“Not necessarily. The magic’s not supposed to leave the body. Blood magic is harder to control—a ball sent across the room with a pricked finger might appear in someone’s throat, for example. The immortality spell was a lot of magic let loose. It became what it wanted, not what the caster intended. Now anytime a vampire drains the last drop on anyone, human or magician, the spell gets activated in that person. They become a vampire too, and many of them don’t know why or how—only that they’re a creature of myth and legend.”

“My mom was drained, and she’s just dead,” I say.

“She probably wasn’t completely drained and still died from blood loss,” he says.

His words are gentle, but they clench around my throat and drag me into the memory. He’s right. She wasn’t dead. I grabbed her wrist when I found her. Her hand was limp, but then I felt that twitch under her skin. It gave me this ridiculous hope, and I kept shaking her and saying her name, but the twitch wasn’t hope. It was the last bit of life leaving her body. I was the one there when she died. The vampire was long gone.

“Hey.” Xander’s voice is soft. “We don’t have to finish this right now.”

But I need to. It feels urgent. Being a vampire is a curse. One some people accept but others have forced upon them. It doesn’t really matter which of these categories a vampire falls into—it’s not an excuse. They still hurt people. They’re monsters that need to be snuffed out.

Xander begins to step toward me, but I shake my head. I don’t need comfort. I need the truth I’ve been desperate for since I first saw Gerald on television and knew in my bones that he was a lying killer. “I still don’t see how you all have a chance against literal vampires. Aristelle, maybe, but you?” I point at Xander. “What are you going to do with a deck of cards? Death by a thousand paper cuts? Are Reina’s birds going to peck them to death?”

“I have many other talents, Ava.” He pauses, holding my questioning stare. “Plus, we’re immortal.”

I’d take a step back if I weren’t already against a wall. He just got done telling me the cost of immortality. My fingers clench around the stake I’m still holding.

Xander notices. “Wait. Don’t go all Buffy on me again. Although, the Buffy Xander certainly deserved to get stabbed.” He cracks a grin, but I don’t. I’m not in the mood for vampire jokes on a good day.

He darts forward so quickly that he’s a blur of green, and then he’s back against the wall with my stake in his hands.

My mouth gapes. “You’re not helping your case.”