“We are not dealing with sensible vampires in this place.” He paused, then added, “We’re not even dealing with your kind of sensible.”

The comment drew a smile, as he’d no doubt intended. “Then we could be in big trouble.”

“And it means you will have to watch the screen to see when the Rakshasa appears. I will deal with what comes.”

My gaze flicked to the light screen. The vampire was reaching his climax and the whore was intact, and alive. “I will, when I have to.”

He nodded. His attention obviously wasn’t on me, but rather on the danger that lurked beyond the closed door.

“How many do you think they’ll send at us?” I asked quietly.

“There are at least a dozen, by the feel of it.”

Twelve against two weren’t great odds by any stretch of the imagination, but they weren’t insurmountable given that we had not only Azriel’s skills but the two swords, as well. It could have been a whole lot worse. It could have been half the damn room.

I flexed my fingers and glanced briefly at the screen. The room was being cleaned and the blood whore escorted away. “I still can’t see the point of testing me like this if they’d rather see me dead.”

“As I said, we are not dealing with any rational mode of thinking.” He paused. “We could leave. We have that option.”

“But it’s not one we can take. However crazy this whole setup is, proving I can protect myself against a horde of crazy vamps might just be enough to save me from the council’s death edict—especially if the Rakshasa doesn’t turn up tonight.”

“Then prepare to fight.” His gaze came to mine, the blue depths storm lit. “It’s not going to be pleasant.”

My stomach began to churn. I stepped back and raised Amaya. Her fire burned over the hilt and crawled across my skin, as sharp and as electric as the hissing in my mind. Hissing that said, Come, come, come…

I shivered, and wished I couldn’t hear the beat of those words, or feel the answering echo of anticipation deep inside me. Wished the vamps that were crowding closer and closer down the hall would just leave us alone.

But all the wishes in the world wouldn’t change the reality. Not this time.

Then Azriel said the two words I’d been dreading.

“They come.”

And they did.

Only not just through the door, but from the ceiling itself.

Chapter 12

There was little warning, just a crack of sound as half the damn ceiling fell on our heads and spewed a seething mass of hissing, hungry vampires onto the floor—at the exact same time the first lot hit the door and crashed it open.

Back to back, Azriel said.

I pressed against him and ignored the plaster still falling around us, Amaya held at the ready and her die, die, die chant a scream inside my head.

Azriel entered the fray and Valdis screamed. It was a sound of defiance, a call for blood. I shivered and swung Amaya as the first of the vampires scrambled to their feet. Her fire rained through the air, the droplets hitting floor and flesh with equal deadliness, burning whatever it touched but having little impact on either. Then her sharp point met flesh, but there was no jolt, nothing to indicate I’d hit anything at all. An arm plopped to the floor and blood sprayed, covering all of us. The scent of it filled the air, fueling the hunger already rampant in the room. The nearest vampires turned and attacked the injured vampire, sinking their teeth into his flesh and tearing him apart. They reminded me of dogs fighting over a bone, and again I wondered at the council’s willingness to destroy their own just to test my worthiness.

But then again, they weren’t exactly sacrificing the cream of vampire society here.

More vampires scrambled to their feet and came at us. I swung Amaya left and right, the movements so fast her fiery edges were little more than a blur. Blood and gore and flesh flew everywhere, the stench of it so thick that bile rose up in my throat and threatened to choke me. And still they came at us, the tide seeming to have no end and certainly no hesitation.

Claws slashed and tore, teeth gleamed. I dodged one blow, barely rocked back against another. Fingernails as sharp as steel sliced across my chin, peeling it open. I cursed, swung my sword viciously, and cut the offending talon off at the elbow. The vampire’s scream was one of rage rather than pain, and I had to wonder just what sort of drugs they were all on, because this was more than just blood hunger. It had to be.

Then, with a thunderlike crack, more of the ceiling came down, bringing with it more vampires. I dodged, but not fast enough, and hit the floor with enough force to see stars and lose my grip on Amaya. The vamp on top of me knocked her farther away, and she screamed furiously, the noise cutting through the din the vampires were making. Then another weight joined the first, pressing my face into the floor, squashing my nose and making it difficult for me to breathe. I punched wildly but ineffectively, and the vamp holding my head chuckled. His breath washed over me, and even though I could barely breathe, his odor crawled into my body through my pores, leaving me with the bitter scent of rancid meat.

