Den of Sorrows (15 page)

Sally glanced down just as a rat scurried in front of her. “You don’t have to tell me twice,” she told her mate as she moved closer to him.

The group was quiet as they followed the tunnel. Every fifty or so feet they would stop and Vasile, Alina, and Costin would all suck in deep breaths through their noses. She understood what they were sniffing for—blood. As they continued on, Sally noticed that the deeper they went, the heavier she felt. As though with every step she took, a brick of despair was being set upon her shoulders. Her heartbeat increased and her hands began to shake. Sweat trickled down her back despite the fact that it was cool underground.

“You okay?”
Costin’s voice filled her mind and for a brief second his presence chased away the heavy feeling, but then it was back.

“I don’t know what it is, but there’s just so much sorrow down here.”

He reached back and grabbed her hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze.

After ten more minutes of walking, Vasile held up his hand, stopping everyone in their tracks. “Do you smell it?” he asked turning to look at his mate and then to Costin.

Costin nodded. His jaw was clenched tight and his eyes had begun to glow.

“What is it?”
Sally asked him, using their bond.

“Blood.”
She heard the hesitation in his voice. There was more but he didn’t want to tell her.

“And?”

“It’s young.”

Sally swallowed back the bile that rose up in her throat. She’d known that they were targeting children, but to be this close to it was completely different than standing in Vasile’s office being told about it. The misery that had begun filling her continued to expand, and she was sure it was going to choke her. 

“How much further?” Peri asked Vasile.

“A couple hundred yards.” Vasile turned to his mate. “You stay next to Sally.” Alina didn’t argue.

They continued forward and, after walking for a few more minutes, Peri extinguished the glowing orbs. Sally held onto Alina so she didn’t stumble in the blackness. They weren’t left in the darkness for long.

Sally could see light ahead of them coming through an arched doorway. They stopped only feet from it. Costin turned to her and pressed a quick kiss to her lips. “Stay with Alina.”

“I thought you told me to stay with you,” she challenged, not wanting him to leave her.

Costin grinned, his dimple making an appearance. “And suddenly you have the urge to do what I tell you?”

No, not really
, Sally thought to herself. She just didn’t want to be down here without him next to her.

“I love you, Sally mine. Please stay with Alina so that I know you’re safe.” He kissed her forehead.

“I love you too,” she told him and then watched as he followed Vasile, Cypher, and Nissa into the lit doorway. Alina took her hand and pulled her to the side of the tunnel, close to the door but not close enough that she could see anything.

“This isn’t a big coven, Sally,” Alina told her. “They will be fine.”

She tried to be reassured by Alina’s words, but then the screaming started. Sally felt her blood run cold as the sounds of snarls joined the screams and then her mate slammed the bond between them closed.

She lunged forward, attempting to get to the doorway, to get to Costin. But Alina was much faster and stronger. The Alpha female wrapped her arms around the healer and pulled her tightly against her. Sally felt the tears streaming down her face as the screams continued. She didn’t know why she was crying. Perhaps, it was because of the utter despair she could feel radiating from the room, or maybe it was because she knew that they weren’t just under the city of Little Rock. They were in a graveyard. But this wasn’t a normal graveyard where people could come visit their loved ones who had peacefully passed on. This was a graveyard for lost souls. It was a graveyard for those who had been ripped from their own happy lives, had their blood drained from their bodies, and then been tossed aside like a discarded empty bottle.

Tears continued to stream down her face as Alina attempted to hold her together. Sally was pretty sure that if she let her go she would fall to the floor in a thousand pieces.

“It’s almost over,” Alina whispered into her hair. “Hang on a little longer.”

C
ostin bit back the snarl as they entered the underground lair. Like fat lazy cats, vampires lay sprawled across Victorian couches and chintz armchairs that were spread throughout the room. Some of them had bloodstains on their clothes, some on their faces. All of them disgusted him.

“What’s wrong with them?” Nissa whispered.

Peri’s lip curled. “Blood coma. They’re in a stupor from gorging themselves. Like overstuffed ticks, they can’t move because of the amount of blood they’ve ingested.”

“That’s just gross,” the other fae responded.

“They’re vampires,” Peri said dryly. “What part of this did you think wouldn’t be gross?”

Nissa simply shrugged.

Suddenly there was an earsplitting scream and Costin, along with the others, turned in the direction of a tunnel that broke off to the right. He lowered himself into a crouch, as did the others, ready for battle.

The screaming continued as suddenly five shrieking vampires came barreling out of the tunnel. Costin didn’t wait for them to get close. He phased his hands to claws and allowed his canines to lengthen and then lunged forward, closing the mate bond at the same time. Snarls joined the screams as body after body fell at his feet. He no longer cared if his enemy was on their feet attacking him or lying in their overfed induced stupor; he killed indiscriminately. The whole thing couldn’t have taken longer than ten minutes.

Costin stood, panting as he turned in a circle to see his other three comrades standing and staring at the carnage before them. They were all soaked in blood, though it seemed that he and Vasile sported more than the two fae females.

“Everyone okay?” Vasile asked.

Costin nodded.

