Twelfth Krampus Night Read Online Free PDF Page A

his horse fidget. “Easy, Hrolf, easy,” he whispered into Hrolf’s ear to steady him, and then to the forest, “If you were serious and a competent shot, you’d have arrowed me by now. You’re bluffing.”
    â€œI don’t use bows or arrows. Nor swords. Against you, all I need are my bare hands. And hooves.”
    â€œWhat?” Hans said, then shuddered when the spot in the trees where he’d aimed his bow roared at him. Hrolf reared, sending Hans, still holding his crossbow, tumbling over Gisela’s body and landing butt-first on the ground. Hrolf bounded for the village but had gotten not twenty feet when a large chain flew from behind tree trunks and wrapped around the horse’s neck. The wielder yanked back the chain, and the sound of the horse’s neck snapping echoed through the branches. Hrolf collapsed on his side, pinning Gisela’s lower body to the ground.
    The wielder dropped the chain. Hans saw an immense figure striding behind the trees, making its way toward the shaken knight.
    Hans aimed his bow, timed the thing’s movements and fired an arrow the moment the figure strode past an oak tree. The arrow sizzled and hit its target square.
    Hans didn’t attempt to reload. He dropped the weapon next to him and remained seated, marveling at what appeared from the woods with an arrow’s fletchings and nock jutting from a brown, hairy rib cage.
    â€œOuch,” the creature mocked.
    Now Hans knew what it meant by hooves, for it stood on two of them, the top of its head hovering eight feet above ground. The two twisted horns atop its skull made it ten feet.
    The creature plucked the arrow from its side and almost flicked it away like a used toothpick, but refrained at the last second.
    â€œI know you,” Hans said, awestruck by the thing his parents had warned him about when he was a child who had scoffed at the idea of its existence. “But it’s January. It’s over. And I’m no longer a boy.”
    The creature stood in front of Hans, resting its clawed hands on its hips, looking at the knight the way a parent might a misbehaving child.
    â€œCorrect. You’re now an unthinking yes-man. You should’ve stayed a boy. I never came for you then—you must’ve done something right. But that was long ago. Today you turn a blind eye to despicable acts perpetrated by those who employ you.”
    â€œTake the girl, she’s yours.” Hans dove back to reality.
    â€œYou don’t think I’m aware of that? It’s what I’m planning on doing to you that’s keeping me here.”
    The thing brought the arrow up to its eye level, examining it, and then looked down to the knight and grinned to reveal all of its fangs. It then held up its pointer finger, making certain Hans could see its curved talon. “I have an idea. Let’s you and I go for a walk.”
    The creature’s hand, when placed over Hans’s screaming mouth, concealed almost all of the slowly dying knight’s head, muffling his anguish. It finished with Hans and loped to the horse and used the same bloodstained fingernail to slice the rope binding Gisela. It lifted the horse by the tail and gingerly picked up Gisela, seeing what he’d expected but needing to be sure.
    â€œAnd they say I am heartless. You were lucky you were with child a month ago.” It held Gisela by her shoulder, her body dangling from its grasp like a used handkerchief. “The master frowns upon harming pregnant women.”
    It looked at Gisela’s belly. “I must show you to the master. He needs to see the frau’s handiwork. The master is not without heart either. I am certain he shall have me return you to your family.”
    It reached over its head, still holding Gisela, and lowered her body into a tall and fat barrel it had strapped to its back.
    It retrieved the chain from around Hrolf’s neck and lowered the links into the