Stiletto Read online

  The words were sharp, cutting, and Rowan stiffened just a little. The she nodded, so deeply it was almost a bow.

  “I’m here to follow you,” Rowan said. “I’ll do whatever you ask.”

  “It’s not about what you’ll do,” Sienna said.

  She snapped a finger. Instantly, two vampires stepped forward and grasped Rowan’s arms, one on each side. Sienna nodded, and they dragged Rowan past the dais, past Grandma and Mom and the children, and toward the small door.

  Alec put a firm hand on my shoulder, and I swallowed the shout of warning that had risen to my lips.

  Far below us, Rowan held her head high and let herself be taken.

  28

  I was halfway down the corridor before I realized I’d moved. Then Brendan’s hand closed around my arm.

  “Wait,” he whispered, directly into my ear.

  The closeness of his lips sent tingles across my skin.

  “We have to go get her,” I whispered frantically. “I’m not sure what Sienna’s plans are, but they can’t be good.”

  “Getting ourselves captured won’t help,” Brendan said. “There are still a hundred vampires down there. We can’t take them all on at once.”

  “He’s right,” Alec said, although he didn’t sound as certain. “Once whatever this is has ended, we can go down and try to find Rowan and the rest of them.”

  “How long are we going to have to wait?”

  “You’re a Dagger,” Brendan said. “You can be patient.”

  I cut my eyes at him, but he wasn’t wrong. I blew out a sigh.

  “All right, fine. Where do we hide? These look like bedrooms, and I don’t want to be here when the sun comes up.”

  “You think they’re full of coffins?” Brendan said. His glance toward the doors was a little too curious.

  “I think I’d rather not know,” Alec said.

  We continued down the hallway, always keeping one eye on the events downstairs. A vampire guard herded Grandma and the others back through the little door, so we moved quietly toward that side of the building. There was another stairwell at the end of the corridor, and this one led up into one of the building’s towers as well as down toward the throne room.

  Alec snuck up the stairs, searching for a good hiding place, and quickly came back down.

  “Abort mission,” he said, drawing a hand across his throat. “There’s bats in the belfry.”

  “Bats-bats or vampire-bats?” I said.

  “I have no idea and don’t plan on finding out,” he said. “I vote we keep ourselves away from the prying eyes of any species.”

  “Agreed,” I said, just as Brendan snorted.

  “You’re scared of bats?” he asked.

  “We should all be scared of any creature that might report us to Sienna.”

  He seemed to see the sense in this, and we continued around the corner to the hallway that looked down to the back of Sienna’s throne. There was a small closet there, just before the corridor gave way to a dead end. It was unlocked and full of dust and the kinds of discards that always seemed to fill the corners of old houses like this. I settled in the back between two broken chairs, and Brendan and Alec managed to find seats on crumbling boxes labeled things like Electrical Cords and Magazines/Books in pretentious calligraphy.

  Every half hour or so, we took turns darting out of the closet and across the hall to see what was happening below. After a while, Brendan started playing some shooter game on his dimmed phone, and Alec began flipping through one of the old magazines from the box underneath him. I couldn’t imagine being able to see the text in the dim light coming from the crack in the door, but his canine eyes were better than mine.

  I just sat and waited. I tried to imagine how the building might be laid out below us, where Rowan and the others might have been taken, what could be happening to them. They weren’t pleasant thoughts, but they kept me alert and on edge, and by the time Alec reported, after taking his turn, that people were starting to leave the gathering downstairs, I was keyed up enough to feel like I could maybe take them all out by myself.

  I didn’t, of course. I just pressed my back against the wall and stayed silent as footsteps came up the stairs. It was early morning by now, and it seemed like these vamps, in addition to living in a stereotypical house, also maintained a stereotypical sleep schedule. Doors in the hallway opened and closed, and unintelligible voices floated down the corridor toward us.

  Finally, the footsteps and voices stopped, and it seemed like the house had gone to bed.

