"You can't make us do that!" Kurtis said from behind Nicole.

"I can," Stevie Rae lifted her hands, squeezing them into glowing fists. "And it won't be just me. Lenobia is tellin' the High Council 'bout y'all. You'll be officially banished from every House of Night in the world."

"Hey, Nicole, like Venus said before, you be lookin' kinda rough. How you feelin'?" Kramisha suddenly said. Then she raised her voice, talking to the kids over Nicole's shoulder. "How many a you been coughin' and feelin' like crap? Ain't no vampyre been 'round y'all for a while now, right?"

"Ohmygood ness, I don't know how I could've forgotten 'bout that," Stevie Rae said to Kramisha, then she turned her attention back to the kids in the kitchen, speaking right past Nicole. "So, how many of you wanna die? Again."

"Looks like bein' a red fledgling is really just another kind of fledgling," Dallas said.

"Yeah, you might die if you're around vamps," Johnny B said.

"But you for sure will die if you not around them," Kramisha said, with more than a hint of smugness in her tone. "But you know 'bout that 'cause y'all already died once. Wanna do it again?"

"So y'all need to choose," Stevie Rae said, still holding up her glowing fists.

"We sure as hell ain't choosing you for our High Priestess!" Nicole spat the words at her. "And neither would any of you if you knew the truth about her." With a Cheshire cat smile, she spoke the words Stevie Rae had feared most anyone hearing. "I'll bet she didn't tell you she saved a Raven Mocker, did she?"

"You're a liar," Stevie Rae said, meeting Nicole's red gaze steadily.

"How did you know there's a Raven Mocker in Tulsa?" Dallas said.

Nicole snorted. "He was here. Your precious High Priestess's scent was all over him because she saved his life . He's how we trapped her on the roof. She went up there to save him again ."

"That's bullshit!" Dallas shouted. He pressed his palm against the cement wall. Stevie Rae felt her hair lift in a sudden rush of static electricity.

"Wow, you really have them fooled." Nicole said mockingly.

"That's it. I'm done with this," Stevie Rae said. "Make your choice. Now. Light or Darkness, which will it be?"

"We already made our choice." Nicole's hand went up under her baggy shirt and came out with a snub-nosed gun, which she aimed at the middle of Stevie Rae's head.

Stevie Rae felt one instant of terror, and then she heard cocking sounds and her stunned gaze went from Nicole's gun to the two Kurtis and Starr had raised and pointed at Dallas and Kramisha.

That pissed off Stevie Rae, and everything kicked into fast-forward.

"Protect them, earth!" Stevie Rae cried. Spreading wide her arms and releasing her fists, she imagined the power of earth, chrysalis-like, enclosing them. The air around her glowed a soft, mossy green. And as the barrier manifested, Stevie Rae saw the oily Darkness that was clinging to the ceiling shiver and then dissipate completely.

Dallas yelled, "Ah, hells no. You're not pointing that thing at me!" Closing his eyes and concentrating, Dallas pressed both of his hands against the side of the tunnel wall. There was a crackling sound. Kurtis yelped and dropped his gun. At the same instant, Nicole screamed - a raw, primal sound that was more like the roar of an enraged animal than something that should have come from a fledgling, and she squeezed the trigger.

The gunshots were deafeningly loud. The sound echoed painfully over and over until Stevie Rae lost count of how many real shots there were and how many were just an avalanche of sound, smoke, and sensation.

Stevie Rae didn't hear the screams of the rogue fledglings as the bullets ricocheted off the earth barrier and slammed into their bodies, but she saw Starr fall and watched the terrible blossom of red that bloomed from the side of her head. Two other red-eyed kids slumped to the ground, too.

Pandemonium broke loose, and the unwounded fledglings in the kitchen pushed and shoved and climbed over each other as they fought to get to the narrow entrance that led up to the main depot building above.

Nicole hadn't moved. She was holding the empty gun, looking wild-eyed and still pulling the trigger when Stevie Rae yelled, "No! You've done enough!" Acting on an instinct totally allied to the earth, Stevie Rae clapped her glowing hands together in front of her. With a tearing sound, a raw, gaping hole opened in the far end of the kitchen, where before there had only been the curving side of the tunnel.