Page 59 of Priest

“I promise.” Priest pulled away and narrowed his dark gaze on Azriel. “If anything happens to him, I will have your head.”

Azriel didn’t argue. He just nodded and placed a hand on Oliver’s shoulder. “See you soon.”

The rest of Alpha Team were gone in a blur, and Oliver felt like the wind had been knocked out of him. He turned helpless eyes on his friend as insecurity took over. “I can’t teleport. I barely got control of my tracking ability before we came here.”

Azriel took his hand gently. “Then follow my lead. Let your instincts guide you.”

Oliver was shaking, but the longer Azriel touched him, the more he could feel it. The pull—not to just anywhere, but to Poe.

“Yes. Search for him. Find him,” Azriel murmured.

Something warm rushed through him, then the feeling in his stomach like a massive hook trying to pull him somewhere. Instead of fighting it, instead of trying to study it, Oliver simply gave himself over. There was a rushing sensation and total darkness.

And then, he was there.

Oliver came to in the midst of screaming and gunfire. His ears immediately began to ring, and he felt something small and sharp whizz past him, but Azriel’s wings enveloped him like a shield. How had it all gone to shit so fast?

“Do you know where he is?” Azriel said, speaking over the cacophony of noise.

Oliver did everything he could to concentrate. For a moment, his mind wandered to Priest, terrified he wasn’t okay, but he had to focus. He closed his eyes and reached out again. For a second, there was nothing. Then…

“Inside. Not too far,” Oliver said. His anxiety was turning into hope, and beyond them, the battle began to quiet. He wasn’t going to drop his guard, but he had a feeling the tides were turning in their favor.

“Let’s go.” Azriel took him and moved faster than Oliver was still capable of going. His feet barely touched the ground as he zipped inside a building with metal walls. It was like a giant warehouse, except inside was a maze of corridors.

There were doorways everywhere and people screaming for help.

“The Bravo Team will get them,” Azriel reminded him. “Where is Poe?”

Oliver began to run, following the invisible thread leading to his brother. It got stronger as they turned a corner, and then it became burning hot before it fizzled into nothing. The lack of sensation almost sent him to his knees, but Azriel was ahead of him, using his brute strength to rip the door off its hinges.

Inside was a bed, several monitors that were no longer connected to anything… and then there was Poe. He was unconscious but breathing, on top of a white sheet. He was thin and looked like he’d recently been drained of all of his blood.

But he was alive. Oliver could sense it.

He brushed past Azriel and grabbed him, yanking his hands back when they touched his icy skin. “Poe,” he whispered. His friend groaned, head lolling to the side, but he didn’t wake up. Oliver looked over his shoulder. “Is he dying? Can you tell?”

Azriel’s face looked broken, shattered, and Oliver wanted to scream. They could not have come this far only to lose him.

“He’s turned,” came a voice from just beyond the doorway. Knight appeared, drenched in blood and dragging a struggling man by the front of his throat. “He also needs to feed. There were three other starving Vampires here.”

Oliver’s stomach twisted as he realized what the man was for. Was his crime worthy of a death sentence?

Knight’s gaze challenged him, and Oliver looked back down to Poe. His lips had parted, dry and cracked around the edges,and Oliver could see his fangs. He was clearly starving, and he knew that would eventually kill him.

But would Poe forgive him for letting him feed?

“It’s your choice,” Knight said, dragging the man closer. He looked Oliver dead in the face. “This one was in charge of the children.”

The children.

Oliver turned his head and threw up half his dinner. He didn’t have time to stop it. Stumbling to the side, Azriel caught him and wrapped him tightly in his wings as Knight took his place. “Sorry,” he gasped, wiping at his mouth. “Sorry I…”

“I know. I know,” Azriel said gently. His voice was clearer now that everything was going very quiet. “The most monstrous creatures that live in this world aren’t the actual monsters in the end. It’s the ones who are given the most and make the choice to do things like this.”

Oliver squeezed his eyes shut and buried his face against Azriel’s chest. His guardian’s arms were warm and comforting. Not the ones he wanted but ones that still protected him. “Is he feeding?”

“He’s feeding,” Azriel said.

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