Billy Purgatory and the Curse of the Satanic Five Read Online Free PDF Page A

flying cat carving on the rock before the girl. “If you take this gift, you are changed.” The woman took hold of the handle of the ax that glowed with a light all its own and twirled it over the frightened and confused girl's head. “You can never return to live with people,” the woman continued, “and you are alone unless you find more like you.”
    Imena stared at the totem gift; it was beautiful, and resembled nothing that the girl could have ever imagined on her own. It, and the woman who offered it to her, were both more fantastic than even the wildest story the Shaman had ever told around the fire.
    The woman began to move towards the trees, opposite the way Imena pushed herself into the grove.
    â€œWas it you?”
    The woman stopped before the wall of choking vines at the girl's question.
    â€œDid you take my parents?” Imena asked in a near whisper. “Are you the wind?”
    The woman didn't answer as she pushed into vine and limb. “Do you take it or do you not? Decide. You're running out of time.”
    As the woman faded, Imena's fingers wrapped around the cat cloaked in wings under the African night.
    II.
    Billy Purgatory's feet hurt. The zoo sucked, and that funky half-moon shaped mountain he was climbing in Armenia was way too high. If he hadn't have kept staring over at the ramp he was gonna fly off of, and dreaming about how he'd be the most famous skateboarder from this side of a Rhino's Uranus and back, he'd have ditched this Elder guy and run off.
    That guy, the High Elder, was having way too much fun trudging up that mountain. Billy watched the feather he had dangling offhis robes swing back and forth as he led the way for him and the rest of his culty-clique. Thank whatever that he was wearing that robe too; seeing the guy's bony ass shake around underneath it was punishment enough.
    It was on that morning, before the sun rose over the zoo-country, that Billy Purgatory realized he sacrificed a lot for his art.
    â€œWhy does it have to be so high?” Billy dug his sneakers into the rock path and kept pulling himself up.
    â€œSo you may fly.” The High Elder always had that happy squeak in his voice, like he was trying to sell someone something. He reminded Billy of that vacuum cleaner salesman that Pop kept slamming the door on. The guy always came back smiling, even after Pop shot at him with a rifle.
    â€œHow come I have to fly?” Billy was all into the idea of flying, but he didn't know why it was so important to these zoo dudes.
    â€œBecause it is prophesy.”
    â€œIs that all you got to do in the zoo? Hang out and try to fulfill your dumb… what's a prophesy anyhow?”
    â€œMy people have made predictions. You should know what prophesy is, Purgatory. You might just be the chosen one.”
    Okay, so this guy thought about people that were badass a lot — Billy wasn't gonna argue that he wasn't that. “Chosen by who?”
    The High Elder pulled himself up between two boulders. “It is difficult to explain.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œMust you ask so many questions?”
    â€œYeah, I'm a kid. That's what we do.”
    â€œPlay a game of quiet.”
    Climbing made Billy's scar ache. “Are we there yet?”
    The High Elder looked back to Billy, his crazy eyes staring down his beard at the boy. “It will be almost as satisfying if you crash into the rocks and it stops your questions.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œYou ask the universe silly things. ‘Why is it so high?’ ‘Why must I fly?’ ‘Can I have a sandwich?’”
    â€œWell, can I?”
    â€œNo. You are here for one reason and one reason only. You are to fly off this mountain, as has been predicted by the ancients.”
    â€œYou ever ask yourself if them ancients you're talking about might have just been making this stuff up?” Billy took a minute to catch his breath. “You ever heard of someone