Primal Fear Read Online Free Page A

query completely.  And yet he still didn’t make a sound, instead choosing to nod slowly as a crooked, tired smile spread across his face.  A tear slipped from the corner of his good eye, sliding down his cheek to fall onto his hospital gown.
    “He understands me,” John murmured.   He leaned forward, reaching out to steady himself on the cold steel rail of the hospital bed.  He suddenly felt very weak in the knees, his senses dazed.  But he managed to speak softly, cautiously.
    This time the old man responded, his voice weak and hoarse.  He uttered only a handful of syllables, speaking slowly and painfully, but John nodded as he went on.
    “His name is Mahuk,” John reported.  “He’s from one of the northern villages, one of the old nomadic tribes.”
    The old man murmured something else and when John tried to translate, he felt as if he’d lost a good deal of his breath.  “He’s saying . . . he says he’s a descendant of Maku Jha Laman . . .”
    John swallowed, his voice finally starting to waver.  Something was wrong here.  Terribly wrong.  The old legends
    were only stories, just tales made up as warnings to children, to frighten them in the cold, dark winter nights . . .
    “Who?” Morris asked.  “Who’s this Maku—”
    “He was one of the most powerful shaman in my people’s history,” John said quietly.  “He lived more than two hundred years ago.”
    John watched numbly as Dr. Morris graced him with a dubious glance as he went back to speaking in his native tongue.  But however strange it must sound, there was no denying the fact that he’d managed to finally break through to the old man.
    “He says . . .”
    John hesitated, unsure that he’d heard it correctly himself.  “He says there is great danger, that he has left his village to fight it.”
    “What kind of danger?”
    “Wyh-heah Qui Waq,” John said, and the old man’s gaze darkened as the words filled the room.  “He says it’s coming.”
    Morris frowned, obviously confused.
    The old man was only trying to warn them, John knew.  Trying to help them.  But he was scared, and very weak.  And the fear in his own expression—a fear he was doing his best to conceal even now—had only served to make matters worse.
    “I don’t understand,” Morris said.
    “I know.  This is just—”
    “I’m sorry, John, but none of this makes very much sense to me.”
    “I’ll explain in a moment.  Right now I need to see his possessions.  Whatever he was carrying when you found him.  I need to look through them.”
    “And then you’ll explain?”
    “I’ll try my best.  But he’s very adamant.  He says it’s very important for me to find his possessions.” 
    “Is that all he said?”
    John paused, lowering his voice.  “No.  He told me my life depends on it.”
     
     
     
     
     
     

 
     
     
     
    Chapter One
     
    John carried the old man’s satchel into Morris’ office, laying it out carefully on the doctor’s desk.  He hesitated at first, toying with the clasp, feeling oddly reluctant about peering into the case, into the shaman’s personal belongings.  But the urge to know what lay inside was too powerful, and he soon relented to it.  Besides, he’d given Mahuk his solemn oath that he would do as he’d been asked.
    “It will help you to believe,” the shaman had told him, and John couldn’t be sure if he truly wanted to.  To believe or to disbelieve completely . . . each extreme bothered him for different reasons.  To forever wonder , though—that was somehow the worst possibility of all.  To hold the answers to so many questions in his hands and then simply turn away from them? 
    No, such an act was simply not in his nature.
    Dr. Morris seemed to sense his discomfort, already moving towards the door.  “I’ll let you take care of this, John.  I’ve got a couple of patients I’d like to look in on.”
    John looked up, grateful for the gesture.  “Thanks.  I won’t be