Read Online Wintercraft: Blackwatch by Jenna Burtenshaw - Free Book Online

cover.
     
    Wintercraft
     
     
    Wintercraft was one of the rarest and most dangerous books in Albion. Within its pages was the life’s work of a group of Walkers who had lived centuries before Kate was born – people who could enter the veil, just like her – along with the many experiments they had conducted into what they found on the other side. The Skilled did not like the practice of Wintercraft. They saw the veil as something to be studied, not entered and experimented upon, and Kate had witnessed the damage that the knowledge within this book could do for herself. It had almost cost Kate her life on the Night of Souls, and it had endangered the lives of hundreds of people who had seen it put to work within the city square, but Wintercraft was a part of her. She had to protect it.
     
    Many of its pages had been written by Kate’s own ancestors, and her parents had died trying to protect it from the High Council when she was just five years old. The book held answers that the Skilled were unable to give her about what it meant to be a Walker, and even though parts of it were difficult to understand it had become a comfort to her. Only Edgar knew that she still had it. With nothing else to do in that place, she wrapped herself in the bed blanket and began to read.
     
    The hours snailed by, and Kate found herself dozing over the open pages, dreaming of shades, listening circles and wardens. Her mind wandered back to the time she had spent with Silas, to the faces of the people he had killed and the souls of the people he had helped her to set free, and the memory of it jolted her awake. She scrambled out of her blankets, reached for the security of her candle and lit a second one from a box on the room’s curving shelf, just in case the first flame went out. The shades had gone and she had already put out the other lights, not liking the shapes they cast up the walls. A scar on her left arm stung a little; a thin line left from a cut made weeks ago when Silas had stolen her blood. ‘Silas,’ she whispered to herself.
     
    Then the scratching sounds started. Krrrr … krrrr … krrrr … It sounded as if something was trying to claw its way into the room.
     
    Suddenly two candles were nowhere near enough. Kate dragged the candle box from the shelf and held handfuls of them against the open flames, dripping a trail of wax on to the floor beside her bed and standing the candles up in it one by one. She held one in front of her, trying to pinpoint the sound, but it seemed to be coming from everywhere at once. Then she pressed her hand against the door and tiny vibrations thrummed against her fingers. Someone was outside, trying to scrape their way in.
     
    The scratching stopped and she crouched in front of the door, peering out through the middle keyhole. She heard something snap and something metallic rang out against the lock and skidded off across the cavern floor. Someone swore under their breath and Kate pulled back as a metal wire stabbed through the keyhole, dangerously close to her eye. ‘Who’s out there?’ she asked, but no one answered. She moved to the upper lock, hoping to get a look at her visitor’s face, but all she could see was a mess of black hair bent forward as its owner concentrated on his work.
     
    Kate tugged her sleeve down over her right hand and waited by the middle lock for her moment to strike. When the wire poked through again, she snatched at the hooked end and pulled hard. The wire threaded straight through the door and when Kate looked through the keyhole, Edgar’s eye was looking back.
     
    ‘What are you doing?’ he demanded.
     
    ‘What are you doing?’
     
    ‘Getting you out of there.’
     
    ‘It sounds as if you’re trying to wake the whole cavern,’ said Kate. ‘Just leave me alone. I’m fine where I am.’
     
    ‘Leave you alone? In there? Of course. Why didn’t I think of that? I’m sure you’re having a great time sitting in the dark.’
     
    ‘I was