The Iron King by Julie Kagawa Read Free Book Online Page B

four-year-old half brother. I didn’t know where these demonic mood swings of his were coming from, but I hoped they weren’t the start of a trend. Maybe he was just upset because of Mom’s accident. Maybe if I fed the brat, he’d fall asleep and leave me alone for the night. I stalked to the freezer, grabbed the pizza, and shoved it in the oven.
    While the pizza cooked, I tried to clean up the puddle of vegetable oil in front of the refrigerator. I wondered how the stuff had ended up on the floor, especially when I found the empty bottle stuffed in the trash. I smelled like Crisco when I was done, and the floor still had a slick spot, but it was the best I could do.
    The creak of the oven door startled me. I turned to see Ethan pulling it open and reaching inside.
    “Ethan!” Grabbing his wrist, I yanked him back, ignoring his scream of protest. “What are you doing, you idiot? You want to burn yourself?”
    “Hungry!”
    “Sit down!” I snapped, plunking him into a dining chair.
    He actually tried to hit me, the little ingrate. I resisted the urge to smack him. “God, you’re being snotty today. Sit there and be quiet. I’ll get your food in a second.”
    When the pizza came out, he fell on it like a wild thing, not waiting for it to cool. Astonished, I could only stare as he tore through the slices like a starved dog, barely stopping to chew as he gulped it down. Soon, his face and hands were smeared with sauce and cheese, and the pizza was rapidly diminished. In less than two minutes, he had consumed it all, down to the last crumb.
    Ethan licked his hands, then raised his eyes to me and frowned. “Still hungry.”
    “You are not,” I told him, snapping out of my daze. “If you eat anything else you’ll get sick. Go play in your room or something.”
    He stared at me with a baleful expression, and it seemed that his skin grew darker, wrinkled, and shriveled beneath his baby fat. Without warning, he leaped off the chair, rushed me, and sank his teeth into my leg.
    “Ow!” Pain lanced through my calf like an electrical shock. Grabbing his hair, I tried prying his teeth from my skin, but he clung to me like a leech and bit down harder. It felt like glass shards stabbing into my leg. Tears blurred my vision, and my knees almost buckled from the pain.
    “Meghan!”
    Robbie stood inside the front door, a backpack flung over his shoulder, his green eyes wide with shock.
    Ethan released me, jerking his head toward the shout. Blood smeared his lips. Seeing Robbie, he hissed and—there’s no other way to put it— scuttled away from us and up the stairs, vanishing from sight.
    I shook so hard I had to sit down on the couch. My legthrobbed, and my breath came in short, uneven gasps. Blood, bright and vivid, seeped through my jeans like an unfurling blossom. Dazed, I stared at it, numbness deadening my limbs, freezing them in shock.
    Robbie crossed the room in three strides and knelt beside me. Briskly, as if he’d done this kind of thing before, he began rolling up the cuff of one pant leg.
    “Robbie,” I whispered as he bent over his task, his long fingers surprisingly gentle. “What’s happening? Everything’s going crazy. Ethan just attacked me…like a wild dog.”
    “That wasn’t your brother,” Robbie muttered as he pushed back the material, revealing a bloody mess below my knee. An oval of jagged puncture wounds marred my leg, seeping blood, and the skin around them was already purpling. Rob whistled softly. “Nasty. Wait here. I’ll be right back.”
    “Like I’m going anywhere,” I replied automatically, and then his previous statement sank in. “Wait a minute. What do you mean, that wasn’t Ethan? Who the hell else could it be?”
    Rob ignored me. Walking to his backpack, he opened it and pulled out a long, green-tinted bottle and a tiny crystal cup. I frowned. Why was he going for champagne now? I was hurt, in pain, and my kid brother had turned into a monster. I was certainly not in