Drew

I knew ninjas were tricky bastards, notorious for eluding capture and executing heroic escapes, but I never would have thought a poisoned one could wiggle out of silver chains. I bet Vivian didn't bargain on it, either.

My mind reels in turmoil as we race through the dark. A few random footprints where Emiko took our picture were all we had to start the trail. Drops of her blood litter the base of a tree here and there, but the trail appears random. The pines are dense in this area, requiring us to slow our speed so we don't run into them.

Is Vivian a manipulator? I'd heard stories from my old seethe about a mutation in the bloodline that allowed a vampire to control another vampire. The mutations supposedly occurred frequently many centuries before my time. I wasn't sure I believed the elders, taking the repeated tales for the powerful undead as myth and exaggeration. One person even likened it to a human born with a necromancer gene and that perhaps the virus, which makes us semi-immortal, mutates when it combines with the dormant trait.

But, they also said every manipulator has been killed upon discovery; the trackers wore cloth-lined silver caps to thwart the dangerous ability of their prey.

The trees whiz by as both Paul and I silently scan the darkness for traces of blood. Footprints in the snow appear every now and then; but not enough to indicate she's running. Could she be jumping from trunk to trunk and hanging onto the trees to prevent a visible trail? We trudge on, as fast as we can, not knowing where the injured vampire might be headed.

What does this new development with my master mean for me? Will she confirm my suspicions or deny them? Could she alter my memories and I wouldn't know it? The idea of a detection charm was clever, but it can't be the only fail-safe idea Coraline's inner group came up with. Taking the charm from the Tribunal member and convincing her she never had it will only keep suspicion off Vivian until the curly-haired vamp reports back to her co-conspirators.

They will surely know what a missing charm and a spotty recollection will mean. What's next? Will our haven in the Arctic and my new relationship with Chelly be ruined before I've had even a few months to enjoy either?

Rage starts to spill into my blood, increasing my slow pulse to a pounding in my ears. It wasn't enough to lose Angie? I might lose my new home and what I'm building with Chelly, too? The adrenaline in a vampire magnifies the fight-or-flight human instinct to dangerous proportions. I welcome the shaky focus it gives me and embrace the desire coursing through my veins to kill in order to protect what is mine. I wandered for eighteen months before I found this place, I don't intend to run any more.

The blood trail angles toward the apartments and soon dies away to nothing. We pace back and forth through the woods, scanning for a trace of Emiko. With nothing to guide our way, Paul and I are left to continue on instinct.

"Do you think she's dumb enough to head back to the apartments for fresh blood?" Paul asks.

"It looks like the last blood drop in the snow confirms if she was intending to go back there, it certainly wasn't direct."

"Would she try and take a circuitous route to confuse us?"

"Can't say. Up ahead," I point. "Do you see those indentations in the snow?" We jog forward and see a series of footprints. "She seems to be running flat out now, wherever she's going." Just then it hits me. She's heading for the damn planes. Safe to assume when you've lived 250 years you've probably had time to master how to fly a plane.

"What do you think that thing Vivian did back in the clearing was?" The fear in Paul's voice too closely resembles the emotion I've got brewing in the pit of my stomach. "Did you see the dead children in her head?"

"She didn't kill them," I say quickly. "She killed their predator." The images crawl back into my mind and the rage she felt in the moment engulfs my senses. So much anger and hate. I push it back as best I can, determined to focus on the here and now and not some distant past swirling around in my master's brain. "Let's talk about it later and stay on task. I think Emiko's headed for the airstrip." I grab my phone to notify the others and find the screen blank. "Dammit, battery's dead. Is your cell working?"

Paul pats his pockets. "Shit. Must have fallen out be back in the clearing. I can't find it."

I reach out with my mind....

And touch no one, not even Paul.

The mental shield Rafe threw in place must be blocking us all while Vivian plays in Coraline's head. Once again, the implications of what she's doing and what she can do scare the hell out of me. Will they come for her? Will the council hunt us all down for being in the seethe of a manipulator?

Paul nudges my shoulder and motions down the trail, "Let's go."

We quicken our pace and see a few large patches of flattened snow. "She must be weak," I say in a cloud of vapor, my breath freezing in the air before us. "This marks the fourth time she's stumbled." In a hundred yards, the footprints disappear altogether.

"She'll be slower while she's still trying to hide her trail," Paul says.

"Let's get there as fast as we can and try to come up with a way to slow her down. Maybe one of us can get to a phone in the hangar and call the rest of the seethe."

The airstrip lies about a mile north and to the east. We race through the darkness with only the puffs from our infrequent breaths giving us away. I'd rather not be paired up with Paul when facing down Emiko, I doubt he can fight... but two has got to be better than one.

The sound of my neck breaking in the peace of the greenhouse still haunts me. This woman is deadlier than anyone I've ever fought. Will the two of us be enough to take her?

My own past leaves my fight skills wanting. Sure, I was trained in fencing while growing up, but that didn't prepare me for much when I changed. My first master, the Whitechapel serial killer, liked his prey weak and vulnerable, getting off on their fear. With his superior strength and position of rank, his victims never fought back. He told me he avoided encounters with other vampires and when he turned me I noted quickly that his fight skills were mediocre at best-not much help in training me to defend against my fellow undead.

However, he did master the element of surprise, which might be our only way to slow Emiko down. The large dark mound of the corrugated steel hangar comes into view. I raise a hand to indicate a halt and, thankfully, the inexperienced vampire sees it and understands.

Security lights dot the corners of the building, their glow a welcome respite from the woods. Two other structures lie farther away and a rope links a far door of the hangar to a nearby low building with lights on. The ropes are used to navigate short paths by hand during storms. What may seem like a straight walk between two buildings can become a death trap in the right weather conditions.

Paul shivers in the cold, wrapping an arm around his middle. "There should only be a skeleton crew up here, right?"

"Yes," I answer, recalling the change in the normal weekly schedule. "We weren't planning on anyone landing during the expedition, so there should be just two in there right now."

"Do you think she'd go in for blood because of the injury or head straight for the planes?"

"We didn't find a bullet dug out on the way." I stomp some circulation back into my feet. "I'm guessing the shot was a through-and-through. Either way, I'd run first."

Paul scans the area around the two closest buildings. "We don't even know if we beat her here or not. I'm thinking the best spot to ambush her would be in the hangar."

"Yeah, me too." A screech of metal rolling on metal rends the air and we both strain to see the leading edge of the building. "Shit. She's already here."

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