Crown of Ash (Blood Skies, Book 4) (38 page)

Damn it.

Danica sped down the hill.  The cycle laun
ched across the first bridge.  T
he hole
beneath
it
was deep and filled with charred bones.

Clouds of d
ust
blew across the hillside like wraiths
. 
The
canyon
wall
was
covered with cracks and
foul waterfalls of sludge. 
T
he
bottom of the slope stood at the edge of
a
stony
field
.

Black raced down the hill.  The
Tiger’s
motor revved and faded
and
shook hard against her stomach and legs
.  H
er body ached. 
She shook her head and focused.

Don’t stop now.

She
barreled over the next bridge
and felt it rumble and shake beneath her
. 
F
ire
exploded up from
the
hole
just
seconds later. 
H
eat washed over her, and the force of the blast
made the cycle sputter and tip.  S
he almost lost control.  Her spirit shielded her from the heat, but not before she felt blisters sco
u
r her back beneath the leather
armor
.  Sweat poured down her face and into her eyes. 

Fi
e
ry
rain scorched the
ground
. 
Danica
twisted the bike
and
turn
ed
sharp
at
the nadir of the slope
.  She
dodg
e
d
broken steel girders
that
stuck
out of
the
dirt like rusty knives.

The
ground
leveled out.  She raced onto
grease
d
stone
covered
with
unnatural mist.  Even with
the
speed and adrenaline and the heat of the fire still washing over her, Danica felt the cloying chill
of
the black field,
the waves of utter cold that rolled at her like
walls of
frozen breath. 

She
was still
behind the others. 
Cole
was a hundred yards ahead,
dodging Creyzak
a
n
d
the
wagon
, which
rammed into the El Camino and sent it spinning. 
Metal flew into the air
.  B
oth vehicles vanished into the
brume
.

Black rocketed
through
the field of dark stone. 
Vapors
raced apart beneath
the cycle’s
armored wheels.  Broken links of chain and sharp stones littered the ground.  The air smelled like the inside of a meat locker.

She only
made it
a few yards
before
she had to twist the cycle so hard she almost spun out.  The fi
eld was littered with pits
,
nearly twenty-
feet wide
and
spaced about
fifty
yards apart, so utterly dark and camouflaged by the stygian mist they were all but impossible to see
from a distance
. 

Danica’s blood froze. 
She just knew that Lara had
fallen
into
a pit
.

She sped forward.  Panic gripped her chest
.  Her spirit flew around her like
a hurricane.   

The world
was
blue haze and steaming dark
smoke
.  The midnight ground
seemed to go on forever.  She heard the distant
cheers of the
captive
crowd.

The vampire
war wagon
had stopped
and
parked
next to one of the pits
.  Danica
drove
towards it
and slowed down
.
 
Her spirit
fused
around her
in a hot
shield.   

She
brought the bike
to a
stop
next to the
wagon
.  Its bone armor and dangling chains were covered in road grit
and
scorch marks
. 
Smoke poured out of i
ts h
eavy
guns
.
I
ron blades covered
its
hull
like razor
ed
fur
.

Black leapt off her cycle and ran
over
to the
pit
.  The El Camino was there,
stuck just a few feet below the mouth of the
hole
. 
Lara’s vehicle
had fallen at a
n
angle
and hung
suspended
: the
front ram plates
had wedged into the black stone about ten paces down from the lip, while
the rear tires had turned
sideways and were
stuck
in the wall on
the opposite side
.  The vehicle creaked
in place
, ready to plummet. 

“Lara!”

“Dani!”
Cole’s
voice came from inside
the car
. 

Black’s
spirit bristled, then roared.  She heard the footsteps, but not in time.

Creyzak stepped up
out of nowhere
and smashed her face with a long
exhaust pipe
he’d
ripped
off
his vehicle
.  Her spirit took the brunt of the blow, but the
impact
still knocked her backwards
.  Blood spurted from her mouth
. 
Her
back
hit
the stony ground
. 