  “What’s the plan?” Alec asked, so quietly that I wouldn’t have heard him if I hadn’t been so on edge.

  I crouched between their seats, resting my elbow on the box Brendan sat on. He shifted a little to make room for me, then shifted back so we were touching.

  “We stick together.” This seemed like the one nonnegotiable to me—the one way to make sure that one of us wouldn’t get captured while we were trying to rescue the current prisoners. “I’m hoping we’ll find Mom and Grandma first.”

  Their names felt like bubbles coming out of my mouth, delicate parcels of hope and joy and excitement that would burst at the first wrong move.

  “They’ve probably been here longer than Rowan,” I added. “They’ll have a better sense for where we can find her, assuming they’re being held separately, and they might know how we can get out of here without getting caught.”

  “Sounds solid to me.” Brendan started to stand, but I tugged him back down.

  “We’re getting the Daggers out,” I said. “And only the Daggers. Sienna isn’t who we came for.”

  “We’ll get the Daggers out first,” Brendan answered, which was not what I’d said.

  I grabbed his hand and yanked him in closer to me.

  “We’re getting the Daggers, and then we’re leaving,” I said. “You were right. There are at least a hundred vampires in this place, and we’re not going to risk our lives going after them tonight.”

  “This morning,” Alec pitched in, less than helpfully.

  “You’ll get your chance to deal with Sienna,” I said. “You can’t be stupid about it.”

  Brendan grumbled, and I wasn’t sure he was going to agree, but then he swore under his breath.

  “You’re right,” he said. “I know. I just—if she realizes we escaped, and she moves the whole operation, we might not find her again.”

  “That’s true,” I said. “It’s a risk we need to take. It’s a risk I need you to take. Can you do that?”

  He was silent a long moment and seemed to be wrestling with himself in the darkness.

  “He can do it,” Alec finally said, and Brendan, reluctantly, nodded.

  29

  This old mansion wasn’t as creaky as Grandma’s house. I realized, as we walked through it, that the building wasn’t that old. It was just designed to mimic antiquity. The bones underneath were young and solid, which made it a lot easier to sneak through the hallways without causing the kinds of creaks and squeaks that might give us away.

  We made our way back to the first floor and found an entrance to the throne room. It was almost pitch-black inside, and I realized for the first time that there were no windows or skylights or any other access to the outdoors. We slipped quietly along the edges of the room, Brendan in the front with my hands on his shoulders and Alec keeping watch behind me.

  The small door the prisoners had disappeared to led to a narrow, curving set of stairs lit by a single dim bulb and filled with the damp odor shared by all cellars. I made sure our glamours were secure, and then we snuck down the stairs, one dangerous step at a time, until we stopped in a huddle and peeked around the final corner.

  A vampire was standing guard in front of a few prison cells, or at least making half an effort to do so. He lounged in an armchair that had been dragged downstairs for the purpose and tapped quickly on his phone, which was clearly set to some game or other. Behind him, all six children were grouped in the largest cell t
ogether. Someone had brought a few thick rugs down to put on the cell’s cement floor, and a television at one end of the cell played a cartoon with the sound turned down low. A few of the children were sleeping; the ones who were awake looked exhausted, and I couldn’t tell whether it was because they’d been kept up half the night for Sienna’s display or because they’d simply been worn out by their captivity.

  Mom and Grandma each had their own cells, and they hadn’t been gifted with old rugs or cartoons. They both sat on the bare cement with enchanted shackles around their wrists. Someone had attached particle board to the bars on either side of the cells so they couldn’t see each other or the children. Mom was sitting in tranquil meditation, and Grandma was in the middle of her usual morning yoga routine. I wanted to laugh and cry all at once at the sight of her transitioning to a plank in these dismal surroundings.

  I looked back to Brendan and Alec, and Brendan wiggled his fingers at me in a poor imitation of magic. I smirked and turned my attention to the guard.

