Book Of War – John Peel (1)

Dafyd spat. “To allow a woman to fight like a man. It’s disgusting.” “She’s saved my life more than once,” Score an- swered. “As far as I’m concerned, she can do whatev- er she likes, and ’ll back her up, gladly.” Pixel looked uncomfortable. “I really don’t think you’re helping matters, Score,” he said. He turned to Lord Votrin. “Your daughter is our friend, sir, and we will help her to help you as much as we can.”

“What can the two of you do?” Lord Votrin asked. “You’re both too scrawny to be fighters, and even if you were great warriors, two more on my walls won’t hold off the attackers for very long.” “We’re not soldiers, true enough,” Pixel agreed. “But we have other, more valuable skills.” “At this moment,” Dafyd replied, “we don’t need other skills. We need swords, thousands of them.” “Pardon me,” Pixel said gently, “but you honestly don’t know what you really need. The three—four,” he added hastily, glancing at Jenna and blushing, “of us can do more than a small army could, once we know what needs doing.”

Lord Votrin growled, and turned to Helaine. “You chose a poor time to leave, daughter,” he said. “And an even poorer one to return. And, it seems, you asso- ciate with a very poor group of friends. A peasant and two outspoken and foolish young men. If these are the people you give your friendship to, then | truly despair of you.”

Score looked at Helaine. “I know he’s your father, but can I just whomp him once? He really needs some of that arrogance knocked out of him, the old wind- bag.” Jenna felt a lot closer to Score when he said that. She had always despised the nobles for the treatment of the common people; now she was amazed to dis- cover that they treated their own just as badly.

She al- most felt sorry for Helaine, who was clearly trying to get along with her father and brother, and failing mis- erably. Lord Votrin glared at Score. “You are a guest in my home,” he said coldly, “and for that I make some al- lowances. And you’re the friend of my foolish daugh- ter, so 1 make more. But there is a limit to my benev- olence.”

used his right hind foot to scratch just be- hind his red, furry ear. After a moment, the itch subsided and he felt comfort- able enough to start a good, long nap, which he so richly deserved. “You lazy creature,” Shanara said, sweeping into the room with her usual hateful energy and liveliness. “You’re not thinking of sleeping again, are you?” “lm tired,” Blink protested. “I’ve had a very busy morning.”

“You only ate breakfast.” “Like I said, I’ve had a very busy morning.” Shanara eyed him in her usual fashion—a long, hard look that promised lots and lots of work. “I just hope I never meet a lazier, greedier creature than you in my life,” she muttered. “You’d try the patience of a saint.” “You’re not a saint,” Blink replied. “If anything, you’re the exact opposite.”

Shanara smiled sweetly, and tossed her long, blue hair over her shoulder. Like most humans, she was very vain about her appearance. Unlike most humans, her appearance changed whenever she wished it. Shanara was a very powerful magician, who special- ized in illusions. She never let any other human being see her as she really was. In fact, even though Blink had been with her for several years, even he wasn’t certain he knew what she really looked like.

And he wondered if, after all these years of altering her own looks, whether Shanara knew what she was under- neath all that illusion. Not that it really mattered; Blink could always tell what Shanara was. . . She was the one who made him work while all he wanted to do was to sleep. “What can be so important?” he asked her, plain- tively. “There’s no impending crisis that I know of.”

“You don’t know much, and that’s a fact,” Shanara scoffed. “I know the values of beauty sleep,” he said, hinting hard, but it had no effect on her. Some days she could be so cruel. “This is for Score, Helaine, and Pixel,” she in- formed him. “IT thought they were still resting,” he complained. “Those three?” Shanara laughed. “I sometimes think they don’t know how to rest.”

“T could teach them,” Blink offered. “I’m an expert.” “That’s true, but it’s a useless talent.” The magician looked around her laboratory. It was filled with po- tions, powders, jars, flasks, books, papers, strange ap- paratus, and dust. She wasn’t a particularly tidy per- son. It was one of her virtues, Blink thought. He hated people who bustled around, cleaning up and disturb- ing him. “Helaine may need to go back to Ordin,” Shanara said. Blink looked at Shanara, even though he could barely keep his eyes open.

“I thought she’d given up that place for good,” he said. “And I can’t blame her. All that fighting! It sounds most exhausting.” “Breathing sounds exhausting to you,” Shanara mut- tered.

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

Book Information

• Unique ID: 3bc56f20cc8d362f
• File Extension: .pdf
• File Size: 8,653,575 bytes (8.253 MB)
• Title: –
• Author: Unknown
• Pages: 263
• Language: English (en)

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• Estimated Reading Time: 247.47 minutes
• Total Words: 49,493
• Total Characters: 278,623
• Average Words per Page: 188.19
• Average Characters per Page: 1059.4

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