King of Dead Things by Nevin Holness

Author:Nevin Holness
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Atheneum Books for Young Readers
Published: 2024-04-16T00:00:00+00:00

* * *

The three of them dropped underneath the window to wait, the brick cool against Eli’s back. Inside, Eli could just about make out the sounds of figures moving around. Clatters as they pulled open cupboards and tossed things aside.

Eli couldn’t focus on anything past the footsteps of the creatures inside and the harried breaths of his friends on either side of him. He tried to think about his breathing, but the worry kept distracting him, sickly and insistent. Ten minutes, he’d told Malcolm. Ten minutes, and then he was going after him.

He looked at the clock on his phone as the moments ticked by.

What if she’d already gotten to him? What if they were already too late? Nobody else was going to know Malcolm was gone. Nobody else was going to miss him. Eli, more than anyone, knew what it was like to have nobody look for you. He wasn’t going to let the same thing happen to somebody else.

Max took his hand and squeezed, and Eli forced himself to focus on that instead. On the warmth of her fingers and her chipped nail varnish, on the half-smudged ink reminders that she always jotted across her palm.

“He’s back,” Sunny said, and sure enough, there was Malcolm, all hulking six feet of him, climbing out of the basement window. He was gasping for breath and there was dirt on his cheek, but he looked unharmed.

“Thank God,” Max said, and she reached up to hug him. She was still holding Eli’s hand, and it got tangled between the crush of their bodies. Malcolm looked thrown by the sudden contact, but he reluctantly bent over to squeeze her back.

“Cutting it a bit close,” Eli said, releasing Max’s fingers to dust the gravel from his palms. His heart hadn’t stopped thundering yet. “You good?”

“Yeah. Fine,” Malcolm said. He wasn’t looking at them, though. His concentration was still on the house. “We need to go. You have the fang?”

“It’s in my bag.”

Max exhaled a breath of relief. Sunny, meanwhile, had a face like thunder. “Great, so at least if we die, it won’t be for nothing. Can we go now?”

“Yeah,” Eli said, “let’s go.”

They followed the narrow passageway along the side of the house, stepping over discarded bottles and stray bin bags, careful to keep up a quick pace. Eli felt the grind of gravel under his heels and a graze against the back of his knuckles as they brushed a wall, but he ignored it. The end of the alley was blocked by a gate. It was rusted shut, but Malcolm pushed his way to the front and kicked it, hard, with the sole of his shoe. After three attempts the door opened with a groan.

“Wait,” Sunny hissed once they were through. To their right were the steps leading up to the front door, where he could hear movement inside. Left was the first narrow pathway that they’d come from, their way back to the indoor market. They waited until the voices drifted further into the house.

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