Dragonblood Vampire

Chapter 11: Attack

More and more vampires flooded into the stadium, taking cover behind stands and rushing through the hallways. Their shouts echoed. They'd find Lu and Qiao, but what could they do for them? It'd look like they were frozen in the middle of the hallway, since nobody could see magic. What would happen if the military tried to move the dragons? Would the magic wrapped around them snuff out their lives?

Jia-Li and I reached the top of the stairs. We turned to watch the oncoming military. She was panting and beaming, as if Christmas had come early.

"They'll find the bomb," I said.

"Let them," said Jia-Li. "The bomb is only the bait."

I stood there with the silver chains burning into my arms and watched the military swarm into the stadium. Vampire soldiers armed with guns and who knows what else.

But they were all Americans. My people. Fighting to defend our country from an alien, otherworldly threat.

Fierce pride swelled in my chest, as well as anger at the dragoness standing beside me. I strained against the chains with all my borrowed dragon strength. One long pull until my shoulders popped and my wrists screamed as if I was cutting my hands off. Then I rested a moment, and did it again.

Jia-Li reached into an inner pocket of her dress and pulled out one of the vials of magic. She held it overhead, and the aurora burst from it in waves of green and red.

The Huli-Jing cascaded from the stands and surged toward the army, their ghostly shapes turning solid and vicious.

The army fired and felled some of the foxes, then the foxes swarmed into their ranks and chaos began.

I put every ounce of my strength against those chains.

One of the links popped, and the chains fell from my hands at last. My wrists looked as if the Huli Jing had been chewing on them, but they were already healing.

I grabbed Jia-Li's hand and tried to wrench the magic vial away from her. She turned on me, teeth bared. Her fist hit my jaw. The world whirled and I crashed across the bleachers and rolled down several levels before I managed to catch myself. My teeth didn't meet right. I held my jaw in place until my vampire body healed itself and popped my jaw joint back into place--it hurt like hell--then I climbed back toward Jia-Li.

She was watching her foxes decimate the vampire army. I disliked the red glitter in her eyes. "Jia-Li, stand down!"

She didn't look at me. "What makes you think you have the power to stop me, parasite?"

I was a vampire, dammit. I grabbed her arm and sank my teeth through her skin.

She screamed--had she really not been expecting that?--and rained blows on my head with the force of a sledgehammer. My vision blurred and darkened, but I held on, drinking as much of her blood as I could.

Jia-Li grabbed my nose and twisted it. I let go with a yell. She planted a kick in my stomach that drove me into the wall at the top of the grandstands. It bent and cracked. So did my back. But fresh dragon blood swirled through me. I couldn't stand up straight until my back healed itself, but I faced her. "I won't let you do this. Call off the Huli Jing. This is Earth and you can't have it."

She bared her teeth and for an instant the dragon stared at me through her human mask. "I'll call them, all right. Daji!"

Daji appeared out of nowhere, not a hair out of place, slanted eyes laughing. Her tails swirled around her perfect legs.

Jia-Li pointed at me. "Take him."

I tried to run, but my legs gave way and I fell flat. Pain seared down my back like buckets of liquid fire. Jia-Li had shattered my spine or something. It might take a while for my vampire body to mend this one.

Daji grabbed my arm and hauled me upright. Her animal eyes stared into mine--cold, hungry, and unfeeling. She'd use me and discard me when I no longer suited her.

Death by sex. What a way to go.

"I dislike broke toys," she murmured. "Pity you won't last as long now."

Jia-Li had walked off down the stairs, her back to us. I'd ceased to exist to her.

And Lu was in the hallway under the stadium with her brother, wrapped in magic and unable to lift a finger. Compared to her aunt and the monster holding me, she was a perfect lady. Gentle. Kind. Caring. She'd even saved me by letting me feed on her.

As Daji dragged me along the top of the grandstands, searching for a dark corner, my thoughts drifted to the military lab. Becoming a rhinoceros was one of the highlights of my life. Too bad I couldn't do that with dragon blood.

But what if I could? I had the blood of two dragons flowing inside me.

I recalled the sensation of the beast raging within, straining to escape. And I realized that just as there had been a rhinoceros, there was now a dragon coiled inside me, waiting for me to call on it. I summoned it with all my strength.

My back cracked as it healed all at once. My body swelled. Claws erupted from my fingers and my mouth stretched, my teeth turning long and pointed. Daji yelped and dropped me. I grabbed her tails in one gigantic paw and held her in place as my transformation settled. I rose to all four feet and blinked, shaking my head. My eyes were wider apart with razor-sharp vision. Wings flopped at my sides. When I lifted my head, it was fifteen feet from the ground. I twisted my neck--much farther than a human's could move--and checked out my back. I'd become a fire-orange dragon with spikes down my back, enormous leathery wings, and set of claws that'd make a velociraptor envious.

Daji stared up at me, ears flattened and eyes wide. She looked like an animal. Hatred and loathing churned in my draconic gut.

"You were going to rape me to death," I said in a bass rumble.

She struggled to escape, but I gripped her tails even tighter. The hatred turned to fire deep inside my chest. I inhaled and tapped into that internal heat--and heaved a fireball of blue-white fire into Daji's face.

She screamed as she burned. I blew breath after breath of fire until there was nothing left but ash and a couple of tails still in my paw. I opened my fingers and they blew away like feathers.

Then I turned a clumsy circle and paced toward the stairs in search of Jia-Li. She was in for a big surprise now.