Read Empire of Bones for Free Online Page A

they got more and more inbred, and weirder and weirder. Finally, one son goes nuts and starts killing people.”
    “Wow,” Cyrus said. “I thought this was a funny story.”
    Diana shrugged. “The Avengel doesn’t usually get involved until a story stops being funny. Anyhow, they’d named this kid Icarus, like in the myth. And he always freaked out in the dark. That’s when he killed people, but he never remembered it when the sun came up. So he gets the fastest plane he can, and he starts flying west, chasing the sun like we are, only he actually keeps up and would even get ahead of it. He only touched down to refuel, and he just flew and flew. He burned through millions in fuel and replacement planes and a network of rogue ground crews, always changing where he touched down, and he just kept going. It took Rupe eighteen months before he caught him.”
    “Seriously?” Cyrus asked. “He flew with the sun for a year and half? He was never in the dark?”
    “Nope,” Diana said. “Not once. Icarus the Sun Chaser. Rupe said he was all the way nuts and practically blind when they caught him. He thought the guy would be angry or depressed, but he’d burned his eyes so bad, he always had this huge flaring afterimage. He thinks the sun follows him now.”
    “Where is he?” Cyrus asked.
    “Back in Greece, in a hospital. Jeb said the guy was the saddest killer he’d ever seen. Tons of money, no mind, and the last survivor in his crazy family.”
    Even behind shades, Cyrus blinked and turned away from the bright horizon.
    “Don’t worry,” Diana said. “It’ll go down again. We’re not flying that fast.”
    The sun did set again, but slowly. And the sky held on to its blue for hours, while down below, the ground was swallowed up by the darkest shadow Cyrus had ever seen.
    Diana yawned and looked over at Cyrus’s leg. An hour into the flight, Antigone had dragged him back into the cabin and their mother had bandaged it, warning him that they would have to dig the pellets out later. Just a little something to look forward to, Cyrus had thought. And Dan had rubbed his head like he was still a kid. Which he guessed he was.
    Horace had been surly, refusing to even look at Cyrus. Antigone had hung the two paper globes from the ceiling to dry, where they looked like a pair of enormous, ridiculously droopy socks. Cyrus hadn’t seen a drop of ink left on either of them.
    Nolan and Niffy had been sleeping side by side. Dan had been sitting cross-legged on the floor, both eyes on Flint, who was hog-tied with Niffy’s belt and curled up on the floor. All the vents were open and blasting cool air, but the little cabin had still smelled an awful lot like people.
    When the sky had grown black and the time hadfinally come to descend, Diana was asleep. Her arms were open in her lap, her head was tipped just a little back, and her shades had slipped two freckles farther down her nose. Her lips were parted slightly. Cyrus twisted in his seat and looked back into the cabin. He couldn’t see Nolan and Antigone, but the others were all asleep. Only Flint’s shoulder was in view, but even he was still.
    Cyrus turned back to his instruments, and the darkness on the ground below him. He could see a city web of pinprick lights in the distance, but not a big city, and they weren’t flying that far anyway. He had the coordinates Rupert had given Diana, but nothing else. There were stars above him, but no moon. He hoped there would be lights wherever they were supposed to land, because coordinates were only going to help him so much.
    He nosed the plane down a little too quickly, and Diana’s head lolled forward, then tipped toward him. Cyrus leaned over and pushed it back up. No good. Her chin hit her chest.
    Oh, well. He’d have to wake her up soon anyway. He wasn’t about to just pick a spot in the darkness and try to land.
    “We overshot.” Diana’s voice was quiet in his headphone. She yawned. “Get low out over the lake and