Chapter 2
Naomi moved slowly, knowing she had all the pressure on her shoulders right now. Of the three, she was the one I was most sure could handle it. She moved with grace, and pressure didn’t seem to ruffle her in the same way.
At the same time, Tess was slowly coming up the stairs behind me and I knew she had her own weapon raised. It made me feel a little safer that she was thinking to come up to back me up, even as she paused just a little further down the stairs than me. She was the one I most trusted at my back.
For a couple of seconds Naomi was at the top of the stairs and couldn’t move off to one side yet.
She blocked my view, but I knew I couldn’t panic.
Instead I listened. For now all I could hear was my own heart as it pushed blood through my body, the gentle, slow breathing I’d learned to master thanks to my parents, and the very slow movements of Naomi.
Finally, she shifted to one side, revealing the same scene as two seconds earlier.
She crouched, stake in one hand and crossbow in the other.
If the vampires now moved, she would go for one and I would get the other.
At least I had to hope we could. Vampires moved fast and didn’t go down unless you got them right in the heart.
I had a few other weapons concealed about me, but I couldn’t get to any of them fast enough. Not when we were this close.
As soon as Naomi was in position Tess started to move again, coming up beside and then past me. Thankfully she didn’t bump into me or brush past enough to put me off and I could keep staring forward, ignoring her as best as possible.
Just as Tess had come up the stairs a little, Alan also followed. He was the heaviest of us and also the least graceful. I considered asking him to hold, but I knew he wouldn’t need to come far before he was adequate backup and worth having there even if we woke the vampires.
Tess moved a little faster than Naomi did and blocked my view less.
She wasn’t as graceful about shifting to one side of the door, however, and brushed up against the banister, making enough noise that it made one of the vampires move.
I couldn’t see which one of them it was, but everyone froze in place again and waited to see if they would move more.
After a few very tense seconds, we collectively relaxed and Tess finished getting into place. I barely waited for Alan to catch up to me before I continued my walk up the stairs, still wearing the ring that enhanced all my abilities in a similar way to a vampire.
I didn’t take my eyes off the room ahead and continued to creep. I was still a few steps away from the top when the vampires stirred again. We all stopped. I wasn’t sure we were going to get much closer and I very carefully lifted my hand again and held my fist up.
Although I didn’t do so for long, the team got the message and they all waited. There was a slight groan from inside the room and the vampires began to wake up.
I knew we were all close enough that one big inhale could give our scents away and make it obvious the vampires weren’t alone. Assuming the smell of blood and other bodily fluids wasn’t sufficient to mask us.
Either way, I didn’t move. I didn’t have a great shot from where I was, but if they came toward us I would. We either needed them to notice us, or go back to sleep.
“Babe, you awake?” a male voice said groggily.
I had assumed correctly that the extra vampire was the turned partner of our original target. The academy wouldn’t care what happened to him. Either scare him off or kill him. It didn’t matter. If we wanted to get paid we were definitely going to have to take him out, however.
This wasn’t going to be easy to solve. Thankfully the female vampire didn’t seem to respond, and that at least meant we only had one to worry about. For now.
I shifted position slightly to try to make sure I was able to get the perfect shot.
This was the moment that counted. Moving didn’t seem to draw its attention but I was aware that the situation could turn and I was the team lead.
The ring was also still on my finger and I wouldn’t be able to take it off now until these vampires were dead.
Although I made it up another step and got myself into the perfect position to fire, the vampire still didn’t hear us.
“Babe?” the male vampire called again. He didn’t get a response, but that stirred him on to finally move. He got up. As he came toward the door, I shot. There was no choice. A fraction of a second more and he’d have noticed one or more of us.
He looked down at the holy water-covered crossbow bolt sticking out of his heart and gaped as he quickly died. I rushed forward, not even attempting to be quiet or reload my crossbow. I didn’t have time. I caught the vampire just before he could fall backwards.
The other vampire began to stir, but Alan had responded well and came running in with me. While I was lowering the dead vampire to the ground, he came striding in and got his shot. He put another bolt in the chest of the woman and killed her before she could even wake properly.
