p. 1

[close]

p. 2

hunted house of night 05 by pc and kristin cast

[close]

p. 3

also by p c cast and kristin cast marked betrayed chosen untamed this is a work of fiction all of the characters organizations and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the authors imaginations or are used fictitiously hunted copyright c 2009 by p c cast and kristin cast all rights reserved printed in the united states of america for information address st martin s press 175 fifth avenue new york n.y 10010 www.stmartins.com isbn-13 978-0-312-37982-7 isbn-10 0-312-37982-x

[close]

p. 4

this one is for john maslin-ex-student research aide and brainstormer extraordinaire an all-around great guy who bears a striking resemblance to our damien hmmm

[close]

p. 5

acknowledgments the house of night is a team effort and not just because kristin and i are the dynamic duo the series is supported by an amazing group of people at st martin s press their creativity is only exceeded by their generosity please know how much kristin and i appreciate all of you jennifer weis anne bensson matthew shear anne marie tallberg brittany kleinfelter katy hershberger and our wonderful cover design team michael storrings and elsie lyons we heart smp as always we are indebted to our agent and friend meredith bernstein we would like to thank the manyab>marked in their english classes and who made our visit to their very cool school a great time and while we are mentioning cool schools we have to thank a group of longtime fans-the teachers from the jenks oklahoma school system we heart us some jenks teachers see y all at the next signing

[close]

p. 6

hunted

[close]

p. 7

chapter one the dream began with the sound of wings in retrospect i realize i should have known that was a bad sign what with the raven mockers being set loose and all but in my dream it was just background noise kinda like a fan whirring or the tv turned on to the qvc in my dream i was standing in the middle of a beautiful meadow it was night but there was an enormous full moon hovering just above the trees that framed the meadow it cast a silver blue light strong enough to throw shadows and made everything look like it was underwater an impression that was strengthened by the gentle breeze blowing the soft grasses against my bare legs in sweeps and whirls like waves lapping sweetly against a shore that same wind was lifting my thick dark hair from my naked shoulders and it felt like silk floating against my skin bare legs naked shoulders i looked down and let out a little yip of surprise i was wearing a seriously short buckskin minidress the top of it was cut in a wide v front and back so that it hung off my shoulders leaving lots of skin visible the dress itself was amazing it was white and decorated with fringe feathers and shells and seemed to glow in the moonlight all over it was beaded with intricate designs that were impossibly beautiful my imagination is so darn cool the dress tickled a memory but i ignored it i didn t want to think too hard-i was dreaming instead of pondering déjà vu moments i danced gracefully through the meadow wondering if zac efron or even johnny depp was going to suddenly appear and flirt outrageously with me i peeked around as i twirled and swayed with the wind and thought i saw the shadows flicker and move oddly within the massive trees i stopped and was trying to squint so i could get a closer look at what was going on in the darkness knowing me and my weird dreams i d created bottles of brown pop hanging from the limbs like bizarre fruit just waiting for me to pick them that s when he appeared at the edge of the meadow just inside the shadows of the trees a shape materialized i could see his body because the moonlight caught the smooth naked lines of his skin naked i stopped had my imagination lost its mind i wasn t really up to frolicking around a meadow with a naked guy even if he was the amazingly mysterious mr johnny depp you hesitate my love q twidat the sound of his voice a shiver passed through my body and terrible mocking laughter whispered through the leaves of the trees who are you i was glad that my dream voice didn t betray the fear i was feeling his laughter was as deep and beautiful as his voice and as frightening it echoed in the limbs of the watching trees until it drifted almost visible in the air around me.

[close]

