Bonds of the Vampire King (Blood Fire Saga Book 7) by Bella Klaus (reading e books .txt) 📕

I sat back, staring at footage of Kresnik’s ifrit flying through the night sky atop a phoenix. From the camera’s angle, I could only guess this came from the helicopter. Kresnik turned to the lens and bared his teeth.

If this was the only evidence of our flight across London, it might be easy enough to dismiss as the mischief of someone with too much time on their hands and a powerful computer graphics card. That night, we had stopped traffic. Practically everyone had smartphones these days. There had to be hundreds of clips taken of us from different angles.

The next cut was another helicopter shot but through the bare branches of the trees. It was of me waddling in slow motion beneath its canopy and shifting back into my red-haired self.

“Bloody hell,” I whispered.

The camera had only caught me for a millisecond and only the top of my head, but it was obvious to anyone with a pair of eyes that one, I was the same phoenix from the nighttime footage, and two, I could shift back from a fire bird to a woman.

“Sarah Thompson-Smith has come forward to identify herself as the world’s most sought-after phoenix,” said the television presenter, an Asian woman whose bright red lipstick glinted in the studio lights.

The camera pulled out, revealing a second woman with red hair in a shade too dull to be supernatural. Captions on the screen labelled her as Sarah Thompson-Smith. Pushing her chest forward, she flashed the presenter a bright smile of whitened teeth.

“Implants,” I muttered under my breath.

“Tell us about yourself,” the interviewer purred. “How long have you been a phoenix, and where did you come from?”

“It’s like you said earlier.” Sarah tossed her hair over her shoulders and flashed her too-white teeth. “Angels like me have descended from heaven.”

I shook my head from side to side, wondering if the woman was a supernatural who had dyed her hair to match my shade, or she was a human who had fallen from a great height.

The presenter turned to the audience. “Now, I know what you’re all thinking. You all want proof that Sarah really is the phoenix.”

“Too bloody right.” I folded my arms across my chest.

“What do you think?” The presenter winked at Sarah. “Could you give BBC Score and our viewers an exclusive peek of your wings?”

The camera panned out, revealing the white space on the right of the studio, where there stood a stage and a silver stripper pole.

I reared back, wondering if I’d stumbled across the British Jerry Springer.

Sarah rose from her seat and sauntered toward the stage. Beneath a strapless top, she wore a pair of booty shorts, fishnet tights, and stilettos.

Rolling my eyes, I reached for a burger and took a bite, already predicting how this would end. After a sensuous pole dance, Sarah would make some kind of excuse, saying she’d tired out her magic and would invite viewers to see her perform at whatever circus had flown into town to take advantage of the nation’s desire to meet a phoenix.

Music blared across the surround-sound speakers. Instead of heavy metal, burlesque, or something edgy, it was the kind of new age tune we’d play in the Crystal Shop’s healing rooms. I chewed on my mouthful of burger, wondering what on earth she would do next, but then she spun in a circle and transformed into a bird of fire.

The burger fell loose from my fingers, and I gaped at the replica of my phoenix.

Chapter Twelve

I stared up at the screen with my mouth gaping open and the half-eaten burger still wedged between my teeth. The phoenix continued toward the stage with her wings outstretched, curled the tip around the stripper pole, and leaned her body to the side.

Wings didn’t work like that—you couldn’t just curl their tips around a pole and expect them to support a bird’s body weight. Wings were extraordinarily long arms with fingerless hands, and instead of digits, they had a network of feathers… At least that’s what I remembered from biology classes.

After landing on her feet, the phoenix raised a clawed talon to the studio lights, rolled her feathery body, and grabbed the pole with both wing tips.

“This is bullshit.” I picked up my fallen burger and took a hefty bite.

Next, the phoenix swung herself around and around, with her legs outspread like she was doing the splits.

I shook my head and tore my gaze away from the screen. There’s no way a real bird could do that.

While the travesty of a phoenix continued her dance, I polished off the burger and bit into a scotch egg. Breadcrumbs spilled down my lips as I chewed the spicy sausage meat and glowered at the screen. Now the phoenix lay on her back, spreading her legs wide before bringing them together, crossing them and her talons toward the floor.

In some circles, I supposed that was considered attractive behavior, but my skin tightened and every nerve in my body bristled at the thought of this impersonator making me look so… No word could possibly describe how I felt about this pole dancing phoenix.

“What’s this?” a gruff voice said from the doorway.

Beowulf and Kain stepped inside, their wide eyes fixed on the television screen.

“Some silly cow went on human TV pretending to be me.”

Beowulf scratched his chin. “Now that the Mage King is missing, his people think they can get away with anything.”

“What?” I asked.

“That is a light mage.” He pointed a thick finger at the screen. “I doubt that a witch would waste the magic needed to perform such a massive glamor.”

“Of course.” I reached for a hot dog and took a large bite. “I was so busy being offended that I hadn’t worked out how she was impersonating my phoenix.”

Kain lowered himself into the seat next to mine and took a Scotch egg. “Isn’t that illegal?”

“It is,” Beowulf growled. “We made an announcement that any further breaches of the Supernatural Secrecy