Total pages in book: 200
Estimated words: 189930 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 950(@200wpm)___ 760(@250wpm)___ 633(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 189930 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 950(@200wpm)___ 760(@250wpm)___ 633(@300wpm)
“Are we stopping?” I asked.
“No.”
My brows knitted. “Then why are we slowing?”
“It’s the path—” Airrick, who rode to our left, cut himself off, and I grinned. I knew he was about to call me Maiden. Something he’d done so many times over the last couple of hours that Hawke had threatened to knock him off his horse if he did it one more time. Luckily, he’d caught himself this time. “The path gets uneven here, and there’s a stream, but it’s hard to see through the growth.”
“That’s not all,” Hawke added, his thumb still moving, catching the wool and dragging it in a slow, steady circle.
“It’s not?”
“You see Luddie?” Hawke was talking about one of the Huntsmen who rode to our right. The man hadn’t said much since we left. “He’s keeping an eye out for barrats.”
My lip curled. Barrats weren’t your average rodents. Rumored to be the size of a boar, they were the things of nightmares. “I thought they were all gone.”
“They’re the only thing the Craven won’t eat.”
Didn’t that say something? I shuddered. “How many do you think are out here?”
“I don’t know.” Hawke’s arm tightened around my waist, and I had a feeling he knew exactly how many.
I looked at Airrick.
He averted his gaze.
“Do you know how many, Airrick?”
“Eh, well, I know there used to be more,” he said, sending a nervous glance at Hawke. He immediately faced forward. “They didn’t used to be a problem, you know? Or at least that was what my grandfather told me when I was a boy. He lived out here. One of the last ones.”
“Really?”
Airrick nodded as Hawke’s thumb continued moving. “He grew corn and tomatoes, beans and potatoes.” A faint smile appeared. “He would tell me that the barrats used to be nothing more than a nuisance.”
“I can’t imagine rats that weigh nearly two hundred pounds being only a nuisance.”
“Well, they were just scavengers and were more scared of people than we were afraid of them,” Airrick explained. I was confident that I would be scared of them, whether they left people alone or not. “But with everyone moving out, they lost their…”
“Food source?” I finished for him.
Airrick nodded as he scanned the horizon. “Now, anything they come across is food.”
“Including us.” I really hoped Luddie had perfect eyesight and a sixth sense when it came to barrats.
“You’re intriguing,” Hawke commented as Setti trotted ahead of Airrick.
“Intriguing is your favorite word,” I told him.
“It is when I’m around you.”
I let myself grin because no one was watching, and I wanted to. “Why am I intriguing now?”
“When are you not intriguing?” he said. “You aren’t afraid of Descenters or Craven, but you’re shuddering like a wet kitten at the mere mention of a barrat.”
“Craven and Descenters don’t scurry about on all fours, and they don’t have fur.”
“Well, barrats don’t scurry,” he replied. “They run, about as fast as a hunting dog locked onto prey.”
Another shudder made its way through me. “That is not helping.”
He laughed. “You know what I would love right about now?”
“For there to be no talk of giant, people-eating rats?”
Hawke squeezed me, and I felt a dip in my chest. “Besides that.”
I snorted.
“Do me a favor and reach into the bag by your left leg. Be careful, though. Hold onto the pommel.”
“I’m not going to fall off.” I held on, though, stretching forward and lifting the flap of the bag.
“Uh-huh.”
I ignored that and reached inside. My fingers brushed over something smooth and leather. Frowning, I grabbed hold of it and pulled it out. The moment I saw the red cover, I gasped and shoved it back into the bag.
“Oh, my gods.” I sat up straight, my eyes wide.
Hawke burst out laughing, and ahead, Kieran looked over his shoulder at us. Could he see how red my face was?
“I can’t believe you.” I turned at the waist, and for a moment, I got a little lost in that dimple in Hawke’s right cheek. The left one was starting to appear, too. And then I remembered what was in the bag. “How did you even find that book?”
“How did I find that naughty diary of Lady Willa Colyns? I have my ways.”
“How?” The last I’d seen it, it was shoved under my pillow, and with everything that had happened, it hadn’t even occurred to me that someone might find it and have questions.
Lots of questions.
“I’ll never tell,” he replied, and I smacked his arm. “So violent.”
I rolled my eyes.
“You’re not going to read to me?”
“No. Absolutely not.”
“Maybe I’ll read to you later.”
That was even worse. “That’s not necessary.”
“You sure?”
“Positive.”
His laugh was low and soft against my neck. “How far did you get, Princess?”
I pressed my lips together and then sighed. “I almost finished it.”
“You’ll have to tell me all about it.”
That wasn’t likely to happen. I couldn’t believe he’d not only found that damn book but had also packed it. Out of everything he could’ve brought with him, he’d grabbed the diary. The corners of my lips twitched, and before I knew it, I was smiling and then I was laughing. When his arm tightened around me again, I relaxed against him.