The Dragon's Egg (Dragonfall Book 1) by David A. Wells

Author:David A. Wells [Wells, David A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Alexander Publishing
Published: 2015-08-30T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter 20

Ben woke to a commotion sometime during the night and saw light flickering across the walls of the room. He could hear Frank and Cyril whispering intensely.

“I told you no fire,” Cyril said.

“It was my watch,” Frank said. “I was cold … and I’m tired of you telling me what to do.”

“You jeopardize us all.”

“Bullshit,” Frank said, his voice rising. “Go back to sleep, old man.”

Hound and John woke up as well.

They all froze at the sound of footsteps upstairs. Not those of a man, but of a barefoot child running across the floor.

“What was that?” Imogen whispered.

No one responded, everyone holding still, straining to hear whatever came next.

Laughter echoed down the staircase, a child playing.

“I thought you checked upstairs,” Frank said to John.

“I did,” John said, pulling on his boots.

“Sounds like you missed a kid,” Frank said, turning toward the stairs.

“That’s no child,” Cyril said, stopping Frank with a hand on his arm and a warning in his eyes.

Frank took in Cyril’s expression with a glance and looked back to the staircase. Footsteps started down the stairs, boards creaking under bare little feet, slowly, tentatively, as if a child were sneaking up on someone in a game of hide-and-seek. Then, in the space of one step, the sound changed into heavy boots bounding down toward them. All eyes were on the landing. Three rushed steps later, the sound transformed into a howl of such inhuman anguish that Ben felt his blood freeze in his veins.

A shadowy apparition hurtled down the stairs, indistinct in form and inky black. It crashed into the wall at the landing, its entire smoky substance exploding like a hurled ball of tar, but then coming back together just as quickly and coalescing into something that could not be. A creature of darkness. It had no eyes or mouth, no claws or fangs, but it radiated malice and fear. The wall where it had hit was scorched and smoldering.

While all eyes were on the beast, the front door burst open with such force that the top hinge broke free, the door slamming against the wall with a crash and coming to rest at a sickly angle. The thing in the landing spun in a ball of blackness, tentacles whipping out a few feet every now and then, leaving black scars on the surfaces they touched.

Ben felt visceral fear well up within him with such intensity and gibbering madness that he nearly lost all sense of himself and bolted for the door.

Imogen screamed.

Standing in the threshold of the front door was another beast, this one seven feet tall and looking for all the world like Satan himself. Reddish-black skin, chiseled muscles, horns sprouting from his forehead, a barbed tail, and hateful glowing red eyes.

“Hold!” Cyril shouted.

Frank cried out in terror and ran. Somewhere in the distance, Ben heard the back door burst open as Frank fled into the night. Then he realized that he was up and holding his sword, facing the twin beasts with Homer growling at his side.

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