Alexandra prowled along the dark streets, in a distinctly bad mood. In deference to the cool April breeze, she was wearing a leather jacket over her favourite catsuit, but she had every intention of killing tonight.

She was used to Christian's always-growing staff of domestic spirits and minor elementals; they were beneath her notice, since she knew they were friendly and they treated her with respect, and she was willing to admit that they were useful.

The necessity of tolerating a very powerful naga, not just out in her territory where she could have ignored him, but right in her own home, was annoying, to say the least. For Christian's sake, she’d been enduring it and forcing down the instinct to lash out with violence at every small thing that irritated her. Most of the time, she tried to stay Mark around the house, though there were moments and conversational subjects that just felt more right as Alexandra. Her gratitude to Vadin for his part in her current life did help, and as near as she could tell, he wasn’t unsympathetic, since he spent much of his time in the library where she didn’t have to interact with him all the time. It was stressful, but it was at a level she could bear, especially by going out every night to work off some of it.

Finding the marks of another lamia on university students for the past three nights, another lamia flagrantly disregarding Alexandra's territorial markings, was simply infuriating. No playing this time. No warnings, like she'd given the butterfly lamia. This one had been here for days and couldn't help but know Alexandra had claimed this city. This one was going to die as soon as Alexandra laid eyes on her.

So far the interloper had targeted students, so she headed for the cluster of bars that were most popular with them. Not that they should be out drinking with exams approaching quickly, but since when did that stop them?

In the third, she spotted a tall, broad-shouldered woman, red-blonde hair drawn back in a tail, dancing in the centre of a cluster of fascinated men. Skin-hugging acid-washed jeans, strategically ripped, and a tight sky-blue tank-top showed off a lot of muscle.

Alexandra stalked through the bar, men getting hastily out of her way, and even some of the women shrinking away from her nervously.

The dancers nearest her looked back and forth between Alexandra and the interloper in confusion, signals from both lamias at war with each other.

“You,” Alexandra said curtly. “I want to talk to you.”

“Later,” the blonde amazon said lazily. “I'm busy.”

“Now,” Alexandra snarled. She glared at the nearest dancers. “Get lost.”

Dazed, bewildered, they obeyed, but only with many a glance back at them.

The amazon's expression clouded. “You bitch! How dare you interrupt while I'm hunting?”

“Outside.”

“Fine! Now's as good a time as any to kill you.” The blonde lamia strode towards the back door.

Alexandra followed, fingers flexing and curling into claws; despite all efforts to keep her wings folded out of sight, she suspected that someone alert looking the right direction might have had a glimpse or two.

Behind the bar was an alleyway with garbage bins, empty bottles, and someone's rather battered pick-up truck, all illuminated by a bare light bulb in a metal cage.

Alexandra ducked as she cleared the doorway, and the amazon's swing at her missed by inches. Rather than simply straightening, she launched herself straight at the amazon's throat, nails hooked to tear.

The amazon stepped back, out of the arc of the swing, and circled, eyeing Alexandra warily.

“You're in my territory,” Alexandra growled, pacing closer, keeping a close eye on her opponent's copper-nailed hands. “Did you honestly think that you'd be able to get away with just moving in and ignoring that?”

The amazon shrugged, moving so the truck was between them. “Why should I be afraid of a witch's tame pet?”

“Then why are you trying to stay out of my reach?” Alexandra planted one hand on the tailgate of the truck, and shoved hard. It collided with the wall at the end of the alley with enough force that she heard glass break, but at least it was somewhat out of her way. “How much of a coward does that make you?” Only a few feet separated them, every step she took, poised and ready, brought her closer to being able to rip this infuriating interloper's throat out.

The amazon's grin showed all her teeth. “Oh, I'm not a coward.”

Pain flared up Alexandra's leg, and it buckled under her; as she fell, new pain exploding from her ankle, she saw a slight figure in cut-off jeans and a denim vest roll to her feet and bolt for cover in the shadows beside the truck. The aura of another lamia was unmistakable.

Alexandra caught herself with both hands on the ground, feeling a new pain, and twisted to assess the damage. No blood, it was only a kick to the side of her knee, and she didn't think her ankle was actually sprained; she should have at least partial mobility back shortly.

Two lamias? Working together?

She flung up one arm to block a swing, but the close-fisted blow from the amazon's free hand caught her just above her ear. She doubted she could get to her feet, between the dazzling display of starbursts and the damage to her leg; blindly, she rolled onto one hip and kicked as hard as she could for the centre of the lamia aura looming so close to her.

She connected squarely, heard a gasp, and the aura fell back a couple of steps. Alexandra used the opening to stagger to her feet. She couldn't put much weight on her bad leg, but at least she had both hands free.

The amazon darted forward, lamia-fast for all her mass. Both hands lashed out towards Alexandra's abdomen, curled into metallic-copper claws; Alexandra took a limping step backwards, cursing silently at the pain in her ankle and knee. There had to be a way to win this! She was not going to lose to some upstart who thought Alexandra's witch had made her weak! She wasn't going to leave her friends unprotected, alone in a city with this intruder!

