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

held himself stiffly in front of Daks, keeping a few inches between them, but as their ride wore on, exhaustion seemed to win and he slowly slumped back against Daks’s chest. When he was sure Ravi had nodded off, Daks wrapped an arm around his slim waist, just to keep him on the horse, of course. With Ravi’s warm back snuggled into his chest and his slow, even breathing lulling him, the brisk early spring air on Daks’s face and the fear of being followed were the only things keeping him awake. But when he found himself nodding off despite his best efforts, he called over his shoulder to Shura. “We need to find somewhere to rest before I fall off a horse for the first time since I learned to ride.”

Ravi stirred in his arms, and Daks tightened his hold despite the stab of pain in his side.

“We’re all tired,” Shura agreed, casting a worried glance back at Fara.

She tugged on the reins until her mare ambled to a halt, and then she swung out of the saddle. “I’ll take a look around.”

The other mare and Horse stopped as well, and Daks did his best to stay alert while he waited for Shura to return.

“What’s happening?” Ravi croaked, sitting up. “Where are we?”

“I’d say we’re halfway to the Kun river,” Daks replied. “Shura’s finding us a place to rest for a few hours.”

Fara urged her horse alongside theirs and said, “I’ve heard of a few places up closer to the crossing that are at least partially sheltered.”

Daks gave her a tired smile but shook his head. “I’d rather stay away from places anyone has heard of, but thank you,” he replied. “We just need a decent clearing shielded from the road where the horses can eat, drink, and rest, and we can do the same.”

“Do you think we’ve gone far enough?” Ravi asked, furrowing his brow.

Daks experienced an unexpectedly intense pull to smooth his fingers over that brow and gripped the reins tighter.

“I think we’ve gone as far as we should tonight,” he answered gruffly as he swung his leg over Horse’s rump and dropped to the ground. “Plus, now that I’ve had a chance to think a bit, I’m beginning to wonder if they’ll come after us at all.”

He groaned as he stretched tired muscles, but when he caught Ravi’s skeptical look, he explained, “There’s nothing to connect us to the search in Rassat. The soldiers just got into a drunken brawl in an alley with some travelers. Shura’s a bit distinctive, I’ll grant you. But the men might also be loath to admit two women and a man took them all out—with your help of course,” he added, giving Ravi a tired smile. “That should work in our favor. If the company is waiting for a contingent of brothers to join them, they can’t venture far. Add in how dark the alley was, and that they were probably doing something they weren’t supposed to, and we might be in the clear for a while, as long as no one really got too badly hurt.”

“It’s possible,” Fara agreed.

Shura chose that moment to emerge almost silently from the shadows, spooking one of the mares into snorting and making the rest of them jump. “I’ve found a glade not far from the river. There should be a bit of grazing for the horses, and it’s shielded from the road by a slope. Come.”

She moved to take the reins of Fara’s mare as the woman dismounted.

When Ravi didn’t move, Daks stepped in close and murmured, “We’ll need to walk the horses from here, since we’re going deeper into the woods and the grade gets a bit steep closer to the river.”

Ravi jerked and blinked sleepily at him.

“Oh. Right.” He swung his leg over and dropped awkwardly to the ground.

When he wobbled a little, Daks automatically shot out a hand to steady him, unaccountably pleased when Ravi didn’t flinch from his touch. Ravi was fairly adorable when he was too sleepy to scowl and hurl abuse. Although he was kind of cute when he was fuming too.

Daks huffed out a breath and shook his head as he shifted Horse’s reins to his right hand and moved to follow Shura’s retreating shadow. He obviously needed rest too.

They followed a deer track deeper into the stretch of woods between the river and the road. Daks wasn’t looking forward to the journey back uphill, but he’d be better rested then at any rate.

When the rushing of water was loud enough that they must have been within mere yards of the river, the land flattened out, and the thick tree trunks opened into a small glade ringed by half-buried moss-covered boulders that seemed to sparkle in the moonlight. His skin tingled, and the hairs on his arms lifted as he stepped into that circle of stones and the Singers’ tales his mother used to spin for him before bed came to mind.

Tired though he was, he opened his senses and searched with his gift. The hum inside the ring was definitely different from outside it, but the same could be said of any holy temple, old battlefield, or mage’s workroom. It could mean anything. He knew what trap spells and curses felt like, and this wasn’t it. There was no threat here, nothing active, only some faint energy clinging to the place like the river mist filling the air. None of the rest of their party seemed uneasy. Horse hesitated slightly before entering the ring, but that was it. Daks was getting spooked by nothing, and he gritted his teeth, irritated with himself.

To help settle both of them, he took the saddle off Horse and rubbed him down with a few handfuls of dead grass as Shura and Fara saw to their mounts and Ravi slumped in a heap on the ground away from everyone else. They’d need to do a more thorough inspection of the horses in daylight, but his arms and his side protested