Darkness Devours (Dark Angels 3)

It was a risk we would have to take if we were to have any chance of killing this thing. I walked over to the panel, found the intercom, and swiped my hand across it. “Marshall? You there?”

He didn’t answer immediately, which suggested he hadn’t been keeping an eye on us—although that didn’t mean the council wasn’t. When he finally came online, his blue eyes were bright and somewhat annoyed. I wondered what we’d interrupted. “What do you want?”

“I want the address of the vamp that’s just left the ghost’s room,” I said without preamble. “The Rakshasa just marked him.”

Marshall sucked in a breath. “So kill her.”

I snorted. “If it was that easy, I wouldn’t be here.”

He grunted in acknowledgment of my point. “Jerry Harcourt was the vamp just in there. He rents a room in Lyle Place boardinghouse—it’s only a few minutes down the road.”

Which meant we’d better hurry if we wanted to set our trap. “Thanks.”

“Do you need me to do anything?” Marshall asked.

If he could have done anything, I very much doubted we’d have been called in. But I just said, “No. Just ensure that he leaves, and we’ll do the rest.”

“Righto.”

As the screen returned to the image of the bloodstained room, I swung around to face Azriel. “Will this work?”

He shrugged. “As I have said before, I’ve never hunted a Rakshasa. I’m told they can be extremely difficult kills.”

And this one was killing people who deserved to die—a fact that didn’t make going after her any easier. But since it was my life or hers, there was really no other choice.

“Then we’d better get over there and set our trap.” And if the trap didn’t work, then we hunted it back to its lair. I shivered, and hoped like hell it didn’t come to that. Not if the Rakshasa was feeding more than just herself.

Azriel held out a hand. I placed my hand in his and let him pull me into his embrace. It felt so warm and safe that I wanted to cry. Or maybe that was just a reaction of the bitter anguish that still echoed inside my head.

His energy surged, and in an instant the room disappeared and we were zipping through the gray fields. The room we reappeared in was dark and smelled faintly of urine and booze. Obviously, vampire Jerry did not live in one of your more up-market boarding establishments.

Azriel immediately stepped away and moved to one corner of the room. He raised his hands and paced the walls, murmuring softly. The words were lyrical and easy on the ear, but there was a dark undercurrent to the energy that swirled around and through his voice, and foreboding crawled down my spine. It somehow seemed wrong for such darkness to be coming from beings who were warmth and light.

He continued walking around the room. Mist formed behind him, becoming luminous tendrils that crawled up the walls and across the ceiling, until the soft, glowing, ethereal net of silver covered every compass point as well as the floor and ceiling. When the circuit was complete, the net locked together, then faded. But the power of it remained, making the tiny hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

“Won’t the Rakshasa feel the energy and run?” I asked, rubbing my arms and trying to ignore my growing sense of unease.>He nodded and stepped back, waving us into the hall. I stepped over the bodies and various body parts, noting that the few vampires who were alive were quiet, and showing little of their previous almost insane hunger. Suggesting, perhaps, that it had been ramped up for the occasion by an outside force—either some sort of drug or another vampire.

Again fury swept me, but I somehow kept my sword by my side as I walked past Marshall.

“Take the second door on the right,” he said, his expression wary, suggesting he knew exactly what was going through my mind—although I guess that wouldn’t have been hard given the expression I was no doubt wearing. It certainly felt dark from my side of things.

I walked into the indicated room. It was much the same as the first one, only this one had a small sink area, a medical kit, and a couple of towels sitting to one side of it. Obviously, he’d had this room prepared for us.

I swung around as he came into the room behind us. “Have we your guarantee that this is the end of the tests?”

“There will be no more tests, no more disturbances in this place,” he said. “I guarantee it.”

“What about the dead? Won’t that cause problems given the highly charged atmosphere in the main bar?”

His smile was cool, almost arrogant. “There will be no further trouble from any vampire in this place.”

Meaning he could have stopped the onslaught if he’d so desired. Which also meant he was far more powerful than I’d been suspecting. But then, if he was Hunter’s creature, I shouldn’t have expected anything else.

“Good,” I grumbled. “Now, if you could turn on the TV on your way out, I’d very much appreciate it.”

He gave me a somewhat sardonic bow, then hit the control panel to the left of the door and left. The light screen came to life; the room was being mopped out, readied for its next customers.

I took a deep breath and released it slowly. It didn’t do much to ease the churning in my stomach or the anger still trembling through my muscles.