Branded by Joseph Humphrey

Author:Joseph Humphrey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Intrepid Pen Publishing, L.L.C.
Published: 2021-09-15T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 78

Henry moaned and cracked open an eye. His vision was bleary.

A blue candle burned faint light next to him. It looked new. No wax had melted, no wick was exposed.

Must not have slept too long.

He rolled his head. Charley sat in a kitchen chair on the other side of the bed, slumped over, asleep. A novel was in her lap called Mildred the Magnificent, a tale about a talking rabbit and her adventures on her motorcycle.

“Henry?” She startled awake and knocked the book to the floor. “Henry! Are you awake?”

“Ugh. I think so.”

“He’s awake!” Charley turned her head and called through the open door.

“Charley, not so loud, I just woke—”

He was interrupted by a thunderous flurry of footsteps. He tried sitting up as Dawn ran into the room.

“Henry!” Dawn cried.

She bowled him over with her embrace and wept and buried her face in his hair, kissing him and smelling his own unique smell.

“Hey, Mom. Is everything okay?”

Thom followed through the door.

“Henry!” He threw his arms around the two of them. “How are you feeling?”

Henry lifted his arms out of the embrace and above his head for a large, long stretch. Stretching felt pretty good. Actually, overall he felt pretty good.

“Better.”

The large discoloration was a permanent, intense navy color under his skin that burrowed up to his elbow. His arm looked like he had submerged it in a giant vat of indigo ink that splashed up his skin.

He flexed his fingers. They felt normal.

The normalcy surprised him. “It doesn’t hurt at all.”

“I’m just so happy that you finally woke up,” Dawn said.

“Wait, what do you mean?”

“Henry,” Thom said, “you’ve been asleep for four days.”

That surprised him more.

“Four days?”

“We debated if we should stay here or try to take you somewhere else,” Thom said. “It seemed like you were safest here. With your mother.”

“We didn’t know if you would ever wake up,” Dawn said. She pulled him close again.

Four days. That explained why his stomach roared inside.

“What happened?”

Charley smiled. “There’s a lot to tell you.”

“Now that Henry’s awake,” Thom said, “we’ll leave at sunrise. Every night, I feel the hot, dry breath of the Nekura down my neck. They are close. But tonight we celebrate! And I’ve got just the thing.”

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.