Blood's Pride (Shattered Kingdoms)

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Blood's Pride (Shattered Kingdoms) Page 27

by Evie Manieri

—but before she could move, someone rushed past her, knocking her into the wall. As she struggled to regain her balance, she saw the person run into the stables, straight to Dramash, and hoist him off the ground as if he weighed nothing at all. Just as she remembered where she’d seen that mane of black hair, its owner turned around to face Frea, easily managing the bucking, kicking child she was holding. Harotha saw a long Nomas knife – the same knife she’d held in her own hand – shining against the boy’s throat.

  The Mongrel had Dramash.

  she heard Eofar say as he rushed back to her from scouting ahead to determine the situation in the stables.

  she told her brother. It was true, but it was also true that she didn’t want to open her eyes, or give up the cool, steady support of the corridor wall. The weight of Truth’s Might, strapped across her back despite Eofar’s exasperated protests, pulled like a lodestone.

  he muttered as he tried to lift her right arm around his shoulder without unbalancing her. Her head swung down as he pulled her gently against him and she found herself staring at the knotted sleeve of the clean shirt he’d found for her, watching it inscribe little circles in the air where her left elbow should have been.

  Lahlil had left them in the funeral room, supposedly to gather more supplies, but she had never returned, and now Isa was convinced that something had happened to her. Eofar was equally convinced that she had abandoned them. They had waited long past the time when they should have gone, until finally he refused to wait any longer. For her part, Isa would have been quite content to lie in that chamber indefinitely, looking up at the stars through the open ceiling while she slowly emerged from the cocoon of Lahlil’s drugs, listening to Eofar tell her about Harotha, and Daryan, and all of the other things she’d missed. A strange odour had filled that room, not at all unpleasant, a soft mixture of perfume and ash and sand. Isa thought she would remember that scent for the rest of her life.

 

  Together they continued on to the stables, staggering awkwardly. The numbness had given way to spasms of fiery pain, and when those finally abated they’d been replaced by a relentless, teeth-grinding ache. She felt so weak that she could barely lift her head.

  At last they made it into the stables, but the room was so crowded with triffons, slaves, bales of hay, paraphernalia of all kinds, that she could see only a few feet in front of her in any direction. The Shadari subtly moved out of their way, and though no one spoke to them or looked at them directly, Isa thought they exchanged glances as they passed.

  she asked her brother. There was a raised voice somewhere on the other side, but she couldn’t make out the words over the sound of her own pulse pounding in her ears.

  he said succinctly.

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