As he Traveled back to Miami, rare fury filled Jonny. He wasn't immediately certain what angered him more: the fact he'd put her in danger or the idea Valon had fucked her up on purpose. He'd dangled her from the ceiling like a piece of meat and left her intact rather than handing her over for his vamps to drain. Calling off the ambush was another clue that Valon was sending a message.
Jonny had exposed a vulnerability he hadn't wanted to acknowledge, and Valon pounced.
"Ikir," Charles said the moment Jonny materialized.
Jonny drew a breath to keep from exploding at his battered second. Charles had been patched up by their vamp Healer and was limping but still on his feet.
"What is it?" Jonny asked with rare impatience.
Charles held out a familiar talisman, and Jonny picked it up. "This is how they know where to ambush us," he said, surprised. "They had one, too."
"Not anymore," Charles said. "I grabbed that from one of their Trackers."
"Let's hope they don't have another one," Jonny said, considering it. "How many did we lose tonight?"
"Ten from my location. None from the other teams. Over a hundred of his vamps were there waiting for us."
Jonny handed back the talisman. "Then we have four more teams ready to go out again. Send out a Tracker. Any hit he gets, dispatch a team. Keep up the pressure as long as we can maintain it. I'm done with this shit. The second anyone spots Valon, I want to be notified." He started away, needing an outlet for his anger.
"Ikir," Charles called. "How is the Natural?"
"She'll survive, but she's not coming back here."
"Very well, ikir."
"Send me the first location the Tracker finds," he added. "I'm going to start dealing with these assholes myself."
Charles didn't respond. Jonny knew his second didn't agree, but this time, he was quiet, sensing Jonny's anger.
Jonny resisted the urge to return to the Guardians' compound in Texas and stand over his sister while she worked on Ashley. Instead, he paced on the beach, his mind on Valon and the confrontation he knew was coming. Their cat and mouse game was costing him too much. It was time to take the fight directly to Valon and end it once and for all.
His toe hit something more solid than sand, and he knelt. The strange knife Valon had given Ashley was half buried in white sand. He picked it up. Without the knowledge of thousands of years of history to guide him, he had no way of figuring out what the weapon was, or why it was allegedly capable of disabling him. Faint, cool magic tickled his fingertips. It didn't feel strong enough to take on a god, but neither had the locational talisman the Others used.