Total pages in book: 204
Estimated words: 193124 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 966(@200wpm)___ 772(@250wpm)___ 644(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 193124 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 966(@200wpm)___ 772(@250wpm)___ 644(@300wpm)
And then everything begins to still.
A kind hand lands on my shoulder and I jump. “Fear not. I shall protect you.”
Except I don’t want the knight in shining armor. I want the mercenary.
“Merc…”
Putting my head in my hands, I fall backward and weep as though I’ve known him all my life. We were so close to getting away. If only he had—
“Fates!” Julion barks.
As I drop my slimed hands, I … can’t believe what I’m seeing. For reasons I cannot fathom, Merc appears to be riding on the back of a cresting balas, the broadsword like a bit between those jaws, his powerful body straddling the back of the neck as he steers the forward motion by jerking on the hilt or the tip by turns. Meanwhile, the balas is in an absolute fury at its passenger, and this anger is the propeller that sends them both on this hellfire ride—
He’s coming right for me. Right … at the wall.
Like he’s going to drive that beast—and himself—directly into the stones.
“What are you doing!” I scramble to my feet. “Merc—”
With an athletic surge, Merc jumps up and plants his boots on the knobby spine, balancing as if he surfs upon a board. And then at just the right moment, he yanks the broadsword free of that mouth full of teeth, whips it around—and stabs the balas in the rear. As the ugly, red-eyed head arcs up and the body of the monster breaks out of the water, its master leaps forward, one step, two steps, three steps—
He jumps off the nose of the balas, throwing himself at the lip of the moat’s walling.
Fates, he’s not going to make it. As the other balas retrench their positions, and form another circle, he’s going to smash into the stonework, knock himself out, and fall back into that horrible water and all those yellow teeth.
“Merc!”
At the last moment, when surely he’s going to make a full-body impact, he trains the tip of the broadsword at a mortared fissure. The penetration is spot-on, and he double-grips the hilt, lithely swinging his legs up and around—
Just as one of the balas launches out of the water after him.
As those jaws snap at nothing but air, Merc is flying free, a perfectly executed tumble planting him upon the grass with both boots under him, and that sword still in the grip of his very sturdy palms.
He’s breathing heavily. But he’s utterly alive, and smiling like a god.
“Well,” Julion remarks, “I did not know one could ride those wretched creatures.”
I don’t even think. And that, of course, is a fault of mine when it comes to the mercenary.
With a cry of joy, I launch myself at him, and Merc catches me with one arm easily, his laugh so deep and masculine, the satisfaction in it is warmer than the sunlight itself—and he keeps laughing as he swings me around and around, my legs spinning out as I find myself sharing in the happy release.
And then comes the moment of pause, our silly spinning stilling, our faces almost too close together, our bodies totally too close together.
The way Julion clears his throat, we might as well be naked.
As I push myself out of Merc’s arms, I flush and then panic about having shown myself. Except there’s no worry on that. Punching out my arms, I see nothing of my skin, just muck from the moat. From my face to my feet, I’m covered with congealing slime.
Cloaked in it, one might say.
“So I gather you two are of acquaintance,” Julion says with disapproval.
Twenty-Two
On Matters of Size.
Deep in the autumnal woods, behind the thick trunk of a thimbe whose leaves have gone red and orange, I’m peeling off my absolutely disgusting underclothes. The chill in the air makes me goose-pimple all over, until I feel for sure my bones have turned to icicles. Julion has given me an entire bladder of fresh water to clean with—for all the good it can do against what coats me—and I grit my teeth, brace myself, and empty the rush over my head—
A beautiful scent blooms around me, of roses and other flowers I have never smelled before.
It’s not water.
As a tingling enlivens the root of every strand of my hair, I bring my fingertips to my nose. Then I rub them together. It’s an oily substance, astringent in nature, and it’s doubling and redoubling. Glancing down my body, the fizzing trail it leaves on the way to my feet generates heat.
I pour the rest of the bladder over my head, closing my eyes and luxuriating in the unexpected gift. Soon enough, I am as covered in the cleanser as I am with the muck, and just as I’m wondering how to rinse off, the solution starts to evaporate. Steaming off my hair and scalp first, the moat’s stench and slime leave with it, and I watch my forearm as my freckled skin emerges. When I reach up to my head, I’m surprised to find the locks of white hair dry and fluffy—and as I bring some forward to my nose, the flowered scent lingers.