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

He found her standing with her back against the wall opposite the door to the examination room. She was tense, rigid. The yellow of her eyes was lost in the whites. Her mouth was open in a silent scream, lips moving, jaw working, breath frozen in her chest. Sorrows kept running. A figure appeared. Sorrows stopped ten paces away. A half-born male, naked, body torn apart, guts hanging, dragging on the floor. He stepped toward Brochand.

Sorrows didn’t know how many doors he’d passed, how many steps he’d taken since he'd left his room. He didn’t think about breathing or blinking or the beating of his heart. Those things were either instinct or insignificant. They didn’t require thought. They just needed to be done. He didn’t know when he’d strung the bow. Didn’t remember nocking an arrow. Didn’t think about drawing back, taking aim. Instinct. The half-born crouched, his legs tensed, he leapt. Sorrows didn’t blink, didn’t breathe, didn’t think. The bow moved a sliver forward, leading. He released. The string snapped and the arrow hissed. It hit the half-born behind the eyes with a heavy, wet thud. The half-born crumpled to the floor at Brochand’s feet. Sorrows ran. Reached Brochand as she fainted, caught her with his left arm, holding the bow in his right hand. He laid her down on the floor, turned to the half-born.

He expected to see tentacles. Expected to see the ribbons of flesh fluttering like grass in the breeze. His hand was on the Grimstone, prepared. But nothing happened. No thunder, no crackling of light and heat as the astral and physical planes diverged. The dead half-born was just that: a dead half-born. His body was covered in dozens of deep, red cuts the width of a thumb. Sorrows had fought enough to know a dagger wound when he saw one. Or thirty. He rolled the body over. Brown eyes, ragged brown hair. Twitching fingers.

Twitching fingers were wrong. Unexpected. Sorrows stared, was still staring when the half-born’s hand shot forward, grabbed his tunic, pulled. The body left the floor, drew close, whispered three words. Sorrows shook off his surprise, pushed the half-born away, scrambled to his feet. Fingers stopped twitching. The body lay still. Sorrows swallowed, slowly lowered his bow. Didn’t remember nocking an arrow, didn’t remember drawing it back. Instinct. He glanced at Brochand, the body, the open door.

A smear of blood and gore led back into the examination room but was steadily fading. The smell of ginger and lemon was heavy in the air, overpowering whatever magic was in the corridor. Sorrows left Brochand, followed the trail in and found Utuur behind a table, dead in a bad way. White tunic spattered with blood, forehead caved in. Chunks of face missing, jaw torn and hanging, pool of blood receding beneath his wrists. No hands, no clean cuts. Like two halves of a loaf torn apart. The first scream, primal, animal-like. Pain and suffering.

“Utuur?” Oray asked behind Sorrows.

“Dead,” Sorrows said.

“Shun it,” Davrosh said.

“Seph?” Oray asked.

Sorrows shook his head and turned around to see Oray and Davrosh step into the room, careful to avoid the path of blood from the half-born to Utuur.

“Not a Seph,” Sorrows said. “Looks more like something a Cursed would do, except for all the blood.”

“I found that half-born in the Quarry two days ago,” Oray said. “He was brought in for examination.”

Sorrows nodded. “They’d opened his chest.”

“How’s a half-born do all this after he’s dead?” Davrosh asked. “And if he was dead already, why’d your arrow stop him?”

“It’s the bow,” Oray said. “With the soul.”

Sorrows nodded. “Doesn’t answer your first question. We’ll need to talk to Brochand.”

“She’s going to need a day or two, maybe more,” Oray said.

Sorrows said nothing. He understood. He knew what shock could do to a person. Knew it had a tendency to linger and creep. Knew how it haunted and how it never truly disappeared. Knew you just learned to live with it in time.

“She’s lucky you were here,” Davrosh said. “You saved her life.”

“Right,” Sorrows said. He glanced at Utuur, wondered what Brochand had seen. “Lucky her.”

He turned, walked past Oray and Davrosh.

“You leaving?” Oray asked.

“I’ve seen enough,” Sorrows said. “Going back to bed.”

“Just like that?” Davrosh asked. “How can you sleep after seeing something like this?”

He was almost out the door. He turned. Oray was studying Utuur, Davrosh was staring at him. He shrugged, then left.

“It’s all I ever see,” he said to no one in particular.

The stone was cold beneath his feet. His nostrils burned from the smell of restoration magic. He ignored the glances of the mage guards crowding the corridor, pushed his way through, opened doors on his left after a while. Found his room after four or five tries. He unstrung his bow, set it in a corner, stripped naked, pulled the tapestry off his wall, wiped the sweat off his body, cleaned the blood between his toes. He climbed into bed, covered the lamp, stared into darkness, waited for sleep to take hold of him. All the while, the half-born’s whisper echoed in his mind.

Where were you?

Chapter 35

THE BLADE HUNGERS or thirsts or lusts. Whatever it is a soul feels toward a body. It is powerful, compelling, and insatiable. It pulls you from your dreams; it forces you out into the night. You’d only thought to try the blade once, to confirm its power, to gauge its potential. You might not be patient, but even you know better than to draw unwanted attention. Too much is at stake. You can’t have the wrong people asking the right questions. Or so you thought, at first.

But then the goblin came to you, alone. So weak, so easy to overwhelm. And the blade did its work. You hid the body better than the first. The half-born was a mistake from tip to hilt. Your impatience got the better of you. The goblin was an improvement. You were thorough. You covered your tracks. You can’t leave another body