A Vigil in the Mourning (Soulbound #4) - Hailey Turner Page 0,22

sleeve into his hand. Leon’s grip tightened on Jono.

“The bounty on your head was worth the drive north,” the demon said. The skin on his face seemed to move, black veins briefly showing through what skin wasn’t covered in blood. The smell of sulfur grew stronger, making Jono gag.

Before anyone could respond, one of the hunters on the other side of the fence was slammed to the ground by the force of the person that landed on him. Jono heard bones crack, the gurgle of a scream broken off by virtue of a throat being torn out. He heard blood spatter on cold pavement like rain before the vampire moved, flinging himself over the fence and into the playground with a speed that few others in the preternatural world could match.

“You wasted all that gas for nothing and came driving through my territory without asking,” the newcomer said.

Jono heard Austin swear from behind him as the master vampire for the Brooklyn Night Court landed amidst his followers. Jamere’s physical appearance was that of a teenager, but the vampire was over four hundred years old, and how he looked had no bearing on the viciousness he employed when it came to holding his territory.

“Bounty isn’t on your head, but we’ll kill you for the fun of it,” the demon said.

Jamere’s laugh was low and deep. The smile on his dark face showed off a mouthful of jagged fangs. “You wouldn’t be the first hunter to try.”

Whatever signal Jamere gave, Jono never saw it, never heard it. One second the vampires of the Brooklyn Night Court stood like silent shadows in the dark playground. The next, they were blurs of motion that Jono’s eyesight couldn’t keep up with.

Vampires couldn’t fly, but they moved with a speed that lay the foundation for the myths that had propagated over the centuries. The remaining two hunters beyond the playground scattered rather than fight, which told Jono they probably weren’t sharing their soul with a demon. Not standing their ground was their first mistake. Jono tuned out their screams in favor of making sure he got answers.

“Don’t kill the demon,” Jono said.

“This isn’t your territory,” Jamere reminded him as he darted in close underneath the demon’s quick knife thrust to bury his clawed hand in the body’s gut. “You don’t give the orders here.”

“The New Rebels pack is under my protection, which means you and I are overdue for a chat about borders.”

Jamere ripped out a coil of intestines, tossing the ropy organ away from him. The tactical vest the hunter wore had torn like so much wet paper in the face of the vampire’s strength. The body in his hands jerked, a few more loops of intestines falling out of the hole. Blood and the acidic smell of a punctured stomach gave the cold breeze a sour undertone.

The sound of thunder when no lightning had struck echoed loudly in Jono’s ears. Gray light haloed the hunter for a split second before fading. The sulfur scent diminished as the demon fled.

There went any hope of getting answers.

Wherever the demon had escaped to, it wasn’t to anyone around them. Vampires had no souls, and the black magic powering the werevirus made possession too difficult most of the time for demons to attempt it on a werecreature. Jono only hoped they hadn’t damned anyone in the neighborhood to demonic possession.

Jamere dropped the body and turned to look at Jono. “You must be fucking special to have the Krossed Knights coming after your ass. Maybe I should leave you to the fuckers next time or put you out of your misery myself.”

Jono froze at that bit of information. Hunters of all things that went bump in the night had grown out of the Crusades in the western hemisphere, their numbers fluctuating over the centuries. They’d had more influence in the times where magic wasn’t looked upon as something useful. The last couple of centuries hadn’t been kind to their numbers, and they, in turn, had never been kind to the people and monsters they hunted.

Different branches had broken off and drawn up their own laws over the centuries as they migrated across the world. The Krossed Knights were predominantly found in the United States, and a problem Jono had managed to steer clear of until now, it seemed.

“Lucien wouldn’t like that,” Jono said in a low voice, gambling on the thinnest of associations with one of the most notorious vampires in the world to keep him and everyone else