A Tithe of Blood and Ashes (The Drake Chronicles Book 7) by Alyxandra Harvey

 
    G etting up at five in the morning to sit in a cold snowplough truck was not exactly the same as still being awake because I’d been kissing Nicholas way past my curfew.
    But I wasn’t about to tell my dad that. I had an exam later this morning and I needed to study. And unfortunately, they didn’t have exams for kissing Nicholas Drake. More’s the pity. I’m pretty sure my grade point average would dramatically increase. As it was, I was bundled in the passenger seat, trying to remember the dates of when random hunters killed random vampires hundreds of years ago.
    I wondered if there’d be a bonus question on who killed whom at the Blood Moon battle back in November. Somehow, I doubted it. Once again, my vampire knowledge was wasted on the Helios-Ra.
    Dad pushed more snow along, steam rising from his travel mug of contraband coffee. His ulcers were healing, mostly because no one had tried to kill me in weeks, but Mom had already tossed out the coffee maker. Now he drove into town to a café which bartered secret coffee for free snow removal.
    Hot air blasted through the ancient heater, chasing the frost and fog off the windshield. I had about two hours before Dad dropped me off at school for my Monday morning exam since my car had broken down again. As if Monday mornings weren’t rude enough. I still boarded in the campus dorms but after the battle, Mom needed as much art therapy and family time as she claimed I did and she’d never even set foot near the battlefield. We compromised by having me spend at least a couple of weekends a month at home. I didn’t mind, especially since Nicholas wasn’t exactly welcomed on campus, curfew or not.
    It was getting better. There’ been enough blood in the snow, both human and vampire, to scare the secret Violet Hill citizens into a proper attempt at a peace treaty. It helped enormously that Solange was no longer possessed by the spirit of a batshit crazy thousand year old vampire. And that Hope, the rogue Helios-Ra hunter, was locked away. We could now all focus on keeping the Hel-Blar out of town. They were still coming down off the mountains, drawn by the remains of the battle even two months later. They were getting too close.
    Way too close.
    Dad instinctively slammed on the brakes to avoid hitting the hulking shadow in the middle of the road. The crossbow I’d put up on the dash slid into my lap as the seatbelt locked tight, digging painfully into my sternum. He thought it was a deer or a coyote.
    I knew better.
    “Hit it! Hit it!”
    “Lucky Moon , since when do ----.” His disappointed anti-violence speech cut of abruptly when the Hel-Blar lifted it head, hissing at the headlights.
    Rows of needle-sharp teeth glinted with saliva and mottled bruise-blue skin looked exactly like the dead frostbitten flesh it was. I undid my seatbelt and then clipped it back in the holder, hooking it around my feet to secure me as I stood up through the sunroof. The smell hit me first: rot and mildew and stagnant bogwater. The Hel-Blar smelled me just as strongly: warm blood and cherries and pepper, if Nicholas was to be believed.
    I lifted the crossbow, bracing myself against the roof.
    “We talked about you killing things from the truck!” Dad snapped, throwing the truck into reverse. “Sit down!”
    I nearly apologized to his ulcer, but I didn’t sit back down. If the Hel-Blar took off into the woods, it would only come back later and attack someone who didn’t know how to put it down. Hel-Blar saliva was contagious, it would turn anyone human or vampire, into a feral fetid beast.
    The truck slid sideways, the plough scraping against the icy road. But the wind was frigid and I’d fumble the bolts if I waited any longer. My fingers were already stiff. The snow thickened, until I was peering at the Hel-Blar through a veil of white. He clacked his jaws at me, but scurried to the side of the road. Dad was still backing up. I was going to lose him.
    “Not a chance, you vile