Shadowcry Read Online Free PDF

slow, shuffling steps. It was a man, his face lit by the flames while his eyes stared hard at the ground.
    Kate stayed still.
    The man stopped, straightened his back with great effort, and raised his nose to the air. Then he turned, his bloodshot eyes suddenly looking right into hers. She ducked out of sight, pulling her coat over the lamp, her heart pounding in her chest.
    â€œHello?” the man called down the tunnel, making that one word sound dangerous and threatening. He definitely was not a neighbor.
    â€œWho’s there?” he shouted again.
    â€œKate?” Edgar called her name from the ladder, and she turned back, gesturing for him to be quiet. “What’s wrong?” he whispered.
    â€œHello?”
    Kate squeezed along the tunnel as fast as she could and pounced on Edgar, clamping a hand over his mouth. “Shut up!” she hissed, pulling him down into a crouch and blowing out the lamp. “There’s someone else down here.”
    â€œBetter come out,” came the man’s creeping voice. “Come on out, now.” A scratching sound scraped the walls: the sound of a blade being dragged slowly along uneven stones. “Yer trespassin’! You got no business bein’ in my place. Come on, now. Show yerself and yer sweet young bones. Let old Kalen pick ’em clean.”
    Kate and Edgar waited as the footsteps drew closer, trying to make themselves as small as possible in the space next to the ladder. There was nowhere to go, and smoke was seeping down through the trapdoor as the fire made quick work of the cellar.
    â€œWhere are ya, eh? Don’t think I didn’t see you up here, girly.”
    The man’s torch swelled the tunnel junction with a wash of light, and he shuffled in after it. He was dressed in the long black robes of a warden, but he looked much older than any wardens Kate had seen. His robes were shabby and worn, he had strips of rags wrapped around his feet instead of boots, and every piece of uncovered skin was streaked with pale mud, making him look grim and skeletal in the half-light.
    He raised his torch, turned a grimy dagger in his hand, and looked down the bookshop’s tunnel. Kate and Edgar stared back, not knowing what to do. The man’s light did not stretch all the way along the tunnel. Maybe the shadows would keep them safe. Kate looked up the shaft. The hatch was starting to crackle now. The fire had made its way into the hiding place and the trapdoor was smoldering, sending small sparks fizzling through cracks in the wood.
    Something snapped above them, and a handful of hot sparks rained down from the trapdoor into Edgar’s hair. Kate brushed them out before he could notice, but the edges of the door were glowing and curling in the heat. A few minutes more and they would be getting more than sparks dropping on their heads.
    The old man showed no sign of moving.
    More sparks sprinkled down. The trapdoor began to buckle.
    It was time to go.
    Kate grabbed Edgar’s arm, pulling him awkwardly behind her, and together they ran for it. The man looked up, spotted Kate’s frightened face heading his way, and grinned.
    â€œHa!” He lifted his blade, but Kate kept running. She had just one chance. Dozens of shiny beetlebacks were glistening on the floor and some were creeping their way steadily up the tunnel walls. As soon as she was close enough, Kate scraped a handful of squirming beetles from the stones and threw them into the old man’s face. He yelped with surprise, trying to scratch them off with his fingernails, and Kate collided with him, struggling to keep her balance as he fell to the floor.
    â€œKeep going!” shouted Edgar, holding her steady as they clambered out of reach of the old man’s slashing blade. A fist-sized chunk of burning wood bounced down the bookshop’s ladder, sending fiery splinters spearing toward them from the dark, and the man cried out, shielding himself from the