Creyzak
brought
the pipe
up
over his head.  His translucent
Vuul
skin
flooded with angry blood
,
and h
is
squat
grey
eyes burned
with
rage. 

Danica lashed
out
at him with her sp
irit. 
Fiery
razor
s
raked
Creyzak
across the chest, but he leapt back in time to avoid the full force of the blow. 

She struggled to her feet. 
H
er face was numb,
and
the rest
of her body
burned with pain. 

Her spirit fused to her forearm
as
a jagged shard of razor light.  Danica’s
vision had gone blurry
, but her spirit
helped guide her actions
. 

The Vuul was silent
as he swung the pipe again
. 
Danica
sliced the
metal
apart
and sent it smoking to the ground.  She leapt up and kicked
Creyzak in the
face
. 
G
rey-green blood spurted from his mouth as he fell
onto his
back.

“Dani!”

The car creaked in the hole
behind her
.  Black
sent
her spirit into the pit.  She felt
him
strain as
he
wrapped round the falling car
and held it
.

Creyzak leapt up.  His supernatural metabolism fused his wounds together.  She watched sickly
black veins pulse and throb as
he charged
.  Without her spirit, she was unarmed, and the grey-fleshed killer had two feet
of height
and at least a hundred pounds on her.  She tensed, bent her knees,
and
readied for the
impact
. 

Her spirit strained
.  She sensed Lara try
to escape,
felt her
climb out and grab
onto
the pit
wall
, but the earth was dry and loose.  The car slipped.

Creyzak jumped at Danica, and
though
she managed to twist out of the way
at the last moment he
still
reached out and grabbed
her arm
, right
where the bullet had struck. 
She screamed in pain
. 

They tumbled to the ground.  The Vuul’s weight smothered her as they rolled over each other.

“Dani!” Cole yelled.  “Dani, please….”

Lara
screamed.  B
lack’s spirit
grabbed
Cole.  The car
fell and
crashed
into the darkness. 

Creyzak
was on
Danica
,
and
he
punched
her
in the face
with
his
rock-hard fist
s
. 
S
kin split
and blood flew everywhere.  H
er head smacked against the rock. 

Danica’s
spirit tore
into
the Vuul’s face
like a knife
. 
Creyzak
fell back with a cry.  Cole
ran over from the edge of the pit,
grabbed
the Vuul
from behind
and
threw
him to the ground. 

Danica could barely see.  Blood ran
into
her eyes, and the bones in her face ached.  She heard cheers and calls in the distance as the
crowd roared it’s
appreciation of the
battle
.

Her spirit pulsed dully at the edge of her thoughts.  He had little
power
left.  With no time to recover and with as much as she’d ask
ed
of him
during the race
, it was a wonder he’d been able to pull Lara
to safety
. 

Cole kicked and clawed at Creyzak as he rose.  The Vuul
took Lara
by the throat.

Black struggled to her feet.  Her vision pulsed and faded.  She channeled her spirit into a smoking blade
and cast it at the back of Creyzak’s head
. 

It was too late.  The Vuul snapped Cole’s neck with a swift twist
just seconds
before the
arcane weapon
cleaved through his skull.  The bodies fell to the ground almost in tandem. 

The distant roar of the crowd faded.  The strength drained from
Black’s
body, and the breath left her lungs.  She stumbled forward a few steps
and
fell to her knees. 

She couldn’t breathe.  Hot t
ears flooded her eyes, and her mouth
moved
soundlessly.  Her arms shook as she took Lara in her arms. 
Cole’s eyes were open
and
full of fear
.  Her pale
skin was warm, and
her
dark hair
was
pasted to her forehead. 

Danica couldn’t
hold herself still
. 
Something cold welled up inside her, an emptiness.  A void. 
The wail she released didn’t even seem to
come from
her
, but from somewhere else.

She
held
Cole tight,
hugge
d her, smother
ed
her, hoping, wishing
,
for her to be okay.  She muttered something into
Cole’s
ear over and over again, and she wasn’t
even
sure what
it was
.