Asunder: A Gathering of Chaos by Cameron Hopkin (children's ebooks free online .txt) 📕

“What?!” she cried, eyes wide.

“You keep saying what,” he noted, sawing awkwardly at the chandelier’s anchor rope. “I’m pretty sure I spoke clearly. Really, though: hold tight.”

The senior guard noticed what he was doing immediately. “Out of the way below!” he bellowed to his companions. “Downstairs, go! Come on, move!”

The rope parted under Kest’s hands, and there was an awful, silent moment of weightlessness as they fell. He let the mace go and held on to the cross brace as tightly as he could. I hope I haven’t just killed us. And then the chandelier crashed down with a sound like thunder.

The wooden beam beneath him drove hard into his stomach, bruising his hip bones painfully and driving the air out of him in a grunt. His arms were jerked backwards in their sockets as his tight grip secured his upper body from the crash. He heard a thump and a cry amid the crackling sound of crumbling vidrin and his thoughts went immediately to Nira. She didn’t have nearly the grip he did – is she all right?

She was on his dark side, forcing him to twist up and around to bring her into view. The movement made the circular beam grind painfully into his hips, and he shifted away to ease the pressure. Nira was flat on her back, eyes wide and holding still. She was covered in vidrin shards from head to toe, and glowing muck from the broken pods was spreading all around her. “I’ll get you,” he groaned. “Stay there.” Vidrin was thin, fragile stuff – the Weavers made it from hardened sap, Renna said – and the shards could slice through skin if you weren’t careful. He was more worried about the ooze, though. He’d heard that some kinds could be poisonous.

He extricated himself from his perch, landing beside her with a crunching splat. She flinched as yellow, shining stuff splashed across her torso. “Close your eyes,” he suggested. “I’m going to pull you up. Can you move?” She gave a terse nod, and he took both her hands and pulled her quickly to her feet. They stood in an open cage beneath the circular tiers of the fallen structure. He brushed away what vidrin he could see what a careful hand, trying not to be inappropriate. It wasn’t easy, given the skimpiness of the costume. After a few awkward brushes at her chest, he gave up and retrieved his stolen mace.

They heard a shout from down the central hallway. “Time to go,” muttered Nira. They climbed out of the cage of the chandelier, and Kest bolted for the door. “Not that way,” she cried. “There will be more of them out front.”

He halted. Perhaps the ruckus had pulled the gate guards from their posts, but perhaps was a poor measure to bet their survival on. They had been lucky so far, but charging the two armed gate guards across twenty meters of clear space when they were already alert pushed chance past the breaking point. “Where?” he asked.

She seemed dumbfounded that he’d asked her. “Uhh... this way!” she called, breaking for the hallway along the perimeter of the house that they had used to get up to the third floor when they had first come in. That seemed like a lifetime ago. “I saw a doorway to outside earlier.”

They pelted down the hallway, shouts and the pounding of feet seeming to come at them from all directions. The major domo of the house stood in the doorway of a room adjoining the hall, and his eyes widened as they came into view. “They’re here!” the old man screeched. “Captain!”

Nira threw an elbow into the prissy fellow’s face as they raced past, and he collapsed with a groan. She barked a satisfied laugh and rubbed at her forearm but didn’t slow her pace.

“There!” she cried, pointing ahead. They had come to the back corner of the huge mansion. Hidden in the shadow of the stairs they had taken up earlier stood a plain, unmarked door in the outer stone wall. Perfect. He reached it first, fumbling at the latch. He glanced to the side and saw the guard captain and several of his fellows racing toward them from the perpendicular hallway. He lifted the wooden handle and pushed. It was locked.

The guards were only thirty meters away, maybe. Nira pushed against his back urgently. “Go, go!” Planting his feet, Kest rammed his shoulder against the door. It was a flimsy thing, but it held, and his shoulder ached. He hit it again, then again. Ten meters away. Nira threw herself against him as he struck the door with his shoulder a fourth time, and the outer latch gave way with a crack, sending them tumbling into the afternoon. He pitched forward, nearly falling, and used his hands against the courtyard cobblestones to push himself back up and keep running. Nira was scrambling to stay upright beside him.

They were in the courtyard adjoining the stables, and workers in smocks and heavy gloves froze in surprise as guards spilled into their space with weapons out and voices raised. I can make this work, Kest thought in a panic. Can I make this work? Six zephyrs stood stamping their paws, geared up in their traces and attached to a fancy carriage painted in glossy reds and blacks. Kest had never seen a zephyr before coming to the Mainland, but they were the primary beast of burden and transportation here. They were ill-tempered things, but their six strong legs and broad backs made them ideal for saddling and hitching to wheeled conveyances. One simply had to be careful to keep them well-fed and firmly tethered at night, or else one was likely to wake up missing a finger or two.

Right now, sharp teeth or not, these animals looked like a way out to Kest. His stomach lurched as he looked at them – he’d felt an