Page 141 of Tin God

Alone on the bridge, Ben speared through the air, ignoring the bullets that hit his body, shoved the guards blocking Paulson with a battering wind as he reached his hands out to grip Henri Paulson around the throat.

Ben’s hands closed around the vampire’s neck for only a moment before the guards pulled him away, one swinging a knife down toward his neck.

Ben swung his sword arm up, and the gladius sliced off the arm of the vampire, making the guard scream and the knife clatter to the floor.

He felt another blade hit his ankle, but he ignored the bite of pain.

More bullets hit his side, but none of them even came close to his spine.

Ben felt a deep slice along the small of his back, caught the scent of his own blood spraying the air, and time suddenly seemed to slow.

The black wind came to Ben in the scent of his own blood. It was a whisper in the darkness, wrapping around him like a shield as his vision went dark.

Ben closed his eyes and saw the room around him, the dead matter of the machinery mixed with the living elements of air and flesh and blood. The gold mist of matter woven through with silver mist of the water in the air, the flesh, the red threads of energy that hummed through the human-made machinery that surrounded them, all glowing against the wash of rain against glass.

And through it all, the darkness, the darkness in everything.

The precious space between.

Ben reached for the darkness that belonged to him and gathered it in, pulling it into himself, swallowing the emptiness like heated wine, gripping it in his fist and pulling hard until the gold compressed into a solid mass that fell like lead to the floor.

He expanded, his element stretching the borders of his physical form until he felt as if all the space in the metal-wrapped compartment was his to command. The air answered him, whispering that it had been waiting. That it was glad to be seen.

That it would serve him.

Ben opened his eyes and saw Henri Paulson frozen in front of him, his eyes darting from the crumpled lumps of flesh and blood that were barely recognizable as the guards who had made up his personal retinue.

Mangled steel, flesh, and fluid coated the ground, and Paulson had to steady himself on the control panel as he started to slip.

“What are you?” The vampire didn’t sound afraid.

He sounded fascinated.

“I’m Ben Vecchio. And you’re Henri Paulson.”

The vampire’s eyes lit up. “You’re remarkable. I will make you rich beyond your dreams.”

Ben frowned. Did this vampire think everyone was for sale?

“No, thanks.” Ben inhaled, and the air was thick with a blood mist that entered his lungs and fed his amnis. “I’m good.”

He drew his sword back and swung, slicing the billionaire’s head from his body in one clean cut.

Henri Paulson’s disembodied head thunked against what remained of the glass windows and fell to the ground, rolling into a messy mass of flesh that had once been a water vampire. Guns, swords, and daggers sloshed in the bloodstained water that flooded the bridge, turning it into nothing less than a scene of elemental carnage.

Ben flew back, desperate to hide the evidence of his violence before Jennie’s people saw what he had done.

He was not ready for questions about his power.

He surveyed the battle on deck, but it was clear that Jennie and her pink-glow-stick army had taken control of theNautilus, so he gathered his bursting energy and brought a violent whirlwind to tear into the elevated bridge, sweeping away the machinery, the bodies, the weapons, and what was left of Henri Paulson into the ocean.

Jennie looked up and shouted at Ben, but he couldn’t hear her.

All he could feel was a burning pain on his skin.

ChapterThirty-Six

Brigid saw Tenzin curled into a ball in the corner of the room, but she couldn’t focus on her. She knew the vampire would survive. That was what Tenzin did; it was what Brigid did.

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