The vampires paused, as if they weren’t certain they were hearing her correctly.
“Well?” she asked the silence.
“By all means!” Oliver shouted, and the rest of the vampires roared in agreement.
“Now go!” she shouted. “Clear us a path to the ship where you’ll see the show. I’ll set the stage.”
Jin couldn’t tamp down a smile as the vampires obeyed her commands. Arthie allowed herself no such triumph. Her gaze tracked every movement around them. “If there are more Ripper vampires, we’ll have a problem on our hands.”
Jin’s mother shook her head. “There is only the one.”
His father’s fail-safe had killed the other six.
“Really? We have nearly a hundred more waiting to turn,” Matteo snapped.
“They will not mutate so long as they continue consumption of the coconut water.”
“And how exactly are we going to get rid of the Ripper on our tail?” Arthie asked.
“It appears he’s targeting you three,” his mother said. “He will follow you as far as he can.”
“That’s not reassuring, Mother,” Jin said.
“Don’t you understand? We only need to get to your ship,” she said. “He’ll follow you into the sea.”
And vampires couldn’t swim. Even if a Ripper vampire could, he couldn’t make it across the sea to Ettenia. It was entirely morbid, but it would have to do.
29ARTHIE
Calibore in hand, Arthie waved the vampires through the fortress gates. They weren’t in the best shape. They were pale from being starved—ghastly so, for vampires were already pale from lack of blood to begin with. Most had thinning hair and gangly limbs.
But they were eager for the same vengeance she was, and she was just as eager to give it to them. Jin and Matteo made quick work of the guards rushing toward them, but Arthie knew it wouldn’t be long before they were overrun. Once the others passed through the gates and started for the trees, Oliver included, she turned to Shaw. Sora was nowhere to be seen.
She was about to ask for a torch. Shaw had something else instead.
“Take this—it’s a calling card.”
He held out a heavy gold coin, stamped with something she couldn’t make out in the dark. Arthie glanced at him, brow furrowed before she pushed him aside and fired Calibore in the direction of an oncoming guard.
“It’s one of our few possessions we kept safe and out of her sight. From long ago when we first met with the Council to show them our findings. In case we don’t make it off the island, take this to a Horned Guard minister,” Shaw explained, “and it will earn you an audience with them.”
A guaranteed ticket to the Council. Arthie didn’t know such a thing existed.
“Why are you giving this to me and not Jin?” she asked. He didn’t answer, and Arthie didn’t have time to wait. She pocketed it. “You’re making it off the island. We still need you, remember?”
The moonlight flickered in Shaw’s gaze. Appreciation shone in his eyes, for she wasn’t discarding him after what she’d seen, and that meant his son might not either.
Sora joined them with a torch. “Everything is in place.”
“That quickly?”
“Oliver offered to help, as did a few others. Vampires do move fast.”
When Arthie took it from her, it was with a sense of reverence. It weighed as heavily as the years since she’d fled Ceylan’s shores. The fort reached for the skies with a cold hand, casting its black shadow over the coast. Inside, guards shouted in Ettenian. Ceylani were in there too, but they knew the island. They’d escape. They had to.
Arthie raised the torch.For my mother. For my people. For the tyranny that must end.“Now.”
Shaw lit the torch and took a step back. The flames flickered in his eyes. She held it high, thinking of the trees that had been cut down for Ettenia’s tea plantations, spawning regular landslides. Thinking of the spices they’d snatched away, the gems they’d scoured the earth to find. The lives they’d ruined for no reason other than the fact that they could.
