Seals by Kim Richardson Read Free Book Online

dead.”
    But Kara wasn’t convinced. She had heard
something. She was certain. But what was it?
    “What’s up with that smell?” Jenny moved in
amongst the dead crops, her face twisted in disgust. “It’s not the
bile, and it’s not coming from this field. It smells like
raw sewage left out in the sun all day.”
    Her brow furrowed. “Smells like demons.”
    Kara picked up the scent. It was just to the
north of where they were. Jenny was right.
    Curious, and before anyone could stop her,
Kara jumped into the air and stroked hard with her wings.
Immediately, she soared into the air and flew toward the smell.
    The smell was coming from beyond the small
hillside to the north. It wasn’t easy to see. Everything looked
gray and in shadow. A quick glance below her and she smiled. David,
Peter, Ashley and Jenny were running below her. It gave her great
pleasure to be able to do something that they couldn’t.
    She would miss this, the flying, her wings.
She assumed that she would return to normal once they had destroyed
the knights and sent the archfiends back into their cage. The way
the air rolled over her leathery wings was exhilarating. But if all
worked according to plan, she would only have four days of flying
left. She would get her four days’ worth.
    With a final bank to the left, she pulled
back and arched her wings high above her head. She rolled them back
and forth, her feet brushed the ground, and she landed with a
slight hop. She beamed. She had landed with more grace than usual.
Did the others catch that? As she turned, her smile died.
    Below the hillside a vast bowl stretched
beyond the horizon and disappeared into shadow. The ground was
littered with the corpses of dead animals.
    Thousands and thousands of cows, goats,
sheep, chickens, and pigs were piled on top of one another in a
giant, open grave. Their bodies were emaciated. Their skin was
pulled so tight around their bodies that it was almost
transparent.
    How could they have died of starvation in
only three days? They looked as though they had been drained of
blood, of their organs, and only skin and bone remained. Even their
fur and feathers had fallen off. Their eyes were empty sockets, and
their bodies were stained in that same black liquid.
    Kara knew they had died in pain. It was the
most horrific thing she’d ever seen. It didn’t feel real. It was
too gruesome. No demon had the power to wreak such devastation.
Only a god, a dark god, could have done this.
    Instead of crying out for the fallen, Kara’s
rage poured through her like hot oil. She had to blink the dark
spots from her eyes. She wanted to destroy the archfiends…she
wanted to kill them all…
    “Oh. My. God.” Jenny collapsed to her knees
beside Kara, her hand on her mouth. Peter knelt beside her and put
his arms around her shaking shoulders.
    “This is sick.” David looked about as angry
as Kara.
    “There must be millions of dead
animals down there. How did they all end up like this? It’s like
they were picked up and thrown in this valley to die. What kind of
monsters could have killed so many?”
    “The archfiends are as powerful as gods,”
said Kara. “And the four knights must have a lot of that power.
It’s pretty clear that they did this. It’s their mission to
destroy life so that they can break the seals for their
masters.”
    “I don’t know what I was expecting. Mr.
Patterson did say they were nothing like we’ve ever faced before.
But this…”
    She lost hope. She didn’t know how she could
have imagined she’d be able to defeat the four knights of the
apocalypse if this was any indication of what they could do. How
would she defeat even a single one of them?
    Kara heard that strange clicking sound
again, as though someone was sharpening hundreds of knives.
    “But which one did this?” asked David.
“Death? It’s gotta be Death.”
    Kara surveyed the devastation.
    “I don’t think it’s the one called Death.
This is the one called Famine. It