Chosen (Slayer 2)

“It might!”

“Well, we don’t have time to figure it out now! Leo, get into the tower wing. Rhys, Cillian, take up sentry in the Council wing. You should have a good view out of Bradford Smythe’s old rooms. Pick them off if they come near.”

“Anyone who comes near?” Rhys asks, hesitant.

I almost say yes, that’s how focused I am on protecting the castle. But Artemis. And, hells, Honora. I don’t want her dead. If only so I can rub her defeat in her face. “Legs until you can see their faces. Then heart shots, assuming vamps or demons.”

“On it.”

“Be careful,” Cillian says.

“Oh, I don’t plan on being careful. I plan on being vicious.”

Jade appears from the dorm wing. Her head is still bleeding, but she has my discarded crossbow and looks terrifying as opposed to terrified. “Took out two more. If you can cover me, I’ll go to the shed and get supplies to blow up their vans so they can’t get away.”

My mother cuts a hand through the air. “Too risky. There are hellhounds out there. Post yourself at the far end of the dorm wing. Guard our backs.”

Jade scowls, but she nods and disappears where she came from.

“We do need to neutralize the hellhounds.” My mother checks the safety on her gun. “I seem to recall we’re both pretty good at—”

That’s when the front doors blow up.

24

MY HEAD RINGS, AND I cough as bits of dust and plaster and centuries-old stone particles invade my lungs. I scramble to my feet, blinking away the grit and expecting a hellhound to lunge at me from the gaping hole where the front doors are hanging wildly by one hinge. But no hellhounds are prowling.

“Hey, Wheezy! Catch!”

I turn just in time to have my own mother thrown into me. I catch her, stumbling backward and nearly falling. I set my mother on her feet. She straightens her suit jacket and pulls out a sleek black club. “Thank you.”

Honora stands across from us, one of those wretched shock sticks in her hand. I’m going to take it from her, and then I’m going to shove it down her—

“You were supposed to be unconscious.” Honora’s hair isn’t even mussed, a sleek high ponytail showing off her lustrous dark locks. She’s wearing perfectly fitted black pants, combat boots, and a black sweater. She’s like an advertisement for traitorous assholes—betray your people, but look good doing it!

Now it’s not the grit that’s making it hard to see. It’s the pulsing red on the edges of my vision. “Yeah, well, you were supposed to be screaming ‘my arm!’?”

She tilts her head in confusion. I rip one of the heavy doors the rest of the way off and throw it at her. She only has time to raise one arm to protect herself, and the door slams into her forearm with a bone-shattering blow.

“You bitch!” she screams, clutching her arm and dropping to her knees.

I shrug. “It’s not ‘my arm,’ but it’s close enough.”

“Nina.” My mother’s voice is sharp. “Careful.”

“Not with her.” I refuse to try and hold myself back. Not for Honora. I take a step toward her, then twist to the side as a dart whistles through the air, hitting the wall behind me.

Artemis reloads. Judging by her position, she came from somewhere else in the castle—the dorm wing, or the Council residence hall, or the kitchen. I don’t know which. I was too focused on my prey. Artemis is holding a pillow, of all things, in one hand. But in the other, she has the dart gun trained directly on me.

“Artemis,” our mother says, “you are grounded.”

Honora laughs, her normally low voice high and tight with pain. “You’re all lunatics. All you had to do was give up some demons. Now look at us.”

I don’t take my eyes off the dart gun, but I’m trembling with rage. “You came here! To our home!”

“This isn’t a home,” Artemis says. “It never was.” She tosses the pillow to Honora and then fires three darts at me. I twist out of the way, jumping and somersaulting across the floor. None of the darts hit me.

“Oh.” Our mother stumbles to the side, then leans against the wall and slides to the ground. One of the darts is embedded in her shoulder. “So grounded,” she slurs before her eyes close.