Page 104 of Worse Fates

Ramy chuckles. “Flags?”

“Of course you did,” Kai replies, long-suffering and smiling. “Go on then, tell me all about flags.”

“So, there’s actually a study of flags called vexillology—”

Before I can dive into this fascinating flag subject, a crash echoes through the mansion. Ramy bolts up, moving so fast to the door I don’t even see it, and presses his ear to the wood.

I scramble up, shoving Kai’s phone into my pocket, and move to stand in front of him. I want Ramy to turn around and laugh, wave away our fear and tell us it was nothing, we’re all too on edge.

Ramy doesn’t do that.

He looks at us over his shoulder, face drawn tight and fangs descending.

“Someone’s inside the mansion,” he whispers.

A shaky exhale slips past my lips as fear coils around my middle like a snake and squeezes. I rush over to the fireplace, struggling to suck in new air as I snatch up two pokers, black metal warmed from the fire and hand one over to Kai.

Kai has to dry both trembling hands on his jeans, rubbing away oil and sweat, before he can get a proper hold on our make-shift weapons. All the while Ramy stands like a statue, head tilted up and listening for something my human ears can’t pick up.

Smash.

I jolt at the noise but keep my feet planted. Somewhere in the distance something crashes to the floor and a boom reverberates through the halls.

Ramy puts a finger to his mouth, indicating to us to stay quiet and after a beat, the vampire cracks open the door and slips out before either of us can stop him.

My shoulder presses to Kai’s, needing something solid as just knowing he’s there isn’t enough. The heavy quiet—punctuated by slams and shattering—closes in, tightening like a noose around my neck.

We wait, tense and muscles so tight they could pop.

Kai’s short, heavy pants pound against my ear like a second racing pulse, and I use each exhale to count the stretching seconds. It’s when I’m about to say ‘fuck it’ and gofind my friend, the door cracks open and Ramy slips back inside as quiet as a shadow, his face a torrent of supperessed rage.

“Blood mages.”

I straighten my back. “Tell us what to do.”

Ramy is silent as he rushes across to the window, the grey clouds overhead making him appear colourless as he looks out. Moments later he pushes up the window leading into the garden.

“I need to get you two to another part of the mansion.”

“Are you fucking kidding me, Ramy?” Kai hisses, low and taut. “We all gotta get out of here!”

Ramy’s shaking his head before Kai finishes. “The mansion is surrounded.”

“Shit. Then we start taking those bastards out, one by one,” I snarl, my protruding knuckles shaking as I clutch the poker in a vise-like hold.

“If you kill one of the rats, you make the others more powerful,” Ramy tells us. “We need to move—now.”

And with that we rush over, and drawing from my years of experience escaping through windows, I slip out with ease. Then help Kai so he doesn’t fall on his ass.

My socks aren’t thick enough to protect me from the cold that begins to sink into my feet. But when I hear the window shutting and Ramy moving ahead of us past skeletal trees, bushes and rows of winter flowers, I ignore my feet turning into ice. Ramy directing us from the rough pathway and onto the grass to cover our hurried steps.

It doesn’t take long for the icy dew to soak my socks. It’s uncomfortable, the cold nearly painful, but I push it to the back of my mind and keep my ears open for any sudden sounds. My heart speeds up when more crashes come from inside the mansion as we pass the bench where Lucero and I had our discussion all those days ago.

Ramy ushers us to a window boarded by stone moulding, then lays his long delicate hand on the glass. He waits for something, my stomach located in my throat, and then there's aboomand something topples hard enough to shake the entire house. It gives Ramy the chance he needs to smash through the glass.

I expect to see cuts, but when the vampire pulls away, any cuts are quickly healed in a blink of an eye and with not a drop of blood spilt.

Efficiently, he unclasps the lock, sliding open the window and helps us both inside within moments.