Wicked (The Drake Chronicles Book 1) Read Online Free PDF Page B

he’d been in the woods, he had gathered ingredients for a simple attraction spell a few months back. He needed rowan and fresh sap from a tree. He’d nearly been slaughtered by a band of blood trees in the process.
     
    He didn’t even know they grew in the mortal world, but indeed they did. Blood trees were vicious and carnivorous.
     
    They feasted on unsuspecting forest wanderers, devouring the blood that flowed through their veins. They’re branches morphed into spiked claws and they could snatch someone by the throat within a second.
     
    A branch snapped behind them and Ethan snatched Emma by her wrist and they tore the rest of the way to Logan’s house. They didn’t need to think, they just needed to remember what Mason had told them, if you ever hear something ominous, don’t second guess it, just run like hell.
     
    And indeed something was gaining on them, breathing heavily, and growling. Emma didn’t dare turn; she didn’t want to know what was coming after them. She just wanted to get away.
     
    “ Faster! ” Ethan pushed himself and Emma toward the back porch light behind a wooden fence.
     
    The siblings rushed into the fence, climbed over, and collided with the damp ground of Logan’s back lawn.
     
    They thought they were safe for a moment, but as they picked themselves up from the moist grass, a thunderous crash erupted behind them.
     
    They spun around, frightened and breathing hard.
     
    There were eight hellhounds, foaming at their mouths and digging their massive paws into the perfectly manicured lawn. Just then, the back door flew open and out stepped Logan’s father, Bennett Hardwicke, a large machine gun in his hands.
     
    “Get inside. I’ll deal with them,” he commanded and before he could repeat himself, Ethan and Emma bolted through the back door and into the house. They threw themselves to the ground as a mass of gunshots stung the air.
     
    A window shattered and Emma turned to see a hellhound on top of the kitchen table, staring directly at them.
     
    “Crap, run!” Ethan scrambled off of the ground and ran down a photograph garnished hallway, Emma on his heels.
     
    Logan stepped out from the dining room, a large black book cradled in his arms. He was sweating and shaking.
     
    “Hi,” he said nervously as he rapidly turned the pages of the book. “I’m trying to find a banishing spell, but I can’t seem to—”
     
    “Are you crazy?” Ethan spat. Emma turned to him.
     
    “What?” Logan asked, looking puzzled.
     
    “You can’t banish them. You have to physically disable them, it is common magic knowledge,” Logan sneered at Ethan and threw the book on a chair behind them. “Now, do you have something heavy and blunt, preferably a crowbar?”
     
    The kitchen door behind them smashed to the ground and a hellhound growled, the sound raiding their eardrums.
     
    The hellhound’s snout was long and black, while its gray fur looked ravaged and moist. On all fours it stood over five feet in height and smelt of rotten meat, sour and dead. Its eyes were a crimson red, and were narrowed to slits.
     
    “So, you got that crowbar?” Ethan took a step back, shielding Emma.
     
    Logan hurried over to a lone door, ripped it open, and brought a long silver spear out from what looked like a hallway closet.
     
    “Will this work?” he yelled over the sound of his father’s machine gun. Ethan smiled and held his hand out. But Logan ran right past him and went for the hellhound on his own.
     
    Ethan’s smile faded. What was this idiot doing? He thought.
     
    Emma saw Logan’s face, fierce and bold. He was serious; he was really going to attempt killing a hellhound. She held onto the back of Ethan’s sweater with fear and closed one eye, expecting the worst.
     
    “What are you doing? You didn’t even know how to kill one before I told you. You’re going to get yourself killed!” Ethan screamed.
     
    “I can do this,” Logan snapped, but Ethan saw the uncertainty