"We will be fine. I remember."

"Ready?" Mikjall's voice questioned from behind us.

"Yes, come outside. It will be easier if I don't have to blur through the house." I jogged out of the room and through the kitchen door, took the porch steps two at a time, and waited for the others to join me.

The night air was warming slightly. The soft glow of sunrise was turning the horizon just a shade warmer than the sparkling midnight blue that stretched over our head now. The stars were fading. Soon they would be invisible again as the sun rose and its light bathed the land.

The door slammed open and shut several times. Heavy footsteps pounded on the rickety old porch. Soon I was surrounded. Bailey stood next to Jesse. She was so young Erick wouldn't let her carry two people for the trip. It was probably a wise choice. Beside Erick stood Malachi and Garrett. To my right, Mikjall stood behind Riza, who clutched her baby so tightly her knuckles were turning white.

"I promise it won't last long," I said, trying to give the small woman a little rea.s.surance. "Let's do this."

Bailey and Erick gave a nod. We each grabbed our pa.s.sengers and leapt into a run toward the forest. Minutes later, we emerged on the bank of the Mississippi. One more leap and we would almost be there. I took it first, panting as I carried the very uneven weight of a Kitsune in one arm and Drakonae in the other.

I lunged forward, landing on the western bank a half dozen feet from the water's edge. A few running steps led into a vertical leap that cleared the wire fence.

The ground sped toward us. I made sure to lift them high so my legs could take the brunt of the landing. My ankle snapped, and I screamed through the pain, refusing to let either of them hit the ground.

"Eira!"

I released Riza, and she stepped away with the baby. Mikjall knelt beside me on the ground. The smell of his blood filled the air, and I turned to him, gritting my teeth through the pain of my body knitting together the broken bones.

Bailey and Erick landed a few feet away with the others only a few moments later.

My fangs descended, and I nearly bit into Mikjall's exposed forearm.

His hand encircled my throat and pointed my mouth up, so that the blood from the cut he'd made dripped into my mouth. A few minutes later, he released me.

I stood next to him, catching his arm when he swayed uneasily. "You gave too much, you big oaf," I whispered.

He chuckled, something I'd never seen him do before.

"Thank you, though. It would've taken precious time for my leg to heal without your blood," I said, knowing he was hurting from losing so much blood in one night.

He nodded. Riza took my place at his arm and helped him walk away.

"Eira, are you okay?" Erick asked, pointing his pa.s.sengers toward the tent where I knew Killian was resting. I could still smell him, and I recognized his heart's pattern.

"I am now. We have to hurry." The sky was half lit with the sunrise. Darkness had left us. Our people were more vulnerable now. As well as us. We could move more freely in the dark. And there were fewer people to see under the cover of night. The roads we'd used would be filled with cars now -morning commuters.

Chapter Thirty-Three.

EIRA.

Erick's hand touched my shoulder, cautioning me from moving forward. I turned and surveyed the camp before me again, noticing a guard to my left across the field. He was hidden away in a tree blind.

"I'll take him," Erick whispered, his voice barely at a decibel I could hear. "Those are yours." He pointed to the two guards half-dozing to my right. "Bailey stay where you are until we clear the area."

She nodded and crouched lower.

He blurred away first. The snap of the guard's neck was the only distinguishing sound that could be heard from the tree. The guards to my right hadn't even noticed.

I moved next, running as I drew Dragonbreath from my back. They never saw me coming.

None of the soldiers did.

We moved stealthily through the outer guards and closer to the panicked center of their command. They knew vampires were hunting them. But their fear made them stupid and careless. We picked them off one by one. Blurring through, grabbing them, and carrying them off to the edge of camp where no one was watching anymore, we fed until we had enough and then raced for the lake house.

I stopped at the edge of the forest and gasped for breath I did not need. The house was gone. Nothing more than a burning pile of rubble. I sniffed the air. The smell of explosives was acrid and thick in the air, but I couldn't detect any human or diesel fuel. No trucks. Where were the soldiers?

Erick and Bailey came to a stop next to me. We stood in the shadow of the trees and stared in disbelief together.

Had they escaped? Were they captured?

The howl of a wolf sounded from across the field.

