Midnight's Daughter(96)
It was good to see that my luck was holding true.
A stream of dirty water flowed out of the pipe directly onto the mage, temporarily blinding him. I let go of the pipe and hit the ground, close enough to the man to get my arms around his waist. A dark shadow fell over the courtyard as the leader spread huge, leathery wings; then it was on top of us, its weight and momentum sending us crashing to the ground. I waited until I heard the mage’s scream when the talons latched on to him, then scrambled out from underneath and bolted for the entryway.
Chapter Twenty-two
The heavy wooden front door was hanging off its hinges, letting in a flood of light, but there was no one to see. Bodies had fallen everywhere, but a quick survey told me that none were Louis-Cesare or Radu. The sounds of a sword fight echoed distantly.
My foot slipped in something, in someone, but I kept my balance and followed the sounds of metal on metal. The long, polished oak table in the dining room bore muddy boot prints, but it, too, was empty. Behind me, I heard the scuffle of claws on tile and glanced back in time to see the leader’s head stick in through the door. I didn’t think its body would make it through the narrow arch, but I didn’t intend to wait around and find out.
Beyond the dining room lay a library, with tall windows on one wall and a floor-to-ceiling collection of books on the others. Weirdly, it looked almost untouched, the only damage a vase of flowers that had been knocked off a small table. I skirted the mess and went through to the next room, which I did recognize: the small antechamber leading down to the wine cellars.
Shit.
I peered down the stairwell. It gaped up at me like a maw. I really hate dark staircases, and this one had no light at all. I remembered that we’d dined by lantern light; maybe Radu had never had electricity run down there. Great, just freaking wonderful.
A crash behind me made me turn in time to see a huge, birdlike body topple over the library table and crush the fallen vase to splinters. Okay, there were things I hated more than the dark—like the things that prowl in it. I practically leapt down the stairs, slamming the door shut behind me.
The stone was cool beneath my bruised feet, and almost total darkness closed around me, sinking into my bones. I couldn’t see anything while my eyes adjusted, but the stairs were evenly spaced and they went only one place—to the small wine-tasting room where we’d dined. Here, a few oil lamps burned, illuminating the room’s only occupants: the hundreds of bottles that lay on their sides, many broken, leaking Radu’s label all over the stones until I couldn’t tell by sight what was wine and what was blood. I jumped up on the tabletop to get to the other side of the room without lacerating my feet. Behind me, the door at the top of the stairs burst open with the crack of splintering wood. I rapidly pushed on toward the sound of the fight, loud enough now that I knew I had to be close.
There was only one door in the room besides the one I’d just come through. I took it and found a stone corridor lined with barrels. It led, presumably, to the winery next door. The only light came from a far door at the end, which was standing wide open, and the faint glow behind me. Halfway down the rows, Caedmon, still wearing Mircea’s face, battled Drac.
I started forward, so relieved I was almost sick, and fell over something. Or, more accurately, someone. Vivid turquoise eyes met mine, and I breathed in the faint scent of salt and ozone. “Radu.”
“Dorina…”
A rustle of wings reminded me of what was behind me. I grabbed Radu and rolled to the side, putting a large barrel between us and the door. I was pretty sure the leader couldn’t break through solid stone walls, but it might be able to squeeze through the opening.
“A weapon,” I hissed, searching Radu’s body. The only thing I encountered was blood, and the seeping warmth told me that at least some of it was his. “Don’t you have anything?” I demanded, peering over the barrel. The half-breed appeared to be caught in the doorway, but I wasn’t buying it. The one at the top of the stairs was no wider, and it had made it through that. And there had been more than enough intelligence in those yellow green eyes to think up a way to lure me out from behind the protection of the barrel.
A knife was slipped into my hand. It was a lot shorter than I would have liked, but better than nothing. “Stay here,” I said. “I may be a few minutes.”
The leader screeched as I reemerged, loud enough to reverberate off the stone in an eardrum-rupturing echo. I ignored the theatrics and darted out into the hall. It was clear; Drac and Caedmon must have taken the fight into the winery.
As soon as I was in the open, the creature tore loose from the door and came at me in a whirl of claws and wings. I felt a line of fire splash across my arm from that wicked beak; then the tail caught me in the gut and knocked me back against the stone wall, rattling every bone in my body. Before I could move, the creature was on me, a low, ugly sound of fierce delight echoing around us. I lashed out with the knife, almost blindly, and by sheer luck the blow connected. A dark rain splattered my face, blood-warm and slick as engine oil, and I twisted away.
As the impossibly graceful shape flowed upward to the ceiling, I realized that the damn Fey wine hadn’t worn off completely. In a moment of sickening disorientation, I felt the touch of an alien hunger. I could hear it in my mind, half-human thoughts through a haze of fury. Rend, pierce, kill. Hot blood spraying, teeth closing on something weak and soft… tearing the underbelly, where the slickest, thickest taste resides… violet looping entrails and wet sacks of meat, so sweet…