Duel At Grimwood Creek (Book 2) Read Free Page B

decades and never find them.
    She couldn't risk it. She had to move quickly, too.
    Which meant moving off the path and taking a more direct route toward the bordertown. It was a slim hope. One she knew depended on her luck in avoiding any sudden shifts in terrain. Or worse, any Draug haunting the shadows.
    Inwardly, the elf groaned in anticipation of a few more scrapes and bruises.
    Always a few steps behind, the warlock kept muttering to himself. An irritating noise given the pounding ache behind her eyes.
    An ache which didn't seem to want to fade.
    As her thoughts turned toward the warlock, she realised with cold certainty that she couldn't trust him.
    Spellslingers could never be trusted. They were dangerous. Even the weakest could kill with a wave of their hand. And he'd managed to kill more Lichspawn than even she could have.
    All with a few words.
    And then there was his story about what had happened while she was unconscious. But what had really happened?
    She looked down at her wrist. A few specks of dried blood were all she had to show. Not even a scar. Something so powerful as the cables of solid shadow Gaket had unleashed couldn't just disappear. He had to have done something. Must have. So what really happened? And why would he heal her and then tell her he didn't?
    And what did all that have to do with Talek's box?
    She'd been gripping it in her fist since reaching the path. And despite the warlock's insistence that only a mage could open it, the lid flipped open easily enough even now. Her fingers explored the empty container and her mind puzzled at the absent contents, though she didn't yet remove it from her pocket.
    All she'd wanted was something to remember him by. A token of a the love she'd found so difficult to reveal, even to him. But which she still felt burning in her chest every time she thought about him.
    About his eyes. His wry smile. The sound of his voice.
    His smell.
    Hands, cupping her face.
    The elf's expression hardened, and she pushed thoughts of her husband aside.
    The box, once a symbol of the chains which had bound them together, had become a curse.
    “You alright up there?”  
    Looking over her shoulder at him, she caught a look of concern on his face which quickly fell away behind a curtain of weariness. He looked tired to the point of passing out. But she had to keep moving. Had to catch up. “I'm fine,” she grunted. “Stop fucking asking. It's pissing me off.”
    “Everything pisses you off,” the warlock shot back.  
    She let it go. Ahead, the path wove between two hills. Formed from pebbles, shale, and shattered bones, they stood like guardians of the pass. In an age long past, they could have been barrows.
    Could have just been natural hills, too. The elf didn't care.
    But she'd been watching them for the past few minutes and did care that she couldn't see the path beyond. Couldn't see if Raste had left a few of his men behind to take care of her. She scratched at the palm of her hand and the corner of her mouth leaked cruelly upward toward the scar on her cheek.
    As she led the warlock toward the gap, all the elf was expecting was an arrow in the teeth.
    “Nysta?” Chukshene said behind her. “I've got a bad feeling-”  
    His words were cut by a hollow roar which exploded between the hills like an eruption of wind. She dropped into a fighter's stance, A Flaw in the Glass glowing in one fist. In the other, the blade called Kindness which she'd taken from the body of a wagoner who'd tried to bury it into her face. She could hear a rumble. Followed by another.  
    Another.
    And, with horror rising like frozen mist from her belly, she realised it was the footsteps of something big.
    And then she heard the chains.
    The warlock's hand fisted around the back of her jacket as he lurched sideways, pulling her toward the closest trench scarring the earth. At first she resisted, but then caught the look of terror in his eyes as he hissed; “Move it, Long-ear. Trust me, you