“It’s been too long…” He sighed. “We will finally … have our retribution.”
“I’m going to unchain you now, and then I need to move Alana.” I reached above his head to the rebar. It was easier than trying to pry the cuff off his leg.
Right as my palm touched the metal, a cold, bony hand wrapped around my ankle.
I had to resist a very strong urge to kick him off and quiet the growling wolf in my head. Instead of reacting, I angled my head down to meet his gaze, my eyes holding a question.
“We have waited … for you.” His eyes were now a clear muted blue.
I pried the rebar open just enough to unhook the chain. Then I stepped back, breaking his grip on me. He let go without a fight. “What exactly do you know about me?” It was hard to believe this emaciated vamp, left in a crypt to rot for centuries, would know anything about me.
“It was foretold…” he whispered.
“But you attacked me when I first arrived. You didn’t think I was anything special then,” I pointed out. “Why the sudden change of heart?”
He said one word in Russian. “Sila.” When my expression didn’t change, he said another. “Strength.”
16
I waited for Yuri to elaborate on his comment. “Okay…” I said when he remained silent. “I guess we can choose to continue this discussion at a later date.” I glanced around the cell. “I need to get out of here,” I muttered.
I strode over to Alana.
Dragging her along the ground would just be wrong, so I bent down to pick her up. It was the only decent thing to do. She weighed next to nothing and thankfully did not stir. As I carried her to Yuri, the end of the chain still attached to her forehead clattered along the ground. Nice.
I lowered her carefully into his open arms.
His face said it all. This was his bride. “I’m sorry, you know”—I pointed to her head once I deposited her in his lap—“about her wound. She wasn’t very reasonable and I had to stop her.” And a metal plate to the forehead did the trick. “I’m sure you’ll be able to work it out, but you may want to act fast and do it while she’s still unconscious.”
“She will … heal…” he said quietly. “Go now. They will be back soon…”
I headed over to the corner.
The entire cell was full of dirt. I knelt, plunging my hands into the ground. About a foot down I hit wood. It was some kind of trapdoor. “Do you use this often?” I asked, glancing over at him. “It doesn’t seem like a super-duper idea to have a permanent escape hatch in the floor of a prison cell.”
“It is not nice … below,” he answered. “You must … beware.”
That sounded ominous.
My wolf snarled. After the creatures we’d encountered fighting Selene, I wasn’t looking forward to meeting any new surprises. “Care to shed a little more light on that before I head down into the depths of despair?”
“Trows,” he answered.
“Trolls?”
Gads! I didn’t want to fight a troll.
He shook his head. “No, Trows. The Queen employs them … to keep intruders out and … us in.”
“You mean like fairies?” I replied, flipping quickly through my mind for my limited knowledge of a Trow. If I was right, I had a vague recollection of them from old books I used to page through in my father’s library when I was a kid.
“Much worse than fairies … evil … small … mixed with troll … lives in water.”
Water. That’s right. New Orleans was at sea level. I’d been so stupid. I felt like slapping myself between the eyes. Of course we weren’t in a basement. Down meant water.
I ran my hand around the wooden trapdoor, searching for a way to pry it open. I found it in the form of an old iron ring and pulled. The old wood hatch creaked as it bowed, caught by matted earth around the edges. I yanked harder, careful not to rip the iron ring off completely.
It finally swung fully open.
The smell was horrific.
I gagged, covering my mouth. “You have to be kidding me!” I coughed through my closed fingers. “It smells like death lives down there.” Eudoxia was going to get an extra sock in the jaw for making me go through this. “Maybe I should just tear the main door off its hinges and we can all go free right now? That sounds like a much better option.” I let go of the trapdoor and made a motion to stand.
“No!” Yuri’s voice held a strong note. The first I’d heard from him. I looked over at him. He was totally healed, still cradling his bride. “If you do that, the vampires will swarm. An alarm will sound and we will all be punished. Down is the only way.”
Damn. He was right. Swarming vampires would not be ideal at the moment. I couldn’t free anyone with a horde of vampires after me. I reluctantly knelt by the hole and pulled the hatch up again and glanced down into the putrid darkness.