Deltora Quest #6: The Maze of the Beast Read Online Free PDF Page A

was icy. “You, I gather, did not even see today’s note. Yet they were able to give the word.”
    “It was not difficult to work out,” Lief said, stepping forward hastily. “The note said, ‘WHEN ENEMIES AT PASS, ORDERS NORMAL.’ The first letters of those words spell the password — ‘WEAPON.’”
    As Doom glared at him, he shrugged and threw caution to the winds. He was not going to be bullied like Dain. “I had a clue to the code, of course,” he said loudly. “I had already seen the label on Dain’s jar of honey. ‘Quality Brand.’ There, too, initials are used to disguise the truth. Why are you afraid for it to be known that you use Queen Bee honey?”
    Another loud murmur arose from the crowd. Doom barked an order and immediately Lief, Barda, and Jasmine were seized from behind by several pairs of strong hands. They struggled, but it was no use.
    “What are you doing?” Lief spluttered. “I meant no harm by my question! I was simply interested.”
    “Then you would have done better to hold your tongue,” said Doom, his eyes hard as stones. “You have stumbled on a secret we are sworn to protect. It is forbidden to trade with the Resistance. And Queen Bee honey is even more rare and valuable than Queen Bee cider. It has amazing healing powers. The lady risks much bysupplying it to us. She risks not only her own life, but the lives of her sons.”
    Now it was Lief’s turn to stare. The idea of the wild old woman they had met after their escape from the Plain of the Rats being a mother seemed very strange.
    “It is nothing to us if Queen Bee supplies you with honey,” growled Barda. “Who would we tell?”
    “Your Master, perhaps,” called Jinks, his small eyes gleaming with excitement. “Is that why you were allowed to escape from the palace, Brave Guard Barda? Had you sold yourself to the Shadow Lord even then?”
    Barda lunged forward in fury, but the hands that held him jerked him back.
    “Be silent, Jinks!” roared Doom. He gazed at Barda thoughtfully for a moment.
    “So,” he murmured. “You were a palace guard. Your real name is Barda. And where were you hiding for all those years, Barda — before you began travelling the countryside with your young companions?”
    “That is my affair,” said Barda, meeting his eyes squarely. “I choose to keep it to myself. As, I think, you choose to keep to yourself your own whereabouts in those early years, Doom.”
    “Your whereabouts — and your real name,” Jasmine muttered.
    Doom glanced at her quickly. His mouth tightened. He turned once again to Barda.
    “Were you in Tora?” he asked bluntly.
    At this, Dain, who had been slumped on the mattress with his head bowed, looked up eagerly.
    But Barda looked blank. “Tora?” he repeated. “What is this fascination with Tora, among you? No, I have never been to Tora in my life.”
    Doom abruptly turned away. “Take them to the testing room,” he snapped. “I will speak to them again when the three days have passed.”
    “Let us go!” Jasmine shouted, as they were dragged to the cavern door. “There is no reason to imprison us! You know that we are not Ols! You know it!”
    Doom lifted his chin. “We shall see,” he said.

    Locked in the small, brightly lit cave that Doom called “the testing room,” the three companions spent three weary days. A barred window was set into the heavy wooden door, and at all times a face stared through it, watching their every move.
    Their possessions were with them. Even their weapons had not been taken from them. Trays of food were pushed under the door, and they had plenty of water. But there was no privacy, no darkness, no peace.
    By the third day even Barda was desperate. Jasmine lay curled on a bunk, her hands over her face. Kree sat in a corner of the cell, his wings drooping. Lief paced in an agony of impatience, feeling time tick away.
    He cursed the day they had met Dain — then remembered that if it had not been for Dain, he, Barda,