"Someone made it!" I ran, staying with the line of trees. A moment later, the thwack thwack of a helicopter beat the air above me, and shots rang through the trees, pounding into the branches above my head.

f.u.c.k! I blurred in short spurts, hoping to keep their attention and draw them away from where I'd heard the wolf. The last thing I needed to do was lead them to our survivors. Bailey and Erick were still in the clear. They could move without detection as long as I went slow enough to keep their fire aimed at me.

The hiss of a missile made the hair on my neck stand on end. I leaped to the right and blurred a hundred yard away, disappearing from their view. The explosion behind me sent shards of trees flying like spears of death. I could only pray none had hit a target.

I peered around the trunk of the large tree I'd hidden behind and came eye to eye with a piece of wood the size of my arm impaled into its trunk. Shaking off the close call, I peered through the branches and listened as the chopper circled, trying to detect my location.

"We have them." Erick's voice cut through the din of the helicopter above my head. "Run."

"All four!" I shouted.

"They didn't all make it out!"

d.a.m.n it!

"Run, Eira!" Erick's voice thundered. A human would barely have heard him over the roar of the engine, but I heard him like he was standing next to me shouting into my ear.

"I'm going," I shouted again before jumping into a ground-eating run.

The brightening landscape rushed past me. Roads. Cars. Trees.

Thirst burned in the pit of my stomach. I could feel it creeping up, growing stronger and stronger until all I could see was the beat of life surrounding me. Heartbeats of the people in the cars I was pa.s.sing. Heartbeats of the animals in the forest as I blurred past.

When we arrived at Vicksburg, all three of us would be ravenous. We had all been prepared to feed some from Alek. I needed to reach the Army base first. They had to be prepared.

I pushed myself harder, using every reserve of energy I could muster. I leaped the Mississippi and then the fence.

"Jared!" I stood from my crouched landing place. My vision was red, and I licked my lips as a soldier rushed past me a few yards away. His heart raced as fear blossomed like an orchid in his mind.

Two thuds behind me signaled that time was up. They were here.

Erick released Alek and growled for him to run.

Bailey was carrying Lisa, one of the Lycans.

That was it. No more? Only two? The guilt of losing more friends cut through the devouring thirst that drowned out my reason. I had failed them a second time.

A scream roared from my throat as I fell to my knees. The thirst and the pain of my guilt overwhelmed me. Jared's scent filled my nostrils, and I fought not to attack him as he knelt beside me.

"Drink this, Eira."

He held a plastic cup to my lips, and I sipped the warm, thick liquid. Blood. His blood. I hadn't had the blood of a Phoenix before. It was spicy and rich and filled with magick. Just what I needed to regain control of my lucidity. As I downed more, my faculties returned, and my vision went back to normal. My fangs retracted, and I sat up next to him on the ground.

His body sank down beside mine, tension flowing from his muscles.

"Thank you," I mumbled as I finished off the last few drops from the cup.

I turned to meet Alek's gla.s.sy stare. He was sitting in the gra.s.s a few feet away. Lisa had disappeared. Erick and Bailey were leaning against each other, both sipping from a red plastic cup like the one Jared had brought me.

"Only two?" I waited for a response from the Gryphon.

He blinked and then met my gaze. "When I heard the missile, I barely had time to grab Lisa as I threw myself out the bay window. If she hadn't been sitting there at the table with me, I would've been the only one. Even so, the blast would've killed her had I not wrapped her in my wings."

I sighed and took in his appearance a little more carefully. His face and hands were blackened with soot. His hair was singed, and his clothes were burned in several places.

"I'm sorry. It's just hard. We ran s-so h-hard," I choked. Tears poured down my cheeks. I'd lost them. So many friends. So many I'd called family. Just gone. For no reason other than hate.

"Eira." Killian's voice called to my heart, and I gazed up into his gla.s.sy blue eyes.

"They're gone," I sobbed.

He exchanged places with Alek, and I crawled into his arms. Tucked into his embrace, I sobbed as he rocked me, telling me how proud he was of me. How what I'd done was amazing. And that I couldn't blame myself for any of their deaths. That I'd done everything in my power to save everyone.

