Black Frost Read Online Free PDF

steel
and glass embrace.
    I stepped out the door, took a quick glance
at the muddy ground and reached back into the shop for my walking
stick. About five feet of straight Ash, smoothed, sanded and oiled,
tipped on the business end with a steel spike for traction and
wound with baling wire to keep the end from splitting.
    “Come on Charm! Let’s make the rounds,” I
said.
    We walked out to the driveway, turned left
and walked the road till we got to the property line. A well worn
trail led along a row of posted signs, taking us back down the side
of our land. About two thirds of the way along that leg of the
property, the trail split left, leading up Bear Mountain, or
continuing straight into the pine forest at the back of the
property. I had intended to head back to the top of the mountain to
look at the possum remains, but for some reason my feet headed
straight. Charm didn’t care either way, running just ahead to sniff
interesting spots on the trail. A chill drizzle kept a steady mist
hanging in the air, forming larger drops of water on the tree limbs
overhead. Those fat drips found my head and neck with steady
precision, finally forcing me to pull up the hood of my
raincoat.
    The maple and oak that forest the front of
our land gave way to a stand of white pine, whose moisture laden
boughs darkened the surrounding forest into a strangely forbidding
place. I shuddered, maybe from the cold water on the back of my
neck, maybe from a sense of foreboding that suddenly stole over me.
The familiar woods seemed hostile and bleak this morning. We
trudged on, but I noticed Charm hanging nearer to me than
usual.
    On the back corner of the property, the trail
hooks left in a sharp curve around an ancient pine whose thick
trunk was scarred on one side by a decades past lightening strike.
Charm was now at my side, her ears pricked forward, eyes focused
ahead. I became aware of thudding sounds, dull and erratic. This
part of our land was thickly covered in moss and sounds are
deadened both on the ground and in the canopy. The hair on my neck
went up and I tried to think what could be making those thuds. The
possibility of a bear headed to hibernation occurred to me and I
gripped my staff tightly as we edged around the giant pine.
    What I saw was crazy, so crazy that I
paused in shock to try and comprehend.
    A tall man, dressed in black, was fighting
with three squat shapes that looked like nothing I had ever seen
before. Odd details struck me as I struggled with what I was
seeing. The man had long white hair bound in ponytail and he was
swinging a black stick or maybe a blade, in fast blurring arcs as
he moved in a continuous graceful dance. The things he
fought with were green, slick looking, with long muscular arms,
corded squat torsos and short thick legs. They moved faster than
anything had a right to, but their attacks always seemed to be
where the man had just been, off by mere inches. The whole fight
was only twenty feet away, the thuds being the occasional landing
of a beefy body just missing its target. A single green head
swiveled our way and I froze at the slitted snake-like eye that
glared from a nightmare skull composed mostly of jaws and teeth.
The creature turned back to the fight, dismissing us, but the man
had noticed its distraction and glanced toward us. His momentary
lapse of attention almost cost him his life. The instant his back
turned, one of the sinewy monsters leapt at it, one long arm tipped
with glittering claws swiping at his neck. He spun and thrust,
scoring a hit with his odd weapon that I couldn’t seem to
identify.
    But that change in the rhythm of the battle
put him in a seriously bad place. The one that had glanced at us,
leapt forward, its timing perfect to finish the fight…except for
the sudden stab of my steel tipped walking stick into its
grotesquely muscled back. I don’t recall deciding to move, I just
did, my arm going numb from the shock of hitting what felt like a
rubber-covered rock. My