The Voice: An Ephemera Novella(An eSpecial from Roc) by Bishop Anne

Author:Bishop, Anne [Bishop, Anne]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: PENGUIN group
Published: 2012-02-06T23:00:00+00:00

6.

I have since heard that Ephemera takes the measure of a human heart and helps or hinders what that heart desires. I don’t know if that is true or not. I do know the horse shouldn’t have made it up the hills I remembered as being so steep. But he did make it. Sometimes I thought he’d break under the strain if he had to take another step up an incline, but somehow the hill always leveled out before that last step, and the descents were gentler than I recalled. I’m sure someone would tell me my mind had exaggerated some things on that first journey in order to make it a grander adventure.

I don’t think I exaggerated anything. The world changed itself just enough to give us a chance. Just as I believe the world changed itself that first afternoon when I spotted riders in the distance and knew they were men from the village, looking for us. We kept walking, and my prayer became a chant: Please don’t let them find us.

They should have found us, should have caught us. They never did.

Several days after leaving the village, in the hushed hour before the real dawn, I stopped the exhausted horse in front of the Temple of Sorrow. Standing on tiptoes, I peeked over the side of the cart, not wanting to stand at the back. The Voice looked at me, a question in her eyes.

“We made it,” I said. “I’ll get help.”

She couldn’t get out of the cart. For anything. I realized we had a problem the first time I smelled excrement. But when I went around to the back of the cart, dithering about what to do, the plea in her eyes was more eloquent than words. Every minute I spent caring for her was the minute that might make the difference between getting to Vision or getting caught. So I made my heart as hard and cold as I could make it, and I kept us moving until I saw the bridge and felt numbed by the knowledge that we had reached the city.

I hurried up the broad steps of the temple and rang the bell. Rang and rang and rang.

“There is someone on duty,” a voice grumbled as the door opened. “You don’t have to wake up the whole tem—”

The moment he saw me, the Shaman stopped his complaint.

“Please,” I said, feeling the tears well up now that I didn’t have to be hard and cold. “Please help us. She’s in the cart. She can’t . . . I can’t . . . Please.”

He touched my arm, giving the warmth of comfort. Then he went down the stairs. The sky had lightened enough that I could see his face go blank with shock when he looked inside the cart.

He ran back up the stairs and disappeared inside the temple, leaving me standing there while something savage raked its claws inside me until I thought I would bleed to death without anyone seeing a drop spilled.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.