Read Online The Quest for the Trilogy: Boneslicer; Seaspray; Deathwhisper by Mel Odom - Free Book Online Page B

he’d gone with the wizard to the mainland on one journey or another, his life had been at risk constantly. He didn’t think Craugh had shown up at Paunsel’s for the sparkleberry wine.
    â€œOkay,” Wick said. But some of the drama had gone out of the presentation. Craugh was the only person he’d known who had actually lived through the Cataclysm and knew many of the key events firsthand. “Where was I?”
    â€œThe Unity forces sent three armies to the Painted Canyon to head off Lord Kharrion’s forces.” Craugh sat at a table near the front whose previous tenants had rapidly evacuated at his approach. He placed his staff across the table and stretched his long legs under it. “One of dwarves, one of elves, and one of humans. Carry on.”
    â€œRight.” Wick tried to marshal his thoughts, but the sparkleberry wine was interfering almost as much as his nerves. “So there they were. Three armies headed for Painted Canyon and the goblinkin hordes. Master Blacksmith Oskarr of the Cinder Clouds Islands led the dwarves. The elves were marshaled by King Faeyn of the Tangletree Glen. And General Crisstun of Promise Wharf commanded the humans. The reached the pass at the Unmerciful Shards under the cover of night before the fugitives and were able to set up defensive positions at Fell’s Keep, an old human trading post that had been abandoned after the dragons had started nesting there.”
    The tavern crowd hung on every word. Although none of them had experienced war on quite the level of the Cataclysm, all of them had probably fought for their lives against men or beasts at one time or another. They knew what those armies faced.
    â€œThe defenders let the fugitives through,” Wick said, “and settled in to fight. Then came the goblinkin, marching in double-time, their ranks swelled with monsters and dire creatures Lord Kharrion had lured to their dark cause. Confronted with so many goblinkin, the three armies knew they were fated to die. If they tried to fall back, their resistance would fall apart and they would leave the rearguard of the fugitives open to attack.”
    Silence rang throughout the tavern.
    â€œThey’d already lost so much at Teldane’s Bounty,” Wick said, “that no one could bear to lose women and children again. So it was decided among the warriors of those three armies that they would sell their lives as dearly as possible and hope to slow the encroaching goblinkin horde enough that the fugitives might be able to escape.”

    â€œâ€™Twas a brave an’ selfless thing they did,” Hallekk stated.
    â€œâ€™Twas,” Verdin agreed. “Too bad they had to go an’ get betrayed the way they was. Mayhap more of ’em might have survived.”
    â€œFor nine days,” Wick went on, hurrying so the argument wouldn’t begin again, “the defenders of Fell’s Keep kept the goblinkin at bay. They fought till the Painted Canyon ran red with blood. At night, when the goblinkin made camp and slept, elven warders went quietly among them and stole supplies and arrows, and killed goblinkin where they found them—strung up the bodies from the cliff sides, tossed their ugly heads into the campfires, and put horse droppings into the soup the goblinkin had made of fallen enemies—as testimony to the fate that awaited those who continued to fight.”
    The crowd listened in rapt attention.
    â€œGoblins know of the Battle of Fell’s Keep,” Wick whispered, pitching his voice to roll over the crowd. “Stories of those days are still told around goblinkin campfires, and they’re whispered among the young to scare each other.” He knew that because he’d sat as captive around those campfires a time or two.
    â€œWho betrayed them?” someone asked.
    â€œNo one knows,” Wick said. “Although many tried to guess afterward.” He sat heavily, no longer as