Eye of Hel by Alaric Longward

Author:Alaric Longward [Longward, Alaric]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: BluA
Publisher: Hardhill Productions
Published: 2015-11-16T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 14

Lex came up to me. I sensed him close and heard his chain armor clinking. He stood there nervously. ‘You wanted to see me? Us?’ his words rung out, and I twitched with fear.

‘I cared for you,’ I whispered. ‘But I loved Ompar.’

Why, was the unasked question in the air. ‘Thank you for telling me, yes. I know,’ he answered with barely a whisper.

I turned to look at them all. Anja and Ulrich were there. Dana was climbing stairs. Cherry was looking at me from behind a drooping hem of a sail. ‘There is a demon in this group,’ I said. ‘Something that works to hurt me and to steer things Euryale’s way.’

‘I might hate Ompar—even now—but I did nothing to kill him. I am still here,’ Lex said.

‘I am not guilty,’ Anja noted. ‘But I would still leave.’

I laughed. ‘You will.’ The ships were very close to the fabulous city of Trad, the many tiered city full of lights, and I remembered Cosia telling me how people of the city ate dinner with their families after sundown on the roofs. Refugees were filling the decks, the pain of losses and terror evident on their faces, their futures uncertain. Magical lights filled the docks as we came closer, and men and elves were standing there, waiting. ‘I want you to get off the ship here.’

‘Who?’ Anja asked.

‘Lex,’ I said. ‘Ulrich, Cherry. You, of course. I’ll take it from here. Find service with the elves.’

‘I’d be happy to go,’ Anja said bitterly. ‘And they should come with me indeed. Will they allow it, even?’ she wondered, looking at Trad with curiosity.

‘They will.’

‘Are you totally out of your damned mind?’ Lex asked me. ‘Hello!’

‘You will go, and you will not come back to me,’ I said. ‘I cannot trust you. Find a hovel or a palace, Lex, I don’t care. Find service. And if I see you again, make sure to avoid me. Ompar’s death will not let me rest easily. Ulrich, you wish to join your cousin and your lover?’

He hesitated. Anja pulled at him. ‘Ulrich? I know we have been … sad these past weeks. But this is our place to start again.’

‘She hurt you,’ Ulrich said sadly. ‘She suspects you of murder and lies. But she is troubled. She needs our help still.’

‘She failed us in Gray Downs! She and her sister!’ Anja shouted. I noticed Asfalon moving to the deck, and then he was looking up at us. How different from Ompar. A high lord, distant, cold.

Ulrich tried to grab Anja. ‘She didn’t trust us in the Gray Downs! You know it! All because of Ron and what happened the day we arrived. And in the end she defied this creature that wanted the rest of us dead. Alexei and Dmitri died while she tried to save them. I hurt her. Badly. And I owe her. I care for you. But I owe her.’

‘You owe her? You care for me?’ Anja asked him. ‘I—’

‘She tried to tell you she is sorry!’ Ulrich yelled so hard all the heads on the deck turned in our direction.

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