p. 8

do you pretend you do not know me his voice brushed against my body making the little hairs on my arms stand up yeah i know you i made you up this is my dream you re a mixture of zac and johnny i hesitated peering at him i spoke nonchalantly even though my heart was beating like crazy because it was already obvious this guy was not a mixture of those two actors well maybe you re superman or prince charming i said reaching for anything but the truth i am no figment of your imagination you know me your soul knows me i hadn t moved my feet but my body was slowly being drawn toward him like his voice was pulling me i reached him and looked up and up it was kalona i d known him from the first words he d spoken i just hadn t wanted to admit it to myself how could i have dreamed him nightmare-this had to be a nightmare and not a dream his body was naked but it wasn t completely substantial his form wavered and shifted in time with the caressing breeze behind him in the dark green shadows of the trees i could see the ghostly shapes of his children the raven mockers as they clung to the limbs with the hands and feet of men and stared at me with men s eyes from the mutated faces of birds do you still claim not to know me his eyes were dark-a starless sky they seemed the most substantial thing about him that and his liquid voice even though this is a nightmare it s still mine i can just wake up i want to wake up i want to wake up but i didn t i couldn t i wasn t in control kalona was he d built this dream this dark nightmare meadow and somehow brought me there closing the door to reality behind us what do you want i said the words quickly so he couldn t hear my voice shaking you know what i want my love i want you i am not your love of course you are he moved this time stepping so close to me that i could feel the chill that came from his unsubstantial body my a-ya a-ya had been the name of the maiden the cherokee wise women had created to trap him centuries ago panic spiked through me i m not a-ya you command the elements his voice was a caress awful and wonderful compelling and terrifying gifts from my goddess i said once before you commanded the elements you were made from them fashioned to love me his massive dark wings stirred and lifted beating forward softly they enfolded me in a spectral embrace that was cold as frost no you must have me mixed up with someone else i m not a-ya you re wrong my love i feel her within you

[close]

p. 9

his wings pressed against my body drawing me closer to him even though his physical form was only semi-substantial i could feel him his wings were soft winter cold against the warmth of my dreaming self the outline of his body was frigid mist it burned my skin sending electric currents through me heating me with a desire i didn t want to feel but was powerless to resist his laugh was seductive i wanted to drown in it i leaned forward closing my eyes and gasping aloud as the chill of his spirit brushed against my breasts sending shooting sensations that were painful but deliciously erotic to places in my body that made me feel out of control you like the pain it brings you plea sure his wings got more insistent his body harder and colder and more passionately painful as it pressed against mine surrender to me his voice already beautiful was unimaginably seductive as he became aroused i spent centuries in your arms this time our joining will be controlled by me and you will revel in the plea sure i can bring you throw off the shackles of your distant goddess and come to me be my love truly in body as well as soul and i will give you the world the meaning of his words penetrated through the haze of pain and plea sure like sunlight burning away dew i found my will again and stumbled out of the embrace of his wings tendrils of icy black smoke snaked around my body clinging touching caressing i shook myself like a pissed cat shaking off rain and the dark wisps slid from my body no i m not your love i m not a-ya and i ll never turn my back on nyx when i spoke nyx s name the nightmare shattered i sat straight up in bed shaking and gasping stevie rae was sleeping soundly beside me but nala was wide awake she was growling softly her back was arched her body was totally puffed up and she was staring slit-eyed at the air above me ah hell i shrieked and bounded off the bed spinning around and looking up expecting to see kalona hovering like a giant bat-bird over us nothing there was nothing there i grabbed nala and sat on the bed with trembling hands i petted her over and over it was just a bad dream it was just a bad dream it was just a bad dream i told her but i knew it was a lie kalona was real and somehow he was able to reach me through my dreams.

[close]

p. 10

chapter two okay so kalona can get i g zizento your dreams but you re awake now so pull yourself together i told myself sternly as i petted nala and let my cat s familiar purr soothe me stevie rae stirred in her sleep and murmured something i couldn t hear then still sleeping she smiled and sighed i looked down at her glad that she was having better luck with her dreams gently i pulled back the blanket she d curled up under and breathed a sigh of relief when i saw no blood seeping through the bandage that covered the terrible arrow wound that had pierced her she stirred again this time stevie rae s eyes fluttered and opened she looked confused for a second then she smiled sleepily up at me how are you feeling i asked i m okay she said groggily don t worry so much it s a little hard not to worry when my best friend keeps dying i said smiling back at her i didn t die this time i just almost died my nerves are telling me to tell you there s not a big difference in that almost to them tell your nerves to be quiet and go to sleep stevie rae said closing her eyes and pulling the blanket back up over her i m okay she repeated we re all going to be okay then her breathing deepened and i swear in less time than it took for me to blink she was asleep i stifled my big sigh and scooted back on the bed trying to get comfortable nala curled up between stevie rae and me and gave me a disgruntled mee-uf-ow that i knew meant she wanted me to relax and go to sleep sleep and possibly dream again uh no not likely instead i kept an eye on stevie rae s breathing and petted nala absently it was so darn weird how normal everything seemed here in the little bubble of peace we d made looking at sleeping stevie rae i found it almost impossible to believe that just a few hours ago she d had an arrow sticking through her chest and we had had to escape from the house of night as chaos tore our world apart unwilling to allow myself to sleep my exhausted thoughts circled back replaying the events of the night and as i sifted through them i was amazed anew that any of us had survived i remembered that stevie rae had unbelievably asked me to get a pencil and some paper cause she thought it would be a good time to make a list of stuff that we needed to get down in the tunnels so that we d have the right supplies and whatnot if we had to stay hidden for a while she d asked me that in a totally calm voice while she was sitting in front of me with an arrow stuck through her chest i remember looking at her getting really sick to my stomach and then looking away and saying stevie rae i m not so sure this is a good time to be making lists

