Bad Bones by Graham Marks Read Free Book Online Page A

as if he was running out of air to breathe.
    And this time he could smell the fear radiating off the victim, another young boy, as he was led right past him. Watching him being picked up and placed on the altar, Gabe retched at the thought of all the blood spilled on it by the thousands of souls who had died there. He looked down and saw the stones used to build the pyramid had been stained a dark, dark black by the gore that had soaked into them. So much blood no amount of rain could ever wash it away.
    Light from the setting sun flashed off the golden knife – the exact same knife he now had in his possession – and
drew his attention to the man holding it. It occurred to Gabe that maybe he was some kind of priest, although the guttural noises he was making, along with the elaborate feathered headdress, made him look and sound more like a crazed bird. Then he noticed the crucifix. This man also had a crucifix, like the one he’d found, except not all bent and damaged.
    There was something odd about the cross, but before he had a chance to think about what it was the priest let out a roar and Gabe knew what was going to happen. Death was being called upon. This truly hateful scene was pulling Gabe in with its terrible, graceful savagery. And what made it so much worse was that he could see some kind of awesome, insane beauty about what was happening in front of him.
    That was when Gabe woke up, covered in sweat. The room was pitch black and for a second he panicked that he’d gone blind. Then the soft, fluorescent green glow from the display of his alarm clock pushed away the dark just a little and he saw it was 3.34am. Now 3.35am…
    Gabe lay flat on his back, exhausted. His skin crawled like he was covered in ants and he felt as if he’d been to … the word ‘hell’ squirmed and skittered around in the back of his mind waiting to be let outand he tried as hard as he could to ignore it. Hell was other people. Someone famous had said that, and he wanted to believe it was true and that was all it was. He did not want to believe it was crazed, knife-wielding people and lost souls, blood-soaked altars and sacrifices to unknown gods.
    The thought of going back to sleep was laughable.
    More of what he’d just been through? No way.
    Gabe dragged himself out of bed and padded down to the bathroom, the corridor lit by the plug-in night lamp his sister still said she needed. He closed the door and switched the light on. In the mirror over the sink an exhausted, freaked-out version of himself stared back. He looked like shit. Running the cold tap he sluiced his face and rinsed his mouth out; it was only when he saw the blood running away that he realized he must have bitten the inside of his lip. He checked his ears to see if they’d repeated their performance from earlier in the canyon. They hadn’t. He dried off and sat on the toilet lid, elbows on his knees and hands cradling his head. He felt lousy. His life genuinely was crap, whichever way you looked at it, and now he couldn’t even escape from what was going on with a good night’s sleep.
    He sighed heavily. Tomorrow was another day. And tomorrow he and his family would still be facing the same problems. Tomorrow he had to work for Benny, and who knew what that might entail. Tomorrow he would also have to try and get rid of at least some of the damn gold. Although looking on the bright side, if that was at all possible, if Benny and Mr Cecil LeBarron both paid up, the day
after
tomorrow might feasibly be better.
    Yeah, right.

    “Gabey-Gabey-Gay-ay-ay-bee, hugging his pillow like a bay-ay-ay-bee!”
    Gabe jerked awake to see his sister, Remy, bending over and peering at him like he was some weird zoo exhibit.
    “Scram, Remy,” he muttered, turning over and squinting at the clock; he found it hard to believe he’d actually fallen back to sleep, not had any nightmares he could remember and that it was now 7.06am… make that 7.07.
    “What’ve you got there,