Page 28 of Beautiful Madness

I tore my hungry stare from thedaywalkers and looked at Bastien. Neither of us said a word, but we didn’t haveto. He gave me a nod, and then, as though both of us were afraid the other wouldget the most kills, we tried to outrun each other to the daywalkers.

He beat me there, but not bymuch.

There were four of them andonly two of us, and they weren’t without power. They weren’t without magic,either, and when my blade glanced off my opponent’s chest, I discovered theirs wasa protective magic. They were going to be hard to kill, but that was fine withme. I was in a mood.

Their human victims fell to theground and didn’t move—at least not at first. But even as I filled my handswith magic and took a millisecond to appreciate how easily my magic had come tomy call, the two women rose as vampires. As daywalkers. And they were starving.

Shit. Now there weresixmonsters to kill.

I covered my demon blade withthe magic that exploded through my blue-tinged fingers, and unlike Bastien, whopossessed claws he could stab right through a man’s chest, I used my knife andmy magic.

I wasn’t sure what had changed,but the wolf elder was going to be pleased with my progress.

I slammed a daywalker to theground and staked him with my blade, and he fought so strongly he nearly threwme off him. His strength shocked me, because any regular vampire would havedied quickly with a stake in his heart. His strength should have fallen awayalmost immediately, but it did not. The daywalkers were different thanvampires, and I needed to get that fact into my head. Even a vampire would riseagain if I didn’t take his head or leave the stake in his heart, and I wasn’tleaving my blade. I didn’t have time to take his head as there were otherdaywalkers to kill—so I sheathed the demon knife and pulled a sharp woodenstake from my belt, then slammed it into his chest.

And then, unlike with either myblade or my magic, something happened I’d never seen before. The daywalkerscreamed, freezing my blood with the haunted, tormented sound of his agony, anddied. And when he died, he exploded into a pile of black dust.

He was just…gone.

So that explained what happenedto the humans who were disappearing from the city—they were either rising asdaywalkers or dying and leaving only traces of the black dust, scatteringthrough the city with the slightest breeze.

There was a second when Bastienand I stared at each other, both awed and shocked, before the remainingdaywalkers, desperate and horrified, turned to run. They were fast sons ofbitches, too. But Bastien, as a master, was faster. And I, as a…whatever thefuck I was, was faster.

By the end, there were sixlittle piles of quickly dispersing particles of strange black dust, and neitherBastien nor I were overly injured. We stood staring down at the pavement, bothof us lost in our thoughts, and I could guess that his feelings were a mixtureof horror, fear, and amazement.

“So quickly,” he whispered.“With no chance of recovering or rising again. Just dust.” He looked at me,finally. “What does that mean for their afterlife? Will they escape it? Willthey find it more quickly? Will it be different for them? What does it mean?”

But he wasn’t asking me. Notreally.

Then he asked me a question hedid want me to respond to, though he knew very well the answer. “Do you eversee the spirit of a vampire who has passed, Kait?”

“No,” I murmured.

He nodded, put his stare backon the sad piles of dust, and shook off his despair. “Will you hunt moretonight?”

“I will, but first I need to goto the police station. The detective thinks he might have one of them in acell.”

He scoffed. “There is nopossible way a human could have captured and transported a daywalker to jail.”

“No. I think he might havecaught a freshly turned human or a badly injured vampire.”

He continued gazing at theground, but his voice became guarded. “And if it is one of mine?”

“Then we’ll see.”

His shoulders became a littleless stiff and finally, he looked at me. “I will find you after. If you needme.”

I nodded. “Bastien, you knowJared is missing.”

“I have heard nothing. It’s asthough he went willingly. There is no trail, and there are no murmurs ofsuspicion. We want him back, as well, Kait.”

“Even though you’re enemies,” Isaid, a little skeptical.

“His absence upsets the balanceof the city. I have been searching from the moment I heard he was missing.”

I believed him. “Thanks,Bastien.”

Before I could turn to leave,he stopped me with a touch on my arm. “You understand I will do anything foryou, Kait, whether I want to or not.”