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. Lisette stepped backward, eyes wide, frightened even in her Empress form.A quick glance showed me an older caridling in the far right lane.Six cars ahead of us, drivers had moved on, but for a half-dozen car lengths in all directions, the drivers patiently waitedfor Grandma s permission to move.Grandma s memento mori writhed between my boobs, tentacles tightening convulsively around my neck.I plunged my hand through the sides ofthe car trunk, ripping it open to reveal a cooler, lawn chairs, and what I wanted: a tire iron.Auntie Rachel once stopped Fang by jamming a tire ironthrough his engine block, so I rammed the iron home, through the memento mori s large gem, through my chest and deep into my own heartwhich, based on the pain, will clean out sinuses if they re stopped up.I mean: fuckin ow!Grandma and her memento mori screamed in unison.Talbot leapt from the trunk of one car to the bed of a big truck, evading the grasp of thegargoyle that had been holding me before the memento mori got me.Two others lay on the ground trying to make the asphalt heal their wounds orsomething.Each of them seemed panicked and blubbery, mumbling to themselves in French. I think I left my stake in the car. I waved at Lisette. Be right back. Tuez-la! Grandma yelled in French, but I knew what she meant: Kill her.In this part of downtown, newly refurbished buildings stood side by side with old ones, and the trees that once lined the streets were mostly gone,replaced by iron grids over sad-looking mulch.Wood.Wood.Wood.I need wood.I could punch through a wall, try to find a two-by-four.I rolledthrough the glass of an abandoned furniture store with a lease sign in the window before I could change direction.I had a new plan.and it wasmuch more fun.The injured gargoyles came after me as expected.I ran out through the back, feet covered in cuts and glass, but they weren t holy wounds, so thepain was small and fleeting.The rear fire door wrenched free of its brick moorings when I hit it, and up the fire escape I went.One tiny jump for avampire.At full speed, the edge of my vision blurred and I imagined a sonic boom (or maybe it was real, but I suspect it was only in my head).Aseries of rapid-fire jumps conjured a further image, one of Ricochet Rabbit from those old cartoons.Gargoyles followed in slow motion.Each footstep hurt less and less as the particles of glass reached their maximum depth.Rooftops vanishedbelow me as I raced back in the direction of Lisette, raised up my arms, and did a swan dive from about five stories up.Her head came up at the final second, but she did the human thing: she reacted with surprise instead of moving. Qu est-ce ? No one expects the Spanish Inquisition! See! Now why hadn t Dad been there to hear that?I hit Grandma in the wings, driving her to the ground, smashing her face against the street.She threw her arms out in front of her.Bonessnapped.Some hers.Some mine.Black ichor, zombie nastiness, flowed out from the wounds.It pooled at my knees and around her chest.Icouldn t stop, couldn t give her time to heal.I forced her over onto her back, her left wing ripping as she rolled onto it at an unnatural angle.I hit the sweet spot over her sternum just right, popped it, and went straight for the heart.Grandma s chest cavity was rotten on the inside.Theobsidian flesh of her uber vamp body was full of rancid meat and pus.In the middle of it all, one organ was beautiful and full, untouched bycorruption: her heart.It came free with a wet snap, more easily than a human s, and I leapt up, ignoring the pain in my knees, attempting to run onlegs that d broken. What on earth? Talbot looked at me, eyes wide, nostrils flared, and smelling like fear.A grunt of annoyance passed my lips when my brokenlegs wouldn t support my weight.Gargoyles hit the ground behind me and Talbot leapt forward to engage them, silver claws gleaming in the night. Greta, run! I m trying!Seizing Grandma s heart between my fangs freed up my hands, and I began to crawl.Her blood hit my tongue with all the heat of tobacco andnone of the taste, kicking my regeneration into overdrive.Shards of glass pushed out of my feet as I stood on knees reknitting with audible popsand snaps.She tasted like Dad [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]