A Day Of Faces Read Online Free PDF

and she sprawled onto the wet kitchen floor with a scream, limbs flying out in odd directions. There she lay, amongst the broken crockery and glass.
    “You son of a bitch,” I said, the words tumbling out unbidden. I darted across the kitchen, moving like only squamata can do, and was on him in a heartbeat, pinning him against the counter. 9 “You’ll never hurt her again, you hear?” I pulled my lips back, revealing my fangs, sharp and long and eager.
    Then I paused. Which was all he needed.
    He threw me off and back across the room. Roaring to his feet, he shouted “what were you going to do? Kill your old man? Don’t be ridiculous.”
    I’d landed on my feet, instinct kicking in. “You need to leave,” I said. “Tonight.”
    There was an unfamiliar flicker across his face. He actually looked hurt, just for a moment. His mouth opened and closed a few times, but no words came out.
    That was when the outer door splintered apart, wood and glass flying into the room, and Cal dived in, crunching into my dad and sending the both of them skidding all the way to the opposite wall.
    My dad swore and rolled away, jumping up and running back to the worktop, where he pulled a large knife from the block and held it out in front, waving it back and forth. He didn’t even say anything to Cal, but dived towards him, knife poised. At the last step he slipped on water, spilt from a broken jug, and tumbled forwards, flailing wildly.
    The knife embedded itself harmlessly in the wall, half a foot from where Cal lay crumpled on the floor as my father piled on top of him. They both cried out, my father a strange whispering wheeze and Cal a surprised, horrified squeal of sorts.
    Cal was trying to get up but my father was weighing him down, even though he was no longer fighting or moving.
    Something had happened.
    I rushed over and took hold of my father’s shoulders, pulling him backwards. There was an odd resistance, then a sucking pop as he fell onto his back.
    Two large, gored holes were in his chest. Actual holes, where I could see though to blood and muscle and bone. Cal lay against the wall, freaking out, his month-old horns covered with blood, which was dripping down and onto his face.
    I crouched by my dad. He was still alive, though not for much longer. His breathing was ragged. “I thought—” he gasped, scrabbling to hold my hand. “I thought—he was attacking you—”
    Then he died.

Interlude #1
     
    The coffee machine never worked. That was the one constant of working at Applied Dynamics, and Wynton Simons needed a coffee. The baby had kept him up half the night again and he’d needed to get in to work early, which had meant setting the alarms for five in the morning. He wasn’t one to complain, but everybody had a threshold and his wasn’t far away.
    “Just have the instant stuff,” said Janice, spooning endless sugars into her tea.
    “I’d rather not have anything,” Wynton said.
    “Well, then,” said Janice, pushing her glasses up her nose as she tended to do when making a point.
    Wynton made his way sluggishly from the canteen and down the corridors towards his office. The one he shared with five other men, of varying odours. It was a grey, overcast day outside, with rain on the horizon, making the building seem even more dour than usual. It was times like this that he started thinking about looking through the job supplements and updating his online work profile. But he already knew that he’d be too tired to do anything productive by the time he got home.
    Derek emerged from the gents, tapping away happily on his tablet. Probably hadn’t washed his hands. Or even stopped using it while he went. He glanced up, saw Wynton, and reluctantly tucked the tablet into the back pocket of his jeans.
    “Alright, Wynton?”
    Wynton managed a shrug. “Didn’t get much sleep. Baby being a baby.”
    “How dare it.”
    “Right,” Wynton said, “what’s that about? Outrageous.”
    “You see the