King Of Flames (The Masks of Under Book 1) by Kathryn Ann Kingsley

Author:Kathryn Ann Kingsley [Kingsley, Kathryn Ann]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Limitless Publishing, LLC
Published: 2019-03-04T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nine

Everything was a flurry of motion.

As it turned out, groups of people didn’t like to be abducted, herded into a room, left in the dark about what was happening, and then rounded up like cattle. They kinda took offense to that and didn’t react too politely about the whole scenario.

Figures in white filed into the room, led by a painfully thin old woman in a birdlike white half mask. Behind them came a small horde of…oh. Those would be the Hounds, then. Lydia had yet to see any of them herself, but judging by Gary’s and Nick’s reactions, that was what they were. The monsters walked on all fours, backs hunched and covered in damp, scraggly fur. They had odd, bone-like faces with teeth that were far too long for their jaws. On one side of their faces, they had four eyes, and on the other, only two.

They were snapping their massive jaws in excitement, almost chittering them together in rapid succession. It made a horrible clicking noise as they chattered.

The monsters of Under had come prepared for a reluctant bunch of prisoners. The Hounds were moving around the edges of the rooms, climbing over the rocks and up onto the walls, clinging to the stone surfaces as though they had every business in the world defying gravity as they were currently doing.

They almost looked like vultures with their bald heads and what looked like fur, or feathers, bushing out from their shoulders and down their hunched bodies. After a moment, it became clear what they were trying to do. The Hounds were circling the room then moving inward—herding them all into the center.

Kaori was weeping quietly, still huddling against Nick like she had known him all her life. Nick was holding her, trying to console the woman as they were pushed away from the walls by the monsters pushing them toward each other to avoid the beasts.

Gary was holding onto Lydia’s arm like a kid in a haunted house.

“Where are they taking us?” Nick asked her. Any annoyance he had in Lydia’s direction was gone the moment a real threat appeared.

The monsters were starting to push them closer to the door, getting them together and ensuring there were no strays. They were dogs herding sheep.

“This world collects people,” she tried to sum up quietly. “They can turn us into monsters like them. They’re going to add us to their ranks,” she said, realizing she didn’t have an excellent understanding of it either. Just what she’d briefly been told by Lyon and Tim, for what good it had done. She had answers, but she was trapped here with them all the same.

“It is time!” the woman in the bird mask announced, gesturing broadly with her thin, frail hands. The robes hung loosely off her skeletal frame. Seeing her up close, the woman’s face was cracked and wrinkled. “We will now welcome you all to our world. We will welcome you all home.”

Lydia was sure she was trying to sound reassuring.

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