The Haunted Earth by Dean Koontz

Author:Dean Koontz
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Published: 2009-12-27T21:16:06+00:00

Chapter Twelve

Blake had broken the collapsible shovel into two pieces, and now he used these to divert Count Slavek's attention. He threw the spade section at Slavek's face, then tossed the handle hard at his ankles. As the vampire put up his arms to ward off the blade, he stepped backwards and got his legs tangled hopelessly in the whirling handle. He cried out, stumbled clumsily to the side, fell onto his back, thoroughly confusing his fanged comrades..

Jessie turned as soon as he had thrown the second piece of shovel, not waiting to see what it would do. Without bothering to scoop up his flashlight, he leaped across the open grave, grabbed Helena's hand and started running—not in any planned direction, just away.

Brutus ran ahead of them, taking enormous strides, leading them purposefully toward the main cemetery gate. He could have headed for one of the walls and phased right through, Jessie knew, but he had chosen to stay with them. Jessie remembered that it had been the hell hound's touch which had changed him from stone to flesh in the sculpture garden at Millennium City...

The sound of wings grew behind them.

"Faster!" Jessie shouted.

Helena gripped his hand more tightly and increased her pace to match his, issuing not a word of objection.

He looked at her as they entered an open aisle where there were no granite obstacles to beware of, and he saw that she was holding up quite well. She didn't seem terrified, merely frightened, biting her lip and straining to get all the speed she could out of her fine, long legs. Then he saw the flashlight that she carried in her other hand, and he relized it was proof of his own terror that he hadn't noticed, until now, that it was on and that the bright beam danced across the earth directly in front of them, pinpointing their position for Slavek and his pack.

"Helena!" he shouted.

Still running, her breasts shoved out like twin ornaments on a new fluttercar, her yellow hair flying out behind her like a tailfin pennant, holding tightly to his hand, she glanced sideways at him.

"The flashlight!"

She didn't get what he meant.

"Throw the flashlight away!"

She held up the hand torch, slowing down and thereby forcing him to slow as well, looked wonderingly at the instrument for a moment, then realized what he meant. She pitched it away, to her right. The beam whirled crazily, a spinning yellow lance that shaved paper-thin wafers of darkness off the bulk of the night, then struck a large tombstone and shattered.

They picked up speed again, running as fast as they could, the grass treacherously damp under them.

Still, they could hear wings flapping behind them—and the shrill cries of many tiny creatures: bats.

Ahead, Brutus slowed and came to a full stop, his long tail straight up in the air, his pointed ears thrust forward, the long hair down his neck and back bristling.

In a moment, they were up with him.

"What's the matter?" Jessie asked. His heart was pounding so loudly in his own ears that he could barely hear his voice.

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