Page 46 of Deadly Alliances

A large vampire huddled in the corner of the room. His face and arms were a scorched, angry red. But he was alive. Disappointment gnawed at me. I’d hoped the sun’s effect on a vampire would be instantaneous.

As I slowly shifted, I watched the clearly weakened and suddenly non-threatening immortal creature. I half-expected it to lunge at me, but it seemed thoroughly cowed by the growing hole in the wall, shrinking further and further into its small pocket of shadows.

I stalked from the room as the entire east-facing wall completelymelted, leaving no corner in shadow. Satisfied that the vampire was certainly a goner now, I didn’t even bother to look back to make sure.

The hallway was a different story. Except for the sunlight streaming from the open door, it still had the protective darkness, albeit illuminated from artificial lighting. So I’d need to be careful. I silently cursed myself for not picking a wall with a grand hall or conference type room full of vampires, but how could I know the wall I chose was just individual vampire quarters?

Fortunately, the screams in the adjacent rooms on this floor, as well as those above and below, told me that the structure was deteriorating at an accelerated rate.

I pressed against the bud in my ear. “Peters, do you have a location for Arya?”

“Notttt yetttttt,” he hissed with his snakelike rasp.

Dammit. I knew he was useless.

I paused for a moment, concentrating on going invisible without my scales. It was markedly more difficult. All the times before, I’d been in a relative state of calm, either in my room or in the sim room. I was anything but calm now, my heart racing with exhilaration and apprehension, the screams and shrieks of burning vampires piercing my eardrums.

But I closed my eyes and thought of Arya, thought of all the times I’d held her, kissed her, made her smile, all while regulating my breathing. Finally centered, I opened my eyes and looked down at my hands as I flexed them in front of me. But I only saw the floor beneath me.

Excellent.

I walked down several floors without detection, hoping to overhear or find some clue about where they were holding Arya. But the entire tower was in utter chaos, and the hallways soon became crowded with vampires at various stages ofburned to death, staggering and slumped against the shadowed walls—both the dead and the dying. I decided to make my way back up. Maybe one of those towers held Arya?

“What was that?” a petite vamp girl hissed as I passed, her tone filled with venom and her hair a mess of pink curls. She looked mostly unscathed.

I swore under my breath. In my desperate need to hurry and the ever-thickening crowd, I’d jabbed her shoulder with my elbow by accident. I backed against the wall as if it would help, but my panic and growing discouragement made me feel suddenly exposed.

And then I was.

Five pairs of narrowed eyes shot to my location. The other four were clearly weakened or dying, but the girl was barely hurt. In desperation, I tried to tap into my invisibility again, but I couldn’t reach it. My concentration had been shattered. And now I was in a hallway full of vampires.

I did the only thing I could think of—I explosion-shifted, breaking walls and furniture, and crushing a few bodies underfoot. The girl let out a shrill shriek when I clamped my teeth into her forearm, but she returned in kind with a kick to my front claw with enough force that I heard the bones cracking before they bent at a ninety-degree angle.

I released the girl’s arm, letting out my own pained roar, and fled—as best as I could—down the hallway, up the stairs, and away from her. But swift footsteps unimpeded by atoo-big-for-the-hallwaysize gave her the upper hand, and she soon caught up tome.

I shifted back, clutching my broken arm with my good one, and staggered toward the next door I could find, cotton-candy girl-doll on my heels. If she caught up to me, dragon or not, I’d be finished. So I put all my weight into my good shoulder, crashing through the door and into the safety of the blood-red plush carpet and streaming sunlight.

It wasn’t planned, but the timing was perfect. She thought she had the upper hand and was on my heels seconds before I busted the door open, seconds before she sank her teeth into my neck as she pounced forward. But the leaping forward and my collapsing to the floor gave the sunlight a straight shot. A full-frontal attack.

I shoved her off my back and onto the sunlit floor. She screamed and clawed at her eyes as she burned, but she managed to scramble behind a piece of furniture, an armoire of sorts that was partly shadowed. Then she slumped to the floor.

I stood, my chest heaving as I watched her. There was an open wall behind me. I could escape into the sky right now and away from the murderous vampires. But I still didn’t have Arya, nor did I have any idea where they were keeping her.

The vamp’s breaths were labored, but she was still alive—which meant she could still talk.

“Where’s the siren girl?” I asked, my voice low and slightly trembling.

She spat in my direction right as a voice crackled in my ear.

“Where. Are. You.Private Dracul?” It was Char. Apparently she noticed my absence.

“You mean Hadrian’s little trophy from the fishbowl?” the vamp girl asked, seemingly not bothered by the burns on every inch ofher skin, which were beginning to look like a red version of the melted tower walls.

I averted my eyes, resisting the urge to gag. And fuck, the smell!

“Where is your master keeping her?” I asked, breathing only through my mouth to avoid the god-awful stench. “One of the towers? Is there a dungeon?”

“Private?” Char hissed in my ear. “Private?” Her voice cracked on the second one. She was concerned for my safety.

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