A Plague of Shadows Read Online Free PDF Page B

favorite ventures with her neighbor.
    “Why do you ask?” she questioned, her heart in her throat.
    “No reason, I thought I saw something yesterday,” he said, dismissing the notion with a wave of his hand. Or maybe he was swatting at a bug.
    Abagail had stopped where she stood, her thoughts racing far ahead of her. “What kind of something?”
    Rorick drew to a stop and turned back to her. He leaned against a tree and peered up through the canopy of leaves toward the blue sky. “Well, I can’t be sure, but I thought I saw a shadow, or something. It was in these woods, lurking behind trees, almost slinking.”
    Abagail didn’t know what spurred her. Before she could stop herself, she had turned and was racing back toward the house, Rorick’s voice calling out behind her, urging her to stop, wondering what she’d seen, but she kept running. She wasn’t trying to get away from Rorick, just trying to get away from the woods.
    It was one thing to think she’d seen a darkling, but it was something else completely to know someone else had seen it. And lurking in these very woods.
    Why would he come in here? Abagail wondered. That wasn’t hard to answer, Rorick was always going headlong into danger. Likely he thought he’d run into the darkling and he would best it. Stupid , Abagail thought. What does he think he is, a Light Guard? She scoffed.
    Branches slapped painfully at her arms and face, she made little attempt to keep them at bay, her attention diverted to the sudden swirl of dark clouds high above. A storm was blowing in out of nowhere, and she would have to make sure Hafaress’ Hearth was built up against a possible deluge.
    Fat drops of rain slapped her in the face, and in the distance came the warning rumble of thunder.
    “Abbie, wait!” Rorick yelled.
    Panting, Abagail drew to a halt.
    “What’s gotten into you?” he asked, his eyebrows knitting together. Thunder rumbled louder overhead, and the rain hit the canopy above heavier, trickling down onto them, plastering her short dark hair to her forehead, and standing out on Rorick’s beard in beads.
    “I saw it too,” she panted over the thunder. “I saw the darkling.”
    “Now?” He asked, glancing around them as if it would bound out of the trees behind them.
    “Yesterday,” she said. Her head spun, so much was happening: the dreams, the room, the butterfly, the bees, the darkling. She bent at the waist and threw up into the bushes. She hadn’t eaten yet, and for that she was grateful, all she produced was bile.
    Rorick grimaced and looked away. “But how could they be here?” he wondered once she wiped her mouth. “We are so far away from where the fire fell.”
    “That was ages ago,” Abagail said. “You don’t think the darkness would stay in one spot do you?”
    “But darklings are just the shadows of the evil people that died when the fires came,” Rorick said.
    “And evil spreads when the All Father turns his Sleeping Eye on the world,” Abagail pointed out.
    Rorick frowned. “What are we going to do?”
    “We need to get home. We need to build the fire up before the darkling comes back for us,” Abagail said. She crossed her arms tight over her chest and stared back toward her home. Through the trees she could see Hafaress’ Hearth burning strong.
    “What’s the matter?” Rorick asked, resting a hand on her shoulder. The rain poured down heavier.
    “I think the darkling has already visited my home,” she whispered. He could barely hear her over the thunder.
    Lightning flashed closer.
    “How, what makes you say that?” he asked.
    “Our bees are dying.” Abagail went on to tell him what she’d seen, what had happened with the bees. He grabbed her hand and looked her fingers over, inspecting her nails and her palm. She didn’t mind it when he did it. She didn’t pull her hand away like she had when her father had shown the same concern. Her posture relaxed at his nearness. Warmth spread through her as Rorick’s