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

He settled onto his ass, his boots still trailing in the mud, and put a hand to his diaphragm while he propped himself up with the other.

“Shura, are you okay?” Daks called harshly, and Ravi turned to find her nodding as she held her left arm close to her body

“It just clipped my shoulder,” Shura bit out, before turning to glare at Ravi. “What were you thinking? Of all the idiotic, useless—” She let out a string of words in her own language Ravi didn’t understand, but he was pretty sure they weren’t flattering, until Daks cut her off.

“That’s enough, Shur. It wasn’t his fault, and I’m all right.”

They shared another one of their long looks, before Shura nodded once, begrudgingly, and turned to Mistress Sabin, who hovered at her elbow.

Ravi clenched his jaw in both guilt and anger and attempted to struggle to his feet. Daks appeared at his side before Ravi got even halfway up, though he didn’t seem completely steady either. They were both soaked to the skin, shivering, and covered in muck that smelled as bad as it looked.

“I’m okay,” Ravi protested, which was mostly true.

He’d have a huge bruise on his chest and it hurt to breathe, but he could stand without aid. Daks’s dark blue eyes seemed a little wild when Ravi met his gaze, but after a few seconds of study, Daks nodded, blew out a shaky breath, and withdrew his hands. Without another word, Daks turned and headed toward the women.

“Is it bad?” Daks asked Shura.

Her dark eyes were oddly intent as she studied Daks’s face. “No. It’ll hurt for a while, but I can still use it.”

To demonstrate, she flexed and rotated it while Mistress Sabin pressed her lips together in obvious disapproval.

“What happened?” Mistress Sabin asked.

“Trap,” Shura answered grimly.

She was still watching Daks closely, but she spared a small glare for Ravi before turning back to stare at her partner… but Daks’s eyes had that vacant look they took on when he used his gift.

After a few seconds, he shook his head. “If there’s anyone out there, I can’t sense them. There’s no magic.”

He moved to the branch that had struck them and crouched down, examining the ropes. “This has been here a while. I don’t think it was meant to do any real harm, only deter unwanted visitors. It’s just our bad lu—” He cleared his throat. “We just ventured too far from the safe path.”

“But that’s dangerous, leaving something like that out here,” Mistress Sabin protested. “Anyone could chance upon it. That could have killed a child.”

“I imagine anyone out here who’s supposed to be would know how to avoid it. I think the moral of the story is, don’t stray too far from the road.”

Ravi winced, but how could he have possibly known? As if the bugs, the muck, the wet, and the cold weren’t enough, he had to worry about traps too? He’d only wanted to pee.

“Ravi, can you travel?’ Daks asked brusquely, jerking Ravi’s attention back to him.

“Yes.”

Even if he couldn’t, he certainly wouldn’t have admitted it.

Cursed. I’m cursed.

“Good. Let’s get the horses turned around and see if we can find that trail we missed.”

Without a backward glance, Daks moved to where the horses and the mule had retreated and began sorting them out. Luckily for all of them, Horse seemed to have corralled the other three and kept them from bolting in the excitement.

Daks didn’t seem at all bothered by the fact that he was soaked from the neck down anymore, but Ravi shivered again as he grabbed his sodden borrowed cloak off the ground and made his slow, somewhat pained way to join the others. At least the fog seemed to be lifting. That was something.

“We should take a look at your wound too,” Shura called out as she approached them.

“It’s fine.”

“Vaida, you may have torn the stitches we put in at the farm,” she argued.

Daks shook his head. “It’ll wait.” He turned to Ravi, his face set in a frown. “You can change into dry clothes now if you need to, but I’m going to wait until we’re closer to Traget and I can find a clean stream or pool in the river to wash in.”

Ravi’s lovely borrowed clothes were clammy, covered in mud, and smelled of bog, but he shook his head and said, “I’ll wait.”

With a brusque nod, Daks turned to Shura. “Take the mare up front. We’ll follow.”

While Ravi blinked at him in surprise, Daks collected the heavy sodden cloak from him and walked to the mule. When he returned, he carried Ravi’s old cloak, freshly cleaned and mended.

“Climb up,” Daks ordered, handing him the cloak and nodding to the stallion.

His face was still set in a heavy frown, and Ravi wanted to snap something biting to defend himself. He hadn’t done anything wrong. Daks had no right to be mad at him. But since he hadn’t exactly been looking forward to sharing another ride with Shura, especially while she was angry with him, his chest hurt, and he smelled like he did, he kept his mouth shut. He’d say something later… much later, like when they were safely in Samebar kind of later. Then he’d tell both of them to go to the Seven Hells.

Much to everyone’s relief, Shura found the track they should have taken easily, now that the fog had cleared some. The entrance was completely overgrown, and Ravi probably would have missed it even on the second pass, but he didn’t try to offer those words of comfort to her. Her scowl was nearly as forbidding as Daks’s.

The rest of their ride that day was still miserable, despite the air clearing and the sun brightening the farther they headed away from the bogs. Damp, muddy, and shivering, Ravi had to work for each breath around the throbbing band of pain across his chest. Having Daks’s big body pressed to his back, solid and warm, helped, but he