Kitty's House of Horrors (kn-7) by Carrie Vaughn (christmas read aloud txt) 📕

He said, “They could have just staked her, but they didn’t. They waited, and they triggered this… this thing. This trap.”

We arrived and saw what he meant. Gemma was trapped in a cage, just tall enough to stand up in, just wide enough to grip both sides with her hands. Sheltered out of sight by a tree, it was portable, maybe set here only in the last day or so the way the grass under it was recently crushed. Steel and heavy, it would hold lions. A winch welded to the back had reeled in Gemma, who struggled against a harpoon sticking out of her right shoulder. The whole thing could have been automated, set on a trigger, operated by remote—we’d seen that the hunters had cameras and monitors set up. They could have moved their base since Grant interrogated Valenti. But as Jeffrey had said, they could have staked her just as easily as trapping her with harmless—to her—steel. This trap had a different purpose.

The cage was at the edge of the open meadow, and sunrise had begun. A band of full sunlight crept toward us across the grass.

Anastasia was talking Gemma down. Gemma herself gritted her teeth and threw herself against the barbed spike in her shoulder.

“Gemma, darling, stay calm. Don’t struggle. Don’t thrash.”

The younger vampire closed her eyes and settled, nodding in agreement.

Anastasia reached through the cage and held the spike, where it protruded from her back. “We’ll work it out of you. Carefully, now.”

Gemma eased herself forward, leaning against the spike, rolling her shoulder a little, struggling against the barb. Anastasia braced it still. I heard the wet, meaty sound of ripping flesh.

Vampires felt pain. I’d seen them get hurt. But they didn’t bleed much, and they didn’t need to breathe unless they were speaking. Gemma slid herself off that hook and didn’t make a sound. When she was free, she fell forward, and Anastasia dropped the spike, where it dangled off the winch.

Anastasia glared at Grant. “Every magician is also an escape artist, yes? You can pick the lock?” She pointed to the door of the cage.

Grant was already kneeling before the lock, working on it with a couple of thin metal tools, his lock picks.

Gemma leaned forward, pressing herself against the bars of the cage, leaning toward Anastasia, reaching. Anastasia held the younger woman’s face.

“Ani, I don’t want to die,” she said, gasping now in instinctive panic. She was still more human than not, had spent more years as a human than as a vampire.

“Hush,” Anastasia said. “Stay calm. When he opens the door, we must fly to safety, do you understand?” Gemma nodded quickly. Her face puckered and she started crying.

I had never seen the sun rise so quickly.

“Anastasia, go back to the lodge,” Grant said, never turning his concentration from the lock.

“No, not without Gemma, I’m not leaving.”

“You’re in danger,” he said. “Go back.”

“No!”

“I’ll save her. I’ll get her out. But I can’t worry about you both.”

“Gemma—”

The girl was sobbing.

I said to Anastasia, “Some of the stories say you guys can turn to mist. You can vanish, reappear at will—”

“We can’t just walk through walls and iron bars!” the elder vampire said. “She’s just a child!”

“Anastasia, please,” Jeffrey said, putting his arm around her shoulder, urging her away.

“Jeffrey,” I said. “Go back to the lodge, the hunters’ blind, whatever’s closer. Get a tarp or a blanket or something we can put over the cage to shade it,” I said. I’d started crying, too. I’d have thought I’d be out of tears by now. “Both of you, go!”

Anastasia turned and ran, Jeffrey following, struggling to keep up. I moved around the cage, putting myself between Gemma and the sun, as if my small body could shelter her.

Grant worked on the locks. He clenched his jaw and seemed to be struggling.

“Grant?”

“This type of lock would be easy, but there’s a film of silicone sealant on the mechanism. It’s glued shut.”

Gemma pressed her back against the bars, as far away from the oncoming sunlight as she could get. Watching, I could almost see it move toward her, a reaching hand. Grant continued jamming his pick in the lock, working it in an arcane fashion that might as well have been magic.

With a pop and a click, the lock sprang and the door swung open. Grant took hold of Gemma’s arms and pulled.

And the sunlight reached her.

“No!” Grant screamed in fierce defiance and clung to Gemma all the more.

But the light touched her legs and she caught fire, and the flames raced up her as if she were made of dry cotton. Her clothing didn’t burn so fast but stayed for a moment as a shell around an inferno. Her eyes held terror, her gaze locked with Grant’s, her mouth open in a silent wail.

Then the fire was gone and all was ash, specks drifting above on heated air. Grant knelt before streaks of soot and ash on the ground, his hands rigid in front of him, his skin burned to blisters.

The smell in the air was… I breathed through my mouth and tried to shut it out.

I moved to Grant, put my hand on his shoulder. The expression on his face was lost, the eyes sad. He looked old.

“I had her,” he murmured. “I’d opened the lock. I’d won.”

I wasn’t sure he’d even noticed his hands. He hadn’t moved them. They still curled as if they held Gemma’s arm.

“You’re hurt,” I said. “Let’s get inside.”

He slumped against me, and I almost panicked, thinking I’d have to drag him back, thinking he’d die, too, and then what would I do?

“I’m so tired,” he said, leaning on my shoulder. Just resting a moment.

“I know,” I whispered.

Turning at the sound of running, I saw Jeffrey, standing with a wool blanket that might have come from the hunters’ blind. When he saw us, he dropped it. His shoulders slumped, and grief pulled at his face.

A pair of gold filigree rings had survived