Doorways (A Book of Vampires, Werewolves & Black Magic) (The Doorways Trilogy - Book One) Read Online Free Page A

kill them!’ William told him.
    ‘We have creatures like that back home...in my world.’ Zach said, ducking to avoid a low hanging branch. ‘But they’re just in stories....horror movies. We call them vampires.’
    ‘Are you so sure they’re just stories?’ William asked, glancing at Zach through those huge, magnified lenses.
    ‘Of course they’re just stories,’ Zach wheezed, fighting to stay level with the boy.
    ‘I hate to disappoint ya,’ William grinned, lengths of hair billowing from his face and back over his shoulders like tentacles. ‘But vampires are real. They are the Slath that have passed through the doorways from our world and into yours. In our world they are just Slath, but in your world they become vampires .’
    They reached a small clearing and William came to a sudden stop. He sniffed the air and was off again, shouting over his shoulder, ‘this way!’
    Zach watched as he bounded off again in a whirl of flowing hair.
    ‘So what does that make you? A werewolf?’ he called after William, half-joking but fearing the answer.
    ‘Only in your world,’ William howled, ‘here I’m a Noxas and my friends call me William ‘the Wolf’ Weaver!’
    ‘You’ve got to be kidding me,’ Zach sighed under his breath, and then raced off after William again.
    They ran in silence, Zach trying to make sense of this new world and what William had told him. Why was he here? But more important, where was here ?
    William reached another small clearing and stopped. The area was circular in shape and at its centre there was a small burnt-out fire. Surrounding this were several large rocks that looked as big as armchairs. William carried the girl over to one of these large stone chairs and settled her into it. He then disappeared into the nearby undergrowth and reappeared carrying an armful of branches and twigs. William began to pile these on top of the burnt-out campfire.
    Zach looked across at the girl who had curled herself into a ball in the makeshift chair. She shook as if she was freezing cold. From where Zach stood, she looked fragile, like a sculpture cut from glass.
    ‘What’s her name?’ Zach asked William.
    ‘Neanna Cera,’ he replied without looking up.
    ‘Is she ill?’
    ‘Kinda.’
    ‘What happened to her?’
    William patted his shirt pockets and then rummaged through those that covered his worn looking trousers. They were blue and looked like denim but the material looked coarser - somehow thicker. His shirt was brown and seemed to be made from the same material. Looking him up and down, Zach realised for the first time that William’s feet were shoeless. Just like his fingers, his toes were long and covered in thick brown hair.
    ‘She was out in the sun for too long,’ William replied, after finding what it was he was looking for. He pulled a small wooden box from his trouser pocket. Flipping it open, William pulled out a match, which he held to the branches and sticks placed on the campfire.
    ‘If the sun can kill her, what was she doing out in the desert?’ Zach asked, moving to the centre of the clearing and positioning himself on the ground near the fire that William had got going.
    ‘We were looking for you,’ William said, stoking the fire with a long twisted stick like a child prodding at a dead insect. ‘Well, not exactly. We were looking for the doorway that you would come through.’
    ‘But how did you know that I would come?’
    William looked at him confused. Seeing this, Zach reminded him. ‘You said you were looking for me – looking for my doorway. How did you know that I would come?’
    Realising that their conversation had returned to the doorways, William combed the hair beneath his chin with his long ivory nails and said, ‘that was the problem you see. We knew you would eventually come across a doorway, but we couldn’t be sure when and exactly where. Every night for the last month Neanna and me have travelled across the desert looking for your doorway