Read an Excerpt

Chapter 1


THE STORM CRASHED down behind me, lightning bolts chasing me like a pack of bloodhounds, thunder screaming at me. As light flooded the darkness, I looked up through the pounding rain and saw a wall of jutting rocks looming above the road, their long arms poised like executioners.

The wind was a giant hand at my back, driving me on. I tried digging in my heels, but the road was mud, my feet indistinguishable from the swirling brown goo that sucked me downward.

My heart pounded as if I were pursued by a midnight stalker. My body dripped like a deep gash in a dark cloud.

Why did my right arm feel so heavy? My forefinger trembled. My right temple ached from a pressure I couldn’t explain. I sensed a cold eye staring at me, a shadowy Cyclops threatening me, pushing itself toward me.

Where was I? What was happening? How did I get on this road alone, bareheaded in this awful tempest? I remembered driving to my mountain cabin and then … the rest was a blur.

Gusts of wind kept shoving me forward, letting up a little, then pushing even harder. All I saw through dripping, stinging eyes was the ground passing beneath my feet. My jeans were drenched, my hunting jacket a soaked sponge. I shivered. My knees quaked and my mind started spinning in the gray violence. I could no longer tell ground from sky, earth from heaven.

“Help me! God, help—” Catching myself I groaned. I might as well be talking to the tooth fairy for all the good it would do me. I heard a violent noise like a huge canvas tarp whipping in the wind. I looked over my shoulder, then dropped to the ground in frozen terror. The sound was the flapping of giantIt looked like a dragon—no, a flying dinosaur, a pterodactyl with dead eyes and jagged teeth.

It appeared too heavy to fly, but it did, and it was coming for me.

I rose from the mud and ran with the wind, but the beating of those wings grew until it filled my ears. I felt the blast of the creature’s hot breath. I smelled a thousand matches lit at once—sulfur. I flailed my arms and fell again into the mud as the monster swooped down.

As I tensed, the beast brushed over me. How could it miss? Was it playing with me, terrorizing me before the kill?

I saw the predator circle, keeping its gaze on me like a sniper on his target. Those eyes, cold and brutal—shark eyes. The beast smirked. Did it take pleasure in my terror? I sensed intelligence far greater than mine, ancient and brooding. The thought of a calculating mind in something so grotesque sent an electric wave of terror through me.

Finally the monster turned and disappeared behind the torrents of rain. I stared into the swirling gray where it had vanished. Had I really seen it? I rose from my knees, willing them to be strong. I ran, my feet battling the mire. I had to find shelter.

Behind me I heard again the whipping tarp, louder and louder.

In a heartbeat the fiery breath fell on me again. I threw my arms over my head, and as I fell into the mud I felt daggers pierce me, claws penetrating the base of my neck, ripping through muscle and tendon. Jerked off the ground, I screamed.

The beast dropped me back into the mud, the echo of my cry disappearing into the merciless storm.

Up. I had to keep moving.

I was kept from surrendering to the ground again only by the dim sight of a stone outcropping on a hillside a hundred feet away. I stumbled onward and up, in pursuit of the shelter, evoking memories of pushing across rice paddies in Nam, searching for the safety of a bunker.

As I fought through the storm, a warmth trickled over my right shoulder. I reached my left hand inside my jacket and felt my flannel shirt, now soaked in blood. My neck throbbed. 

With aching slowness I turned my head each way.

As I did, I saw the winged beast circling. It plummeted toward me like a rock from a cliff. I curled up, pressing my body against the muddy road.

Just as it grazed my neck, I heard a terrifying roar. It came neither from the beast nor me but from an immense dark shape prowling the ground, a beast I could barely see, a mass of fur blowing wildly in the wind. As the roar filled the air, the flying monster’s head jerked back violently. It squawked fiercely as it spun away, choking and sputtering, cold horror in its eyes.

I gasped for breath, feeling only a moment of relief. What foe could strike terror into a creature more dreadful than any I’d ever imagined? Would I rather face the flying beast or the prowling one?

I pushed myself the remaining thirty feet to the rocky refuge. Just as I reached it, a burst of wind slammed me into the stone outcropping. Stunned, I fell, throwing out my arms. On the ground my groping hands found a recess, a furrow in the base of the rock. Behind me, just a few feet away, I saw the shadowy image of the ground beast, its great head still roaring up at the sky. Was I the gazelle and this the lion about to claim from the hyena its meal? I reached farther into the recess, pulling my body along, but was still exposed to beasts and elements.

I lay flat on my face, embracing the stony ground. I tried to get a grip, to move myself farther, but I couldn’t. My body didn’t work, but my mind did. I’m a realist, a skeptic, I reminded myself. The dinosaur couldn’t be real, the prowling brute couldn’t be real. But my stinging neck and pounding heart and the roars of wild beasts said otherwise. I willed myself to wake up, but I couldn’t. I pressed my eyelids shut and longed for the relief of dreams or consciousness, whichever I wasn’t already in.

When I opened my eyes, I found myself in damp darkness. I spit out sand and heard an echo. Beyond my feet, the barest light came from a two-foot opening. I must have crawled farther than I thought—into a cave. I couldn’t remember.

I was spent, twisted and lying in a heap, too sore to move.

My mind slowly grew more alert, despite a torturing headache. I felt paralyzed in this utterly unfamiliar place. All I’d known was far away. Here, there was nothing else besides me and raging beasts and nature gone mad.

I reached into my jacket pocket, feeling the wet fabric for the box of matches I’d picked up at the cabin. I counted them and swore. Only four. Carefully I struck one against the wet box, three times, then once on the side of the cave. Finally a spark. I blew lightly on the flame, and it came to life.

The back wall was only an arm’s length away from me, while the cave’s height was maybe six feet.

I looked down and saw in the thin ashen dust a boot print larger than my own. Had I blacked out? Had someone pulled me in here from the storm and the beasts?

A gust of wind forced its way into the cave, blowing out the match. I lit a second one and looked at the ground. The print had disappeared. I stared at where it had been just a moment before. Nothing.

I must have imagined it, or maybe it was my own. Yes, I had pulled myself into this place. I had rescued myself, like I’d always managed to do. I was alone—Nick Seagrave, alone again.

I heard footfalls and heavy breathing just outside. I shuddered. The ground beast was stalking me, so close I could feel its wet heat, smell its animal scent. It couldn’t fit through the cave’s mouth—could it?

I pushed myself to the back of the cave, but even then I was only four feet from the breathing. I heard sniffing now. Whatever it was, it had locked on to my scent. I couldn’t stop shaking. Only my headache and the pain in my neck kept me from yielding entirely to terror.

After a long shivering stillness, I took off my jacket and tore the left sleeve off my shirt. With trembling fingers, I wrapped it around my neck to protect the wounds.

The ground beast fell silent. After a long while sitting against the cave wall, my back and legs cramped. I stretched them. Trying to find the least painful position, I curled up like an old soldier digging in for a long night.