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She rubbed her own throat. "Most vulnerable spot?"
A nod. "But thats going to take time. For now, if you can pin or shoot an angel coming at you, youll disorient him long enough to run. "
A pause, and she realized he was waiting for a response. "Im not too proud to run. My legs have kept me alive more times than you know. "
Those ice green eyes seemed to gleam with subtle approval, but that was probably wishful thinking on her part. "If youre trapped in a situation where you have no choice but to fight, a good aim will give you a slight advantage. "
"Emphasis on slight. "
Galen pulled a knife out of the wall, his biceps flexing. "Youre playing with archangels. Slight is an improvement on certain death. "
Chapter 25
Jason stood across from Raphael on the balcony off Raphaels office, the buildings of the Refuge spread out below.
"What have you learned?" Raphael asked his spymaster.
The tattoo on Jasons face appeared complete, but Raphael knew that while the chunk of flesh that had been ripped out by one of Lijuans reborn had healed, the markings were only temporary, so as to betray no weakness. Jason was having the ink redone step by painful step. "Shes keeping a secret. "
Raphael waited. All archangels kept secrets, but for Jason to comment on it had to mean something.
"Its a secret she appears not to have shared with anyone, but I think the Shade knows,"
he said, referring to Phillip, the vampire whod been with Lijuan longer than Raphael had been alive. "Hes like a pet to her - she hasnt forbidden him from entering the sealed room as she has everyone else. "
"Do you think you or one of the others can get a glimpse inside the room?"
Jason shook his head. "She has a ring of reborn around it night and day. " He touched his face. "Im fairly certain theyd tear any intruder limb from limb. "
Total dismemberment was one of the very few ways thatmight lead to the death of an angel Jasons age. However, if the head was left whole, there was a chance of regeneration. "Have you been able to confirm how many of Lijuans reborn eat flesh?"
"Its no longer the old ones alone - I saw a pack of younger reborn feast on the bodies of the newly dead," the angel replied. "They did it out in the open. "
"So, she crosses another boundary. " It was one more indicator that her mind was no longer functioning as it should. "Tell me about this sealed room. "
"Its in the center of her mountain hold, hidden deep within the core. The reborn roam all the corridors around it, and the ones that roam are the ones with eyes that shine - the ones who eat of flesh. "
"Do you have any idea what she might be hiding?" It could be nothing good, that much was certain.
"Not yet. But Ill find out. " Jason resettled his wings. "I did as you asked and had Maya work her way into Dahariels domain. Something is going on, but whether it relates to the events at the Refuge, its impossible to say. There are rumors that Dahariel killed several of his vampires recently, but that couldve been a legitimate punishment. "
"Have Maya remain where she is. I have people inside Nazarachs and Anoushkas homes. "
"If it does prove to be Nazarach?"
"Ill execute him. " Nazarach ruled Atlanta, but only under Raphaels grace. "Dahariel is the strongest of them all. " And the most coldly intelligent. Leaving that decapitated head in Anoushkas bed was the kind of calculated threat Dahariel might make.
"If it is him," Jason said, "hes begun to strike close to home - one of Astaads favorite concubines was found eviscerated yesterday. She was branded inside. All indications are that she was alive at the time. "
"So . . . " It seemed nothing less than death - brutal, merciless - would satisfy this would-be archangel now. "Astaad hasnt informed the Cadre. "
Jason didnt comment except to say, "Pride. "
"Yes. " The archangel who ruled the Pacific Isles had to be enraged that someone had managed to breach the walls of his harem. "One more archangel bested. " In the most cowardly of ways, but drunk on vicious pleasure, the angel behind the assassination wouldnt see it that way. He, or she, would, Raphael was certain, view it as a true victory.
"Sire - there is more. "
"Yes?"
"They found another Guild dagger in her chest cavity. "
"Little hunter, little hunter, where aaaaaarre you?" Playful, singsong, horrifying.
Wrapping her arms around her raised knees, she ducked her head, making herself even smaller. The cupboard smelled of blood. Ari and Belles blood. On her feet, in her hair, on her clothes.
Go away, she thought, please go away. Please, please, please, please . . . It was a litany in her head, her voice small and weak. Where was Daddy? Why didnt he come home?
And why wasnt Mama in the kitchen like she was every morning? Why was there a monster there?
"Where are you hiding, little hunter?" The creeping footsteps stopped for a second. An instant later came an even more chilling sound - lips smacking together. "Your sisters are most delicious. Do excuse me while I go take another bite. "
She didnt believe him, terror and a frustrated, clawing rage keeping her locked in position. The giggle came three seconds later.
"Smart little hunter. " A deep breath, as if he was drawing in the freshest of air.
Her own nostrils burned with the pungent aroma of a spice for which she had no name, mixed with ginger . . . and a golden, pure light. It nauseated her that this foul creature, this monster, smelled like summer days and a mothers warm embrace. He should smell like rot and pus. It was another affront, another pain to add to the ones hed already carved across her heart.
