Read Online Wizard of the Grove by Tanya Huff - Free Book Online Page B

breastplate except for the hole punched through it . . . as though the steel had been paper.
    *   *   *
    Rain during the first three days on the Tage Plateau kept fighting intermittent and casualties light. The fourth day the sun shone and the killing began again. The strength of the Elite fell from fifty-five to forty men. The Duke of Cei lost half his Guard but the remainder held. The Duke of Belkar lost twenty archers when their position was overrun. The Duke of Hale lost his life.
    â€œThen who is Hale now?” Rutgar asked, his fingers digging the tension out of the prince’s shoulders.
    Rael rolled a blue glass bead between his thumb and forefinger. He’d found it near where Hale had fallen. He couldn’t imagine the duke with an unbeaded mustache. He couldn’t imagine the duke dead. “The eldest son, just ten this summer. I think his name was Etgar.”
    â€œWas Etgar?”
    â€œIt’s Hale now.”
    The Melacians died by the hundreds, but more continued to come through the pass.
    *   *   *
    â€œFather, are you sure you should be out of bed?”
    Raen glared at his son. “I’ll not lie in bed, while my people die.”
    â€œIt won’t help them if you die as well.”
    The king put his foot in the stirrup and pulled himself up into the saddle. “I have no intention of dying,” he growled and turned his warhorse toward the battle.
    At the end of the day, the edge of the king’s surcoat was stained with blood and he had to be lifted down from his horse.
    â€œI’m fine,” he protested as two of the Palace Guard placed him gently on a litter. “I’m just a little stiff.”
    â€œFather!” Rael pushed through the gathered crowd and flung himself to his knees, desperately catching up his father’s hand in his.
    â€œI’m fine,” the king insisted. He managed a weak smile, but his face was gray and slick with sweat.
    Rael looked up at Belkar, his whole body begging the duke to say it would be all right. Belkar shrugged.
    â€œThe king is down,” ran the whisper through the ranks. “The king is dying.” Weapons, tools, meals, lay forgotten as the army fell silent and waited for news.
    â€œGet out of my way.” Glinna’s voice, impatient and commanding, pushed apart the silence and split the circle surrounding the litter. The surgeon strode through the break and glared down at the king. Her mouth pursed and her eyebrows lowered. “I told you so,” was all she said, but there were several lectures worth of meaning in the words.
    A wave of near hysterical giggles rippled outward. The king would live. No one used that tone on a dying man.
    Glinna looked up at the sound. “Don’t you lot have something to do?” The crowd melted away and she shifted her gaze to stare pointedly at the prince. He stared back, the green of his eyes growing both deeper and brighter. She raised one eyebrow. “Very pretty, Highness. Now get up off your knees so we can move your father inside.”
    Rael sighed as he scrambled out of the way.
It’s not fair,
he thought.
When I want people to be impressed, they never are.
    As the litter moved away, Glinna slipped her hand under the bloody surcoat.
    â€œMadam!” Raen gasped, his eyes wide, pain mixed equally with surprise. “Try to remember, I am your king.”
    â€œAnd if you want to remain my king,” the surgeon told him dryly, lifting the tent flap and standing aside to allow the litter to pass, “or anyone else’s king, for that matter, you’ll do as I say.” The flap fell behind them.
    â€œShe’s got a terrific way with her patients,” Rael muttered and started back to where he’d left Rutgar holding his horse.
    The Duke of Belkar fell into step beside him. “Think of it as an incentive to stay in one piece, Highness.”
    â€œWhat do you