The sound of breaking glass echoed through the estate, followed almost immediately by screams of the staff and the unmistakable sounds of combat. The snarls, furniture splintering, bodies slamming into floors and walls.
"Get to the safe room now, my lady," the lead security guard ordered, already moving toward the source of the breach.
"No," Lilian said, surprising herself with her certainty. Fear was there, but it didn't own them. She might not be centuries old like her mates, but she wasn't helpless either, a vampire nonetheless. "I can fight."
"Miss Carter, the princes gave explicit orders ~"
"They are not here," Lilian cut him off. "I am here. And I'm not going to hide while people gets hurt protecting me."
Mrs. Hemsworth appeared at her side, no longer looking like the kindly housekeeper, but a vampire hunter she was with a blade in each hand. "She's right. If they breached this far this fast, the safe room won't hold anyway. Better to fight."
Another crash echoed from the east wing. Then the west. They were attacking from each directions at once, overwhelming the estate's defenses.
"How many?" Lilian asked.
"At least thirty," the guard reported with a grim face as he checked his monitors. "I don't know. Maybe more."
Thirty rogues. Against maybe a dozen security guards and household staff. They were clearly outnumbered, and unlike the rogues, they had people who couldn't fight like the servants, the staff, the laundry maids, and the groundskeeper.
Lilian drew in a breath and made herself stand straighter.
"Get everyone to the central hall," Lilian ordered, her voice sounded authoritative. "Fighters form a perimeter. Those who can't fight in the middle. We hold them there until the princes return."
The security guard looked like he wanted to argue. Then his eyes flicked to Lilian's face, to the faint gold beginning to flare in her irises, made him snap into a nod. "Yes, my lady."
Within minutes, they had assembled in the grand entrance hall. Eight security guards, Mrs. Hemsworth, three housekeepers who apparently had combat training, and Lilian herself forming a defensive circle around six terrified staff members huddled in the center.
The chandeliers above trembled as the first rogues forced their way inside.
They came through every entrance at once.
They were feral, fitting the descriptions of the vampires should be. Red eyes burned with hunger and madness, snarling with dirty teeth, moving with that jerky aggression that marked vampires who had lost most of their humanity to the hunger.
"Hold the line!" Mrs. Hemsworth shouted.
The first rogue reached Lilian, and she reacted on pure instinct like she was taught. She dodged his lunge, grabbing his arm, and using his own momentum to throw him into the wall.
The impact would have killed a human, but the rogue just shook it off, snarled, and came at her again.
She fought bravely, but there were so many of them.
A rogue broke through the defensive line, heading for the non-combatants. Seeing that, Lilian turned her body to intercept, but she was too far away. She knew instantly that she would never reach him in time.
Panic surged, thinking that someone was going to die because of her.
And that moment, a sudden power, different from anything she had felt before. It wasn't like vampire strength or speed. This was wild, electrical, and utterly foreign.
The world seemed to slow, and sounds becoming muffled. Colors deepened until everything felt unreal, and the shadows along the walls writhed and moved like living things.
Lilian felt herself move. It wasn't walking or running, but somehow passing through the darkness between her position and the rogue threatening the staff.
One moment she was across the hall, and the next she was standing between the rogue and his intended victims.
The rogue skidded to a halt, his eyes widening in surprise, then fear as Lilian's own eyes blazed pure gold now, power thrumming through her body, begging for release, demanding to be used.
She gave in to it.
Her hand shot out, grabbing the rogue's throat, and dark energy poured from her fingers. The rogue screamed in pure agony, as shadows wrapped around his body, tightening like snakes, crushing him.
When Lilian released him, he fell to the floor and didn't move. Dead or unconscious, she couldn't tell and didn't care.
"What the hell was that?" one of the security guards breathed, but no one answered as they themselves didn't know what kind of power their potential lady of the house used. Only Mrs. Hemsworth watched with pride.
Lilian looked around the hall. More rogues were pouring in, but now they were hesitating, seeing one of their own taken down so easily. She could feel their fear, could smell it mixing with blood.
She reached for that well of power again, and this time it came easier. Shadows responded to her will, pooling around her feet, crawling up the walls, and temperature in the hall dropped noticeably.
The rogues attacked as one, perhaps hoping to overwhelm her through sheer numbers.
Lilian let the power loose, and the shadows exploded outward from her body like a shockwave, slamming into the charging rogues and sending them flying. Those who tried to get close found themselves entangled in living darkness that burned where it touched, leaving marks like frostbite on their skin.
She was dimly aware of Mrs. Hemsworth and the guards taking advantage of the chaos, finishing off stunned rogues. But most of her attention was focused on the power flowing through her, the shadows responding to her commands like extensions of her own body.
A particularly large rogue broke through her defenses, getting close enough to rake claws across her shoulder. Pain flared sharply, and with it came a surge of rage that fed the power.
Lilian grabbed the rogue's face with one shadow-wrapped hand, and she felt something pull. It wasn't blood, not life force exactly, but energy.
The rogue's strength flowed into her, making her stronger while he weakened. Within seconds, he was unconscious.
But she could feel the strain now, the way her body was burning through energy faster than it should. She forced herself to rein in the wild surge of the foreign power within her body, and the shadows receded slightly.
Meanwhile, the rogues, seeing their numbers dwindling and facing the unknown power of the newborn vampire who had just killed or incapacitated a dozen of them single-handedly, began to retreat.
They fled through the same entrances they had breached, leaving behind their fallen comrades.
Silence fell over the entrance hall, broken only by heavy breathing and the soft moans of the wounded. Several guards were injured but alive, and the non-combatants were shaken but unharmed.
Mrs. Hemsworth herself had a deep gash on her arm but was already wrapping it efficiently.
"Is everyone okay?" Lilian called out, her eyes returning to its original brown color with golden flecks.
A chorus of affirmatives, though several voices were shaky.
They were safe.