The car pulled to a stop outside the house I’d been staying in with Jo and Patrik. I didn’t wait for the driver as I threw open the door and pulled myself out of the car, one hand pressed tightly to the wound in my side.

He didn’t say anything just shot an apologetic look my way as he drove away. Not that I cared. Other things filled my mind with a sense of urgency that I couldn’t deny as I rushed up the short path to the front door and inside.

There were all there. A sob of relief and fear for my friend escaped me. She was missing but they were all there and would help me get her back.

Jo, a large bruise on her cheek and cut above her eye that couldn’t dampen the fury that burned there. Two of the fingers on her left hand were being bound together by Delilah who actually bore a look of concern. The only other emotion I’d seen from her had been undisguised condescension.

Patrik lay on one of the couches, his torn and bloodied shirt on the floor beside him. A wide bandage had been wrapped around his waist, already discoloured from the blood seeping through. He had one large arm over his face and as he shifted at my entrance, I noted that one eye was swollen completely shut.

“You made it,” Marie said and I thought I could detect relief in her voice. “Your friend?”

“They have her,” I said and almost lost that oh so very tight control I was keeping hold of. Almost.

“Have who?” Abe said as he entered the room, a steaming bowl of water held in both hands and a first aid kit beneath his arm. He nodded once at me as he passed and then stopped as he saw my face. “You’re hurt.”

“No shit!” Jo said before I could respond. “We all are. What happened to you? How’d you get out?”

“Over the roof.”

“Bullshit! No way you could get down from up there.”

“We did,” I snapped back. “They have Evie! We need to get her back!”

“Sit down!” Marie said. Her tone imperious and fully expecting to be obeyed. I glared at her and didn’t move. “Be seated and let us tend your injuries. Then tell us what happened.”

“But Evie…”

“We can do nothing for her until we know what happened,” she insisted and I gave in, dropping to the couch with a groan of pain. Abe rushed forward and set down the bowl of water as he inspected the cut in my side.

“It was a trap,” I said.

“We figured,” Patrik said with a grunt.

“Prick at the hospital set us up,” Jo added and at my look added, “the bouncer whose balls you crushed. He was the one who told me where they were.”

“She sacrificed two weak vampires to trap you all,” Marie said. “Patrik and Jo managed to get free by luck as much as anything. How did you escape?”

In halting tones, I told them what had happened, though every now and then I had to stop as Abe pushed a needle through my skin to sew up the cut. Marie nodded thoughtfully as I explained how I’d used my powers to first get to the roof and then across to the next building.

When I told of Evie drawing away the others so that I could escape, my voice almost failed me but I coughed to clear the lump that seemed to have formed in my throat and finished with waiting at the bar for her.

“How do you know they have her then?” Jo asked. “You didn’t see them take her.”

“I was told. She’ll be taken here tomorrow night,” I said as I held out the piece of paper. The other woman rose from her seat with a wince of pain and limped across the room to take it from me.

“Who told you?”

My gaze fell to Abe and then away as I hesitated. I knew how it would sound, like another trap. What choice did I have though? I needed their help. “Sephtis,” I said and watched as the colour drained from the older man’s face.

“He’s here!” Marie’s voice was full of shock and fear as she almost leapt to her feet. “In Manchester. What did he say?”

I couldn’t take my eyes from Abe as he stared at his hands that trembled slightly where he held the needle still halfway through my skin. His eyes met mine and I flinched away from the pain I saw there.

“Yes,” I said. “He’s here and he knows about all of you and this place.”

“How do you know that?”

“He had a car waiting with a driver to bring me back here and I didn’t give him the address,” I said as her shoulders sagged. Fear was practically emanating from her in waves and that scared me as much as anything else.

“What… what did he say?” Abe asked with tight control. “Tell me everything he said.”

I did. Almost. I left out the part about the blooding since I had no idea what it was and no way of knowing their reaction. Something told me that his suggestion not to tell them was worth listening to. When I had finished, Abe shared a look with Marie and she snatched the paper from Jo and stormed into the next room.

“You know him,” I said to Abe. “How?”

“He’s the one who killed your parents. You’re sure?” he replied, evading my question and I nodded.

With a weary moan, he pushed himself up to his feet and handed over a packet of pills. Just generic pain killers that you could get over the counter. I took them gratefully and popped a couple into my mouth, swallowing them down dry.

“Can we trust him?” Patrik asked.

“Of course not,” Abe replied absently. “He’s a vampire and more than that, he’s a soulless bastard and the worst of his kind.”

“But we need to get Evie back,” I said and blinked away tears before they could form. I won’t break down, not now! My hand went unbidden to curl through my hair, trying to find something to grip and pull out.

“We will,” Patrik said.

“You can’t promise that. She’s likely already dead.” I glared at Jo but she shrugged unapologetically. “It’s true.”

“Jonah is headed to the address,” Marie said as she came back into the room, her mobile phone in hand and I looked at her blankly. “One of the members of another team. He’s close and will go to observe it and report back.”

“We’re going then?” Patrik asked and I gasped with renewed hope as she nodded.

“This is an opportunity we can’t waste. If this is correct and she will be there with more of her kind, we can clear the whole nest.”

“You can’t trust him,” Abe said angrily.

“We can trust that he has no desire to see Anahella live and he wants something from her,” Marie said with a glance to me.

