The Tales of the Wanderer Volume One: A Book of Underrealm (The Underrealm Volumes 4) by Garrett Robinson (elon musk reading list TXT) 📕

“Do you think servants of the Lord have no honor?” she said. Then she smiled. “You will have to find out, I suppose.”

She attacked again. I warded her blows, but each one forced me another step back. I could not risk a glance behind me, but I could feel the closed door at my back. The woman saw it, and she gave a grim smile. She was a better fighter than I was, and we both knew it. I took a wild swing that forced her a half-step back. But even as my sword came around, I could feel myself losing my balance. I stumbled, and she saw her opening.

“Die, wretch,” she hissed, swinging for my side.

The only thing I could do was fall to the floor. My sword clattered out of reach. Her blade hissed harmlessly through the air where I had stood a moment before. But I had only prolonged the inevitable. I rolled desperately onto my back, hoping against hope that I could roll out of the way of her next swing.

But the woman was not standing over me with her blade held high. In fact, she was only standing at all because Mag’s spear had pierced straight through her head and embedded itself in the wall. Now the woman hung feebly from the middle of the spear, bouncing up and down slightly with its spring. Her eyes were cold and empty.

I looked over. Mag stood in the right-hand doorway, blood spattered all across her clothing. She had arrived just in time to throw her spear across the room and through the head of my foe. Even as I watched, her battle-trance slipped away and warmth came back into her expression.

“Five, Albern,” she said. “I took five of them, and still I had to help you against one.”

“In a building like this, yes,” I said. “Put me on an open field and put a bow in my hand—”

“—and stand your enemies in a line facing you like practice dummies, and do not give them any weapons to fight back, yes, yes,” said Mag. She came to me and held out a hand to pull me up, forcing a slight smile. “We cannot always fight in perfect circumstances, you oaf.”

“Oh, be silent,” I grumbled. “And would you take back your spear? That is unnerving.” I pointed at the grey-haired woman, still suspended where she stood by Mag’s weapon.

Mag’s little smile died, and she went about the messy business of retrieving her spear. Once she had extricated it from the woman and the door, she cleaned it on the woman’s cloak. I went to where my sword had fallen and picked it up, keeping a suspicious eye on both doors leading out of the room. I did not want to be taken by surprise again.

Mag noticed my attitude and shook her head. “I got them all. The house feels empty.”

“But still evil,” I remarked. The air was still thick with the curious power I had felt earlier.

“Yes, still evil,” said Mag.

“How did the woman get past you?” I said. “She emerged from the left-hand door—the same one you went through. Did she slip by somehow?”

Mag turned to look at the door, frowning. “She did not. I circled the whole house and came back around the other way, and I did not see her until I killed her. But I passed a staircase leading up. The woman must have run upstairs, and then come back down after I had passed. She, and three others—they found me in the back room, surprising me by attacking from behind.”

My eyebrows shot for the ceiling. “However did you survive.”

Mag put a hand over her heart. “It was a near thing.”

I could not quite find a chuckle for her joke. A mercenary learns to lighten their mood, even in the midst of the grim business of killing, but I was never able to laugh in the presence of an enemy’s corpse.

“I wish now that I had not killed all of them,” said Mag. “I did not think to let any of the others live, for I thought we could interrogate this one.” She pointed at the corpse of the grey-braided woman.

“Interrogate …” I closed my eyes and sighed. The weremage. She was not here. In the fighting, I had almost forgotten about her. “Sky. I had not thought of that.”

“Clearly not,” said Mag. “In any case, we did not find what we sought, and I feel it would be unwise for us to remain here overlong. Let us be on our way.”

“A sensible suggestion,” I said.

I turned to the front door and threw it open, relieved, at least, that I would be able to escape the oppressive feeling that permeated the house. The open air outside felt like cool springwater on a midsummer day. I stopped just past the threshold and took several deep breaths. Mag was not so dramatic about it, but I could see the relief on her face as well. She planted the butt of her spear on the ground and leaned on it with a sigh.

“You!”

The voice—new, but still familiar—froze my blood. I looked up, the sinking feeling in my stomach growing worse, to see Yue marching towards us, her face red beneath her shock of bristling yellow hair.

“Dark take the both of you—you are under arrest, under the authority of the King’s law.”

“Constable Baolan,” I said, raising a hand to wave at her. “Well met, again.”

She stalked up to us in a huff, hands balled to fists by her sides. Behind her were the same two constables we had seen at the gate the day before. They looked at each other warily, hands near the handles of their clubs.

“I told you not to make trouble while you were in my town,” growled Yue. “And then, a short while ago, someone came and told me they saw you chasing a boy through