Page 567 of Shadowblood Souls
I lift my head. “We have to try. We owe them that much. The criminals—it seems like they were horrible people before Balthazar took them. I’m not saying we try to reason with them. But the kids are victims here just like the people they’re attacking, just like they’ve always been.”
Willow fixes me with her penetrating gaze. “You’ve been saying that all along—that the kids need to be saved. This is where it’s gotten us.” She waves toward the screen. “How much more harm are you going to let them do?”
Jacob pushes forward to glare at her. “None of this is Riva’s fault. We’re all doing the best we can—at least, the six of us have been.”
I grasp his arm to get him to back down. Guilt condenses in my gut.
The nymph isn’t wrong. I’m the one who’s advocated for the younger shadowbloods the most, who’s argued the loudest whenever any of the shadowkind expressed doubts about rescuing them.
If I hadn’t insisted so adamantly that Sorsha be careful and avoid the kids, she probablycouldhave ended this catastropheyesterday, when it would have been so much less of a disaster. When the dozens of people now dead were still alive.
But I still can’t quite convince myself that it’d be better if the many dead had included Nadia’s charred corpse—and Devon’s and Tegan’s. And all the other kids, some not even in their teens yet, that Balthazar transformed into his greatest weapons.
“We haven’t really tried to fix things,” I say. “Not since we realized how badly Balthazar messed with the younger shadowbloods. We know what we’re dealing with now. There has to be a way to stop them without murdering every shadowblood other than us.”
Fang snorts. “And how do you figure you’re going to find that way? How long are you going to let them keep rampaging around while you think about it?”
I square my shoulders, my heart thudding faster. “We know where they are now. It looks like they’re sticking together—the attacks were all at different times, following a fairly straight path across the country, weren’t they?”
By the computer, Sorsha nods. “It looks like they’re traveling from one place to another as a pack, tracking down the groups of hunters.”
Her expression is tense, but she holds her posture steady, looking ready to leap into action whenIsay how I think we should handle this—regardless of what the shadowkind think.
If we still have her on our side, that’s something.
Girding myself, I seek out Rollick’s gaze at the edge of the crowd. “The six of us—and anyone else who’s willing to help and follow our lead—will head back to the States. We can predict where the other shadowbloods are headed. We’ll stop the attacks, take out the former inmates, and do whatever we can to get through to the kids.”
The corner of Rollick’s mouth lifts in a slanted smile. “It sounds like you have your plan all worked out. You don’t needpermission from me. But I assume you could use a method of transportation.”
I shrug awkwardly. “Unfortunately, we can’t just leap through a portal.”
“My private jet is getting quite a workout these days.” He dips his head to me. “We can set off as soon as you say the word. I wouldn’t mind getting back to my usual turf myself.”
“I’m in,” Sorsha says without hesitation.
Snap sets a possessive hand on her shoulder and looks toward his friends. “We go where Sorsha goes.”
I turn to check with my guys. Every one of them looks back at me with total resolve.
“We’re not going to let those kids down,” Zian rumbles, his dark gaze stormy.
Please, may that be true—and may we save them without letting down a whole lot of other people who don’t deserve to die either.
Twenty
Griffin
By the time we get within ten miles of the wayward shadowblood group, Riva doesn’t need to borrow my locating talent for us to keep track of them. I can taste their erratic fury even from that distance, like wavering blasts of a scorching wind.
The caustic emotion prickles through my awareness, setting my nerves on edge. I’m used to picking up on other people’s feelings, and I’ve absorbed some horrible sensations, but nothing that eats at my insides quite like this before.
It’s like acid, burning away at my thoughts, at every gentler feeling inside me.
What must it be doing to the people who are experiencing it firsthand?
From where I’m sitting next to Andreas at the front of the SUV that’s carrying us, Sorsha, and a bunch of ephemeral, invisible shadowkind on our quest, I point to the right at an intersection. “They’re that way.”
The glow of streetlamps and late-night bar windows streaks over our vehicle through the darkness. A giggle passing between a swaying group of friends filters through my window from the city street.
