01 - The Burning Shore Read Free

second. It was a lapse that almost cost him his
life. While he and the big Reiklander had been struggling the Tilean had slipped
behind him, waiting for an opportunity to strike. And the opportunity was now.
    With a grunt of effort, the Tilean’s sword whipped silently forward, tearing
through the silk of Florin’s shirt with an angry whine. It sent a line of
white-hot pain slicing across the muscles of his back.
    Spinning around to face the next blow Florin saw the rapier flickering
towards his eyes and ducked a little too slowly. Another thread of agony zipped
across his forehead, and a spill of hot blood ran down into his eyes.
    Blinking back tears, Florin stumbled away, crouching low, waiting for a
chance to duck in behind that sword point.
    But the Tilean gave him none. The rapier gave him the advantage, and he
intended to use it.
    “Should have just paid up,” he said, flitting to one side with the grace and
finesse of a dancing instructor. “Now it’s too late.”
    With a practiced flick of his wrist the man struck again. The blade was
invisible as it sliced through the darkness. Florin spun to one side. The blade
hissed past his ear, and he lunged forward.
    Once again the Tilean was too quick. Even as Florin tried to close with him
he’d skipped backwards, the blade of his rapier swishing playfully through the
air.
    “Ranald’s teeth,” Florin snarled with frustration. Behind him he could hear
the Reiklander groaning with pain as he lumbered slowly back to his feet.
    “What’s that you say?” the Tilean asked, nipping forward to send the tip of
his blade stinging across Florin’s nose.
    “I said you can have the gold,” he snapped, trying to ignore the fresh burst
of pain.
    “Sorry, my friend,” the Tilean said. “Too late for that. You’d have me
arrested as a common thief.”
    “Stop messing about,” the Reiklander interrupted, his voice an aggrieved
whine. “I’m bleeding. Just kill him.”
    The Tilean obediently lunged forward from the shadows. Florin, desperation
pushing him into one last frantic gamble, threw himself forward and to the
right.
    For a split second he thought that he’d made the wrong choice. Then the
Tilean’s blade flickered as it stabbed through the air to his left, and Florin
was upon him. With a yell he gripped the elbow of his sword arm and plunged the
blade of his dagger into the little man’s stomach.
    The Tilean’s eyes opened in twin circles of shock as the knife ripped upwards
into the soft flesh beneath his ribs. Then his mouth gaped opened in an
expression of perfect outrage as Florin twisted the blade up into his heart as
neatly as if he were coring an apple.
    With a horrible sucking sound, he pulled his dagger free and let the Tilean
fall.
    He died silently. The barest rattle of his last breath was silenced by a
thump as his body collapsed bonelessly onto the ground. Florin’s senses were
already concentrated on the Reiklander.
    But the big man was already running: his heavy boots pounded down the street
as he fled. For a second Florin considered giving chase. Then he looked down at
the body at his feet.
    The blood, black in the moonlight, still pulsed from the wounds in its
stomach and throat. It seeped between the cobbles to mix with the filth of the
gutter, as inconsequential as a butchered pig’s.
    With a deep, shuddering breath Florin knelt down beside the man. He reached
under his jaw to feel for a pulse. There wasn’t one. Unthinkingly he wiped his
dagger clean on the Tilean’s shirt. Then he turned the corpse’s face away from
the grimy stone of the pavement. He brushed a smudge of dirt away from its
forehead, and closed its eyes.
    Fighting the tight fist of nausea which clenched his stomach, Florin rose to
his feet. He squeezed his temples and took a deep breath.
    Why didn’t I just run, he asked himself?
    But he no more knew the answer to that than to why he’d spent his inheritance
on cards, or why he’d turned down