Page 127 of Marked By Moonlight

The men continued conversing, shifters in French, vampires in Romanian, as I decided it must be. My shoe scuffed, and I froze, but no one looked over.

Slow…steady…I told myself.

I peered ahead, memorizing the look of each cubic foot of unoccupied space before slipping into it. One hint of my shadow on the wall, one line out of place, and I would be busted.

My mind ached with the effort of maintaining two parallel illusions.

“Now you’ve really scared her, Etienne,” one of the wolves laughed. “She’s like a block of ice.”

I focused all my attention on moving my illusion’s elbow and bowing the neck to appear even meeker. But I forgot to let the hair on fake me sway, and the effect was a little jarring.

A good thing Henrik changed position just then, covering my mistake with his shadow.

I thought it was a coincidence at first, but then he did it again, and I realized it wasn’t. Henrik had caught on to what I was doing, and he was doing his best to help me.

I’d never felt more grateful to a vampire. I also prayed I would never have to be.

I readjusted the angle of fake me’s neck and continued tiptoeing along. This was the really tricky part, because the three shifters had spread out across the width of the tunnel.

I flattened myself against the wall and continued, holding my breath as I pulled level, then past, Etienne, who was just inches away. His buddy stood half a step behind him, closer to the center of the tunnel, giving me more space to maneuver. I took another step, then another.

The wolf shifter frowned, and his nostrils flared.

I froze.

He looked around, then turned back to the others and asked Etienne to repeat whatever he’d just said.

Heart pounding, I moved faster. Still a snail’s pace, but a frantic one. Any second now, they would be onto me.

“Hey, you,” the closest shifter barked to fake Mina. Once. Twice. Then he whistled sharply for my attention.

Shit. He was definitely onto me.

I moved faster, a yard past him now. Two yards…

He turned his head, following my movements with his nose instead of his eyes.

“Wait a minute…” he muttered.

I broke into a jog, doing my best to replicate the empty space before me. But my nerves were too shaky, and my shadowjumped in and out of view instead of remaining invisible. The flickering overhead lights helped mask the effect, but—

“Shh,” the wolf shifter ordered.

Everyone went quiet. Even Henrik, dammit.

I halted a moment too late, and the slap of my foot echoed down the tunnel.

Muttering, one of the vampires reached for the illusionary me, which was now leaning strangely and weirdly out of proportion. Henrik moved to block him, but it was too late. The vampire’s pale, bony hand swept through the air, and—

I released the illusion and sprinted for the far end of the tunnel. Chaos erupted as the men gaped at the empty spot my illusion had occupied a moment earlier.

“She’s over there!” someone yelled.

“Get her!” Etienne shouted.

I ran for my life.

The pipe slipped out of my hand, and the man closest to me swore and leaped sideways. The sound of metal bumping over cement echoed through the tunnel, and a lightbulb went off in my head. I was moving too fast to shadow-walk in a convincing manner. But I might be able to cast simple illusions to trip them up.