Naomi and Tess weren’t far behind, but they were also ready for action and they quickly moved to cover one of us each while we checked our targets were dead.
“Both dead?” Tess asked after a few seconds. I nodded as I saw Alan do the same. Only when I had confirmation did I slip my ring back off, making sure to keep it out of sight of the rest of the team. We had done it.
“We need something of hers,” Naomi said. “Does she have anything on her we can take?”
“Take her sock,” I suggested, pointing to her feet.
She had gone to sleep with enough clothing on that it should work.
It was a little gruesome to take an object from our marks, but it was the simplest way the academy could verify that the subject of a contract was dead and the only way we got paid.
Magic was involved in the checking process, but I didn’t pretend to understand it.
While I was the daughter of two successful vampire hunters and I had embraced learning from them as much as I could, they hadn’t been ones for using much magic and as such, I didn’t know very much about it.
Naomi dabbled, but she hadn’t brought any of it into a battle yet, aware that dabbling wasn’t the same as being proficient with it.
I was sure she would continue to grow, but for now I straightened and contemplated our next task. We had to consider what to do with the bodies and the evidence that we had been here. Thankfully I hadn’t touched anything and Alan and Tess were wearing gloves, but I didn’t know about Naomi.
On top of that, we had to decide if we should take back the crossbow bolts or leave them.
There was enough destruction and chaos here that we could leave the vampire bodies behind and it would become its own little murder mystery.
Sometimes this sort of thing was put down to drugs, or the police were bribed to never solve it or worry about it.
Now and then, a situation like this was never reported.
If this apartment was rented, the academy might try to pay whoever owned it to let them clean it up and just move on. While I didn’t know which option was likely to apply to a house this ruined, it wasn’t our problem beyond making sure none of this pointed to us.
I grabbed the end of my crossbow bolt and yanked it out of the chest of the vampire at about the same time as Alan pulled his out of the woman. He pulled a stack of tissues out of his pocket and wrapped it around the end so the blood wouldn’t get on anything else and I did the same.
Tess pulled a small flammable bag from her pack and opened it out for both of us to drop the used ammunition into it and then she sealed it.
I held my hands out for it, knowing it was also my responsibility as team leader to make sure none of the others got into trouble.
I would burn the whole thing, including the bag, when we were safely home.
With that done, we left the bodies where they were and hurried out the back way. I’d already scoped out the best way to get away from the house without being seen at this time of night, and by the time anyone might be able to see us, we were a group of four young people with rucksacks on our backs.
Our weapons were stashed away and we could have been going anywhere for any reason.
“That was amazing,” Alan said when we could talk more freely and were no longer having to concentrate on being careful. “You just shot him and he didn’t see it coming. It was like you didn’t even flinch, and it was the perfect shot.”
I smiled at Alan’s enthusiasm as he recounted the situation we had all been in only a short while earlier.
“You did good work with the other,” I replied, not sure I wanted to be the subject of a lot of attention and happy to deflect it back on him, but he shrugged in response.
“My target never really moved.”
“And Tess and I hardly did anything at all,” Naomi added.
As I frowned, I looked between my three team mates.
“Look, I know it seems like sometimes it all falls on one of our shoulders, but you all play a part. You were covering some element of the mission, trying to keep us all safe. We can only fight as effectively as we can because we are working so well as a team. Who pulls the trigger on the crossbow doesn’t matter. We killed two vampires tonight.”
This seemed to make them feel better and I didn’t get any more fuss from them.
“You were amazing, as always,” Tess said a few seconds later. “The way you hit the guy in the chest as soon as he was coming toward us. He looked so shocked that he’d been hit by anything. It was almost fun.”
I shrugged, not sure where she was going with this and not wanting to draw too much attention to myself.
I was better than before in situations like this partially because of the ring I carried.
I didn’t want the team knowing about that just yet.
And I wasn’t looking forward to telling the academy how we’d achieved our mission either.