Silent Kingdom by Rachel L. Schade

Author:Rachel L. Schade [Schade, Rachel L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Asta Publications, LLC
Published: 2016-09-12T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 10

Spinning around, I sprinted back into the forest, snapping twigs and skidding on ice. He was all but silent behind me, possessing the surefooted, swift pursuit of a hunter, until I felt strong arms grasp mine and jerk me backward. One of his hands caught at the arrow in my arm, breaking the shaft and making blood ooze from the wound. Screaming, I squirmed, yanked myself free, and tumbled into the snow.

Kyrin snatched my hair in his fist and dragged me through the snowdrifts. I cried out and clawed at his arm, but he didn’t let go until we were back in the clearing. My scalp burned, my head ached, and my arm throbbed and left a bloody trail in the snow. I stared up at sky, tracing the sharp edges of the tree limbs clawing at it, as if desperate for escape from this world. I cringed as Kyrin bent over me, a coil of rope in his hands.

“It’s unfortunate you chose to run into the forest at night. Lyanna and Rev will be worried sick about you, and Avrik will miss you, but sadly, by the time I find you deep in the forest where you lost yourself, it will be too late. I will discover your mangled body, just as I found that guard’s years ago.”

I struggled, punched, kicked; I even spit in his face, but he was twice my weight and his work was effortless. He bound my arms behind me, tying one end of the rope around my wrists and the other around the trunk of the nearest tree.

After years of being mysteriously mute, I wasn’t sure if my voice would still be there now. Perhaps it had only returned to deliver my most recent fatal message. To my surprise, when I tried, the words fell easily from my lips. “How can you do this?” I shouted, my voice cracking in the frigid air. I yanked futilely against the rope. The trunk trembled, shaking the branches and dusting me with snow. “You’re endangering your own son! He is out here somewhere, being attacked by one of the sedwa, because of you.”

“You should know that I, of all people, know how to find and protect my own son. He will return home safely tonight. I am giving him food and shelter and ensuring us protection from the king and his guard; he will never be called upon to enter the war. As for the lives I endanger…I hold no allegiance to the hateful people of Evren.” His steamy breath followed his words, ghostly in the silver light glancing off the snow. “And no matter what you mean to Avrik, I will let you die before I see his own life in danger.” For a moment, his gaze seemed almost to soften. “It is a shame he will have to lose you. But think of it as an honor, Elena, to die to save the life of a friend.”

Then he was gone, winding his way through the trees, leaving me breathless, without a single retort on my lips.

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