I had nothing left. For three heartbeats I stared. His lips curved into an eager smile.

I jerked into motion. Piscary casually reached out and grabbed my ankle as I tried to rise. I fell, kicking out, managing to hit his face twice before he pulled me to him and immobilized me under his weight.

The scar on my neck gave a pulse, and fear surged through it, making a nauseating mix.

"No," Piscary said softly, pinning me to the carpet. "You will be in pain for this."

His fangs were bared. Saliva dripped from them.

I struggled for air, trying to get out from under him. He shifted, holding my left arm over my head. My right arm was free. Teeth gritted, I went for his eyes.

Piscary jerked back. With a vamp strength, he grasped my right arm and snapped it.

My scream echoed against the high ceilings. My back arched and I gasped for air.

Piscary's eyes flashed black. "Tell me if Kalamack has a viable sample," he demanded.

Lungs heaving, I tried to breathe. The wave of misery thrummed from my arm and echoed in my head. "Go to hell…" I rasped.

Still pinning me to the carpet, he squeezed my broken arm.

I writhed as agony sang through me. Every nerve ending pulsed into a burn. A guttural sound escaped me, pain and determination. I wouldn't tell him. I didn't even know the answer.

He leaned his weight onto my arm, and I screamed again so I wouldn't go insane. Fear made my skull hurt as Piscary's eyes flashed into hunger. His instinctive need had risen high, triggered by my struggles. The black of his eyes swelled. I heard my sounds of pain as if outside my head. Silver sparkles from shock started between me and Piscary's eyes, and my cries turned to relief. I was going to pass out. Thank you, God.

Piscary saw it, too. "No," he whispered, his tongue making a quick pass over his teeth to catch the saliva before it fell. "I'm better than that." He took his weight from my arm. A groan came from me as the agony dulled to a throb.

He leaned to put his face inches from mine, watching my pupils with a cool detachment as the sparkles disappeared and my focus returned. Under his impassivity was a growing excitement. If he hadn't already sated his hunger with Ivy, he wouldn't have been able to keep from draining me. He knew the instant my will returned, smiling in anticipation.

Taking a breath, I spit in his face, tears mixing with my saliva.

Piscary closed his eyes, his expression showing a tired irritation. He let go of my left wrist to wipe his face.

I swung the heel of my hand up to smash it into his nose.

He caught my wrist before it hit. Fangs glinting, he held my arm. My eyes traveled down the scratch he had cut in me to invoke the amulet. My heart gave a hard pound. A ribbon of blood trailed slowly to my elbow. A drop of red swelled, quivered, and fell to land upon my chest, warm and soft.

My breath was shaking. I stared, waiting. His tension rose, his muscles tightening as he lay atop me. His gaze was fixed to my wrist. Another drop fell, feeling heavy against me.

"No!" I shrieked as a carnal groan slipped from him.

"I see now," he said, his voice terrifyingly soft, harnessed need pulsing under it. "No wonder Algaliarept took so long finding out what frightens you." Pinning my arm to the floor, he leaned closer until our noses lay side by side. I couldn't move. I couldn't breathe. "You're afraid of desire," he whispered. "Tell me, little witch, what I want to know or I will slice you open, filling your veins with me, making you my plaything. But I will let you remember your freedom—mine forever."

"Go to hell…." I said, terrified.

He eased back to see my face. It was hot where his robe had shifted and his skin touched mine. "I will start here," he said, pulling my dripping arm to where I could see it.

"No…" I protested. My voice was soft and frightened. I couldn't help it. I tried to bring my arm closer, but Piscary had it tight. He pulled my arm in a slow controlled motion as I fought to keep it unmoving. My broken arm sent surges of nausea through me as I tried to use it, pushing at him with the strength of a kitten.

"God no, God no!" I screamed, redoubling my struggles as he tilted his head and sent his tongue across my elbow, moaning as he cleaned it, his tongue moving slowly to where the blood flowed freely. If his saliva reached my veins, I would be his. Forever.

I wiggled. I thrashed. The warm wetness of his tongue was replaced with the cool sharpness of teeth, grazing but not piercing.

"Tell me," he whispered, tilting his head so he could see my eyes, "and I'll kill you now instead of in a hundred years."

Nausea bubbled up, mixing with the darkness of insanity. I bucked under him. The fingers of my broken arm found his ear. I tore at them, reaching for his eyes. I fought like an animal, instinct a hazy mist between me and madness.

Piscary's breath came in a harsh pant as my struggles and pain whipped him into a frenzy of restraint I'd seen in Ivy far too often. "Oh, the hell with it," he said, his flowing voice cutting through me. "I'm going to drain you. I can find out some other way. I may be dead, but I'm still a man."

"No!" I shrieked. But it was too late.

Piscary's lips pulled back. Forcing my bleeding arm to the floor, his head tilted to reach my neck. The haze of pain swelled into ecstasy as he ground his fingers into my broken arm. I screamed into his moan of anticipation.

A distant boom of sound struck through me, and the floor trembled. I spasmed, the warm rapture of my arm shocking into a breathless feeling of pain. The sound of men shouting filtered in through the haze of nausea.

"They won't reach us in time," Piscary murmured. "They're too late for you."

Not like this, I thought, out of my mind in fear and cursing the stupidity of it all. I didn't want to die like this. He bent to me, his face savage with hunger. I took a last breath.

It exploded from me as a green ball of ever-after smashed into Piscary.

I wiggled in the minuscule shifting of weight. Still on me, Piscary snarled and looked up.

My arm was free, and I wedged my knees between us. Tears blurred my vision as I fought with renewed desperation. Someone was there. Someone was there to help me.

Another blast of green smashed into Piscary. He rocked back. I got a leg under me and levered us up, flipping Piscary off me.

Scrabbling to my feet, I grabbed a chair and swung. It hit him, the shock echoing up my arm.

Piscary turned, his face savage. He tensed, gathering himself to leap at me.

I backpedaled, my broken arm clutched tight to me.

A third blast of green ever-after hissed past me, hitting Piscary and sending him flying backward into a wall.

I spun to the distant elevator.

Quen.

The man stood beside a huge hole in the wall beside the elevator in a cloud of dust, a growing ball of ever-after in his hand, still red but taking on the tinges of his aura. He must have had the energy stored in his chi, since we were too deep underground to reach a line. A black satchel sat beside his feet, several wooden swordlike stakes extending out from the open zipper. Beyond the hole was the stairway. "It's about time you got here," I panted, staggering.

"I got caught behind a train," he said, his hands moving in ley line magic. "Bringing the FIB into this was a mistake."

"I wouldn't have had to if your boss wasn't such a prick!" I shouted, then took a shallow breath, trying not to cough at the dust. Kisten had taken my note. How did the FIB get there if Quen didn't bring them?

Piscary had regained his feet. He took us in, showing his fangs in a wide smile. "And now elf blood? I haven't fed this well since the Turn."

With a vamp's speed, he raced across the large room to Quen, backhanding me in passing. I was flung backward. My back hit the wall and I slumped to the floor. Dazed and hovering on the edge of unconsciousness, I watched Quen evade Piscary, looking like a shadow in his black bodysuit. He had a wooden stake the length of my arm in one hand, a growing ball of ever-after in the other. The Latin spilled from him, the words of the black charm burning themselves into my mind.