Sentinelspire Read Online Free

nearly all the soil, leaving a sheer wall of slick rock sloping some twenty feet down. The drum of the water as it hit told Berun the pond below was likely deep. The pool drained into the open end of the ravine that broke the hillside.
    Standing on the dozen or so feet of opposite shore, his back to the rock wall, was a man. Not one of the locals, by his looks. His round eyes and the paleness of his skin painted him a westerner. His clothes were ragged and torn. His hands and face bore many tiny scratches—probably from scrabbling through the thick brush—and blood smeared a good portion of his skin. In trembling hands he held a spear, and he kept the steel point low, between him and the massive steppe tiger.
    She was a beautiful beast. Her tawny coat was streaked by dusky stripes that faded into a uniform gold along her underbelly. Familiarity hit Berun, a feeling like fear. The fine lines of red ochre painted in intricate designs along the top of her head and down each flank gave her away.
    “Taaki,” Berun whispered. His throat caught at the noise, but he remembered that the sound of the waterfall would probably drown out normal speech. He’d have to shout to be heard down there.
    The steppe tiger crouched, her muscles taut and prepared to spring, kept at bay only by that sharp steel barb.
    Berun swallowed, considering. If Taaki was here …
    Maybe she was alone now. Maybe that explained why she was roaming the Amber Steppes and the outer Shalhoond, preying on sheep and shepherds. Maybe—
    No. That might have been a hope had Berun not found the boot print with the letters scratched into the soil. Those letters—
Kheil
—meant any such hope was in vain.
    He looked at his arrow, at the tiny bit of blue hemlock fiber twined through the steel tip. He knew he’d have to hit the tiger with three such arrows to take her down. Unless he could get one shaft into her heart, and from this vantage point, that was almost impossible, even for him. If he hit her from here, the poison would take time to work through her body. It would burn, set her heart to racing, and that would only drive her mad with fear and pain. Steel-tipped spears and poisoned arrows would not be able to stop her then. The blue hemlock would kill her, yes, but not before she killed the man with the spear and then turned to attack Berun.
    Berun took his hand off his arrow, nocked tightly against the bowstring, and reached up to the lizard on his shoulder. “Time to go to work, Perch,” he said.
    The lizard climbed onto the back of his hand and hissed, his jaws distending as he saw the tiger below.
    Berun held out his arm, pointing the lizard at the tiger, and said,
“Drassit. Toch gan neth!”
And through their bond—
Strike and lead her away. Strike-strike!
    The lizard leaped and spread his limbs, the thick membrane between his hind and forelegs and the first third of his tail spreading to catch the air. Perch couldn’t fly like a bird, but he could glide like some of the squirrels of the Yuirwood, and his light frame helped him to ride the air with a feral grace. He glided almost to the opposite wall of the ravine before turning in a tight spiral, then turned again before the waterfall could take him. Two thirds of the way down, the lizard aimed for the tiger’s head and folded his legs. The winglike membranes collapsed and the lizard’s claws pointed down, sharp as needles.
    Perch hit the tiger just where the base of her skull met neck and shoulders, where the fur was thick but the skin soft.The tiger let loose a teeth-rattling roar and leaped backward. Berun knew how thick the fur was there, and the tiger was startled, not hurt. As she shook her head to dislodge the lizard, Perch leaped, using the tiger’s own momentum to propel him onto the rocks. The tiger resumed her crouch, her fangs bared, her gaze flitting between the spearman and the lizard.
    Perch stood on a rock, balancing on the base of his tail, and hissed at the tiger. Enraged, the