  He was easy enough to knock out. A quick drawing of earth energy into my hands, a visualization of sleep pouring like sand into his eyes and heavy clay filling his limbs with the weight of exhaustion, and he was out. His head lolled back. The phone dropped from his hand onto the cement, and he started snoring.

  “So dignified,” Brendan muttered.

  Mom’s head jerked up at the sound of his voice. In an instant, she was on her feet and at the edge of her cell with her hands around the bars, scanning the room for whoever had spoken.

  Grandma was slower to respond. She pushed her plank into a downward-facing dog pose, then stepped her hands back to her feet and stood with a stretch.

  “Scarlett,” Mom whispered, her voice carrying in a hiss across the room.

  I stepped out from behind the cover of the stairwell, and her face instantly flushed with concern and relief and other emotions I couldn’t untangle. She shoved a hand through the bars and reached for me. I was across the room in an instant. She wrapped her arms around me as best she could, and I reached through the bars and tried to squeeze her. It was awkward and clumsy and easily the best hug of my life.

  “We thought you were dead,” I said, and I didn’t recognize my own voice. “She told us she’d killed you all.”

  “I know,” Mom said. “Or at least I divined.”

  “Couldn’t you have sent a message?”

  She shook her head. “She took our necklaces first thing. And these don’t help.” She held up her wrists and shook them. The shackles slipped up her arm.

  “That sucks.” I held a hand over one of the shackles and tried to figure out how to break them loose. It took only a few moments for the cold energy of ice to skim across my palm, radiating from the shackles and freezing Mom’s abilities. I counteracted the ice with fire, bringing as much heat to my hand as I could muster and directing it all toward the cuff.

  It clicked and sprang apart as the metal dissolved. Mom flinched away and rubbed her wrist, where a small red burn had blossomed, then held up the other wrist.

  I couldn’t force the cell itself open with a spell, but Alec was right behind me and had the good sense to rummage through the guard’s clothes for the keys. He got Mom’s cage open while I helped Grandma get free of her own chains.

  She wrapped her arms around me the moment she was out and squeezed like she was trying to get every last bit of air out of my lungs. And then she let go, suddenly all business, and she and Mom helped me collect the children. They were all sleepy-eyed and disoriented by the sudden change of plans, but the older girls helped us soothe and gather the little ones.

  “I have to find Rowan,” I said.

  “She’ll be upstairs.” Mom closed her eyes, and I kept my mouth shut so she could focus.

  Her eyes moved back and forth beneath her eyelids, and then she opened them.

  “She’s in a parlor on the first floor, I think.” She rubbed her wrist. “Sienna’s with her.”

  “Can you get the kids out?” I asked. “I’ll go find Rowan.”

  Mom nodded, and Grandma put a hand on my shoulder.

  “I’ll come with you.”

  “No,” I said. “Sienna can’t know you’ve gotten free. As far as she knows, I think you’re all dead and won’t have come looking for you.” I jerked my head toward the still-snoring guard. “He’ll be out for at least another hour, which buys you an hour to get out of here while I pretend Rowan’s the only one I’m after.”

  “Then we’ll see you at home,” Grandma said. “Be careful. Don’t trust anyone.”

  “I know who to trust,” I said.

  “Then we’ll get these babies back to their mothers.” Grandma picked up Coralie and patted her back. “You make sure you come home to yours.”

  30

  It wasn’t hard to find Rowan, not once Mom had pointed us in the right direction. The parlor was near the front of the house, almost beneath the closet we’d hidden in earlier, and it was the only room in the house where anyone seemed to be awake.

  We hugged the wall outside the room and listened to the voices from behind the closed door. There were several of them, all talking in low tones, and laughing sometimes in a way that made me think whatever was happening inside wasn’t exactly funny. Alec cautiously lowered himself to the floor and tried to look under the door. He twisted his head, squinted, and then held up three fingers.

  “Sienna?” I mouthed.

  He nodded, and mouthed back, “I think so?”

  “Rowan?”

  He shrugged.

  It was close enough. There were three of us. We could take on three of them.

