Blood Red (9781101637890) Read Online Free PDF

rushing water would cover any noise. It was too hungry to think of anything but draining the prey dry, and all it had to do to escape immediate detection was tip the body into the water when it was done. The victim wouldn’t be found until the body had traveled far from the village—if it was ever found at all.
    It’s smart, I’ll allow that. This is probably how it’s kept people from knowing it’s prowling their villages until now.
If it hadn’t been for the Brotherhood—well, the creature probably could prey at will for months before having to move on.
    And almost exactly halfway between her and the creature was its intended victim; from here it was little more than a white form stumbling toward the mill, but Rosa knew it was almost certainly one of the village women or girls, dressed only in the shift she went to sleep in, being drawn by the creature’s sinister magic.
    Poor girl.
The creature would have gone sifting through dreams, looking for someone who was vulnerable. And . . . well, expendable. The servant girl who was a bit of a slut. The unwanted, plain daughter who would never find a husband. The widow who was a bit odd. Someone who, when she vanished, would set heads wagging and tongues clacking, but would
not
send friends and neighbors out on a manhunt.
    Probably the servant girl who is a bit of a slut. People will assume she ran off on her own when she vanishes.
Rosa gritted her teeth.
Not tonight, monster. Not this time.
    Rosa put her hand down to the
alvar
; in her hand was a bit of cheese from her belt pouch. The
alvar
took it greedily and scuttled away. That was all the thanks it needed, as most of the Earth Elementals—the small ones anyway—were always eager for a bit of “man-food.” As soon as it had hidden itself, she moved.
    The creature—the
vampir
—had all of its attention focused on luring in its prey. It must have been very, very hungry after a week without feeding—or feeding only on the unsatisfying blood of what it could catch in the forest.
    She took advantage of that preoccupation to slip up the hill, staying in cover by making use of every bit of fence, hedge, and wall. She moved as quickly as she dared, conscious that the clock, so to speak, was ticking away the precious seconds before the girl fell into its clawlike hands. She had to reach the
vampir
before its victim reached it.
    She slipped around by the back of the mill, and the noise of the wheel, the falling water, and the river all surrounded her with so much sound that it was impossible to hear what was going on up ahead of her.
    She didn’t need to hear anything, however. The nearness of the creature was like a feeling of sickness. And she was close enough she could sense its excitement. The prey must be very near.
    She readied her hand-crossbow, with the special, oversized bolt made entirely of hardened holly wood, with a needle-sharp point in place of an arrowhead. It was one of the weapons she had made sure to have with her when the local Brotherhood had first called for help. Excitement and fear in equal measure boiled up in her, and every nerve was afire with both. With the bolt in the channel, the crossbow cocked and ready, she rounded the corner to confront the creature.
    Just in time. Its victim was a mere ten feet away, swaying where she stood. The hideous thing had its back to Rosa and had no idea she was there. Its bloodlust and hunger were overpowering at this distance. Even an ordinary human with not a speck of magic would have felt it. It had no eyes, no thought, for anything but the prey in front of it.
    With a silent prayer to Saint Hubert, she let fly.
    The bolt flew clean and true, hitting the monster squarely in the heart.
    Its victim dropped where she stood, unconscious, as the monster’s control over her evaporated.
    It didn’t die cleanly, of course. The
vampir
never did. It thrashed and writhed and spouted half-rotten blood