The Royal Hunter Read Free Page A

barter to get. “It’s not like she can’t go back to her old life once she’s healed the queen.”
    “Lives, once dabbled in, never return to their former sameness. Like a rock thrown in a pond. Even after the surface ripples smooth, the landscape beneath is forever altered.”
    “Fine. I don’t mean her any harm and neither does the queen.”
    “Yes, but have you stopped to consider that others will want to prevent her from helping the queen? Can you keep her safe from this harm?”
    “Me? I’m just the deliveryman. The queen will handle protection.”
    “The royal court tried to protect her once before and she almost lost her life. Why should she trust them again?”
    “That was almost thirty years ago. Security is far more advanced.”
    “As are those who strive to get around it. Did it occur to you that there is a reason she has not returned? She did not depart this time with an easy heart. It was her duty from birth to attend the royal family and she was the first ever in her line to disobey and put her own needs over those she was born to help.”
    “If her heart was so heavy at the thought ofleaving, hearing of the queen’s predicament would make her want to return, wouldn’t it?”
    “She never knew the young queen,” Baleweg announced. “Eleri was in service during the time of King Cynan.”
    Archer leaned forward. “So, tell me how to find her. I assume you know how to get me there?”
    Baleweg studied Archer. “Your impatience will cost you things you can ill afford to lose if you are not careful.”
    “I haven’t had too much trouble up to this point.”
    Baleweg merely sighed. “Time is an ongoing continuum. Rushing toward it does not make it advance any faster.”
    Archer took a deep breath and tried to smile without clenching his jaw. “How do we find her, then?”
    “The heart will be your guide.”
    “Wonderful.” He had no heart. He’d given the only one he had to his mother … and she’d sold it.
C’est la vie
.
    “Trust me.”
    Archer stared at the old man. “Like I said.”
    Baleweg sighed, then rose to his feet. “You will see.”
    Archer whistled for Ringer. “I guess I need you to show me how to get back once I find her.” Not that he really believed he was going anywhere.
    “There will be no need. I will be coming with you.”
    Archer laughed. “I work alone. Nonnegotiable.”
    Baleweg turned. “I go with you, or you stay right here in the twenty-third century. Nonnegotiable.”
    Archer stared him down.
    “Do you wish to trust
your
heart? Or mine?”
    Score one for the old man. Archer swore under his breath. “There are going to be some groundrules. I am in charge. We go where I want, when I want, no questions asked. If you don’t keep up, you get left behind. And if it comes to a choice between my skin and yours guess which one I’m going to save? You still in?”
    Baleweg smiled. “If you don’t keep track of my skin, as you call it, you will be forever stuck in the past. Are
you
still in?”
    “The past?” Somehow he’d assumed the old man had been talking about the future. For the first time, the skin on the back of Archer’s neck prickled. Not a good sign.
    “Yes, the past. And be aware, we cannot return to this precise moment. I cannot move you backward in your own life’s span. The time we spend there will also be spent here.” Ringer meowed and rubbed against Baleweg’s legs.
    “Traitor,” Archer muttered. Could this guy really know what he was doing? Could he risk not finding out? “Okay, fine, fine, we’re both in. What do we do next?”
    Baleweg turned and focused on a point somewhere in front of him. He began to chant beneath his breath. A chill that Archer couldn’t define, or control, chased over his skin. The hair on the back of his neck stood straight out, his instincts all but shrieking that he was about to take an irreversible step. He was a heartbeat away from stepping back and telling the old man to stop, when Baleweg