One of the wooden crates crashed to the floor with a boom like cannon fire. The crate exploded on impact, sending pieces of wood and a hail of bolts flying through the air, pelting us like shrapnel.
Something hit the back of my head and I reeled. I could feel splinters through my jeans.
Another crate fell, then a third, thunderingly loud. It was only a matter of time before one of us was crushed or injured. My jeans and hoodie deflected the worst of what hit us, though I expected to be covered in bruises.
“This way!” Sorren shouted. The angle of the falling crates had given him the clue he needed to find our way through the wind toward the door.
As quickly as it came, the wind stopped, and I realized that the ghosts of the wronged dead stood between us and the exit.
I stumbled, and the ghosts closed ranks, cutting me off from Teag and Sorren. They turned to come back for me, and the cold wind gusted again, tipping the stack of crates right beside us.
Everything seemed to happen at once.
Instinctively, I threw my left arm up to protect myself. The ghosts lunged for me. Bo’s tags jangled from the collar around my wrist, and suddenly the sound of an angry attack dog echoed from the stone walls. Bo’s ghost stood between me and the vengeful spirits of the wronged dead, barking like a junkyard dog and baring his teeth, snapping and snarling.
The ghosts were still between me and the door, but they didn’t try to get past Bo, buying me a few seconds to react. With my right hand, I leveled Alard’s walking stick at the closest crate as it tilted crazily and began to careen toward me.
I didn’t know if Bo’s ghost would disappear if I tried to focus on the memories that activated Alard’s walking stick, but there wasn’t time to worry about it. I willed myself to concentrate, opening myself to the resonance of the walking stick, fearing that at any moment, the ghosts would close around me.
Fire burst from the silver tip of Alard’s cane, striking the crate that was headed straight for me. The crate burst apart with a crash, and the blast of fiery power threw the fragments backwards, showering the ghosts with a rain of burning embers.
I tried to run, but the ghosts forced me back. Crates were tumbling everywhere. I saw Sorren throw Teag out of the way, only to be buried by the falling jumble of splintered wood and the hail of bolts, clamps, and sundry metal fasteners. I didn’t dare blast the crates now for fear of incinerating Sorren and Teag. I shoved Alard’s walking stick through my belt.
“Sorren!” I screamed. Teag thrust his lantern with its blue-black witch’s candle at the ghosts and they shrank back, clearing a path to the door. He grabbed me by the shoulders and threw me toward the opening, diving to follow me, he rolled and was back up on his feet. I landed hard, but Teag grabbed my arm and dragged me to my feet, hauling me toward the door. Behind us, I heard Bo’s ghost holding our attackers at bay.
A thunderous roar reverberated from the walls as we ran the last few feet to the door. I was bleeding in a dozen places from where bits of wood and metal had clipped me, and Teag had a nasty gash on the side of his head, plus at least as many injuries as I did. I wanted to turn to look for Sorren, but Teag had a hold on my sleeve, dragging me forward.
I knew Sorren was immortal, but he had also told me that he could be destroyed. A stake through the heart would immobilize a vampire of his age, but decapitation would be fatal. It wasn’t difficult to imagine pieces of flying wood impaling him or some odd piece of metal shearing through his neck. I had no idea whether ghosts could attack the undead directly, and my loyalty warred with my common sense because I wanted to run back in to see if I could help. Teag must have sensed my conflict, because he kept a tight grip on my arm.
A piece of one of the falling crates clipped me in the head and I went down on one knee. Bo’s snarling ghost wavered and winked out. The angry spirits surged forward, tearing at our clothing, grabbing fistfuls of hair, scratching at us with bone-sharp fingers that left bloody welts down my arms and back.
“We can’t leave Sorren in there!” I said, staggering to my feet and stumbling as Teag refused to let me fall. The ghosts were right behind us. Teag shoved me through ahead of him, and the darkness closed around him, pulling him backward.
“Cassidy! Run!” Teag yelled.
I wheeled back toward the warehouse. I was not giving up.
“Get your dead fucking hands off of him!” I shouted at the darkness, lunging back through the doorway. One hand closed around Teag’s arm and the other grabbed a fistful of his hoodie and despite the way my vision reeled from the throbbing welt on my skull, I pulled for all I was worth, bracing my feet against the doorframe.
The vengeful dead fought me, hungry for another sacrifice. I was swearing like a sailor under my breath, channeling my fear, anger, and desperation to save Teag. Icy cold tendrils were shredding Teag’s hoodie and shirt, and he screamed in pain as sharp, skeletal hands scraped the flesh from his back.
I acted on instinct. My right hand came up, palm out, straight-arm, and a blast of yellow-golden light barely missed Teag’s ear. Its power threw me backward into the parking lot and dragged Teag with me, since my hand had a death grip on his hoodie. I stared in horror, afraid that the warehouse was about to go up in flame, but it was power, not fire that streamed from my outstretched palm. Like the force fields I had seen in science-fiction movies, the golden light held the ghosts at bay. I felt my grandmother’s presence more strongly than at any time since her death. Grandma Sarah was a loving woman, but when someone she loved had been wronged, she could be fierce.
The burst of light gave us the chance to scramble backward until we had put most of the lot between us and the warehouse. The golden light winked out. I sat back on my heels, staring at the warehouse in despair.
“We left him in there.” I was never going to forgive myself.
“He’s almost six hundred years old, Cassidy. I’m sure he’s been through worse things than this,” Teag said, but I could tell from his voice he didn’t really believe his words. Teag was pale, and bleeding in enough places that he looked as if he’d been mugged. My heart was thudding, blood pounding through my veins in aftershock. If Sorren still existed, he wouldn’t have any trouble finding me.
The street of warehouses seemed deafeningly silent. I froze, waiting to hear sirens, but if the Covington place ever had a security system, it was deactivated along with the electric service. I glanced around, but the run-down warehouses nearby barely had outdoor lights that worked, let alone security cameras. I didn’t know what was worse: thinking the cops might show up at any second with guns drawn or being utterly alone out here in the dark with no back-up.
“What do we do?” I asked, staring at the warehouse. “He could be hurt. We can’t just leave him in there.””
“Vampires heal super-fast.”
I shook my head. “Not if something impaled him. If he’s been impaled through the heart, he won’t turn to dust, but he can’t move.”
“Fortunately, that did not happen.”
Sorren emerged from the far side of the Covington building. He had worn jeans, a dark t-shirt and a black lightweight jacket for the night’s endeavor, and it looked as if he had rolled in sawdust. A deep gash on his forehead soaked one side of his face and the collar of his shirt in blood, but the wound was healing even as I watched. His hair was dark and matted, testimony to other injuries I could not see. One sleeve of his jacket was torn at the shoulder, and he had put the knees out of his jeans. His sword still hung from his belt. A gash across the front of his shirt and a bloody wound beneath it vindicated my worry. The crates had not struck him through the heart, but they came close enough.