A World of New (A Shade of Vampire, #26)

“He wasn’t deliri—”

“It doesn’t matter.” Atticus knelt and was begging now, his voice ragged with desperation and grief. “Whatever my son may have said, I don’t care! He is my son! I c-cannot let him die!”

I swallowed hard, glancing once again at Shayla. She was still looking torn, but I was sure that we both knew that there wasn’t an option here anymore.

And as much as the idea of handing Lawrence back to those aberrations of humanity made me sick to my stomach, I realized… I wanted what Atticus wanted, even if it was against Lawrence’s wishes. I wanted him to be cured, no matter what the price.

Shayla drew in a long, slow breath. She looked to Corrine, my grandparents and then back to Lawrence’s father.

“All right,” she said heavily. “We will bring your son.”



If I had ever thought about Lawrence and I parting, it would never have been like this. Shayla scooped him up from the hospital bed and planted him in his wheelchair while he was still unconscious. I gazed down at his sweaty, pallid face, barely even having a chance to kiss his cheek before the witch vanished us back to Atticus.

And then Lawrence was lowered into the boat, before being hidden from my view completely in the front compartment.

It felt like it was all happening in slow motion. Almost like I was watching the events rather than participating in them.

Shayla asked whether she ought to transport them back to Chicago to hasten the journey, but Atticus refused, saying that an IBSI helicopter was waiting nearby for him to return. They had decided not to come any closer after their previous fracas with The Shade, and just sent him instead.

Then Atticus locked himself out of view, too. The vessel began to move. It quickly ramped up its pace, speeding away and leaving behind trails of white foam in the water.

My eyes were wide, barely blinking as I stared. I wasn’t quite sure what I was feeling in that moment. I guessed I felt… numb. Caught in time.

Shayla returned us to the jetty and I stood at its end, staring at what had now become a white dot in the distance.

And I remained standing, long after it had disappeared.





Victoria





I was sitting with Ruby in the dining room of my family’s treehouse, helping her with her math homework while getting on with my own studies in between.

Since my visit to Saira, I had been doing everything I could to distract myself from watching the hours go by. My mother had promised that they would do all within their power to find Bastien. Now I just had to wait for their return to see if they had been successful.

When the elevator doors slid open outside our front door several hours later that day, my chest swelled in anticipation. I shot up from my chair and rushed to the door to see my parents approaching on the veranda. They looked dirty, sweaty, and battle-worn, but otherwise okay.

I rushed to them and flung an arm around each of their necks. “What happened?” I asked. “How come you’re back so soon?”

As I glanced from my mother to my father, their faces lit up in smiles.

“We found him,” my father said. “Your werewolf friend.”

My jaw dropped. Oh, my God! It was everything that I had been hoping for, but now that my father was confirming it, I could hardly believe my ears.

“We discovered him on the ogres’ shores,” my father went on. “He had been adrift in the ocean for some reason. He reached a beach and crawled for shelter amid some shrubbery.”

“He was in a bad state when we—or, I should say, Micah—found him,” my mother continued. “We were thinking to just send him back here with Arwen and Brock to be treated, but the rest of us could do with stocking up on weaponry. We’ll be leaving again soon, perhaps even within the day.”

I was burning to ask how the mission had gone so far, but right now, I couldn’t think about anything other than…

“Bastien,” I breathed. “Where is he?”

“In Meadow Hospital. The fourth floor. Being treated,” my mother explained.

I wished that a witch could vanish me to the hospital in an instant. I darted into the elevator and hurried down to the ground. I grabbed my bike and began racing as hard as I could toward the hospital.

I passed family and other League members along the way, including Ben, River, and Aiden, but I couldn’t bring myself to stop. I called greetings to them as I dashed past, until I finally reached the edge of the sunflower meadows. Panting, I left my bike by a tree and ran the rest of the way through the flowers, skidding to a stop at the hospital’s rotating entrance. I rushed in. Since all the elevators were occupied, I took the staircase and rushed up to the fourth level on foot.