The Gully Snipe (The Dual World Book 1) Read Free Page A

could be heard. He ignored the commands and set his mind instead to actively dodging the throngs of the crowd that were unaware of the arrest that had so recently been thwarted and were still going about their business in the streets of the capital.
    The Gully Snipe felt close to free and victory, and so he ventured a quick glance behind him to gauge the distance of the guards, with almost fatal results. As he turned back forward, his eye caught on something familiar to his left. He spotted the soft, brown and auburn curls and the emerald eyes of the girl locked with his own for a split second, and he cursed how easily he was distracted under the circumstances. But then, she was watching him, too, so he decided that maybe he could be forgiven for being distracted this time. He wondered briefly what had caught her eye, other than someone running the streets so hard it was like the gypsies themselves were hard on his feet to boil his bones for soup.
    Just as he forced his face forward and his mind back onto the more pressing matter of his escape, a carriage being pulled by a large Belder horse, of the kind so prevalent in the Iisendom, had crossed his path and stopped right in front of him. He would have careened right into the beast’s barrel if it weren’t for the fact that Belders were so large and tall. The Snipe managed to duck under the horse’s belly and to the other side, startling it as he did so. The resulting nervous stepping of the large beast caused the guards to decide it was less risky to go around the horse and carriage, even if it gave their prey a small extra amount of a lead.
    The Snipe peeled off to the right, down a side street, and with the market behind him and consequently fewer people to thread through, was able to sprint ahead even faster, dodging right and left down more streets and alleys until he was sure he had lost the guards. He even entered the front door of an inn that he knew had a convenient back door that let out into a hidden alley not too far from the Chalk Market. Inside the inn, he slowed to a casual walk and tried to pace his breath and heart. He nodded politely to the pretty young girl that worked it and took the time to remove his chaperon and flip it inside out. The guards that were looking for someone in a black hood would pay no attention to someone wearing a light brown one instead.
    He placed his throwing knife back where it belonged in his boot. The knife was one of his dearest possessions and he felt oddly naked without the hilt of it against his ankle; so precious was it that he would have given up the money before losing the knife. With an extra deep breath, he walked casually out the back of the inn, checking the side of his belt to ensure he still had his moneybag. He exited the alley and melted into the teeming crowd of much poorer people that frequented the Chalk Market.
    Not a bad day’s work, after all.
    Except for the sore back from landing on it and throwing the guard overhead.
    And the tooth.
     
     
    ~~~~~
     
     
    The Gully Snipe walked through the unused gate in the old city wall. This was one of the original city walls of Lohrdanwuld, back when the city was much smaller than its current size. The gates and barbicans in the old, original walls were still in place, but never used. The newer city walls were further out, to the west of where the city backed up against Kitemount, and were the ones actively used to defend the capital now.
    As he passed through the gate along with a stream of others moving from one part of the city to another, he spotted a familiar face. Seated on the paving stones at the foot of the gate was Almonee, what was left of her frazzled white hair sticking out from under her skewed cap as she gnawed on a tough parsnip. The Snipe wondered if he’d wind up in her place one day, with only a few teeth left in his mouth and slightly touched in the head, like her. She made no notice of the hooded, young man standing and watching her from only a