Greaves could do a dump, and he’d heard rumors that at least one of his minions also had sufficient power. One more disadvantage for Endelle’s side.

He just had to trust the situation to work out. What he could do was keep all the death vamps in front of him so busy they’d have to stay put.

Endelle, he sent, hoping against hope she was tuned in to him.

Hang tough, Warrior, she responded instantly, straight into his head. Your lavender sweetheart’s call hasn’t made it to Second yet. That’s what all these morons are waiting for.

He took a breath. Thank God for Endelle.

I should give you a little warning, though. Leto’s packing a bomb, a little shredder package he won’t hesitate to use, so keep your nuts tight.

Don’t I always, he sent.

Endelle laughed then fell silent. After a moment, her voice pummeled the inside of his head. Holy shit! Can you hear that? Damn, this ascendiate has power.

Kerrick turned his attention to the Trough. He could feel it now, a deep vibration within the dimension. Beneath his sandals, the earth rattled back and forth, earthquake-fashion, and a sound like a freight train grew louder and louder.

The next moment an explosion ripped the air. The sand rose like a geyser straight up out of the Trough, a quarter of a mile high and a full ten feet across. He’d never seen anything like it in his life.

Holy shit. A hand-blast through a dimension.

He had never known an ascendiate with such a highly developed level of power. She would be one helluvan asset to Endelle and one huge threat to Greaves. No wonder he’d sent Leto and three squads of death vamps to head her off. He needed her dead. Period. And despite the big rule of no death vamps on Mortal Earth, this was war and the bastards would follow him into the Trough anyway. When Leto and his crew showed up on Mortal Earth, COPASS would treat it as part of the ascendiate’s rite of ascension and not the usual violation of Second Earth Law.

He sighed. Same old shit.

He thought of Alison, of having held her in his arms and how difficult it had been to penetrate her mind, the same woman who had folded out of the Blood and Bite.

He moved back several yards as the sand began cascading back on itself, falling into the wash as well as the surrounding lawn. Leto and his men dropped into crouches and took the brunt of the sand on their backs. One of the vamps writhed under the onslaught. The others held steady. Leto, as expected, didn’t flinch.

Kerrick focused on securing the ascendiate for Endelle. Nothing else mattered.

Leto rose and reached for his phone.

Kerrick called to him sharply, not wanting him to contact anyone who could start sending death vamps into the Trough. “Hey, dickheads. Looking for me?”

Twelve. Thirteen, counting Leto. Well … this would be a challenge. He dipped his chin. Bring it on.

Leto turned around, dispensed with his phone, folding his sword into his hand at the same time. “Well, if it isn’t Thorne’s lapdog. Look, boys. Cocksucker just arrived.”

“Fuck you, Leto.”

“You first, asshole.”

Kerrick would have preferred to mount his wings but since he’d be heading into the Trough, he couldn’t. You never got dumped in full-mount. The wings would never survive the fall. Besides, he could manage this bunch on solid ground.

Endelle? he sent.

Just get me some blue skin first then prepare to get dumped. Whatever you do, don’t mount your wings.

Got it.

He lowered his head, lifted his sword, and with preternatural speed launched at all thirteen vampires at once.

* * *

“Will you look at that,” Endelle cried. Her chest felt on fire as she watched Kerrick fight. She had Marcus’s wrist in a stranglehold to keep him from folding into the fray. “Three down and the rest of those motherfuckers are scratching ass, wondering what the hell happened.”

Marcus shouted, “Endelle, let go of me. Now!”

“No can do, gorgeous.” Of course he was anxious to do battle. He was a goddamn warrior and she was streaming Kerrick’s moves straight into his head, a blow-by-blow event, which caused Marcus’s face to darken and his lips to curl into a fierce snarl.

She stood with him in front of her desk, restraining him. She wished she could have sent him immediately to back Kerrick up, but as much as she valued his readiness to wield the sword, she couldn’t risk the two of them being together right now, not with so much bad blood between them.

“Let me go!” he cried. “Ten to one. If Leto engages…”

She smiled. Marcus was a warrior at heart, in every cell of his body, no matter what he’d been doing for the last two hundred years.

“Relax. Be patient. Leto’s too busy texting, which tells me things have gone awry at the fucking compound. Besides, Kerrick is doing just fine.”