“Peri, you and Nissa check that tunnel and make sure that there aren’t more laying in wait. Costin and I will search for any survivors.” Vasile motioned for Costin to follow him and they took off down the third tunnel opening. After searching for half an hour and coming up empty, they headed back to the main room.

Costin’s feet froze as he crossed the threshold to the chamber. Peri and Nissa where both kneeling on the floor in the center of a circle of small bodies. Both females’ faces were tight with emotion, but neither shed a tear as they whispered their magic over the bodies and cleaned the blood from their skin, erasing all traces of the horrific death they’d been dealt.

“What are they going to do with them?” Costin asked Vasile in a low voice so not to disturb the fae’s work.

“They’re going to move them to a different location and give the police an anonymous tip. Unfortunately, the parents won’t ever know what really happened to their children, but at least they will have some closure.”

As soon as Vasile stopped speaking, the two fae began disappearing and reappearing, each time taking another child with them until there were none left.  

“Well, one coven down, and undeterminable number left to go,” Peri said as she ran a hand down the front of her. The clothes that had just been a bloody mess were suddenly spot free.

Nissa did the same thing and then the two fae motioned toward Costin and Vasile and gave them the same treatment.

Peri and Vasile began talking about how to completely burn the remains of the coven and Costin turned to head back to the doorway where he’d left his mate. He began to open the bond and as soon as he did her fear, doubts, and pain rushed into him like a tidal wave stealing his breath.

“Sally,” he breathed out as his walk turned into a run.

Chapter 9

“I’m considering starting a diary. With all the crap that has happened to me, it’s bound to be interesting. But then again, it might just say,
today I didn’t kill my mate and we saved the world
, page after page after page. Lame. I could write about Dec and I, but then I’d be all hot and bothered even more than I am now. Not practical. Okay, so the diary is out.” ~Jen

J
acque restlessly paced the alleyway as they waited for the others to return from their little vampire extermination mission. She pressed her hand to her stomach as she felt the baby kick and then gritted her teeth as the jar to her bladder nearly caused her to revert back to pre-potty trained ways.

“You okay, Luna?” Fane asked as he placed a large hand on her lower back.

“Your child just likes to do the Irish River Dance on my bladder, no biggee.”

He chuckled, as if she was being funny. She wasn’t. Jacque frowned at him and continued her pacing. She had never been good at waiting, especially if it meant waiting to see if all of those she cared about were going to return to her in one piece.

"She's going to be fine," Jen said as she started walking beside Jacque matching her step for step.

"I know," Jacque retorted. "I'll just be happier when I can see that for myself."

"How did we handle her being gone with Peri for so long?" Jen asked as she shook her head.

Jacque shrugged. "We didn't know what she was doing. Now we
know.
She's possibly fighting a coven of vampires that are killing children." She turned to look at Decebel and Fane. "Should we be able to hear anything? I mean if they’ve already started fighting?"

"I've put up a sound barrier," Alston spoke up. "No noise will come up out of that opening and I'm sure Peri has done the same thing."

"So we won't know if they're getting slaughtered?" Jacque snapped.

"Love," Fane said gently as he walked over to her and took her hand. He pulled her away from the others and took her face in his hands. "Are you okay?"

She took several deep breaths. "Yes, I'm fine. It's just… I'm just worried about Sally."

"Costin won't let anything happen to her, nor would my father, my mother, or Peri for that matter. She's as safe with them as she would be here."

She knew what he was saying was true, and maybe it was just her hormones (man she was sick of that excuse) but Jacque was concerned about Sally. It was on the tail end of that thought that Sally's screams reached her ears.

J
en's eyes snapped from Jacque to the manhole from which Sally's screams were ringing loud and clear.

"I thought you put up some fancy sound barrier," Jen snarled at Alston as she made a lunge for the manhole. She heard Decebel's growl behind her, but she didn’t stop to see how close he was to snatching her out of the air. Jen dove headfirst into the hole, executing a perfect summersault that, had she not been part werewolf, she'd never have been able to pull off. She landed in a tucked roll and the momentum carried her to her feet.

As she rolled up and hit the ground running, she looked back to see Decebel land just where she'd been. Jen knew she was going to catch hell from him for acting before thinking, but if it meant getting to Sally and helping her, then whatever Dec threw at her would be worth it.

Sally's screams were still filling the air as Jen rounded a corner. She'd been pulling on her wolf’s superior senses in order to follow the sound of her terrified friend’s voice. The reverberation of her screams was painful on the wolf’s sensitive ears, but Jen was immensely grateful both for Sally's incredible lungs and her own supernatural hearing, because it meant that finding her in the underground labyrinth would be a tad easier.

"Jennifer!" Decebel growled from behind her and, based on how well she could hear his voice even over Sally's screams, Jen knew her mate was within grabbing distance.

"She needs our help, Decebel. I'm not just going to stand by and listen to my best friend scream in terror."

"In what life would I ever ask that of you? I'm simply asking that you let me go first. Let me meet whatever danger there is so that you can tend to Sally."

Okay, so maybe he had a point. She slowed a little and let him take the lead. The look he gave her as he past made Jen want to smack him. She could be reasonable—sometimes.