"She should take the girl and go," Sarafina said, gripping Will's wrist, trying to tell him with her eyes how strongly she felt about it.

Rhiannon and Amber huddled in a corner, speaking softly, rapidly and at the same time. Amber wore her own clothes. A backpack with a patch that read 'Stroke 9' on it sat in the corner and had to be hers. With a dead sound on the final stroke of nine... The line from T. S. Eliot's The Waste Land ran through Fina's mind, and she wondered if Amber had found a literate rock band to admire. It would fit with what she sensed about the girl. Typical teen on the surface-but one with depths beyond knowing. At her age, those depths must be predominantly unexplored. But Sarafina had a feeling this girl had more to her than anyone-even those closest to her-realized.

Sarafina noticed how close the two stood to one another, the way Rhiannon couldn't seem to stop touching the girl, smoothing her hair, touching her forearms, her face. The woman loved the girl fiercely. It was obvious, and it was touching. It shouldn't be quite so powerfully touching, though. Not to Sarafina. She'd made it her mission in life never to be that moved by anyone or anything. Her throat shouldn't tighten at the sight of Rhiannon with her precious Amber, and her eyes shouldn't burn, her chest feel hollow and empty.

Will looked at her again, and she got the feeling he could read her thoughts as clearly as any vampire. "You're not as cold as you pretend to be, Sarafina. You might as well stop pretending."

"My coldness or lack thereof has nothing to do with it. The child is important. And it's my fault she's here. She and Rhiannon should leave here. Now."

His eyes moved over her face, and she shivered, certain now that those eyes of his were seeing things deep inside her, things she didn't let people see. She had to avert her own.

"It's a nice thought," he said. "But she couldn't get out of here if she wanted to, not with all the men outside."

"We could do something to divert their attention."

His arctic blue eyes narrowed. "Run out there like targets, get them to come after us? That kind of thing?"

She shrugged. "It might work."

"It might. But I have something else in mind." He glanced toward the other side of the room, at Rhiannon and young Amber Lily. "Rhiannon's husband is one of the prisoners. She'll never leave without him."

"She might. If it meant saving Amber."

Amber lifted her head then, looking Sarafina dead in the eyes from across the room. He's right. Rhiannon might go, but I wouldn't. My parents are captive here, too, don't forget.

Sarafina held the girl's gaze for a moment, finally nodded once, then glanced back at Will again. "Forget it. She won't even consider leaving."

"Rhiannon?"

"Amber."

"Oh."

She bit her lip. "What's the plan?"

"We keep our presence to ourselves. And we wait. There will be a diversion, but not for a while yet. So we stay here in the house, undetected. We take our time, slow and quiet, and we take them out one by one." He looked out through the bars, up and down the hallway. "No one in sight." Then he took Sarafina's hand in his, as if he were big and strong and she was small and weak. It was like a promise that he would protect her, the way he closed his hand around hers. Wordless, but full of meaning.

And utterly ridiculous.

They crossed the room to where the other two stood, and Will began giving instructions as if he were still in the military and they were his troops. "Amber, I want you to act just as if nothing has changed. Stay here in the cage and pretend you're still at their mercy."

"What about them?" She glanced at the two bodies on the floor. One dead, one unconscious.

"We'll get them out of sight."

"And if I need to get out of here in a hurry?"

Will pulled the key ring from his pocket and removed from it the key to her barred door. He gave it to her. "Hide it somewhere in the room."

"There's a loose floorboard, near the door," she said. "You could probably reach in and get hold of it from the outside, if necessary."

"Does anyone else have a key to this room?"

"Stiles, I think. Maybe others. They all manage to come and go easily enough. I have no way of knowing if they're passing around a key or two, or if they each have one of their own."

He didn't look as if he liked that idea much, but he kept his thoughts to himself and turned to Sarafina and Rhiannon. "The three of us are going to be like ghosts in this place. We slip through this house like shadows. We stay out of sight. Patience is the key here. Don't rush it. When we manage to corner one of them alone, we take them out, quickly and silently. Hide the body, so no one's alerted to our presence. If we do this right, we'll have the house to ourselves before these amateurs even know anything's up. Got it?"

