Dark Lord's Wedding Read Online Free PDF Page B

with the flawed woman and young man who had brought the fennec. They couldn’t have sensed the tracker enchantment. It hadn’t been in his earring stud. This gem she started to enchant to bring the fox back to health.
    She lifted the fennec so his mildewed nose was level with hers. “Your nose will soon be black again. Look at my hair. It’ll be silver forever.” Hiresha tilted her head. The fox batted at one of her grey locks. He started chewing on the strands.
    Tethiel clamped a possessive hand on the shoulders of the flawed woman and the young man. “Celaise and Jerani told me the fox lived up to his name. The Golden Scoundrel.”
    The young man, Jerani said, “Took three days to find him again after one escape.”
    “He’s most intelligent,” Hiresha said.
    “More than that, he’s sacred,” Tethiel said to Jerani. “An incarnation of a god.”
    “There’s no evidence to support his divinity,” Hiresha said. “Other than his perfection.”
    Tethiel nodded back to the sinkhole. “She need not fear stealing from one god when she carries around another.”
    The fox yawned wide enough to inspire worship. Her enchantment had suppressed his fever. He would be able to rest.
    “A tragedy we can no longer share dreams,” Hiresha said. She squeezed the fox once more, kissed him between the ears, and then handed the fox back to Jerani. “Guard him with your life.”
    He held the fox at arms’ length. “We thought you—”
    “Bring him to my banyan stronghold at midnight.” Hiresha hopped into the air and Attracted her boots on. Her robe swirled around her, concealing the brilliance of her dress. Her paragon diamonds whirled around her upraised hand. She glanced back to the tribesman and the Feaster woman. “A man may come asking for me.”
    Jerani stopped cringing at the fox to look up. “What?”
    “He likely will have an overgrowth of tattoos.” Hiresha had to leave this instant. “He’ll be dangerous. Neither of you should try to fight him.”
    The young man exchanged a look of unease with the Feaster woman.
    Hiresha dipped down to Attract a cave-slime stain from Tethiel’s coat and then launched herself into the sky. The rain parted from her. The forest canopy beneath her was a swaying sea of rushing green.
    She kicked off a tree trunk for greater speed. Parrots squawked in an outrage of blue and orange.
    One feathered creature was less innocent. It had the shrunken face of a human. She had chanced upon one of the Dominion’s hexed abominations. A man they had transformed into a monster. The winged warrior turned to her the moment she darted around a swaying branch.
    He would have glimpsed her, yet he might not believe his eyes. A woman flew over the jungle without even one feather. If he had spotted the spinning arcs of her jewels and known them, that would ruin her.
    He could not know. He couldn’t guess. This land had no enchantresses. And there were no enchantresses like her.
    The winged warrior flew around the tree spire and into view. Hiresha dropped into the cover of the canopy. She careened around mossy branches, between woody vines, below flowering bromeliads. Even if the winged warrior couldn’t match her speed, he could follow her by the sound of surprised howler monkeys.
    She slingshotted herself higher into the rainforest mist. The condensation bit into her skin as she zoomed from wisp to wisp around the treetops. The necessity for evasion slowed her. She would be late. She could not be.
    The sun neared its zenith. That smeared blast of light in the clouds would strike her into slumber. She should find a place to rest in a treetop. She could secure herself and await her shift to her other facet in safety.
    Any jaguar could find her while she lay dead to the world, any honey hunter, any winged warrior. No, she had to reach her reliquary.
    She sprang over the village mining her amethysts. A glance told her they had unearthed a promising collection of material. Nahui wasn’t in