Rare Vigilance (Whitethorn Agency)

“I told you,” Cristian said steadily. “Now do you believe me?”

He stared at Cristian for a long moment before saying, hoarsely, “Yes.” He shook his head like he was trying to shake something loose inside his skull. “Yes, I believe you.”

“What do we do?”

Decebal crumpled the cup. “Find their sire. End this madness.”

“It’s the Wharrams,” Atlas said. When the pair looked at him, he explained, “We caught their mole a week ago. This timing is too convenient.” Hopefully it was enough. God, let it be enough so he didn’t have to explain all of what he knew to support the accusation.

“I will speak to the Council about our suspicions,” Decebal began, only to trail off. He and Cristian turned toward the door, heads cocked expectantly.

Peter, one of Decebal’s employees, burst into the room. His hair was disheveled, his chest heaving as he sucked in air, and his eyes were wide with shock.

“Creatures,” he gasped out to Decebal.

“Where?”

“We’re holding them to the gardens,” Peter said, “but there are too many. They’ll be inside soon.”

“Have they found our nest?” Decebal demanded.

Peter shook his head.

Decebal pointed at Atlas. “Get my son out.”

“We’ll leave through the garage,” Atlas told Cristian. He stood, world wavering a little, and dug the key to the damaged car from his pocket.

“I can help here,” Cristian argued, as if his injuries were nothing more than minor inconveniences.

Decebal turned back to him, eyes blazing, hands shaking as he clasped them around the back of Cristian’s head. “You cannot, fiul meu.”

Yells from outside the medical office. Héléne must have run out to help and left the door to the hall open. Decebal looked back over his shoulder, hearing something Atlas couldn’t make out from the rising din. Whatever it was, Cristian heard it too, because he watched the doorway as if he expected Death itself to come waltzing through. Decebal turned back to his son, pressing their foreheads together. “You must live. I’ll send someone to help you, but you must go now.”

He pulled back and looked to Atlas, desperate. “Run far, understand? If their sire knows where you are, they will not stop hunting.”

“And you?” Atlas asked.

Decebal’s leonine gaze swung back to the door. “I will destroy their nest. Once it is safe, I will call you both home.”

Atlas held Cristian back until Decebal was gone. He knew Cristian’s pain at not following his father. He’d felt the same urge to protect when his platoon was attacked. It had nearly cost him his life, and he’d promised Decebal Cristian would not suffer the same fate.

“We have to go,” he said. “Stay close to me.”

The hall was empty. Atlas knew it was a false peace. Somewhere overhead, the Vladislavic family was fighting for all their worth. They were dying. Even vampires would be hard pressed to survive such an onslaught. He and his platoon had fallen against the creatures’ speed, knocked down and torn apart before they could fire a shot or draw their knives. And here he was, without any kind of defense, about to run straight into a garage that could be filled with the creatures.

A cold sweat broke out over his skin. The lights, normally so gentle on his eyes, grew harsher the farther they ran down the hall. Every sound echoed around and through him—the squelching thud of their footfalls, their breathing, Cristian’s soft grunts of pain as he moved—and he fought the impossible fear that the strigoi would hear them through the floors and walls and converge on them. Feed on them.

Cristian stopped him when they reached the door. “Will you be able to drive?” he asked. “You’re shaking.”

“Better to have something to focus on,” Atlas admitted.

Cristian’s thumb rubbed against his hand, a brief, reassuring pressure, before he let go and took hold of the door handle. “Ready?”

There was no other choice. Not when they heard the splintering of wood and the muted sounds of growls and screams suddenly sharpened. The fighting had broken through into the nest. Decebal must not have been able to hold the line.

Cristian glanced back, his hand lifting from the handle in a moment of indecision. Atlas couldn’t let him go down that road, not when it could distract him from the dangers ahead. He ignored the rising clamor at their backs and opened the door. The damaged car sat where they’d left it haphazardly parked. There were no shadows moving along the walls, no screeches, no claws dragging over concrete. If they hurried, they might make it into the car before the creatures found them.

They flung themselves into the front seats and Atlas started the car with a breathless prayer. It caught just as their time ran out. The first strigoi raced through the open door and keyed on the engine’s noise, the way it caught and changed pitch when thrown into drive. Atlas raced forward, clipping the creature with the ruined bumper, following the wide lane as it turned into the second line of cars and up, up, up, out of the garage. The lights around the property illuminated the strigoi crawling and sprinting and hunting through the grounds. Atlas counted five rushing toward a figure near the garage entrance. He started to slow when he recognized Helias, but Cristian’s hand pressed down on his thigh, urging him forward. Helias lunged toward the first strigoi with a bared snarl, narrowly avoiding its snapping jaw