[close]

p. 11

ouch dang that hurts worse than gettin one of those goat-head thistles stuck in your foot stevie rae had sucked air and flinched but still managed to smile over her shoulder at darius who had ripped open the back of her shirt to expose the arrow that was sticking out of the middld i kep me of her back sorry i didn t mean it s your fault that it hurts what d you say your name was again i am darius priestess he s a son of erebus warrior aphrodite had added giving him a surprisingly sweet smile i describe it as surprisingly sweet because aphrodite is usually selfish spoiled hateful and kinda hard to tolerate in general even though i m starting to like her in other words she s definitely not sweet but it was becoming clearer and clearer that she really had a thing for darius hence the unusual sweetness please his warrior-ness is obvious he s built like a mountain shaunee had said giving darius an appreciative leer a totally hot mountain erin echoed and made kiss noises at darius he s taken twin freaks so go play with each other aphrodite automatically snapped at them but it had seemed to me that she didn t have her heart in the insult actually now that i was thinking about it again she d sounded almost nice oh by the way erin and shaunee are soul twins not biological twins being as erin is a blondhaired blue-eyed oklahoma girl and shaunee is a caramel-colored easterner of jamaican descent but genetics didn t mattered with them-they might as well have been separated at birth and then rejoined by twin radar oh yeah thanks for reminding us that our boyfriends aren t here shaunee said cause they re probably being eaten by man-bird freaks erin said hey cheer up zoey s grandma didn t say the raven mockers actually ate people she said they just picked them up with their humongous beaks and threw them against a wall or what ever over and over again until every bone in their body was broken aphrodite told the twins with a lighthearted grin uh aphrodite i don t think you re helping i said though she was right actually as scary as it sounded she and the twins both might have been right i hadn t wanted to think about that too long so i d turned my attention back to my injured best friend she d looked absolutely horriblepale sweaty and covered with blood stevie rae don t you think we should get you to a i got it i got it just then jack had burst into the little side-tunnel area that had been made into stevie rae s room followed closely by the yellow lab that rarely let the kid out of her sight he was flushed and brandishing a white briefcase-looking thing that had a big red cross on it it was right where you said it d be stevie rae in that kinda kitchen tunnel place and as soon as i get my breath i ll tell you how pleasantly surprised i was when i discovered the working refrigerators and microwaves damien said following jack into the room breathing heavily and dramatically holding on to his side you ll have to explain to me how you managed to get all of that down here including the electricity to run it damien paused caught sight of stevie rae s bloody ripped shirt and the arrow that still protruded from her back and his pink cheeks blanched white you ll have to explain after you re fixed up and not en brochette anymore en-huh shaunee said bro-what erin said.

[close]

