your brother.”
Briony shook her head. “You won’t hurt Jake.”
“I’m certain I wil .”
“No,” she said, and threw the holy water in the same moment. “You won’t.”
Pietre screamed and dropped Jake, just before Kevin surged past in his wolf form to knock the master vampire from his feet.
Jake pointed at the window. “Briony, the prisoners.
I’l help Kevin.”
Briony knew he was right. She hopped in through the open window, doing her best to avoid a few remnants of broken glass. Carol looked up as she came in, and actual y flinched away as Briony went to lift the chains from her.
“We don’t have time for this, Carol,” Briony snapped.
“Do you want to be rescued or not?”
The werewolf girl nodded mutely, and Briony lifted the silver from her.
“Thank you,” Carol said grudgingly, but Briony was already moving to the next of the werewolves. She had just removed the chains from the last of them when she heard a scream from outside. She ran to the window and saw Pietre’s hand on Kevin’s furry chest, his nails gouging into it like claws.
Briony didn’t hesitate. She hopped up onto the windowsil and then threw herself forward, her boot lashing out to connect with the vampire. It wouldn’t do permanent damage, but the sheer momentum of it was enough to knock Pietre away from Kevin. A smal er wolf leapt at the vampire, and Briony realized Jake had transformed.
At that point, things turned to utter chaos. Vampires poured from the house, many of them with teeth and nails reddened by whatever they had been doing to the wolves.
Josh’s werewolves ran from the trees, smashing into them, while Carol and the others seemed to have shaken off the effects of the silver at least wel enough to fight. For a second or two, the space around Briony was a writhing mass of figures trying to harm one another.
At that point, someone grabbed her around the waist. Fearing that it might be a vampire, Briony tried to fight, but whoever it was knew what they were doing, and dragged her back into the trees like she was nothing. Was it Kevin, trying to protect her?
Briony turned as soon as the arms around her let go.
It wasn’t Kevin, but someone she knew and did not expect to see.
“Aunt Sophie? What are you doing here?”
Chapter 7
Briony wanted to ask her great aunt so many things, but she wasn’t sure that there was time. Even as Aunt Sophie let go of her, a pair of vampires rushed from the trees at them. They were young, and wore modern clothing, but Briony did not recognize them. It did not matter.
Whoever they were, they obviously weren’t there to make friends. Briony fel back into a guard position. Even as she tensed for the battle to come, though, a very familiar form leapt past her, kicking out at one vampire hard enough to smash it back before thrusting a stake at another. It burst into the cold flames of its death even as Briony recognized the newcomer.
“Fal on? Aunt Sophie, what are you doing with Fal on?”
“Oh,” Aunt Sophie’s voice was light, like Fal on wasn’t stil struggling with his second opponent, “he helped me out of a bit of a tight spot with Pietre. He must be very devoted to you, you know, if he is prepared to hang out with an old fogy like me on the off chance of seeing you. Now, excuse me one moment.”
Aunt Sophie stepped past Briony to where Fal on was stil struggling with the second vampire, took out a stake, and plunged it into the creature’s chest in one smooth motion. It was almost casual, and yet the creature was dead in an instant.
For a brief moment after the vampire died, stil ness reigned within the little space they occupied, but then Briony couldn’t contain herself any longer. She threw her arms around Fal on in a hug that would have driven the breath from someone who actual y needed to breathe. She stared at him, just drinking in his presence.
“It’s so good to see you again.”
“You too,” he replied, his hands going to her face as he kissed her, brushing over it like they might learn every contour of it. “That’s because I was worried about you. And this is just because I want to.” He kissed her again. Briony let herself melt into his lips, not even caring that Aunt Sophie was standing right there for the first few seconds.
Eventual y though, the thought