Total pages in book: 38
Estimated words: 34989 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 175(@200wpm)___ 140(@250wpm)___ 117(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 34989 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 175(@200wpm)___ 140(@250wpm)___ 117(@300wpm)
Ice was forming in Nolan’s stomach as he jerked his gaze to Sky. “You’re serious, aren’t you? You really mean that Sky’s got a spell to put all of Christoph’s organs and bones to the outside.”
“Yep. Saw him test it out once on a corpse, and it was messy as fuck. Everything kind of exploded in all directions, like if you cook a burrito in the microwave too long.”
“I think I’m going to be sick.”
Moon continued talking as if Nolan hadn’t said anything. Maybe he should slap his hand over Moon’s mouth. But he couldn’t risk taking his eyes off Sky.
“I think it was worse because the corpse was a few weeks old. All the bits were already rotting and loose. I doubt a living creature would explode quite like that.”
New rule: no more questions for Moon. Any questions could now be saved for Sky.
He couldn’t tell if Sky had dropped his protective shield, but he was moving his hands in front of him now and saying something, but the rising wind was carrying away his whispers.
“Does anyone know what Christoph’s special ability is?” Aiden inquired of the other vampires in his clan.
It was on the tip of Nolan’s tongue to demand what the hell Aiden was talking about, but Fox answered.
“I think Winter heard it was flight or maybe floating.”
Wonderful. Just freaking wonderful. It wasn’t enough that vampires were fast, strong, and practically immortal, but they had to have bonus powers as well. How in the world had humans survived for so long?
Nolan glanced around, but Winter was completely missing from the stairs and even the small crowd in the yard. Where the hell had the vampire gone? Maybe he had a good secret position from which he could assist Sky. That probably wasn’t legal, but Nolan didn’t give a shit. He wanted Sky safe and in his arms.
“Yeah, flying ain’t gonna save his ass,” Moon snickered.
Even as they spoke, Christoph rose smoothly into the air as if he were a bit of dandelion fluff. The vampire laughed as he hovered there above Sky, preparing to dive-bomb him.
Sky reached into both of his pockets and pulled something out. With his right, he threw what appeared to be a small bag that hit Christoph square in the center of his chest with a white puff of smoke or dust. At the same time, he moved his left hand out in a semicircle beside him, and some liquid spread across the lawn in a fan.
Fuck. Sky had tapped into the underworld. He hadn’t seen Sky work a lot of magic, but this already felt familiar…and scary.
Christoph touched the spot where the bag hit his chest and rubbed the powder on his fingers. Nolan heard snippets of the ugly threat the vampire delivered, but it was nothing compared to the cold, evil grin on Sky’s face.
A scream cut through the nearly silent air. Nolan’s gaze whipped to Colette, who was running to the relative safety of the house from where she’d been in the yard with the rest of her clan. Aldo and the others followed her with the same stark, horrified expressions.
Nolan stared at where they’d been, and his heart stood still. The air became trapped in his lungs as he watched a tall, thin figure pulling itself out of the ground. White bone flashed through the shredded black cloth that wrapped it. A deep hood blocked its head and face from view, and Nolan was grateful.
The thing almost appeared to be an eight-foot-tall skeleton, but its liquid smooth movements made it part cheetah. And then there were its…fingers. They were long, sharp spikes made of bone rather than actual fingers. Each one was at least twelve inches long and clicked together as it moved its hands.
“Who-who…” He stopped and swallowed twice to get enough saliva in his mouth to speak. “Who is that?”
“I’ve never seen him before,” Moon whispered, a tremor threading through his words. “But I think…I think that might be Reaper.”
The creature lunged forward in a series of quick, smooth steps, stalking Christoph without giving even a side glance at Sky. More black shadows rose from where the monster had erupted from the ground, rolling and thickening across the lawn.
Christoph roared and tried to fly around the deathly figure, but its hand flashed up in a white blur, those spike-like fingers stabbing directly into the center of the vampire’s chest.
But there was no splash of blood. No cry of pain.
With a jerk of its hand, the creature removed its fingers from Christoph and pulled out a white, wispy thing at the same time. Like a ghost.
No, it had pulled out Christoph’s soul!
The vampire’s lifeless body fell to the ground in a heap. Reaper pulled the soul close to its chest like it was holding a secret treasure and ran off to the spot where it had come out of the ground, dropping into the opening between worlds and disappearing completely.