The Goblin Warrior (Beneath Sands Book 2) by Emma Hamm (100 books to read txt) 📕

down her spine was from the souls of her parents finally finding rest.

“Jane?”

She turned slightly as Lara and Reed returned. Half of her face turned towards them, and they were both struck by the changes they saw in her. Even turned away from them, she appeared far more exotic and dangerous than either of them had ever seen. Her movements were hardly even human.

“You gathered those rather quickly.”

“Well.” Lara placed two pairs of boots and a face mask on the table. “We’ve never been overly fond of our neighbors. They’re rude and they think they’re better than us.”

Her hands patted the boots roughly. “They’ll be brought down a few notches to walk without boots for a while. And they were gone. Sneaking into their tent was easy.”

Reed put his stolen belongings on the table with the others. “Who are you giving these too, Jane?”

Once more, Jane shook her head. “That’s something I can’t tell you.”

“After we stole these for you?” A lock of hair fell across his forehead. “After we’re putting our necks on the line for you?”

Jane reached forward and tucked that long back into the tangled mess of his hair. “You did nothing. A ghost of a woman long past came through the camp this night. If asked, you were safely in your bed.”

“What?”

The two of them watched her leave them with bewildered expressions on their faces. Neither of them would know what to say when a band of raiders came through the camp in a week’s time. The raiders would speak of a massacre they had found on the road here. The raiders would appear shaken, the first time any in the mining town had seen such a thing.

Reed and Lara would look at each other in fear. They understood now what Jane had been running from and were shaken to their very souls. They would sleep in each other’s arms that night.

The raiders would leave without any bloodshed for the first time in years.

Leaving the mining camp where she grew up was both bittersweet and freeing. The tents flapped in the wind behind her and the sound of life flickered until she could hear it no more. There was always something wrong there. The people were ill, there was not enough water, the food was running low.

Jane longed for the ease of life Below. She longed for sight of happy faces that weren’t lined with stress and discomfort. Perhaps it was petty to think that a life imprisoned was better than one here. But for her, it was.

She walked back towards the goblins with a renewed purpose in her step. She wanted to see them. She wanted to see Ruric. She wanted to be in the company of someone who protected her at all costs. Someone who she would protect at all costs.

Her hand raised to finger the chain around her throat.

Of course, there was a fine line between protection and control. She did not understand why he had chained her. Even more so, she didn’t understand why he refused to remove the chain. It had been long enough. There were even goblins who were confused by why he was still marking her his slave, yet calling her his wife.

She shifted the clothing in her arms. There was hardly time to be considering her feelings. They needed to get to the City. They needed to find the goblin boy and then her family.

“I’m coming for you.” She whispered into the wind. For a moment she paused to turn her face towards the sun. In her mind’s eye, she could see them clearly. The bright colors of their hair that echoed the yellow orb. They were everything to her. Luther and Willow had to know that she was at least alive.

It was dangerous to tell them where she was or how she was living. But the wound in her soul that had never healed called out for them. Jane understood now that she needed them to know she was alive. She didn’t want them to mourn for her.

When she opened her eyes and looked towards the horizon, she squinted to see what was there. The wind had picked up, but what worried her was the red tint on the horizon.

She swore loudly.

A sandstorm barreled towards her. The sky darkened under the mile high wave that could not be stopped.

She turned on her heel and sprinted away from it. The goblins had no idea how to survive in something like this. They would surely be taken unawares and what would she do then? The sun was just starting to reach the horizon, but it was doubtful they would be coming out until full darkness had fallen.

She clutched the clothes hard to her chest as she crested a dune and slipped. Her body rolled down the sand, and for once she was pleased to be Above ground. There were no stones to harden her fall. Still, the breath was knocked from her lungs for a moment before she pulled herself back to her feet.

Running seemed impossible in the sand. Every step slowed her down. Every movement was half the speed she needed to be moving.

Jane wasn’t sure what direction she was running. The sun had been blotted out by the swirling sand behind her and every dune looked precisely the same as the last.

She had never been lost in the sands before, but she knew how quickly it could happen. Her heart beat faster as her breath heaved from her lungs.

“Ruric!” She yelled.

They had to hear her. They had to be nearby. She knew where they were. Jane knew that they were in this direction unless the fall had turned her around.

Once more she slipped down a dune and rolled into the base of a tree.

“What?” She whispered, looking up at the barren branches of the tree. She had never seen one before. There were no plants around the mining camps. There were no plants Above at all as far as she knew.

Yet this was the shell of one.