Read Online Dragon Wizard by S. Andrew Swann - Free Book Online Page B

want?”
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    I woke and for a moment, a mane of black hair dominated my vision.
    Lucille jerked upright and I saw that was a literal mane,belonging to the horse she rode upon. Lucille shook her head and blinked as if she had just snapped awake herself.
    A shout cut through my sleep-induced disorientation.
    â€œYour Highness!” Krys’s voice came from somewhere to our right.
    â€œI’m fine,” Lucille snapped without looking in her direction.
    â€œNo, you’re not.” Krys rode up so that she was even with us. I saw her just out of the corner of Lucille’s eye. “You almost fell off.”
    â€œYou’re exaggerating.”
    â€œLook down. Your right foot isn’t even in the stirrup anymore. And where are your reins?”
    Lucille blinked and looked down at her empty hands. “What?”
    Krys walked her horse in front of ours and I realized that we weren’t moving. Lucille looked down and we saw Rabbit standing next to our horse, holding the dropped reins and patting the animal on the neck. She looked up at us with a half-smile and shook her head.
    Krys sighed. “You’re lucky he’s well trained.”
    â€œYeah . . .”
    â€œWe have to make camp. You’re in no condition to continue.”
    â€œWe can’t stop. Running out of time.”
    Look at the pendant,
I thought at her. If my dream-vision meant anything straightforward, it would be that.
    â€œI know, we only have a day,” Krys said. “But you still need rest.” She yawned. “We all do.”
    Lucille lifted the elf-king’s pendant up from where it hung around her neck.
Yes.
She squinted at the smallhourglass and said, “By this we only have . . .” She trailed off, staring at the slow-moving sand.
    â€œYour Highness?”
    â€œThat elf bastard!” she snapped so viciously that Rabbit winced.
    The implications of my dream were right. The black sand had barely begun to coat the bottom of the empty chamber, only very slightly more than had been there when she had first looked at it. Judging by the angle of the sun it was evening, nearly a half day gone since the elf-king’s appearance at dawn . . .
    A half day in the mortal realm.
    Time flowed a bit more leisurely under the hill, where Timoras held court. A day in the Winter Court could be a week, a fortnight, a month . . .
    The elf-king had declined to specify
whose
day his ultimatum entailed.
    Typical.
    Lucille leaped off her horse.
    â€œIf it wasn’t an act of war I’d strangle that smug inhuman ass.”
    â€œWhat is it?”
    Lucille yanked the pendant over her head and threw it, chain and all, at Krys. Krys caught it out of the air.
    â€œWe have time. He’s having a joke at our expense.”
    Krys peered into the pendant. “It’s falling up?”
    Lucille shook her head and rubbed her eyes. “No, it’s just falling under the hill.”
    â€œHuh?”
    â€œHis day. Not ours.” Lucille sighed. “Let’s make camp. I’m about to drop.”
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    After tying the horses at the edge of a clearing where they could graze, Lucille spread her bedroll under a sheltering tree and flopped down. She hadn’t so much as removed her boots, but just the act of lying down made our muscles melt as if we had returned to my featherbed at the castle. She let out a long sigh.
    A grunt came from a few feet away, and Lucille turned our head so we could see what it was.
    Krys had slid down to sit, leaning her head back against the same tree. Despite her closed eyes, she noticed Lucille’s attention. “Rabbit has the first watch, Your Highness.”
    Lucille glanced back toward the clearing. Rabbit sat on a fallen log, honing a knife with a whetstone. I don’t know how Lucille saw her, but I thought her time with the court over the