Chapter 29 Chapter 29
LENORE
“We’re leaving. Now.”
Those words finally snapped me out of my confused daze and I drew my brows together. “What?”
Cameron began to pull me to the hallway, and it took me a moment to notice he was tracking blood.
“Oh my God! Are you—”
“Is there anything you want to grab?”
“I— No. Is that—”
“Then let’s go.”
We were in the hallway now and as we rapidly closed the distance to the suite’s main door and I stopped letting him pull me along.
“Cameron!”
How did he get here? No one could enter the city without an invitation, so where did he get one? Did anyone see him enter the palace?
“I can’t leave! There are guards at the door,” I said in a rush before realizing there was no way he would have been able to enter if the guards were still at the door.
“I took care of them. We have to leave before they get back up.”
My gaze dropped back to his bloody footprints. “Is—Is that theirs?” I blinked rapidly, my lips parting as I wondered how Killian would react to my brother killing two of his guards. Then I processed his last sentence and almost sighed in relief because he hadn’t killed killed them.
“We have to go.” He tried to pull me along again, but I didn’t budge.
“No, wait—”
“I thought you were dead, Lenore!” He suddenly burst out, and I almost jumped. His eyes were wild. “All of us. We were fucking terrified! And then I got here and saw blood everywhere. I—” He cut himself off, taking in a shaky breath and tipping his head back a bit.
“...I’m sorry.” I should have tried harder to get a phone. I knew they’d be worried when they didn’t hear from me, but I didn’t think it would be… I just didn’t think. “I’m so sorry. I lost my phone and—”
“It doesn’t matter. I am not letting you spend another moment here. We’re leaving.”
When he tried to pull me along again, I didn’t stop him. I needed to tell him I couldn’t leave. That the King had done something to the invitation so the pack representatives wouldn’t be able to leave the city without his permission or death.
But if I got into that right now, I’ll end up spending a lot of time trying to convince him to leave the city without me, and we didn’t have that time. Killian or Fabien could come back at any time and it would be bad if the King found out Cameron was here. I needed to get him out of here.
Cameron opened the suite’s main door, and after we stepped out, I gasped. One guard was lying on the floor—in a pool of blood—by the door and there was a spear lodged in his chest. Another guard was a couple of feet down the hall and in the same condition, but instead of a spear in his chest, it was a knife.
My lips remained parted as we walked past them. I had never seen Cameron fight before, but I never could have guessed he’d be able to take down two vampires on his own. How did he do it? …Where had he even gotten the spear from?
“This way,” Cameron muttered before we took off down the hallway. Thankfully, we didn’t run into anyone on our way, so it didn’t take long for us to get out of the building.
This was the most unnerving thing I’d ever done in my life and my heart threatened to beat out of my chest with every step we took. Cameron had said he’d seen blood everywhere and as we ran down the ground-lit path beside the palace, I finally understood what he meant.
There were pools of blood everywhere I looked, and in some places, it looked like the ground itself was bleeding.
What the fuck?
I already knew one of the pack representatives was dead, and Killian had mentioned there were casualties, but I didn’t think it was this bad. Oh my God.
How had the rogue vampires even gotten into the city? How many people other than that boy from the training ground got killed?
The fact that if Killian hadn’t showed up when he did, my blood would also soak the ground like this hit me once more and a cold wave embalmed me.
“You shouldn’t have come,” I finally spoke again after a while had passed as we headed through a small gate that led us out of the palace. It wasn’t the main gate and I couldn’t help but wonder how Cameron had found it—I also wondered why we hadn’t run into anyone since when we left Killian’s room—but they took a backseat to the pressing issue of Cameron’s being here. “Does our father know you’re here?” I added and Cameron let out a humorless laugh.
So that’s a no.
“How did you get in? Where did you get an invitation?”
“I didn’t need one. I just—”
“What do we have here?”
Cameron instantly came to a stop while I froze at the sudden voice. Then I turned to find Travis—the boy who had taunted me the night we had dinner with the King—walking up to us, a condescending smile on his face. It looked like he’d also come through the gate.
Has he been following us?
“The werewolf prince,” Travis continued. “Does the vampire King know you’re here?” His gaze shifted to me and his eyes gleamed as he returned his attention to Cameron. “Does the vampire know you’re stealing his whore?”
I frowned. The fact that people had jumped to that conclusion when they learned I’d moved into Killian’s palace was annoying, and even though the relationship I had with him was progressing in that direction, that word made me want to hit him.
Cameron, on the other hand, didn’t want to engage and just resumed pulling me with him.
Travis clearly didn’t like that. He scowled and quickly went around us, blocking our path. “I’m talking to you,” he bit out, shoving Cameron back.
“And I’m choosing to ignore you,” Cameron responded, tightening his hold on my hand.
“Uh—”
“You think you’re so big, huh? You and that animal you call your father.” Travis walked up to Cameron, only stopping when their noses were almost touching, and I quickly glanced around. There was still no one else around.
“I’m not interested in this, Travis.” Cameron tried to walk around him, but Travis shoved him back so hard, he stumbled and inadvertently let go of my hand.
“My brother wasn’t interested in being killed by your father either!”