Johnis looked at Darsal. The water in his fist was now nearly useless. He could slow Alucard, but to what end?

“Darsal, tell us he’s lying,” Silvie said.

She swallowed and shifted on her feet. “There has to be a way out,” she said.

Karas gripped the books tighter. “The books—”

“Are mine!” Alucard finished.

“That wasn’t the oath!” Darsal said. She’d snapped out of her indecision and glared at the beast. “The books or me, that was the deal, and you, too, are bound by that oath! Otherwise you’d have taken them already.”

Her eyes switched to Johnis, and she spoke urgently. “Touch the leather skin on the books with blood and you enter a simulation between this world and another. Open these four and you enter another reality entirely. The other three books are hidden there, Johnis, sought by the Dark One.”

“The Dark One?” Johnis glanced at Teeleh, who hadn’t removed his stare. The beast knew all of this already.

“Marsuvees Black,” Billos said. “The magic man.”

It made Johnis’s head spin, this business of realities. But in many ways it was like being able to see the Roush and the Black Forest here, while most of the world remained blind to them.

Beyond the skin of these books waited another reality, bristling with power.

Darsal stared at Alucard. Bitterness laced her voice. “So take your spoils!” she said, spreading out her arms. “But the books belong to them!”

“What are you saying?” Billos cried. “Not on your life. No, not a chance!”

Alucard’s eyes settled on the books in Karas’s arms. “Then you offer yourself in her place?” he asked Billos.

“No, he doesn’t,” Darsal said. “No, Billos, you aren’t! That wasn’t the vow I made.”

“Actually, it was,” Alucard said. “Either one of you. Dead.”

“Stop it!” Karas cried. “Stop arguing about who will die! We don’t know that he isn’t lying!”

Her voiced echoed, then the room settled into silence except for the breathing that came from the Shataiki beyond the gate. Watching, ever watching.

“Then put it to the test,” Alucard said.

“How?”

“Billos, do you accept the debt owed to me by Darsal?”

Darsal started to protest. “No, he—”

“Yes,” Billos said.

“I accept your obligation,” Alucard said. “You are now bound by the laws of the books and may not use them until you have paid your debt.”

“Meaning what?” Darsal demanded, stepping forward.

“Meaning he can’t use the books as long as he’s alive. Unless, of course, you give me the books first.”

“But . . .” She stared at Billos, then back at Alucard, lost for words.

“Show her, Billos. Open a book and see what happens.”

Johnis jerked his hand from the bag and held it out without thinking of the water now dribbling to the floor. “No!”