Read Online Red by Alyxandra Harvey - Free Book Online Page B

tossed her one of my daggers and reached for my gun. I fired at the ground, grazing the basilisk. It was enough to convince it not to slide toward Sloane, but not enough to break its focus on Colt, who was still on the ground, looking nauseous.
    “So I guess that makes me bait.” She smiled softly in that slightly melancholic and mad way of hers before darting out of her hiding place. Justin kept pace with me on the other side of the basilisk.
    Its tongue touched the tip of Colt’s boot. He kicked out, forgetting his beer-queasy stomach. The basilisk made a strange screech-hiss that had adrenaline burning through me. My muscles quivered with the need to push harder, faster. My vision narrowed to the basilisk, to the flutter of movement under the scales, foreshadowing where it would strike next. The barbed tip of its tail swung hard. I dodged, but it was close enough that I felt the shift in the cold predawn air.
    It kept moving, striking the trees with its tail as it passed. It was strong enough that when it hit Justine’s tree, she lost her footing. She tumbled off her branch, landing hard in withered ferns. Justin ran to help her up.
    Tobias dropped silently to the ground, taking Justin’s place beside the basilisk. I fired again, distracting it from Sloane, who was standing in the middle of the path leading it to the lake. She had my knife in one hand and the splintered end of the broken spear in the other. Colt wiped blood off his face, scouring in the undergrowth for some kind of weapon. Tobias poked the basilisk with the end of a long branch. The smells of dying plants and mildew breath wafted around us. The lake glinted between the trees. The light was opalescent, like the inside of an abalone shell.
    “Come here, you freaky little worm,” Sloane taunted. A dragonfly darted past, then tumbled like a stone into the lake. Basilisk saliva sizzled on the shore. Sloane swore and jumped aside. I vaulted over a fallen log and came down hard, using the momentum of my weight to stab a knife into the basilisk’s tail. The blade slid through scales, pinning the basilisk to the ground. It thrashed, shrieking and spitting.
    Saliva seared through the side of my sleeve, and I yanked my shirt off before it could burn through my skin. One of Justine’s bullets tore through the basilisk’s left wing. As it screamed, I tossed my shirt at Sloane. She caught it, then dropped it over the reptilian eyes, shielding us. I pulled the knife free. Green blood oozed, corroding the steel handle. I dropped it before it could hurt me.
    The basilisk, momentarily blinded and maddened with pain, slid forward to get away from Tobias’s staff and Justine’s sword. It glided into the water, sinking quickly until there were only ripples left. We hadn’t killed it, but at least it wouldn’t be coming after us again tonight.
    “Dude.” Colt rolled onto his back, wiping blood from the gash on his forearm. “I totally had him.”

Chapter Eight
    Kia
    If I thought fixing one little faucet and classical piano music were going to change Ethan’s mercurial attitude, I was dead wrong.
    I saw him at his locker with Justin, two handsome seniors everyone couldn’t help but stare at. I caught his eye when I passed by and smiled. “Hey, Ethan.”
    He nodded in that annoying way guys did, that lazy, arrogant half lift of the chin. Like I wasn’t good enough for a full nod, or like he couldn’t remember my name. Then he shut his locker door and left without a single word. I’d been an idiot to think I’d seen another side of him.
    Justine, sadly, didn’t leave with him. She laughed at me from her own locker, a few feet down. I could smell her perfume even from here, cloying and flowery. “God, stop throwing yourself at him. You’re embarrassing yourself.”
    It wasn’t only my palms that burned that time, but the soles of my feet. The smell of burning dust hung in the air. I was too afraid to look down to see if my shoes were melting.
    Justine