Read Vampire Down (Blood Skies, Book 7) for Free Online Page A

them.  They may be survivors.”
    “ Let’s hope they’re friendly,” Danica said. 
    They moved deeper into Centertown, towards the remains of the Tower District, where most of the residential structures were located.  The streets were narrow and tall, making it seem as if they moved through sandstone valleys.  The windows were dark, and even though the sun was unobscured by clouds the buildings were tall enough that only muted light filtered down to the road.   
    Her spirit wound his way ahead.  He was anxious, as terrified as she was, and it took all Danica had without having to resort to the brute force of her golem arm to keep him in check.  She possessed greater control over him than she’d ever had before, but she didn’t like to exercise it, since it meant making use of all the thaumaturgic safe guards set in that bastard limb; better they worked together, not as master and servant.  She’d abused him when she was Dragon, thrall of the Ebon Cities, and she still felt echoes of his pain, like a whipped dog coming to heel.  She never wanted to feel that again.
    He soared back to her, slithering along the stone and up against her skin like a warming gel.  Information filled her mind, facts learned like they’d already been there, details integrated into her consciousness. 
    “They’re in the old watchtower on the west edge of Centertown,” she said.  “The one with the munitions cellar.”
    “ Which means they might be armed,” Cross said with a nod.  “Terrific.”
    The tower was dead ahead, a solid and windowless structure whose apex was capped with old-fashioned parapets and a floodlight.  The door at its base was solid oak laced with iron, black and brown and looking more like a drawbridge.  They left Ronan and Shiv a few paces back in a closed alleyway, and Danica covered Cross as he approached with the shotgun in hand. 
    Cross pushed the door open to darkness.  Danica sent her spirit in as a ball of arctic blue light which illuminated the contents of the tower: recurve bows, old war horns, bedrolls, water skins, gear belts, shammies, knives, spoons and cups, linens, leather traces, cloaks, a piece of old storm glass, all of it stacked neat against the stark sandstone walls. 
    Her spirit hovered there, lighting the room.  She didn’t detect the other presence until it was almost too late.
    A warlock’s female spirit launched at them from out of the dark.  Danica whipped her companion out into open air moments before the inside of the tower filled with liquid red energy that nearly set the place alight.  Cross jumped back.  Shots rang out from the turret above, a rapid barrage of rifle fire that seemed thunderous and alien in the otherwise still and frozen city.  Chunks of stone ripped up from the street.
    The spirit inside was as crazed as it host, half-mad from isolation, erratic in her movements and pulsing with unstable power.  Danica held, waited for the ghost to stop immolating the interior.  Her heart sank as most of the equipment was scorched, but the moment the warlock’s hostile spirit withdrew Danica launched her own attack.  Her spirit barreled past Cross and screamed into the shop in a blaze of white light, a pulsing resonance that would blind and possibly render anyone inside unconscious without doing them any real harm.  She expanded his form as he moved, watched as his presence blossomed and spilled through the seams in the tower walls.
    The air pulsed silent, a held breath.  Motes of dust and crystal froze as the spirits collided.  Ice and flame sucked in, drawn as if through a funnel.  Danica shouted a warning, and Cross fell to the ground.  Everything slowed.
    The blast released, a blinding white explosion.  Arctic flames licked against the nearby buildings.  Sheets of cold fire rippled up and down the walls.  Screams rang out. 
    The air thinned as the fire died.  Danica had to blink her vision back into focus, like she’d been too long staring