Read Online Scriber by Ben S. Dobson - Free Book Online Page B

gushing over my hands, thicker and faster than I was ready for. Pressure was certainly being released; for a terrifying moment I thought that it would not stop. But as I held my breath, the flow slowed to a manageable level.
    I had done it. My held breath burst from my lungs in a triumphant laugh. I shook my sore arm to loosen the tense muscles as I looked to the two Army Scribers with a satisfied smile.
    “It’s done,” I told them. “He just may survive this.”
    When I looked back, the High Commander was no longer breathing.
    “No.” I put two fingers against his neck; there was no heartbeat. Desperately, I pounded a fist against his chest once, then again, but it did no good. In the brief moment I had looked away, Ord had slipped quietly into oblivion.
    “No, no, no! It was done!” I lashed out with my foot and caught the bucket sitting near the cot. The foul smell within the tent grew fouler as vomit spilled across the ground.
    “He is with the Father now.” The bald medic put a hand on my shoulder. “You did all you could.”
    I wrenched myself away from him. “It doesn’t matter.” I rubbed my temple, forgetting that my fingertips were stained with the High Commander’s blood. “They’ll say I killed the King’s nephew.”
    Their faces both went white at that—it hadn’t occurred to them that we might be blamed for Ord’s death.
    “No, they can’t… We didn’t—” the heavier man stammered. “We only held him! It was you that did it!”
    “Your concern is touching,” I replied sarcastically. “But don’t worry yourself. It will be me they blame. I make for an easy scapegoat.”
    “They needn’t blame anyone.” The voice came from behind the medics—from the High Commander’s cot. Both of the other men turned towards the sound, blocking my view. My heart beat wildly in my chest as I shoved between them to look upon the cot where the dead man lay.
    Uran Ord looked back at me, his blue eyes clear and alive.

Chapter Seven
     
    The Brothers of the Sky and the Sisters of the Earth, collectively known as the Children, are the preachers of the Mother and the Father. Their traditions are taken from the Book of the Divide, one of the few texts to survive even through the Forgetting, presumably dating back to a time before the cataclysm destroyed ancient Elovia.
    The Children maintain holy places known as Gardens in nearly every village, town, and city in the Kingsland. The main feature of a Garden is a grassy area of carefully tended vegetation where the Children give sermons, as plant life is the symbol of the Mother and Father’s love. To quote from the Book of the Divide, “Though forever parted, their love lives in all things that grow in the Earth and are nourished by the Sky”. Beyond that, however, the Gardens have little in common—they range from humble shacks on grassy fields to ornately designed structures surrounding verdant courtyards, like the historic Old Garden in Three Rivers.
    — From Dennon Lark’s Religions of Cendonia
     
    “Forgive me if this seems strange, Scriber, but I could not let my men hear me asking these questions.” Uran Ord sat on the edge of his cot, his head wrapped in white cotton bandages that masked the deep incision in his scalp. For a man who had been dead a quarter-hour before, he was surprisingly talkative. He had sent his medics away, and for the last quarter-hour or so, had questioned me thoroughly on subjects that he had no business not knowing the answers to.
    “It’s not unprecedented for a blow to the head to interfere with memory, High Commander,” I said with an assurance I did not feel. “But I would strongly recommend that you go to the Academy for examination.” I had been trying to convince him of this since he had awoken. It was not uncommon for a head wound to cause some memory loss, but it was very uncommon for a man to rise from the dead. I should have been relieved that he lived—it saved me from being blamed for his