Rhiannon's brows rose, and she gave a nod. She was impressed in spite of herself, and Sarafina's chin rose in pride she had no business feeling.

"Let's get these bodies out of sight."

"Closet?" Sarafina suggested.

He shook his head. "If someone does find them, we don't want them blaming Amber."

Rhiannon gripped the two by the backs of their shirts, pulling their upper bodies off the floor on either side of her as if she were carrying a pair of suitcases. "Where do you want them?"

"Are you going to be all right?" Sarafina asked Amber.

"I'll be fine. Just make sure my parents are okay."

Fina nodded, and then she and Will tiptoed into the corridor. Will went along the hall, listening at doors and opening them, until he found a room that seemed unoccupied. Sarafina peered over his shoulder when he opened the door. It must be a storage room. Dusty boxes, boards, old furniture and books were stacked all over it.

She glanced back at Rhiannon, still waiting in the entrance to Amber's room, and gave her a nod. Rhiannon dragged the two into the hall, and Amber closed the cage door behind her. The vampiress hauled the two limp mortals easily down the hall and then into the storage room, letting them both drop from her hands once inside. She tossed a piece of canvas over the dead man, glanced down at the tranquilized woman. "How long do you think she'll be out?"

Sarafina shrugged. "If that tranquilizer was the same one they used on us in the past, maybe she'll be out for good."

"So much the better."

"Uh, let's take precautions, just in case," Will said. He took a sheet from where it was draped over an old desk and tore a strip from it. Then he stuffed a little ball of it into her mouth and wrapped the rest around her as a gag. He used the drapery cords to bind her hands and feet together and to each other. Hog-tied was the term Sarafina thought applied. They stepped out of the room, Will letting the others go first, then turning the lock on the door from the inside and pulling the door closed behind them.

There were voices, muffled and coming from downstairs. Rhiannon and Sarafina both shot Will a worried look, as if he were the natural leader. And Sarafina supposed he was. Will gave a nod, and they crept down the curving staircase, none of them making a sound.

Will had left his walking stick outside the fence when they'd jumped it, Sarafina noticed. It couldn't be easy for him to walk lightly, if unevenly, down the stairs. He was in pain, she knew that. But he had gripped it in that ironfisted will of his, and he wouldn't let go.

She'd honestly never known a man like him.

At the bottom of the stairs there was a large foyer, with two archways leading into other parts of the house. One on the left, one on the right. Rhiannon took the left one. Sarafina locked eyes with Will. "Take the right," he said. "I'm going to find the basement."

She nodded.

He cupped her face, leaned close, brushed her lips with his. "Be careful."

"You're the one who's mortal."

He nodded. "And you're not going to let me forget it, are you?"

"This is no time for joking." She averted her eyes, swallowed hard. "Don't get killed."

"I'll do my best."

Nodding, she linked eyes with him one more time, then finally turned away and glided silently through the archway that led to the right. She didn't look back.

The house was dim. It was equipped with gas lamps, though the mortals using the place hadn't bothered to light them. There were few electric lights on, and only night shone in through the large windows. Fortunately, Sarafina thought, her night vision was better than that of Rhiannon's cat.

She wondered about the cat for just a moment. She hoped the creature was wise enough to stay out of sight out there, away from those men. Those rifles, which would only slow a vampire down, and the tranquilizer darts that would incapacitate one, would certainly kill a panther.

Her thoughts ground to a halt when she heard voices. They grew louder as she made her way through the massive house, from one room to another, closing in bit by bit, until she located them.

Two men, sitting in a library, with a book open on the table between them. Sarafina stood just outside the door, her back pressed to the wall. There was a mirror on the wall to the men's left, and she could see their reflections in it. They couldn't see hers, though.

