Dragon Blood-Hurog 2 Read Free Page A

twins.
    "Bandits," I said in answer to Oreg's look as I mounted and lead the way out of the bailey.
    "My brother spied them near our farm and Da sent me here for help." There was a hint of accusation in the boy's tone. Three people, it implied, would not be much help.
    The air was chill with the coming winter. We'd taken the last of the harvest in this week. Oreg said he thought it might snow soon, but today the leaves still clung to the branches of the rowan and aspen in bright clumps that stood out against the dark greens of the pines and firs. Pansy, my stallion, snorted with
    pretended fear and shied violently when a falling leaf fluttered too close. In battle, not even a heavy blow
    would cause him to step to the right or left without my request, but outside of serious work, Pansy loved
    to play.
    The shortest path to Atwater's farm skirted the edge of the mountains where the land was too rocky to Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html plow. The farm was isolated in a hanging valley away from the other cultivated fields of Hurog. That isolation had lured bandits into thinking it was a target before, but none of them had ever managed to take anything from Atwater. I didn't think that was going to change today. The turf was still soft enough that the steady trot I'd set was unlikely to cause the horses much stress. People were another matter entirely.
    "We need to hurry," said the boy for the third time. I'd had a gentle mare found for him, but I needn't have. He sat her bareback (his choice) and was impatient with the rest of us for holding him back.
    "Never arrive for a fight breathless," snapped Tosten.
    "If they overran your farm, we'd smell smoke by now," I reassured the boy, shooting Tosten a repressive
    look. "They might not have seen the farm, or your father may have driven them off or killed them. Either
    way we don't have to hurry. There can't be very many of them, or I'd have heard about it before they made it this far onto Hurog lands."
    "Don't worry about Tosten, boy," said Oreg cheerfully. "He's as impatient as you are." Tosten sank into silence. Oreg, in contrast, was unusually lighthearted, teasing the boy until he smiled—at which point my brother let his stallion speed past us. With a glance at me, the boy sent his mare cantering after my brother—obviously hoping I'd hurry after both of them.
    "I wish you wouldn't bait Tosten," I murmured to Oreg.
    Oreg just smiled, though his eyes didn't light up the way they did when he was really amused. "Your brother has had plenty of time to decide that I'm no threat to him. Time he grew up. If I choose to tweak his tail a bit—that's between him and me. He doesn't need your protection anymore, Ward." I rolled my eyes. "You encourage him," I said.
    "I frighten him," Oreg corrected, and even his mouth was serious. I must have looked unconvinced, because he shook his head and said, "I'm no threat to his relationship with you, and he knows that. It hasn't been about that for some time." Oreg smiled again, but this time it was a genuine one. "Poor lad's fighting dragons."
    It was an old Shavig saying about someone who was displaying rash bravery impelled by fear. The ironic
    twist to Oreg's tone was because in this case it was literally true. Oreg's father had been half-dragon. Oreg could take dragon form when he wished, and considered both the human seeming and the dragon his true forms.
    I weighed what Oreg had said. Tosten was the only one who knew the whole story about Oreg. As my heir and as my brother I thought I owed him that. Perhaps it would have been better if I'd stuck to half-truths.
    Atwater's boy waited for us at the top of the trail, though Tosten was still ahead.
    "Tosten told me it is magic that lets you see there's nothing wrong at my home. There's a lot of folks who
    are frightened by magic."
    It sounded like a personal observation, and I looked at him sharply. He colored up, but his eyes met Generated by ABC