Read Online Gods of the Dead (Rising Book 1) by Tracey Ward - Free Book Online

and we’ll head back out there together at first light.”
    “Shouldn’t we just wait until morning together then?”
    He shrugs into his jacket, shaking his head. “We owe it to them to check it out. I’ll be fine, I promise. I’ll be careful.”
    “Okay.”
    He opens the door, the sound of rain pouring into the quiet cabin along with a gust of wet, cold wind that gathers at my feet. “Lock this door behind me.”
    “I will.”
    He grins, the expression forced. “And don’t look so worried.”
    When he leaves, I listen to his footsteps on the porch heading out onto the pathway. I hear the gate open and close, latching solidly. The roar of the truck firing up, dying, sputtering reluctantly, and finally catching life. The rough gears grind together, the engine roars once more, then the beast fades away into the night taking my dad with it.
    I sit down at the small table next to the radio, my mind on the road with him. It’s tracing his path, running a timer in my mind and plotting his progress. It should take him all of ten minutes to reach the Farm by the back roads. Ten minutes to get there, maybe ten to check the place out, and another ten to come back. Thirty minutes round trip. It’s not that long.
    I sit waiting the entire time, and when thirty minutes turns into fifty, then ninety, and still there’s no growl of the angry engine on the road, the sickness in my stomach worsens.
    Suddenly the radio cracks to life and I nearly jump out of my skin. I pick up the mouthpiece and wait anxiously for a familiar voice. It clicks like someone is trying to use it but nothing comes over. No words or sounds. Just static and a sporadic tick. There’s no pattern. It’s not Morse Code. It’s nothing I understand.
    “Hello?” I call hesitantly into the mouthpiece.
    A couple of clicks, then a sound that could be breathing, thick and almost gagging.
    “Can you hear me? Over,” I try again.
    I turn the volume up all the way and the static and breathing fills the cabin until I’m not alone anymore. But when they speak, I wish I was.
    “It’s here,” a strangled voice hisses. “It’ssss heeeeere.”
    “The Fever? The Fever is there at the Farm? Over.”
    Wet coughing. A pained moan. “Nooo.”
    “What then? What’s there?”
    Click. Slam. Scraping and pounding from far off. A low growl like an animal followed by a faint whimper.
    “Death,” they whisper brokenly, tears in their voice. Tears that drip from the air and fill the room until I’m soaked in them and sweat and a shaking fear that pulls at every muscle in my body. “Death is here. And He brought the Devil with him.”
    I drop the receiver and run for the door, grabbing my coat and my knife. I throw open the door, but halt at the threshold. The radio crackles again, sounds pouring in and following me out of the room. It’s a crash and the growl, but then everything is drowned out by something so much worse. Something so much more terrifying.
    It’s screaming. Blood curdling, pained screams that pierce my ears and send me careening from the cabin and out into the night.

Chapter Seven
    Vin
    Sienna turns to me, the firelight from the pit in the yard getting lost in her dark hair where it’s sprawled out over the grass. Even though she looks tired she’s prettier than I’ve ever seen her. No makeup, no drugs. Just clear eyes and full lips that smile lazily up at me.
    “Finally a night with no rain,” she mumbles happily.
    I nod but I don’t say a word. She’s relaxed for the first time in a week and it’s not because of the Valium. It’s because of the quiet. It’s exactly why I’m on edge.
    For a few days there were cop cars, ambulances, and fire trucks blazing up and down the streets constantly, people running, driving, biking, even sailing off into the Sound. But almost a week into the panic that all stopped. That’s when the screaming started. That’s when we knew we were past the looting, rioting phase and the Fever had hit home.