Total pages in book: 204
Estimated words: 193124 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 966(@200wpm)___ 772(@250wpm)___ 644(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 193124 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 966(@200wpm)___ 772(@250wpm)___ 644(@300wpm)
With my uninjured hand out to the side for navigation, I know I have to get moving not because of what he said to me, but because I imagine my old dear friend in that bed, so helpless as the men set upon her. I imagine their murderous faces, their knives, the rank stink of their sweat. The echo of the horror she must have felt surges through my suffocation and panic, and I take a step forward. And another.
And another.
Her gold is on my body, in a pouch in my pocket. I mark my progress by the way its weight slaps against my thigh.
After I make the turn, another decline dips beneath the soft soles of my slippers, and I can feel it, the sensation in my feet returning. Right after that, as if in reward for my bravery, the glow of the torch flares in the void up ahead. As it gets brighter and brighter, I realize that Merc’s waited for me.
I exhale in relief. He’s giving me time to catch up to him, and if I didn’t, he clearly would have come back for me.
Evidently, there was a fourth option—
Oh. He hasn’t waited for me. Voluntarily, that is.
Merc’s crouched down at the edge of a pond’s worth of water, moving the torch around as if assessing the depth of the pool as well as where the far edge of it intersects the slope of the tunnel ceiling. The firelight sparkles over the black water, making it look like oil, and all I want to do is tell him to get back before something leaps out at him.
“You better know how to swim,” he says grimly.
Rising to his feet, he shoves the torch at me, and I take the grip that’s been warmed by his hold and squeeze my hands around it. After he sheathes his broadsword at his hip, rather than his back, he starts to unbuckle the heavy weapons belt at his waist.
My eyes lock on his scarred hands yanking at the leather strapping, right over the laces of his britches. Right over … the seat of his sex.
A flush roars to my face and I drop my eyes.
“What are you doing?” Even though it’s obvious—and how far is he going to go?
“I’m going to see if there’s a way through. I suspect the tunnel’s collapsed somewhere up ahead and this is moat water.”
“Wait! There are balas in the—”
“I know. But there’s no going back, remember.”
Dropping his pack, he shucks all of the holsters on his torso, then removes his leather overcoating and the chained breastplate, revealing a long-sleeved black sheath that stretches over his muscled chest, shoulders, and arms. Dimly, I wonder where all of his other clothes are—they must be in that pack—and then he bends over and starts to undo the buckles on his heavy boots.
I have to turn away as it looks like he’s indeed about to drop his pants.
Crescent moon, he probably is going to take his leather pants off. And fates protect me … I want to see. All of it.
All of him.
Closing my eyes, the sounds of the shifting of clothes, of his breath, of the creak of what covers his lower body, are too intimate to bear, and for a moment, I am back at the Gauntlet on the second floor, listening to Sallae Mae and her ilk do their business.
When I hear a splash, I whip back around. Merc’s already wading into the fetid flood—
Okay, he’s kept on the black sheath, and it’s long enough so that it covers down to his mid-thigh. I can’t decide whether I’m relieved or disappointed. What’s clear is that given our circumstances, his nakedness or the lack thereof should be the very last thing on my mind.
“Where’s your weapon?” I blurt out.
Merc glances over his shoulder, and I jerk to the side just in time to miss his eyes. “I’m coming back for them. And you.”
With a messy fumble, I get out my little knife and offer it to him, even though the stumpy blade is pathetic compared to what he normally carries. “Take this. If that is moat water, the balas will scent you through the currents, and at least you can swim with this easily in your hand.”
When he just stares at what I’m holding out, I turn the blade around so the hilt is facing him. “It’s better than nothing.”
In the firelight, his half smile is a beacon all its own. “You have that with you always?”
“Even a mouse needs to bite if threatened.”
Merc steps out of the water and takes the blade. Then he gently unfurls my fingers and lays it back in my grip properly.
“You keep this.”
“What if you don’t come back?” I blurt as he turns away again.
“Then you’ll either try the water yourself or you’ll starve to death here.” He glances back at me. “Don’t worry, though, I won’t be gone but a bit. I have to live long enough for you to show me what’s under that hood of yours, yes?”