Fall of Night The Morganville Vampires - By Rachel Caine Page 0,92

breath; the burns had gone all the way up to his shoulders, and the bright red flesh looked unhealthy and extremely tender. But Oliver was old. Why was it so hard on him? Amelie could handle the stuff, after all. Then again, Jesse had been badly burnt, too. Was it just that some vamps were less sensitive to it than others? Or maybe even something in the lineage – Bishop’s bloodline being more resistant. Interesting problem, and part of her brain chewed away on it even as she asked him, ‘What can I do?’

‘Go away,’ he snapped, and shut his eyes. His face was taut with effort, and Claire backed off. Most vampires with silver burns had to have blood, quickly. She didn’t necessarily want to be Oliver’s portable life support unit.

Jesse moved forward with her arm around the still-almost-limp Elizabeth. ‘Come on,’ she said. ‘You can collapse later, but for now move your ass, Oliver. Help will be on the other side, if our friends aren’t in bigger trouble than we are. Claire, you go first. I’ll take care of your friend. But we can’t stay here. You don’t build a trap unless the hunter comes to take his prize, sooner or later.’

Claire dived into the narrow, concrete tunnel. Her knees and elbows and palms were already abraded from the earlier journey, and this time it hurt like hell. She, or all of them, had shed little slivers of door glass along the way, and she could feel the shards stabbing into her skin. One big exercise in pain, and exhaustion, and claustrophobia, and she was very glad to see the metal of the door at the end.

Wait.

We didn’t close that, she thought, and put the flashlight in her mouth so she could lean forward and throw her weight against it. Nothing. Not even a budge. No handle to turn on this side, and even if there was, Claire thought that it might have been nearly impossible to get the right amount of leverage at the awkward, bent-over angle she had to use. She remembered it had been tough to open before.

Staying where she was didn’t seem like much of an option. Neither was backing up; behind her, Jesse was somehow managing to balance Liz’s head and shoulders and crawl backward, dragging the girl with her; Eve must have been trying to support Liz’s legs.

Which, from the length of the tunnel, would have left Oliver either in the other room, or dangerously close to those silver spikes on the gate.

Claire lunged forward and slammed her shoulder into the door – once, twice, three times … and it suddenly gave, spilling her out into the other room. She rolled through a pool of congealing, rotten blood, and the nausea welled up again as she spotted the severed head of the bat-thing, and Derrick’s body … and then a brilliant beam of light swept over her, blinding her, and she heard Shane say, ‘Claire!’ in a breathless tone that made her shiver from the bottom of her soul. Next thing she knew, she was swept up in his arms, and lost in a strong, enveloping hug. ‘God, the blood—’

‘Not mine,’ she said. ‘And it smells disgusting.’

‘I wasn’t going to mention it,’ he said, and laughed a little, holding her close. ‘I’m guessing it came courtesy of that thing there?’

‘Yeah. Whatever it is.’

‘Nasty. Did you kill it?’

‘That would have been awesome, but Jesse did the honours …’ Claire’s voice faded as she pulled back, and she glanced back at the tunnel. Jesse was out, and Myrnin was helping her pull Liz free. Michael, standing ready, grabbed Eve’s reaching, flailing hand and yanked her out, too, and straight into his arms.

Nobody hugged Oliver. Not surprisingly. Although Michael did frown at the sight of him. ‘What the hell happened to you?’

‘What does it seem?’ Oliver growled, as he settled his shirt back on over his silver-abraded arms. It must have hurt. ‘Someone built a very nice rat trap with the girl as its cheese. And although it pains me to admit it, without Claire’s cleverness we might have been stuck there.’

‘Bad news, then, because we might be stuck here, too,’ Pete said. He was farther back – covering their asses, Claire guessed. ‘We’ve got company, folks. And I’m a little short on firepower up in here. Jesse?’

‘Coming,’ she said. She still sounded unruffled, a total contrast to the tension everyone else seemed to feel; it was as if none of this bothered her a