his feet as he raised his hand for help.
“Yeah, I think so.” Chase dusted off his suit and nodded toward Vanzir. “He’s got the last of them, it looks like.”
“Yeah, he does. I think.”
Just then, Vanzir drained the shadow men dry, and they vanished. Panting, he turned around to stare hungrily at Camil e, and she took a step back. He stepped forward, then stopped himself.
“Don’t ever get near me again when I’m feeding.” He gave her a stark look. “You have too much life energy and stand out like a lol ipop in the middle of a bunch of broccoli. I don’t think I could help myself.”
Morio let out a low growl, but Camil e put her hand on his arm. “Stop. He can’t help it—it’s his nature.” She nodded at Vanzir. “Understood. I’l try to keep my distance when we’re in a fight.”
He gave her a bleak smile. “Babe, you’d better.”
“Now what?” Chase asked.
“I think the question should be, what did you do to that creature?” I stared at him. “You couldn’t just knock it out with a punch to the kisser.”
Chase looked at me, bewildered. “I don’t know, to be honest. I just . . . I reached out and pushed.
I remember thinking, Get off me, and I . . . shoved and it vanished.”
“Shoved . . . do you know if you touched it physical y or with your mind?” Camil e swung around, eyeing the detective.
He shook his head. “Don’t know. I real y don’t remember.”
I gave Camil e a warning shake of the head. Chase was obviously opening up in his abilities, but what they were, and what they would become, we didn’t have time to find out standing here below the streets of Seattle. “Wel , whatever you did, it worked. As to what next . . . hel , I don’t know. We could explore each of those passages, but I’m afraid we might get lost.”
“Why don’t we head back to the main tunnel and see where it leads?” Vanzir nodded back toward the way we’d come. “This area seems too dangerous right now.” He seemed antsy.
I stared at him. “What’s up with you?”
He blinked. “Nothing. I just don’t want anybody hurt.”
Camil e shrugged. “He may be right.”
“Okay,” I said. “The tunnels leading out of this chamber look too dark and too narrow anyway.
And our flashlights aren’t working in here.” I led them back through the narrow passage, hurrying to get us back out to the main tunnel. Once we were there, our lights came back on.
“I don’t like it down here,” Camil e said. She drew close to Morio. He put his arm around her shoulder. “I hate being underground.”
“I know. Let’s get a move on.”
We fel back in formation again. We’d been traversing the passage for another ten minutes when I stopped and looked up. Slivers of dim light filtered down.
“Wait here,” I said, then slid my gloves back on and headed up the iron-rung ladder again. As I came to the top and cautiously slid the manhole cover aside, I blinked, surprised to find myself smack in the middle of the park in which I’d found the girl’s body. About ten yards from where I’d found her body, to be exact. That meant our serial kil er was probably using this tunnel system to come and go. If I was right, he had built himself a nest down here somewhere.
I scrambled back down the ladder. As I jumped the last five feet and turned to tel them what I’d found out, there was a loud shriek and a laugh, and one of the broken slats from the wooden floor sailed into the air, directly at me. Morio was standing nearest and he leaped to push me out of the way, but as he did so, the splintered end of the board lodged into his side. Deep. Blood began to flow heavily from the wound and he groaned, sinking to the floor.
“Crap!” I leaped to his side. Camil e was already there, kneeling by him as Vanzir and Chase looked in vain for the attacker. The next moment, a hail of pebbles rained down on al of us, including a few stones as big as my fist. They hit hard, and we were al under attack.
“What do we do?” Chase yel ed, trying to shield Camil e and Morio.
Vanzir pushed Chase out of the way. “Get the kitsune above ground,” he said. “I can’t take him.
If I tried to move him through the astral, it might worsen that wound.”
“I can do it,” I said, prying Camil e’s hands off Morio. She was sobbing, trying to wake him up.
Morio had fainted—probably from the pain. Demon or not, a large wooden stake in the side had to hurt. I gathered him in my arms and slowly began to rise toward the manhole, floating up. Carrying someone made it doubly hard to control the power—passengers were always problematic, but we didn’t have a choice. I’d done it a few times and I could do it again. My main goal was to get him up topside before the ghost decided to attack us while we were airborne. I bit my lip, concentrating on keeping us afloat.
Vanzir pushed Chase toward the rungs. “Get the fuck up there, Johnson. Menol y wil need your help once she’s topside with Morio.” He turned back to the direction the stones had pelted us from.
Camil e raced to his side, cal ing up the Moon Mother’s energy. As I neared the manhole cover, I heard Vanzir shout something, and then he laughed in that deep, terrifying throaty way he had.
Crap. What was going on? But I couldn’t go back to check. Morio’s skin was clammy. He’d gone into shock and the scent of his blood was driving me nuts. As I came to the manhole cover, I knocked it away, driving straight into it with the top of my head. Sometimes, vampire strength rocked.
I hovered up and out of the tunnels, coming to rest on the street next to the manhole. Quickly, I darted to the lawn next to the sidewalk and laid Morio down on the snow-covered grass. Fuck. We needed something to cover him with. I could strip off my turtleneck, but that wouldn’t do much good. Wil ing Chase to hurry up, I examined Morio’s wound.
We were under a streetlamp, thank gods, and I could see the long, narrow board. Oh hel . It had driven itself a good five inches into his side. The good news was that it hadn’t been near his heart.
The bad news was that he was bleeding far too much and the scent was so strong and sweet that my fangs had descended. I wil ed them up, pushed back the hunger, and pressed my hands against the wound, trying not to jostle the stake until we knew what was going on.