She stood there for what seemed like an eternity, and it was killing her to stick to Will's instructions- to be patient and wait until one of them was all alone. She didn't sense kills taking place anywhere else in the house, and she wondered if Rhiannon or Will was facing the same problem-too many of them together in one place.

The hours dragged, and she began to wonder if they could complete this mission and make their escape before sunrise at this rate.

But eventually the men's inane conversation turned to subjects of interest, and she paid attention then.

"This is between us, okay? It doesn't go any further." The second man nodded, and the first went on. "Stiles is keeping something from us. Look at these notes." This was the younger of the two, pale complexion, stocky, strongly built, with a crew cut.

The other one had male pattern baldness and looked Italian. He was older, more sure of himself, wiry-a cocky, arrogant man, Rhiannon thought, sizing him up easily. "What's wrong with the notes?"

"Oh, come on. Don't tell me you don't see it."

The arrogant one shook his head.

"Stiles has been questioning the girl for hours at a time," Crewcut said. "So what's she been telling him? It's sure as hell not all here. He could've gotten this much information from her in the course of a half-hour interview."

The other one shrugged. "What are you, blind? Did you not get a look at that girl or what?"

"I don't-"

The dark one smacked the younger one upside the head with the flat of his hand. "He may be spending hours up there, Jughead, but if he's done nothing but question her, then he's no more human than she is." He smiled meaningfully.

"You mean...you think he's been...?"

"Wouldn't you?"

"Jesus, that's sick, Joe."

Sarafina thought "Jughead" might die a bit more mercifully than "Joe." She might even let him live.

"She's an animal," the younger one went on. "That would be like screwing a dog, man. And I don't give a damn how pretty she is, she's a goddamn demon."

Oh well. So much for mercy.

"Yeah," Joe said. "A demon. A little wild thing. And I intend to take her the first time the boss's back is turned."

"She'd kill you."

He reached into his shirt pocket, pulled out a dart. "Not if she's sedated, she won't. Not completely, though. I want her awake enough to know what's going on. Maybe put up enough fight to make it interesting, you know?" He grinned. "Where's the boss now, anyway?"

"Locked in the lab again. We won't see him for a while."

"Mercer and Caine?"

"In the basement, guarding the prisoners."

"Perfect. I guess my opportunity has arrived. You want to join me? You can have sloppy seconds."

"You're a sick son of a bitch."

Joe shrugged, got to his feet and started for the doorway. Sarafina looked left and right, but there was nowhere to go. No cover. She kept her back to the wall, closed her eyes and imagined herself blending into it, becoming a part of it.

"Mists of magic, cloud his sight," she whispered. "Cloak my form as dark cloaks night."

He walked past her, never noticed her there. Didn't turn around, didn't look back. She kept her eyes closed and her mind open. She would have felt him notice her if he had, but he didn't.

When his footsteps faded, she opened her eyes again and saw his back vanishing down the halls. She paused a moment, thought of Rhiannon, felt her mind's vibrations and tuned into them. Rhiannon, how is your search progressing?

I've found no one yet. I sense two below, one on this level, but hidden somewhere.

I've had two here with me. They mentioned men named Mercer and Caine. Those would be the two in the basement. Stiles is apparently locked away somewhere. That makes at least five of them.

That's one more than we thought were in the house, Rhiannon's thoughts whispered across the vastness of the mansion. Not that it matters. We can deal.

One of mine is on his way up to Amber's room. He intends to drug her and rape her.

Oh, does he now?

Rhiannon didn't need to say more. Sarafina was confident "Joe" was as good as dead. But she was worried. If there were two men in the basement, would Will be able to handle them?

Stop worrying, Rhiannon thought fiercely. I'll go to the basement the moment I take care of the gnat in Amber's room. You focus on Stiles-having dealt with him in the past, and far more recently than I, you may have better luck honing in on his energies.

