Chrono Spasm Read Online Free PDF Page B

a long way from his home on Monster Island.
    Jak’s nose wrinkled, his keen eyes searching the woods. The trees were sprinkled with snow, not thick but enough to line their branches, ice crystals making their leaves glisten in the faint starlight. Little patches of snow littered the ground, too, dotted here and there like some unfinished mosaic, the green shoots of grass clumping between the tiny oases of white.
    Jak said nothing, merely gestured to Ricky to indicate that they would keep searching. He hurried on, weaving swiftly between the trees, the Latino youth following in his wake. The smell was getting stronger, a smell like raw meat.
    The trees were less dense here, and Jak could see now almost the whole way down the slope on the opposite side to the path they had taken to reach the copse. Down there, where the ground leveled off, he saw a dark shape splayed across the snow. It looked like a snow angel.
    Jak stopped suddenly, motioning with one hand for Ricky to do the same. “There,” he said, pointing to the snow angel.
    “What is it?” Ricky whispered, narrowing his eyes to see. His hand was automatically reaching for his Webley Mk VI revolver, instinct kicking in.
    Jak glanced at the boy’s hand and shook his head. Not yet. He didn’t want any shooting unless necessary, bad enough they had had to chill the two mutie riders at the redoubt’s doors. Why draw more attention unnecessarily?
    Jak held his hand up, his pale flesh ghostly in the faint glimmer of distant stars. He motioned toward a snow-sprinkled ridge that ran down between the trees. The ridge was shallow enough to climb down. “Safe way.”
    Ricky nodded, following Jak down the slope, his hand still close to the butt of his holstered revolver. In silence, they hurried down the slope, ever alert to the presence of other people or wild animals.
    There was a subtle change in the acoustics at the bottom of the slope, one that Ricky noted just momentarily, while Jak seemed much more concerned with it. The snow was light in the air, but it was enough to muffle noise, sufficient that they might be crept up on without noticing.
    “Careful,” Jak warned his companion.
    Ricky nodded, and then Jak was away, legs and arms pumping as he darted out beyond the edge of the line of trees, keeping his body low as he sprinted to the figure lying in the distance. Ricky followed, his heart pounding at his chest as he hurried to keep up. Ahead of him, Jak was a white blur, the blush of snow across his shoulders and back.
    The two stopped. It was a man, naked and nailed down with his stomach opened to the elements. The flesh of his stomach had been pinned back, trails of guts and intestines pulled out from it in bloody coils that turned the snow red.
    Ricky gulped, tamping down his urge to throw up. “Who would do this?” he whispered.
    The man’s eyes flickered at the noise. He was alive.
    “Help me,” the man croaked.
    Ricky stepped forward, but Jak stopped him with a gesture. There was something else there, Jak realized, something watching them.
    He turned, scanning the snow-spattered trees and bushes, their outlines barely visible in the starlight. And there, prowling among the bushes, was a white-furred mutie wolf, its massive head low to the ground, snout twitching as it sniffed at the air. It, too, had scented the blood and been drawn to it.
    The wolf looked up, twin tusks jutting sharply from its bottom jaw, its pale eyes fixing on Jak’s. The albino watched as the wolf’s nose twitched again and its black lips curled back to reveal a fearsome set of teeth. Then it charged them.
    * * *
    W ITHIN THE COPSE , Krysty spoke gently with Nyarla in a quiet voice while Ryan conferred with the other members of his crew.
    “Must have come from somewhere,” Ryan said quietly. “She isn’t dressed for this climate.”
    “What language is she speaking?” J.B. asked. “It didn’t sound completely like English to me.”
    “She’s using English words,” Ryan