Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 123190 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 616(@200wpm)___ 493(@250wpm)___ 411(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 123190 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 616(@200wpm)___ 493(@250wpm)___ 411(@300wpm)
Even if I’d been older, I was far too deep in my trauma to think in terms of physical attraction during our days in the dungeons. But today? Three years removed from the darkest nights of my life, and with Kendrick at my back and his warm forearm against my bare stomach, his fingertips brushing my side? Today, safe is mixed up with a whole messy bunch of other emotions I’d rather not analyze too closely.
I’m saved from having to reply when Remme falls back to ride alongside us.
“We have a couple of options,” he says. “There’s a village ahead where we’ll be able to find dinner and a couple of rooms for the night with no problem. Or we could keep riding and hit Elligold, probably right before sunset, barring any complications along the path.”
“We should head on,” Skylar calls without looking back. “Get as far on day one as we can.”
“But I’m guessing there’s a reason you think we should consider stopping sooner,” Kendrick says to Remme.
Remme nods. “According to our sources, Elligold is a much smaller place. So there’s a chance they won’t have available lodging for us or, worse, that like a lot of these small rural towns, it was wiped out entirely during Mordeus’s rule. We could camp if it comes to that, but since we’re trying to operate with an abundance of caution . . .”
Kendrick considers this, but only briefly. “We stop early. It’s been a long day already, and I don’t want Jasalyn to be so sore that tomorrow is excruciating.”
Remme rubs his shoulder like it’s bothering him. “I’ll ride ahead if that’s okay. I’ll scout the area and secure our lodging.”
“I need a window in my quarters,” I blurt.
“Her quarters?” Skylar snorts and tosses a derisive look over her shoulder. “Where does she think we’re going? The palace? Princess, we all share, and as for your window?” She shrugs. “You get what you get.”
“Do what you can,” Kendrick tells Remme.
Remme spurs his horse into a gallop to ride ahead.
“Who are you?” I ask, craning my neck to try to see his face.
I feel his chuckle more than hear it. “What kind of question is that? You know who I am.”
“No, I mean, who are you to them? They look to you for leadership. They let you order them around. They follow your orders even when they don’t like it. Why?”
“Every group needs a leader, Slayer. Anything else breeds chaos.”
“Yes, but why you?”
“Because I’m the only one they are all willing to listen to without someone getting a knife in their gut,” he says.
It strikes me as an evasion, but I let the subject drop. We have days ahead of us, it seems, for me to figure out him and this group of his and what they mean to each other.
Days and nights.
“What kind of place do you think Remme will find for us?” I ask. I can be flexible with how we spend the day—whether I get my own horse, how much I push my sore muscles—but the night is something different.
Kendrick tightens his arm around my waist. “I won’t leave you in the dark,” he says in my ear. “I promise.”
And with those words, my fears of a dark night in a strange place fizzle away.
Chapter Nine
Felicity
SHE HAS A FRIEND.
The nights are still too dark, and the conditions are still wretched. Everything hurts. Her bones and muscles from sleeping on this hard, cold floor, her stomach from too little food, her throat from too many tears. But they threw another girl into her cell—a human girl. Fair-haired and fine-featured, like an angel. Terrified, like her.
Jas watches her from the opposite corner of the cell, and for the first time since she was thrown into this place, she feels . . . better. Calmer. I’m not alone.
The girl wipes her eyes and squints at Jas. A tiny stream of light comes in the slit of a window in the corridor, and she can see wispy white hair, light blue eyes.
“What’s your name?” she asks.
Jas blinks at her. She hasn’t spoken in days, and her throat is still raw from all those hours of wasted tears.
“I’m Crissa,” the girl says.
Jas swallows. “Jasalyn.” The three syllables come out scratchy. She doesn’t recognize her own voice.
“Who are you?” Crissa asks.
She frowns and repeats herself, trying to make her unused voice louder this time. “Jasalyn.”
Crissa smiles. Her tear-filled eyes shine in the light. “Yes, you told me your name. I’m wondering who you are. Why are you in here?”
Jas shakes her head. “I don’t know.”
“Mordeus always has his reasons.”
Jas stares at the window in the corridor. She’s been here long enough to know the patterns. When the sun streams in like that, dusk comes soon after and then the darkness.
A baby cries in the next cell. There’s a stone wall, so she can’t see the woman, but she’s heard her cooing to her child, heard her begging the guards for more food and water so her body can produce the milk her baby needs.