Sarafina agreed. God, it ate at her to care as much as she did. And yet the rage rising up in her belly at the thought of one of these men harming Willem Stone told her that she did care. She would tear them apart if they hurt Will.

She turned her own attention back to Crewcut, who was bending over the notebook now, his back to the door.

She slid slowly inside and thought about closing the door behind her to prevent anyone happening along and seeing, but decided against it. If its hinges creaked, the man would have time to shout, and she couldn't have that.

She glanced once behind her and, seeing no one, glided silently up behind him and positioned her hands on either side of his neck, not quite touching. Just as he sensed her presence and started to turn, she closed her hands all at once, without expending much effort at all. His larynx was crushed in her grip as easily as a paper straw would have been. His bones cracked like tiny, brittle twigs. He died instantly.

"Animal, hmm?" she whispered. Looking around the room, she spotted a closet, lifted the man out of his chair and carried him toward it. She dropped him inside and closed the door. Then she turned and walked quietly back out of the room, taking the notebook with her. It might be of interest to Amber and her guardians to know what Stiles had written there- though if "Jughead's" theory were correct, this was less than the entire story.

"Four left," she whispered. "Three, if Rhiannon and Joe have crossed paths yet." She went to search the house for the lab where Stiles had locked himself away.

She and Frank Stiles went way back. She owed him.

Amber was pacing the room, glancing over and over out the barred window at the guards below, wondering just how they were all going to get out of this hellhole alive when there were so many of them out there. Footsteps in the hall brought her head around fast, and she jerked the drapes tight, just in case. She hoped to God it was the others, returning with good news. It had been hours since they'd left her alone. Though she doubted it could be true. She'd spoken to her mother mentally, told her what was happening, but up to now, no one in the basement had seen any sign of the rescuers.

Amber recognized the man who stood outside her door as one of those who had brought her here. She hadn't seen him since then. Her meals were always brought by the female, Kelsey, backed up by the big blond man called Nelson.

The look in this man's eyes as he slid a key into her lock told her Stiles might have had a good reason for that policy. This man was slick and slimy. And she knew what he wanted before he opened the barred door, stepped inside and said, "You do me nice and I'll let you out of here. Deal?"

"Oh, I'll do you all right," she told him. She moved closer, wondering why no one had warned him that she was strong enough to tear off his arms and beat him to death with them.

He slid his hands around to cup her buttocks, and she lifted hers to his neck, to break it. But then she felt the sharp jab and realized the bastard had come prepared.

Her head swam, and her knees unhinged. She sank, but he caught her under the arms, hauled her to the bed and dropped her across it. Then he straddled her and fumbled with her jeans, unbuttoning and unzipping them.

He'd left the barred door open. The idiot.

Rhiannon appeared in the doorway. Her form was fuzzy, but Amber didn't need to see her to know she was there. And oh, God, was she pissed.

She strode into the room, gripped the man by the hair on the back of his head and hauled him off of Amber.

"Wha-? Who?"

She didn't give him time to get any louder. She put her hands on either side of his head and gave such a violent twist that when the body slid to the floor, the head remained in her hands. A length of skinny pinkish cord still connected the one to the other and blood flowed like a waterfall.

"Oh, gee, I think he lost his head." Amber laughed at her own joke. "Shit, Aunt Rhi, look at that mess." Her words slurred together.

"Button your jeans and hand me a blanket."

Amber lowered her eyes in the direction of her jeans, but her hands really didn't want to move. She tried to move them, but they only rose and then dropped lazily onto the bed again, which she found freaking hilarious now that the threat was gone.

"Hell," Rhiannon whispered, dropping the head next to the body on the floor and leaning over the bed. She rolled Amber to one side, then the other, peeling a blanket out from under her.

"He's got the funniest look on his face," Amber said, pointing at the gaping, surprised head. "He's like, 'Hey, where's my body?'"

