The Living Night (Book 1) by Jack Conner Read Free Book Online

over to
them. He clapped Ruegger on the back and kissed Danielle's hand. He could be
very charming when he wanted to be.
    "Looking forward to the race, I hope,"
he said and led them to their respective sleds. "Good luck. Just remember
that I'm looking out for you, okay? You'll be fine."
    He vanished into the crowd. Danielle shot a
glance at Ruegger, but he appeared solemn.
    Five minutes later, the racers lined up at the
starting line, talking and chuckling, some finishing joints or beer cans or
sniffing a few quick lines. Danielle could tell by experience that these were
the lightest of the drugs involved. She switched on the radio fastened to her
sled—she and Ruegger occupied different vehicles—then deliberated on the choice
of music.
    “How about Wagner?” said Ruegger, his sled
alongside hers. “Seems fittingly grand and energetic for a sled race.”
    She smiled. Their tastes in music varied widely,
she was all too aware. She and Ruegger had actually met in the New York punk scene,
where he had been attempting, without much success, to learn the intricacies of
the new sound.
    She punched a button, and heavy metal flooded
out.
    Ruegger sighed.
    “Sorry,” she said, “but Wagner ?” She made a face. “A sled race of shades in the heart of
darkness of northern Alaska
earns a little Metallica, if you ask me.”
    “If you insist.”
    A gun blasted, and the racers lurched off in a
confused flurry of dogs and shades, snow kicking up in all directions. The Ice
Queen Sophia leapt into the lead at once.
    Danielle kept her stance firm, maintaining a
tight rein on the ten dogs at all times. Still, the sled bucked and rolled, and
more than once she felt her position shift precariously. Her blood started to
rush. Despite her best efforts, she laughed, then yelled defiantly at the other
contestants, who laughed and yelled back. She tried to pretend that Barrow had
only been a nightmare.
    Casting frequent glances at Ruegger, she could
tell that, after some time, he was getting into it as well, making his dogs go
as fast as he could, trying to stay just a few strides ahead of her. Sticking
her tongue out at him, she prodded her animals on and screamed in exaltation
when her lead dog breasted his.
    The competition proved determined, and Danielle
tried to extend her mind into those of her dogs. Never very good at the whole
psychic thing, she nevertheless knew instantly that her dogs couldn't be
controlled by her—because they were being controlled by someone else. A quick
look at Ruegger's grimace revealed that he wasn't that one. He was having
trouble with his dogs, too.
    "Fuck," she said.
    Their sled dogs started to veer off, cutting
across the tide of the other racers and into the more deeply forested regions
surrounding the main racing grounds. The boisterous cries of the racers receded,
replaced by the stirring of the wind, which swept through the white trees and
tickled at Danielle's ear.
    She ripped out a gun from beneath her jacket.
For his part, Ruegger pointed up through the trees at something. Twisting, she
saw a winged figure, barely discernable against the stars. Maleasoel. What
could she be doing up there—following Ruegger and Danielle? The jandrow's speed
lagged suddenly and she swooped in a tight arc off in the direction she'd come
from.
    Ruegger withdrew a gun of his own.
    Their dogs went mad, deliberately charging close
to shrubbery or low branches, forcing the sleds to smack against trees or knock
into stubs or small rises. Ruegger jumped off his perch and Danielle followed,
embedding herself in the snow.
    Slowly, she rose on her snow-shoes, turning to
locate him. For a wild moment she couldn't see Ruegger, but he was there,
dusting himself off and shaking his head. He glanced up, saw her, and they trudged
toward each other, embracing quickly and checking one another for wounds.
    "It’s them," he said.
    "Junger and Jagoda," she nodded, and
fired off a round to make sure her gun wasn't jammed. He did the