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

already fond of her, which could be a problem if they had to cut and run. He’d been proven wrong before, so he’d hold judgment for now, but the quality of her wool traveling garb and the delicate gloved hands holding the reins didn’t make her seem like the kind of woman who was used to sleeping rough.

“A pleasure to meet you, Daks. And you may call me Fara.”

One of Daks’s eyebrows quirked in surprise. Rassans were normally quite fond of their titles and honorifics. Maybe she wasn’t as prim as she appeared.

“Uh, Daks, what’s that?” Shura asked as Daks felt the presence of a large body at his back.

He gave her a bland look and smiled. “A horse?”

Shura narrowed her eyes at him, and Daks smirked and held up his hands. “He just showed up. Maybe he’ll be useful. Maybe not. But we don’t have time for pleasantries right now. Ravi had another Vision… or something. The pulse of energy was brief, before it thankfully stopped, but that doesn’t mean no one else felt it too. We need to get moving.”

“Where is he?” Shura asked sharply, nudging her mount closer.

For some reason, when Shura’s mare got close to the white stallion, it suddenly reared away, and Shura had to wrestle with it to get it under control again.

“Not so popular with the ladies, I guess,” Daks quipped, even as he frowned in puzzlement at the stallion.

Shura dismounted, handed her reins off to Vahal with a nod of thanks, and approached the wagon with Daks on her heels. Ravi lay in the bed unmoving but for the gentle rise and fall of his chest.

“Still out?” she asked unnecessarily.

“Yeah. He only stirred briefly with the whatever that was.”

“If he has Visions even when he’s drugged, that could be problematic. I’ve never heard of such a thing before.”

Daks shrugged. “Well, we weren’t exactly planning to keep him knocked out all the way to Samebar, so that’s pretty much moot, right?”

She glanced in his direction and cocked an eyebrow, and he narrowed his eyes at her. “I’m not carrying him all the way to Samebar, Shur. It’s not happening. Besides, you could kill him, keeping him drugged up the whole time.”

She only shrugged, grabbed a pack from the wagon, and carried it to her horse. When he continued to stare after her as she strapped the pack to her saddle, she huffed. “You were the one who said we needed to move, so move. If we need to get away from here fast, we’ll have to ride double for a while. It’ll be hard on the horses, but it’ll put a greater distance between us and any followers to start, and we can walk them later.”

“What about this guy?” Daks said, crooking a thumb at the white stallion that seemed to want to follow him like a puppy.

“You think you can trust it?”

“I have no idea.”

“Then you ride it. We don’t have a saddle or much extra rope. We can strap Ravi to my horse with the packs, and I’ll ride double with Mistress Sabin while you take the other.”

“Your great sacrifice is duly noted,” Daks quipped under his breath as he fought a grin, and she shot him a glare.

“Perhaps I should remind you, yet again, of why we’re in this situation,” Shura replied icily, and Daks winced.

“That won’t be necessary.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yup. I’m sure.”

“Okay, then. Bring him here.”

Though Vahal took a step forward, Daks beat the man to it and obediently dragged Ravi to the edge of the wagon bed as gently as he could. Shura’s mare still seemed a little skittish because of the stallion, so Daks waved his arms at the big white brute until it snorted at him and took a few steps away. When Shura led her mare close enough, Daks took a deep breath, gritted his teeth against the coming pain, and hefted Ravi over the saddle with a grunt. Ravi stirred slightly at the treatment but didn’t wake, and Daks frowned.

“How much of that stuff did you give him?”

“Enough,” Shura replied curtly. “Don’t fret. Maran’s potion-maker promised no harm would come to him from taking it. He’ll wake eventually, hopefully when we are a better distance from the city.”

With help from Haruk and Vahal, Daks got Ravi and the remaining packs strapped to Shura’s horse before warily approaching the stallion. If this didn’t work, he’d be jogging behind the others for the next several hours or overburdening Shura’s mount with his own weight on top of Ravi and the packs. Neither of those options particularly appealed.

“Well, horse, let’s see how far your trust and admiration goes.”

He’d rigged a quick rope halter, which the horse allowed him to tie on without so much as a twitch of complaint or unease.

“I bet someone is really missing you right now,” he murmured in a soothing tone as he petted the stallion’s neck.

Now for the big test.

He led the horse to the wagon and used the bed to lever himself onto its back. He tensed for the thing to rear or bolt, but nothing happened. He waited another few beats, but when the horse only turned its head to give him a placid, expectant look, Daks grinned. Maybe his luck was improving.

“Okay, let’s go,” he called.

Shura eyed him skeptically from behind Fara. “You sure?”

His grin widened. “Of course I am. No problem.”

Shura shook her head and nudged their horse into a walk.

After giving Haruk and Vahal his thanks and saying his goodbyes, Daks collected the other mare’s reins in his free hand and nudged the stallion after them. The two men both looked a bit jealous as he turned and waved, but they waved back until Daks’s little party traveled around a bend in the road and they disappeared from view.

Chapter Four

FOR THE second day in a row, Ravi woke with every inch of his body aching and no idea where he was. The headache this time wasn’t quite the same. It throbbed more than stabbed, but the fuzzy