“You’re lucky your mate has bruja blood,” Donovan said. “Me next, if you will, lass.”
“Sure.” I started to unwind the chain from around Dastien’s wrists. Chunks of his skin peeled off when I moved the last bit of chain. I hesitated, not wanting to hurt him more.
“Do it.”
I swallowed, and did it. Dastien muffled his cry. I knew it wasn’t me who had put the chains there, but causing him pain still sucked. “You okay?”
“I’ll be fine now. Hurry. We have to go.” Dastien glanced up at the hole in the ceiling and then out to the sleeping vampires. “They should be up already.”
He didn’t have to tell me twice. I quickly unchained Mr. Dawson, Donovan, and Sebastian.
Adrian started growling. Chris and Shannon quickly followed.
“Well, it was a fine attempt, but we will fight our way out after all,” Sebastian said. The three alphas shifted into their wolf form quickly.
The cavern was silent, except for the soft growls of the wolves who now stood in a circle around Meredith, Dastien, and I. Movement rippled through the cavern as the vampires slipped soundlessly from dead to undead.
“Aren’t you going to shift?” I asked Dastien.
“Not yet. What’s in your bags?”
I couldn’t look away from the vampires. There were so many.
“Tessa,” Dastien said.
Shit. I was panicking.
“Her bruja cousin made them for us. Weapons,” Meredith said. “Holy water.”
Dastien took my pack from me and unzipped it.
I had a second to think before I was soaked. “What the hell!” I wiped the water from my eyes.
“And she’s back,” Meredith said. She held up a bottle with a black cross on it over her head and dumped the contents. “Makes it harder for them to grab onto you if you burn the shit out of them.”
“Here.” Dastien handed me a large water gun, and then stuck two small ones in my back pockets. He pulled out some little glass vials filled with red and yellow grains and some green flakes. “I love your family.”
“You’ve never really met my family. Hell, I just met my family.” I grabbed one of them. “What is that?”
“They’re spells. But from the color, they may as well be grenades.”
Meredith pulled out some vials filled with blue liquid. “I didn’t get any like yours, but I did get these!”
“I don’t know what those are,” Dastien said. “I’ve never seen anything like it. How many do you have?”
“Your cousin was right,” Meredith said. “I know exactly what to do with them. I’ve got three and that’s plenty. These fuckers pack a punch.”
Dastien muttered something and threw one of the red and yellow ones into the cave. An explosion reverberated against the walls. I put away my flashlight as the burning vampires lit up the cavern.
“Enough with the pow-wow. We’re out of time,” Meredith said.
“Right before you throw the vial, say, ‘In the name of Jesus Christ, I purify you.’”
“Seriously.”
“Yes. It doesn’t have to be exactly that, but the intention in your head and heart when you throw it needs to be that. And you need to really feel it and believe it for it to work. That’s the thing with brujos. They’ve got a bit of Catholicism mixed in with everything they do.” Dastien kissed me. His lips were firm for a second, and then softened. “Stay beside me.”
His clothes ripped and fell to the floor as he shifted forms.
“The wolves brought us some of their own for breakfast,” one vampire’s voice rang through the cavern. “And a witchblood.”
A vampire floated above the rest. I left my backpack unzipped and put it on backwards. I stood, palming one of the vials in one hand and my holy water gun in the other. As the vampire gained speed, moving toward me, I threw the vial and said the words.
The explosion was easily three times as big as the one Dastien’s gave off. The vampire screamed as decayed flesh melted from its bones. Flames rained down on the vampires below, burning them to a crisp.
All movement in the cavern stopped for a moment.
And then hell broke loose as the vampires in front swept toward us. The wolves ripped into the closest vampires.
“Your blood makes them stronger. You throw the vials. I’ll back you up with water,” Meredith said.
I tossed at anything that moved. Once they learned what our plan was, they stopped their freaky floating tricks. Any that Meredith got with her gun burned down to dust. It only took a squirt per vampire, but we didn’t have an endless supply. And we were still grossly outnumbered.
“We need to get out of here,” I said. “We can’t hold them off here until morning.”
“So what now?”
“We burn a path.”
Donovan barked twice.
“I’m taking that as confirmation that my plan is good.” As soon as I said that, the vampires converged to block the way out. “You assholes are just making this easier.” I hoped I was right.
I threw the vials in quick succession. “I’ll grab left and center. You take care of right. Wolves, don’t let anything get us from the back.” I took a deep breath.
How the hell did I end up in charge here?