“Damn it!” Drew shouted.
Sebastian roared at Drew while flapping his wings, which sent one of the other vampires behind him sprawling. He didn’t seem to notice the ruckus he’d just caused, instead darting around the back of the car. His wings trailed behind him, twitching with agitation, as if they didn’t understand why he hadn’t taken flight instead of using his less-powerful legs.
Then he did the most amazing thing.
Alice swore his wings bulged right before dropping, as if suddenly weighted with iron. She clung backward to the backseat, cautiously excited, as Sebastian lowered himself to one knee. Head raised, eyes on her, he took a single breath—his chest expanding and then letting go—and simply sprang from the ground and into the air.
The change on his face, the utter shock and realization that he could fly, that he could do this, was just short of astonishing. He released a sound of triumph. Of familiarity. And God, how Alice’s heart reacted to his cry.
“Follow him,” Alice cried to Drew. He didn’t hesitate, and the car lurched forward. Not before Alice stuck her head out of the window, calling to her man. “Home, baby. Head home!”
A smile curved her lips as she watched, certain he flew for sanctuary. His wings unfurled against the night air, black on black, with only the stars above him for company. She crouched, then craned her neck to follow him, noting with some trepidation that he didn’t quite have this new ability fully under control. Bast yawed a few times, the effort to move his wings with the currents a foreign skill he was set on mastering. The wings didn’t flap, so much as glide, across the sky, propelling him forward.
“I know what he reminds me of,” Drew said.
Alice turned just enough to catch the way he also crouched as he drove, his attention shifting between the side view mirror and the road ahead of them. “He’s beautiful,” Alice replied.
“I would have expected a lot more bulk though. And a tail, definitely,” he muttered.
“Do you know what this is? Why he’s changing like this?” All this time, he’d shunned help from his men. Had Sebastian excluded the very people who could help him?
Drew ducked to look in the mirror again before meeting Alice’s eyes in the rearview. He chewed on his bottom lip, tearing away a thin strip of skin. It was disgusting and unexpected, but at the same time, a move she understood from a friend troubled over the latest happenings.
“Don’t hold back if you know something, Drew.” She had a feeling he fought loyalty to Sebastian over whether or not he should divulge his knowledge. “He’s been sick and if the result is this...I only want to help. I care for him a great deal.” Maybe more than that.
“Look at him,” he demanded. “Can you not see it?”
“I see a vampire now covered in scales and flying like a bird. I don’t know what it is you people can or cannot do, so give a dog a bone here, huh?”
“It’s the size of him that concerns me more than anything. He’s easily seven or eight feet tall right now. If he gets bigger, I’m right. I have to be right.” They were mutterings of a contemplative person, not part of a conversation.
“What are you right about? Shit. Wait. Do you see him?” Her fingers dug into the leather, the supple material yielding beneath her blunt nails. Alice searched the brackish sky, trying to locate his silhouette in between overhanging tree limbs and the simple clumsy trap of the car. She hoped like hell Drew was an excellent driver, because she forewent the safety belt in order to slide to the other side of the vehicle. No matter where she looked though, she couldn’t find Sebastian. “Did we lose him? Speed up! We can’t lose him.”
“No worries,” Drew said, but she felt the car accelerate anyway. “We know where he’s going. Besides, he’s not likely to let you out of his sight for too long. Not sure what hold you have over him.”
It was more question than statement, but Alice ignored it. What went on between her and Bast was none of Drew’s business until and unless Bast said it was.
“My God, he is beautiful,” she repeated as she found him again. No other words could describe the grace of his form as it glided through the night air. He’d found his stride, his wings shifting subtly, quietly and with gentle finesse. She marveled that something his size could make it look so effortless, but if she hadn’t known better, she could have sworn Sebastian had been flying every day of his life.