Vampire Instinct (Vampire Queen #7)

Elisa, no. Mal’s voice was thunder in her head, but his vehemence told her he might as well be off in the Never Never, because he was obviously too far away to stop whatever was going to happen for the next few minutes. All they had was her.

Jeremiah and William were both up against the bars of their cells, snarling, though she couldn’t tell if it was bloodlust stirred by the violence or they were protesting Leonidas’s behavior. Matthew was curled in a ball at the back of his cell, ears covered and rocking.

“No, stop it. Stop it!” Still screaming at him, she didn’t let herself think or hesitate, anything that would give Leonidas a vital second of forewarning. She punched open the control to unlock the inner gate, yanked it open, reached down and caught the little girl by the arm, jerking her through.

Though she’d done all in one unbroken series of motion, Leonidas slammed against the inner gate just as she slammed it, the lock catching and holding, thank God. He’d moved like lightning, pulling out of Miah, dragging the girl with him. As his arm punched through the mesh opening of the inner gate, Elisa flung herself backward, Nerida wrapped around her. The wedged outer gate gave under the thrust of their combined weight. Nerida clawed her way out of Elisa’s arms and was gone, disappearing like a ghost into the woods. Her kicking feet hit the swinging gate as she scrambled away and before Elisa could lunge and stop it, the outer gate clanged to a closing position. Nerida had locked her in the small space between the outer and inner gates.

Of all of them, Nerida was least likely to harm anyone before they could bring her back. Cutting her losses there, Elisa rose. As long as she kept her back against the outer gate, she was out of Leonidas’s reach. And now, with her locked in, he had no way of blackmailing her with Miah’s well-being to let him out of the enclosure entirely. Of course, she would have happily opened the gate to get him to release Miah, because Mal would have run him down like a cheetah on a turtle. But now it wasn’t an option.

Leonidas howled, realizing it as well. Elisa pivoted, jutting her chin at him, despite the fact every muscle in her body was shaking, including those that controlled her vocal cords. “Now you’re trapped, same as me. And the only thing that will save your life is if you let her go, let her go back to her cell and shut herself in.”

“The only thing . . . save her life is you . . . in here. He kill me anyway. Don’t command vampire . . . bitch.”

Despite the lisp caused by the fangs, the spray of spittle, he was clear enough. So was Mal.

You tell that bastard letting her go is the difference between a long, slow death or a quick one. That’s a promise.

Elisa spoke the words, feeling their strength, feeling the heat of a mature male vampire fill her, his rage and intent focusing on what was before her. She didn’t mind feeling that bloodlust now. It was similar to what was going through her veins.

Leonidas spat, something horridly like a laugh strangling out of his throat. “This is slow . . . death. Stupid. At least Master . . . let us kill.” The last three words were slurred in his long fangs, making a foam of his saliva. He didn’t look like anything human anymore, not that he’d ever made that much of a pretense of it.

He held Miah in one arm, his hand fisted in her hair. The girl had tears on her face, her nose running with blood and phlegm, drool leaking from her mouth around the fangs. Elisa wondered if she’d been as grotesque after her rape, everything slack and lifeless, eyes dead like that, no dignity or modesty left. Everything ripped open raw. Neither victim nor perpetrator could hold on to a mask of humanity during such a thing, perhaps suggesting something deep and terrible about them all.

Elisa. Mal’s voice, strained, telling her he was coming as fast as he could, such that even conveying a thought took precious effort. You will not go into that cell.

You’re not close enough yet. He’ll kill her before you get here.

He’ll kill her anyway. Elisa—

Just after her rape, when someone was talking to her, sometimes a part of her stepped away, leaving her attentive face, dutifully appearing to record the words, a vague, meaningless acknowledgment of the person speaking. The rest of her went somewhere else, where it was just her, alone with the turmoil she was facing and the odd, disjointed thoughts that came with it.

Would Miah let her wash her face, her body? The way Mrs. Pritchett and Mrs. Rupert had done for her? Their quiet cluckings and silent tears had been a soothing lullaby that had let her stay in a stupor for a while, avoiding the stark reality of what had happened. Or, if Mal wouldn’t let her be that close to Miah, would he do it for the girl? She thought he might. Which was good, because she might not be in any kind of shape to give Miah a bath after this.

There were several stakes and a crossbow hooked on one side of the square area, just in case they were needed. Picking up the stake, she estimated it would give her the extra arm length she needed. She looked toward Leonidas.

“Here’s how it’s going to be.” Her voice had gone from shaking to eerily calm, almost hoarse. “I’ll put my arm through this gate so you can hold on to me. You’ll let her go, and when she gets in her cell and closes it, I’ll use this stake to reach back and push the button behind me. The inner gate will open, and I’ll come inside with you.”

