Total pages in book: 155
Estimated words: 142916 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 715(@200wpm)___ 572(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142916 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 715(@200wpm)___ 572(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
When Benedek looked through the eyes of the frog, he saw exactly what the vampire intended. He was in the Amazon rainforest surrounded by enemies. He was that little frog tempted to leap into the pitcher plant or find the flowers promising food but giving death. Benedek refused to be fooled. He looked with the eyes of a hunter—a predator.
He found a large-leaf elephant plant close to the tree, one he knew wasn’t poisonous. He quickly scanned for any predators that would harm his little frog before taking control and making the leap onto one of the giant leaves extending toward the kapok tree.
He went still, knowing patience often determined the winner. He didn’t allow the fact that the night was slipping away and hunted and hunter would have to go to ground to rush him. When he rose, Emil might very well escape their net. He had to be found and destroyed this night.
Wind swept through the canopy, rocking the branches and shaking leaves. Foliage swayed under the assault. A sliver of moonlight found its way through the heavy canopy and shroud of fog to illuminate the kapok tree. The illusion shimmered and faded. Benedek made out the ancient oak hidden behind the larger tree.
The oak stood as it had for hundreds of years, weathering every storm, giving refuge to birds and reptiles. Hidden within the crevices and knots had been the homes of countless creatures. Several long crevices held the golden sap that fed so many insects, including the moth. Several buzzed around the pencil-thin streams.
Ignoring the illusion that shimmered over the top of reality, Benedek kept his gaze fixed on the moths. He was forced to look with enhanced vision, as the wind carried rolling dark clouds across the moon and came and went capriciously, often obscuring light. The fog swirled around the kapok tree, distorting the vision and shadowing the oak tree.
It took close to ten minutes of patient observation before he pinpointed the one moth that didn’t behave as the others. Not once did it go near the enticing sap. It was a little larger than the other moths. Moths had scales, and this particular moth’s scales looked slightly different from the others’. Benedek had no doubt that those scales were armor. The abdomen was black and the six legs were ringed in black. The proboscis, on examination, looked as though it was stained with blood, not sap.
The moth suddenly flew straight at the oak tree, impaling a raccoon as it stuck its head out of a knot on the tree. The raccoon shrieked and tried to duck back inside the hollowed-out hole. The moth fluttered its wings, unmoved by the thrashing and flailing arms as the raccoon tried to bat the attacker off him.
Benedek used the frog to leap past the illusion of the kapok tree to land next to the oak tree. He shifted as he landed, his fist closing around the moth, ripping it from the raccoon’s head and crushing it. As he did, vines from the kapok tree whipped around his body, thick, muscular, not woody. Without looking, he knew it wasn’t natural vines wrapping him from head to toe, it was a giant green anaconda. The animal was enormous and incredibly strong. She had to be a good twenty feet or more and very heavy. She wrapped him up quickly, expertly, ripping him away from the oak tree to take him to the ground.
Benedek kept his fist tight around the moth, crushing it even though he was no longer able to see. The green anaconda was constricting his entire body, including his head. He tried shifting. It was impossible. Next, he tried changing the composition of the snake to render it harmless.
Normally, he could easily deal with a snake by changing its composition, but it seemed to have safeguards woven into or around the scales. Without warning, the snake bit down on his fist, sinking teeth into his hand. The snake had recurved teeth, sharp enough to pierce right through his palm and the back of his hand. The anaconda wasn’t venomous, but it didn’t need to be. Emil had ensured its teeth cut like a saw even though they were still backward.
Benedek forced his hand deeper into the mouth of the snake to get past the teeth. If he called down a rider for help, that would create a gap Emil might use to escape. The moth was still, but he knew the vampire was alive.
Szelem, are you able to break free? His one ally was embedded in the earth. He knew it would take time to free the dragon from the soil if he chose to come to his aid. It was one thing to give advice; it was another to be disturbed from a resting place you’d chosen to live out your remaining days.