Shadow of Death: Book Two of the Chosen Chronicles Read Online Free PDF Page A

the work on the sword was incomplete and by the time it was done the sun was rising, making his skin prickle and forcing him to make a mad dash from the forge to the home.
    Gratefully, he accepted the hospitality of a hot shower and a bed, but sleep eluded him in the forms of two young children. Rory and Jenna, thrilled that he was staying, had jumped on him while sleep slipped its arms around him, jerking him awake to their laughter. He did not remember the last time he spent the whole day awake, but Gerry ’ s kids made it fly by.
    He had to get home. He knew he would not be able to survive Christmas Day without collapsing from exhaustion or having his hunger flare up.
    Resolved, he followed the chain-linked fence and glanced up at the ice-covered barbs. He had to be careful not to get caught on them. He was scarred enough from the damage that iron weapons and torture devices had wrought upon him. He did not know what more he could take. With that, he made sure that his feet would not slip and gracefully jumped over the barbed fence, landing in a puff of snow that cratered around him. Glancing around to see if anyone saw him, he settled the box on his back and found the train tracks.
    The snow ’ s consistency changed from loosely packed globs to smaller, ice laced ones as the wind picked up, swirling the top layers of snow into devils that danced around him. Blinking into the growing storm, he brushed his long hair from his face to no avail. The wind whipped up strands, entangling them in ice. Every time he tried to move preternaturally fast, the snowfall would become a wall, forcing him to slow down. His pace was still faster than a mortal ’ s but nowhere near what he could have managed if the weather had co-operated. At this rate it would be well after midnight when he returned.
    Flipping up the collar of his leather coat, he began the journey to the two-story flat he and Notus rented in Westminster.
    The wind whipped around him, stinging exposed pale flesh with needles of ice, forcing him to keep his head down. The train tracks, buried beneath the snow, were hardly discernible and he would have walked off of them several times had there not been guiding posts and the fences to either side. Lone iridescent lights heading poles offered scant illumination as the buzzing of       millions of snowflakes flittered around them before descending to add their small worth to the increasing girth of the white blanket.
    Each step was fraught with the potential of slipping and falling. One misplaced heel, one overzealous push off could send him into the white fluff. No matter the powers of a Chosen, they were nothing when pressed against the ravages Mother Nature presented. Still he kept going; the plodding pace in a world a-swirl in white pulled him towards the lassitude of trance. No sound abounded except what wind and snow plucked at the immobile harp of a land asleep. Despite the storm and the attention it demanded, he found his mind slipping to other things.
    Two decades had passed since the Mistress and Master recalled him back to Britain, his work complete, with the profound gratitude of the Grand Council that was formed to settle the issue of the Vampires. Settle it they did, by using him as their weapon. He was as much at fault as they, for he had given them no choice that night nearly one hundred and thirty years ago.
    Bridget and Fernando had set the stage and he and Notus had worked out the finer details. It was no longer an issue of his Destruction, it was now a matter of the survival of the Chosen, and Bridget was right, only he could tell for certain who were Chosen and who were not.
    His mind slipped to the past through a trance of snow and ice.

Chapter II
     
     
     
    H e stood outside the old abandoned theatre, wearing only a cotton shirt and black trousers in the cold wind. He refused to glance in the direction of the puddle of light spilling from the lamppost where he had discovered Jeanie ’ s corpse.