Bright Blaze of Magic (Black Blade, #3)(40)
So I’d pulled all the furniture back out and put it right back where it had been before, as though I was still living here. Then I’d gone the extra step of bringing in the food, water, and other supplies, just in case my friends and I might need them some night.
Like tonight.
Devon looked around. “You’ve been busy.”
I shrugged. “I wanted to put the weapons somewhere a little safer than a tree in the woods. Who would ever think to look for black blades in a library basement?”
Felix shook his head. “Not me, that’s for sure.”
Oscar flew up out of my coat pocket and hovered in midair in front of the metal rack. “I knew that you couldn’t be eating all those bags of bacon-flavored beef jerky by yourself. I knew it!” He zipped back over to me. “You were stockpiling them, weren’t you? Telling me that you were hungry and asking me to grab them from the mansion kitchen when you planned on bringing them down here the whole time.”
“I did eat some of them.” I grinned. “They are bacon-flavored, after all.”
Oscar huffed, but a small smile lifted his lips.
“I can’t decide if you’re supersmart or superparanoid to have brought all this stuff down here,” Deah said. “I’m going to go with both.”
“Both is probably right, but I’ll take that as a compliment. Anyway, we should clean up and then try to get some rest. It’s been a long night, and tomorrow . . .”
My voice trailed off, but I didn’t have to finish my sentence. We all realized that we didn’t know what was going to happen tomorrow. The light mood vanished and everyone quieted down again.
I handed out the extra clothes I’d stored down here, then led the others back upstairs and showed them where the restrooms were. It wasn’t as good as taking a long, hot shower, but we cleaned the blood, dirt, and grime off ourselves as best we could. I even stopped up a sink in the men’s restroom and filled it up with water so Oscar and Tiny could take a bath.
When we were mostly clean, we headed back downstairs to the basement to try to get some sleep. Devon and Felix took the air mattress on the floor, while Deah and I curled up on the cots. Oscar used some of the extra clothes to make a bed for himself and Tiny, right next to the bags of bacon-flavored beef jerky on one of the metal racks.
Once everyone was settled down, I ran my fingers over the touch lamp, casting the basement into darkness. One by one, the others drifted off to sleep, their breaths growing deep and even, but I lay on my cot, staring up at the cracks that zigzagged through the ceiling, replaying tonight over and over again in my mind, wondering what I could have possibly done that would have saved everyone at the restaurant and the mansion from Victor. Even though I’d known that it was coming, he’d still attacked my friends, my Family, and I had failed to save the people I cared about.
Just as I’d failed to save my mom four years ago.
My hand curled around the Sinclair cuff on my right wrist, my fingers tracing over the small sapphire star embedded in the metal. The sharp points of the star pricked my skin, but the sensation soothed me because it told me that I was still alive and that I still had a chance to save my friends.
I’d kept Devon, Felix, Deah, Oscar, and Tiny safe, and I was going to make sure they stayed that way. In the morning, I would start figuring out how to find and rescue Mo, Claudia, and the rest of the captured Sinclairs.
And Victor . . . I was going to find some way to defeat him, to finally make him pay for all the horrible things he’d done to me, my mom, and my friends.
I wouldn’t fail them again—no matter what.
My promise complete, I dropped my hand from the cuff, turned over onto my side, and finally let myself drift off to sleep.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“Ouch!”
A sharp bang, followed by that whispered word, made my eyes snap open sometime the next morning.
Had the Draconis found us after all? Were Victor and Blake here, ready to finish what they’d started at the restaurant last night? I lay still on my cot, although my hand had already wrapped around my mom’s sword, which I’d slid under my pillow. My fingers curled around the hilt and my entire body tensed as I readied myself to leap up and start swinging the weapon at anyone who came near me.
“Be quiet!” another voice hissed. “Lila’s still asleep!”
I knew those voices and I relaxed as I realized what was happening. Devon and Felix were trying to quietly get up but not having any success at it, since the basement was still pitch-black. I looked over at the clock sitting on the table in the corner. Just before noon. We’d been down here for almost twelve hours. I scrubbed my hands over my face. I felt like I could sleep for twelve more hours, but I couldn’t afford to stay in bed any longer. Not if we wanted to get to Mo, Claudia, and the others in time.
So I reached over and hit the touch lamp with my fingers, flooding the basement with light. Devon and Felix froze at the bottom of the steps, while Deah let out a low groan, rolled away from the light, and pulled her blanket up over her head. On their shelf on the metal rack, Oscar and Tiny didn’t move or stir at all, both of them still snoring in chorus, like a low drumbeat running through one of the pixie’s beloved country songs.
“What do you think you’re doing?” I asked, my voice thick with sleep.
The guys exchanged a guilty look, but they both turned to face me.