World Weaver (The Devany Miller Series Book 4) Read Free Page A

to keep myself upright.
    “Go! Let her play her games.”
    “She can’t hold me, Marantha.” I wanted to go outside and bust the Anforsa’s ass, but I wasn’t sure I’d be able to do any butt kicking while Kenda was mainlining the Omphalos.
    “Send her out and you won’t be killed,” came a voice from outside. It was Kenda’s, amplified. The vibrations shook the walls and Marantha groaned.
    “I just got done paying for the last bit of destruction,” she said, then raised her voice. “You do not have my permission to enter my house, Anforsa Kenda!” She glared at me and put her finger to her lips.
    Plaster crumbled. A picture fell, hitting my shoulder as Kenda spoke again. “I know she’s in there. I smell the stink of her Skriven magic.”
    “You are insane. Go away or the Council will hear about this.”
    The laughter peeled the paint from the walls. The powder blue flakes sifted down on us like snow. “I am the Council. They are me. It has been decreed that Devany Miller pays with her life for her crimes. And any who help her will be considered traitors and will be executed.”
    “I’m not helping anyone. Last I checked, we had laws. Laws that didn’t include murdering people we are scared of.”
    I had to hand it to Marantha. She had big ole lady balls. I was terrified, but I could hook away if I had to. Marantha? Not so much. Still, she didn’t look scared so much as royally pissed off. She was scary when she was mad.
    “Send her out now, and I will promise you a fair trial.”
    Marantha made shooing motions with her hands. “Get out of here,” she whispered.
    “Not without you,” I said quietly. “She’s insane.”
    “I can handle her.”
    More laughter. The witchballs that lit up Marantha’s living area fell off their pedestals, and I reeled back in fear. “Are they going to explode?”
    Marantha ignored me. “Go on.”
    “Not without you.”
    She rolled her eyes at me. “I can handle Kenda. If she kills me, she’ll regret it. She can either let me alone or face rebellion.” Marantha shouted again, “Isn’t that right, Kenda?”
    The house stopped shaking.
    The silence was creepy.
    “Go ahead. Come in here and grab me. You won’t find the person you’re looking for. You won’t find anything but trouble.” Marantha crossed the room to me and grabbed my arms. “Don’t make a liar out of me. Get out of here now. You won’t do me any good if any of the Council members sees you here. Right now, it’s her word against mine and I still have friends in high places. Go.”
    “Damn it, Marantha. Don’t get yourself killed.”
    Outside, the Anforsa shrieked her triumph. I hooked away as the side of Marantha’s house crumbled to dust.
    Heart thundering, I stood in my bedroom at home and hoped to heck Marantha knew what she was doing. I didn’t need another death on my head, especially not the death of a friend.
     
    ***
     
    Though I’d spent a little over an hour with Dad and Marantha, five hours had flown by on Earth. I had only ten minutes before Liam would be home, so I stripped off my blood-stained, tea-moistened clothes and scrubbed my face in the bathroom, wincing when I got soap in the cut from Kali’s knife.
    Clean, I padded to the closet and pulled a comfy t-shirt off a shelf along with my favorite faded blue jeans. I slipped on blue underwear and bra, the lacy silk making me smile. I put my hair up in a messy bun, then stared at my reflection in the mirror. Faint purple circles shadowed my eyes and was it me or were there more wrinkles there than last time I looked?
    I smoothed on some skin cream, patting it on my chin and neck, too. I made it downstairs and had food heating on the stove when Liam walked in the door. He asked the same question every day and every day I had to let him down.
    “Did you find her?”
    I shook my head.
    Some days he railed. Some days he went right up to his room. Some days he cried. Today he picked up our kitten weaving around his ankles