The Fall of Waterstone (BLACK LAND’S BANE #2) by Lilith Saintcrow EPUB & PDF – eBook Details Online
- Status: Available for Free Download
- Authors: Lilith Saintcrow
- Language: English
- Genre: Fantasy
- Format: PDF / EPUB
- Size: 4.2 MB
- Price: Free
Caged Creatures
Thus did the folk of the High-helm pass swift and silent, over treecrowned hill and through murmuring valley, until they reached the
place shown unto their king. The first stones of Laeliquaende were
laid with joy, and as the white towers rose Taeron’s people sang.
Even so close to the Enemy’s land the music flowed unceasing, until
the day doom arrived in the form least suspected…
—Gaemirwen of Dorael, Concerning the Lost Kingdoms
At least they did not throw us in a pit,” ruddy-haired Arneior snarled,
tapping a disdainful fingertip against the bars. The slim metal pillars were
light, even decorative—for the Elder make no thing without attention to the
most pleasingly efficient shape for its function—and their powdery surfaces
were utterly impervious. Even had we some implement to cut through,
where on earth would we go? “Though that would be easier to escape.”
No freeborn creature likes to be caged, and a shieldmaid less than most.
I sat upon the cell’s shelf-bed, which now bore a thin cushion of
wondrous softness and blankets of surprising warmth. The guards were not
impolite, though regarding us with a great deal of curiosity. They were
Elder, had presumably seen mortals enough in their time… and yet.
There was nothing else to do, so I combed my hair with surpassing
slowness. As well as bedlinen and small necessaries, the politely inquisitive
guards had also brought my mother’s second-largest trunk, hauled this far
north by what seidhr I could not tell—and it did not seem they had searched
its interior, at least.
The appearance of our luggage bespoke some graciousness upon the part
of our hosts, and further intimated the men of Naras might not be finding
their own confinement overly difficult. Our prison was amply sized,
contained a water-room, and once the sun left the sky a soft glow remained
in shell-shaped patterns painted upon the wall, dying gently as we readied
ourselves for sleep.
I tried to discern the seidhr in such a wonder by laying a fingertip
against luminescent stone, but it granted no illumination other than the
physical. In fact, the meat inside my skull, usually so painfully active, was
hard-pressed to find a solution to any quandary. Even twisting my hair into
braids starred with red coral beads—all of Dun Rithell’s supply until traders
brought more upriver in summer—did not help.
To make matters worse, I still occasionally shivered with the cold of our
passage across the Glass, not to mention the memory of a snow-hag and a
great lich, attempting the healing of Eol of Naras, the final terrible effort to
reach this hidden city where Aeredh said some great Elder weapon lay
waiting for my use. The shocks lingered in my flesh, echoes not fading as
an ordinary nightmare but acquiring new and terrible resonance whenever I
shut my eyes.
My shieldmaid’s attention was wholly taken with peering down the
stone hall, testing the bars at intervals, listening intently for any sign of our
guards, and performing what practice she could within the barred room’s
confines.
For More Read Download This Book
EPUB