The slash missed, but the amazon followed it with a vicious backhanded swing at Alexandra's head, her hand closed into a fist. Alexandra flung both arms up to block it, but the sheer power of it knocked her weight onto her bad leg, and she went down again, this time on her bottom, right on top of an empty bottle. Glass smashed; she felt pinprick jabs into her skin.

The amazon grinned again and closed in, copper nails glinting in the harsh light.

Think! Think like Chris, use whatever you can!

Alexandra slid a hand along the ground next to her hip, and flung a handful of gravel, dirt, glass fragments, and whatever other refuse covered the ground, directly into the amazon's face.

The blonde cried out, hands rising instantly to protect her eyes. Heedless of the glass, Alexandra pushed herself up onto her good knee, and drove her nails into the amazon's abdomen, just below her ribcage. With her other hand, she seized the amazon's arm, and pulled herself all the way up, wincing from the volume of the blonde's shriek of pain and disbelief. A flailing hand caught her across the upper arm, shredding the leather and biting into skin. One more swipe of her already-bloodied nails, right across the amazon's throat, silenced her, and she crumpled.

Alexandra staggered forward a step, scanning the alley for the only remaining lamia aura besides her own.

The other one broke cover and vaulted onto the cab of the truck, clearly intent on escape. She didn't have enough distance to make it; Alexandra lunged for her, seized an ankle and dragged her roughly down onto the hood of the truck. The other lamia struggled frantically, but already furious and hot with bloodrage, Alexandra pinned her.

This one had a distinctly Native look, coppery skin and black hair braided with beads, a snug dark T-shirt with an dreamcatcher design under the denim vest, slender and not tall enough to reach higher than Alexandra's shoulder. None of which was unusual for a lamia; that wasn't what registered past the overwhelming hunger for blood and kept her from killing the intruder on the spot. Each cheek bore three parallel scars from just below her temples down to her jaw. And there was something in those wide brown eyes that wasn't simply anger or bloodrage. She stopped fighting against Alexandra's grasp and simply went limp, eyes closing in resignation.

“Since when do two lamias work together?” Alexandra demanded. There was something else strange about this, but she couldn't quite place it yet. She battled the bloodrage, forcing it down inch by inch under her control, grimly.

The other lamia opened her eyes, expression full of sheer astonishment. “Why aren't you killing me?”

“I still might if you don't answer the question,” Alexandra snarled. “What were you doing travelling with another lamia?”

“Brianna protected me from the other lamias where we were. Her parent killed mine when I was very young. Brianna… kept me around.”

She should have died. What was the price on surviving? Alexandra started to ask the question, then understanding struck. The scores down her cheeks were territorial markings, much like those a lamia left on prominent or important buildings to claim them. She hooked a hand into the front of the young lamia's close-fitting T-shirt, and tore, half expecting what she saw, but no less appalled. Thin red cuts outlined a detailed, rather artistic pattern, against her skin. A closer look showed her the traces left from a lamia feeding, the same psychic fingerprints she'd seen on the university students.

I should kill her. She's in my city, she helped attack me.

I think she's already paid in blood and pain and fear for what she's done. I'm not sure she's even old enough to be out on her own yet.

“What's your name?”

“Tori.”

“Human population density is high around here, and the territory map of lamias and rival liminals is complicated, but you should be able to find one of the smaller communities that are satellites of this one and that’ll be enough to support you if you're smart and careful. Go northwards, not along the lake, and you’re more likely to find somewhere not occupied. Stay there, stay out of downtown, and I'll leave you alone.”

Tori blinked, eyes widening, as Alexandra backed up and let her slide off the hood. “You're letting me go? Why?”

“Because living with humans does weird things to your head,” Alexandra growled. “But it does not mean being weak. If you cross me again, I will kill you. Clear?”

Tori nodded. The tension was still there, but beginning to fade a little; confusion and hope were vying for dominance, overriding the fear. She gestured at Brianna's limp body. “Should… would you like me to get rid of Brianna? I jammed the back door on the way out, but it won't take long for people to show up.”

This one's smart, for all her size and her youth. I might be letting a future danger stay nearby.

The little part of her mind that hadn't been there before Christian whispered, Or a future ally.

“No, I'll take care of it. You get out of here.”

Tori nodded, and fled at a quick walk.

The pain in her leg was easing, but there was still no way Alexandra could get away unnoticed without jumping planes anyway. She leaned down carefully to get a good grip on Brianna's shirt and dragged her, with some effort, towards the mouth of the alleyway. The first humans to come into sight probably got a fleeting glimpse of her vanishing as she planeshifted, dragging Brianna’s dead weight with her. With no particular destination in mind, that took her to the chaos that existed between the various domains. She heaved Brianna's body into the unformed lands.