Ari. Belle. Gone.
She blocked her sobs with a fist, knowing her sisters would never dance with her across the kitchen floor again. Belles legs, those beautiful, long legs had been broken until they twisted in a way that was simply impossible. And Ari . . . the monster had nuzzled into the nightmare that was her neck before Elena found the courage to follow her sisters dying command to run. But the blood, the blood would give her away.
She waited, listened. He was moving around. She thought he mightve gone upstairs, but her pulse was pounding too hard in her ears. She couldnt trust the sounds, couldnt run.
Not when he could be standing in the corridor waiting for her. Then it was too late. His footsteps came back into the room.
"Ive got a suuuuurprise for you. " A sly, scraping sound, the knob of the cupboard where she was hiding being twisted away. She pushed back into the wood but there was nowhere to go, nowhere to run.
"Boo!"A single perfect brown eye stared mischievously through the hole made by removing the knob. "There you are. "
She stabbed out with the knitting needle shed picked up from her mothers basket in the living room, spearing that eye dead center. Liquid spurted onto her hand, but she didnt care. It was his scream - high, piercing, agonized - that mattered. Giving a savage little smile, she pushed out of the cupboard as he stumbled back, darting past him and up the stairs.
She should have gone outside, found help. But she wanted her mom, needed to see that she was alive, was breathing. Shoving through her parents bedroom door, she slammed it shut behind her, turned the lock. "Mama!"
There was no answer.
But when she looked around, relief poured through her. Because Mama was just sleeping. Running over on feet that continued to leave fading red imprints on the carpet, she shook her mothers shoulder.
And saw the gag around her mouth, the knives that pinned her wrists and ankles to the sheets. "Mama. "Her lower lip quivered, but she was already reaching to undo the gag.
"Ill help you. Ill help you. "
It was the terrified warning in her mothers eyes that made her turn.
"Bad little hunter. " Shaking the bedroom key at her, the monster pulled the needle out, and looked at it with a single curious eye, the other a bloody ruin down his cheek. "Do you think Mommy would like a present?"
"W
ake up, Elena! "
She jerked into a kneeling position in one go, reaching for the knife shed slipped under the pillow out of habit. Raphael looked up at her as she stared down at him, knife held high, ready to go for his throat.
Red hazed her vision, her tendons quivering with the need to strike out.
Elena. The scent of the sea, of the wind. Youre safe.
"Ill never be safe. " It came out a withheld scream, so taut, so painful it was barely sound. "He hunts me in my dreams. "
"Who?"
"You know. " She tried to lower the knife. Her muscles refused.
"Say it. Make him real, not a phantom. "
Her mouth filled with the taste of bitter rage. "Slater Patalis. " The most infamous killer vampire in recent history. "We were his last snack stop. "
"The records say the hunters were able to capture him because you disabled him. "
"I remember stabbing him through the eye, but that wouldnt have stopped him. " Her fingers finally unclenched, dropping the knife. It wouldve sliced into her thigh had Raphael not caught it midfall.
Placing it on the small bedside table, he said, "Your memories are incomplete?"
"Theyre coming back more and more. " She stared out at the wall, seeing nothing but blood. "Ive always seen parts, but now I think they were jumbled up pieces of the whole.
What I saw tonight . . . " Her eyes burned, her hands fisting on her thighs. "The monster broke my mothers legs, her arms, pinned her to the bed, made her listen as he killed Belle and Ari. "
Raphael opened his arms. "Come here, hunter. "
She shook her head, unwilling to surrender to weakness.
"Even an immortal," Raphael said quietly, "has nightmares. "
She knew he wasnt talking about her. Somehow, that made it easier. She fell into his embrace, burying her face in the warm curve of his neck, the clean, bright scent of him filling her lungs. "Later, I saw the streaks on the carpet, realized shed tried to come to us even after he hurt her so badly. But he came back upstairs, put her in that bed again. "
"Your mother fought for you. "
"She lost consciousness soon after I found her. I was so scared then, so afraid to be all alone with him, but now, I think her lack of consciousness was a mercy. " Her stomach twisted because in the most secret depths of her mind, she knew Slater had hurt her mother in other ways, made Elena watch. "I stayed awake because I knew Beth was coming home from her sleepover soon. I knew I couldnt let the monster get her. But he was gone before that. "
"So your youngest sister was saved from the horror. "
"I dont know," Elena said, remembering the lack of comprehension on Beths small face at the funeral ceremony for Ari and Belle. "It was her first ever sleepover, and I dont think shes spent a night away from home ever again. Somewhere deep inside, shes afraid of what shell come home to. "
"You, too, hold a hidden fear," Raphael murmured. "What is it that youre so scared to speak of?"
"I think," she said through the haze of tears she refused to let fall, "he did something to me. " Then hed left both her and Marguerite alive, while Ari and Belle lay dead on the kitchen tiles.