Duty Calls: The Reluctant War God Book 1 Read Online Free PDF

why he was smiling. I sensed the two men coming up behind me, but I was determined to play my part. I just wanted to make sure the lyre didn’t suffer any more.
    I dropped when they hit me on the head and I fell over the lyre. I quickly stored it away in a pocket of reality where they couldn’t get to it, and then I rolled on my back unconscious as far as they knew. Damn! I’d forgotten how much it hurt. I hoped they would be happy with just pummeling me, and not stick any swords into me while I was down. It had been a long time since I had exercised my deeper self-healing powers and I didn’t want to go through the hassle.
    “What? Now where in hell is that toy he was playing with? Damn it, who took it?” The sergeant was disgusted, but rapidly losing interest.
    “Toss him over there with the others. When he wakes up, we’ll have Captain Rosten question him.
    They threw me down and I would have broken a rib had I not been tougher than the normal mortal. I felt them place a leg iron on me and then walk away.
    Luckily, they had placed me in the shade. I took the opportunity to sleep, hoping when I woke I could convince this Rosten fellow not to make me endure the pain and inconvenience of torture.

 
     
     
     
    CHAPTER FIVE
     
    A kick in the ribs woke me up. It was mid-morning, and a guard with rotten teeth was taking an inordinate amount of pleasure in rousting us for inspection. Of course, he had no doubt been up at dawn and probably considered us slackers. He grasped me by the neck and forced me to stand. Then again, maybe he was just an asshole.
    I noticed the manacle on my ankle connected to a length of chain keeping all the prisoners linked together.
    All in all it had been a pleasant enough nap, the pain in my side had gone away and I actually got some good sleep. But, I had dreamt and my dreams are never pleasant.
    I had seen a war of long ago, and a fair-skinned, lithe-limbed, beautiful people whose name I couldn’t remember. They created art of unmatched beauty, paintings which saw into the heart of whatever subject they chose to represent. They were poets and dancers and singers. They lived a peaceful existence in harmony with their neighbors, but they did not give the gods their due.
    These people knew no gods. They cared for strangers, aiding those travelers who were sick or injured. They were great teachers and their ambassadors traveled throughout the lands teaching the secrets of astronomy and physics. But they did not bow to my family’s vanity.
    I watched as they died again. I watched as I led armies to slaughter them all down to the last wailing child. Their cities fell in flame and their art was destroyed, until nothing remained in the world showing they’d ever existed. The gods were pleased. I was a hero. I was my father’s son in those days.
    The guards led us away towards a large campaign tent—which I assumed belonged to Captain Rosten. I noticed the traffic along the road had slowed. Most of the refugees had made it to the temporary safety of the city.
    Guldon had placed their armies just outside the city to provide an initial defense, but based on what I had already seen, I knew it would be short lived. The Jegu would quickly overrun defenders and force them to fall back into the city itself. Then the siege would then begin.
    Siege warfare is a nasty business full of disease, starvation, and slow insanity. I saw the dread in the eyes of the soldiers we passed. They knew what was coming.
    But the city of Tarnon looked to be in good shape to mount a defense. Built upon a rocky hill, it sat majestically surrounded by a series of thick city walls and not so majestically by a sewage-filled moat. That made it difficult to tunnel underneath to sap the walls. The high ground also made it more difficult to mount a cavalry charge against the defenders.
    I could see the gatehouse was stout, with twin barrel towers to either side. There were both inner and outer doors and a goodly number of