Blood Prophecy

CHAPTER 43



Solange


Kieran stepped in front of both Mom and me and shot one of the guns off his belt. It didn’t fire bullets or holy water. Instead, flares exploded with fiery trails, blinding the Host who were coming for us. Red flashes seared the darkness for a blinding, eye-stabbing moment.

Mom was already flipping over Kieran’s head, landing in front of him once the flares had burned out. Trails of light burned into my eyelids like comets every time I blinked. The Host closest to us shouted, covering their faces. There was a pause in the fighting as everyone was silhouetted in impossible red light.

I snapped out of my momentary panic and balanced my mother’s flip by sliding low through the snow, stake in hand. I went left as she went right and we made our own fist, closing deadly fingers around the Host. They didn’t notice right away, assuming they had the upper hand because there were more of them.

You’d think they’d have figured out not to underestimate my mother by now.

As for me, I was happy to be underestimated. I’d finally realized being underestimated could be a powerful weapon. I stood still, pretending to be frozen with fear again.

They turned toward me, eyes flaring and fangs flashing.

Mom’s sword turned hilt over tip above their heads and I reached up to grab it out of the air. The familiar weight of a sword in my hand made me smile. I used it to knock a stake out of a vampire’s hand, flipping it to Kieran. He caught it, immediately going into a fight stance. The world narrowed to my sword, the crunch of snow under the boots of approaching Host, the hiss of anger as they got closer to me, and the sound of bat wings.

And then Kieran went down.

He vanished from sight as Host closed around him. An arrow flew out of the trees behind us. It hit one of the Host and she stumbled back, clutching at the shaft embedded in her stomach. Blood welled between her fingers. Hel-Blar howled at the edge of the circle, trying to join the fray when they smelled her fresh blood.

I still couldn’t see what had happened to Kieran.

I leaped forward, decapitating the Hel-Blar and stabbing the nearest Host. When he doubled over in pain, I kicked him out of the way. The next Host crumbled to ashes when I slid the tip of my blade into his chest. I was yanking the sword free when a blow caught me on the back of the neck. I stumbled and fell hard to my knees. Bats lowered like a curtain. Shielded, I crawled forward in the boot-churned snow.

Kieran was bleeding from a cut over his eyebrow and there was a gash on his knee through a tear in his cargo pants, but he was alive. Relief made my eyes water. We scrambled to our feet, standing back to back against the rest of the Host. Nicholas was suddenly there too. Bats and arrows shot between us, as if the very air wanted us to fight back.

But there was one weapon left in Hope’s arsenal and it was far more dangerous than rogue units, stakes, and Hypnos powder. None of us could defeat it, not even my mother.

Actual dawn.