Page 14 of A Sacrifice in the Smoke

“Is it dangerous?” I ask, frowning. Drew pretends not to hear as he runs back to the end of the tunnel. I let out a short, anxious breath, then turn to keep watch. Every so often, I call back to Drew to make sure he hasn’t fallen in, and his returning shouts give me bursts of reassurance.

After a few minutes of this, a figure appears up ahead. It’s moving strangely, and I already know what I’m seeing by the time she stops beneath one of the working lights.

I swear and hurry to close the distance between us. “You can’t be here! I’m not alone and I don’t know how Drew would—”

“Silver teeth, silver teeth, silver teeth,” she hisses. She halts in the middle of the path and beats at her own head.

“Stop! Stop it!” I catch hold of her wrists, holding my breath against the terrible stench wafting off her. “Drew will hear you! What are you talking about? Silver teeth? Are you talking about the one who’s letting weepers in?”

The weeper just keeps shaking her head and trying to hit it. She looks worse than she did the last time we spoke—her skin is waxen, her eyes so bloodshot that it looks like a special effect—which can only mean the virus is progressing.

I step back, hyper aware of how close we’re standing. How long until she views me as a food source, instead of a person?

Despite the danger, I’m about to attempt another round of questions when I hear thethud-thud-thudof footsteps approaching swiftly from behind. Before I can turn around, something hard and heavy smashes into my skull. I feel a bright, searing pain.

Then I’m gone.

* * *

Once again, I awaken disoriented and in pain. My head is pounding like a sacrificial drum. “If I keep getting concussions like this, I’m going to get really fucked up,” I mumble, though I don’t really know who I’m talking to. My mouth is dry. Why is my mouth so dry?

My vision begins to solidify, and I see that I’m not in the same tunnel I was struck in. The ground in here is mud, and the brick walls all around us are covered with moss. There’s the sound of running water nearby. We’re all sitting in wooden chairs, our hands tied behind us—me, Drew, and Noah. A quick glance tells me that whoever took us also helped themselves to my gun.

Drew is still unconscious, but Noah is wide awake and sitting up. When our gazes meet, the bounty hunter manages to give me a rueful grin. There’s a trail of dried blood going from his nose to his mouth.What is he doing here?

As though he can hear my thoughts, Noah answers. “I came down to tell you the news,” he sighs, shifting in his chair. The wood groans. “Well, to warn you, more like. The Vampire King announced today that Henry is no longer his heir, which means a pissed off vampire is probably going to be coming after you sooner rather than later. I ruined a perfectly good pair of shoes searching these godforsaken tunnels because I’d half-convinced myself Henry would be down here, too.”

“I didn’t know you cared that much, Forrest. I’m touched. Did someone get the jump on you, too, then?” I add, biting back a moan when a jolt of pain goes through my skull. I test the tightness of the ropes, hoping our attacker is an idiot who doesn’t know how to tie a proper knot. No such luck.

“Yeah. You know, this isn’t the first time I’ve been tied up,” Noah tells me abruptly. He stops and tilts his head, then, as though he’s deep in contemplation. “But I will say this is the first time I’ve been tied up without a whip involved.”

Only Noah fucking Forrest.I’m about to reply when a voice says, “You’re all awake! Great!”

It’s Leo.

His new master must not be treating him kindly, because his face is gaunt and unshaven, his hair hanging past his shoulder in greasy strands. He comes down the rest of the tunnel, pulling something behind him. No, two things. Weepers, I see a moment later, bound by their hands and feet. Their sobs fill my ears, accompanied by a tinkling sound. Something silver flashes at Leo’s hip—a set of keys. At the sight of it, something clicks in my mind.

Silver teeth, the weeper had said. What if she’d been talking about the ridges of that key? What if she’d been trying to warn me he was coming?

I watch as the human pulls a pocketknife out, breathless from exertion. My dart glances to Drew, who still hasn’t stirred. If I couldn’t hear his heartbeat, I would worry that he’s dead. But it’s there, faint and steady—he’s just unconscious. Whatever Leo intends to do with that knife, I need to keep his focus away from Drew, who wouldn’t heal from fatal injuries. “What are you doing? Why do any of this?” I blurt when Leo takes a step closer to him. I can see Noah glaring at me in my peripheral vision.

“Well, you saw the pictures on my wall, right?” Leo asks, cutting at the weepers’ ropes. Fear rushes through me. Why is he setting them free? The firelight and the shifting blue-black shadows illuminate half of Leo’s face, and the look in his eye chills me more than the damp air. “So you probably saw one of me and Paul. He was my best friend, and we were partners for years down here. But then, one day, Bill got a call. One of the royals was pissed because their room smelled like sewage. Plumber had already been out, so it had to be a sewer sector issue. But those tunnels are unstable—there was a cave-in. I was trapped on one side, Paul on the other. I had to watch him be eaten alive by weepers we hadn’t known were there.Weshouldn’t have even been there, man, but some undead asshole came along, decided to take our freedoms away, then stuck us under the ground to be food for other monsters. So when I got my hands on these keys, I saw an opportunity. An opportunity, I’m afraid, that would be wasted if I let you stop me.”

As the weepers begin to rise, Leo tosses a bloody steak to the ground, then the pocketknife at Noah’s feet. The weepers lumber toward the steak, their weeping even louder now, and Leo uses their distraction to hurry past the rest of us. That’s when it hits me—he’s going to leave us here to be eaten alive. Just like his best friend was. Panic makes me heavy, as though my veins have filled with iron.

“Wait. Let Drew go!” I blurt wildly, twisting in the chair to keep my eyes on Leo. “He has nothing to do with this! He doesn’t know anything, I swear to you.”

“Can’t take that chance, Your Highness.” With that, Leo pulls a grate down and traps us on the other side with the weepers. Horror burns a hole in my stomach. I spin towards Noah frantically. He’s already gotten the knife between his feet and is currently in the process of maneuvering it upward. He needs more time.Weneed more time. The weepers are still tearing at the steak with their teeth and fingers, but it’ll be gone within a minute, I’d guess.

“Leo, we won’t say a word to anyone. You don’t have to do this,” I tell him vehemently.

“Don’t just stand there,” he says through the metal squares, flashing his yellow smile. “Run.”

Noah is on his feet now, but I don’t spare him a glance—I’m calling after Leo, begging again, pleading for mercy. The frail human is faster than he looks, though, because I realize I’m shouting into an empty tunnel.

Growling, I turn back to Noah, still straining against my bonds. The skin around my wrists begins to tear. He’s kneeling in front of me, working at the ropes securing my legs to the chair. “Drew,” I shout now, ignoring the pain. “No, Noah, get Drew first. Drew, wake up!Please.”

Drew’s eyes open just as one of the weepers takes a bite from his neck.

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