Venture Unleashed (The Venture Books) Read Online Free Page B

which he rotated just so, pressing in just the right way to choke him.  
    “Time for lights out, kid.”  
    Venture cursed silently. Little sparkles of light appeared on the edges of his dimming vision. Then, darkness closed in on him.
    He was lying on his back when he came to. Starson gave him another swift shake. His eyes fluttered open. Starson sat down next to him, unlaced his gloves, and flexed his fingers. Venture lifted his dizzy head.  
    “Put your head back down, kid, or I’ll make sure you regret it.”
    This time Venture obeyed.
    “You know your name? Know where you are? All that stuff?”
    “Venture Delving. Champions.”
    “Good. You’re a tough kid, Venture Delving.” Starson’s brown eyes gleamed at him. “And you’re either stupid or you have the spirit of a champion. Which is it?”
    He knew it was a rhetorical question, but he answered anyway. “I’m not stupid.”
    “I’m going to go get you some ice. Try to stay out of trouble until I get back, all right?”
    Venture mumbled, “Right,” and wiped a bothersome drip of blood from his eye.

CHAPTER FOUR

    Someone was calling Venture, calling him out of a deep sleep.
    “Hey, Vent.” The voice was familiar, yet strangely shaky. Venture struggled to focus his eyes, focus his mind. He was lying on a strange bed, in a strange room. Stiff, but nice, clean. Definitely not his bunk.
    “Earnest?”
    Venture willed his eyes to open just a little wider. It was really him, perched on the edge of a plain wooden chair, leaning over him.
    “That’s right, Vent, I’m here.”
    “But—where?”
    “You’re still at Champions. You’re in the sick wing. You’ve been here for four days.”
    Venture recalled vague memories of lying there in the crisp bed, praying for the pain to go away. Then, hearing hushed voices around him speculating on his injuries, and praying that pain or no pain, he would just be allowed to live. People had called his name, asked him questions. He wasn’t sure whether he’d answered them or not.
    His ribs were broken. He recognized this particular brand of pain; they’d been broken before, when he was just an eleven-year-old kid, trying to keep himself and Jade alive. But that had been a brutal attack by a handful of ruffians on the road near the Fieldstone property. Not an unbalanced match with a cool-headed champion.
    “I tossed my trainer.” He coughed out the words. “Dasher Starson fought me. Choked me. Couldn’t get up. Thought I was okay. I don’t understand.” He hurt so bad, every breath was agony. His words came out in uneven, painful bursts. “Justice know? He’ll kill me, make me come home.”
    “Justice doesn’t know. Nobody back home knows.”
    Good. His brother and guardian, Justice, was the only family Venture had left, apart from Justice’s wife, Grace and their baby, Tory. Justice worried enough about Venture’s risky career choice. If he hadn’t been even more worried about the dangers of Venture’s closeness to Jade, his master’s daughter, he would never have consented to him training to be a prize fighter. Putting some distance between the two of them was the only reason Justice had let him come here.
    Venture put his hand to his chest, feeling for his pendant. It was there. Just as it had been when he’d said good-bye to Jade back in Twin Rivers. She’d placed her hand right there, over the emblem of the Faith. God be with you , she’d said. But he hadn’t had it on the night Parker and Fisher had dragged him to his punishment.
    Earnest noticed his confusion. “I found it with your things.” He shrugged sheepishly. “You were pretty bad off. I figured it couldn’t hurt.”
    Venture smiled. Earnest, of all people, had put it on him. As though it were a good luck charm, but still. He must’ve really been worried.
    “How’d you know to come?”
    “I didn’t. I came to see you about something else. When I got here they told me I could find you in the sick wing. And Dasher