Page 132 of The Rogue's Curse

They turned to look. “You’ve been a vampire for about five minutes,” Paris said.

“They hurt me,” he said. “I want to help.”

“Can you shoot a gun?” Kristina asked.

Avery nodded. Kristina looked at Paris, and he shrugged. She handed over a gun, and he set his jaw.

“Are you good, or do you need the second shot?” Kristina asked, holding up the injector of epinephrine.

“You just want to drug me,” he teased.

“I would love to stab you, honestly,” she said.

He glanced at Sasha, who simply looked calm in that uncanny, self-assured way he usually did. Nikko was a mess, and it would be a miracle if he walked out of here. “Hit me,” Paris said.

Kristina looked a little too pleased as she drove the needle into his neck. Burning cold swept through him, and then the spike of sheer intense energy hit him. “Fuck,” he groaned. “let’s go.”

Gunfire rang out as they bolted up the stairs. There were impacts and grunts, then the clatter of bullets hitting the concrete stairs. Above him, a man in a suit aimed a gun downward. Paris zigzagged, sprang off the nearest railing, and up toward the man with his glowing knife out. He slashed across the man’s throat, then whipped around to stab the blade into the back of his neck, breaking the Covenant mark. The blade jolted, and he felt like something had been carved out of his chest as power exploded from the blade. The man went rigid. Paris wrenched his blade free and let the dead man fall down the stairs.

Sasha grabbed his collar and said, “Let us clear a path.” He grabbed Kristina, kissed her on the lips, then said, “See you on the other side, radnaya.”

She flashed him a wicked grin, and Paris couldn’t shake the thought that he’d been inadvertently spying on their foreplay. The pair burst through the door and into the upper floor of Shea’s stronghold. A rolling boom like thunder rocked the floor, and he heard Sasha swearing furiously.

Paris followed, nearly overwhelmed by the sensory overload. Sasha was on his knees, trying to pull his leg free of entangling gray-black tendrils of magic that slithered up from the floor like rotten spider silk. The room was unnaturally dark, with arcane symbols glowing on the floor and ceiling. Shea’s witch must have rigged the place, just as Shoshanna had protected the compound.

Across the room, he could hear someone shouting, “There’s something on the roof! We can’t get out that way!” A cluster of vampires at the center of the room had to be protecting Shea. Several were writhing on the floor, entangled just as Sasha was.

Paris darted forward and slashed through Sasha’s bindings. Red sparks flew from the blade as it sliced through the ethereal tendrils, and Sasha sprang free. Without pausing, he and Kristina lunged forward, headed for the cluster of vampires.

To his surprise, Kieran O’Brien emerged from the pack, along with Lilah Whitlock. Both still looked exhausted from their captivity, but their cheeks were flushed with the feverish red of a recent feeding.

Shea remained hidden behind his phalanx, but Paris pressed on. He made it halfway across the room, beheading a zealously optimistic follower who had no weapon but his bare hands. As he sprang over the fallen vampire, cold pierced his belly.

He stared down to see a tangle of gray, like a sickly tree root, impaling his belly. It emerged from the shimmering wards on the ground and pulled him down. Vampires fell on him, fists pounding against his back. The cold of the magic was excruciating, making it hard to think. Smaller roots burst from it, spreading ice through his tired body.

The warmth of the blade’s power reminded him of Misha, reminded him that he had somewhere to be. With a furious shout, he sliced through the tendril to free himself, then slashed at the ankles of the nearest vampire. Someone fell, leaving him an opening. He wriggled through, then sprang off of someone’s back and over the crowd.

Shea was in the back of the room with two guards blocking his path. Red eyes gleamed, though he looked more angry than afraid. Red marks glowed on Shea’s wrists like burning embers.

A petite woman with short red hair stood at his side, hands working quickly around a glowing blue orb of light. That had to be his witch.

“Sasha!” he shouted.

As soon as he called, a gunshot rang out, dropping the guard to Shea’s right. The other moved to cover him, and Paris cut around them to tackle Shea. As he lunged, Shea threw a vicious punch. Heat radiated from his fist, and the impact of it threw Paris back and into the wall. He felt like he’d been hit by a bus. Shea’s eyes burned fiery red, and those marks glowed like a furnace.

“You must enjoy pain,” Shea snarled.

“Under the right circumstances,” Paris replied. He narrowly dodged another vicious punch, ducking awkwardly and kicking out at Shea’s legs. When the older vampire tripped, he darted to the side and went for his neck. Shea caught his arm and slung him around, hurling him back nearly to the door.

As he struggled to recover, more twisting gray vines peeled away from the ground and yanked him down to the floor. They twined around him like a cocoon, and he felt the sickening crunch of ribs cracking. Twisting awkwardly, he cut through the strands around his right arm with Misha’s blade, hauling himself forward.

White-hot pain sparked up his arm as Shea stomped on his hand. “Let him up,” he roared.The witch’s power gave way, and Shea hauled him up by the neck like a pesky kitten. “An intelligent man would have tucked tail and run long ago.”

“I’m pretty, not smart,” Paris said. He feinted a head-butt. When Shea’s head tilted to the side, Paris grabbed his ear and twisted until flesh tore and blood filled his fist. Shea roared in and released him. They tussled furiously, grappling like wrestlers and throwing bone-cracking blows. A roar vibrated through Shea’s chest as he slammed Paris into a wall. Instead of squirming away, Paris embraced him tight, sliding the carved stake into his left hand.

“My only regret is that I’ll kill you before Alazan. I wish you could watch him fall,” Shea said.

“Are you angry that Eduardo wouldn’t fuck you? Hairy sociopaths aren’t his type,” Paris said.Shea’s face twisted with fury.

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