Rhiannon rolled her eyes, turning with the blanket, intending to wrap the head and body to reduce the mess, but there was already a significant pool of blood on the floor. It would take too long to clean it up, she decided. She kicked the body and head underneath the bed, wiped her hands on the blanket, and then dropped the blanket to the floor to cover the bloodstains. Then she hauled Amber off the bed and dropped her into a nearby chair.

"I'm going to have to take you with me. You can't stay here like this. Any one of them could come for you, and you're defenseless in this condition."

"Yeah, but I gotta tell you, Rhiannon, my headache is long gone. So is his, I'll bet."

"Quiet!"

Amber put her finger to her lips, making an exaggerated shushing sound.

Rhiannon quickly arranged the blankets on the bed to look as if someone were lying asleep beneath them, a trick that might fool an army of kindergartners- but only very stupid ones.

Then she fastened Amber's jeans, gathered the girl into her arms and carried her out of the room, closing and locking the door behind them.

"Where are you taking me?" Amber asked.

"To the basement, I suppose. But only if you're very quiet."

Amber nodded and bit her lip to keep from laughing.

Will found the basement entrance right away. It had been his goal all along to get to the prisoners being held down there. It might have been easier to locate the men he suspected were lurking on the mansion's ground floor, but he had every confidence in Sarafina and Rhiannon. They could handle themselves. Maybe not against a tranquilizer-armed militia that knew they were coming, but this was a handful of men who were not expecting them.

They would be fine. And they would see to it that Amber was, as well.

He couldn't be so certain about the trio held in the subterranean levels of the place. Being held in the bowels of the earth was far too familiar to him not to twist his guts into knots. And from what Rhiannon had said about the DPI and the men who had served it, it was as likely as not the prisoners had undergone deprivation of heat, food and light, and possibly more active forms of torture.

He felt sick at the thought but couldn't quite shove it to the back of his mind. He'd lived it. It was too real, too recent, and too much a part of his soul.

He opened several doors as he made his way through the house, until one opened onto a set of stairs, descending into darkness.

He figured there was probably a guard down there...somewhere. Stepping onto the topmost stair, he pulled the door closed behind him, making the darkness complete. His bad foot was aching. He should have brought his damned meds with him, but he hadn't planned on taking an extended trip. It took effort and concentration to step down on the foot, evenly, slowly and soundlessly, despite the pain that shot through it more with every ounce of weight.

A stair creaked, just slightly.

Willem went still, motionless, waiting.

When no sound emerged, he took another step. There was no way to tell where the stairs ended and the floor began, other than to just put his foot out there and feel for it. There were more stairs than he would have expected. The cellar was deep.

His eyes began to adjust to the darkness. He could make out shapes by the time he finally reached the basement floor. Turning right, he moved slowly, arms out in front of him. Somewhere in this direction there was supposed to be an entrance to a secret section of the basement-once a wine rack.

He felt only a wall of crumbling stone.

Inching along it, feeling his way, he wondered if he shouldn't just find a light switch and snap it on.

A flare of light came on the heels of that thought, startling him-and then he realized it was the flame of a match or lighter, only a few yards farther along the wall. He watched the flame move in, saw the end of a cigarette glow and the flame go out. If he'd kept going, he would have walked right into the smoker. Thank God for nicotine addiction.

He shook off the fright and again began moving slowly, steadily, forward. His foot hit something; a pebble or bit of stone skittered across the floor. The glowing tip turned in his direction.

"You there, guards." The voice came from the other side of the wall, though Will realized it must not be a wall where the guard stood. That must be the barred door. But the man had shouted "guards" not "guard."

Hell, there was more than one.

The smoker turned toward the voice, which wasn't a voice Will recognized.

"What the hell do you want, bloodsucker?"

"What I want is to rip your heart out and suck it dry. But that wasn't why I summoned you just now."

Will smiled just a little. The vamp knew he was here. He'd heard the pebble as clearly as the guard had. Maybe he'd heard more than that. Sarafina said their senses were magnified. He guessed the owner of the voice must be Rhiannon's husband-Roland, she'd called him.

