Page 81 of Tell No Tales
"Why wouldn't she?" Klaus asked.
"We're asking a lot of her by making her stay in the place she was persecuted," Vadim said, keeping his voice low. "Now that she's determined to live, she may decide to flee without us."
"She's not a fighter," Nola said. "She'd be better off in Glamiere than Aquarion."
Vadim glared at her as though he wanted to argue, but Yvette's grip on his shoulder stopped him.
"We'll take her wherever she wants to go, if she stays," Yvette whispered. "For now, we need to go."
They sneaked their way downstairs with no trouble, but then Nola almost tripped over a body at the bottom of the stairs. She stepped backward, causing Yvette and Vadim to collide because they were right behind her.
"Fuck."
Vadim's whisper caused a stir off to their right. Several mundane humans laid out on packs and travel beds rubbed their eyes and sat up.
"Knock them the fuck out," Nola whispered. "Now!"
Vadim nodded and raised his hand over the banister. He closed his eyes, and he seemed to glow even brighter with dark energy. It radiated from his eyes and threatened to overcome Klaus with its sheer beauty. Damn, Vadim was the sexiest man he'd ever seen.
Once Vadim was finished, they navigated through the main room over the sleeping and unconscious mundane people. Klaus still didn't understand their purpose at the dorm, unless their sheer numbers were supposed to deter the weaver children above them from sneaking out.
"We'll need to find another way back inside," Vadim said once Nola shut the door behind them.
"We'll need to find somewhere else to stay the night," Yvette whispered. "They'll be scouring campus for a death weaver come morning."
"They didn't see anything," Nola said. "No one died. Right, Vadim?"
"Drained, not dead."
"Good." She nodded. "Let's keep it that way."
"Halt!"
"Oh, fuck." Vadim turned toward the sound of the mundane man's voice.
The light globe in the man's hand cast strange shadows inside the tunnel as his arm shook. "Who are you?" the man had just enough time to ask before he dropped to the ground.
"Drained," he reassured Nola again. "Let's move."
At the end of the tunnel, Nola and Vadim scouted ahead for the best way to the library and dorms beyond. Nola waved them forward, and Klaus and Yvette ran across the open ground to a copse of trees beneath a window.
"There," Vadim pointed to the third-story window. The flicker of a candle was faint through the dingy drapes, but that was the room where they'd left Martiz. "We'll have to climb to get back inside."
"Not if I'm with you." Nola waved and a splash of water followed her hand. "Library first."
They skated alongside the dorm and ran for the next, a long and low structure that seemed to be made of glass.
"Greenhouse," Yvette said. "The library is just beyond."
Thankfully, the greenhouse was empty. The library had a single guard out front, but Vadim led them to another entrance around to the south side and sloping doors into the ground. Vadim and Yvette pried them open, and Nola led them into the darkness below with a water globe to light their way.
As Vadim and Yvette pulled the doors closed behind them, Klaus had never felt more claustrophobic, and he'd been locked in some tight places to think about what he'd done wrong as a child. The musty air clung to his clothes and made him cough.
"If we find more people down here…" Nola's whisper died off as they stepped onto the packed earth of the basement. No people, thankfully, only a dank chill. Klaus welcomed the wider space, though the darkness still seemed to close in around them.
"It's this way." Yvette took Nola's arm to guide her and the light toward the stairway she remembered.
Klaus thought he sensed something in the dark beyond Nola's light source. He reached for Vadim's hand, startling him for a moment before he laced their fingers together.
