A World of New (A Shade of Vampire, #26)(6)

Thus, I instructed the dragons to continue forging ahead to The Woodlands.





Grace





The Woodlands was so densely populated by trees, I feared we might not even be able to spot the IBSI’s buildings from above. But thanks to a high pole rising through the treetops—perhaps some kind of power or communication pole—we didn’t have difficulty. Then we caught the glinting of fluorescent lighting through the treetops’ foliage. We had arrived.

“We ought not descend too low,” Derek said, “lest they’ve installed more sensitive alarms.”

“Our first protocol will remain the same as regular missions, of course,” my father said, sitting behind me with my mother—all of us atop Tyron. “And what is that, Grace?” he asked me.

“Rescue any humans or other innocents,” I replied.

“Exactly,” my father said. “Lucas and Kailyn,”— he looked to the fae who were now hovering in the air—“you’ll come with me to do the initial scoping out, I assume.”

“Of course,” Kailyn said.

My father slid off Tyron, leaving my mother and me on the dragon’s back, while he, Kailyn and Lucas gathered together and thinned themselves.

I wished at times like this that I had the ability to fly and thin myself like my father did. I would be far more useful on these missions.

The trio descended on the treetops and disappeared through the leaves. We waited in tense silence, listening and hoping that they would not take too long, that they would meet with no obstacles on the way.

I doubted anything would happen to them, being creatures that the hunters had still had little chance to study, but one never could be too sure with these people. There was an unsettling mystery to their operations, many things about their technology still did not make sense to us.

I released a sigh of relief as, about half an hour later, the trio returned. As they arrived at our level, my father said, “We searched the buildings. Found no humans—or other innocent creatures. Just hunters and an enormous basement of their mutants. They also have a wide clearing around the back of the buildings where they keep the beasts. Hundreds and hundreds of them.”

They must’ve slowly but surely transported them all through the portal from their base in the Philippines.

Derek paused, his eyes settling on the quiet compound beneath us. “All right,” he said in a deep voice. “Then let us begin.”

Everyone among us who could hover—namely the witches, fae and the jinn—remained in the air, while the rest of us remained in our positions. The fae began rummaging through our supplies of weapons, gathering explosives, while the witches and jinn worked on creating a sturdy shield beneath us to protect us from any retaliation we might receive from the ground.

And then the first bomb was dropped. It shattered the peace of the woods, followed immediately by strangled cries and screeching. Hunters and mutants. I found it rather ironic that these explosives had been provided to us by the US government.

By the time the fae had rained down three in quick succession, the entire compound was a storm of fire and smoke. But we had only just begun.

The dragons began descending. I steeled myself as they each took a deep, sucking breath before shooting out torrents of deadly flames directly toward the buildings.

I couldn’t help but feel that this might be overkill.

If the place had been smoldering before, now it was absolutely blazing. There was certainly no need for me to assist in spreading the fire further.

Becoming bolder, Tyron dipped lower, moving toward the back side of the compound where less fire had spread. I could make out a group of eight hunters who had not been caught up in the explosions and fire—I guessed they had not been in the buildings—racing toward the fence. Tyron quickly quelled their attempts, engulfing them in a billow of fire.

Exploring the back side of the compound further, we discovered what my father had been talking about: the vast crowd of mutants. They were chained to the bases of trees.

“Another dragon over here,” Tyron bellowed. Ridan headed our way. Riding upon him were my grandparents, Derek and Sofia.

The two dragons doused the mass of mutants with fire. I knew these creatures to be resilient to heat, but not to the sort of heat that the dragons were breathing down. They would be scorched to a crisp.

I was not bloodthirsty by nature. As brutal as these mutants were, all of this was hard to watch. Especially since the mutants had been chained and unable to fight back or flee. I had to recall the words my father had spoken earlier about how some evils simply needed to be eradicated.

These hunters and their mutants, although they posed as protectors, were evil. Devils in disguise.

As my eyes roamed the scorched backyard, I noticed something odd in a far corner that was as yet untouched by flames—a dark rectangular shape etched into the soil.

“What is that over there?” I yelled through the chaos. I squinted through the smoke. A ceiling?

I directed the dragons toward the shape. As they touched down on the ground, I realized that it was indeed a ceiling. A tinted glass ceiling to some kind of underground room.

My mother, grandparents and I slid off the dragons.

“We need a couple of witches or jinn over here!” Derek shouted.

Mona manifested beside us a few seconds later along with Shayla.