Total pages in book: 120
Estimated words: 112089 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 560(@200wpm)___ 448(@250wpm)___ 374(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112089 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 560(@200wpm)___ 448(@250wpm)___ 374(@300wpm)
She studied him for a long time. “And now, you need our help.”
“We don’t need ye to sort this out, sure we don’t,” Niamh said. “We’ll stumble through the wood, find a place to make a stand, and wait for the mages to come find us. We’ve got a plan and plenty of power. We just needed to get out of our town so as not to endanger its people.”
“You preferred to endanger us?” the basandere shot back, and suddenly, I wasn’t happy Mr. Tom had shoved Niamh into tagging along.
I didn’t get a chance to do damage control.
“This group of enemy eejits aren’t goin’ta trouble ye at all.” She waved the possibility away. “They are the lackeys. Jessie and that other weird mage are about as strong as they come—much stronger than what is coming. That weird mage is as good as a magical encyclopedia. Don’t let all the stoopin’ and knee scrapin’ fool ya. Once he’s in his element, he’s worth his weight in gold. They will block the enemy mages, and then what do ye have? Beefed-up mercenaries. Remember what those are? Or have ye been playin’ hide ’n’ seek with hikers for too long?”
“Maybe don’t lean on the ‘I offend people as my duty’ angle of your personality this once,” I murmured to Niamh.
She clearly didn’t hear me because she didn’t change her tone. “If ye have any sort of savageness left to ye, which ye must, since Missus Smith enjoys ripping off limbs and throwing them around the place, ye’d blow right through them. They can’t sense ye like the shifters can, and our mages could keep ’em from using magic to locate ye. Ye’d be phantoms until ye ripped out their middles and flung their bodies over yer shoulders. It’d be nothing more than a bit of sport for ya.”
Well, that explanation was a bit much.
The basandere caught my grimace. “And you tried to convince her of this?”
She was asking the others but clearly talking about me, so I answered. “They did. And I believed it.”
“What changed your mind?” she pushed.
I swallowed and took a moment because I knew this was essentially a trial, and I didn’t want to mess up more than the others already had. Thank God I could just use the truth on this one. I told her about the peace and contentment I’d experienced here, how my gargoyle felt at home. I told her that I had a son, too, and I’d realized how angry I’d be if the tables were turned. How violent it would make me—
And then I froze in panic because I hadn’t meant to say that last bit.
“I mean…it’s just…” I held my breath for a long moment, hoping one of the others would come to my aid. When they didn’t, I made a mental note to plan horrible jokes on them and tried again. “Anyway, it would be wrong to put you and your family in danger. Even if nothing’s likely to happen, something could, and I couldn’t live with that possibility. It’s better if we go.”
Again she studied me. Everyone held silent. This was clearly the deliberation before the verdict.
“Buln’dan left to follow the stars,” she finally said, pushing back onto her hands and gazing upward through the space between the tall trees. Pricks of light glimmered within the sheet of black. “It is hard to set off on one’s own. You always wonder if you did the right thing. In unsure moments, insecure moments, you seek validation. You try to push other people onto your path to prove it was the right one. This is what he is doing. He is trying to force us to join his journey.”
I pressed my lips tightly together to keep from saying anything but couldn’t help myself. “Except he didn’t try to force you to join his journey when he left.” I cocked my head. “Or did he? Was he trying to get you to his mountain all this time?”
Dave’s face snapped up. The basandere narrowed her eyes.
I felt my eyebrows lift of their own accord. “I honestly don’t know anything. I’m just asking. It hadn’t occurred to me before now.”
“No,” Dave said with a budding smile. “I didn’t. Through loneliness, times when I wondered if I should just return and seek a mate…I never felt the pull enough to change my mind. In fact, I felt a stronger urge to stay.”
“Right. So it’s not—”
“This village—you—were trying to push me onto a certain path,” Dave continued. “You tried to talk me into coming back every time I visited. Even now, you would prefer that I return. I do not feel that urge, though. I feel the rightness in what I am doing.”
“But you are forcing us into your ways,” the basandere countered.
He hung his head a little again.