Bane's Choice (Vampire Motorcycle Club #1) - Alyssa Day Page 0,114

We fight!” She pointed. “And there’s Sylvie. I owe that bitch.”

A deep, roaring bark sounded from the kitchen, and Bram Stoker flew out of the doorway and started toward them, his fur standing straight up and his lips curled back from his teeth. The Cassidys were right behind him, and they both carried shotguns.

“If it’s a battle they’re looking for, we’re going to give them the fight of their lives!” Mrs. C shouted. Her cheeks were flushed, and she had boxes of ammo sticking up out of her apron pockets.

Her husband nodded, face grim. “We’ve defended this house before, and we’ll do it again. No way do those bastards hurt any of our family.”

Bane had no words, so he just shook his head and stepped out onto the porch. “Constantin, is this all you’ve got? I thought you’d bring some of your warlock friends. Instead, you’re hanging around with a bunch of dead bodies because nobody alive wants anything to do with you, right? The Chamber must be scraping the bottom of the barrel to send the likes of you.”

“I don’t need help, Nightwalker.” The necromancer turned and flung his arms out in a ridiculously melodramatic gesture that encompassed the oncoming dead. “Take the vampires, my people. Take them all, but keep the woman alive.”

Meara’s voice rang out from the roof. “I’m your Huckleberry.”

A shadow of confusion crossed Constantin’s face. “What?”

Beside him, Ryan laughed. “Good one, Meara! We’ll watch that one later tonight, after we kill these assholes!”

Just then, Sylvie jumped down from where she’d been hiding in the branches of one of the Southern Live Oaks and stalked toward them, the dead parting in a wave before her. “You didn’t forget me, did you, you stupid Nephilim whore? I’m going to drain you dry, over and over, and make such delicious magic from your blood. Maybe even from your bones. You don’t need all of those arms and legs, after all.”

Ryan shuddered but then rolled up her sleeves. “If you want me, come and get me, Necro-Bitch.” She started forward, shoving balloons out of her way, but Bane caught her by the back of her shirt.

“No.”

She laughed and then grabbed his face and kissed him, hard. “Nice try. But you don’t get to tell me no about this, either.” And then she twisted out of his grasp, jumped off the porch, and raced toward Sylvie.

Bane roared with frustration, but before he could go after her, the fight was on. The first swarm of the undead had reached the lawn, and he waded in, blasting them with magic and also using his hands, feet, and the long knife that had been sheathed at his side to stop them any way he could while he fought his way toward Constantin.

Edge and Luke descended on the horde of zombies like twin waves of destruction, swinging swords that they’d started carrying after the attack in the cemetery. And Meara—watching Meara was like taking a master class in graceful killing. She flew, danced, kicked, and twirled in an arabesque of destruction, and wherever she moved, the undead went down and stayed down.

But it wasn’t enough. The more corpses that they stopped, the more that kept coming up out of the river. Constantin—far more powerful than Sylvie—must be calling bodies from every cemetery for miles around.

He was still doing it, too. Protected by a group of his undead, he stood with his eyes closed, still chanting. Waves of foul blood magic flowed out from where he stood.

Bane needed to get to him. Now.

But he also needed to protect Ryan. Now.

And he was suddenly, desperately afraid that there might not be time to do both.

…

Ryan’s Nephilim magic—for that’s what it surely was—came easily to her call now. Whether something about the explosion had finished clearing whatever block or binding had kept her from her power before, or whether meeting her father in person had done it, she was ready and willing to use the magic of life and light against the forces of death and darkness.

“Apparently, Nephilim are freaking poets, too,” she shouted at Sylvie, who was stalking toward her, the zombies falling away from the path between them.

“Bring it, little angel spawn,” the warlock spat. “I’m going to enjoy torturing you for what you did to my face.”

She tilted her head toward the light, and Ryan saw for the first time that the entire right side of the warlock’s face had been horribly burned.

The healer in her felt bad about it, for a second or