Dragon Tide: Rock Eaters by Sarah K. L. Wilson

Author:Sarah K. L. Wilson [Wilson, Sarah K. L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Sarah K. L. Wilson
Published: 2019-12-04T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nine

This time when I awoke, it was to a pain in my neck. I reached for it, trying to shove it away, but the thing pressing on my throat would not move.

My eyes shot open. A dark figure blocked out the light of the rising sun in the distance. Behind the figure, mist burned off the desert ground in little trails, and a line of horses stood with silent riders.

“What have we here?” a heavily accented voice asked. “Visitors from the Dominion?”

“No,” I gasped. There was a strange sound like metal being sharpened or a fire being lit with a flint, but I couldn’t turn at all to look.

“Arriving in our moment of weakness?” A woman with long flowing hair and bright eyes was staring into mine with more intensity than the sun.

“No!” From this angle, I couldn’t even see if Bareena or Heron were okay. I couldn’t feel his warmth anymore.

“Arriving with our enemies?” There were voices far in the background – calling? Yelling?

“That’s not –”

The butt of the sword – I thought that might be what I was looking at – jammed harder into my throat and I gasped at the pain of it.

“You think that because you are a young girl you will be spared? And the old woman, too? You are wrong. We in Baojang are not weak like Dominion women. We do not spare our women from the difficulties of life.”

“You have me all wrong, I –” Again, the sword handle was jammed into my throat.

“Today, the evil darkness of the enemy floods up into Baojang like a flesh-eating swarm. And we will exterminate this swarm to the last insect. And today, we find these strangers so close to the battle that they could be a part of it.”

“Please,” I gasped. But now I realized what I was hearing – the sounds of men fighting and blades clashing together. And under it all, the ground still shook.

“Please what?”

“Please spare us. We fight against the Draven and their Manticore servants.”

“You are not much of a fighter,” the woman enunciated every word as she leaned back from me, tossing her long black curls over her shoulder. Her clothing – what I could see of it – was white and filmy but over the white clothing was chainmail and armor – greaves and a cuirass, a breastplate that was definitely made for a woman’s shape, and chainmail wherever the plate didn’t cover.

“And you are,” I agreed. The butt of the sword pulled back a little.

“I am Kavva, daughter of the Bone Prince and leader of his third spear. I and my spear – these warriors with me – will kill as many as we can today as we die. We will not spill our own blood without taking three times the toll from our enemies.”

As if she’d said something positive, the warriors behind her cheered.

“Is that a joke?” I asked.

But now she was the one who laughed. “Oh, this one is funny. It is a shame we will have to kill her.

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