Liv disappeared into his home. He had no idea what she was planning to do and it made him uneasy that she moved through the hallway unerringly, as if she had a purpose now. She didn’t pause at Lourdes’s or Genevieve’s door, but continued on to the large kitchen.

Liv, wake up, honey. You’re sleepwalking. He was gentle, not wanting to startle her, but kitchen meant knives. If necessary he could muster up the strength to remove a weapon from her hand from the distance where he was, but it wouldn’t be easy.

She stumbled, but kept walking, right past the block of knives sitting on the counter, straight to the door of the basement. Now he was really uneasy. What could she possibly be up to? More importantly, what was Vadim up to?

Liv. He poured more strength into his command. Wake up now.

The sun was at its highest peak. He was at his weakest. He’d designed his security system to prevent intruders from harming the occupants of the compound. The safety nets he had for the children were mainly outside the houses.

Donald, she’s in my house, coming down to the basement. Be prepared for a battle and protect yourself if necessary. Have Mary use her voice to counteract Vadim, but you have to wake her up fully and then keep her awake.

Like Charlotte, he detested that he was helpless, lying in the healing earth while his child was in trouble and he couldn’t get to her. Already, he thought of Liv and the others as his children. His family. He needed to be the one to go to her and hold her safe in his arms when she was threatened.

He still didn’t understand how Vadim could get to the child in spite of the powerful safeguards woven around the compound. It should have been impossible for the vampire to get so completely to the child, so how… A memory came to him. In passing, Maksim had mentioned to him that Blaze and Emeline were very, very close and Emeline saw things in her dreams. She had dreamt of the tunnels running beneath the city and the vampires and monsters occupying that labyrinth. She’d shared the dreams with Blaze – literally.

Blaze didn’t have that gift – Emeline did – yet night after night, Blaze dreamt the same dream, running the tunnels to save the children, over and over until the two women had perfected their abilities in their dreams. Emeline had projected her dreams into Blaze without realizing she was doing so. She was close to Liv. Very close. Liv went to see her every evening. They already knew that Emeline had projected her dreams of Vadim to Liv, but she was awake on her porch. Was it possible that once Vadim had that path to Liv, he didn’t need Emeline to keep it and now he had complete access to the child?

On the monitors he saw Donald and Mary stepping out of their little yard and heading across the compound toward the house, hand in hand as usual. He pushed a sense of urgency into them, wanting them to hurry. He had a bad feeling.

Liv went down the wide, wooden steps and turned away from where Charlotte and Tariq rested toward the large workroom where the unassembled carousel horses were along with all the tools and paints. She went right to the bundles that contained the horses and chariots that Vadim had placed his blood in.

Liv! Wake up! Get out of there. Don’t touch those horses. He gave the order, pushing command and compulsion into the child’s mind.

Still, it was too late. He knew it the moment he saw her enter the workroom. She rushed across the room straight to the cursed horses and chariots. Even as he gave her the commands she was already bending over the nearest horse, the one Charlotte had touched most recently, the one where Vadim’s blood had spewed a curse over every man, woman and child who had sat on it.

Liv gripped the horse’s neck and swung up into its saddle, her legs clutching the horse’s sides. The moment she was in the saddle, the thing rose into the air, coming alive, bucking and snorting, whirling around over the other horses and the chariots. Instantly, the horses sprang to life, the chariots exploding into action.

Donald, get Mary back to the house! Tell Emeline to get under cover and stay there. Tariq had his eyes on the monitor, knowing Fridrick, Vadim’s general, had an army waiting outside the gates. He felt them now, a powerful force.

He pushed the red button on the console with his fingertip and instantly a voice came back to him. “Is this a drill?”

“It is not.” It took a tremendous effort to use his voice, but he’d practiced for this day. He knew exactly what to do. The small army of human men, men already trained to fight in wars, men he’d trained himself to fight vampires and puppets, as well as other monsters, were on alert and now they’d been activated. Response time was under six minutes.

A series of explosions rocked the gate and walls of the compound, but the safeguards held. Overhead a rocket tried to penetrate from above, but it bounced away and exploded harmlessly. Liv’s horse spun around and around, like a madly whirling carousel out of control, the other horses following suit. The chariots joined them. Liv led them through the house, still whirling so that the child had to clutch the horse’s neck to stay on its back.

Liv screamed. She clearly had come awake now, but was unable to get off the horse. She tried, struggling wildly, terror on her face. Beside him, Charlotte stirred, her eyes opening, horror already spreading through her.

Liv. Her voice was surprisingly calm. She used the pathway through Tariq’s mind to get to the child. Hold on and try to relax. Just hold on. It’s moving too fast to try to jump off, honey.

The calm in Charlotte’s voice penetrated and Liv stopped screaming and bent over the neck of the horse, her arms and knees tight around the wood as the horse burst out of the house and into the open.

Tariq began to press the green buttons on the panel at his fingertip. There was a bank of them. One was for Danny’s bedroom. Others were for Emeline’s room, Amelia’s, Bella’s, Lourdes’s, Genevieve’s and the Waltons’.

Get in your bedroom, Emeline. It was one of the few times he’d ever used the Carpathian path to Emeline. Blaze and Maksim had ensured she had it so she could communicate with them all, but she despised anyone in her mind, so out of respect, they avoided talking to her telepathically. Emeline turned and ran back inside. He could only hope that she did as instructed.

Donald, get Mary into the bedroom. He could see the older couple running for their house. They’d been told what to expect if the compound came under attack. This was the only way he had of protecting them against humans as well as the monstrous puppets Fridrick, as general of Vadim’s army, would send against them.