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I gripped Mencheres’s hand despite my anger with him, feeling his answering tight squeeze. In my peripheral vision I saw A
Gregor and Bones met together again in a frenzy of violence. This time, I could see silver cutting into flesh, flashing in the moonlight before coming up red as they hacked at each other. Neither of them made a sound, though. No one watching did, either. The silence was somehow more loaded than screams.
Bones rolled away from a downward swipe toward his heart, pushing back from Gregor and coming up dirt-smeared a few feet away. He flung his knife in the next instant, burying it to the hilt in Gregor’s sternum—but not before Gregor fired off his own blade, which landed right in Bones’s eye.
I choked back my scream, afraid the smallest sound would prove lethally distracting to Bones. He yanked the blade out without pause, countering Gregor’s attack as Gregor freed the knife from his chest and came at him with incredible speed. If I hadn’t been a vampire, I would have hurled at the sticky red substance on Bones’s knife, but he never paused as he fought Gregor while his missing eye slowly grew back.
Gregor feinted left, then dove low, sliding under Bones and coming up on the other side so fast, I hadn’t realized what he’d done until I saw Bones arch in pain, the hilt of a knife buried high in his back. Gregor barked out a command to Lucius, catching the silver knife Lucius threw and then charging at Bones as Bones tried to reach the knife in his back. He couldn’t do that and hold off Gregor’s fresh attack, though.
Gregor increased his speed, somehow seeming to have four arms instead of two as he slashed at Bones, opening up new cuts on Bones’s body even as Bones kept that glinting silver knife out of his chest. Gregor had been holding back before, I realized, horror and panic welling up in me. He was even faster than he’d first appeared.
Bones was forced back, that other knife still protruding from between his shoulder blades, as Gregor pressed his attack. The only sounds were silver clashing with silver, or the sickening slices of flesh and bone being split apart—until the slow, dull boom began in my chest.
Mencheres squeezed my hand so hard, it was painful, but I couldn’t stop the beat of my heart. Each new blow or slash, each new glittering smear of crimson, seemed to add speed to the tempo in my chest. Murmurs broke out in the crowd, mostly from the newcomers, as the cadence inside me became steadier and more audible.
Gregor flicked his gaze to me—and Bones flung himself forward, bashing his skull into Gregor’s and ripping his knife into Gregor with a brutal upward swipe that cleaved his ribs. Gregor howled but jerked back fast enough to prevent the blade from climbing higher into his chest. He swept Bones’s feet out from under him, leaping on top of him without regard for how it forced the knife buried in his rib cage deeper still.
I didn’t understand why until Bones let out a gasp, his face twisting with agony. The knife in his back. Their combined weight had thrust it all the way through, its silver tip poking out of the front of Bones’s chest, dangerously near his heart. When Bones bucked up, throwing Gregor off, and spun around to meet his next attack, I saw that the end of the hilt was level with his back. He’ll never be able to pull it out now, I thought, the booming in my chest becoming stronger. How could Bones beat Gregor with silver burning him up inside? When each thrust and blow forced the knife ever closer to his heart?
But Bones continued to fight with a speed and ferocity that defied his condition. He forced Gregor back, tripping him with a move too quick to follow, and slashed his knife deep across Gregor’s eyes when the other vampire moved to protect his heart. Bones leapt off Gregor in the next instant, avoiding the knife Gregor tried to ram into his back, and kicked dirt into Gregor’s face, further blinding him. When Gregor’s arm came up to defend himself, Bones hacked through it with a force that left half the limb severed on the dirt.
I yanked free of Mencheres’s grip to clasp my hands together in fervent prayer that this would be it for Gregor. But he avoided the next downward swipe of Bones’s blade to leap straight up into the air, calling out to Lucius for the third and final knife. Gregor’s eyes must have healed enough to see the flash of silver against the night sky as Lucius threw the blade, high enough that Gregor had to reach to catch it.
Bones met him in the air just as Gregor grabbed his blade. The knife Bones had aimed for Gregor’s chest drove into his stomach instead as Gregor’s downward blow blocked him. Bones ripped his knife sideways, spilling red gore over himself. The two of them tumbled to the ground, Bones twisting to land on his feet, Gregor falling in a heap, clutching the wide wound in his gut.
When Bones charged at Gregor, and the Dreamsnatcher did nothing to protect himself, I felt a moment of triumphant exhilaration. But even as Bones’s knife descended on Gregor’s unprotected back, right where his heart would be, Gregor’s fist shot forward, the knife it gripped stabbing Bones deeply in the stomach.
Pain blasted across my subconscious as the wall Bones had erected between us fell and his emotions came roaring through. I felt the agony of the silver inside his back and his gut. The latter wound burned much hotter, making me clutch my stomach in instinctive reaction. If this was only a shadow of what Bones was feeling, then the pain must be boiling like acid all through him.
Bones’s blade wavered and skidded across Gregor’s back instead of burying into his opponent’s heart. I watched, appalled, as Bones staggered backward, his hand going to the knife still buried in his stomach. He pulled it out even as Gregor rose to his feet, his arm and the previously disabling slash in his gut healed. Bones continued to back away, his steps wavering. I couldn’t hold back my scream as Gregor yanked the knife out of Bones’s hand and kicked him hard enough to leave Bones sprawled onto his back.
Rage and anguish washed over me, so tightly interwoven into my emotions that I didn’t know if it was mine or Bones’s. Even though the silver knife was out of his stomach, his pain there didn’t lessen. Unbelievably, I felt it grow with crippling intensity, smashing over me in waves, until only Vlad’s arm around my shoulders kept me upright.
Something was wrong. It shouldn’t be getting worse; the silver was out. Why couldn’t he move? Get up, I screamed silently. Get up!
Boom. Boom. My heart thundered in my chest as Gregor pounced on top of Bones, who was weaponless. Dimly I heard A
As if in slow motion, I watched Gregor raise the knife. Saw his knees slam into Bones’s arms, holding him down as Bones tried to throw Gregor off. Watched the knife begin its descent toward that blood-smeared chest directly underneath it. Felt Bones’s despair, bitter as poison. Saw Gregor’s glowing emerald gaze flick through the crowd until he found me. And then Gregor smiled.
It was the same smile he’d given me right after killing Rodney. Satisfied. Triumphant. Merciless. Gregor’s blade touched Bones’s chest, slicing into his skin, and his smile widened.
My vision went red and a single thought permeated through my whole body: No.
Flames shot up Gregor, so fast they covered him before the smile had time to leave his face. I had an instant to smile back—and then Gregor’s head exploded. His hands still gripped the knife in Bones’s chest, but then his body pitched to the side, nothing but flames left where his head had been.