Chase climbed over the side of the manhole and yanked out his cel phone, yel ing on it as he raced over to my side.
“Sharah, get a team out here now. Fuck, where is here?” He stopped to glance around, then caught sight of the street signs. “Cross streets: Greenbelt Drive and Vader Way East. Morio’s been severely injured. He’s losing blood.” He paused. “I have no idea what blood type a youkai-kitsune takes. And Camil e’s stil . . . hel , Camil e and Vanzir are stil down there with that thing.
Just get here stat!” He stuck the phone in his pocket and joined me.
“I’ve got compression going, but damn, Chase, this is bad. He’s in shock. Can you cover him with your coat?”
Chase yanked off his parka and covered Morio with it, then took off his suit coat and bal ed it up, stuffing it under Morio’s head. “He’s pale . . . far too pale.”
“He’s lost a lot of blood. I’m not sure what to do. I have no clue about the physiology of a nature demon.” I glanced over at the manhole. Stil no Vanzir or Camil e. “Where the hel are they? I’ve got to go check on them. Chase, can you sit with Morio?”
He shook his head. “I can’t watch for Sharah and keep compression on his wound, too. You have to stay here with me until the team gets here.”
“We may be too late. I have to go see what’s going on with my sister.” Frantic, I smacked the ground next to me, and the thud ran in a rol beneath our feet. The blood from Morio’s wound started again, and I hustled to press my hands to the gash. The scent of the blood was also driving me nuts, and I prayed we didn’t have any unwelcome visitors drop out of the woodwork, like our vampire serial kil er.
But it wasn’t another vampire that showed up. No, we couldn’t be that lucky. I heard a noise and glanced over at the nearest tree. There, in a ghostly fog, was a stark figure cloaked in the wreaths of mist. Holy crap, another ghost!
“What the fuck is this? Spook central?” I nodded to the ghost. “Chase, we can’t stay here, that thing could—” But before I could get the rest of my sentence out, the spirit hurtled itself our way with a shriek.
I threw myself over Morio’s prone body, keeping one hand pressed against the bloody fountain, as Chase paled. He was half-kneeling, half-standing, and the spirit flew right through him, knocking him to the ground.
With a groan, he hit the pavement, rol ing away to come up in a crouch, a look of sheer terror masking his face. He held out his hands as the spirit wheeled and came in for another round, and this time the thing had a face—or rather it was a face. Like a giant skul , with mouth shrieking wide, it descended on Chase. I could do nothing, unless I wanted to expose Morio to more danger, except watch as the spirit engulfed the detective.
“Camil e! Vanzir!” I screamed as loud as I could, hoping they could hear me, hoping they were al right. “We need you!”
Just then, Chase shuddered and a sparkle of colors began to surround him. The spirit seemed to pul back, and with a massive convulsion, Chase threw it off. The ghostly mist paused, and in that pause, the sound of sirens began to blare up the road. Sharah and her men screeched to a halt in the middle of the road and leaped out of the ambulance. The spirit seemed to think the better of confronting so many and vanished into the night, a puff of fog on the wind.
Chase shook his head and turned, staring at me. “What did I do? How did I keep it from hurting me? I could feel it trying to get into my mind.”
“I don’t know,” I said slowly. That was twice tonight he’d done something to repel our attackers. It occurred to me we needed to run him through a battery of some kind of tests, though I had no clue how or what.
As Sharah and her men came over to help with Morio, the evening took on a surreal feel. The snow started again and I stumbled back, toward the manhole, terrified that if I went down I’d discover Vanzir and Camil e, dead. But I had to find out. In the silent night, surrounded by the soft fal of the snow, I stumbled toward the tunnels, my hands slick and bloody. I stared at the drops of red, bringing my fingers to my nose, where I inhaled deeply. The musk of Morio’s scent was also clinging to me, and I felt a sudden wash of fear. What if he died? What would happen to Camil e?
What if she was . . .
Pushing the thought away, I closed myself to the fear and raced over to the manhole. I leaped over the side without a thought to what might be waiting below, and hurtled to the ground. As I landed, I flashed on my light and looked around, praying that they were okay.
I caught sight of Vanzir first. He was standing there, arms hanging down, staring bleakly at the wal , shaking his head.
“What? What’s wrong? Where’s Camil e?” I grabbed him by the arm and swung him around. His eyes were spinning and I could tel he’d been feeding. “No . . . please don’t tel me . . . Camil e!
Where are you?”
“I’m right here.” Camil e’s voice cut through the darkness as she stepped away from a pile of broken wood. Her expression was bleak, too. “Morio?” Her voice hung in the air, and I stared at her. Her dress was ripped in several places and her face was covered with dirt.
“Morio’s alive, but seriously wounded. Sharah’s up there with him now. Chase and I had to protect him against a ghost or I would have . . . are you okay?” Something in her demeanor was guarded and I couldn’t read her, for once.
A dark cloud passed over her face, but she nodded. “Yeah. I’m al right. Just roughed up. We managed to hold that thing at bay. But I want to get the fuck out of here. I need to be with Morio.”
She headed for the ladder, passing by Vanzir without a word, her lips pressed together.
I watched as she began to reach for the rungs with bare fingers. “Stop! Use these.” Mutely, she al owed me to slide my gloves on her hands, then silently started up the ladder.
Turning back to Vanzir, I said, “What happened? Tel me what happened down here! We heard an explosion and Camil e’s shriek . . . and you . . . laughed.”
“Camil e set off one fucking hel of a spel . That I can tel you. And I fed.” He said nothing more, just stared at me. I found myself wanting to go to him, but shook myself out of it.