Bloodline Alchemy: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy Academy Novel (Bloodline Academy Book 6), Lan Chan [free ebook reader for android TXT] 📗

My legs gave way, and I sank onto the sand, gasping for breath. My head was spinning. Grabbing at my shirt, I cut off a piece of the hem with the knife to use to staunch the bleeding in my hand.

Agatha stood up again. “How long to do you think you can stall? Nobody is coming for you this time.”

She shot a beam of purple light at the portal. It tore asunder, opening the small portal into a hole the size of a domestic swimming pool. Gnashing came through from the other side.

Scrounging around in the sand, I spotted the knife and picked it up. Holding the pitiful little knife in my non-bleeding hand, I turned to face the oncoming demons.

28

For some reason I had never really allowed myself to think of my own demise. With Lex around, I had focused all of my energy on worrying about her. Now that I was staring down the portal of my own death, I was completely unprepared. Not one but three demons dragged themselves through the portal. Two were the same kind of demon as the one that I had just killed. The third was a monstrous cross between a satyr and a bull. Its cloven legs were thicker than my torso. They led up into an uncovered groin that transitioned into the chest of a human male. From there, the tanned flesh turned into thick bovine hide as the head morphed into that of a black bull.

All three of them lifted their noses into the air. I was bleeding out something fierce. After it had died, the demon I killed had voided its bowls. The stench that clung to the air along with the sulphuric stink of the fens made my stomach revolt.

The problem was that demons had keen senses of smell too. While my human nose was just battered by an onslaught of smells, their noses seemed to be able to rifle through the scents until their heads turned in my direction.

Any hope I’d had of hiding behind the splash of blood and guts of the previous demon died. I couldn’t think beyond the fear that kept slugging me in brutal waves. The knife rattled in my hands.

Time. I needed time to think.

That was unfortunate, because the demons launched straight at me once they realised it was my blood they tasted in the air. There was no more room for squeamishness. Sliding my bleeding hand into the mess of black demon blood, I directed a wave of blood magic into it and completed the blood circle.

It closed just as the bull demon collided horns first with it. The blood circle thickened as I directed more blood magic into it until it became a ring of glowing pink. Gasping at the overexertion, I fell on my ass again.

This was it. The extent of my blood magic. I was able to use demon blood like any other blood, but their essences were out of my reach. Their souls, such as they were, belonged to Lucifer. As a low-magic witch, I had no access to them.

I sat there curled in a protective bubble of my arms and legs. A sitting duck as soon as the blood circle gave way.

My world became the slash of scaled tails and the boom of horns against the circle. I could no longer hear the crowd above the overwrought thudding of my own heart in my ears. Again and again the demons bashed at the circle.

I was so desperate that I sank my hand into the dead demon’s guts and shot the alchemy into it. Using all the force of will I could muster, I tried to transmute the demon’s essence into power. Absolutely nothing happened except for a strange tug that seemed to come from a million miles away. An awareness rose up, its senses suddenly alert. Almost like an eye opening in the distance.

Gasping, I retracted the alchemy. It was just in time to hear the first part of the circle cracking. The bull demon ran headlong into the circle. I tried to throw more magic at it, but I was too weak. Instead of bouncing off, its horns pierced the circle.

The sound of the crowd inhaling was so loud I heard it even through the circle. Sick of waiting for me to sacrifice one of the supernaturals to defend myself, they were now shouting at the demons to kill me.

The bull demon latched on to the blood circle by sinking claws into it. The thing turned its head slowly. I felt the blunt, dark force of its own sinister magic grinding against the circle. Black dots appeared in my vision. I raised bloody hands and cupped my head in them as pain exploded inside my mind.

The blood circle broke.

Get up! The voice in my head wasn’t very compelling. Not when the pain was still cascading down my neck. Proving that I was good at following orders, I crawled out of the way as the bull demon came storming towards me.

I made it a few metres before something snagged my left leg. Yelping, I kicked out with my free leg and slammed my foot against the bull demon’s head. It was like kicking a steel rod. Rivulets of pain snaked up my leg as the demon dragged me towards it, mouth open. Before it could chomp down, I whipped out with the knife and sliced it across its nostril. The thing bellowed. Green blood squirted from its wound and decorated my sneakers.

It pushed itself up to standing and hauled my foot along with it. Blood dripped in a flowing river down its chest.

The demon held me like a fish caught on the end of a line. It dangled me there as it swiped at the blood. The alchemy fluttered. I grabbed at all that I had left and sank it into the demon’s chest.

I thought of the burn of the black toxic sludge