Mal had gone silent, probably because he knew he couldn’t stop her. Or he was close. Either way, she wouldn’t think. She couldn’t. She just had to buy time. Leonidas would want to torture her, violate her. He wouldn’t want to kill her immediately. He’d waited too long to have her at his mercy. She would survive this. She’d survived it before and no worthless, raping piece-of-cursed-garbage vampire was going to end things for her. She was stronger than that, and so was Miah. She met the girl’s gaze, and that link helped her still her trembling hand on the stake.

So be it.

Leonidas stared at her as she extended her arm through the gate. The single limb was undeniably pale and fragile under that violent gaze. She let her fingers brush Miah’s hair. The girl’s dark eyes stayed on hers, and whatever Elisa could give her in that single exchange, she did. It helped her not think of what was ahead. Even without a blood-link between them, she hoped the girl understood the most important thing Elisa was thinking at her, hard enough that if will alone was all it took, it should be scrolling across Miah’s brain in bright lights.

Run like the devil, the second he lets you go.

“There’s your offer,” Elisa said, shifting to hold those red eyes in the grip of her own. Her fear had gone, buried beneath that numbness. She wondered if it had worked the same for Miah, rape after rape, when she knew she couldn’t stop it. But this wasn’t the same. Elisa wasn’t going to let go of control. She was making the choice. That made all the difference. She knew Mal would be angry with her, but some things a person had to do. There were too many bad things in the world to stop them all, so when one was laid before you like this, you had no choice. She suspected he probably knew that as well as she did.

Summoning up something black and dreadful in herself, as fearsome as what lay in a vampire’s heart, whether it was the one before her or the one she sensed coming to their aid like a streak of dark lightning, she spoke again. “You know you’ve wanted human meat ever since Victor took me down under your nose and didn’t share. Prove you’re even more of a monster than he is. Let go of her, you bludger.”

Before she could flinch, his hand clamped over her arm. He could tear it from the socket, break her bones like twigs. Yank her forward and crush her windpipe. But to do that last one, he had to let go of Miah. Plus, everything he wanted had narrowed to getting Elisa inside the enclosure with him, all his rage and violence culminating into one summary act.

What had Mal said? You never run from a predator; you never look away. He might kill you anyway, but he would for sure do so if you ran. She wasn’t going down as prey; that was for damn sure.

Leonidas dropped his hold on Miah, and the girl was gone. Elisa had a brief impression of her flashing into her cell. Metal vibrated under her arm as Miah slammed the cell door.

Jeremiah was shouting something unintelligible through those interfering fangs. William was still snarling, further garbling any communications. Bloodlust had seized them fully, she was sure, the noises a pack’s brutal encouragement. She understood. Mal had taught her a few things these past couple weeks. When instinct was involved, there was no fault or blame. It was simply the way life was. Like her instinct to save Miah and Nerida now.

It was then she heard Mal. No longer trying to stop her, as if he knew that was futile, but giving her something else.

Hold on, Elisa. I’ll get there.

I know.

She pushed the button with the stake and the door buzzed its release. In the next blink, Leonidas had yanked the gate forward and ripped her away from it like a shred of ribbon. The stake skittered away on the ground as he punched her brutally in the face.

It hurt like bloody hell, but she was hazily sure he’d pulled the punch, because otherwise he would have broken her neck. Her head was reeling so much from the blow, she was barely conscious of him tearing at her flesh, the painful puncture of his fangs above her nipple as he shredded her clothes away from her. It was odd, but that was where Victor had bit her first as well. Was it a buried need, some twisted need to reconnect to the mothers they’d lost?

The disjointed thought sparked with lightning flashes of pain. Though she felt all of it, heard the scream that tore from her throat as a bone broke somewhere on her, perhaps at her thigh as he wrenched her leg outward, she was somehow floating as well. There was a noise, a short buzzing sound, like the gate releasing, and she wondered if he’d somehow rocked the inner gate door so hard it had slammed back against its own controls, bouncing there so it was depressing it in those irregular rhythms.

She was yanked up from the ground, shaken like a rag doll, but now it was more than Leonidas. She tried to blink through the blood in her eyes, to make sense of the whirling dervish going on above her. William . . . Yes, William was on Leonidas’s back, his arm around the older boy’s throat. Jeremiah was between her and Leonidas, freeing the lock of his hands on her, which explained the rag-doll effect before she was freed, thudding to the ground. She was being dragged back by two sets of hands, and got a momentary glimpse of Miah and Matthew leaving her to join the fray.