Getting to my feet, I start to run … but guilt slows my pace. Don’t be a hero. How can I run away, seeking cover while Daphne fights this battle on my behalf? She knows she’s outmatched, we both know it—and despite what she said, I can’t help but look back, watching from half a block away as she squares off with a hundred-and-fifty-year-old vampire.

When she gets close, she twirls, slashing at him with the stake. But he vanishes, blinking out in a puff of vapor—only to reappear instantly, right behind her. Before I can shout a warning, I realize she’s anticipated the trick, lashing out and slamming her foot into his pelvis just as he materializes; he reels, but when she dives back to bury the stake in his chest, Rasputin counters with a blow that sends her flying through the air.

He turns toward me, then, those horrible eyes burning brighter than the streetlights, and I hear his voice thundering in my head. You’ll join us, August Pfeiffer.

“Keep running!” Daphne shouts, scrambling to her feet. She charges a second time, leaping into a spin kick that catches air when Rasputin relocates again—but once more she’s anticipated the feint, the point of the stake catching him in the shoulder when he reappears on her opposite side. He growls, his face darkening, and Daphne screams, “Go!”

Fire blazing in his eyes, Rasputin lunges straight at her—and disappears in a dark smear, just as before. The trick is old now, and Daphne anticipates it … but when she spins around to catch him, her stake finds nothing but air. Reappearing in the exact same place he vanished from, Rasputin catches her arm in midair, and the sound of bone snapping is as horrifying as our head-on collision with the tree.

Shock pulls all the blood from my head and pushes my stomach into my throat, and the night wobbles as Rasputin rips the stake from Daphne’s limp hand, crushing the wood into splinters. And then I watch, frozen, as he wraps a hand around her chin and twists her head, viciously and effortlessly, to the side. There’s a nauseating crack … and Daphne drops to ground, limbs sprawling. Her blond hair streams over the wet road, her eyes half open and turned to the sky—glazed and unfocused.

Dead.

I gag stomach acid, tears flooding my eyes, everything too bright, too real. The vampire blood surges and snaps in my veins, anger and grief hurtling up out of the darkness—and deep down, in a place I can’t name, I sense the Corrupter’s power. He likes the chaos inside me. My fingers itch with the desire to rip Rasputin’s head clean from his body and watch him crumble into nothing but dust and bone.