A Blood Seduction (Vamp City #1)(64)

Not the Games. Was there ever a kid less suited to violence than her brother? He had height, but little muscle, and had never been into sports or skateboarding or anything physical. He'd always been a mind kid - video games, computer games, school. He was a great student with a quick, agile brain. And now they were going to put him in an arena and order him to fight to the death.

The cold seeped from her blood into her flesh and down into her organs, a debilitating frost that threatened to strip her of her ability to think, to act.

She turned to Grant. "Tell me how to find the gladiator camp."

"Not until you've fulfilled your part of the bargain."

She blinked. "Not until I've freed all these people?"

"Yes."

Her temper flared. "Do you have any idea how long it can take for the sunbeams to appear? It took me six days . . . six days . . . to get back in after I escaped." From the moment she'd first arrived in this place, she'd been chained, enslaved, ordered about, and punished . . . by vampires. She'd be damned if she was taking it from a slave, too. She closed the distance between them, eyes shooting fire as she got in his face. "We're doing it my way this time. You tell me where the gladiator camp is, and we'll start in that direction, hunting sunbeams as we go. But the Games are in two days. Zack will be dead in two days. Two days that aren't likely to matter one bit to your buddies here."

But Grant wasn't one to be cowed, especially by a sorceress who couldn't find, let alone control, her power. Blue eyes flashed with a temper equal to her own. "You do realize you're not getting out of here without a guide."

Quinn straightened, folding her arms across her chest. "Then it looks like we have a stalemate." She frowned as the implication of his demands hit her for the first time. "Or a trap."

It was his turn to frown. "A trap?"

"If Vamp City's magic fails, you die. Are you convinced I don't have the power to renew it? Is that it?"

"I have no idea what kind of power you possess." But he looked away as he said it, making her think he knew precisely. Making her think, too, that he was a lousy liar.

"If I escape Vamp City with my brother, I'll never be back. You know it, and I know it. So either you think I'm going to be of no use in helping you renew the magic, or you don't think I'll ever escape. Which is it, Grant? Am I powerless, or are you planning for me to be captured once I help your friends?"

He scratched his jaw absently, studying her with those blue, blue eyes. "I have no plan for you to be captured. Escape Vamp City with my blessing." So he did think she was powerless. Or he was just one more liar.

"Where's the gladiator camp?" she persisted.

A muscle leaped in his jaw, but he told her. "Approximately H Street and North Capitol."

That was only a few blocks from Union Station in the real D.C., which wouldn't help her much in this world since she was pretty sure Union Station hadn't been built until long after 1870. Still, she knew the general location. She'd find it.

Quinn met Grant's gaze. "I promise you, I will do everything in my power to see these people free of this place. But my brother is not going to die for it. He comes first. If we run across a sunbeam as we head for the gladiator camp, I'll get them through if I can." She lifted her hands and dropped them again. "You have to understand, I don't know how the sunbeams work. I don't know if I can send them through without going with them. And I can't risk leaving Vamp City and not being able to return for a week, again. But, I'll do everything I can to get them out of here."

The woman, Celeste, moved beside Grant, eyeing Quinn with eyes bright with hope. "I can live with that."

"Me, too," the dark-skinned man said. "If I can help free your brother, I'm down with that, too."

She nodded, then swallowed as she remembered Lily. She didn't even know if the girl was in Vamp City, though her pen's lying on the sidewalk precisely where the worlds collided made it more than likely. Still, how was she supposed to find her, let alone free her? How, for that matter, was she supposed to free Zack from the gladiator camp? Her odds of accomplishing any of it were practically nonexistent.

For one dark moment, the weight of those impossible odds threatened to crush her, stealing her breath, her hope. Leaving either Zack or Lily behind was not an option. Yet how would she ever save them both when twice she'd found her freedom within this world devastatingly short-lived?

Celeste walked over and took Quinn's hand. "Thank you. Bless you. You're the only hope we have."

The dark-skinned man joined her. "Yes, thank you, sorceress. We'll be forever in your debt."

Quinn felt that terrible weight lift slightly, enough for her to take a deep, unsteady breath. "Okay. Who's leading us out of here?"

A guy with a stylishly shaggy haircut and silver reflective glasses unfolded himself from the back wall of the cave. "I'm your guide. Grab your packs and your stakes, boys and girls." He turned and slammed his palm against the wall beside him, and yet another door opened in the stone. "We're going home."

She would never get used to this place.

Grant kissed Celeste's cheek. "Be happy." As she hurried to join the others filing through that back door, Grant turned to Quinn, his gaze probing, his expression enigmatic.