Read Online The Keeper's Shadow by Dennis Foon - Free Book Online Page B

“When we get to your old stomping ground, maybe you can show me? The book. I mean, as your…Lieutenant, I should see it, shouldn’t I?”
    Roan raises an eyebrow at Lumpy and the proud smile lighting up his face.
    â€œWell, it’d be a start, wouldn’t it? I mean if there’s anything to it. The Friend being…a friend…in some way.”
    Not knowing how to respond to Lumpy’s openness to an alliance with a bloodthirsty god, Roan feels the impossibility of what he’s attempting settle over him like a cloud. He barely remembers anything he said in yesterday’s meetings. The future’s tugging him forward, but he’s not sure he’s ready to embrace it. Everything seems so unreal, so unlike anything he’s imagined. “How am I going to do this?”
    Lumpy shrugs. “Just keep taking good advice and you’ll be alright.”
    â€œAnd how do I tell good advice from bad?”
    â€œIf it’s bad, and you take it, I’ll kick you in the butt—or stamp on your toe…or something. Okay?”
    Lumpy at least seems real. Real and surprisingly unafraid. Real and a friend.
    â€œOkay.”

THE PRICE OF DIRT
    WHEN ROAN OF THE PARTING CAME TO US, AITHUNA COULD SMELL THE DEATH IN HIM. LITTLE WAS KNOWN THEN OF THE DIRT, BUT IT WAS CLEAR THAT IT WAS THE CAUSE OF HIS ILLNESS. AND AS AITHUNA CLEANSED ROAN AND THE MANY OTHERS WHO FOLLOWED, IT BECAME KNOWN TO HER THAT JUST AS ITS USERS RAVAGED THE DREAMFIELD AND MADE IT BARREN, SO THE DIRT DID UNTO THEM.
    â€”THE WAY OF THE WAZYA
    T HE EARTH ERUPTS. Snakes of light furrow up out of the cracked, bleeding ground, shrieking. A great needled mouth splits open the sky. The gyrating light-serpents tear into Stowe’s body.
    â€œStowe. Stowe!”
    Someone’s come to help her. “Here!” she screams. “I’m here!”
    â€œStowe!”
    But no one comes, maybe they didn’t hear her. Before she can call out again, the snakes whip around her. Lacerating her flesh, they pull her closer and closer to two unblinking eyes swimming in mottled green gore. Each pupil rolls with nauseating independence in an opposite direction, penetrating her thoughts, insinuating itself into her mind.
    Stowe!
    Willum. Willum! The monster’s shaking her so hard she feels as if her head is about to explode.
    Stowe! The voice wraps around her and she floats in a cool bubble that expands and contracts with her breath, slowing it, calming her.
    Opening her eyes, she sees Willum’s worried face above her. “Was it Ferrell?”
    White crickets are all around her, on her blankets, her pillow, clinging to the bedposts. “No. Not Ferrell. The nightmare. A mouth swallowing…calling out my name, and the eyes, the eyes…”
    Gently propping up Stowe’s head, Willum holds a glass to her lips. “Drink it all, you’ve lost a lot of fluid.”
    Her pillows and sheets are soaked with sweat, even though one or another of Willum’s Apsara friends comes in regularly to change them. Realizing how thirsty she is, she downs the water in one long swallow.
    Willum places the flat of his palm on her forehead and a soothing warmth spreads through her, relaxing her. But the instant he draws his hand away, she feels as if every fiber of her being is moaning with discomfort.
    â€œWhat’s wrong with me, Willum? Why am I still so sick?”
    Willum weighs his words carefully. “The crickets are containing Ferrell, but he draws what life he has from your spirit. It drains you and makes healing impossible. I’ve been doing my best to mask your presence, but he has weakened you to such a degree that something got through. Something powerful and…evil.”
    Stowe cannot seem to prevent her body from trembling. “You think Darius has found me?”
    â€œNo. Not Darius himself…but it is connected to him somehow. I cannot keep you safe here. You need to be at the