Page 3 of Dragonrider Academy: Episode 9

“There!” Jasmine said, shooting a finger into the night.

We all straightened as Topaz and Solstice roared the alarm from above.

They’d seen something, too.

A shadow emerged from the darkness, and with it came a figure that seemed to glide across the ground.

It was a vampire, no doubt about it. His skin was pale, and his eyes glowed like rubies in the darkness.

His height surprised me. I suspected he could have slipped into the darkness, had he wanted to.

Instead, he stretched to his full height and moved with the grace of a predator.

I gulped down a swallow.

“Which one of you summoned me?” he demanded as he scanned us.

His eerie gaze made a chill run up my spine.

Were all vampires like this? When I met my uncle, he hadn’t looked like this.

I had expected a billowy shadow creature to greet us, not a real vampire. I’d devoured paranormal adventure books back at my school library before becoming a Dragonrider. This was closer to what had been described.

Vern stepped forward and held out his hand.

I watched him with rounded eyes.

Vern has some nerve.

“That would be me. I’m connected to your bloodline through my mother.”

When the vampire narrowed his glowing eyes, Vern let his hand fall. “A relative?” the creature asked as if that was almost foreign to him. “Interesting, but that’s not the kind of blood I’m interested in.” His gaze scanned us again, finally landing on me.

His nostrils flared and ice ran through my veins.

“There’s human in that one. Much more my preference.”

He drew out the last syllable of that sentence like a hiss, making my tongue go dry.

I’m going to get eaten by a vampire.

That’s how my life ends. This is it.

I’m just a Vivi-shaped shish kabob.

Stop panicking, Killian quietly reprimanded in my mind. I’m not going to let anything happen to you.

He’d moved to my side and his knuckles had turned white as he gripped his homemade weapon.

The vampire had noticed it with a flick of his gaze. He just didn’t seem to care.

Which unnerved me further. What if that part of the vampire lore from the books I read wasn’t true? I’d shared it with Killian and he’d dutifully made me a wooden stake.

Vern hadn’t confirmed if it would be effective or not. Given he didn’t have much contact with that side of his family, he probably didn’t even know.

Jasmine was the one to lighten the mood. “Will you stop staring at my friend like she’s a piece of meat?” she said on a sigh as she jumped off the headstone. She laced her fingers together and stretched, somehow managing to look bored. “You told Vern that you’d meet us at midnight. It’s well past that and I’m ready for bed, so I suggest we get on with it.”

The vampire showed his teeth in what I thought might have been an attempt at a grin.

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