Oathkeeper by Christopher G. Nuttall

Author:Christopher G. Nuttall [Nuttall, Christopher G.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Adventure, Young Adult, Fantasy, Alternate World, Magic, New Adult, Magicians
Publisher: Twilight Times Books
Published: 2020-07-12T14:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-One (Emily1)

“I GUESS THE STORM DIDN’T DO any damage,” Emily said, as she crawled out from under the cloak. She’d fallen asleep at one point, despite the flickers of tainted magic, only to jerk awake again and again as she remembered where she was. “The landscape looks as hellish as ever.”

“There’s little to damage here,” Cat said. The rings around his eyes were so dark he looked as if he’d been punched twice. He hadn’t slept any better than she had. “It would have been a different story if we’d been caught in the open.”

Emily nodded. She’d read the reports written by people who’d travelled through the Blighted Lands. The storms killed or transformed anyone stupid enough to stay outside, often warping them beyond recognition. She remembered the horrifically mutilated people she’d seen in the village and shuddered. Some of them must have walked through a storm, perhaps hoping it would put them out of their misery. Others might just have been left exposed, if a storm blew over the village. She winced at the thought, then peered north. The skies were as clear as they ever got, in the Blighted Lands, but there was no sign of pursuit. They seemed to have made a clean getaway.

Cat stretched, rubbing his back. “Shall we go?”

“Yeah,” Emily said. Her body ached too, but there was nothing she could do about it. She wanted a bath and sleep in a proper bed... she shook her head. She wasn’t going to get either. “Let’s go.”

She forced herself to walk down the road, keeping a wary eye out for unpleasant surprises. The road seemed to twist and turn randomly, as if it had been picked up by an angry god, twisted out of shape and then dropped back on the ground. The necromancers were mad, she reminded herself. The twisted road might have made perfect sense to them. And it was possible they’d drawn the roads to avoid places of particular danger. She saw faint hints of trouble, whorls of tainted magic, spinning in the distance. They gave them a wide berth as they kept walking. There was no point in running into more trouble.

We’ll be in enough trouble when we reach our destination, she thought. The knapsack was charmed, but the batteries still felt heavy. We might have to evade the necromancer long enough to reignite the nexus point and take control.

She felt the oath pushing and prodding at her as the road twisted again, diving into a barren gully before rising up again and heading further south. The urge to move faster, to risk levitation - or teleporting - was almost overwhelming. She told herself, firmly, that she couldn’t complete the oath if she died on the way. The urge faded slightly, but remained at the back of her mind. She gritted her teeth and kept walking. She couldn’t allow it to push her too hard. They’d have to stop and sleep somewhere along the way.

The landscape grew worse the further they walked.

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