Vampire in Atlantis

depths, and into the three maidens waiting in their crystal cases in Atlantis.
    Serai cried out, but it was a joyous cry, and she threw her arms around him. “We did it! Did you feel that? We strengthened them! They’re better, Daniel, oh, they’re stronger now, and we did it. They’ll be safe for a little while longer, until we find the Emperor. We are better together than apart. There will be no more talk, ever, of us leaving each other or being better off without the other. Agreed?”
    He hugged her back and started to answer, but an unexpected sound, a harsh grinding noise, scraped across his eardrums, and instead he held a finger to her lips and listened with his vampire senses on high alert.
    It was—It couldn’t be. He listened harder, instinctively pushing Serai behind him.
    It was the sound of tramping feet and the roar of helicopters. He had a crazy flashback to another invading army, eleven thousand years ago, and then shook his head to clear it of those images.
    “It sounds like the army is on its way, and we’re still trapped in here by the sun for a little while longer,” he told Serai. “This isn’t good.”
    Her face drained of color, but she squared her shoulders and nodded. “It wouldn’t be fun if it were easy,” she said, and he started laughing.
    “Oh, Princess. You are absolutely the right woman for me.”

Chapter 32
     

     
    Nicholas heard them first, long before Ivy’s human ears picked up any disturbance. It was barely dusk, and the apprentice had finally arrived, dragged by his ears all the way, one would think from the way he was sniveling. Ivy had tried to comfort him at first, promising him he wouldn’t be hurt, but she’d finally given up in disgust.
    Even Ian had rolled his eyes after the first ten minutes or so and told the witch to “man up, dude.”
    “We’re in trouble,” Nicholas said. He pointed to the man, Phillips or Phelps or whatever. “Shut up, now, or I’ll kill you myself.”
    Phillips shut up, cramming his fist in his mouth to do it.
    Ian shot Nicholas a hard look. “He’s a clerk in the New Age shop down by Tuzigoot, not exactly a hard-ass. Scaring him even more isn’t going to help.”
    “Shut up and listen.”
    Ian, astonishingly enough for a thirteen-year-old boy, actually shut up and listened. Five seconds later, he ran to his mother and took her arm.
    “Mom, it’s gotta be the army. Holy crap, it really is the army coming to rescue us!”
    Ivy and Nicholas shared a grim look over Ian’s head. If the army were on its way, the last thing they’d have in mind would be rescuing a witch from a vampire. More likely, they were after the power source of the King stone and would kill all of them to get it. Nicholas had heard rumors that the P-Ops Division was corrupt all the way to the top, and now he might be soon to gain confirmation firsthand.
    “Hey, I lied, Phil,” Ivy said tiredly. “You’re probably going to get hurt.”
    The man started wailing again, so Nicholas strode across the cave and casually backhanded him to shut him up. Phil’s eyes rolled back in his head, and he slumped to the ground.
    “That’s better. Now maybe I can think.” Nicholas walked over to the box that held the gem and stared down at it as if the amethyst itself would give him a clue as to what to do next. They’d been on the verge of trying one final experiment to see if they could learn what the King stone really could do, when the stone had begun glowing on its own, shooting out a beam of light so strong that Nicholas was surprised it hadn’t cut straight through the stone cavern wall. Ivy told him that it wasn’t just light, either; the stone had been projecting magical energy at a level far more intense than anything she’d seen from it thus far.
    “What can we do?” Ivy asked now, holding tight to Ian’s arm. “You promised to keep my son safe, vampire, and it’s dark enough that you can escape with him in a few minutes. I’ll stay here and deal with the army.”
    “I won’t leave you, Mom,” Ian protested, and she ignored him as if he’d never even spoken, still staring steadily at Nicholas.
    “I won’t leave you, either,” Nicholas said, leaving her to interpret it as she would. “We’ll all get out of here. The members of my blood pride should be here any minute to assist us.”
    “Why did you send the guy away who brought Phil? He was human. The sunlight wouldn’t have bothered him.”
    “More witnesses I didn’t need.