p. 12

it s french for something being skewered usually food cretins the world going insane and evil letting slip the birds of war he raised his brows at the twins as he deliberately misquoted shakespeare obviously expecting them to recognize it which they just as obviously didn t does not excuse sloppy vocabulary then he turned back to darius oh i did find these in a not-sosanitary pile of tools and lifted what looked like giant scissors bring the wire cutters and the first aid kit here darius said in an all-business voice what are you going to do with the wire cutters jack asked i m going to cut the quill end of the arrow off so that i can pull it the rest of the way through the priestess s body then she can begin to heal darius said simply jack gasped and fell back against damien who put an arm around him duchess the yellow lab who had become completely attached to jack since her original own er a fledgling kid named james stark had died and then un-died and shot an arrow through stevie rae as part of an evil plot to let loose kalona a nasty fallen angel yes looking back on it i see that it s complex and even kinda confusing but that seems to be typical for evil plots whined and leaned against his leg oh jack and damien are a couple which means they re gay teenagers hello it happens more often than you d expect wait scratch that it happens more often than parents expect damien maybe you and jack could uh go back to that kitchen you found and see if you can whip up something for us to eat i said trying to think up things for them to do that didn t include staring at stevie rae i ll bet we d all feel better if we ate something i d probably puke stevie rae said that is unless it s blood she tried to shrug apologetically but broke off the movement with a gasp and turned even whiter than her already totally pale complexion yeah not really hungry over here either shaunee said gawking at the arrow that was poking out of stevie rae s back with the same kind of fascination that made people rubberneck at car wrecks ditto twin erin said she was looking everywhere but at stevie rae i was just opening my mouth to tell them i really didn t care if they were hungry or not i just wanted to keep them busy and away from stevie rae for a while when erik night hurried into the room got it he said he was holding a really old combo cd-cassette-radio that was humongous it was one of those things they used to call boom boxes way back in the day like the 1980s without looking at stevie rae he set it on the table that was close to her and darius and started fiddling with the ginormic glaringly silver knobs muttering that he hoped it could pick up something down here where s venus rdqu c ke if they o stevie rae asked erik it obviously hurt for her to talk and her voice had gone all shaky erik had glanced back toward the round blanket-draped entrance to the room that served as a door which was empty she was right behind me i thought she d come in here and then he did look at stevie rae and his words fell away ah man that must really hurt he said softly you look bad stevie rae she tried and failed to smile at him well i ve felt better i m glad venus helped you out with the boom box sometimes we can actually get some of the radio stations down here

[close]

p. 13

yeah that s what venus said erik said vaguely he was staring at the arrow sticking out of stevie rae s bare back even through my worry about stevie rae i d started to wonder about the absent venus and tried like hell to remember what she looked like last time i d gotten a really good look at the red fledglings they hadn t been red yet which means the outline of a crescent moon in the middle of their foreheads had still been sapphire-colored like all fledglings tattoos are when they re first marked but these fledglings died then un-died and they had all been bloodsucking crazed monsters until stevie rae went through a type of change somehow aphrodite s humanity who knew she had any mixed with the power of the five elements-all of which i can control-and voilà stevie rae got her humanity back along with some gorgeous adult vampyre tattoos that look like vines and flowers framing her face but instead of the tattoo being dark blue it had turned red as in the color of fresh blood when that happened to stevie rae all the undead-dead kids fledgling tattoos had turned red too and they got their humanity back in theory i really hadn t been around them or stevie rae enough since her change to know for sure that everything was one hundred percent with all of them oh and aphrodite lost her mark-totally so she s supposedly human again even though she still has visions all of this explains why the last time i d spent any time with venus she was more than kinda disgusting looking since she was very nastily undead but now she d been fixed-or at least sort ofand i knew that she d hung with aphrodite before she died and un-died which means she had to have been totally gorgeous because aphrodite didn t believe in ugly friends okay before i sound like an über-jealous freak let me explain erik night is to-die-for hot in a superman-clark kent kind of way and to carry through with the superhero analogy he s also talented and honestly a good guy er vampyre recently changed vampyre at that he is also my boyfriend er ex-boyfriend recently ex-boyfriend at that sadly that means i m going to be ridiculously jealous of anyone even one of the kinda freaky red fledglings who might be catching too much of his interest too much any darius s businesslike voice had thankfully interrupted my inner babbling the radio can wait right now stevie rae must be attended to she will need a clean shirt and blood as soon as i get through with this darius spoke as he put the first aid kit on stevie rae s bedside table opened it and busily pulled out gauze and alcohol and some scary stuff that had definitely shut everybody up &ldquo w too and you know i love y all like white bread don t you stevie rae said giving us a brave smile my friends and i had nodded woodenly okay so you won t take it the wrong way if i say that all of y all but zoey need to go find somethin to keep yourselves busy while darius yanks this arrow outta my chest all of them except me no no no no no why do you want me to stay i saw humor in stevie rae s pain-filled eyes cause you re our high priestess z you gotta stay and help darius plus you ve already seen me die once how much worse could this be than that then she paused and her eyes widened as she stared at the palms of my still dorkishly raised hands and blurted holy crap z look at your hands i turned my hands over so i could see what the hell she was staring at and felt my own eyes widen tattoos spread across my palms the same beautiful intricate pattern of latticework swirls that decorated my face and neck and stretched down either side of my spine and around my waist how could i have forgotten i d felt the familiar burning flash across my palms as we all escaped into the safety of the tunnels i d realized then what that burning meant my goddess nyx the personification of night had marked me again as exclusively hers had set me apart again from all the other fledglings and vampyres in the world no other fledgling had a filled-in expanded mark that only happened after a kid went through the change and then the outline of the

