Malevolent (The Puzzle Box Series Book 1) Read Online Free PDF Page A

would find.
    The puzzle box was gone.
    I fought the urge to roar aloud. I would cut pieces off him until he told me where it was. And what if he opened it?
    The hate soured into fear. For a second my limbs actually shook. I leaned on the trunk and tried to steady myself. The watery sunlight went bright and hot, and burned the back of my neck.
    My bees sang around me. "Mal, what is it? What's wrong?"
    I sat beside Queen Elizabeth's hive and leaned my forehead against the wood. "Robert has taken the box. I fear he may open it."
    Or destroy it. Revenge for my attack on him earlier. More and more, I regretted revealing myself in such an aggressive way.
    I explained this to the bees, who hummed their sympathy.
    Queen Mary's hive said, "We sensed his presence, but we could not attack him. The cold hinders us."
    "Yes," sang the other hives. "We will do what we can to help, Mal. Even if all we do is watch."
    Their kindness comforted me, easing the tension inside. "Thank you, my friends. Tomorrow may be warmer, and if so, I shall need your help locating the puzzle box."
    "The box, the box," they whispered.
    I opened the trunk again, and produced a jar of sticky honeycomb. I pulled out a comb and chewed it, savoring the sweetness of the honey mingled with the pungent taste of the wax. Slowly the blackness inside me lightened. The rage faded. Once more I was human, not a being of every negative emotion. I spoke to God as I calmed, asking for His direction.
    Robert could not destroy my box. Everything about it repulsed his kind, and many other magical creatures besides. He would have to hide it somewhere, or pass it to an untainted human. I could sense its location most clearly at midnight, when the entire bulk of the Earth lay between me and the sun. I would wait and seek it then.
    I had rented a small motor home for the California trip. It was parked outside the orchards on a small access road. I opened its door and climbed inside.
    The interior of a motor home smells unique, and I've never been able to decide why. The upholstery? The plastic furnishings? A faint smell of septic tank? Old cigarettes?
    Either way, it was shelter. I lay on the foam mattress and attempted to sleep. But my kind does not sleep easily, especially in the darkness. The honey I had eaten swirled its healing power into my bloodstream, keeping my sluggish heart pumping.
    Someday my heart would stop and I would become a true monster. That was when I intended to open the puzzle box. But I was not ready to die yet. My mission was not complete. My bees must not fall into the hands of strangers.
    My bees! My one love and greatest sorrow. Colony collapse disorder had claimed half my hives the previous year. Careful as I had been, I lost them, the bees singing reassuring songs until the end. "All is well, Mal, all is well." I believed them until one day their voices fell silent.
    Scientifically, a colony collapses when a queen stops laying eggs, or a worker bee becomes fertile. But the pheromones assure the bees that everything is fine. They never know their own colony is in danger.
    But what causes it? And how to stop it? That is the question apiarists ponder across the world.
    My theories were darker than pesticides or genetically modified crops. Dark beings wielding dark magic, and the bees, servants of light, were the proverbial canaries in the coal mines--their deaths indicating an unseen danger.
    But if God saw fit to remove me from this world through death, my bees would die as well. As far as I knew, they were humanity's last hope against the coming evil.
    I rose and exited the camper. The stars informed me it was nearing midnight. I gazed at their living eyes, and my spirit thrilled. Thence came the magic, a blessing from God himself, rained down in a ceaseless shower. I closed my eyes and imagined I felt it on my skin--a faint tingle, like mist.
    As I stood there in the starlight, the puzzle box called to me. I set out at a brisk walk to find