Raveler: The Dark God Book 3 Read Online Free Page B

drink at the next stream, but they didn’t come to a stream. They came to a valley with a large meadow instead. One that stretched for hundreds of yards in all directions. This was another wurm field, a massive one, crisscrossed with worn trails.
    Talen immediately stopped. Harnock continued with River on his shoulders.
    “Hey,” Talen hissed.
    “Keep up,” Harnock growled.
    Talen followed him down to the edge of the meadow, then pitched his voice low. “What are we doing here?”
    “We’re losing our tail,” Harnock replied. Then he set River down and sniffed the air.
    “Och,” River said, putting her hands to the small of her back. “That’s a rough way to travel.”
    Harnock said, “If we’re quick, there’s a way through.”
    Talen thought back on his narrow escape from the previous wurm field. He thought of the creatures tearing into the dreadmen and their horses. He thought of their terrible speed. “I’m sure that’s what all the animals think.”
    “Where are our visitors?” Harnock asked.
    Talen had been resting his roamling in the crook of a tree. He sent it higher and looked down. A moment later, he saw Nashrud. “About a mile back.” The sickly orange skir were also closer, striking at something in another tree a few hundred yards away.
    “Perfect,” Harnock said.
    “You’re really sure we want to go in there?” Talen asked.
    Harnock said, “Sometimes I come out here to steal their eggs. Moon was very good at it. The woodikin think they’re a delicacy. Maybe later I can show you how. Take you wurm hunting myself.”
    Feed him to the wurms was more like it. “Actually,” Talen said, “I’m happy with chickens, potatoes—things that don’t try to drag you down and devour you in their holes.”
    Harnock just grinned. “You’re going to go to the other side and up that slope. When you get to the top, you’ll see a white ridge a short distance to the southwest. That’s the border of the Orange Slayer woodikin tribe. I’ll meet you there. Now follow me exactly.” He turned and moved into the tall grass.
    River grabbed a bowstave and one of the packs from Talen and followed Harnock into the grass.
    Talen imagined the wurms below, but knew he didn’t have a choice and walked into the meadow after her. After a bit of winding, they came to a fork in the wurm trail and found a hole big enough for a horse. Harnock motioned for them to wait while he walked a bit farther down the trail.
    All Talen could do was stare into the dark depths of the huge hole. He swore he saw something move down there and knew some beast was going to shoot forth at any second and grab them in its maw.
    Harnock listened, sniffed the air. Then he motioned them forward. Talen was more than happy to move away from that hole until he saw that Harnock had brought them to a nest of three more holes just as large. His heart began pumping. They were deep into the meadow now.
    Harnock leaned in close. “When I say run, you sprint with all the speed you can muster for the far side.”
    Talen and River nodded, and then Harnock moved forward, silent as a cat, and led them down a narrow path. A short distance later, he followed a branch to the left. And then they crisscrossed over another. How Harnock knew which forks and paths to take, Talen could not guess. About them the wind hissed through the belly-high grass. A wurm sounded down in one of the holes.
    Harnock led them past a disgusting mass of half-decomposed bones and fur. At first, Talen couldn’t figure out what it was, then realized it must be wurm excrement. Mixed in with the fur were teeth that looked like they came from a bear. He was still thinking on that when they came up on a hole that was making a popping sound.
    Harnock raised his hand for them to stop and motioned them to step back. They waited for a moment, and then Harnock led them in another direction. Not long after that, some distance down the meadow, a thin wurm shot up into the air, trying to