Chapter 4

Ican't breathe. My lungs are being crushed and filling up at the same time. Except not with air – with dust. It rakes down my throat and settles in a thick knot that makes me choke and gag.

It is oppressively hot.

For a moment, I consider whether maybe I'm in hell.

Then there's a flash of daylight, and the pressure on my chest and my limbs is lifted. I scream, without meaning to, as pain floods my body.

I blink but can't see straight. My glasses are long gone.

My hand hurts. I look down and realize I'm clutching something. Whatever it is, it's sharp, biting into my palm and causing a trickle of blood to run down the inside of my wrist.

As I raise my hand, the blood pools in the creases of my inner-elbow.

"Pull him out!" Zephyra's voice shatters the silence. I'd recognize it anywhere.

Hands grab hold of me. Ice-cold. Stronger than human hands.

As I'm yanked free, from what I now know is rubble, I look back and see a flash of deep red flesh. A long, bulky arm. Claws.

Fuck.

The Venatrix.

He had me, but he did not kill me.

Memories flood back. I see Kole throwing Nova over his shoulder and running for freedom. I see Zephyra's face dripping away from her skull, sliding down the bones of her face as if it was made of putty. I feel the earth move, and see the ceiling of the tunnel start to break and crack.

Then darkness.

It fell before the Venatrix could kill me.

When I'm free, barely standing, wavering on unsteady feet, I open my palm and look down.

I'm holding a long black claw. Pulled free in the fight.

It is gone.

The monster that killed my wife is gone, and I have taken a part of him with me.

I pocket the talon before anyone can take it from me, then search for Zephyra. She is huddled in the darkness. The tunnel gapes open, light streaming down. There is no way out for her or her vamps. Only a few shadows to cling to, and no route to safety.

I could run… if they'd let go of me long enough to let me.

But the vampires holding me still are already asking Zephyra what they should do with me.

"Bring him here," she mutters, her voice like sand and ash. Croaky. Barely there. "I need to feed."

The vamps exchange a confused look; in order to take me to her, they need to cross into the light. They'll burn.

She doesn't care.

"Bring him to me," she says. "Or your fate will be far worse than a little sunburn."

Quickly – so fast it makes my head spin – they drag me from the rubble to Zephyra's hiding place. They are sizzling when they come to a stop in front of her. Smoke, which smells like charcoal and sulfur, fills the air. They cry out, and try to pat themselves down.

One of them, when he has stopped patting himself, gives me a shove so I fall to my knees.

I look up, on all fours, and my eyes slowly adjust to the gloom.

Zephyra's eyes are rimmed with scarlet. But they are the only thing that still looks normal.

The rest of her…

I swallow a jolt of bile.

Her skin is mottled, red, angry… like her face is made of wax and has been left in the sun for too long. Like it is sliding away from her bones and, at any moment, will fall away completely.

She reaches for me.

Her arm is raw, exposed muscle. Some flashes of white where the bone sticks through. Her hair, too, is almost completely gone on one side. Once thick and black and glossy, it has been singed to within an inch of its life.

"Are you horrified by me, Kim?" she asks, shuffling closer, like a moving corpse.

I nod before I can help myself. "Will you heal?"

"I need blood." She looks at my neck, then my wrist. "You may choose where I feed from."

I open my mouth to protest. I glance back over my shoulder at the sunlight. Fuck. I can't run. They'll catch me.

Or will they?

Would they risk themselves a second time for her?

"My thigh," I say boldly. "I always wanted to know what it feels like. Seems like now is as good a time as any, seeing as I escaped an early death."

Zephyra coos quietly. Too distracted by her pain to hear the lies in my voice.

The other two vampires click their tongues and lick their lips. "May we feed too, my queen?" one asks.

The other tuts at him to be quiet, but Zephyra nods slowly. "If there is enough left in his veins when I am through with him, you may."

I stand gingerly, and begin to unfasten my belt. Zephyra's eyes widen.

Fuck, she is ugly. I have never seen anything so monstrous. Despite my years of demon hunting… she is the worst creature I have ever laid eyes on.

As one hand slaps the leather free, the other slips into my pocket. My fingers wrap around the Venatrix's talon. I grip it tightly, making it an extension of my own hand.

Zephyra crawls closer. She looks up at me. Desperation swims in her eyes. Her mouth hangs open, her tongue flicking the air as if she can already taste what waits for her. Before she knows what's happening, I slice downward, aiming for her eyes. The talon meets resistance, but I keep going.

Zephyra screams like a banshee and falls backward.

The other two vampires jolt for me, but I dart back into the light and they stop. I pause for half a second before turning and running.

If there are others from Zephyra's nest watching, they do not follow.

I climb up the rubble, and up, and up, until I reach the surface.

Then I haul myself free and tear through the abandoned fairground as quickly as my feet can carry me.

It is early.

The sun is barely inching up over the horizon, but it is light enough that they cannot follow me without risking death.

The city is quiet, for the students are all sleeping off hangovers and the commuters are yet to stumble out into the streets in search of coffee and buses.

Stores are still shuttered.

It is as if the world has paused so I can run through it, barefoot and bleeding, and find my way back to Nova and Thornfield.

When I arrive at the museum, I hurtle up the steps, bang my fists on the door, then collapse.