Page 47 of Witch Untold
Radu popped open the truck of the Rover, and a wave of power skimmed over my skin.
I couldn’t let them do this. “If you kill me, the seal breaks. Humanity is doomed. Is that what you want? Do you want this world to go to shit?” My words came out in a desperate rush.
His expression hardened. “Every world has its end. Maybe this is how yours dies.” He gripped my nape and propelled me toward the trunk of the car.
I wanted to dig in my heels, to resist, but my limbs weren’t my own. They were under Mircea’s control.
My mind screamed in protest. “No. No, get off me.”
There was a body in the trunk, curled into a fetal position, desiccated and dead.
Motherfucker. “What is that?”
“Who,” Radu snapped. “Not what.” He reached down to stroke the body’s head. “Vlad, it’s time to wake up.”
Vlad?
“You’ll feed him first,” Mircea said. “We’ll take what’s left.”
What’s left.
Because they meant to drain me. My bladder tightened in horror.
This was happening, and there was nothing I could do.
The full reality of my situation was a sucker-punch to my chest. My breath whooshed out from my lungs and terror took full control. I’d promised Anna I’d be safe, that I’d come back. That I’d put the seal first. I’d promised, and I’d failed. But it was more than that. It was the desperate need to not fucking die.
“Don’t. Don’t do this. Please don’t do this.” I hated the weakness in my voice, the fact I was begging, but the part of me that needed to live didn’t give a damn.
Mircea picked me up and put me into the truck beside Vlad’s shriveled form. “Feed, brother.”
Fire sliced across my neck and then warmth bloomed in its place. He’d cut me. I was bleeding.
“Please, stop this. There’s still time. We can find another way to stop the ice walkers, we can—”
The body pressed to me twitched and my heart stuttered with panic. I stared at Vlad’s withered face, silent and dead. Maybe I’d imagined it. Maybe he was too far gone to—
His eyes snapped open. Crimson fire.
He lunged.
Chapter Fifteen
Bramble
Someone yells, someone is arguing, a child wails. The police station is filled with fear, confusion, and anger. There’s chaos around us, but Lauris is in his element and power radiates off him. He moves around the room, calming humans, soothing children, and despite his bedraggled state—shirt in tatters, dark stone skin gleaming through the tears—they listen. They act on his instructions. In this moment, he’s no longer the immature idiot who gets on my nerves by goading me. He’s a man.
I tear my attention from him, focusing on the situation at hand. We’re up against a bitch of a foe. The ice walkers won’t stay dead.
We’d had to retreat.
I hate retreating.
Now we’re trapped in a huge blue building. At least the windows are barred. The bastards can’t get in.
Leo and Richie have called in reinforcements. The doors are barricaded. We’re as safe as can be, but a storm’s coming. An actual fecking storm, and it’s interfering with communications out of the town, so no help is coming.
I’m trapped in a fecking horror movie.