Then he tore into my left shoulder blade, biting deep. I yelped in pain and bucked, trying to dislodge his teeth and get both vampires off me, but they rode me like cowboys and wouldn’t budge. Again the first vamp tore into me, this time my back. I choked back another cry and twisted around, throwing my elbow backward as hard as I could. The vamp riding my shoulders was too intent on sucking up the blood to register the movement, and my elbow smashed into the side of his face, caving in his cheek and throwing him off sideways. I twisted violently to one side and half dislodged the second vampire. He lunged forward, canines bared and bloody and madness in his eyes. I tried to roll away, couldn’t, so I threw up a hand in a vain attempt to batter him away. Then, suddenly, Azriel was there, wrapping a fist around the vamp’s neck and flinging him back hard.

He reached down and pulled me upright. There was a cut above his left eye and fury in his expression, but he wasted no energy on words, simply turned and dove back into the attack.

I lunged for Amaya, but she was already slithering toward me. I swept her up, then dove sideways as a vamp leapt over one of the fallen and came at me. I swung my sword but he checked his speed, leaned out of her way, then dove straight at me. I dropped, hitting the floor hard enough to knock the wind out, and pulled my sword onto my stomach. This time he couldn’t check. The blade pierced his flesh, and his momentum drove her dark metal right through his body and out the other side.

I let him fall, then scrambled to my feet, pulled Amaya free, and swung around to face the next threat.

But it was over, and I’d been proven right. The odds hadn’t been insurmountable.

More than sixteen vampires lay dead or near dead in the small room, and there were at least another three or four out in the corridor if the bits I could see were any indication. Blood and gore and body parts lay everywhere, and suddenly I was shaking. But it was anger, not fear, not reaction.

Azriel stepped over the bodies and came toward me. “Are you all right?”

“No, I’m fucking not.” My fists were clenched so tight that Amaya’s hilt cut into my hand. I glanced at the ceiling, looking for the cameras I couldn’t see but had no doubt were there. “Enough! Do you hear me? Enough! No more fucking tests. Either use me or kill me, but stop this stupid waste of life.”

“Impressive,” Marshall said from the doorway. “I don’t believe the council expected you to win so easily.”

My fury suddenly had a focus point, and I took a step forward. Azriel threw out a hand and stopped me from going any farther.

It would not be wise to kill him at this time, came his soft warning into my thoughts. This is not his doing.

I gave Azriel a somewhat dark glance, then returned my gaze to Marshall. “I hope they realize this circus might well have caused us to miss the arrival of the Rakshasa—and wasn’t killing her our actual reason for being here?”

“It is the reason you are in this club, yes,” Marshall agreed, “but not the reason you are on this floor. And trust me, I am no more happy about this waste than you are.”

“Then why the fuck didn’t you do something to stop it? You run the damn place.”

His expression darkened. “I may run it, but that doesn’t mean I have free rein to do as I wish. And I am beholden to the council for certain supplies.”

The blood whores, I thought wearily, and scrubbed a bloody hand across my face.

Marshall added, “And the Rakshasa would not have made an appearance as yet, simply because there has been no killing in that room.”

I stared at him for a moment, his words echoing through my brain. “Meaning you know exactly when someone is going to be killed?”

He seemed surprised by the question. “Of course.”

“So you send men and women in there to feed the vampires, knowing they’re going to die?” I said it flatly, without emotion, even though anger boiled through me, a silent scream of anger that reminded me of Amaya.

“The blood whores in our employ know and understand the risks—and sign a document stating as much.” He shrugged. “We do not, however, waste valuable stock. Only the older ones who are reaching the point where it is not economically feasible to keep repairing them.”

Economically feasible. God, they really were treating the whores like cattle.

And that whole document-signing thing was a farce, because we weren’t talking about regular blood whores here, but people who’d been born and bred for this life. I very much doubted they’d have any understanding at all of what they’d signed.

The fury continued to build in me, and Amaya’s kill chant began inside my head again. The urge to do just that was so strong that my legs quivered with the need to move. I didn’t, but it was such a close-run thing that it scared the hell out of me.

“I won’t stay in this room,” I said, through gritted teeth. “Give me another—preferably one with a sink so I can clean up.”