CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND NINETY ONE – WAR AT THE GATES

He sighed, withered features creasing with regret. "Parts of England itself are no longer held to be...safe environs." John growled low in his throat, fangs glinting momentarily. "Then we'll rip out the sickness by its roots before it can sicken our hearth and home. Whatever the cost." Karina's fingers instinctively tangled in the tattered fabric of his shirt, a silent plea for reason even as her soul resonated profound concurrence with his savage declaration of intent. "Easy, my friend." Alistair's tone was a grandfatherly balm despite the gravity suffusing his every word. "The path before us is shrouded in cruel twists and turns not even I can navigate with any certainty. Prudence and forethought must be our lodestar now, not haste or reckless action." His gnarled hand settled atop Karina's, the livewire thrum of residual energies playing along her Meridians like the lightest feather caress. "For we fight not solely for our own survival now, but for the sanctity of existence itse