Cook, Glen - Black Company 01 - The Black Company by Cook Glen

Cook, Glen - Black Company 01 - The Black Company by Cook Glen

Author:Cook, Glen [Cook, Glen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00


He was talking to himself. Weird stuff. “Want to see him go down. Been waiting four hundred years.”

“We can’t get that close. He’ll smell us coming.”

“Put aside all Power.”

“Oh! That’s too risky!” A whole chorus of voices got into the act. It got really spooky when two of them talked at once.

Raven and I exchanged glances. He shrugged. Catcher did not faze him. But, then, he grew up in the Lady’s dominions. He has seen all the Taken. Soulcatcher is

supposedly one of the least bizarre.

We listened for a few minutes. It did not get any saner out. Finally, Raven

growled, “Lord? We’re ready.” He sounded a little shaky.

I was beyond speech myself. All I could think of was a bow, an arrow, and a job I was expected to do. I rehearsed the draw, release, and flight of my shaft over and over again. Unconsciously, I rubbed Goblin’s gift. I would catch myself

doing that often.

Soulcatcher shuddered like a wet dog, drew himself together. Without looking at us, he gestured, said, “Come,” and started walking.

Raven turned. He yelled, “Darling, you get back in there like I told you. Go on now.”

“How is she supposed to hear you?” I asked, looking back at the child watching from a shadowed doorway.

“She won’t. But the Captain will. Go on now.” He gestured violently. The Captain appeared momentarily. Darling vanished. We followed Soulcatcher. Raven muttered to himself. He worried about the child.

Soulcatcher set a brisk pace, out of the compound, out of Lords itself, across fields, never looking back. He led us to a large woodlot several bowshots from the wall, to a glade at the lot’s heart. There, on the bank of a creek, lay a

ragged carpet stretched on a crude wooden frame about a foot high and six feet by eight. Soulcatcher said something. The carpet twitched, wriggled a little,

stretched itself taut.

“Raven, you sit here.” Catcher indicated the right-hand corner nearest us.

“Croaker, over here.” He indicated the left corner.

Raven placed a foot on the carpet gingerly, seemed surprised that the works did not collapse.

“Sit down.” Soulcatcher placed him just so, with his legs crossed and his

weapons lying beside him near the carpet’s edge. He did the same with me. I was surprised to find the carpet rigid. Ft was like sitting on a tabletop. “It’s

imperative that you don’t move around,” Catcher said, wriggling himself into

position ahead of us, centered a foot forward of the carpet’s midline. “If we

don’t stay balanced, we fall off. Understand?”

I did not, but I agreed with Raven when he said yes.

“Ready?”

Raven said yes again. I guess he knew what was happening- I was taken by

surprise.

Soulcatcher laid his hands out palms upward beside him, said a few strange

words, raised his hands slowly. I gasped, leaned. The ground was receding.

“Sit still!” Raven snarled. “You trying to kill us?”

The ground was only six feet down. Then. I straightened up and went rigid. But I did turn my head enough to check a movement in the brush.

Yes. Darling. With mouth an O of amazement. I faced forward, gripped my bow so tightly I thought I would crush handprints into it.



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