Arrow on the String: Solomon Sorrows Book 1 by Dan Fish (no david read aloud TXT) 📕

Chapter 34

IVRA JACE WALKED quickly. Not so fast as to draw attention, but not too slow. She walked on the street, during the day, in the open. She left her hood down, and her hair fell loose and golden across her shoulders and back. Her cheeks were flushed from cold. Her eyes caught the sun and sparkled like deep water. More than one dwarf turned as she passed. Eyebrows were raised. Stomachs were sucked in. Chests were puffed out. But Jace avoided any advances. She walked for a spell before turning left onto a cross street. The crowds thinned. She maintained a brisk pace.

She was being followed. She had been since she stepped onto the main street. Hammerfell was a big city with many eyes. Some of them cast casual glances, some of them held friendly interest, some of them hunted. The eyes that followed her now were of the latter kind. They stayed with her when she took the first left. They stayed with her when she took another. And another. She led the eyes in a loop of sorts, bringing them back to the alley she had emerged from, back to the hidden door she had opened, back to a long forgotten room beneath an abandoned City Guard armory.

Jace left the door open, walked in, removed her cloak, draped it over a chair, returned to the door and closed it. She spun, facing the middle of the room. She wasn’t alone.

“Mig Costenatti,” Jace said.

Mig swallowed, eyes wide and black. She took a step back, glanced around the room. Saw only one door. Saw Jace standing in front of it.

“How did you do that?” she asked.

Jace offered a small smile. “Do what?”

Mig shook her head. “You weren’t slipped. How did you pull me back in?”

“Why are you following me?”

“Why did you kill Bex?”

“You think me a killer?”

“Yes. Solomon does, as well.”

Jace frowned, took a step forward. Mig took a step back.

“Does he know you’re still in Hammerfell?” Jace asked.

“Yes,” Mig said. Her body tensed; she took another step back, brushed against the wall. “How are you doing this?”

Jace took another step forward, shook her head. “I can’t have him looking for you. Not now. It’s too dangerous.”

Mig pressed herself against the wall, glanced from one side to the other. She reached behind her head, pulled a slender metal pin from her hair, rushed at Jace.

It was a desperate attack. Mig had nowhere to go. She was alone. The door was behind Jace. Mig was trapped. It was a foolish attack. Jace held the advantage in both height and reach. As Mig drew close, it became apparent Jace held the advantage in speed as well. She stepped sideways, away from the hand holding the pin, gathered herself and lunged forward. Mig spun, swiped at Jace. It was a hopeless attack. Jace held the advantage in strength. She caught Mig by the wrist, wrenched her arm behind her back. Mig gasped, cried out. She dropped the pin and Jace caught it in her free hand. Jace forced Mig to the floor then rolled her onto her back and straddled her. Mig tensed, held her breath. Her chin trembled. A tear slipped from the corner of one eye. She gasped, her chest heaved. She shook her head.

“How can you do this?” she asked. “What are you? Some sort of god?”

Jace held the pin in one hand. She reached forward with the other and brushed a strand of hair from Mig’s face. Soft. Gentle.

“You are lovely, Mig. And sweet and clever. It’s no wonder he loves you as he does.”

Mig swallowed. “Don’t you dare hurt him.”

Jace gave a small smile. “I wouldn’t. Not intentionally. But unintentionally, I’m afraid I will.”

Mig struggled, writhed within Jace’s grasp. Screamed and cried out for help. After a while, she stopped, grasped for breath. Her eyes filled with tears.

“Let me go, Ivra. Please don’t do this.”

Jace sighed. “I wish it were that easy. But you’d go to him. You’d interfere. No, don’t shake your head. I know you would. And you’d think you were doing him a favor. But there are things happening which you do not understand. The gods themselves watch every move, every moment. This struggle between you and me. They think I am cornered. That I must choose mercy over death because of what you mean to Solomon and what Solomon means to me. But they underestimate me.”

Mig shook her head, pressed her lips together. A tear slipped across her cheek. “Please don’t.”

“Be brave, Mig. It will be over quickly, I promise.”

“Please.”

Two dwarves passed through the alley outside the hidden door. Each wore a fur-lined leather cloak, brown from sun and age. Each had a beard that spread across his chest. Each carried a silver axe at his hip, blade resting in a rawhide cradle. They were identical in most respects, but one stopped for a moment, turned his head, while the other walked two paces further before looking back.

“What is it?” the other asked.

“Quiet,” the first said.

The other waited, arms folded across his chest, until the first shrugged and resumed walking.

“Hear something?” the other asked.

“No,” the first said. “Only the wind. But I thought at first I’d heard a scream.”

“Must be another storm brewing.”

“Must be.”

✽✽✽

A SCREAM SOUNDED, and Sorrows started counting. It took him one breath to uncover the lamp on the bedside table. At four breaths, he was out of bed with his trousers on. Five breaths and he had his bow and quiver in hand. One breath to cross the room and open the door. He stopped counting on his seventh breath. He stood in the corridor and listened. Commotion to his right, above; raised voices; doors thrown open, slamming into walls; boots on stone. Silence to his left, below. He ran. He moved fast, heading downslope. A second scream sounded. Different from the first. The first had been all pain and suffering. Primal, animal-like, unrecognizable. The second was all fear. Intelligent, comprehending, afraid. And it