THE MONSTERS WE KEEP (THE MONSTERS TRILOGY #1) BY KELSEY EPLER EPUB & PDF – eBook Details Online
- Status: Available for Free Download
- Authors: KELSEY EPLER
- Language: English
- Genre: fantasy romance
- Format: PDF / EPUB
- Size: 2.6 MB
- Price: Free
There’s something different about the zoo tonight. There are none of the
usual chittering screeches. No claws scraping against bars, no taunting
howls and cries and cackles. A storm is rolling in, but that wouldn’t
normally silence the chaos of this place. The cages are all there, locked
tight, but the darkness is thick in the corners—darkness that not even
lightning can illuminate. The flashes paint eerie shapes and shadows before
plunging me back into a night speckled with red and white eyes. The
scariest stars you’ve ever seen, if you didn’t already know they’re behind
bars as thick as your arm.
The monsters are too quiet.
“Lord Protector,” I pray in a whisper—one that’s hollow, somehow,
like their stares are compressing it to nothing.
A signpost looms like a spectre, the lonely crunch of my boots
against the gravel chasing me as I head toward my last check of the
evening. One last monster, and then I can go home. I pick up my pace. The
urge to glance over my shoulder is almost too strong, and my mind conjures
images of beasts springing from between their bars to devour me whole,
shadows with claws and teeth.
It was quiet and dark like this the night Mom was killed, too. I
remember that much—the moon was a sliver in the sky, slicing through the
thickening clouds like a sickle. I’d gone with her after begging to see her
hunt monsters. It was supposed to be an easy one, just a bag and tag of a
swamp lich that was terrorizing a town in the Outlands.
I shake my head, like that will knock the thought loose. What a great
thing to think about, surrounded out here by beasts. Behind bars, sure, but
still. It’s not like I don’t know what they’re thinking, even during the day
when congregants gawk at them, trying to purge themselves of sin. Bathed
in sunlight that glints off the bars, the monsters stare right back, revealing
every horrific part of them. The terrors, subdued.
A rumble of thunder cuts through the silence. I jump, my heart rising
into my throat.
Still, they make no noise.
Their eyes follow me from one cage after another, peering through
bars and fences and windowed enclosures as I check the locks and hurry on.
I can’t see all of them but I can picture them—eight-eyed arachne, standing
as still as stones. Thick-legged chimtars, tusks curved and resting against
the bars as they watch me go by. It’s like they know something is here and
they’re waiting for it to tear through the night and reveal itself.
Truly, I’m not usually scared like this. I’ve worked evening shifts
before. They’re actually peaceful—no congregants bothering you about
some ridiculous complaint, none of them weeping in the middle of the
paths, shouting prayers to the Lord Protector. No other Keepers trying to get
one up on you to gain the notice of the Blessed Council. I can take my time
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