Ghost in the Throne (Ghost Exile #7) Read Online Free PDF Page A

Kylon and Annarah. Morgant stood and wandered to the railing, gazing at the hills. He never did seem to go far from Annarah. He had spent one hundred and fifty years trying to keep his word to her. Perhaps he had decided to make sure she lived long enough to accomplish her task. 
    “How do you feel?” said Annarah.
    “Better than I should,” said Caina, “given that I was stabbed through the heart and asleep for a month.” 
    Annarah waited.
    Caina sighed. “Some headaches. Some vertigo, if I look at something with a sorcerous aura for too long.”
    Annarah nodded. “I thought that might happen. You underwent a great and wrenching change. You will have headaches for a while, though they will pass in time.” 
    “I hope so,” said Caina. 
    “Think of your mind as the map of a city,” said Annarah. “Some of the streets in the map of your mind have been rewritten. It takes time to adjust. Headaches are normal in a valikarion during that time.”
    “What if I am hearing voices?” said Caina. 
    “Oh, nothing,” said Morgant. “It just means you’ve gone mad, that’s all. Happens all the time.” 
    Annarah sighed and gave the gaunt assassin a long-suffering look. Morgant only smirked and looked back at the hills. 
    “Do you ever want to punch him?” said Caina.
    “I am a loremaster of Iramis,” said Annarah, “and the Words of Lore are only to be used for knowledge and healing and defense.”
    “That doesn’t answer the question,” said Caina. 
    “No,” said Annarah. “But there are more important matters. You are hearing voices?”
    “Just once,” said Caina. “I couldn’t recognize it. It said to beware the fire.”
    “Sound advice,” said Morgant from the railing. 
    “Did you recognize the voice?” said Annarah. 
    “No,” said Caina. “I don’t think it was Samnirdamnus, if that’s what you mean.” The djinni had appeared to her and Kylon and Morgant, more than once, playing some game of his own.
    Annarah nodded. “Then I fear you shall simply have to be vigilant, and wait to see if this voice was real or a product of your own mind.” She hesitated. “It…is possible you hallucinated the voice. You were mortally wounded, and your blood was full of Kharnaces’ poison. The Elixir Restorata strengthened the poison, and would have slain you had Lord Kylon not intervened.” The loremaster sighed. “I have never seen such a combination before…”
    “So you can’t predict what the long-term effects might be,” said Caina.
    “I fear so,” said Annarah.
    Caina nodded. “So be it, then. I will be vigilant.”
    She looked at the headman’s hall, at the stone walls and the wooden roof, at all the shadows and corners.
    All the places where Kalgri could hide, waiting to finish what she had started with Caina.
    Yes, it would not be hard to remain vigilant. Not at all. 

Chapter 2: Long Games
     
    Kylon of House Kardamnos awoke in the middle of the night and could not get back to sleep. 
    He ought to have been tired enough to sleep. Most of the day had been spent in preparation for tomorrow’s departure. