My Black Beast by Randall P. Fitzgerald Read Free Book Online Page B

desperately
lazy man.
    The houses seemed to become more modest again
as they moved, still not a sign of a person. As they moved along,
in the streets proper now, the walls started to shrink. Soon there
were open yards and clear overhead views. Lowell looked around to
orient himself and found the spire in the distance. They were
moving away from it as he had guessed. Marka’s pace slowed and he
turned his attention to the girl, worried she might be
hurt.
    She was scanning the rows of houses intently.
Her speed returned and they took another sharp turn at the next
bend. The run was getting to Lowell but what could he say? He
didn’t see anyone give chase. He hadn’t seen another living being
since the woman ran off. Part of his mind wanted to stop Marka and
demand an explanation or to try to calm her down but the part he
decided to heed told him that she knew this place in ways he never
would.
    Another pair of turns and Lowell’s troubled
mind and tiring lungs would have a bit of rest. Well, his lungs
anyway. The pair stood in front of a crumbled stone wall that sat
in front of one among many of the dilapidated houses that seemed to
make up the bulk of the strange city.
    Marka listened to the sky a moment and looked
over the empty streets cautiously before she stepped over the
rubble of the wall. Lowell didn’t follow immediately, only stared
at the back of the girl, her tattoos drawing his eye. Before he had
time to drift too deeply into the curiosities of this world, Marka
made a short, quiet clicking noise with her mouth. Lowell looked up
and she waved for him to follow. He did.
    The inside of the house was, he imagined, more
or less as it had been before whoever lived there had decided to
abandon it. The furniture was covered with dust and dirt from the
collapsed surroundings. It was not nearly as ornate as the rest had
been and was made of a hard smooth material that he was beginning
to think might be bone. There were large stone tables around the
main room and small statuettes on each featuring heroic looking men
and women in various poses. Some among the small set appeared to be
carvings of children.
    The chairs were padded but too dusty to bother
sitting on. Really, it was a bit eerie in general and Lowell half
believed he was going to get possessed by some ghost and forced to
live out a weird domestic life in this strange land at the hands of
the embittered former owner of the place. There were stairs to a
second floor, but they seemed to be more or less out of order as
some upstairs wall had collapsed onto them.
    “ Stay.”
    He looked down at the tiny, scratchy voice and
saw Marka looking up, intent and concerned.
    “ Stay,” she said again, patting him
intently as if asking for an answer.
    “ O-okay? Yeah, fine.”
    With that she moved around him and quickly
made her way out the doorless entryway. Lowell ran to follow but by
the time he had made it to the threshold she was gone.
    He let go a deep sigh and turned around to
look back over the house, or what of it he had access to. He could
no longer hear the siren and he wasn’t entirely sure if it had
stopped or if the thick stone walls of the house were responsible
for deadening the noise. Either way he was thankful. It wasn’t much
of a bother while they’d been moving but now the noise in his brain
was more than enough to make him uncomfortable.
    Left without Marka there to steel the idea
that he had a purpose in this place, the strangeness of it all
began to seep in. There must be someone he could explain things to,
surely. But then, what could he possibly explain? Even if he wasn’t
in some weird, European Wizard of Oz place, the police would be
more than happy to drag him to jail without so much as even trying
to hear him out. If he couldn’t explain it to seemingly reasonable
adult human beings, what hope did he have of explaining to whatever
demon lord ruled over a place where people opened doors with purple
glowing shit?
    Lowell resolved to