The Unwilling Apprentice (Book 2) by Heidi Willard Read Free Book Online

as the other statutes broke apart and the thin stone covering shattered to the ground to reveal more of the winged creatures. The things stared back at the pair with yellow, green, red and golden-colored eyes, but none dared move toward them except the one that stood in their path of escape.
    Pat clutched onto Fred, who clutched onto his staff with one arm wrapped around the girl. He heard footsteps and whipped his head around to find the large creature closer to them. "S-stay away. I'm warning you."
    The creature straightened up and scowled at him. When it spoke its voice was like smooth gravel. "What are you doing here, human?" Fred blinked; the creature could talk. It could also get mad, which is what happened when he didn't immediately answer. "What are you doing here?" it repeated in a louder voice. The words echoed off the cavern walls.
    "We, um, we just want to get through to see the fireworks," Fred replied.
    The large thing wrinkled its nose, and opened its mouth to speak, but they heard something scrabble across the rocks. A smaller one of the creatures popped up over the top of a stalagmite, and its shining eyes lay atop a wide smile. From its physical aspects it appeared to be a girl not much younger than Pat. "Fireworks? Those pretty lights in the sky?"
    "Get back!" barked the larger one. She whimpered and slid back behind the rock. He glared again at the pair. "This is our domain, and punishment for trespass is death."
    While Fred cringed Pat bristled at the threat. She pushed off him and stomped up to the large creature. "How dare you threaten us! What right do you have to be beneath the castle, hiding like some common thief?"
    The creature stiffened and his eyes narrowed. "Common thieves? We have a greater, more ancient right to be here than you humans. You are the ones who came here and asked for our help, and when we most trusted you you betrayed that trust."
    Pat blinked; that wasn't quite the answer she had expected. Fred stepped up behind her and gave the creature a shaky grin. "Um, so you're the ones on the tapestries in the castle, right? The flying things?"
    The creature snorted. Fred wasn't sure if that was a laugh or an angry snort. "Yes, we are the 'flying things' in the castle tapestries. We helped the humans defend their town as they protected us when we slept, but while the human population increased ours dwindled. We took to the inside of this great hill and our alliance crumbled until it was broken by one of the kings."
    Pat flushed at the accusation. "A king of Galaron would never do such a treacherous thing!" Knowing the current ruler, Fred had his doubts.
    The creature stepped forward and grabbed them by the collars. He hauled them through the onlookers and into a small tunnel close by them. It soon led to a dead end, where he dropped the pair and nodded at the end. The youngsters followed his gaze and found themselves staring at a pile of rubble and old bones. Bits of uniforms, very similar to those worn by the castle guards, were still attached to the bones.
    The creature sneered at the bones. "The king sent his guards down during the day and they destroyed everyone they found. We found the guards still at work hacking our brethren, and we killed them. Then we hid ourselves away into greater depths of the hill, and when the king himself ventured down here to find what had happened to his men he found only piles of stone and the bodies of his humans. Believing us fled or dead, he left everything as it is and struck us from the records of the city. This is where we have resided for the past fifty years."
    Pat and Fred's eyes widened, and they both turned around. "But if you're down here how can you survive?" she asked him.
    "We do not need food, only water, and that is provided by the natural springs that flow through the hill," he replied.
    Fred looked around at the damp, dark walls and the heavy air. It wasn't exactly a paradise. "Why didn't you escape and find some other place to live?"