The Kingdom of Kevin Malone Read Online Free

two sharp-spined roofs parallel to each other, one on a stone-walled building and the other just a wooden porch running along the stone house’s front. The main roof was straddled in the center by a spindly little steeple with a clock in it.
    â€œThe Dairy!” I said. “What’s it doing down there?”
    The Dairy really was a dairy once, where people bought ice cream. These days it’s used for photo exhibits and to sell books and pamphlets about the park. No way could it be located somewhere east of the zoo; but then Fifth Avenue couldn’t be an ocean, either.
    Things moved around, all right.
    â€œIn the Fayre Farre,” Kevin said, “that’s an inn. We’ll have some ale, or, um, juice or something, and I’ll tell you why I’ve been trying to get you into the Fayre Farre, Amy. I think you’ve got a very important part to play here. Heroic, even.”
    â€œOh,” I said. “Great.” We’d been doing Greek myths in English this term. Heroes go through hell. I eyed the Dairy without enthusiasm.
    I knew that your average sword-and-sorcery story had to have a scene at the inn, which was always full of spies, drunken peasants, lusty-busty serving wenches, and our traveling company of heroes. I only hoped that everybody here wouldn’t talk some kind of fake Middle English.
    Kevin started down a dirt path that skirted the stone outcrop. Sock-footed and still hugging Rachel’s skates, I picked my way gingerly after him. It’s all a hallucination, I thought. I’ve fallen on my head on the skating pavement and I’m dreaming.
    Then I heard Kevin swear in a choked voice, and I looked up from my feet. He was running toward the gateway to the innyard, where a raggedy man was dragging himself over the ground toward us. The stranger couldn’t walk because his ankles were fastened rigidly apart at the ends of a bar that looked like it was made of peeled sticks.
    Socks or no socks, I ran, too.
    Kevin plumped down on his knees beside the man, who could barely lift his head to look at us. I’ve never seen anyone so thin. He had on torn green pants and a dirty shirt that had once been bright with multicolored patches, and his hair was long, blond, and filthy.
    â€œKavian Prince!” he croaked, staring up with huge, red-rimmed eyes. He looked maybe a couple of years older than Kevin. “I found the prophecy.” He blinked at me. “She’s in it, your lady here.”
    Kevin glanced at me grimly.
    The hurt man squeezed his eyes shut and moaned. “Past that, I can’t remember. I knew the whole prophecy, every word, but then the Bone Men—”
    â€œLater, Sebbian, tell me later,” Kevin said, feverishly struggling to unfasten the strange manacle on the man’s feet. It wasn’t made of wood but of two long bones twisted between the stranger’s ankles and lashed tight together at the outer ends with hard leather strings.
    â€œWet rawhide,” Kevin muttered between set teeth. “It dries rock-hard.”
    No way were those shrunken knots going to give. Up close, I could see that the man’s bare feet were swollen so that the bone fetters had cut into his flesh, which was horribly inflamed. Now I noticed a sickly smell about him that made my throat close up.
    He had somehow rubbed or chewed through the sinews holding a smaller bone manacle closed on his wrists and had gotten one hand loose. But he couldn’t free his feet with his bare hands any more than Kevin could.
    â€œCan’t you cut him loose?” I asked.
    Kevin slapped the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand. “I am sworn to use no edged weapon until the Farsword comes to my hand. I’ll get this off him somehow, though. Sebbian, what happened?”
    Sebbian, his cheek resting on one outstretched arm, murmured, “Bone Men got me. Got away, crawled here, but inn-folk had fled—nothing left, no food, no