Wintercraft: Blackwatch Read Online Free Page A

neck. The bowman quickly readied another and Silas’s feet left the ground as he leapt from the cliff, launching himself far out into the air. The north wind streamed against his face and the sea beneath him bristled with rocks as he brought his arms up into a deathly dive and plummeted down into the waves.
     
    He plunged hard into the shallow water, buffeted by the tide, which sent him slamming back into the cliff. The rocks sliced his arms and the force of the ocean raked his body hard against the coast.
     
    The remaining Blackwatch looked down from the path, not daring to follow their target into the sea, but there was no sign of life in the water.
     
    Silas was gone.
     

2
     
    Judgement
     
     
     
     
     
    Kate Winters sat at the back of the empty meeting hall, staring at a pair of slim wooden boxes that stood side by side on a small semicircular stage at the front of the room. One was painted white, the other black, with a wire basket hooked on to either side, each box standing half as tall as a man.
     
    ‘There they are,’ she said quietly. ‘Those boxes are going to decide everything.’
     
    Edgar sat down, passed Kate half a sandwich and propped his feet on the arm of the chair beside her.
     
    ‘They’re just boxes,’ he said. ‘It’s the people who use them you’ve got to watch out for.’
     
    Kate looked back at the main door. The meeting hall was the largest chamber in the sanctuary of the Skilled’s underground cavern, and one of the oldest. Like most of the structures there most of it was built into the cavern wall, but the stone outer walls were curved slightly, making it look different from the rest. It was a communal space set aside for important meetings and events, and was left standing empty most of the time.
     
    Edgar leaned back and stared up at the vaulted ceiling, where paintings of all the Skilled who had lived and died there in the last twenty years were pinned into place. ‘I don’t know who thought that was a good idea,’ he said between bites. ‘This place gives me the creeps.’
     
    Kate did not look up. She could sense the pale ghosts of the people those faces had belonged to, caught within the veil between life and death, unable or unwilling to leave the living world behind. She tried to ignore them, but since the Night of Souls it had become difficult to block them out.
     
    ‘When do you think they’ll start to arrive?’ she asked.
     
    ‘We’ve got plenty of time,’ said Edgar. ‘You’d think they’d at least let you sit in on the decision. It’s your life. If anyone deserves to hear the verdict, it’s you.’
     
    ‘I don’t think we should have come here.’
     
    ‘Why? No one’s going to see us.’
     
    ‘No, I mean here . To this cavern. The Skilled don’t want me here. None of them do.’
     
    ‘They’re just nervous,’ said Edgar. ‘They’ll do what’s right in the end.’
     
    ‘I hope so,’ said Kate.
     
    Asking the Skilled for help had been more difficult than Kate had expected. From the moment she entered their cavern on the Night of Souls she had feared she was making a big mistake. Silas was right. The Skilled did not understand her, and they definitely did not want her among them.
     
    Kate had spent her first day in the cavern being questioned about the murder of Mina, the Skilled’s leader, who had died while Kate was in her care. They took her uncle Artemis away and would not let her speak to Edgar or his brother Tom for three days. No one believed that Silas Dane was the one who had killed Mina. They thought that Kate was behind it and it had taken a long time for Edgar and Artemis to convince them not to keep her locked away.
     
    During the past few weeks they had agreed to hold an informal trial, which seemed to consist of everyone except Kate giving their opinions of what had happened. They consulted the veil and argued with each other over the best course of action to take against her, but no one was interested in what