It wasn’t denied now, and it didn’t grab me so much as snatch me up and throw me through the gate, where Pritkin was waiting on the other side, because of course he’d gotten the portcullis open; of course, he had. I snatched him up, too, on my way past, getting rewarded with a flash of brilliant green eyes in a bloodied face, and a triumphant yell as the portal released us and another power took us. My power.

And then we were gone.

Chapter Three

Chapter Three

I hit the ground running and almost immediately smacked into a wall. The blow had me stunned for a moment, but I was pretty sure that we’d landed okay since I felt modern carpet under my butt when I abruptly sat down. I was also pretty sure that I’d managed to bring both guys back with me, because a fight had just broken out.

A big one.

The landing pad I usually used in these cases was in my bedroom, so that was probably my favorite lamp, I thought, as something big shattered against the wall. The pieces went everywhere, including down onto me, so I flipped over and started crawling. There were a lot of feet in the way, scuffling around, and some pointy bits that I was fairly sure were the trailing ends of the wings that Mircea should not have had, because contrary to legend, vampires did not turn into bats.

Well, most vampires, I corrected myself, because the old ones had some pretty freaky powers, but I’d seen Mircea’s and that particular trick wasn’t among them.

“Pardon, dulceață,” the man in question said, as he fell into my path.

“Urp,” I said, because my brain didn’t seem to be working right.

Mircea didn’t notice, and launched himself right back into whatever was going on above my head. Didn’t know; didn’t care. I felt funny and I could swear that I saw Pritkin’s legs cover the same bit of floor three or four times in quick succession, as if he was doing some kind of weird dance move.

Michael Jackson would have loved that one, I thought, just as the door to the hallway slammed open and a bunch more legs joined the party.

Mircea’s were directly in front of me again, because he seemed to be trying to shield me from the fracas while still pummeling something off to the side. You had to admire the manners. It reminded me of a story about Marie Antoinette that my governess had once told me, while trying to improve my childish ways.

“She accidentally stepped on the executioner’s foot,” Eugenie had said. “On the way to the scaffold. Yet she asked the man for his pardon, nonetheless. Now, what would you have done in her stead?”