Thief With No Shadow Read Online Free Page B

He didn’t need to be told what the salamander meant. It was legend. It was horror.
    Bastian trembled. For Liana. Fear knotted in his belly. There was perspiration on his skin. His pulse beat fast and loud in his ears. “No,” he said hoarsely. “I...I can’t.”
    The salamander shrugged sinuously. “Then the necklasss isss oursss.” It turned away, into the hot shadows of the den.
    “Please.” Bastian swallowed his pride and begged, holding his hands out to the creature. “I must have it. I need it to lift a curse.”
    The salamander looked back over its shoulder. It blinked burning eyes at him, uncaring, and closed the door.

 
     

     
    CHAPTER FIVE
     
     
    A CURSE. M ELKE clenched one hand in Hantje’s matted hair. What had she done to this man and his family?
    She’d thought the harm was only to herself. She had stolen, had crossed a line burned in her soul that she’d sworn never to breach, had become the creature she never wanted to be. Wraith. Thief.
    If her actions ruined this man, if anyone died because of her...
    She felt for Hantje’s pulse. Live. Let the sacrifice be worth it.
    The man stepped close to her. Melke tensed, her head bent.
    “He’s as good as dead.”
    She knew it from the way Hantje’s pulse faltered beneath her fingertips. She shook her head. Her grief was too huge, her shame too overwhelming, to admit he was right.
    “Yes!” The man gripped the nape of her neck, jerking her head sharply back, forcing her to meet his gaze.
    Melke struggled not to flinch from him. His face was as hard and brutal as those of the mercenaries she’d seen in the northern ports. He wanted to hurt her. It showed in the twist of his mouth and the tight furrows that bracketed it, in the flaring of his nostrils.
    “I’ll give you his life in return for the necklace.” She heard hatred in his voice, and she heard truth.
    “How?”
    “A healer.”
    She stared at him. A healer. A chance for Hantje to live.
    What was her brother’s life worth? Her own death? Hantje had tried and failed. How could she hope to succeed?
    Melke spoke the truth carefully, “The salamanders...I don’t think it’s possible to steal from them. Not even a wraith can do it.”
    The man’s fingers pinched tighter at the nape of her neck. “If you want him to live, you will do it!”
    “My brother tried,” she said, her voice thin and slightly breathless. Could he hear her pain? “You see the result.”
    Breath hissed between the man’s teeth. He released her abruptly. His face contorted in loathing. “Another wraith.” He spat at the ground by Hantje’s feet. “You have destroyed us because of a stinking, thieving piece of scum .”
    His hands clenched into fists. Fury pulled his lips back from his teeth. She saw in his eyes that he trembled on the brink of violence. He wanted to injure her as she had injured him.
    I am sorry , she wanted to say, but the sheer inadequacy of the words gagged her. No apology she could make would be sufficient. She turned her face away from his rage. I did not mean to harm you. It was not my intention.
    She touched light fingers to Hantje’s hair. How long before he died? How many minutes, hours, before she was alone?
    “If my sister dies, I will kill you,” the man said. Emotion was thick in his voice.
    If someone dies because of me, I will not want to live.
    She laid her fingers on Hantje’s skin, bloodied and bruised and burned. How precious life was. How fragile. How easily destroyed.
    If Hantje died, if this man’s sister died...
    “I will try to do it,” she whispered.
    The man said nothing. She turned her head and looked up at him, tall and hard-faced. The hound stood, large and black, at his side.
    “I will try,” she said again. Better to die than to live without Hantje, to live with someone else’s blood on her hands. “Take us to the healer. I will do my best to recover the necklace.”
    “Your best.” His mouth twisted into a sneer. “And what is that worth,