He outmatched all the death vamps in preternatural speed, which meant nearly every thrust or slice of his sword counted. She let out a loud whoop. “Two more bastards down and he’s barely started.” There was nothing so fine as watching one of her Warriors of the Blood, all virile, muscled, highly sexed vampires, doing what he did best with a sword in hand. She drew deep breaths, all the while keeping Marcus in check.

“Turn me loose,” he shouted. “He can’t defeat them all.”

Endelle met Marcus’s gaze straight-on. “I thought you hated him, wanted to kill him.”

“Fuck you.”

Endelle smiled. She knew her men well. “You sure you’re ready to go back to work? You sure you’re strong enough after so much soft living on Mortal Earth?”

She watched a red haze slide over his eyes as his chin dipped. “Don’t I look ready to you?” He split his resonance three times.

Nice.

Again she smiled. He was almost as tall as Kerrick and as muscled. Of course he wouldn’t have let his training lapse. “I have to send Kerrick into the Trough and the moment I do, I need you ready to take on the rest of these motherfuckers. Keep as many of them from entering the Trough as you can. Have you got that?”

“Yes,” he growled.

From the vision in her mind, Leto continued to function separately from the battle. He shouted into his phone, once, twice. He made call after call, which all told her that something had gone wrong.

Thank you, Creator!

“On my mark, half a minute from now and not a second before. Do you understand? Will you obey because I’ll have your nuts if you don’t? Nod if you agree.”

She watched him draw a shallow breath. That was good enough for her.

She released his wrist and focused on Alison as well. She wished she could just fold Kerrick directly to her, but she’d be breaking a big rule. No resident of Second Earth could await an ascendiate on Mortal Earth while the mortal answered a call to ascension. If that rule wasn’t upheld, no powerful ascendiate would ever survive even the first three seconds after demonstrating preternatural power.

No. This was the way it was done.

She gave Kerrick a single mental warning then a damn solid shove with the powers the Creator had given her. Down he went through the dimension, flying, his kilt flapping like a black leather wing. At least he wouldn’t be conscious for the trip.

She shifted to the downtown alley, mentally charted his course, and had to laugh. Would you look at where he was going to land? How about that for fucking destiny. But boy, it was gonna hurt.

With the dump well under way, she nodded to Marcus and told him to do his worst.

* * *

Alison now stood beside the Nova, completely still, her hand on the car as an anchor.

Her heart pounded in her ears, the toms still beating out a painful rhythm. She’d heard the voices of several men and she knew for certain one of those voices belonged to the winged vampire warrior she’d come to know as Kerrick.

She had also heard the clanging of metal like swords being struck hard together, which made sense since she’d already witnessed a sword fight. Then suddenly, as quickly as it had begun, the fighting ceased and silence followed.

A third man with a nasally voice gasped, “Where the hell did he go? Fuck. We’ve lost him.”

“He got dumped into the Trough.” She recognized the voice of the man called Leto, the one Kerrick had taunted. “Shit, where the hell is Crace? Goddammit.”

“He’s not answering?” another voice asked.

“No.” A string of obscenities followed, then, “What the hell?”

“Hello, Leto. Wanna stop playing with your phone long enough to show these numbnuts how a real fight is conducted?”

“Well, fuck me,” Leto said, “look what just crawled out of the swamp—Marcus the fucking Coward. You done hiding on Mortal Earth?”

“So you went traitor, you goddamn sonofabitch.”

More steel clanged … then silence, like someone had punched a mute button.

Alison stared hard up at the dark sky. So, Kerrick had gotten dumped. What exactly did that mean?

From out of nowhere, a blast of arctic air descended on her. The temperature had been a little chilly a moment earlier and yet a powerful stream of icy cold air suddenly flowed from nowhere. She started to shake. What on earth was happening?

The airwaves above began to pulse. Her heart thumped all over again. She sensed that something—no, someone—was coming.

Kerrick, her winged vampire warrior?

Her heart beat heavily in her chest all over again. She shouldn’t want to see him so much, but she did.

The air now pounded on her as though the sky expanded and contracted in slow heavy waves. The pressure increased and her head started to hurt. An intake of air rushed from both ends of the alley, sweeping up in a funnel around her then taking her off the ground. She cleared a whole foot of space. Loose papers whirled everywhere.

She thought, Tornado, maybe? However, not even the faintest wisp of a cloud marred the black sky.

Her chest constricted and she couldn’t breathe. She trembled all over. Maybe she shouldn’t have sent a hand-blast into the air after all. Maybe ascension was something she didn’t really want to take on.