"Stop!"

He didn't respond as quickly as Northwood, but he did hesitate. This guy was more resistant.

"Stop fighting!" she repeated more forcefully, intensifying her will.

Strong or not, he couldn't stand against that much spirit. His arms fell to his sides, and he stopped wrestling me. I stepped back to catch my breath, straightening my wig back into place.

"Holding this one's going to be hard," Lissa told me.

"Hard as in five minutes or five hours?"

"Somewhere in the middle."

"Then let's move. Get Victor's key from him."

She demanded the guardian give her the key for the shackles. He told us the other guardian had it. Sure enough, I frisked the unconscious body–he was breathing steadily, thank God–and retrieved the key. Now I turned my full attention on Victor. Once the fight had started, he'd stepped out of the way and simply observed quietly while all sorts of new possibilities undoubtedly formed in his twisted mind.

I approached and put on my "scary face" as I held up the key. "I'm going to unlock your cuffs now," I told him, in a voice both sweet and menacing. "You're going to do exactly what we tell you to do. You're not going to run, start a fight, or in any way interfere with our plans."

"Oh? Are you using compulsion nowadays too, Rose?" he asked dryly.

"I don't need it." I unlocked the shackles. "I can render you unconscious as easily as that guy and drag you out. Makes no difference to me."

The heavy cuffs and chains fell to the floor. That sly, smug look stayed on his face, but his hands gently touched each wrist. I noticed then that there were welts and bruises on them. Those shackles weren't meant for comfort, but I refused to feel sorry for him. He glanced back up at us.

"How charming," he mused. "Out of all the people who would attempt to rescue me, I never would have expected you two . . . and yet, in retrospect, you're probably the most capable."

"We don't need your running commentary, Hannibal," I snapped. "And don't use the word rescue. It makes it sound like you're some wrongfully imprisoned hero."

He arched an eyebrow, like he believed that might indeed be the case. Instead of disputing me, he nodded toward Bradley, who had actually slept through the fight. In his drugged state, Lissa's compulsion had been more than enough to knock him out.

"Give him to me," said Victor.

"What?" I exclaimed. "We don't have time for this!"

"And I have no strength for whatever you have in mind," hissed Victor. That pleasant and all-knowing mask vanished, replaced by one vicious and desperate. "Imprisonment involves more than bars, Rose. They starve us of food and blood, trying to keep us weak. Walking here is the only exercise I get, and that's effort enough. Unless you really do plan on dragging me out of here, give me blood!"

Lissa interrupted any response I could make. "Be fast."

I stared at her in astonishment. I'd been about to deny Victor, but through the bond I felt an odd mix of feelings from her. Compassion and . . . understanding. Oh, she still hated him, absolutely. But she also knew what it was like to live on limited blood.

Mercifully, Victor was fast. His mouth was at the human's neck practically before Lissa finished speaking. Dazed or no, feeling teeth in his neck was enough to wake Bradley up. He woke with a start, his face soon moving into the delight feeders took from vampire endorphins. A short burst of blood was all Victor would need, but when Bradley's eyes started to go wide in surprise, I realized Victor was taking more than a quick drink. I leapt forward and jerked Victor away from the scattered feeder.

"What the hell are you doing?" I demanded, shaking Victor hard. It was something I'd wanted to do for a long time. "Did you think you could drain him and become Strigoi right in front of us?"

"Hardly," said Victor, wincing at the grip I had on him.

"That's not what he was doing," said Lissa. "He just lost control for a second."

His bloodlust satisfied, Victor's smooth demeanor had returned. "Ah, Vasilisa. Always so understanding."

"Don't make any assumptions," she growled.

I shot glares at both of them. "We have to go. Now." I turned to the compelled guardian. "Take us to the room where they monitor all security footage."

He didn't respond to me, and with a sigh, I looked expectantly at Lissa. She repeated my question, and he immediately began to leave the room. My adrenaline was running high from the fight, and I was anxious to finish all of this and get us out of here. Through the bond, I sensed her nervousness. She might have defended Victor's need for blood, but as we walked, she kept as far away from him as possible. The stark realization of who he was and what we were doing was creeping up on her. I wished I could comfort her, but there was no time.

We followed the guardian–Lissa asked his name; it was Giovanni-through more halls and security checkpoints. The route he led us on went around the prison's edge, not through the cells. I held my breath almost the entire time, terrified we'd run into someone. Too many other factors were working against us; we didn't need that too. Our luck held, though, and we ran into no one–again probably a result of doing this near the end of the night and not passing through a high-security zone.

Lissa and Mia had gotten the Court guardian to erase the security footage there too, but I hadn't witnessed it. Now, when Giovanni led us into the prison's surveillance room, I couldn't help a small gasp. Monitors covered the walls, and consoles with complex buttons and switches sat in front of them. Computer-covered desks were everywhere. I felt like this room had the power to blast off into space. Everything in the prison was in view: each cell, several halls, and even the warden's office, where Eddie sat making small talk with Theo. Two other guardians were in here, and I wondered if they'd seen us in the halls. But no–they were too fixated on something else: a camera that had been turned to face a blank wall. It was the one I'd adjusted in the feeding room.

They were leaning toward it, and one of them was saying how they should call someone to check down there. Then they both looked up and noticed us.

"Help her subdue them," Lissa ordered Giovanni.

Again, there was hesitation. We would have been better off with a "helper" with a weaker will, but Lissa had had no idea when she chose him. Like before, he eventually sprang into action. Also like before, surprise went a long way in subduing these two guardians. I was a stranger–immediately raising their guard–but still appeared as human. Giovanni was their coworker; they didn't expect an attack from him.

That didn't make them easy to take down, though. Having backup went a long way, and Giovanni was good at his job. We rendered one guardian unconscious pretty quickly, Giovanni using a choke hold to briefly cut off the guy's air until he collapsed. The other guard kept his distance from us, and I noticed his eyes continually shifting toward one of the walls. It had a fire extinguisher, a light switch, and a round silver button.

"That's an alarm!" exclaimed Victor, just as the guardian lunged for it.

Giovanni and I tackled him at the same time, stopping the guy just before his hand could brush the button and send a legion of guards down on us. A blow to the head knocked this guardian out too. With each person I took out in this prison break, a knot of guilt and nausea twisted tighter and tighter in my stomach. Guardians were the good guys, and I couldn't help but keep thinking I was fighting on the side of evil.

Now that we were left to ourselves, Lissa knew the next step. "Giovanni, disable all the cameras and erase the last hour's worth of footage."

There was a greater hesitation on his part this time. Getting him to fight his friends had required a lot of forceful compulsion on her part. She was keeping her control but growing weary, and it was only going to get harder making him obey our commands.