  We couldn’t have anything that happened in this room draw attention to us. I didn’t know how heavily vampires slept, but I couldn’t risk waking them. I stepped to the edge of the door and filled my hands with magic, then stretched the invisible energy across the doorframe. I tacked the magic to the edges like a spider tacking her web, and then did my best to seal the cracks.

  The spell would keep sound inside this room. I only hoped Sienna didn’t have another way to alert her army.

  I checked in with Brendan and Alec. They each nodded and quietly shifted, their bodies giving way within seconds to sleek fur over rippling muscles. I had gotten so used to the sight that I had to resist the urge to reach up and scratch behind their ears.

  They liked that when they were in wolf form, I knew, but I didn’t dare try it now. Not just because we were on the edge of making a dangerous situation worse, but because I knew they’d both read into it and think I was making some kind of choice between them.

  And right now, I needed all our thoughts focusing on taking Sienna down.

  I threw the door open and burst into the room, hands out in front of me and full of fire. Sienna was here, as Mom had said.

  Flames shot from my fingertips toward her. Fire worked especially well against her new allies, and the vampire in the room with her flinched, even though he was nowhere near the flames. He was familiar; this was the same pale man I’d seen back in the Orbs stadium.

  Sienna took a deep breath and screamed for help. The sound was loud and piercing and stopped at the door, which Brendan closed behind us with a kick of his powerful back paw.

  “Get out!” she screeched. She raised her hands and pushed a stream of water at me. It froze as it arced through the air, and I ducked just in time for the pointed end of the icicle to soar over my head and implant itself deep into the wall.

  Brendan growled and jumped toward her. She managed to throw a shield of magic between them, but I could see the energy it took for her to maintain the barrier under Brendan’s crushing werewolf weight.

  Alec snapped his jaws at me and made a small yipping sound. He bounded across the room and crouched over a low red settee. Rowan was lying on it, asleep—or worse.

  “Get her out of here,” I said.

  He nudged her with his nose, and her arm flopped uselessly to one side. Her eyes stayed closed.

 
“Don’t touch her!” Sienna screamed.

  She thrust outwards, and the energy shield separating her from Brendan glowed white and pushed him away. He tumbled across the room and collided with an antique chair, which shattered at the impact.

  The vampire grabbed a lamp from a side table and brought it down on Brendan’s head. The stained-glass lampshade shattered. Brendan scrambled to his feet, and I caught only a rush of fur as he threw himself toward the vampire.

  “Get out of here,” Sienna said. Her hair was beginning to look disheveled.

  I threw a fireball at her. She blocked it with a wave of her hand and sent it flying to the wall, where it sizzled out and left an ugly black burn on the wallpaper.

  “You stupid girl. You’re going to kill her if you’re not careful,” Sienna hissed. “She’s between life and death as it is. You’re making it worse.”

  I couldn’t imagine Sienna caring. But I hesitated at her expression; whatever her reasons, this did matter to her. I threw up an energy shield to buy myself a few seconds to look closely at Rowan’s face.

  Her skin was pale, everywhere but her lips. They were red and swollen. Dark hollows had formed beneath her eyes and cheekbones.

  My blood turned to ice.

  “You didn’t,” I whispered.

  “It’s too late for her,” Sienna said. “And now it’s too late for you, too.”

  She raised her hands, and it took everything I had to hold up my shield against her onslaught of curses. Fire and ice and a sickening green fog boiled around the edges of my shimmering barrier. The fog crept around the corners. I coughed but kept fighting it, and in a few moments, Sienna was spent.

  She ducked behind a couch to give herself time to recharge, but I didn’t have a second to spare. Her vampire boyfriend had managed to get away from Brendan, and the blade glinted an instant before he brought it down. I dove out of the way and spun back to face him.

  “Where did he get a sword?” I snapped at Brendan.

  Brendan growled and pounced again, and I winced as the blade sliced through Brendan’s thick fur. A drop of blood fell to the floor, and the vampire smeared it with his foot as he stepped toward the giant werewolf body.