A Shade of Vampire 31: A Twist of Fates by Bella Forrest

Miral could of course have been lying to us about the specimens—that maybe she and her sisters had done something to them, maybe even murdered them—but Miral didn’t exactly strike me as the type of woman to hide that fact. She would’ve told us if she and her sisters had ended them.
    The rest of our group had overheard the conversation—they weren’t standing far away.
    “Let’s move around the back of the building,” I muttered.
    Rose and I traipsed through the snow around the building, the others following us.
    It appeared that it was nap time for these kids. After which the harpies would presumably leave them alone for some time and retreat to different parts of the house. This would be the best time to get the babies out, while the harpies were distracted. I didn’t want to turn this into a war and end up killing the harpies—we just needed to get those kids out of there.
    Rose and I explained the situation, and everybody agreed with my idea of organizing a rescue mission. We discussed the plan in hushed tones before Kailyn, Lucas and I entered the building in our subtle forms.
    We kept watch on the three bedrooms containing children until they had all fallen asleep, and the harpies gathered in the corridor.
    Spreading their wings, the harpies flew to the staircase and headed upstairs. I wasn’t sure what they were going to do now—go hunt for food perhaps? Whatever food existed in this desolate landscape. Or perhaps they went to neighboring islands to hunt.
    Whatever the case, we needed to be swift. We assumed our physical forms and I entered the room closest to me, which contained the strange gray babies. Kailyn entered the room with the werewolf cubs, while Lucas was left with the ogres. The doors hadn’t been closed, fortunately, which kept us from making noise.
    Staring down at the sleeping infants whose species I was still trying to figure out, I dipped down and managed to scoop three of them into my arms. Their sleek skin was strange to the touch, and they felt far too cold. A human baby wouldn’t last an hour in this place.
    Lucas and Kailyn emerged in the corridor at almost the same time—Kailyn holding two of the cubs, and Lucas the two ogres. All the infants remained asleep, except for one of the ogres… who had woken up and apparently taken a keen interest in Lucas’ nose. The baby face-splatted him in an attempt to grab it, even as Lucas jerked his head back.
    My uncle was going to have to practice a bit of tolerance until we got out of here.
    I switched my focus to the stairs. The main entrance to the house was still shut, of course, which meant we had to fly out of one of the windows which the harpies had so helpfully left open. I moved up the staircase, careful to fly as evenly as possible to avoid waking the infants in my arms.
    Reaching the top, I heard the harpies’ voices to my left. They were in the room facing the front of the house. I took a right and flew through an open door into one of the back rooms, whose window was large and open.
    We piled outside, into the harsh wind. After touching down, my mother and sister hurried forward to take a baby each from me; Kira took one of Kailyn’s cubs, while Jeramiah took the sleeping ogre from Lucas, leaving him with the awake, troublesome one.
    Ibrahim and Corrine magicked themselves into the house and retrieved the rest of the babies quickly—the final two gray babies and the final cub—saving us passing the harpies again.
    Each of us donated whatever spare clothes we had to wrap around the babies, even as everybody stared at the strange gray creatures.
    “What are they?” several asked.
    Of course, I could only respond with a shrug.
    Even Ibrahim and Corrine couldn’t seem to offer any insight on the subject.
    “Ugh, brat!” Lucas’ hiss came behind us.
    We turned to see my uncle positively wrestling with the baby, whose interest had developed to Lucas’ ears. He had a fist closed around Lucas’ left one. My father, half