Chapter 6

CHAPTER SIX

MIKO

I woke up to purple eyes in a familiar face.

"Daria?"

"Yes, werewolf. I am here, with Joseph."‘

"Call me Joe."

I saw him looming close beside her. There was no expression on his pale face, his blond mohawk fluffier than usual.

"You are safe for now," Daria added.

Wherever we were, it was nearly pitch black.

"What happened?" I asked, my spine aching. I struggled to remember anything, confused about why I was lying down on a hard, cold floor.

"Take your time to come together," the vampire said gently. "You seem so weak."

My skull felt like it'd been stuffed with cotton wool, my body tired but not quite weak. Better. Much better than before when I'd crawled from the cage.

That was it.The cage. Lance's cage. The winged zombie. The office. The vent.

"I got away," I said, slowly sitting up.

Daria placed her hand on my back, helping me upright. "We found you inside the vent. We are still in the factory."

A network of pipes and frayed cables snaked above my head in this empty and filthy room. Just ahead of me, a short stairwell led up to a closed door. A bigger set of doors were on the opposite side of the room, probably to accommodate deliveries to the factory.

I rubbed the back of my head, desperate for a cup of coffee. "Where did… Fuck."

"Where did we go after the fae came to the farm?" She glanced at Joe, but the other vamp kept his mouth firmly shut. "We fled to help."

"You what?"

"Fled to help, Miko. If we stayed to fight, we risked becoming unhelpful. So, we ran, keeping track of you from the shadows."

"And the blood magi didn't find you?"

"One did," Joe chimed in. "I snapped his neck and threw him down a well."

I couldn't help but chortle. "Nice."

Daria seemed pleased I found it funny. It wasn't really, but whatever. It was a win, and the vamps had survived. That was good enough for me.

"We tracked you to the factory," Daria continued, "and were in the process of formulating a plan. Things changed."

Joe nodded, pulling a white marshmallow from his pocket—a vamp's favorite food aside from blood.

"I'll say," I responded, rolling my shoulders. "Fucking zombies."

Daria held out her hand to Joe. He placed a marshmallow on her palm. "We are in an underground storage facility close to where we found you." She popped the sweet in her mouth. "Your pack are down the corridor."

A jolt of surprise gave my energy a spike. I sniffed the air, picking up dirt, blood magic, the Gilmore family, and my pack.

Relief enveloped me with an exuberant hug. "I have to?—"

"There is a problem," Daria said, cutting me off.

Of course there was. Hearing that got a growl rumbling deep in my chest, my instinct to protect my pack raked across broken glass.

"They are being kept in a room warded by blood runes," Daria carried on. "We have tried breaking them, but you know how blood magic works."

"The runes are bound to the caster," I answered, agitated.

"Precisely. Unfortunately, we cannot seem to find the caster around the factory."

"Shit. Any sign of Basil?"

She shook her head. "We cannot find him either."

Basil got handed to some blood magi who'd be basking in his fae blood.

Blood magi loved fae blood, able to take control of their bodies and minds without breaking a sweat.

Dickheads.

Poor Basil. Yeah, he might be Ori's ex, and kind of pissed me off whenever he opened his mouth, but I didn't wish this on him.

I cracked my knuckles, my body getting stronger with each passing minute. The effects of being dragged from the mind walk too early were fading away.

"My guess is the rune maker's shacking up with the blood magi holding Basil. What's the situation with the biters?"

Daria took a few beats to answer. "The horde remains inside the factory. In stasis, awaiting fresh meat."

"Great. What about any routes to avoid them?"

"There are some. We can show you when you are ready."

I really needed that coffee and a kiss from Ori. "And Lance? Did you see him?"

"Yes. Running away," Joe answered.

"Prick." I got to my feet, stretching out the last remains of ache.

Ah, had to love those cracks.

"Are you sure you can stand?" Daria questioned, worry in her tone.

"Yeah. I'm good. Give me a few minutes and I'll be able to hunt."

Both vampires grinned with delight over that word.

"I love a hunt." Joe practically purred.

"Me too," I said, thoughts turning to my mate.

How to get him out of Faery?

I'd almost got the answer about him, the last part of the mind walk showing me Orion, hitting me with his cherry scent. He came into my life for a reason. Not just for love, but to help save the world from Dawn.

Trev, the oracle, told me about the power of my blood. The troll got his power from a shaman in his village. Roseanne. She'd foreseen Dawn, cryptically, before giving her life to serve the greater good.

She'd said, "Piece by piece, the undead will evolve until they unlock their true power—a power the selfish fools and those who manipulated them never envisioned ."

God, what a sharp dose of reality. The biters were definitely changing, a future of serious nastiness waiting for us if I didn't end Dawn soon. All because of Project Dawn, a pack of lies, and my parents saving my life as a child. My dad gave over his magic-enhancing sleeper blood in exchange for something called Booster Serum Fifty-five. That stuff made me an alpha, saving me from a rare condition where the shifter gene killed a child on their first shift at the age of three.

Dad's blood ended up helping Dawn come to be—which, clearly, was a massive mistake. Project Dawn wasn't a miracle cure. So, what was it? And where did Orion fit into this? I'd been dreaming of him before I met him, coming to think it was down to him being my mate.

But there was more to it.

He comes, this scarlet-haired man, bearing a golden gift in his hand. For you. It is for you. It is for hope. He is hope.

Fuck it. I needed answers. I needed him despite having to die to change the world.

Trev's words echoed in my head: "Miko Reyes, you are the first son of the blood giver. Your father's blood flows in Dawn. He is the maker. The blood of his blood ends Dawn. You are the only blood. You are the first and only son. Give your blood to end this curse. All your blood. Your life for Dawn's ending."

How could I leave Ori behind? How could I find peace in the afterlife knowing I'd found love here?

Because there's more, my inner voice said. He's another key.

Enough of this shit. Right now, I set my focus on saving my pack and getting Orion back. Or maybe I should just head off to Dunstable and find the heart of Dawn, end this once and for all.

No. Not without seeing my people again.

Unease spiked in my guts. What if the biters evolved to unstoppable levels? Or made it impossible to go north?

Shit. I flexed my hands, keeping a lid on my fury. Lance did this, telling the fae our location at the Gilmore family's farm. Once again, that prick shat on my life. He?—

No. Fuck him. Thinking of him clouded my brain. I needed sharper focus, all senses firing to get this done.

"This is the plan," I said, slipping into leader mode. "We search for Basil's scent. His will be the strongest. Sniff for cookies."

The vampires nodded, falling under my command as if part of my pack.

"Then we follow his scent, kill us some magi, and free my people," I added. "After that, we figure out how to get into Faery."

The vampires looked at each other, and once again grinned from ear to ear.

"Glad to see you agree," I said.

Joe stiffened, holding up a hand. "Be quiet."

I fell in line this time.

I heard the footsteps seconds later. Slow and purposeful, heavy breathing coming from someone outside the door.

"I will find the wolf who threatens me," a man said in the crackly, unnerving tone of Dawn. "I am his end. I am Dawn."

Shit.