The Path of Razors (5 page)

Authors: Chris Marie Green

BOOK: The Path of Razors

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But ... not anymore.

Natalia, her curly brown hair barely held back in its barrette, joined Frank’s team of doubt now.

“What if those girls sic more animals on you, as they did last night?” she asked. “Perhaps they can even do it from where they are off campus. Their mind powers seemed that strong.”

“And
perhaps
they can’t do anything to us right now.” Dawn fingered the outline of the sharp crucifix just under her black turtleneck. “Don’t forget that my head trips can be just as strong as anything they have to throw at us.”

Nobody had the guts to say anything to that. They’d seen how Dawn’s ever-growing psychokinesis had taken up puppet-master proportions—she’d even been able to restrain one of the schoolgirl vampires, Della, with her mind during the skirmish.

But Frank gave it one last Daddy try. “They’re capable little girls, Dawn. Don’t underestimate them.”

“So why aren’t they at our front door barking at us right now?”

Costin listened, as if weighing all of this. Kiko just laughed.

“Dude,” he said, “I can tell you why they’re not here. First, those girls are major naive, unless they were just
acting!
And unfortunately for them, naivete isn’t so great a quality for a vamp to have. Second, they obviously didn’t get along with each other. They were a social disaster waiting to happen. I mean, did you see them scrapping among themselves as they hoofed it away from us? And I don’t even need to talk about the big-time tension between Della and her frenemy Violet. Who’s to say they won’t self-destruct before we even
get
to them?”

Frank shrugged.

“The way I figure it,” the psychic added, “we’ll just load Dawn up with a UV grenade or two. I don’t know if a silver bullet or a dart or holy water will work on those hairless wolf-cats, but UV sure did.”

“Pardon me,” Natalia said. “But they move around during the daylight. How can UV affect them so much?”

Kiko scratched his blond head. “I imagine they can only stand so
much
sunlight. Our grenades have enough concentrated UV to knock them to the ground. It’s like having one cocktail and getting a buzz as opposed to having, like, fifty drinks and getting alcohol poisoning. Dawn could take out a small hive of these vamps with only one grenade if she plays her cards right.”

“She might need more than just a grenade,” Frank added. “What if we’re dealing with an Underground that has distinctly different levels of vamps, like the one in L.A.? We’d need for every Underground vampire to be a sucker for that kind of UV dose, too. If they arent, then Dawn could be waltzing into a death trap.”

In spite of Frank’s argument, Kiko pointed at Dawn, shooting her with a wink and a smile. “Our girl can handle her vamps.”

Thankful for his props, Dawn stoically winked back at him. But when she glanced at Costin to see if he’d been persuaded, her heart sank at the way his gaze had gone dark again.

Even though he’d never admit it, she knew that he hated needing their help to such an extent.

She touched the crucifix buried under her shirt again, the points sharp enough to let out pinpricks of bad blood if she pressed hard enough.

“Costin?” she asked, wanting him to give his blessing.

But if he didn’t give it, would it make a difference?

Would he be able to stop her—his master—if it came right down to it?

The thought unsettled her, but it also made her feel ...

Well,
powerful.

And justified, too, because now he couldn’t use her as bait, as he’d done in L.A.

Now he couldn’t hurt her nearly as much.

But ... God, it wasn’t right to think that way. She wouldn’t contribute to literally putting Costin’s soul in hell, which is what would happen if his mission to exterminate the dragon and his blood progeny failed.

“So when morning comes,” she said, putting an end to all this conversation, “I’ll hop into some schoolgirl clothes and get myself to Queenshill.”

Costin paused, and Dawn tensed. But when he nodded, his topaz gaze meeting hers, she knew that he felt just as helpless to control her as he did Jonah.

She wanted to fall into his mind, to tell him he was mistaken, that he was still The Voice. That he was still the boss.

But when a new blast of jasmine air blew into the room, she tore her gaze from his, something dying a little inside of her.

A Friend’s voice—the French accent identifying her as Evangeline from one of Costin’s eighteenth-century teams—whisked through the rest of the jasmine that was spilling into the room as other spirits joined her.

“Outside,”
Evangeline said, the words threading through the atmosphere.
“Get your weapons ready.”

Before she even finished, the team hopped to it, with Dawn grabbing a batch of velvet-wrapped throwing blades from her back pocket and heading for the lab door along with Kiko, who’d pulled his revolver from his shoulder holster. Frank joined them as they ran up the stairs.

About damned time those schoolgirls showed up to finish what they’d started last night, Dawn thought. In her craziest fantasies, she’d been wishing they’d just get on over here and put an end to the waiting.

“How many of them?” she asked.

“One vampire
,” Evangeline said as she trailed back to allow Breisi to take her place beside Dawn and Frank. “
And she is asking for ‘the girl.’ Asking for Dawn.”

Only one?

And she wanted Dawn in particular?

At the top of the steps, she exchanged red-alert glances with her teammates, then sprinted the rest of the way to the front door, where she looked out of the peephole.

And, indeed, out on the premorning street, right in front of the decorated gates of Cross Bones Graveyard, which was really just a slab of cement, stood a schoolgirl dressed in a long skirt, white shirt, and slender red tie.

Violet.

The leader of the Queenshill vampires.

FOUR

THE UGLY STEPSISTER

WHAT
does she want with
me
?“ Dawn asked as she pulled back from the peephole.

“Who?” Kiko asked.