"It's Angelica," the vampire went on. "I think she may be near death."

"Right."

"Look for yourself, man!"

"You think I'm an idiot? I come any closer to the bars, you'll have me. I'm not leech food."

Will squinted in the darkness, wishing to God he could see the action.

"I'll stand back from the bars. See?"

The man didn't, apparently, because he flicked his lighter again, holding it in front of his face. Will could see him now, see his face illuminated by the single tongue of flame. As was the dim outline of the man who stood beside him. Will saw only two. He prayed there were not more.

"Mercer, go up and get the boss. See what he wants to do about this."

The second man flicked on a flashlight, and Will ducked behind a support post and watched its beam move quickly across the basement. He heard the man pound up the stairs and close the door behind him after he got up there.

The first one leaned a little closer to the bars, peering in, holding the lighter a bit farther in front of him. He was extremely careful not to put himself within reach of the prisoners.

His back was to Will now, as no doubt, the vampire had intended. Will moved in, swift and silent, right up behind the guard. He cupped the man's mouth and chin with one hand and braced the other at his nape.

"Don't kill him," a woman's voice snapped.

Frowning into the darkness, Will couldn't see, and he didn't ask questions. He changed his grip to a choke hold and squeezed the guard into unconsciousness. When the man went limp, Will dropped him, and his body fell forward. Will bent over to search him. But before he could even begin, the body was jerked roughly forward, smashing against the bars.

Will had no idea what was going on-at least, not until he heard the sucking sounds. He tried his best to ignore the smacking and slurping, along with the guard's position, which soon became apparent-both arms had been yanked through the bars-and finished searching the guy's pockets. He located a set of keys, removed them, then got to his feet, stepping over the guard and running his hands along the barred door, bumping the arms along the way, until he found the lock panel with its keyhole. Then he began trying one key after another, until, finally, one of them fit.

The feeding frenzy had stopped. He rolled the body aside and pulled the cage door open.

"I'm glad to see you, Stone."

That was Bryant's voice. Amber's father, the man who'd hired him. "Wish I could say the same," he replied, blinking in the darkness. "Good move distracting the guard. I'm glad you heard me kick that pebble."

The other male, the one Will assumed was Roland, cleared his throat. "We heard you coming down the stairs, watched you all the way across the basement. Stealth is not your strong suit, Stone."

"Maybe not to you. The guard didn't hear me, though."

"Where's my daughter?" the woman, Angelica, asked.

Will blinked, looking in her general direction. "I thought you two were able to communicate-you know, astrally or whatever."

"Mentally. She's gone silent. Something's wrong."

Will twisted his wrist, squeezed his watch so its face lit green. "Let's get upstairs. We don't have much time."

"Much time before what?" Jameson asked, already heading toward the stairway.

Roland gripped Will's upper arm to guide him across the dark basement to the stairs. Will was grateful; it would have taken him twice as long, blind.

"Before my diversion kicks in-assuming it works."

They were heading up the stairs by now, but before they could make it, the door at the top opened, letting a shaft of light fill the stairway. Rhiannon stood there, carrying Amber in her arms. The girl hung limply, and Willem's heart twisted.

Angelica gave a sharp little cry, and the next thing Will knew she was at the top, taking the girl from Rhiannon's arms.

"She's only unconscious. One of them drugged her again."

"How are you two progressing?" Will asked.

"Sarafina killed one on the ground floor. I haven't seen her, but I saw the kill through her eyes. I killed another, though I'm afraid I didn't do it as neatly as you instructed. You?"

"One dead down here. Another raced upstairs to find Stiles. You didn't see him?"

"No."

They were all on the ground floor now, Roland closing the basement door behind them, before turning to slide an arm around Rhiannon, pulling her close to him, kissing her hungrily.

"By my count," Will said, "Stiles and the one who ran up here to find him are the only two left in the house."

Jameson nodded. "Then where the hell are they?" Will frowned. "More importantly, where the hell is Sarafina?"