Emissary by Locke Thomas

Author:Locke, Thomas [Locke, Thomas]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Fantasy, Epic, FIC009020, Fiction
ISBN: 9781441223067
Publisher: Revell
Published: 2014-12-30T08:00:00+00:00

They traveled less than an hour, which was good, because Hyam’s feet became increasingly reluctant to rise from the trail. Joelle rode. The Master walked ahead of them with his soft light revealing the path. Hyam walked behind, using his bow stave for support. Dama took up the rear, glancing back so often Hyam wondered if perhaps the mages were trailing along behind. Then he decided he did not care what the wizards did.

He had reached the limits of his endurance when they arrived at the base of the second narrow valley. Hyam sensed a distant coursing flow of power rising through his exhausted legs and declared, “We stop here.”

“There is a pool just beyond the next ridge,” the mage responded. “With a cave that offers a fine shelter.”

“Here,” Hyam insisted. When Joelle descended from the saddle, he told her, “I brought only the one bedroll.”

“I do not care.” Her eyes gleamed in the light. “I am far too excited to sleep.”

“Then you can stand guard.” Hyam tossed Trace the pallet, threw himself onto the earth, and was gone.

He awoke in the depths of night. The wizard slumbered off to his right, the magical light nestled in the boughs of a sapling that rose by his head. Joelle sat with her back against a tree on the trail’s other side. Someone had dragged the saddle off the horse. Dama rose from her position beside Hyam and nuzzled him as he groaned softly and forced himself erect. He walked to the pile of gear and hefted a water skin and a sack of food from the inn. He eased himself down beside the woman and offered her the skin. She drank briefly, accepted bread and cheese and a plum. While she ate and drank, Joelle’s gaze never left his face.

“Are you tired?” Hyam asked.

“For three years and seventeen days, I have lain in my chamber and dreamed of this night. When I could taste the wind and smell the forest and watch the stars. I will sleep later.”

“How old were you when you entered the Long Hall?”

“Fifteen. My parents died from a fever that swept through the forest where we had our cottage. I lived alone for a year. Then the sickness returned, and I thought I was going to die. Then someone rescued me. I thought . . .”

“Tell me. Please.”

“I thought the person had green skin.” She looked ashamed by the admission. “I was very sick.”

“What happened then?”

“I was taken to another place where someone else cared for me. I remember a home made from white stone where they fed me a potion that tasted dreadful.”

“The Ashanta took you in,” he realized. In the mage’s light, her features were smooth as carved alabaster. Her pain was an alien presence and did not belong.

“Those people were not kind. They treated me without feeling. Everything they did for me was a chore. They kept me until they were certain I would survive, and not a moment longer, then they brought me to the Long Hall.

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