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Without a word, Tai’moriee held my mouth to his wrist as I drank and aided my recovery. Greedily, I gulped precious blood down, and then Tai’moriee vanished. The others hadn’t seen him, and Tai’moriee wouldn’t allow them to. Agonised, I rose to my feet as healing kicked in and scrambled over to where the other three were.Did you think healing would be painless? Wrong.

Pal and Mera had knife wounds as well as burns, and I realised that they’d been in some sort of fight.

Surely, it wasn’t Ami who had done this!

Inka had a massive blow to her head that had split the back of her skull open. I winced as I saw the muscle underneath. Inka was incapacitated. Grabbing Inka and Mera, I transported them a little way away and returned for Pal.

Pal was drifting in and out of consciousness, and I worried whether he was okay. I laid Pal down carefully on the grass. As I bit my wrist for Pal, a weak voice stopped me.

“Jacques, the children?”

I stared at Mera with tears in my eyes.

“Oh God, I tried. Honestly, I did, but I couldn’t reach Kit and Rahmon. I am so sorry,” I cried as tears ran down my face.

Mera opened her eyes, trying hard to focus.

“Ramedes. The bitch took them,” Mera whispered.

Anger rose as I wiped my face and stared. Ramedes!

Her cultists had attacked the palace! In a rage, I flew to my feet. This could lead to war.

The bitch had assaulted three Vam’pirs.

Deep down, I knew I could call an SOS, but, as a group, the Vam’pirs wouldn’t arrive in time. The question was, what could one Vam’pir do alone?

Die.

But I had to try, and just as I turned, Ami fell at my feet. Shocked, I stared and pondered how much weirder tonight was going to get.

“Take the placement from my mind,” Ami whispered.

Ami was weak from lack of blood, and as I received the location, I wondered whether I should stay with the wounded. If anyone happened upon them, none were in a fit state to defend themselves.

“Go. The children have until tonight. After that, Ramedes can no longer claim them. Jacques, I will watch,” a voice said, speaking directly into my mind.

I nodded to the invisible Tai’moriee and, yelling for Nathan, chased after the children.

Ami had been clear in her directions, and it took an hour to reach the caves that she had described. As I crouched, watching for movement, I felt something in my tunic and, drawing it out, I stared at the amulet that once belonged to Ricardus.

I hadn’t even realised that I had picked it up. Without thinking, I shoved it back in and snuck into the cave.

There were no lights inside, and I waited for a moment for my sight to adjust. Within seconds, my night sight adjusted, and I crept forward. A red shape moved, and I paused. A red aura that allows us to see their body heat always frames a living mortal.

Silently creeping up behind the guard, I snapped his neck before he realised I was there. Alert, I crouched and searched for a pulse. Finding none, I pulled my hand away when I realised I had killed a woman.

Then I straightened my shoulders. That didn’t matter. Regardless of gender, these fanatics had the children, and I was here to save Kit and Rahmon. Pal and Mera deserved their children back.

I crept forward again and found a flight of roughly cut steps leading down.

Quietly, I made my way down, killing two more sentinels before reaching the bottom. I hoped Ramedes had no guards patrolling. Otherwise, they would find the bodies and would give away my presence. A long passage awaited me that twisted and turned for ages. The only reason I guessed I was on the right path was the fact that I kept coming across Ramedes’s now dead guards.

Down another flight of steps, not as roughly cut as the first ones, I was getting closer to Ramedes when I encountered two sentinels together.

One-on-one is fine, two-on-one is dangerous, and three-on-one means that I am dead. Naturally, I’m strong, but Ramedes is able to juice up her followers. Ramedes can enhance their natural abilities, how I don’t know, but magic seems to be involved.

The fight was a struggle, and I suffered a stab wound to the ribs. Swearing lightly under my breath, I cursed the injury. Tai’moriee’s blood had healed most of my injuries, but I wasn’t one hundred per cent. Still, I didn’t have time to let the injuryheal, and I carried on, the thought of the children pushing me onwards.