Free The Golden Door by Emily Rodda

skeleton of a man, the bones picked clean.
    Rye felt a roaring in his ears. His mind flew to Dirk, but almost at once, he realized that his fears were foolish. These pitiful remains were not Dirk’s. The bones showed that in life the dead man would not have been much taller than Crell. And instead of a skimmerhook, a small hatchet lay half buried in leaves at the foot of the net.
    “What has done this?” Rye whispered.
    Sonia shuddered. She looked pale and sick.
    “Who knows?” she muttered. “Some creature of the Fell Zone — one of the creatures stalking us now, no doubt. They are all around us. Can you not feel them?”
    Rye nodded, his heart thudding. He felt breathless. Again he thought he caught a flicker of movement by the side of the path. He swung around with a gasp, his hand tightening on his stick, but still he saw nothing.
    “We had better move on,” he said. “Soon the sun will set. And the skimmers …”
    “Skimmers!” Sonia made an impatient sound. “Are skimmers all you can think of? You are as obsessed with them as everyone else in Weld!”
    “Of course I am!” snapped Rye. “Because of the skimmers, I have lost my home and everyone I love! As you have yourself, Sonia! Or have you been so long in the safety of the Keep that you have forgotten?”
    Sonia paused. An expression that might have been shame crossed her face. Then, without another word, she stepped from the path to move around the slimy net and its hideous burden.
    And instantly the tree on that side seemed to come alive. What looked like a thick section of mottled bark peeled away, revealing itself to Rye’s horrified eyes as a huge, lizardlike beast, foul-smelling slime dripping from its snarling jaws.

T he monster reared up on its hind legs and lunged at Sonia, its mottled tail lashing, a fan of spines and skin rising on the back of its neck. Sonia screamed and ducked, avoiding the snapping jaws by a hair, and ran for her life. The beast dropped to all fours and leaped after her, frighteningly fast.
    Yelling in shock, Rye shrugged off his bundle, snatched up the dead man’s hatchet, and gave chase.
    Ahead he could see flashes of red as Sonia wove frantically between the trees below him. The gigantic lizard was hurtling after her, gaining on her every moment. At first, it looked weirdly like a huge piece of tree bark careering down the slope, but in moments, its knobbly, scaly skin had begun to change, quickly taking on the nutty brown color of the dead leaves. Soon it was visible only because it was moving.
    Rye pounded after it, slipping and sliding,keeping his feet by a miracle. His heart felt as if it were bursting in his chest. The hatchet was in his hand. If only he could get a clear line of sight, he could throw it. His aim was usually good — not as good as Dirk’s, but good enough. Surely, even running, he could hit a target as large as this huge lizard. Injure it, at least. Delay it.
    And then what? Then his only weapon would be the bell tree stick.
    He could not think of that. He just had to keep running, waiting for the moment when …
    He lost sight of Sonia behind a tangle of bushes. He could hear her sobbing gasps, but he could not see her. He could only see the beast, a surging, hissing mass of brown. For an instant, it was directly below him, but before he could hurl the hatchet, the creature had wheeled around the bushes and disappeared. Then, suddenly, Sonia burst into view again. She was glancing over her shoulder, her face twisted in terror.
    The beast was right behind her. It was almost upon her. And ahead of her …
    Rye went cold. “Sonia!” he bellowed. “In front of you! Beware!”
    He saw Sonia’s head jerk as she heard him. She looked blindly ahead but did not see what Rye could see so clearly — the slimy strands of another crude net stretched across her path.
    In horror, Rye saw the red figure run straight into the net. In horror, he saw her fixed by thesticky, gleaming strings, struggling