Page 128 of A Steeping of Blood
Twenty powerful Athereum vampires. That was more than Jin thought they would have.
“We’ll take two to accompany us through the bunker,” Jin said.
Sidharth nodded. “The rest of us will remain aboveground and await the tribute then.” He gestured to the hall. “Shall we?”
“What about the Council mask?” Flick asked Jin as Laith and Matteo followed Sidharth out.
Jin turned it over in his hands, running his fingers over the bronze ridges and lines. “It’s for Arthie. She deserves to unmask the Ram more than any of us. I just don’t know where to put it.”
Flick took it from him, lifting the hem of her skirt and securing it beneath the buoyant folds of her dress. She didn’t wait for him to turn around. She didn’t move to hide every inch of her skin.
Jin averted his gaze from her leg and directed it to her eyes, only to find her already waiting for him. Goodness, this girl. She grinned and held out her arm. “Let’s go save your sister.”
48ARTHIE
Arthie’s vision blurred when the Ram forced her upright. She swayed, gripping the bars of the cage to remain on her feet. Laith was… gone. He had left her. The reverberation of the Ram’s strike still echoed through Arthie’s core, long after the woman had dropped the metal beam. The girls and boys inside the cage had stopped moving. They looked at Arthie with sympathy, remorse.
For they were in a cage, and Arthie was in front of a gun.
Her gun.
Arthie lifted her eyes from Calibore’s barrel to the Ram’s eyes that were thrilled behind her gunmetal mask.
“Here I was, ready to turn them into vampires by other means, but you arrived at a most opportune moment,” the Ram said.
Other means? Opportune moment?
“Turn?” Arthie asked. The Ram had kidnapped them under the guise of blaming vampires, but she was going to turn them herself? How did she even plan to turn them?
One of the girls shook free of the rope binding her mouth.
“She’s going to set us loose on—” she started to shout.
A gunshot cut her short. She fell in a lifeless heap.
For an eternal moment, Arthie hung suspended in disbelief at the sight before her. The girl was… dead. The Ramshother.
The air rushed from the room. Blood sprayed everywhere. Theremaining eleven girls and boys screamed, the sounds muffled by their bindings.
“You killed her,” Arthie whispered.
“What’s one less?” the Ram asked, and then turned Calibore around and held it out to her. “You asked me what’s in it for you, so here is my offer: I’ll give you Calibore if you turn each and every one of them.”
Arthie looked at the humans. They weren’t dying. They weren’t anywhere near death. Turning them now would mean turning them into half vampires. Like the Wolf of White Roaring. Like Arthie. The Ram wanted vampires that were powerful, difficult to control, yet still thwartable, unlike the Ripper vampires on Ceylan.
Calibore for a small army of half vampires.
A small army for a piece of Arthie the Ram had stolen and dared to flaunt.
Arthie couldn’t pretend now. She couldn’t stifle her anger anymore. There was blood on her clothes. The blood of an innocent girl who tried to warn her. It was on her lip, luring her, coaxing her for a taste.
The Ram saw.
“Unless that deal includes shoving the barrel down your throat, I’ll pass,” Arthie said.
The Ram smiled and fired Calibore again.
49JIN
