Starling Read Online Free PDF Page B

lines of his face were drawn with exhaustion, and the long columns of muscle down the sides of his neck stood out like cords. Mason could see the pulse beating just below his jaw, but she couldn’t hear his heart now. The sound had faded, along with the feeling of electricity in the air. Outside, in the far distance, she heard a rumble of thunder. Maybe the storm—and all its horrors—was moving away.
    “Has anybody got any water?” Fennrys asked, climbing to his feet.
    “Yeah.” Mason dug out her water bottle and started toward Calum with it. “Here …”
    Fennrys intercepted the bottle and twisted off the top. “Not for him. For me.” He threw back his head and swallowed the contents in one long gulp.
    “Uh. Yeah.” Mason took back the empty bottle when he handed it to her. “Okay …”
    She shone the flashlight back at Calum. The telltale threads of blood poisoning seemed to be fading, even as Mason stood there looking at him. The bleeding had mostly stopped, too. Toby had folded Cal’s torn shirt into a square and beckoned Heather over to hold it against his chest. Before she did that, she stripped out of her fencing jacket, took off the tank top she wore underneath it—defiantly daring them with her gaze to stare at her in her bra—and shrugged back into her jacket. She used the thin material of the tank to press gently to the wounds on Cal’s face.
    Mason looked over at the Fennrys Wolf. “Is he …”
    “He’ll be fine, eventually. I think. Maybe not as pretty as he once was.” He staggered a few steps past Mason and stopped, bracing himself against the wall. He was almost as gray as the concrete bricks that supported him. He wiped a sleeve over his haggard face. “But then … who of us is?”

IV
     
    M ason felt odd. She wasn’t freaking out about being trapped in a cellar, and that just didn’t seem right to her. They’d been down there for almost half an hour now, sharing the darkness in an uneasy silence ever since the Fennrys Wolf had done … whatever to Cal.
    Now Mason stood behind a shelf stacked with old practice archery targets, just out of Toby’s line of sight, and listened. Heather was sitting with Cal’s head in her lap and appeared to be dozing. Cal was still unconscious. Rory had retreated to the very back of the storage cellar and was huddled against a stone wall. He was acting like a sulky kid, and considering the circumstances, it made Mason want to punch him. More than usual. Toby had drawn Fennrys away from the others to speak with him in private, but Mason’s burning curiosity got the better of her and she crept silently closer to hear what they were saying.
    “Look … Mr. Wolf, is it?” The fencing master’s rumble of a voice carried over to where Mason stood, partially hidden behind a wire shelving unit, even though he was obviously trying to be quiet.
    “No,” Fennrys said. “It’s not. It’s just … I don’t know.” From where she stood hidden, Mason saw him shrug his broad shoulders. “Just call me Fennrys.”
    “Okay. It’s … an interesting name. How do you spell that?”
    “F-e-n-n-r-y-s,” he said flatly. “I think.”
    Toby took a deep breath, and although she couldn’t see his face, Mason could picture him tugging on his goatee, trying to figure out the best way of saying what was on his mind. “All right then. Fennrys. My name’s Toby Fortier. And I’d like a few answers.”
    “I don’t have any to give you.”
    “So you said.”
    “It’s true.”
    “All right.” Toby huffed and shifted his bulk restlessly. “Look … it’s not that I don’t appreciate what you’ve done here. I mean, I’m grateful. These kids are my responsibility and, well … that’s just it.” Toby’s tone was carefully neutral, but even Mason could tell what he meant by that.
    “Right.” Fennrys laughed a little—not a happy sound. “I get it. They’re your responsibility. And you don’t trust me not to harm them any more than you