Daughter of Prophecy Read Free Page B

then to Rhiannon. The boy was ten, small for his age and frail. He had his father’s pale skin and black hair. Catching her eye, Phelan grinned with excitement, teeth biting down on his lower lip, clearly relishing the prospect of seeing such mythical beasts.
    Rhiannon did not share his enthusiasm. She brushed a hand across the hilt of her sword, taking comfort in its weight resting in the scabbard hanging from a broad belt buckled around her waist. On her fourteenth birthday, her father had given in to her pleading and presented her this scaled-down version of his broadsword. Since then she had joined her brothers in daily lessons with their arms instructor, infuriating Creag by continually besting him in bouts with their wooden practice swords.
    Returning to the big roan, Tellan took the reins and swung easily into the saddle. He led them toward the sheep in the nearby field. The grassy hillsides around the hlaford were rock-strewn. Further on, a series of ridges undulated upward to the higher peaks towering in the distance. Below, a wide stream snaked through the middle of the valley floor, bubbling and frothing its way to the join the Clundy River several leagues away.
    On warm summer days, Rhiannon and her brothers wove fish traps from rushes gathered in the quiet eddies of the stream. Then they waded into the snowmelt with bare toes clinging to the slippery stones along the bottom, placing the traps between rocks that narrowed the current, emerging with chattering teeth and blue lips. Later, they returned to lift the baskets out and carry the trout home to be cleaned and cooked for dinner.
    The clouds hid the sky completely, a solid gray sheet seemingly close enough to touch, as was often the case in the Dinari highlands. Its rugged hills produced two things superbly: sheep with prize wool that could be woven into waterproof garments, and hard-muscled warriors, each equal to any three men from the other five clans. Or so the Dinari boasted.
    But Rhiannon’s beloved highlands had not produced anything in living memory that could wreak such havoc as she saw now. The sight chilled her more than the long predawn ride in the cold drizzle. Less than a hundred paces away from her home the bloody carcasses of several score of sheep dotted the surrounding field. Recently shorn, their white bodies lay in stark contrast against the green grass. The animals’ throats were ripped open. But even more ominous to Rhiannon was the number of limbs torn from their bodies and flung paces away.
    She struggled with the filly again as they came to where the majority of the sheep had been slain. The horse pranced about with light feet, head swinging side to side, blowing low snorts at the mangled corpses. Rhiannon collected her mount with gentle but steady pressure on the bit. “Easy, easy.”
    Phelan nudged his horse up alongside. “You think winged horrors did this?” he whispered in awe.
    â€œI don’t know,” Rhiannon shook her head. “A pack of wolves could kill this many, but . . . ” She swallowed as a cold twist rippled through her stomach. “But their feeding would not tear bodies apart in such a manner.”
    Every carcass in sight had its throat torn away by what must have been sharp teeth and the power of massive jaws. Plus, Rhiannon noted, most of the severed limbs lying scattered about had the bones sliced—or bitten—completely through.
    Her father’s head herdsmen, Serous, came forward to hold the stallion’s bit while Tellan dismounted. Serous was of average height and painfully thin. Both his hands were gnarled, the joints red and swollen. “Not a pleasant sight, m’lord. As a boy, then a man, I’ve been herding sheep nigh on fifty years, and I never seen the like.”
    A murmur of agreement came from the other herders. They shifted back and forth on nervous feet, eyes flicking between their lord and the dead sheep.
    The loreteller dismounted and