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said. “I have always told you so.”
    “Some of us,” Amelie said, “are not so fortunate in our choice of families.”
    She turned away from Theo without waiting for his response—if he’d been intending to give one—and without so much as a pause, slammed her fist into a glass-fronted wall box labeled EMERGENCY USE ONLY three steps to the right. It shattered in a loud clatter, and Amelie shook shards of glass from her skin.
    She reached into the box and took out . . . Claire blinked. “Is that a paintball gun?”
    Amelie handed it to Hannah, who handled it like a professional. “It fires pellets loaded with silver powder,” she said. “Very dangerous to us. Be careful where you aim.”
    “Always am,” Hannah said. “Extra magazines?”
    Amelie retrieved them from the case and handed them over. Claire noticed that she protected herself even from a casual touch, with a fold of fabric over her fingers. “There are ten shots per magazine,” she said. “There is one already loaded, and six more here.”
    “Well,” Hannah said, “any problem I can’t solve with seventy shots is probably going to kill us, anyway.”
    “Claire,” Amelie said, and handed over a small, sealed vial. “Silver powder, packed under pressure. It will explode on impact, so be very careful with it. If you throw it, there is a wide dispersal through the air. It can hurt your friends as much as your enemies.”
    There were real uses for silver powder, like coating parts in computers; Claire supposed it wasn’t exactly restricted, but she was surprised the vampires were progressive enough to lay in a supply. Amelie raised pale eyebrows at her.
    “You’ve been expecting this,” Claire said.
    “Not in detail. But I’ve learned through my life that such preparations are never wasted, in the end. Sometime, somewhere, life always comes to a fight, and peace always comes to an end.”
    Theo said, very quietly, “Amen.”

4
    T hey left the museum by way of a side door. It was risky to go out into the night, but since the only other way to exit the museum was to go back into the darkness, nobody argued about the choice.
    “Careful,” Amelie told them in a very soft voice that hardly reached past the shadows. “I have gathered my forces. My father is doing the same. There will be patrols, especially here.”
    The flames hadn’t reached Founder’s Square, which was where they came out—the heart of vamp territory. It didn’t look like the calm, orderly place Claire remembered, though; the lights were all out, and the shops and restaurants that bordered it were closed and empty.
    It looked afraid.
    The only place she could see movement was on the marble steps of the Elders’ Council building, where Bishop’s welcome feast had been held. Gérard hissed a warning, and they all froze, silent and still in the dark. Hannah’s grip on Claire’s arm felt like an iron band.
    There were three vampires standing there, scanning the area.
    Lookouts.
    “Go,” Amelie said in a whisper so small it was like a ghost. “Move, but be careful.”
    They reached the edge of the shadows by the corner of the building, but just as Claire was starting to relax a little, Amelie, Gérard, and the other vampires moved in a blur, scattering in all directions.
    This left Claire flat-footed for one horrible second, before Hannah tackled her facedown on the grass. Claire gasped, got a mouthful of crunchy dirt and bitter chlorophyll, and fought to get her breath. Hannah’s heavy weight held her down, and the older woman braced her elbows on Claire’s back.
    She’s firing the pistol, Claire thought, and tried to raise her head to see where Hannah was shooting.
    “Head down!” Hannah snarled, and shoved Claire down with one hand while she continued to fire with the other. From the screams in the dark, she was hitting something. “Get up! Run!”
    Claire wasn’t quick enough to suit either the marines or the vampires, and before she knew it, she was being