Next problem. She needed to get home, back to where she could heal. Planeshifting was not a particularly strong lamia ability, and she was definitely feeling too battered to do anything that tiring, but her other option was to stay here and that was absolutely not a good place to try to recover. The easiest way back was to the same point she'd left, but there would be people there for longer than she really cared to wait.

Stepping back through while covered in blood and the debris of the ground in the back alley of a bar was not going to let her avoid notice. Wearily, she rearranged her clothes and anything soiling them into a long coat that covered everything over a very minimal dress that covered next to nothing, since she had limited mass to work with, plus thin gloves that covered the blood that stained her right hand. She was sure she still looked rough, but in this part of town, that would only suggest too much to drink.

All right, how was she going to get home? She could call Eric, but he was with classmates and it had something to do with his upcoming exams, and she was reluctant to interrupt him. There was no point to calling Christian or Sara. Even Seth was out, taking advantage of the opportunity to get together with a couple of local non-witch friends he hadn’t seen since moving—one, she thought, might have been that farmer that helped Christian with straw for the feral cats and firewood for the den and manure for the flowerbeds. She was going to have to get home on her own, without involving her humans.

What would happen then, she wasn’t sure, but planning past that was too much to cope with. Right now, she just needed to get home without leaving a trail of human blood.

She took a deep breath, and switched back to the human plane, making her way around the corner and out of the alley as quickly as she could although she paid for it in pain, and her leg nearly gave way on her, leaving her leaning heavily against the wall as the world turned red. Every instinct wanted her to hunt, now, at any cost, to drive off the pain and weakness.

There was another bar across the street, and she saw a mature man outside it in clubwear just a little too young for him, talking on a cell phone not unlike hers.

She limped across the street as quickly as she could, and before he could go back inside, seized the front of his shirt with one hand. When she kissed him, he started for a heartbeat, then lamia fascination kicked in and he responded.

“Around the corner,” she said in his ear, letting her long coat fall open enough for him to see the little she still had on under it, and he swallowed hard and nodded.

In that alleyway, she pinned him against the wall and kissed him again. She didn’t dare feed much, not when she couldn’t get away from the area and humans in the immediate vicinity were already agitated, but it was enough to take the edge off for the moment, and when she told him to give her money, he handed over a pair of blue ten-dollar bills without hesitation.

“Thank you,” she told him. “Stop preying on the university students, you can probably do better.” Still limping, she left him leaning against the wall, and made her way back to the street.

Around the corner, she phoned a taxi, and about a million years later it arrived. She slumped in the back seat, not inclined to talk, for what felt like an excruciatingly long drive. She had the presence of mind to have him drop her off a block away from the house, but that meant a final painful walk to cover the last of the distance.

She stepped in the front door, through Christian’s house shields, and closed it behind her with a feeling of deep relief that was probably not at all warranted. She was home. She was also still injured, lame and concussed and with an open wound on her upper arm, though nothing was life-threatening and she was managing so far to cling to rationality, so now what? The long coat was annoying her, getting in her way, and she didn’t have the attention to spare for problem-solving, so she simply shoved everything she was wearing a couple of feet to the side. It dropped to the floor as Mark’s jeans and T-shirt and a liberal amount of alley debris and some of the blood. She inspected her now-exposed torn shoulder in irritation.

Sara emerged from the den, curiosity turning instantly to concern. “You're hurt!” She hastened to Alexandra's side, and slid under her arm to support her.

“Where's Chris?”

“He's out—someone thinks they have a ghost. I suppose you don't do doctors, but we need to...”

Alexandra interrupted her. “You need to go back in the den and close the door.”

“What? But...”

“I don't know how long I can stay in control! Call Chris, tell him I need him. And you stay out of reach!” She pulled away, and shoved Sara back, gritting her teeth. The dining room was close; she limped to the couch under the front windows and sank down there. The domovikha would grumble, but that could wait.

Chris was out. So was Eric. There were others out there, she could go hunting, although it would mean grabbing the first who came in reach with no finesse and risking an unplanned kill.

Sara followed and knelt in front of her. “Lexa...”

“I told you to go away!”

“No. I asked Chris for more info on lamias. I know what you need. Let me help.”

Affection for Sara warred with the hunger. “I might hurt you. I told you. Call Chris.”

“Chris is out in the west end. That's too far, you need help now, even I can see that. You don't need to wait, I'm here and perfectly willing. Have been for a long time.”

There was just no way to win this. The longer Sara stayed here talking, the greater the hunger grew, the greater the temptation to simply seize her and take.

Alexandra shivered, and lowered her head to kiss Sara. She wanted it to be gentle, but her control slipped, pure need finally reasserting itself over the protective emotions she'd learned; she growled, deep in her throat, and wrapped arms and wings around the girl tightly, her kiss fierce and urgent.

Sara didn't flinch away, no more than Christian ever had; she slipped her arms around Alexandra's shoulders, trying very obviously to avoid her torn arm, and whispered in her ear, “Did I ever mention, vampires turn me on? And you already know I like girls just as much as boys. I'm not scared of you, and I want you to be okay. Whatever you need that will help you, you can have it.”