The Third Kingdom Read Free

squirmed frantically, his arms flailing as he desperately reached for something, anything, that would help him escape or at least get a breath. He kicked with his heels, aiming for Richard’s shins. Richard pulled his knees up to keep his lower legs out of range. Mostof the blind kicks landed on the ground and the ones that did connect weren’t direct enough. Gritting his teeth with the effort, Richard tipped the man back even farther just to make sure that he couldn’t do any damage with his heels.
    Richard saw a knife blade rising in a bloody fist of the second man. He pulled the man he was strangling over on top of himself as best he could to shield himself against a knife attack. He didn’t know how effective it would be, but it was the only thing he could do.
    Suddenly, there was a loud, bone-cracking thump. The man faltered as he tried to turn. Another, sharper thump swiftly followed. With the third blow, blood rained down.
    The man dropped the knife as he collapsed in a limp heap across the top of the man Richard was choking.
    Richard wasn’t sure what had happened, but he was not about to let go to find out. Without the second man fighting him, he was able to focus all his strength on the task at hand. The big man’s movements had already become slow and weak as not only his wind was being cut off, but also the blood to his brain.
    Richard screamed with rage to power his own aching muscles. As the man’s struggling became sluggish, Richard swiftly changed his hold, throwing an arm around the man’s neck, getting him in a headlock. Hard as he he could, he twisted the man’s head. In the quiet drizzle, when he reached the point of resistance, he pulled back a bit to gather more force, then slammed the man’s head over even harder. When he did, he finally felt the neck snap. The man’s whole body immediately went slack.
    Powered by fury, Richard continued strangling the man even though he was no longer fighting.
    A hand gently reached down with a reassuring touch to Richard’s bulging biceps.
    “It’s all right. He’s dead. They’re both dead.” It was awoman’s voice he didn’t recognize. “You’re safe,” she said. “You can let go now.”
    Still panting from the effort and the rage, Richard blinked as he looked up into several shadowed faces crowded in over him.
    They were not soldiers. From their simple clothes, they appeared to be country folk. Two women and two men leaned in, looking down at him. Back beyond those four, a handful of other men crowded in closer. They, too, looked like country folk.

CHAPTER
3
    Richard gradually released the pressure on the dead man’s neck. As the remaining air hissed from his lifeless lungs, his head flopped crookedly to one side.
    One of the men standing above him lifted the limp arm of the other, smaller of the two dead men atop Richard and pulled him off to the side. Even in death, there was still a bloody snarl frozen on the face.
    A mask of blood had run down to cover the side of the man’s face. Fragments of bone stuck up from his matted hair. Richard saw that the back of his head had been bashed in with a large rock that one of the other men crowded in close still held in a tight grip.
    As the man with the broken neck began to slowly slip off to the side, one of the women, the one who had touched Richard’s arm, used a foot to shove the bigger of the two dead men aside. It was a relief to have the suffocating weight finally off.
    The woman picked up the bloody knife that the second attacker had dropped when his skull had been crushed in. Leaning close, she sliced at the rope binding Richard’s hands and they at last parted. She moved down and cut the rope tying his ankles together.
    “Thank you,” Richard said. He was more than relieved to at last be free. “You saved my life.”
    “For the moment,” a man in the shadows said.
    “We hope you will return the favor,” another added.
    Richard didn’t know what he meant, but he had bigger