Read Online Faery Born (Book One in the War Faery Trilogy) by Donna Joy Usher - Free Book Online Page A

over him, narrowly missing my throat with his dagger. I took off as fast as I could, quickly realising my attempt to outrun this goblin was doomed to fail. I could hear his grunting breath getting closer and closer.
    I could spin and face him, but his momentum would very likely carry him through me. I would be lucky if he didn’t gut me.
    And then I saw the other goblins farther up the street. Swearing, I changed course, heading for the clock tower. I heard yelling behind me and realised I now had all of the goblins on my tail. This was turning out to be one hell of a birthday.
    Glad I had taken up running as a hobby, but wishing I had concentrated on the sprinting part of the vocation, I broke into the square around the clock tower. A handful of men were already there, swords-in-hand as they battled a group of goblins.
    ‘Incoming,’ I yelled as I raced towards them.
    I increased my speed, heading straight for the side of the clock tower. As I reached it, I lengthened my stride and ran up the side, pushing off and executing a backward somersault over the goblins. I landed behind them and hamstringed the two closest; swirling straight away to shove the dagger into a third one’s neck. I felt the blade dig deeper than I had intended, catching as it struck bone. I leapt clear of his outstretched arms with only the branch to defend myself.
    ‘Here,’ one of the men yelled as he threw a sword hilt-first to me.
    I grabbed it out of the air as the closest standing goblin turned towards me. I was used to lighter fencing swords, not this heavy, ungainly weapon. I hefted it with both hands and, using the same technique I had with the branch, I swung the blade towards the goblin. It struck home, into and then through his neck. Blood sprayed out in an arc as he fell to the ground. His severed head bounced a couple of times as it hit the pavement. The open eyes blinked once as they stared up at me.
    ‘Gross,’ I said, trying not to slip in the blood as I stepped around it.
    The next goblin approached me more warily. He feigned a couple of times with his dagger and I slapped him away with my sword.
    To be honest, I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. I had no idea how to use this blade effectively and I was staring at it, wishing desperately it were a sabre, when all of a sudden it was. The shock almost ended my life as the goblin chose that exact moment to charge.
    ‘Whizbang,’ I yelped, diving to the ground. I brought the sabre up as a reflex and the tip of it pierced his side. He let out an ‘Oooph,’ and then fell to his knees, staring in confusion at his chest where the tip of my sabre had emerged.
    ‘Nice,’ one of the men said, kicking the goblin off my blade. ‘But then you always did have style.’ He was huge, with red, shaggy hair growing out of every part of his body. Even the area of his chest that his fur vest didn’t cover was a carpet of red. ‘Duck,’ he said, and I realised in time that he wasn’t talking about the winged variety.
    I dropped to my knees and he swung his sword over the top of me. Warm liquid sprayed over the back of my neck and arms.
    I looked over my shoulder. A goblin lay in a pool of blood. ‘Thanks,’ I said.
    Black and white feathers caught my attention. Standing off to the side, Grams flicked her wand at a goblin. He immediately dropped his dagger, placed his arms in the air, and started to waltz to music only he could hear.
    My shaggy companion clapped his hands together. ‘I think we just ran out of goblins,’ he said.
    I looked around. He was right.
    ‘Luckily,’ he continued, ‘I know where we can find more.’
    As if on cue, a group of them trotted past the end of the square. They looked to be heading towards the field.
    ‘Well,’ Grams said, ‘what are we waiting for?’
    I wasn’t sure that the clever thing to do was to hunt down more goblins. I suspected that it was to go home, lock the door behind us and close all the curtains. But instead, I found myself