Merlin's Nightmare (The Merlin Spiral)

Merlin's Nightmare (The Merlin Spiral) Read Free Page B

Book: Merlin's Nightmare (The Merlin Spiral) Read Free
Author: Robert Treskillard
Tags: Ebook
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stomach like rotten meat, churning his innards. He had to get away; he had to!
    But the wolves were faster, and his horse began to wheeze from the effort. Merlin had been anxious to get back to Dinas Crag with the news he carried and had ridden the horse hard for hours. Its strength was almost gone.
    Another wolf snapped at the horse’s right side, ripping her leg open. The horse kicked, screaming in terror, and then staggered forward again.
    Merlin panicked. He wouldn’t get away. His horse was going to die. He was going to die. He could kill one wolf, maybe two, but never a whole pack. An image of his body, mangled and gutted like the buck, flashed before his eyes.
    A wolf latched onto his boot, its teeth slicing into his foot like small daggers. He tried to draw his sword, but the horse reared up, forcing the wolf to drop off. The hackles of the wolf’s neck twitched, and its yellow eyes lusted for Merlin’s blood as it prepared to leap.
    A wolf on his left gashed the horse’s belly.
    Merlin turned to face the beast, but a large branch blocked his view. He reached, clamped his hands onto the smooth bark, pulled free from his horse, and wrapped his legs around the branch. He didn’t want to abandon his horse, whom he’d raised from a filly, but he also knew the only chance she had of getting away was without his weight.
    The horse shot forward into the brush, with all three wolves slashing it with their bloody jaws. Unfortunately, the end came quickly, with the wolves pulling it down about fifty paces away.
    Merlin climbed up and listened painfully to her last screams.
    When the poor creature’s silence came, and only the wolves’ gory feast could be heard, he took in some deep breaths and tried to discern his position on the path. He’d been traveling south from Luguvalium, the capital of Rheged, and was on his way back home to Dinas Crag. There awaited his wife, Natalenya, and their two children: Tingada, their little daughter, and Taliesin, their growing boy. And their adopted Arthur, now eighteen winters old.
    Surely Merlin had passed the long lake already . . . or had he?
    Ahead of him he could hear a stream burbling in the dark, so the path must have swung closer to it again. But was this the stream — the Derwent — as he had thought? If so, then he was close to home with the crossroad just beyond.
    A faint splash. Maybe a fish. Then another. Full splashing, now. Then clopping. A rider, coming his way, heading toward the wolves.
    Merlin had to warn him. “Who’s there?” he called. “Take care! Wolves just killed my horse, and more are just beyond.”
    The rider cantered forward, slowing just below Merlin. A man with a broad face and a gray beard looked up at him.
    “And what am I to do about such a dilemma? I must get through.”
    “They’ll scatter if you give them enough time — ”
    “No. I’ve an urgent and vital message that must get through.”
    Howling sounded far down the path, and soon the three who had just killed the horse answered. “Maybe it would be best to turn back for now. Is there a village nearby?”
    “Dinas Crag. I’ll take you there.”
    “Not on my horse. You’ll walk, you will.”
    A wolf howled. The man wheeled his horse around.
    Merlin swung down and dropped onto its back, just behind the man.
    “Get off!”
    “Go!” Merlin drove his heels into the horse’s flanks, sending it flying down the path and splashing through the stream thinned by the long spring drought.
    When they were a good distance away and no pursuit could be heard, the man pulled his horse to a stop. He turned and growled. “Get off.”
    “I saved your life.”
    The man shoved Merlin off the back of the horse.
    But Merlin landed on his feet, dashed to the left, lifted the man’s boot, and threw him from the horse.
    The man scrambled to his feet, spitting dry grass, and glared at Merlin from the other side of the saddle. His face was red. “Take off your mask!”
    “No.”
    “Who are

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