Cry of the Taniwha Read Online Free PDF Page A

muffins before he went off to explore the local area. Matt didn’t disappoint her, eating one immediately and pocketing another before heading in the direction of the hotels surrounding Whakarewarewa.
    There were buses everywhere: monstrous things with tinted windows and buzzing air-conditioning units. The drivers clustered in groups in the shade of trees, reading newspapers and sharing the events of the day.
    Matt could see some of the tourists on open ground beyond a bridge. Every so often some of them would be lost in a cloud of steam when a nearby vent belched boiling water. He thought of walking over the bridge and joining them, until he noticed the ticket office and a sign saying it would cost twenty-five dollars.
    However, there was nothing to stop him taking some steps down to a grassed area beside the steaming stream. A track of sorts led through some bushes, and Matt found himself in a secluded place below one of the hotels. Judging by the empty bottles and cigarette butts, it was a hideaway for either the hotel workers or local kids. The tagging onthe wall indicated that it might be the latter. Matt looked for Juzza’s tag, but couldn’t see anything that might’ve started with J. Most of the tags looked fairly old, except a big one that covered most of the wall: WXK had been there recently. Matt smiled to himself. Perhaps it was Wilberforce Xavier Kristofferson, or maybe Wilhelmina Xenobia Krupt, although he suspected it would be something much more basic than that.
    A sign that said DANGER—KEEP OUT blocked a path leading down to the stream. People had walked around it so much that a new path had been formed. Matt took that path and was soon standing on a white rock surrounded by steaming water. Directly in front was a boiling, emerald-green pool with insulated pipes leading off in the direction of the hotel. The path beyond it was lost in the steam. After a bit of thought Matt took the plunge and followed it, hoping that it didn’t lead straight into something hot.
    It didn’t. Instead it led down into a quiet, bushy place beside the stream. For a moment, Matt imagined that this could have been what the world was like when it was young: steam issuing from sulphur-encrusted vents, surrounded by primitive-looking plants. He could have been back in time millions of years and been the only person alive. This image was shattered a few steps further on, however. In front of him was a sloping wall of white rock covered in graffiti.
    This time he did find Juzza’s tag. It was not one of the fancy ones. The only special feature was that the first Z was back to front so that the two of them faced each other.
    From there, Matt followed a path over a bridge and down into a flat area pockmarked with explosion craters. These were obviously dangerous, for they were fenced off. Severalhad boiling pools in the bottom, and others were venting steam.
    A group of four people was standing on the other side of the craters where the path led back into the scrub. Matt was about to move forward when he sensed something wrong with the group. He quickly backed away until he was hidden by bushes.
    It soon became plain that three big guys were picking on a boy. The boy was talking quickly in a high-pitched, frightened voice; so quickly that Matt couldn’t make out what was being said, yet it was obvious he was pleading with them. Then an extra-big bloke picked up the little guy and lifted him over the fence until he was dangling above a steaming crater. The boy screamed ‘No! No! No!’
    Another of the big guys said something, and this time the boy yelled ‘Yes! Yes!’
    Clearly that wasn’t enough, for he was lowered further into the hole. ‘Yes!’ he screamed. ‘Yes! I’ll do it.’ Only then was he lifted back onto the path, where he was dumped on the ground. They fired some more words at him, before turning around and swaggering back across the crater flat.
    Matt squeezed further into the bushes, aware all the time that