Assassin's End by D. K. Holmberg

Author:D. K. Holmberg [Holmberg, D. K.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 1549530402
Amazon: B01N63WSO9
Goodreads: 33025295
Publisher: ASH Publishing
Published: 2016-11-28T00:00:00+00:00

19

The dark silver plate rested on the floor in front of me. I’d cleaned off most of the blood, but I couldn’t get the stink of it out of my nostrils. There was a distinctive coppery scent of blood, and in the small space of this room, it practically overwhelmed me.

Cael sat across from the plate but had not come to sit by me. Had it bothered her so much seeing me operate on Raphe? It had been years since I had attempted anything like this and never had I worked so closely to the brain. Few men would ever survive something like this. That he had told me that the Hjan had very skilled surgeons working on them.

When I went in, I thought that they might have removed the bone and replaced it with the lorcith. Were that the case, removing it ran the risk of killing him. I had no real qualms about killing him but would have preferred that there be a reason. Instead, I’d discovered that the plate lay over the bone, but tendrils of it had snaked deeper. I didn’t allow myself to think of what it meant when I yanked it out.

I’d used a length of thread soaked in a mixture of pressed olives and foxweed. The combination would fight infection. If he survived, I would not have infection be the reason he died.

“I can hear him now,” Cael said, finally breaking the silence.

Had the procedure bothered her so much?

“What can you determine?”

She swallowed before answering, her eyes fixated on the plate of lorcith. It gleamed in the reflected light from the hearth, the metal cleaned to remove all traces of blood. “Everything.”

Cael said it with almost a look of revulsion on her face, and I wondered what exactly she heard. What was it that Raphe hid that troubled her so much? He had willingly allowed himself to be altered like this, and had he gone to the Hjan, turning himself into something of a monster, but could I blame him for reaching for power when he had none?

“That’s just it, Galen,” she whispered. “He was born with gifts given to him by the Great Watcher.”

“But he’s not of Elaeavn.”

She shook her head. “He’s not. He was born outside the city, but his grandfather came from Elaeavn. His mother had some ability, but it was weakened, and then he… he was born with almost nothing.”

“And that?” I asked, pointing to the metal plate.

“It… augmented his abilities. I don’t think it could give them to him if he didn’t already have them.” She pulled her eyes off the metal plate and looked over at me. “I can hear his memories, can feel the joy he felt when he gained his ability.”

What would it have been like to be born, as he had, with almost no ability and then to suddenly develop such skill? I could imagine. Without my Sight, what would I be?

Cael frowned at me. “Your Sight doesn’t make you who you are. I wish you’d stop thinking of yourself as this… this terrible person.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.