"I would tell you to ask the first Arcanes who discovered them, but they're stark-raving mad now." Bella's violet eyes grew unfocused as if she were looking at a memory of her own.
A line of black SUVs waited outside the fence. Christian and Thomas piled into the lead vehicle, still talking heatedly. Bella and Elyssa climbed into the vehicle behind it. I walked around the back of the same vehicle to toss in my luggage when I felt a cold ping on my supernatural radar. It was close. Maybe fifty feet away. I'd felt that sensation enough to know exactly what it was. I spun to face it.
The Templars felt it, too. Within a split second of the sensation, dozens of swords slid from sheaths. Another cold blip popped up behind me. Another to my side. Followed by another. And another.
"Starfire! Get down!" someone shouted as a ball of white energy the size of my head shot from a rooftop down the road and streaked toward the lead SUV.
"Dad!" Elyssa shouted. She dove from the backseat. Rolled on the pavement and pivoted for her father's SUV. But it was too late.
The fireball slammed into the grill of the vehicle, suffusing the frame with brilliant white light, and exploded. My body left the ground and flew through the air, slamming against the hard brick road. A twisted and charred bumper slammed onto my chest. I sucked in a wheezing breath and heard the whine of tinnitus buzzing in my ears. Screams and shouts echoed as though through a long tunnel.
I shoved the blackened bumper off me and rolled onto my side. Noms scattered in all directions as dozens of dark forms leapt from rooftops and hit the ground running. I pushed myself to my knees. The effort sent waves of agony through my back and ribs. Something hard and sharp brushed against the inside of my arm. I looked and found a blade of shrapnel jutting from my side.
"Justin!" someone screamed.
I saw Elyssa surrounded by a circle of Templars fighting off a mob of vampires. Some of the attackers looked barely out of middle school while others looked college aged. Maximus obviously didn't discriminate by age or gender, because there were plenty of females in the riotous mix. Each attacker wore a red armband around one bicep, each bearing a valentine-shaped heart with two fangs piercing it. Some vampires wore pink shirts with the same heart logo on it.
A flutter of pink drew my attention to the SUV Elyssa had been in. Bella hung halfway out of the backseat. Blood dripped from her outstretched hand, forming a puddle on the ground. I roared with anger. Grabbed the jagged shard of metal in my side and pulled it out. The world faded to black for an instant, and a scream tore from my throat. As the ringing in my ears subsided, I pushed myself to my feet and ran for Bella.
I dragged her from the SUV. She groaned. Her eyelids fluttered.
"Bella?" I said.
"I—I'm okay, Justin."
I watched a slice down her arm slowly heal as her supernatural healing kicked in. "Can you run?"
She nodded.
Strong hands grabbed me by the shoulders and jerked me away. Threw me across the road. I turned my roll into a three-point landing and looked into the red eyes of a gaggle of vampires. One-on-one, I knew I could beat them, but—
Something snapped around my neck. I turned and saw a female vampire smile, her fangs glistening. Bella shouted something.
And the world went black.
Chapter 8
Elyssa
Elyssa stared at the burned-out hull of the SUV in shock. Her father and Christian were in there! Adrenalin burned through her blood. She had to get to them. He couldn't be dead. But he probably was. What sick joke was the universe playing on her to steal her brother and her father from her in the space of a week? She reached for a sword, ready to slice through the mob of vampires surrounding her meager circle of Templars, but her sheath was empty. The sword was in the back of one of the SUVs.
She kicked away one attacker and looked around to see who was in charge. Everyone looked too busy fighting for their lives to think about the chain of command. Considering how many vampires were swarming them, she had to do something.
"Call for reinforcements," she shouted to a local Templar fighting next to her. "I'll cover your position."
He gave her a confused look at first, then seemed to realize who she