The Seer by Rowan McAllister (reading comprehension books .TXT) 📕

Daks blew out a long breath when the cart began moving again. They weren’t safe yet, but they’d hopefully passed the worst obstacle.

Every single inch of his body ached by the time the wagon finally stopped again and Haruk called to him.

“We’re far enough away now. You can at least come out of hiding and stretch,” he said in accented trade tongue.

Crates and barrels suddenly moved and flickering torchlight flooded through the cracks of their hiding place. In other circumstances, Daks would have manfully refused the massive paw Vahal extended in his direction, but after the abuse he’d put his body through in the last day, he was embarrassed to admit he needed the help sliding out from under Ravi and climbing out of the box. His legs were asleep, and he had to roll his shoulders several times before he could work the crick out of his neck and lift up his head.

“Thank you,” he murmured, and Vahal nodded.

“You’ll need to stay in the back, but there’s no need to cram into that tiny space. How is the other?” Vahal asked in a rumbling bass Daks could feel in his chest.

“Still asleep. I think he got the better end of that deal,” Daks grumbled, and Vahal chuckled.

“Not far now,” Vahal said gently before heading back to the front of the wagon.

Daks shoved some of the boxes aside to make room for himself and then crawled back in. He braced his back against a barrel a moment before Haruk snapped the reins and barked out an order, making the horse lurch forward. After the first new bump in the road, Daks tugged Ravi out of the box enough to cushion his head on one of Daks’s thighs so the hard boards of the cart wouldn’t do him any more damage than Shura already had. The last thing he needed was to have to carry the man yet one more time because he’d been brained unconscious again.

As the cart rumbled along the rutted road by the full moon, Daks draped an arm across Ravi’s shoulders to hold him in place, settled himself as comfortably as he could, and tipped his head back to take in the stars littering the night sky. Away from the city and the smoky miasma of chimney fires, the view was breathtaking, and he was honestly too tired to try to make conversation with the men in front of him. He should be pumping them for as much information as he could, but Maran’s lieutenant probably knew more than they did anyway, so he could afford to be a little lazy. He’d lost a full night’s sleep to his own stupidity, after all.

He drew in a deep breath of clean sea air and blew it out again, allowing his mind to wander where it would as his gaze dropped to the rolling farmland they now traveled through. Shura was right. It was time for him to face facts and move on to some other job. His feelings were getting the better of him and he was making mistakes, possibly costly ones. If he quit, he could finally tell the High Council where to shove their bureaucracy, their greed, and their petty squabbles and venture out on his own… with Shura, of course. He might not be as young as he once was, but he and Shura were still young and capable enough they could find work anywhere. His gift would always be useful, even if it wasn’t particularly flashy.

His glance drifted down to Ravi’s cloaked head resting on his thigh. He couldn’t save them all. And if he were truly honest with himself, he’d finally admit Josel was gone for good. He’d have found some way to contact Daks in the nearly ten years since his disappearance if he’d still been alive. He wouldn’t have left Daks hurting if he’d had any choice in the matter.

Daks’s hand tightened almost of its own accord on the shoulder beneath his palm. One more rescue and maybe his conscience would be satisfied and the old wounds inside him could heal. After that, maybe he and Shura could find a bit of land somewhere with the wages he’d saved over the years. They’d settle down, find a husband for him and a wife for her. They could be farmers like the rest of his family, and Shura could invite her clan to stay for as long as they wanted and return as often as they wanted.

He fidgeted, grimacing as he lifted one buttcheek and then the other to relieve the ache from the pounding it was getting. It was definitely not the kind of pounding he preferred. A small smile curved his lips as he glanced at Vahal’s broad shoulders above him. If he wasn’t doing this job anymore, he could find a mountain of a man like Vahal to climb on top of every night and hitch to the plow every day. Regular sex and not being on the verge of possible torture and death all the time had its perks, right? He glanced from Vahal’s back down to Ravi’s prone form again and pursed his lips. Or maybe he’d find himself a pretty little thing to curl around every night and hitch himself to the plow every morning instead. The options were limitless, really.

The fantasy lasted for only a few more minutes before he snorted and shook his head. Shura would be ready to kill him within a week, from boredom. She came from a nomadic people, so staying in one place ran contrary to everything she was. She’d do it for him, but he would be cruel to ask it of her. He wasn’t exactly farmer material either… at least, not anymore. They needed a few more years of adventure under their belts before they could manage that level of settling down in any case… or the right partners to make the quiet life more interesting.

With a smile still on his face, he let his head fall back