The Dark Arts of Blood Read Online Free PDF Page A

in love. Eventually, against all his instincts, he’d transformed Charlotte rather than lose her. Karl thanked all the powers of the universe that she’d survived, but he had vowed never to transform anyone, ever again. The initiation held too much danger and pain. Last year he’d witnessed a rash attempt by a power-hungry madman to turn a large number of humans into his own vampire army. The experiment had ended in horrific failure. The Crystal Ring itself would not allow too many vampires to exist.
    And that is no bad thing
, Karl thought.
We are predators, after all. The Earth needs no more of us, especially if something worse is brewing in the human world. Up here, ever since Violette opened our eyes to the dangers, I sense mankind sleepwalking from one devastating war to the next and there is not a damned thing we can do to stop them. A cynic might conclude that the sole purpose of vampires is to feed on the remains of humanity, like vultures on carrion.
    He fought to stay on course as the storm closed in. Karl could see nothing but wild indigo cloud. When he looked up, though, he saw a new apparition: an ebony mass, flickering with blood-red lightning… A shape that coalesced out of nothing.
    As he watched, it dived straight towards him – a coal-black comet the size of a house.
    Karl swerved, thrown sideways by turbulence. Hot damp air filled his lungs. Powerful instinct told him that the thing was sentient, and intent on killing him.
    With an instant survival reflex, he arced out of its path. His hands formed claws, his fangs unsheathed. He was ready to fight – but the entity went roaring straight past, vanishing into the muddy lower layers of the atmosphere.
    Karl took a few moments to recover from the shock. An illusion, no doubt, but the encounter left him with a clear impression of a gigantic death-like figure in a hooded robe, with a huge skull head and a staff like a lightning bolt.
    Only an energy-projection, someone’s dream. Not really there.
    Whatever it was, it left turmoil in its wake. Raqia began to roil violently, the storm whipping up into the worst tempest he’d ever encountered. He lost his sense of direction. Couldn’t see, let alone navigate.
    Enough of this mad, nightmarish troposphere. All he wanted was the firelight of his own parlour and Charlotte’s arms around him…
Focus on her
, he told himself, closing his eyes. Focus on Charlotte, a tiny golden beacon so far away…
    If only he could find his way back to Earth.
    * * *
    The knife lay in the centre of a small table, gleaming against the dark walnut surface. Stefan and Charlotte sat on either side, studying the weapon. The blade fitted into an ivory haft that appeared hand-carved. The ivory was smooth, with a repeated motif along its length and a ruby cabochon set into the pommel.
    Charlotte thought it appeared more of a ceremonial item than one made to cause real harm. Not an army-issue knife that an old soldier might carry, but an unearthly thing with its own glow. Now and then it would tremble, as if someone had knocked the table.
    The parlour was lit by a single stained-glass lamp. The home she and Karl shared, a black timber chalet poised on a hill, stood high and remote amid pine forests, surrounded by a wild and lovely green landscape. The Alps floated like monumental clouds, draped with snow. All around were farms and tiny villages where she and Karl tried never to feed. They had no wish to harm their neighbours, but… once or twice, thirst had got the better of them, and that was all it took to start rumours.
    Charlotte wrapped her arms around her waist, trying to suppress shivers. She didn’t want Stefan to see her in pain or ill. The wound should have healed by now. Still she felt tendrils of cold poison spreading through her veins.
    Yet nothing poisons vampires
, she thought.
At least, nothing we’ve discovered… yet.
    Niklas sat on a sofa a few feet away, gazing at the knife without blinking. She wondered if he had