He widened my field of vision, showing me the great Basarab clan, all the multiplied thousands of them, each donating a tiny bit of power to the fight, because a master never fought alone, either. It was like a tug of war with a multitude on one side, and only one on the other.

But when that one is a god, maybe that’s all you need.

Or maybe not. Because there were two power streams in operation: one going into Mircea and thus into the great well of the family’s power base, and one coming out of him, into the fight. Where it was being magnified by Pritkin’s power and thrown back at Zeus. And, suddenly, I got it.

You are using his power.

Laundered through the family, yes, Mircea confirmed. Our people sequester it away from him, and donate some of theirs in return. He can’t use theirs against us, and he can’t reach his, broken down into so many pieces, and spread across so many lives.

I stared at the multitude of tiny filaments, each shining brightly against the darkness, and each coming from a different member of the family, and felt my heart well with love for all of them. Some were massive ropes all on their own, the ones from Mircea’s masters, I assumed. Others were tiny, barely-there threads, gleaming silver bright, from the newly turned. None of them would have been sufficient on their own, but twined together, they made a gleaming cable of power that Zeus didn’t own and couldn’t command.

And for the first time, I believed that we could do this; I believed we could win!

But we weren’t there yet, and I was starting to get overwhelmed.

Okay, that was a lie. I was overwhelmed, and had been since this whole thing started. But the feeling had been building and building as things progressed, to the point that I wasn’t sure how much more I could take. Being caught between incubus magic on one hand and a vampire’s bite on the other was not normal.

They were both designed to increase a partner’s pleasure and thus prolong the feed, and I’d felt them individually before. But not together, and not with their strength being magnified many times over. I was starting to feel like I might explode, might just tear apart from within with no need of godly help.

I writhed some more, moving helplessly against the bed, groaning and panting and twisting, trying to cope with the sensations pouring through me. Was this supposed to be fun? I wondered desperately. Because this was not fun. This was—

“Augghhh!”