[close]

p. 14

crescent moon on the forehead was filled in and expanded to a unique one-of-a-kind tattoo that framed the face proclaiming to the world that he or she was a vampyre so my face proclaimed that i was a vampyre but my body said i was still a fledgling and the rest of my tattoos well that was something that had never happened before-not to a fledgling and not to a vamp and even now i wasn t one hundred percent sure what it meant wow z they re amazing damien s voice came from beside me hesitantly he touched my palm i looked up from my hands to his friendly brown eyes searching them for any trace of a change in the way he saw me i looked for signs of hero worship or nervous ness or even worse fear and what i had seen was just damien-my friend-and the warmth of his smile i felt it happening before when we first got down here i-i guess i just forgot i said that s our z jack said only she could forget something that s practically a miracle more than practically shaunee said but it s a zoey miracle they happen pretty much all the time erin said matter-of-factly i can t keep a tattoo and she s covered in them aphrodite said figures but her smile took the bite from her words they are the mark of our goddess s favor showing that you are indeed traveling the path she would choose for you you are our high priestess darius spoke solemnly the one nyx has chosen and priestess i need your aid with stevie rae ah hell i muttered chewing my lip nervously and balling my hands into fists hiding myd c exotic new tattoos oh for crap s sake i ll stay and help aphrodite marched over to where stevie rae was sitting on the edge of her bed blood and pain don t bother me at all as long as they re not mine i should take this closer to the entrance to the tunnels i d probably have more luck getting reception there erik said and without so much as a glance at me or a word about my new tattoos he disappeared through the blanket door you know i think food really was a good idea damien said taking jack s hand and starting to follow erik out of the room yeah damien and i are gay that means that we are guaranteed to be good cooks jack said we re with them shaunee said yeah we re not as convinced about the genetics of gay good cooking we d better supervise erin said the blood don t forget the blood laced with wine if you have it she ll need it to recover darius said one of the refrigerators is full of blood then find venus steve rae said grimacing again as darius took an alcohol wipe and began to clean the dried blood on her back from the skin around the protruding arrow she likes wine tell her what you need and she ll get it for you the twins hesitated passing a look between each other erin spoke for both of them stevie rae are the red kids really okay i mean these are the kids who killed the union football players and grabbed z s human boyfriend aren t they

[close]

p. 15

ex-boyfriend i said but they ignored me venus just helped erik stevie rae said and aphrodite stayed here for two days she s still in one piece stevie rae said yeah but erik is a big healthy male vamp he d be hard to bite shaunee said even though he is definitely yummy erin said true twin both of them had given me apologetic shrugs before shaunee continued and aphrodite is so damn nasty that no one would want to bite her but we re little bits of vanilla and chocolate we d tempt even the nicest bloodsucking monster erin said your mom s a bloodsucking monster aphrodite said smiling sweetly if y all don t stop bickering i m gonna bite you stevie rae yelled then winced again and made little panting sounds as she tried to breathe through the pain guys you re making her hurt herself and you re giving me a headache i said it quickly getting more and more worried about how bad stevie rae looked by the second stevie rae says the red fledglings are okay we just escaped from all hell breaking loose at the house of night with them and they didn t try to eat any of us on the way here so make nice and go find venus like stevie rae said &ld h shquo;z that s not a big mark in their favor damien said we were running for our lives no one had time to eat anyone stevie rae once and for all-are the red fledglings safe i asked i really wish y all would concentrate on being nicer and accepting them you know it s not their fault they died and then un-died see they re fine i said it was only later that i would remember that stevie rae never really answered my question about whether the red fledglings were really safe all right but we re holding stevie rae responsible shaunee said yeah if one of them tries to chomp on us we re going to have words with her about it after she s better erin said blood and wine now less talking more doing darius said bluntly they all scurried out of the room leaving me with darius aphrodite and my best friend currently en brochette hell.

[close]