My left hand found the pocket of my jeans where I'd shoved the necklace. The jeans were wet and fought me, but I managed to snag the chain of my necklace with the tips of my fingers. The jeans had the last laugh, though. The lamb snagged on my pocket, and I gave it a hard pull. The jeans released the necklace, but my icy-numbed clumsy fingers lost their hold. The necklace flew with the force of my pull, and I heard it land well out of reach.
I tried to move, but as soon as the sword wiggled, her arms and legs began to twitch again. "Okay, Hunger," I told it. "Can't you do something about this?"
I tried it in German because, after all, it was Zee's sword. "Also, Hunger. Konnen Sie nicht etwas tun?"
I felt it listening to me. Goose bumps broke out on my skin, and magic thrummed in my chest and along my body where the dead woman's flesh pressed against mine.
In my hands, the pommel of the sword warmed. Spice's body began to vibrate about the time the warmth became heat.
I had a terrible thought. What if the sword liked the dead fae better than the live coyote and chose to switch allegiance? I'd been warned about Hunger's reputation for deserting its wielder. So I held on to the sword past the point where the heat became pain.
If the pommel was hot, though, it was nothing compared to the sword. The fae's body turned to ash on top of me between one moment and the next, mingling with the ash of the winery fire and the wet ice. I rolled and scrambled frantically to my feet, dropping the sword as I did.
There was nothing left of the zombie fae woman. I tried to wipe her ash off my coat and jeans, but I was so wet it just smeared. When I dropped it, the sword had burned down through the thin layer of ice on the ground, but it had cooled rapidly to the point where it was gaining another coat of ice from the freezing rain. It lay there in the muck, and the magic it had sent spinning through me was gone.
I didn't want to touch it - but I wanted even less to leave it here, where one of the vampires would get ahold of it. When I touched the hilt, it was so cold it burned my blistered and reddened hands again.
It fought me when I tried to shrink it down. That's why it was still in my hands when Frost hit me and knocked me a dozen feet away. I rolled to my feet and used the sword the way I'd practiced once a month for years when Sensei chose to have us work on weapon forms. Adrenaline meant the ache of my cheek and knee, the misery of being wet, cold, and afraid, was no more than a shadow upon my awareness. All the rest of me was caught in the blade and the dance of martial combat.
I'm not strong by vampire or werewolf standards, but I am fast, and armed with a sword, I fought with as much speed as I could summon. I didn't manage to hit him - but he couldn't get close enough to hit me, either. I was focused on him, but I caught a glimpse of the rest of the building here and there.
Marsilia was down. Her body was too broken for her to stand although she was trying to keep her promise because she was crawling toward our battleground.
Wulfe was down as well. He lay in the sludge, covered with ice, not too far from our dance, and I took care not to end up too close to him.
Hao and Shamus were somewhere behind me. I could hear them fighting, but I couldn't see them.