Coldbloods (Hotbloods #2)

Next, he hit a triangular green button. Both of us held our breath for a second, until the ceiling shuddered and a hole in the roof opened up.

“Ah, yes,” Galo said, his yellow teeth spread in a victorious smile. “Knew it.” Seeing my dubious look, he admitted, “It’s been a while. Anyway, now for up…”

He pushed a curved red lever, and next thing I knew, we were blasting upward. A countless number of levels flashed by, all at a speed too fast to really make out anything, and I only let out a breath when we broke into the sky.

Now we were hovering over a big octagonal stone pyramid, where we had presumably just been. I gazed around at the surrounding area, taking in the snow-and-pine-tree-covered mountain it was housed on with interest.

“So… this must be a pretty remote location, for the Fed to be able to escape human notice,” I said, casting a sidelong gaze at Galo.

“Yes, yes indeed,” Galo said impatiently. “Now, where was it you said we were going?”

I exhaled. It looked like I wasn’t going to get details of the Fed’s location out of the wily old lycan. But that wasn’t exactly important now anyway. We had to concentrate on getting to my friends.

“Um, so I told them to meet me in Borscht,” I said. “At least, I think that was the name of the place.” I closed my eyes and tried to remember the jumble of letters on the town sign, but only came up with an image of Navan’s smile as he danced with me under the stars and held me close in the cold.

“Borscht is a Russian stew,” Galo said after a pause, sounding less than impressed.

“Well, it was something like that,” I retorted. “Can’t you look up similar names on your iPhone or superior Fed technology?”

“Never mind,” he replied, “I’ve just found it. Borscha is what you’re looking for. I’ve set the coordinates into the ship’s location database. Now, I’d rest up if I were you.”

I hoped that Bashrik hadn’t been overconfident about Ronad’s tracking abilities, and that they’d find the right village.

I turned to Galo. “So, this whole illegal escape thing,” I said tentatively. “I’m guessing this pretty much rules out any help from the Fed?”

Galo snorted, turning his gray curled head my way. “What do you think?”

I sighed. Truthfully, I’d pretty much counted on the Fed’s help. But at least I had Galo and his ship. And besides, it wasn’t like staying at the Fed’s HQ would have been a better option, surrounded by hostile lycans. I’d had too many close calls already—there was no guarantee I’d last another day there.

I gave Galo a grateful smile. “Thank you. You know, you didn’t have to do all this, and honestly I wasn’t expecting it.”

“I know I didn’t,” he said with a dismissive wave of his hand. After a pause, he turned to face me. “Truth is… I once had a granddaughter like you. Not so long ago. Anyway, she’s not here anymore, but you remind me of her in some ways. And also, as I said before, it was the right thing to do.” His thoughtful gaze far off, he shot me a rueful smile. “So don’t let it go to your head or anything. You should really get some sleep.”

I nodded, feeling a strange mash of emotions surge through me. But I was just too tired to voice what I was feeling, or express my full gratitude to Galo—I could hardly make sense of what I felt myself. After everything I’d been through, as soon as I closed my eyes, it wasn’t all that hard to take Galo’s advice.



“It’s been fourteen hours, and I’ve been waiting four.” A male voice entered my consciousness from somewhere above me. Firm hands gripped my shoulders and shook me.

Groaning, I opened my eyes to see Galo frowning at me from his seat in the ship. I stretched, then sat up. Immediately, a wave of memories from the past few days washed over me.

In particular, something I had stupidly forgotten to do.

“My friends!” I said, slapping my hand to my forehead. “I never told them we were coming. Bashrik could be at the Fed Headquarters right now!”

“There, there,” Galo said, with a little wave of his hand. “We’ll be meeting them at a tavern in about forty-five minutes.”

“What? How’d you get in contact with them?” I paused. “Does it have to do with you being a ver… What was it that Farl called you?”

“I am hungry,” Galo said with a peevish wag of his head, “but I suppose I can at least sate your curiosity. No, me contacting your friends has nothing to do with me being a veritas. It means I am a ‘truth-smeller.’ There’s about one of us born for every thousand lycans, so we’re quite rare. We could be compared to your human seers, although as I said, our truth ability comes from our sense of smell. In any case, that’s why I believed you… if you were wondering. Because I knew you were telling the truth. Not due to your oratory prowess.”

“Oh… I see,” I said, the pieces falling into place. “So that’s what all that sniffing was about.”

He nodded wryly.

I smiled, shaking my head. Well, it seemed that I’d just encountered yet another mystical creature that transformed my entire perception of how the world was supposed to work.

“I have parked the ship a mile or so away from town and cloaked it with an invisibility layer,” he said, changing the subject. “So now we can go eat and meet your friends.”

“So wait, how did you get in contact with them then?” I asked Galo as we exited the now-invisible ship. If they were at a tavern, I guessed it would be the same one Navan and I had visited on our first night in Siberia. My heart fell just as it did a flip. I felt a renewed pang of guilt in thinking of him, but soon I’d be reunited with our friends—and hopefully… our rescue team.

“Your coldblood friend Bashrik has a comm device that I figured out how to connect with,” Galo said. “I messaged them, pretending to be you.”

I frowned. “Can I see what you said?”

He handed me his own comm device, and when I looked at what he had typed, I couldn’t help but smile. Ten hours ago, he’d written: “Borscha is where we’ll meet.”

Then, an hour or so ago, he’d written: “Greetings and salutations dearest friends. This is Riley. I will meet you at the tavern and I am greatly anticipating this most joyous reunion.”

“You have no idea how young human women speak, do you?” I said.

Galo sniffed. “I’d say I did a pretty good job.”

I decided not to correct him. Despite being a lycan, Galo was proving to be a pretty good ally—someone from the Fed I could finally trust. I hoped my friends would, too, because we’d need his help if we wanted any chance of saving Navan.





Chapter Four





The trip into town took a good half hour. I tried getting Galo to move faster, but he was determined to keep his consistently moderate pace.

“If we rush ourselves and it’s a trap, we’ll have no energy to flee,” he said with a determined nod of his head.