Jack, the giant-killer Read Free Page B

crouch, speared by the beams of nine headlights. And it wasn’t a boy, Jacky saw suddenly. It was a man—a little man no taller than a child, with a tuft of white hair at his chin, and more spilling out from under a red cap. He had a short wooden staff in his hand that he brandished at the bikers. His eyes glowed red in the headbeams of the Harleys, like a fox’s or a cat’s.
    She saw all this in just one moment, the space between one breath and the next, then her sneakers slipped on the wet grass underfoot and she went sprawling. Adrenaline burned through her, bringing her to her feet with a grace and speed she wouldn’t have been able to muster sober, that she shouldn’t have at all, drunk as she was. She saw the little man charge the bikers.
    A spark of light leapt from the leader of the blackclad riders. It made a circuit of each biker, crackling from hand to hand until it returned to the leader. Then it arced out and the staff exploded. Not one of the riders had moved, but the staff hung in splinters from the little man’s hand. A second spark made its circuit, darting from the leader to the little man. He stiffened, dancing on the spot as though he was being
    electrocuted, then he crumpled and fell to the ground in a limp heap. Jacky reached the closest biker at the same time.
    As she reached out to grab the black-leather clad arm, the man turned. She looked for his face under his helmet, but there seemed to be nothing there. Only shadow, hidden by the smoked glass of a visor. She stumbled back as the rider twisted the accelerator control of his bike. The machine answered with a deep-throated growl and the bike pulled away. One by one they moved out, the roar of their loud engines dwindling as they drew away. Jacky watched them return the way they’d come. She hugged herself, shaking. Then they were gone, around the corner, out of sight. The sound of the machines should have remained, but it too was cut off abruptly as the last machine disappeared from view.
    Jacky took a step towards the little man. His head lay at an impossible angle, neck broken. Dead. She swallowed thickly, throat dry. She looked at the backs of the houses. There was still no sign that anyone in them had heard a thing. She hesitated, looking from the houses back to the broken body of the little man. His cap had fallen when he’d collapsed, coming to rest not far from her feet. She picked it up. A man’s dead, she thought. Those bikers… She remembered what she’d seen behind that one visor. Nothing. Shadow. But that had been because of the smoked glass. That had been just… her own fear. The shock of the moment.
    She swallowed again, then started for the house where she’d seen the tall man watching. He’d be her witness that the bikers had been there. That she wasn’t just imagining what had happened. But when she reached the back yard of that house, the building had an empty look to it. She looked to her right. There were the two marble birds. She looked back. This house was deserted, its yard overgrown with weeds. No one lived here. There hadn’t been anyone watching…
    She shook her head. It was all starting to catch up with her now. The drinks. The shock of what she’d just witnessed. Her stupidity at just rushing in. It was all because of the weird head-trip she’d fallen into when Will had walked out… about being empty… and cutting her hair… She ran her fingers through the uneven thatch on her head. That much was real. Slowly she made her way back to where the little man’s body lay.
    There was nothing there. No dead little man. No tracks where the Harleys had torn up the sod. There was only the splintered staff and what looked like…
    She knelt down and reached out a hand. Ashes. A scatter of ashes. That was all that was left of the little man. Ashes and a splintered staff and… She brought up her other hand and looked down at the cap. And this.

    CHAPTER TWO
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    Jacky stayed home from work the next day. She