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Back We Are Blood and Thunder Save as PDF
Chapters (32)
  1. PROLOGUE
  2. ONE
  3. TWO
  4. THREE
  5. FOUR
  6. FIVE
  7. SIX
  8. SEVEN
  9. EIGHT
  10. NINE
  11. TEN
  12. ELEVEN
  13. TWELVE
  14. THIRTEEN
  15. FOURTEEN
  16. FIFTEEN
  17. SIXTEEN
  18. SEVENTEEN
  19. EIGHTEEN
  20. NINETEEN
  21. TWENTY
  22. TWENTY-ONE
  23. TWENTY-TWO
  24. TWENTY-THREE
  25. TWENTY-FOUR
  26. TWENTY-FIVE
  27. TWENTY-SIX
  28. TWENTY-SEVEN
  29. TWENTY-EIGHT
  30. TWENTY-NINE
  31. EPILOGUE
  32. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Lena waited. What could she possibly do to help?

“A man has been pursuing me—you will find him at the forest edge. His name is Emris. You are to tell him that I helped you. Tell him that I said he is mistaken, that I am innocent.” She rapped the side of Lena’s head with the cane. “Do you understand me, girl? Repeat it.”

Lena stammered and flushed with indignation. If she weren’t so reliant on this stranger’s help, she’d have told her where to stick her cane. “I … I am to tell the man at the forest edge that you helped me, that he is mistaken and you are innocent.” Innocent of what? she wondered.

“Good.” The mage lowered her cane. “Now go. There are those in the world who do not come from Duke’s Forest, nor believe in its superstitions.” Her voice was heavy with a cold kind of pity. And as she walked past, she added, “Keep walking, mage, and follow the footsteps I have left behind. You will soon find your way out.”

Lena watched her slender figure fade into the shifting air, the unnatural purple light on her cane gradually swallowed by the cloud. Mage. A shiver ran through her and she clenched her fists tight to stop her hands from trembling.

She took a deep breath, swallowed, and tried to relax a little. When she felt steady enough, she picked up the silver dragon-knife from the forest floor and slid it into her belt. Then she turned her eyes in the direction from which the masked lady had emerged. Follow the footsteps. Lena had wondered how; in the darkness, in the fog, she could barely see her hand in front of her face. But gradually, as she watched, the masked mage’s footsteps began to burn.

A twisting path illuminated the underbelly of the storm cloud in purple imprints, winding into the distance. And Lena knew she would never have found her way without it. The forest’s trick paths looped and disappeared and reappeared without rhythm or pattern, and the storm cloud flickered blue and green between the trees, casting crazed shadows. But the footsteps were steady, trailing far ahead until the thickening vapor reduced them to a blur, then a faint smudge of light.

Lena followed the path.

TWO

Constancy

As the masked mage glimpsed the tall wooden gates of Duke’s Forest, dawn lit the storm cloud a ghostly white. She heaved a sigh of relief. The journey had felt like an endless nightmare. The hem of her cloak and long trailing dress were smeared and spattered with mud, her left hand trembling as it gripped the pommel of her cane. She had a gash on her ankle where she’d slipped against the loose rock of the foothills.