The words didn't help, but the tears eventually slowed. The pain tearing at my heart would be there for years. Charlie had lost her parents and more than half the pack.

Killian hands ran soothingly through my hair. He tugged the hair-tie loose, and my long tresses fell down in a silky wave. Cradling the back of my head against his chest, he worked his fingers into the knots in my tense shoulders.

I allowed my eyes to close. It wasn't that I needed sleep, but just to shut out the other things around me. I focused on his heartbeat. On the sounds of air leaving and entering his lungs. On the spicy smell of his skin.

Through all of this, the fates had allowed me to keep him. No gift could be more precious than that.

"They have a van ready for us. We need to leave." Charlie's voice roused me from my haze. She was speaking to Erick and Bailey across the yard.

I took a deep breath and cleared my mind. Time to press forward. Time to turn off my grief and protect those that still lived. The dead were at peace. Those of us who remained still needed to reach home safely.

Leaning into my mate's embrace, I cupped Killian's face and pulled his mouth to meet mine. The sweet taste of his lips was heaven, and I drank him in.

He swept his tongue into my mouth, and I wrapped my arms around his neck, hugging him even tighter.

"I love you," he whispered against my lips.

"I love you, too."

"We have to go," he said.

"I know."

Chapter Thirty-Four.

KILLIAN.

I climbed into the fifteen-pa.s.senger van Park found for our group. I'd told him we'd leave it in Ada at the courthouse for someone to pick up. Erick had already called ahead, on what I'd found out were enchanted cell phones, and Harrison Bateman was standing by with a bus that would take us the rest of the way to Sanctuary.

Eira settled into the seat next to me, and a Lycan named Lisa took the seat on my other side. Alek climbed into the driver's seat, and Mikjall closed the side door after helping Riza onto the front bench. Park had even miraculously produced an infant ca.r.s.eat to go along with the van. Way to go, buddy.

"Alek, you sure you're good to drive?" Jared asked, latching the front pa.s.senger seatbelt into place.

"Yep," the big Gryphon answered. "Let's get home, shall we? I, for one, have had quite enough."

A resounding chorus of agreement echoed from the other pa.s.sengers as he put the van into drive and left the Army compound at Vicksburg behind. Park had thanked Eira, Erick, and Bailey profusely for their help eliminating half of the force across the river. In a day or so, they'd have the SECR high-tailing it back to Savannah with their tails between their legs. Of course he'd also tried to convince all four of us to stay behind and enlist, to which we had all politely declined.

The miles of road whipped by. I dozed with Eira leaning against my chest. Until now I hadn't really let myself relax.

I shifted in my seat, moving so that the sheath of my sword didn't dig into my shoulder blade quite so much. Neither of us had been willing to disarm when we boarded. The last thing a soldier wanted to do was search for his weapon if something caught him by surprise.

But the hours stretched on quietly, just like the highways. We didn't encounter a single hiccup the whole way.

As we pulled into the courthouse parking lot in Ada, I glanced down at the watch on my wrist. 2:30pm. We'd made excellent time. Other than my stomach being tied in knots from not having eaten the entire day, I was feeling pretty good. More than ready to climb out of the cramped van and stretch my legs.

Mikjall opened the side door, climbed out, and then helped Riza out with the baby seat. I followed Lisa out, and Eira hopped out beside me as I stretched my arms and rolled my neck until at least a couple of vertebrae cracked loudly.

The group moved slowly. We were all tired. The s.p.a.cious pa.s.senger bus was a welcome change to the cramped and crowded van. I'd never liked vans, and this experience had only reaffirmed that dislike.

Harrison came around the front of the bus and waved. Charlie ran to embrace him. Travis and Garrett were hot on her heels.

"They really are both hooked on her, aren't they?"

Eira glanced up and smiled a slow, quiet smile. Not an I'm-so-happy-for-my-friend-I-could-burst, but more of an I'm-glad-they-are-alive-and-have-a-chance-to-be-together smile.

I knew vampires didn't sleep, but Eira, Erick, and Bailey were in desperate need of at least a long power-nap. Dark circles stained the skin beneath their jewel blue eyes. Their skin was paler than usual, and they moved lethargically, as if every step was an effort.