Savage Read Online Free PDF Page B

underbrush and skittered around her feet, nearly tripping her. Her eyes and nose were running and she hacked on smoke as it curled around the two of them like a shroud. Directly overhead, the treetops waved as if in a storm. She flew behind Magus like a kite, her feet skimming the ground as he hustled her out of the forest and into a meadow where a shiny black truck was parked.
    The doors were unlocked. There was a crash behind her and another evil-sounding roar; then she was almost magically in a truck and Magus was behind the wheel, peeling out of there.
    She wheeled around and peered through the small rear window in the cab. A black shadow entirely filled the space. She was thrown sideways as Magus careened around a tree, and then they shot out of the woods onto a one-lane asphalt road. He was going over a hundred miles an hour.
    She looked back through the window.
    The shadow was gone.
    His foot was to the floor as the engine whined. Katelyn held her breath and gripped the armrest. The view to her right was of a massive fire igniting towering trees one by one, as if a giant held an enormous match to each in turn. Smoke poured out of the woods onto the road like a layer of fog, billowing and pluming as the truck ran through it.
    Katelyn had no idea how much time passed, but after a while, again as if by mutual consent, she and Magus both slumped back against the seats and sighed with relief. She detected something hard in the pocket of her jeans and pulled out her phone. It was on, and she checked to see who had called her while it had been in Cordelia’s possession.
    She expected it to be Trick, but it was a Los Angeles number. It took her a moment to realize that Detective Cranston, the lead detective on her father’s murder case, had called her and left a message. She slid a glance toward Magus and put it back in her pocket.
    “You didn’t need to kill that guy,” she began.
    “You’re welcome,” he retorted. “But really, Katelyn, there is no need to thank me for saving your life.”
    “He was no danger to me.”
    “We don’t know that.”
    “We,” she said. “Your pack. The Hounds of God.”
    He opened his mouth to speak, then pursed his lips and downshifted. Irritation flashed over his features.
    “Did I insult you?” she asked.
    “No. I had something for you. I lost it in the forest.”
    She remembered his outstretched fist. “What?”
    “It doesn’t matter now. And the Hounds of God are more than just a pack,” he said. “We’re an order of werewolves. We have a mission. A divine mission.”
    “To go down into hell and kill demons,” she filled in. “But why doesn’t it matter?”
    He lifted his gaze from the windshield and cocked an eyebrow. “To kill demons wherever we may find them.”
    She went cold. Was he referring to her? Was this a trap? She was unarmed.
    But not helpless , she reminded herself. I can kick his ass .
    “Do you think the Hellhound is a demon?” she asked him.
    To her surprise, a sour smile played across his lips. Covered with tattoos, he looked like a demon himself.
    “Wiser men than I don’t know the answer to that,” he said. “We have endless debates about it. Some religious groups argue about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. We argue about the place of the Hellhound in our world.”
    “Do you know who it is? Is it a person at all?” she asked.
    He didn’t answer immediately. Then he said, slowly, “In the sense that our founder was once a person. Thiess, tortured by the Inquisition in Livonia in 1691. He explained to them that God had changed him into a werewolf to go down into hell to vanquish wickedness, but they found him guilty of black magic. To us, however, he is a martyr. A holy man.”
    “How? How do you go down into hell?” she asked him.
    “In visions and rituals. We use good magic, what you might call ‘white.’ Our present leader, Daniel, entered into a trance and witnessed the carnage between the Fenners and the