“That Violet girl. The queen bee of the group.” Dawn went to the weapons panel in the wall near the door, opened it, then extracted a holy water bracelet that she strapped around her wrist, plus a mini flamethrower that she shoved into the waistline of her dark pants.

Kiko had come to her side, dragging a wooden stepstool so he could raid the weapons cache, too.

“Kik,” Dawn said, “I’ll take care of her on my own. She asked for me, and if all of us go outside to say a fond hi, she might bolt.”

“Undergrounders don’t usually ask for so many fights above, Dawn. It’s a concern.”

“Everything’s a concern.”

She donned a communication earpiece and grabbed a locator device for good measure, then stuffed a UV grenade in the pocket of the light jacket she was about to put on.

Frank’s voice sounded from behind her. “How about I zip outside and get close enough for some eye contact? I can go inside her mind in a snap.”

Dawn paused in her prep. “Let me run this by you all one more time—she asked for
me.
There’s gotta be a reason, and I’m going to find out what it is.”

“I can tell you what it is right now,” Frank said. “It’s easier to kill a team member if she’s by herself. Ambush Basics—know what I mean?”

“Could be,” Kiko interjected. “The rest of them just might be waiting out there, hoping we’ll snag on their hook. Not that we couldn’t snag them right back.”

Dawn reached into the weapons hole again.

An exasperated sigh from her dad told her that he knew she was going to do what she damned well pleased. The fact that Costin hadn’t stopped her yet probably even lent weight to her cause.

He wanted her to go outside, wanted to see just what Violet was here for.

And, gee—here she’d thought that her being used as bait for the Underground had stopped in L.A.

As she took a container of garlic essence out of the cache, she admitted that she didn’t mind being sacrificed anymore, that it was actually what she lived for nowadays. Then she motioned for Frank to clear the area before she put some essence on her bod.

Even if these vamps ended up being immune to garlic, she was hoping the stench might confuse their senses a little, taking away their ability to keep track of her every movement if she ended up having to hightail it away for some reason; she’d spray the stuff as she went along, leaving a false trail.

Or maybe garlic wouldn’t work at all if they could hear her body rhythms.

At any rate, Breisi had spent most of the last few hours brain-storming ways that might address both issues, and Dawn trusted that her Friend would come up with something. Hell, even before Breisi had been murdered, she’d been their official awesome mad scientist.

Since Frank didn’t love being around garlic so much, he removed himself to the back of the room, melding with the dark wood, the ominous bas-reliefs featuring friars on the ceiling, the chubby angel faces, and the mirrors that gave such a twisted manor-house feel to this place. Meanwhile, Dawn slapped on the essence, barely even catching the much-more-appealing scent of the Friends as they swirled around her.

The spirits were probably outside, too, near Violet, and the notion gave Dawn that much more confidence.

After wrapping herself in the big, light jacket to cover the extent of her arsenal, she positioned a silver-laced throwing blade in her fingers, ready to rock.

“Hey,” Kiko said, still standing on his stool. “Don’t die.”

“Don’t worry.” Dawn walked to the door. “You still owe me a game of football.” The kind where you played with a triangle of paper.

“Dawn,” Frank said from the back of the room, his own tone carrying an entire epic series of caution.

She stopped, hand on the knob. Damn the timing, but it struck her again how caring he’d become after being turned. Back when he was human, he’d been too drunk half the time to have a fully developed conscience, so Dawn was still getting used to this new, improved, vampire version of her father.

If “improved” was what you’d call it.

“Frank,” she said, softening as much as was possible. Which still left a bunch of room for an awkward edge. “I’m not a kid anymore.”

They locked gazes, but then he planted his hands on his hips and glared at the floor.

Kiko couldn’t resist tossing one in there. “Admit it, Frank—your baby’s all growed up.”

Just as she was about to open the door, Costin’s voice came out of one of the angel-face speakers, giving voice to the wooden cherub.

“It seems that Violet is not approaching, merely ... waiting.”

By now, Costin would’ve instructed Natalia to monitor the video screens in another room while he sequestered himself out of sheer habit. Last night, Jonah had proven that their body could survive outside, but Costin never risked what he didn’t need to. The stakes were just too high, and Dawn couldn’t really fault him for it.

Even though it might be a real game changer if he would just give his new vampire body a chance beyond headquarters ...

But why worry when
she
could deal with Violet right now?

“What do you think the queen bee has in mind?” she asked Costin. “And I really hope you’re not standing at our bedroom window just so you can get good reception.” Although he hadn’t been able to break out of his body with his full powers, he’d retained his ability to use his mind for hypnosis and such. “You’d be giving her a nice target.”

“Thank you for noting it,” he said, a hint of amusement somewhere in there.

Okay, Jonah had taken their body outside last night, but she was still worried about the safety of their ultimate weapon. She was a creature of habit, just like Costin was, and if they didn’t keep him as secure as they could—even with his powers being as questionable as they were nowadays—it would all be over.

“At the moment,” Costin added, “I’m as safe and sound as possible.” Until Jonah decided to take over. Costin didn’t say it, but it was implied. “Yet regarding Violet’s motives? I cannot be certain of anything.”

“Whatever the situation,” Frank said, “we’ll be ready.”

Aw, Dad was backing her up now. His protective doggedness tried to break through Dawn’s frostiness.

Tried, but she was too prepped for action to feel any of the warm fuzzies.

She addressed the angel face. “Costin, you’re ready to control the UV lights outside and flood the area if Violet pulls anything funny?”

“Yes.”

“Then I’m off.”

She didn’t want to wait around for any more gooey stuff. Everyone in the house knew ...