“What though?” I asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.

“That we don’t know.”

She was lying. Something about the way she said the words or perhaps how she looked at me told me that she was lying. I glanced sideways to Abe and caught a contemplative look on his face. He’d seen it too!

“We’ll observe and then go tomorrow,” Marie said as she turned to Jo. “Will you be ready to fight?”

“With some rest tonight… sure, but are we certain this isn’t another trap.”

“No, but all the teams are coming. We’ll clean them out for good.”

“That might be what they want,” Jo warned.

“Then put your mind to the task of ensuring we aren’t taken by surprise,” the older woman snapped back.

“I’ll help you up to your room,” Abe said to me as he offered his hand. I looked up at him and his eyes flicked towards Marie and back to me quickly.

“Thanks,” I said as I took his hand in mine and he hauled me upright.

“Yes,” Marie said. “Sleep now, rest and recover. Tomorrow will be a big day and you won’t be of help to your friend if you’re exhausted.”

With a steady arm around my shoulder, Abe steered me through the door towards the stairs. I opened my mouth to speak but he shook his head and glanced meaningfully back at the room we’d left.

The two flights of stairs up to my room were the hardest thing I’d ever had to do. My legs shook with each step and it was all I could do to put one foot before the next. Halfway up the first flight of stairs, Abe grunted and scooped me up in surprisingly strong arms before carrying me the rest of the way, my head resting against his chest as I listened to his heart beating. Surprisingly steady for a man his age while carrying me.

He nudged open the bedroom door with one foot and deposited me gently on the bed, before moving back to close the door with a soft click. Once sure we were alone he crossed back to sit down beside me on the bed.

“What’s going on?” I asked and stifled a yawn. No matter how exhausted I was, I needed answers and sleep would be a long time coming as I worried for Evie.

“Your scar,” he said with a nod towards my t-shirt and the damaged flesh beneath it.

“What about it?”

“Remember how you reacted when I touched you there with silver?” I nodded and he licked his lips and paused. “The story you told me, of the night your parents died. You said you were hurt but your dad was saying something.”

“Yeah, nonsense mostly.”

“Not nonsense. I wish you’d waited for me before heading off with Marie to join in her crusade,” he said. “I’ve looked into things as best I could considering how long ago it was.”

“And?”

“Marie told you about the demons?” his expression seemed to indicate he wanted an answer so I nodded and held up my hand to my mouth to hide another yawn. “I suspect, and she does too, that it was one of the original shadow demons that possessed your dad.”

“Yeah, she said that. But what difference does that make.”

“Well, quite a bit because I don’t think it ever left.”

I blinked up at him as my mouth formed an ‘O’ of surprise and for the life of me, I couldn’t think of anything to say to that.

“In fact,” he continued. “I don’t know what Sephtis wanted but by being in a human body for so long, your father’s power was limited.”

“Oh…” Yeah, great response. I pushed myself up the bed a little until I had the pillows behind my bank and just, stared at him.

“He had enough strength left to drive the vampire away, but your mother was already lost and you were dying. I suspect, to save you, he put his power into you.”

“His power? You mean my shadows?”

“No. That is just part and parcel of being a half demon,” he said. “Contained inside your scar, is the pure power of a shadow demon. Put there to keep you alive when you should have died.”

“I should have?”

“Do you really think you’d have survived such a wound at that young age without some kind of supernatural aid?” he asked and I shook my head. “He hid it well, so that you wouldn’t know it was there but that sort of power can’t be fully contained.”

“What does that mean?”

“It’s been seeping out over the years. Attracting, well, attracting misery.”

“You’re nuts!”

“Listen to me,” he hissed as he reached out and grabbed my arm just as I was about to wave him away. “Your life, all those bad things that happened to you and those around you. That creeping unease people felt if they were around you too long. That’s a sign that the darkness has been seeping out.”

“How do you know…” I began as memories flashed up before me. All those years of loneliness. The faces of the families that came to the children’s home, hopeful at first but changing as they spent time with me. A shared look of disquiet between them before they moved on to another child.

The only ones that had even considered taking me in were those who had darker intentions and perhaps that too, was a symptom of the seepage. Like attracting like, their darkness pulled in by my own.

Children at school who ignored or picked on me. The boys who only showed me any attention until I gave them what they wanted and then they’d be gone, laughing and joking with their friends about the easy lay.

“Evie,” I said slowly and he scratched at the day old growth on his cheek.

“She’s an aberration,” he admitted. “The one person who seems genuinely nice but manages to tolerate you anyway.”

“Thanks,” I said dryly with a twist to my lips at his words.

“Sorry kid,” he shrugged. “It’s not you, but what you contain.”

“Say I believe you, that you’re right,” I said. “How do I get rid of it?”

“No idea but I suspect that Sephtis does,” he said and exhaled a breath. “Possibly Marie too.”

“Marie?”

“She sees you as a weapon and I’m certain that she wants access to the power you have to cleanse the world of the supernaturals.”

“Why?” I asked. “Why the hatred for them? Why did you both look so scared when I mentioned Sephtis?”

“That’s a long story,” he said softly and I looked away rather than see the pain in his eyes. “But the short version is, that we’ve encountered him before.”

“But you survived,” I said.

“Not only that, we buried the bastard.”