Shadows of Asphodel Read Free Page A

his face.
    Ardis sighed. “Are you sure you can walk? You’re half dead.”
    He gave her a pained smile. “Not half dead. Only a quarter dead.” He gingerly rubbed his side. “That bastard must have cracked my ribs.”
    She shook her head. “That would hurt much more. You wouldn’t be laughing at all.”
    “I take it you have experienced cracked ribs before?”
    “You shouldn’t be travelling,” she said. “You should stay with the medics.”
    Wendel’s face went emotionless again. “No, thank you.”
    Ardis continued walking. Her feet ached, and she could do with a drink before hitting the road. The necromancer matched her stride. Ardis was tall, but Wendel was at least a few inches taller than her. She studied the lean muscles in his torso and the length of his limbs. He would likely have the advantage of reach in a fight, if nothing else.
    “You need a shirt,” she said. “And a coat.”
    “Ah, well, I ruined mine.” He glanced sideways at her. “Were you staring?”
    Her cheeks warmed. “You’re very pale.”
    “Blood loss will do that to a man,” he said. “That, and an inability to tan.”
    Ardis bit back a smile.
    Wendel stopped halfway across the field and shaded his eyes with his hand.
    “I lost my dagger out there,” he muttered.
    He hurried toward the edge of the battlefield, or hurried as well as he could, limping and holding his side. Ardis sighed and followed him. She supposed it was a good idea to let the necromancer have his weapon back. It wasn’t like she could stop him from raising the dead. That was touch magic, skin-to-skin.
    Wendel stopped next to a Transylvanian soldier in a bloodstained blue uniform. The man had died fairly recently, from the looks of it, but the snow had already begun to bury his body. Beside him lay a scythe with a wicked blade.
    “I don’t see any dagger,” Ardis said.
    Wendel’s eyes sharpened. He crouched beside the man and studied his face.
    “He would know,” he said.
    “What?” she said.
    Wendel was ignoring her. He laid his hand on the soldier’s neck, then blew out his breath. All the muscles in Wendel’s shoulder and arm tensed.
    The soldier blinked his unseeing eyes, and sat upright.
    Ardis unsheathed Chun Yi, her nausea peaking. “What are you doing?”
    Wendel didn’t let go of the man, and his face was etched with concentration, or pain.
    “Where is my dagger?” he said.
    The soldier’s blue lips moved, and a gurgling noise came from his throat. He wasn’t breathing; or perhaps the air moving through his lungs was as cold as the winter sky. He stared at Wendel with clouded eyes.
    “You remember,” Wendel whispered, “I know you do. You tried to kill me.”
    Ardis’s hand clenched tight around Chun Yi.
    “The dagger—is by—the tree.” The soldier lifted his arm and pointed toward a pine tree. His gaze never left the necromancer’s eyes.
    “Thank you,” Wendel said.
    He let go of the soldier, and the man collapsed back into the snow. Dead again. Ardis couldn’t help staring at the scythe.
    “That was the man who wounded you?” she said, slightly queasy.
    “Yes,” Wendel said.
    He had a disgusted, disdainful look, one she had seen before on the faces of cats. He scooped up a handful of snow and scrubbed his fingers clean. Ardis doubted you could ever forget touching a dead man, but she suspected she knew why he was washing his hands so religiously in the river.
    “Was that necessary?” she said.
    “Yes,” he said, clearly no longer a man of many words.
    Wendel climbed to his feet and strode toward the pine tree identified by the undead soldier. He pawed at the snow, then held a blade high—a black dagger with ornate silver engravings of flowers on the hilt.
    “Very necessary,” he murmured.
    He tilted the dagger so it caught the sun. Ripples swirled through the black metal, the mark of Damascus steel, an art lost centuries ago.
    “This is Amarant,” Wendel said. “Do you know what that