Total pages in book: 222
Estimated words: 210715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1054(@200wpm)___ 843(@250wpm)___ 702(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 210715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1054(@200wpm)___ 843(@250wpm)___ 702(@300wpm)
Everard. The Sleepless Duke, riding Villain, his war stallion. Crap.
They called him the Sleepless Duke because he ruled over a vast stretch of territory on the northern border and that territory was continuously raided by the aggressive nations from the northwest and the Crimson Empire from the east. The Selva Dukedom was always at war. Ramond vi Everard had no time to sleep. He had picked up a sword at the age of three and never put it down, just like his father and mother before him. He was a violent isolationist, who responded to threats with overwhelming force and shocking brutality.
And he was not supposed to be here. Something monumental must’ve happened because Everard wasn’t allowed in the city without a royal invitation. Sauven Savaric, the current king of Rellas, feared him so much, it was almost a phobia. This wasn’t in the book either. Why? This seemed like a pretty major development.
If he was sneaking into the city, he wouldn’t want witnesses. Of all the people to run into . . .
There was no place to hide. I flattened myself against the nearest house and looked down.
The riders bore down the street, their dark cloaks swallowing the light as if they had cut out pieces of midnight sky and wrapped them around their bodies.
Don’t notice me. Don’t see me.
Villain reached me. The size of this horse was truly shocking. I raised my head a fraction of an inch. The stallion glared at me with a bright blue eye, and I caught a glimpse of the rider, broad shoulders stretching his cloak, his hood hiding everything except for his clean-shaven square jaw.
I held my breath.
The stallion stopped.
Crap. Crap, crap, crap.
I was right by a lantern. He could see me in excruciating detail, everything from my bare feet to the hood of my wet cloak. I didn’t even want to imagine what I smelled like.
“Hold out your hand.”
That voice raised every hair on the back of my neck. He sounded like he ordered people to their death in battle.
Not holding out my hand wasn’t an option. If he cut it off, would it regenerate, or would I have to kill myself to regrow it? Would it regrow at all? If I died again, would I come back to life or was it a limited-number-of-times kind of thing . . .
“Your hand.”
Damn it.
A hard clump blocked my throat. I swallowed and raised my right hand.
I don’t want to die again. Please no.
A cold weight fell into my fingers. He’d dropped a handful of coins into my palm.
“Get off the street and buy some shoes.”
What?
Villain started forward. The riders passed me. The cart rolled by into the night. The hoofbeats scattered down the street, receding.
I stared at the money in my hand. A large silver coin, about the size of a silver dollar—a noma—and two copper coins that had to be dens. My memory informed me in a detached mechanical way that each noma equaled one hundred copper dens, and each den equaled four quarters. A quarter would buy me a pint of cheap ale, a den would buy me a young chicken, and a noma would buy me a weaned calf. Thank you, numerous rereads.
The fear slowly melted away. The last echoes of it drained out of me into the night.
The Sleepless Duke had given me money. The actual, in the flesh, Ramond vi Everard had handed me coins.
Oh my god.
Okay, that was cool beyond all reason. Entirely too much excitement, very scary, but so freaking cool. I shivered. Wow. Okay, I needed to get where I was going now before anything else happened.
I backtracked, counting the side streets. One. Two.
Here it was, a house with a blue door on the corner of a side street, marked by twin lanterns with a small red flower painted on the glass. Squire Way. Found it.
I ducked into the side street. It wound, twisting left, then right, then left again. I followed it. As long as I didn’t take any turns, it would get me to my destination.
I would need to pay an entrance fee. The question was, how much? The door charge wasn’t a means of making money, it was proof of one’s ability to pay. The real fees would be spent inside. For prominent people, the door charge would be nothing. For me, it would be a serious amount of money, and the prices in Rellas didn’t always make sense by modern standards. In this world, cows and fish were relatively cheap, and books and soap were hellishly expensive. Offering too little would be insulting, offering too much would brand me a sucker. I had to find the middle ground.
I didn’t even know how much money I had.
I crossed a street.
Another.
Average daily wages for an unskilled laborer were about two dens. An experienced mercenary made five or six. Would ten dens be enough?