Kiera Hudson & The Adoring Artist (Kiera Hudson Series Three Book 3) (17 page)

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Authors: Tim O'Rourke

BOOK: Kiera Hudson & The Adoring Artist (Kiera Hudson Series Three Book 3)

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Chapter Three

We hadn’t gone much further when we came across an old wooden structure set back from the tracks that we had followed across the desert. It was nothing more than a small shack, with a door and window set into one side. The wind blasted sand against the small building, and it shook from side to side. It stayed standing, even though it leant to one side. It would offer us shelter for the night.

“This way,” I roared at Nik over the howl of the wind.

Nik came towards me, bent at the waist, his hands covering his eyes.

As he reached me, I yanked open the door. He followed me inside. The tiny structure rattled, its corrugated roof lifting up at one corner, then falling back into place.

“Do you think this place is going to stay upright?” Nik asked, brushing sand from his hair and the folds of his clothes.

“Dunno,” I said with a shrug of my bony shoulders. I glanced about the shack and realised what it was. It was a signal box. Along one wall was a row of levers. Above them was written the words
PUSH
and
PULL
.

Nik saw them too and crossed the signal box in one brisk stride.

“Don’t touch!” I hissed, watching him reach for one of the levers.

Nik flinched backwards at the sharpness of my tone. “Why not?” he said, glancing back at me.

“Just don’t,” I said, remembering the levers I had pushed in the other world. “It might not just be the levers you’re pushing.”

Nik looked back again at the levers, then turned away. As the wind continued to buffet against the outside of the signal box, Nik slid down against the wall and sat on the dusty floor. He drew his knees up.

Although the day had been seething hot, the night was bitterly cold. Nik pulled his coat tight about him.

“Try and get some rest,” I said, sliding down the opposite wall. “We’ll get going again at first light.” I closed my eyes.

“Jack,” Nik said.

“Yes?” I said, keeping my eyes closed.

“Do you think we could still change into wolves if we wanted to?” he asked me.

“Why would you want to?” I said, opening one eye and fixing him with a beady stare.

“It would prove if the curse really had been lifted,” he said, looking back at me, his face pale in the weak moonlight that sliced through the window.

“I don’t think being a wolf is something we can really control,” I told him, remembering how I used to be. “It wasn’t something I could switch on and off. It consumed me, Nik. Even when I didn’t look like a wolf, I felt and acted like one. Looking like a wolf doesn’t really matter – it’s what you’re feeling inside that counts.”

“And how do you feel inside?” Nik asked me.

“Confused,” I said, closing my eye again and drawing a deep breath. I felt the first twinge of pain behind my eyes. I rubbed my temples with the tips of my fingers, trying to massage the pain away. The fact that it was there at all wasn’t a good sign, I feared. But perhaps I was worrying for nothing. Maybe my head had started to hurt because I was tired.

“Confused how?” Nik came back with another question.

“Shut the fuck up!”
I suddenly burst at him.

Nik pressed himself back against the wall. I could see that my sudden burst of anger had shocked him.

“I’m sorry,” I said, seeing the concern in his eyes. “I’m just tired, that’s all.”

“Sure,” Nik said, never taking his eyes from me.

Swallowing hard, I said, “Nik, I don’t know any more than you do about this new world we’re in. And I don’t know if the curse has been lifted. I guess neither of us really know until we come into contact with others…”

“Is that why you are following the smoke?” Nik said.

“How do you mean?” I asked him.

“Because that smoke will lead us to someone – perhaps more than just one person,” Nik said.

“And if I don’t kill them within a heartbeat, then the curse must have been lifted, right?” I said, looking across the signal box at him. “I’m setting myself some kind of test?”

“Maybe,” Nik said. “Perhaps it’s a test we both need to pass. I’m a killer, too, Jack.”

“And how do you feel?” I asked, the pain fading slightly as I made small circles against my temples with my fingertips.

“Like there is something missing,” he said thoughtfully.

“The wolf you mean?” I asked.

He looked at me and said nothing. Then rolling onto his side, Nik pulled his coat up beneath his chin. “I guess we’ll soon find out,” he whispered and closed his eyes.

I was still awake at first light, propped against the wall and watching the soft rise and fall of my brother’s chest as he slept on the floor. I regretted shouting at him, but he had asked too many questions. Questions I didn’t have answers to. I wanted those answers as much as he did, but I was scared of what they might be. See, even killers get scared. But was that sudden burst of anger the wolf creeping out of the pit of my black heart and coming to the fore again? I had kept awake just in case. It was like I had been keeping watch over my soul during the night – to prevent the wolf sneaking up and taking it prisoner again. The pain in my head had gone, and was now nothing more than a dull thud at the back of my mind like another heartbeat. Two heartbeats in one body…

Shut the fuck up, Jack!
I roared inside. I couldn’t risk those crazy, paranoid thoughts taking hold of me again. Everything always seemed worse at night. It was like the blackness distorted your fears. The dark gave your worst nightmares a safe place to flourish and grow. Daylight made them shrink back – scuttle away in search of darkness and cover. Standing up, I pushed open the signal box door and flooded it with light.

I gently toed Nik in the ribs. “Get up,” I said.

He groaned and rolled away from the beam of bright light, shielding his eyes with his hands. I left the signal box and stepped back out into the desert. The sandstorm had passed, and once again, I had a clear view across the floor of the red desert. The campfire in the distance had long burnt down and just faint wisps of grey smoke hovered in the air like a minute rain cloud.

“C’mon,” I said over my shoulder. “We’ve got to move on again if we want to catch up with the fire starter.”

“I’m thirsty and hungry,” Nik said, stumbling bleary-eyed into the light. I checked his eyes for any sign of the fire, but there wasn’t any. Nik caught me staring hard at him, and as if understanding what I was searching for in his eyes, he half-smiled at me and said, “You’re looking good, brother.”

“Thanks,” I grunted, unable to ignore the sense of relief that washed over me.

“I mean you look kinda different,” he said, pulling me back by the arm so he could take another look at me. He stared up into my face as I towered over him.

“What do you mean different?” I asked him.

“Well…” he started as if searching for the right words.

“How different?” I pushed.

“Not so much like a pervert, I guess,” Nik said.

“What’s that s’posed to mean?” I growled.

“Don’t take offense or nothing…” he started.

“Just spit it out,” I cut in.

“Well, it’s just that most of the time you walk around looking like a living and breathing mug-shot,” Nik tried to explain. “You know, like a wanted poster.”

“So how do I look different?” I asked.

“You don’t look so freaking creepy, I guess is what I’m trying to say,” he said, turning his back on me and unzipping his fly.

As Nik stood and took a leak against the signal box, I said, “Do I look younger?”

“Maybe,” Nik said, shaking himself and re-zipping his fly. He turned back to face me. Then hooking his thumb in the direction of the black splash marks against the signal box, he smiled and added, “And don’t worry about that. I wasn’t marking out my territory or anything – I really did need to take a piss.”

Before I’d had a chance to say anything more, Nik was heading off across the desert in the direction of the smoke. Looking back at me and waving one arm in the air, he said, “C’mon, Jack, whoever lit that campfire might have left some scraps. I’m freaking starving!”

Daring to believe for the first time in my life that the Lycanthrope curse had finally been lifted, I set off across the desert in pursuit of my brother.

‘Hollow Pit’

(Jack Seth Trilogy)

Book One