Vampire Island Read Online Free

get the hang of a graceful landing. Flying foxes—now those are some elegant pilots. But not fruits.”
    Hudson shrugged. His claws gripped the branch and he arced to dangle upside down by his knees. As he gave a good post-flight stretch to his muscles, he noticed it.
    “What’s that weird smell?”
    “Pesticide,” Orville answered. “They sprayed this morning. Got so warm this month that a few of the hatching cycles have started early, and the young weevils and caterpillars are chewing the seedlings and spruce buds.” A peppered moth sputtered by. Orville looked as if he might lunge for it, but at the last moment let it pass.
    Hudson kept quiet. In his nearly four hundred years of existence in worlds both Old and New, he had come to appreciate the value of listening. Something big was on Orville’s mind. Still, he wasn’t prepared to hear the hybrid speak the following words. “Fly with me? I’d like to show you something.”
    “Okay.”
    More than okay! Thrilling! Hudson rarely shared flights with Orville, who took his time warming up, cracking his neck and rolling his brittle shoulders. The few times they had flown together, the older creature had led Hudson into wild parts of a natural world Hudson had never seen.
    “Stay close,” instructed the older bat, and so Hudson hovered on his side as they coasted. Orville acted as tour guide, but sometimes was silent, allowing Hudson to enjoy the night. He inhaled pine and cedar, spied raccoons and porcupines, and followed the bridges and trestles. He let his eye trace the horizons of rock ruins and ravines. Close by, he could hear Orville identify the name of every shrub, possum, cricket, and bird’s nest.
    Deeper into the woods, Hudson picked up different energy. A whoosh of one creature, then another, flying past. The touch of a wing against his cheek stood Hudson’s hair on end.
    The night was not as serene as he’d thought. And a lot more crowded.
    “Who are they?” Hudson gasped when he and Orville finally circled back and returned to the branch. He could feel his fruit-fortified blood pounding.
    “You think you’re the only hybrid in this wood?” Orville snorted, then made a point of landing with expert grace.
    “Except for you, kind of, yes,” Hudson answered truthfully. “Are there many of us?”
    “Hard to say. Just like us, they keep themselves hidden,” Orville answered. “They bother no one, and nobody bothers them. Young Hudson, I think the time has come for you to sharpen your senses. For example, how would you describe this night?”
    Hudson sensed it was the wrong answer when he said, “Great?”
    The older bat tipped his head. “What else?”
    “Uh…fast, chill—”
    “Chill!” Orville hopped. “Chilly, exactly. But not frosty. And what month is it?”
    “January.” Hudson was perplexed. He’d meant chill as another word for “great.” Kids at school were always using that word. Hudson was proud when he picked up on slang—usually he hardly ever noticed it.
    Orville sighed. “Did you know that our globe is heating up because humans use too much energy? Excess gases become trapped in the atmosphere. The trapped gases are overheating the planet. They melt our glaciers and confuse our forests. Our entire ecosystem is getting sick.”
    “We’re studying the solar system right now,” said Hudson primly. “The ecosystem isn’t until April.” He didn’t like to be ignorant, and he had not known about the trapped gases. So it seemed important to explain why.
    Orville’s eyes were hard as a burnt match. “You are special, Hudson. You’re a pure link between the human and animal world.”
    Hudson preened. Privately, he’d always thought he was a particularly spectacular morph of bat and boy. He wished he could brag to more people about that. Or any people, come to think of it. “Thanks.”
    “That’s why it is important that you know.”
    Hudson drew sharply alert. “Know what?”
    “It might be that you have been