Book of Kinsey: Dark Fate (The Dark Fate Chronicles 2) Read Online Free Page B

oval of granite from her pocket and was running a thumb across its polished surface as her eyes focused somewhere in the distance. Sargon recognized the bit of stone as a totem that many of his people used as a focus when they prayed to Dagda, seeking his guidance on matters both large and small. Dagda was a god of permanence, strength, and bedrock. Granite made an excellent choice for an icon to represent him.
    Seeming to come to a decision suddenly, she stood, slipped the stone back into her pocket, and then knelt before Sargon, taking one of his hands in both of her own. She looked up into his eyes with the firelight painting deep amber into her golden locks and said, “Ya be havin’ ma oath. I’ll not be sayin’ a word about the king’s heir until ya deem it the right time.”
    One by one, each of Sargon’s companions joined her, kneeling before him and giving their oaths. As hope swelled anew in his chest, Sargon looked at the sleeping, shadowed form of Kinsey and smiled.
     

 
     
     
     
     
    K INSEY blinked when the sun broke through the clouds to shine on his face. When he tried to raise an arm to shield his eyes from the bright rays, he found that both his arms were pinned to his sides. Sweat broke from his forehead as his heart began to race. He didn’t know where he was, who was holding him, or how he had gotten here, wherever here was, but he was damned if he was going to be held prisoner without a fight.
    Still squinting against the light, Kinsey flexed his stiff muscles until his arms burst from the bindings, and he rolled to one side to escape the makeshift stretcher. Whatever had befallen him had robbed him of his coordination. The brief respite his outstretched hands afforded ended in a mouthful of loamy soil.
    Kinsey spat, clearing his mouth as he scrambled to his feet and set off in a lumbering run, willing his wobbly legs to stay under him. He plunged through the grasslands that stretched for miles in every direction.
    A confused babble erupted from behind him as a single voice that was vaguely familiar rose above the rest in a languid yet commanding pitch. “Know where yer runnin’ ta, do ya?”
    Kinsey knew that voice. Even as his reluctant joints and muscles began to find the flow and rhythm of use, he came to a juddering halt. When he turned to regard the speaker, he found an old dwarf sitting astride a tan-and-white pony that had already dropped its head to graze on the grasses that were close by on either side of the path. The dwarf’s gray beard shone silver in the bright sunlight, and his dark eyes were crinkled in good-natured humor.
    Sargon, Kinsey’s memory supplied as the dwarf tucked an amber-and-black pipe back into one corner of his mouth in an affectation that Kinsey already associated with this odd little man. The pleasant expression on Sargon’s face grew to an outright smile as Kinsey began making his way back to the caravan.
    Eight other dwarves were arrayed along the path, stretching to either side of the old dwarf. They had all been situated on ponies similar to the one Sargon rode. Tan-and-white heads were bent to the tall grass on all sides as the horses took advantage of Kinsey’s disruption. The riders all watched him closely, patiently waiting. The expressions on their faces were subtly different than he remembered from the last time he had laid eyes on them.
    The last memory he had of them—the last memory he had at all—was in the dungeons of Waterfall Citadel, where he had been imprisoned on some ridiculous charge involving his supposed complicity in the kidnapping of Princess Sacha Moridin. There was precious little hope for the dwarven entourage, foreigners, and companions of a man that was supposedly responsible for creating a set of tensions that could have led two nations to the brink of war instead of bountiful alliance. No, the hope he saw on the bearded faces was new.
    Dak, his loyal horse, stood amongst the ponies, dwarfing them all. The rust-colored