Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 119158 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 596(@200wpm)___ 477(@250wpm)___ 397(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 119158 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 596(@200wpm)___ 477(@250wpm)___ 397(@300wpm)
Heart in my throat, I edged closer, trying to ignore the sudden weakness in my knees. My stomach twisted, stirring up the bad wine and overcooked stew I’d dumped in there to make a very toxic combination. When I was a few feet away, half-hidden behind a support beam, I could make out what the ringleader was saying over the general chatter of the gathered crowd.
“Your kind aren’t welcome in Misty Pass. Who do you think you are, coming through here, eating our food?” the man snarled. “Misty Pass belongs to Edros. It belongs to the humans. It’s never going to be part of Wolfrest.”
I couldn’t see Nylian through the press of meaty human flesh, but the elf didn’t say a word.
“You know, Butch,” interjected a weaselly voice near the leader. “I heard that the elf king of Wolfrest kicked out one of the princes because he killed his brother. How do we know he’s not that exiled prince? Wouldn’t we be doing the royal family a favor by getting rid of him?”
“I’m not interested in doing any elf a favor,” Butch snapped. There was a heavy pause, and I swallowed hard. “But our town don’t need no killers running around. Getting rid of this elf would make everyone safer.”
Shit. Shit. Shit.
Nylian was a skilled fighter, but he was surrounded and outnumbered. Of course, I’d try to help him, but as he’d so eloquently pointed out, I was useless with a sword. I didn’t want to test this body’s muscle memory when it came to fighting under these circumstances. The surrounding crowd had noticed something was wrong. There had to be at least forty people in this tavern. If a fight broke out, it was going to be pure chaos. I needed to come up with a distraction that dissolved the tension in an instant and created an opening for Nylian to escape.
My gaze searched the room for options and landed on the piano. A whine escaped my throat and my shoulders slumped. Really? This was my best option? The ghost of my sweet mother was clapping and crowing about how those years of piano lessons were finally going to pay off.
I cut across the room as fast as I could manage, jumped onto the stage, slammed the wine bottle I was still carrying on the top of the piano, and slid onto the small stool. My fingers danced across the black and yellowish-white keys, causing my eye to twitch in a few places as several of the notes were painfully off-key. At least the damn thing worked.
The noise in the room dropped in half with those few notes, but it wasn’t enough. I needed everyone’s complete attention. While my fingers aimlessly wandered across the keys, I frantically riffled through the list of songs that I could recall. It had been years since I’d played anything. The only reason I’d kept up with my piano playing in high school and college had been to impress girls. That meant my collection of memorized songs were ballads or silly, fun songs. Now was not the time for “November Rain.” This didn’t seem like a weepy-ballad crowd, and it wasn’t nearly as impressive without Slash here to back me up with a kickass guitar solo.
No, I settled on a song that was a lively drinking song that these people could probably relate to. I’d have to pray they could overlook the words that would mean nothing to them, like “movie star” and “microphone.”
After sending up a silent prayer for Billy Joel and his lawyers to never hear about my terrible cover, I lifted my voice above the last of the talking while picking out the opening notes.
“Good evening! I hope you don’t mind me singing you an old song that’s unique to my hometown, but I thought we could all use some entertainment.”
I fell into the song with more gusto than skill, grateful that my usually useless brain continued to hold all the lyrics to this song while I couldn’t remember anything that resembled important names, dates, phone numbers, and other necessities of life. The crowd grew quieter as I made it through the first verse and chorus. By the second set of la’s and chorus, people sang along with me.
This was crazy. They liked it! They really liked the song. Geez, these people were desperate for any kind of entertainment if they were willing to put up with my lackluster singing voice and fumbling fingers. My heart flipped over and heat suffused my cheeks as my fear for Nylian faded. They were all watching and singing now. Fingers danced with more skill than I thought they possessed, and no one seemed to care that the piano was horribly out of key. We were all singing at the tops of our lungs at each chorus.