Serafina and the Twisted Staff (The Serafina Series) Read Online Free PDF Page A

not run. She could not move.
    A wave of black calm passed through her, inviting her to simply shut her eyes and let everything go. A cloud of sickening colours veiled her eyes. She could feel herself passing out. How easy it
would be to simply drift away. But a fierceness boiled in her heart.
Get up!
she told herself.
Run! Get home!
She struggled to rouse herself, to get onto her feet, to at least raise
her head.
    She opened her eyes and squinted through the blood. The terrain on this side of the river was low and gentle, dotted with ferns and birch trees, so different from the rocky cliffs that she had
left behind on the other side. She saw a light coming towards her in the darkness. At first she thought it must be a twinkling star, for the sky was clear, but it wasn’t one light. It was
many lights.
    She felt her chest trying helplessly to suck in air in anticipation of an attack, but even in the haze of her fear she hoped that it might be a torch or lantern, her pa coming in search of her
like he had once before.
    But then she saw that the lights weren’t the flickering flames of a lantern, but the scintillating dance of living creatures floating in the air and coming towards her down the river.
    Are they fireflies?
she wondered as they came closer.
    But these were much larger and bright green in colour, their wings slowly flashing white and green, white and green, as they flew, like the wings of luminescent butterflies.
    But they’re not butterflies, either
, she thought with a smile.
They’re luna moths.
    It was an entire eclipse of moths, each one pale green in colour and glowing in the moonlight, hundreds of them flying together down the length of the river, their long tails streaming behind
their silent, gently fluttering wings.
    She had found her first luna moth in Biltmore’s gardens one midsummer’s night when she was a little girl. She remembered the moth’s almost magical glow in the starlit darkness
as she held it in her open hand, its wings moving gently up and down. But it was strange to see so many of them travelling together. Was she imagining this? Was this how death came? A distant
memory from the midnights of her past?
    But, as she watched the luna moths flying over the water, it struck her again that they weren’t just hovering. They were travelling down the length of the stream, as if they would follow
this river to the one that it flowed into, and then onward to the next river, and the next, through the mountains, and all the way to the sea. They were leaving this place. Just like the birds.
    She heard the wolfhounds barking and howling to each other on the cliff on the other side of the river. They were coming.
    As the last of the luna moths disappeared, she tried to push herself up onto her weakened arms, but she didn’t have the strength. She tried to get her legs underneath her, but she
couldn’t.
    But she’d seen the luna moths for a reason. She was sure of it.
    She looked around for a place to take cover and noticed a grove of birch trees just a few feet away. As she tried to figure out how she was going to reach the trees, she saw a pair of eyes
glinting in the darkness.
    The eyes were keeping their distance, studying her.
    Serafina held the eyes in her gaze and breathed as steadily as she could.
    At first, she thought she had misjudged the position of the wolfhounds, that they had already crossed the river and were now surrounding her. But these weren’t the searing black eyes of
the wolfhounds. The eyes were golden brown.
    A flood of relief flowed into her.
    She knew who it must be.
    ‘I need your help,’ she whispered.
    But what emerged from the forest jolted her with a shock of fear. A mountain lion she had never seen before came straight at her. He was a young lion, with dark fur, but he looked strong,
unafraid and hungry. He was not at all the creature she was expecting.
    Serafina tried to get up to defend herself, but it was no use. The beast could easily kill