Shatter the Earth (Cassandra Palmer 10)

And while mine had been preoccupied with the rope, he had fished a knife out of his boot. I hadn’t seen it, half speed or no, but someone else had. A foot kicked out and caught him, just as he was trying to plunge it home, straight into my belly. It went into his instead and he fell off the roof, a look of surprise on his face.

Probably matching the one on mine.

I looked up at Elena, whose boot it had been. “Uh, thanks.”

“You’re not with them.”

“No, I’m with—”

“Mircea.” It was grim.

I didn’t get a chance to answer. But that wasn’t because of the fey this time. Suddenly, the very flammable straw of the roof had a couple dozen torches lobbed at it, streaking through the night sky like shooting stars. And catching immediately on the dry tinder we were standing on.

Or had been standing on, I corrected, as our part of the roof caved in.

Screw this, I thought, and grabbed Elena, just as we hit down hard. I somehow managed to shift us into the woods, where we hit down hard again, because the previous jolt had wobbled my concentration. And, this time, I didn’t get back up again.

I just lay there, my cheek in the dirt, watching the hut go up like a bonfire, sending flames and sparks shooting skyward. The townsmen—damn them—started to run, having finally gotten a good look at the strange, silver-haired warriors attacking their village. And that was despite the fact that none of the fey were looking for them.

They were looking for us.

And then I was snatched off the ground by a crazed looking, half naked, master vamp. “We have to go!”

“We have to stay,” I slurred, because my mouth didn’t seem to work right.

“She hit down hard,” Elena said, a hand on his arm. “I think she needs a moment.”

“We don’t have a moment! The Svarestri are starting to move into the woods!”

It was true. There was only maybe a dozen left, but they had dropped to the ground, hands digging into the soil, and they were doing something.

And, knowing them, it wasn’t anything good.

“Oh, look,” I said, watching the ground around the little hut start to move. A sunburst pattern formed in the dirt, which seemed appropriate considering the conflagration going on in the middle. And then it started to radiate outwards, like the sun’s rays. Or like dozens of moles tunneling underground.

And tunneling fast.

Mircea said a bad word and scooped me up.

“Can’t you shift us?” I said, my head flopping against his shoulder.

“Not with you leeching all of my power! I don’t have a family in this era. I have nobody to draw from!”

“What?” I said.

“This era?” Elena said.

Mircea ignored both of us and took off, looking harassed and wild-eyed.

“You didn’t hear that,” I told her, and she shot me a side eye.

“What is this ringing in my head?” Mircea snarled, jumping over a tree trunk and causing my head to bounce.

“A warning. We changed time. Or we’re in danger of doing it or something,” I said, not caring ve

ry much at the moment. I just wanted to—

“Don’t go to sleep!” he ordered. “Don’t you dare!”