Anticipating the massive fist before it slammed into his head, Bennett stopped the blow with his shield. The force of it should have sent him flying, but Bennett held strong.
When the next blow came, Bennett juked to the side and drove his sword into Tromos’ side.
Spinning, Tromos slammed his fist into Bennett and sent him flying across the room.
Chapter20
“You let her go, didn’t you?”
“I did. You came back a fucking nutcase.” The corner of Blayk’s lips quirked up as he added, “Maybe you always were, but it was in a direction that suited me.”
The ground shook again, harder this time. The vampire trio flinched as gravel rained from the ceiling, blocking the falling debris.
As it let up, Calloway strolled toward Adair… and Tromos. “If you don’t mind, I have work to do.”
Adair moved her hand to the hilt of the knife at her hip. To Calloway, she winked.
His smile widened as Adair sprinted at him full speed.
From behind him, Blayk was on the move.
As Calloway drew close, Adair swung her knife and gouged into Calloway’s side. Calloway recoiled and turned away from the attack. Blayk anticipated the move and knocked Calloway in the jaw with a blunt fist, sending him back toward Adair. She swung again and sliced across his cheek.
“And you mocked me for training with that smithy rather than eating her,” she mocked Calloway and tossed her knife in the air. “Some humans are worth keeping around.”
Swinging, slicing, she lashed at Calloway. Matched in speed, but he couldn’t anticipate her rhythm and he couldn’t get close enough to stop her. In a feeble attempt to back away, Calloway ran into Blayk. Knocking an elbow into Calloway’s throat, following with a few martial arts moves that were new since Adair had seen him last, he dropped Calloway to the ground.
Rolling away and leaping back to his feet, Calloway grinned with pure malice, delight and something nastier. Those blows should have at least slowed him, if not left him weeping on the ground.
Adair glared at him, the uncertainty plaguing her. “What have you done to yourself?”
Sneering, he boasted with a puffed-up chest, “Your boyfriend isn’t the only one who’s been modified. Have you ever tasted a hunter? Invigorating. The hunter I stole the prophecy from? He heals so beautifully. Or, he did until I finished him off this evening. Like he was made simply to feed me and make me stronger.”
Hatred boiling in her throat, Adair shook her head. “I should have finished you off all those years ago.”
She caught Blayk’s eye, and they lashed at Calloway from either side. The trio fought two-on-one, their energy, their speed stirring the air in the maze, the wind they created gusting down the corridors.
Under Blayk’s kick, dodging Adair’s blade, Calloway ducked and thought himself quite the survivor.
Blayk came up from behind and gripped his hands around Calloway’s head.
From the front, throwing her blade, Adair aimed for his belly.
Calloway’s expression fell pale as he grasped the embedded dagger, his face overcome with shock. Mouth gaping open, he stumbled.
With a final twist, Blayk snapped his neck and Calloway fell to the ground at his feet.
At the gruesome scene, Adair cringed as she watched blood pouring from the open wound, his head twisted at an awkward angle, an occasional reflexive gag the only sign he wasn’t dead yet.
Blayk moved to her side, his expression equally horrified.
Blood oozed from Calloway’s mouth as the life drained out of him.
The ground shook again, rocks crumbling from the ceiling. “Come on.” Blayk grabbed her hand. Together, they sprinted down the maze as it collapsed behind them.
***
Slamming into his face like a series of pistoning bricks, Tromos pounded on Bennett.
