“My wings?”
“Hold them as tight as you can. No big movements. Go!”
The ground was wet and muddy, but Andromeda did exactly what Naasir had ordered, the three of them spread out enough that from above, each one would be nothing other than another muddy patch of grass. It was hard and relentless and they had to go motionless more than once when an angel flew too close overhead. Breath coming harsh and low, Suyin did her best, but she lost consciousness halfway through.
Andromeda helped put her on Naasir’s back and he took the hurt angel the rest of the way.
By the time they reached the trees, Andromeda’s muscles were quivering and the front of her body coated in mud. Using the rain dripping from her hair to wipe off her face, she saw Naasir had already placed Suyin in a seated position against a tree.
“I can’t believe that worked.” Turning into the rain in the hope it would wash off more of the mud, Andromeda looked out over the distance they’d covered.
“The rain helped. Otherwise, we’d have had to hide and wait for another chance.” Picking up Suyin after that short break, he led Andromeda through the trees that didn’t do much to hold back the rain. “Jason probably drove out most of the reborn, but their scent is still thick, so one or more may remain.”
Sword held at the ready as the rain continued to thunder down, Andromeda kept her eyes on alert for the shambling half corpses that were the reborn. When Naasir hissed and said, “Left,” she pivoted, sword already coming up.
A severed head rolled to the ground seconds later. The reborn’s body gushed blood as it fell, but Andromeda stepped out of the way of the spray just quickly enough. “Thank you for the warning.” Again, the rain washed her blade clean.
As it had her father’s when he methodically cut a vampire to pieces once.
Naasir’s gaze searched her face, as if he could sense how disturbed she was at her unhesitating ruthlessness. “It’s us or them. You aren’t torturing or harming the reborn without cause—you are fighting for your survival. That is the right of any creature.”
Andromeda jerked her head in a nod. “Yes.” The reborn may have been innocent prior to their transformation, but they were an abomination now. As for the guards, they would’ve killed Naasir given the slightest chance.
Her jaw firmed, hand tightening on the hilt of the sword. “I won’t let anyone hurt you.”
Instead of laughing at what must seem a ridiculous statement when it came to a man so dangerous and capable of looking after himself, Naasir’s lips curved in a satisfied smile. “I knew you liked me.”
Surprised into a soft laugh, Andromeda reached out to check Suyin’s pulse. It was even shallower than she’d expected. “She could fall into anshara.” Normally, the semiconscious healing sleep was a helpful thing, but it could be a serious handicap if Naasir had to carry Suyin the entire way.
“Angels would be much more efficient if they could drink blood,” Naasir said conversationally.
“Well . . . I suppose that’s true.” A feed would’ve given Suyin an immediate jolt of energy. “Do you ever feed anyone?”
Naasir shot her an intrigued look. “Do you want to taste me?”
She wasn’t put off by that question as any civilized scholar should’ve been. “No,” she said at last, and had the feeling she was telling a lie.
“I want to taste you.” A wicked smile. “Will you feed me if I need it?”
“Of course,” she said, trying to sound pragmatic when the idea of Naasir feeding from her made her insides turn molten. “You’re my only hope of getting out of here.”
He growled at her and didn’t say anything else for the next ten minutes as they made their way through the forest. Finally, she couldn’t stand it anymore. “Stop sulking.”
Another rumbling growl. Turning, he snapped his teeth at her.
She jumped even though she’d thought she was ready for an aggressive reaction. Teeth gritted, she glared at his infuriating face. “Growl at me again and I’ll bite you.” She didn’t know where the words came from, probably from aggravation.
Staring at her, he went as if to speak. His nostrils flared. “Reborn,” he said, and placed Suyin against a tree with a wide-enough trunk that her back was fully protected.
Andromeda didn’t need to be told where to stand; she stood with Naasir behind her, Suyin to her left. His back pressed into her wings, but she knew he wasn’t being provocative for once.
“Be careful of your wings.”
She suddenly remembered his bare hands. “Do you have weapons?”
A joyous laugh. “Yes.”
And then there was no more time to talk. The slavering, blank-eyed and ferociously hungry creatures who were Lijuan’s reborn boiled out of the woods around them.
15
Naasir drew deep on the primal heart of his nature. His claws released and his canines elongated, his vision a knife blade through the dark and his sense of smell acute. All trappings of civilization gone, he wanted to turn and nuzzle at the neck of the woman who smelled like his mate, but that had to wait.
First, he had to kill the foul creatures howling toward them.
They were shambling and laughingly slow in comparison to his speed, but their infectiousness made them a threat against which he couldn’t risk using his teeth. From all evidence to date, it appeared the reborn needed to kill their victim for that victim to become reborn, but Naasir wasn’t going to take the risk that the creatures hadn’t mutated and become strong enough to infect living flesh.
His teeth might be out, but he utilized his claws like blades, slicing and ripping and tearing. At his back, he could feel Andromeda moving with a fighter’s grace, her sword slicing through the air on a deadly whistle of sound.
Heads rolled to the leaf-strewn earth around him.
“Naasir?”
He growled in answer at the concern in her tone. He couldn’t speak quickly when living in this skin that was another aspect of his nature, but he was pleased she was thinking about him.
A clean slice of sound as her sword moved again, blood spraying the air.
He clenched his teeth against the putrid smell and reached out to rip a reborn’s head from its shoulders. That emptied more blood around them, splattering him, but it was worth it to get rid of the tainted creatures. Kicking out with clawed feet, he disemboweled one while decapitating another. He didn’t like to cause the reborn unnecessary pain—Lijuan had likely used innocent villagers as her fodder—but he couldn’t rip off two heads at once.
Behind him, he could hear Andromeda breathing hard. She leaned against him. “Are they all dead?”
He took care of the one he’d disemboweled and thought hard about the words he’d been taught as a child after Raphael carried him to the Refuge. “Yes.” It came out a growl so deep, he knew he didn’t sound human.
Shifting to face Andromeda, he gripped her jaw with a clawed and bloody hand. He turned her head—gently—to one side then the other before checking her neck and body. Her wings were bloodied, but it was from spray. “You’re not hurt,” he got out just as part of him realized he’d probably scared her.
Women didn’t like his claws, didn’t like the way his eyes glowed after a hunt.
Andromeda pushed off his hand and grabbed his jaw. He was so surprised he let her pull him forward and turn his face this way and that. Releasing him, she walked around to his back and pushed up his T-shirt, then came around to do the same to the blood-soaked front.
“You’re not hurt either.” She looked down at his feet. “Did you get cut or bitten there?”
He snorted at the ridiculousness of her question. Dropping her hand from his T-shirt, she scowled at him. “Are those things all dead or do you think we’ll run into more?”
Thinking about it, about words and how they worked, he said, “They would’ve come toward the scent of blood.”