“What tunnel?” Andromeda said, wondering if her instincts had led her wrong after all. “You said there were no other escape routes but the secret gate in the wall.”
Suyin’s delicate face was so sheepish it couldn’t be disbelieved. “I forget things,” she admitted. “The Sleep has that effect, as I’m never awake long enough to truly recover.” Walking to an elegant sofa with curved wooden legs, she said, “I think the trapdoor lies beneath.”
Naasir moved the sofa and pushed the rug aside to expose a smooth, flawless floor. “Where?”
Tucking the knives into the strips of fabric that bound her wing to her body, Suyin went to bend down. Andromeda caught her arm. “Careful,” she whispered. “Don’t bend your back; use your knees.”
Even that made pain lines flare out from the corners of Suyin’s eyes, but her fingers were sure on the wood of the floor as she began to touch what must be pressure points. Andromeda took the opportunity to block the door into this room by propping a chair under the handle. Behind her, the trapdoor opened on a puff of dust.
Waving a hand in front of her face after stifling a sneeze that made her muscles wrench and her eyes tear up, Suyin looked down. “The tunnel goes to the outside. It was built as an escape route of last resort for Lijuan’s people.”
Naasir dropped down into the hole, then pulled himself back out with a lithe strength that made Andromeda want to simply watch him. “We won’t go that way,” he said definitively.
Disappointed, but not that surprised, Andromeda said, “It’s a trap?”
“Yes. It stinks of fresh scat and of reborn.” His lips lifted to reveal his fangs.
“I didn’t know.” Suyin’s throat moved, her fingers trembling as she rubbed them on her thighs. “On my honor.”
“You don’t stink of lies.” Naasir glanced down at the tunnel again. “It’s a trap, but we can turn it on those who set it.” Pulling down the trapdoor, he got up and looked at the rug and sofa they’d pushed aside. “Now we hide.”
Andromeda wasn’t sure that was a good idea, but she’d promised to trust Naasir, so she followed him into the walk-in closet on one side of the room, and there the three of them stood. They didn’t have to wait long. Thudding bangs on the door announced either boots or shoulders hitting it, but the end result was the door breaking open and guards pouring in.
Shouts followed, then came the sound of the trapdoor being thrown back.
Andromeda took Suyin’s hand when she felt the other woman begin to shake. Suyin had to be so scared of what Lijuan would do to her should they be discovered. When she felt Naasir put his arm around the wounded angel, she wasn’t surprised. Naasir might be feral and uncivilized in his true skin, but he was good in a way Xi would never be.
The general’s voice sliced through the air at that instant. “Go after them. Now. Do not allow the reborn to get to the scholar.” Swearing low under his breath, he gave further orders. “Make sure the opposite end of the tunnel is watched, on the low chance they make it out.”
“Sir.”
All went quiet soon after that.
Sliding out only once Naasir confirmed no one remained in the room, the three of them headed toward an exit. This time, they encountered no one in the corridors. Stepping out into the rain-lashed night, Andromeda glimpsed a tongue of hot yellow flame shoot from a window in a distant section of the citadel.
Rain couldn’t put out a fire on the inside. Yes, the spymaster was clever.
When Naasir held out a hand to her, she took it at once. Since her other hand was wrapped around the hilt of the sword, she told Suyin to grip the waist of her pants under the tunic.
The world was an opaque, punishing blackness but Naasir navigated it like he’d been born for it.
When Suyin stumbled, her legs threatening to collapse, Naasir and Andromeda put her between them and wrapped one arm each around her waist, careful not to apply too much pressure. As they helped her to a door in the inner wall, Andromeda saw a flicker of movement to her right. She acted without hesitation, slicing out with the sword to almost decapitate a vampire.
He fell gurgling to the ground.
It was the first time she’d ever truly hurt someone and part of her flinched, bile rising in her throat. That part bore the name of the girl she’d been, the one who’d run from a home where brutality was an everyday affair and kindness considered a laughable weakness. The rest of her understood this wasn’t violence for violence’s sake. It was about survival. Not just her own but Suyin’s and Naasir’s. There would be no mercy should they be caught; these same guards would mete out base torture if so ordered.
Naasir’s eyes gleamed at her through the pounding rain. “Stop playing. We have to leave.”
She went to scowl, realized he was the one who was playing—with her. So she wouldn’t think about the blood she’d just spilled. Wanting to kiss him, she instead helped Suyin through the inner wall gate as the rain washed the scarlet stain from her sword.
That was when their luck ran out.
Three sentries came around the corner almost at once and the men were looking right at their small group. Naasir was on them a split second later but it was three against one. Leaving Suyin leaning against the wall, Andromeda swung into the fight. The sentries could not be allowed to send up an alarm.
Her target was trained, but he wasn’t expecting her skill. She cut his throat, left him trying to clamp his hand over the bleeding orifice. By the time she turned toward Naasir, he’d already taken care of the other two. Seeing her sentry, he reached out and hit the man on the side of his head, slamming him into unconsciousness. “He could’ve seen our direction from here, betrayed us to others.”
“Sorry. I was worried about you.”
He tilted his head to the side, rain rolling down his skin. Then he smiled and went to pick a shaky Suyin up in his arms. Sticking to his side, Andromeda watched their backs as they ran to a small servant’s gate in the outer wall. This time, no one spotted them and they were soon outside, but hardly free.
The area directly around the stronghold was grass currently being flattened by the wind and the rain, offering no hiding places. It seemed an interminable distance to the cover of the trees when winged sentries flew constantly across the sky. “How do we do this?” she asked Naasir.
“Go low and let the wind bend the grass over you.” He put Suyin on the ground, then gently rubbed dirt over the bandages on her back to make them less white. “On your bellies. Be the cat creeping up on its prey.”
“My wings?”
“Hold them as tight as you can. No big movements. Go!”
The ground was wet and muddy, but Andromeda did exactly what Naasir had ordered, the three of them spread out enough that from above, each one would be nothing other than another muddy patch of grass. It was hard and relentless and they had to go motionless more than once when an angel flew too close overhead. Breath coming harsh and low, Suyin did her best, but she lost consciousness halfway through.