Page 120 of Winterfall Destiny

Vamps pass where we stand, and a tall guy walks towards us. Instantly, Jamie's hand slips into mine. Young and beautiful looking, he'd captivate the human Maeve from the past, but here that beauty's eaten away by his sour energy. He pauses to rake a disinterested look between the two of us, although lingering more on my face.

The sleek-haired girl beside him regards us with scorn. "The witches are over there," she says.

"What's left of them, anyway," adds her companion.

His sardonic grin unnerves me as they pass. Almost everybody in this room is hemia. Why?

I subtly watch the pair walk away into the darkened tunnel.

"What did the vamp mean?" asks Jamie.

"There're only four witches in the room," I reply. "I spotted them standing away from the other recruits."

"I hope Tobias gets something from that guy's mind and quickly," Jamie says, looking to where I tip my head to indicate the witches.

Although Tobias painted a picture of the army Natalie spoke about, I couldn't picture large numbers crammed into the catacombs. Then I walked in and discovered the vastness of this disorientating and disturbing subterranean world. I'd imagined a dozen or two, but the supes in this room aren't even the full number.

Which part of the catacombs does the tunnel beside us lead to? Another living area? I'd counted on our group only facing recruits in the main room. How many more fill the Dominion labyrinth?

"Let's talk to the witches," I say, and Jamie's eyes go wide. "We should intermingle, not hang around on the edges, suspiciously. Art didn't recognise any of us, even now he's seen the guys up close."

"I'm completely stunned that nobody knows who we are," says Jamie. "It's crazy that Gabriella doesn't have a most wanted, especially as we're intending to kill her."

"Gabriella doesn't want to admit a weakness," I say. "That's why she isn't telling her lower-level people about us." I turn to the side slightly as another couple of hemia pass. "If Gabriella only possesses limited blood, she'd waste that if her new followers died—because they would if she pitted them against us. Gabriella needs plenty of recruits for this ritual."

Why? For protection? As part of the ritual—sacrifices or something worse? Is there something worse?

"But Gabriella knows that Dorian's found and killed kids she's recruited, and that he'd tell us," says Jamie. "That we'd search for more and stop her plans."

"Tobias insists he's not walking out of the catacombs until we've discovered what this ritual is, or when and where," I say in determination, even though my stomach flutters with doubt.

He won't get that information easily if the recruits don't know. Does Art?

As I shift my attention to the room, Andrei catches my eye. He's difficult to see beneath the hood, but I'm disturbed by his stillness and focus on me above all else. Why isn't he with Tobias?

I'd take Jamie's hand, but few around us touch, as if nobody wants to demonstrate that they're connected. The 'every person for themselves' aura dominates—something not useful for an army.

Are they an army or something else?

We approach the witches grouped in the corner—two guys and two girls. My nerves unfurl when I don't recognise any of them. Not all supe kids attend Nightworld academies, and the ones that the Confederacy exclude make good prospects for the Dominion. But why so few witches when they're central to the Dominion, even now after all the Blackwoods died? I bite my lip. One of two reasons: witches dissuade others from joining or there's something different about the witch kids who the Dominion single out and recruit.

I linger next to Jamie, eyes down and playing with my nails as a nervous new girl, not wanting to meet anybody's eyes yet. Even when keeping myself at a distance, I'm hyperconscious someone will recognise me.

As Jamie introduces himself as Adam, and me as Nicole, I gauge their mental strength. Witches are more likely to detect a mind invasion, and I pull back straightaway. Each of the witch's potency hits me after just one brush of their mind.

These kids huddle together, alert against everybody, not only us. Finding answers won't be easy with mental shields like theirs. Still, if nobody knows 'Maeve', they'll only notice a witch with a stronger aura than most, and a mental barrier to match—the type that the Dominion would recruit.

One of the group sits on the floor, a girl with curly hair and freckled cheeks who watches silently, knees drawn tightly to her chest. Another girl with straight brown hair and a pretty face stands beside her, hands in the pockets of her green cargo pants.

Are any of them Confederacy? I glance around. Is anybody in here a spy besides us?

"You'll regret joining," says a short, stocky guy, without sharing his name. "If you can leave, go now."

"Why would we do that?" asks Jamie. "I aspire to be part of the new future."

The girl on the floor snorts to herself but says nothing.

"How many witches do you see around you?" asks the girl beside her softly, then before he can answer she adds, "Not many."

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