Page 200 of Golden Eagle

A few hours ago, Alexei would have turned to Dante, searching for support, for an answer, a theory. But that was before Dante had admitted to lying, and betraying. Before he’d decided to act like – tobea tsar. Tsars had to make their own decisions.

“You killed your teacher?” he asked, fighting to keep the fear from his voice.

“He wouldn’t let me leave,” Severin said, nearly pleading. “And I wanted to come and warn you about Gustav. I wanted to help you.”

“Why?”

The boy took a deep breath. “Because I want to understand. I don’t know why you…” The fire in his hand winked out, and he reached up, slow, hesitant, and pressed his fingertips to his lips.Why you kissed me, he didn’t say.

Alexei suppressed a wince.To distract you. To manipulate you. It was nothing. It meant nothing. But those weren’t admissions you made to someone who shot fire from his hands.

“And,” Severin continued, thankfully, “they don’t own me, but they think they do.”

Alexei felt his brows go up. “You know that?”

The boy reached into his pocket and withdrew a folded, crumpled piece of paper. He unfolded it with great care, smoothed out the corners of the pages, and held it out toward Alexei.

Alexei waited a beat, and then took it.

“Be careful with it, please,” Severin said, hushed. “It’s the only thing I have.” The last he said with a wonder that edged toward horror. Like maybe it was just hitting him that he’d killed, and threatened, and escaped the only home he’d ever known, all because Alexei had kissed him and forced his way inside his mind.

Or, well, maybe not theonlyreason. The note brought a new perspective to the situation.

It was the one Will Scarlet had slipped into Severin’s pocket while he stood dazed in the threshold of the security office, a letter written in an elegant hand, signed by Robin of Locksley, Familiar of Richard Plantagenet, telling Severin about his sister, the girl Red, and about the wide world that awaited him beyond the Institute’s chilling white walls.

Alexei held it with only the tips of his fingers, and passed it back as soon as he was done. “I guess this made a big impression.” When Severin frowned at him in clear confusion, he said, “Do you believe what it says in this letter?”

“I know that my sister left. I know – I know there are things they won’t tell me there.Wouldn’ttell me.” Past tense. Whatever his conflicted feelings on leaving – on what he’d done in order to leave – he clearly didn’t plan on going back.

The others had approached, ranged apart from one another, a net slowly closing in on them.

“Care to clue us in?” Nikita called.

Severin whirled.

Before he could question the wisdom in it, Alexei reached out and touched his arm. “Wait. They’re my friends.”

Friends. The word came automatically.

“Easy, bud,” Lanny said, lifting his hands to show they were empty. “We don’t wanna see your little fire trick again.”

“Why’s he here?” Nikita asked.

It was Severin who answered. He drew himself up taller a fraction, leveled an unreadable gaze on Nikita, and said, “To help.”

Nikita stared back a moment, then his brows went up. “Well,” he said. “Alright.”

~*~

“They’re still breathing.” Kolya stood over the big vampire that Trina had shot first. Someone else – probably Kolya – had stabbed him in the throat, and that was what had finally sent him crumpling to the ground. His eyes were shut, his face lax and pale, and every breath made a sick, wet sucking sound as air whistled through the gaping wound in his windpipe.

Trina grimaced. “Yeah, they do that. The only way to really kill a vampire is to take the heart out and destroy it.”

He lifted his head and gave her a glance through a blowing screen of long hair, like he was trying to judge whether or not she was kidding.

“Yeah.”

He looked back to the vampire, head cocking to the side as he studied the comatose immortal. He twirled the knife in his right hand, a dexterous flick of his wrist that sent the blade flashing, and reversed his grip on it. “Alright,” he said, and started to sink down to the ground.

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