Down a Lost Road Read Online Free PDF Page A

plenty.”
    I shifted my weight. I was hungry,
and thirstier than I’d ever been. But I didn’t want to be a
nuisance, so I only shook my head mutely. I glimpsed his expression
in the dim torchlight, and the way he watched me I knew he didn’t
believe me.
    “ Sleep then,” he said. “In
the morning it will be time.”
    Whatever that means . I ducked into
the tent and threw myself onto the furs, undeterred by the thick
animal smell. For a few moments I lay face down in a warm hollow in
the pile, the silvery fur coarse against my cheeks. When I almost
fell asleep like that, I rolled over and made my bed a little more
comfortable, then lay gazing at the sky through a hole in the dome.
After a moment I stared more intently at the eerie darkness,
disturbed. The sky spread calm and clear above me, an almost pale
midnight hue of blue-grey. A few tree fronds swayed in a gentle
breeze across the gap, blackest silhouettes against the sky, but
otherwise there were no buildings, no clouds, no city backscatter,
nothing to block the light of the stars. But the sky was empty.
    The realization jolted me wide awake. I
rolled off the pile of furs and ducked quietly out of the tent,
nearly tripping over something just outside the flap. Yatol. He was
just sitting there, cross-legged, watchful, torchlight flickering
on his face. It almost seemed like he was there on guard. Somehow
the thought didn’t comfort me.
    I gave myself a moment to study him. He sat
quietly, perfectly motionless – something I could never do. With
his dark cloak shrugged back over his shoulders, I could finally
see what he wore. A long cream tunic hung down to his knees, with a
high collar and loose half-sleeves, and a wide girdle of brown
leather that covered nearly half his lean torso. It almost seemed
like armor, like it could have been part of a leather cuirass
instead of a belt. He wore sandals – or at least they looked like
sandals until they reached his ankles, where they laced up his legs
around leather wrappings. Besides binding in the loose folds of his
dark pants, the leather wraps had a look that reminded me of
Damian’s hockey shin guards. Another piece of almost-armor.
    From what I’d seen of the other people here,
Yatol’s fashion sense placed him somewhere between the guards with
their brass-studded armor and the purple-robed elder. Interesting.
If I’d heard someone describe his clothing, I would have been
skeptical…but Yatol certainly wore it well. I blushed, realizing
that I’d been standing there staring at him for what must have been
a few solid minutes. But he didn’t seem to have noticed me. Finally
I dropped onto the ground beside him, and he started out of his
thoughts to glance at me.
    “ You should
sleep.”
    “ What about you? Don’t you
sleep?”
    “ I need little.”
    I frowned at his reticence. Part of me found
it ridiculously intriguing, but part found it plain annoying. He
was by far the strangest guy I had ever met – so young, but he had
the sort of quiet strength and self-assurance you’d expect in a
soldier. And that light in his eyes…he was hard as iron. I felt
like a complete child compared to him. No wonder he’d hardly given
me a second glance. He probably thought he had to baby-sit me or
something. Figured.
    We sat in silence a few moments, then he
unstoppered a leather sack and passed it to me.
    “ Drink.”
    “ Wha—” I began, but stopped
and lifted it to my mouth.
    “ It is water.”
    And I would have drunk it without him
telling me. I don’t know why – I just trusted him. Somehow I think
I had from the first moment I’d met him, for all I’d questioned
him. Trusting him felt instinctive.
    I tilted the waterskin back, letting the
warm pure liquid fill my parched mouth. The first mouthful turned
gritty from the sand coating my tongue. Before I could force myself
to swallow I gagged and spit it out into the shrubs with a
shuddering cough. My face burned with embarrassment. Did I really
just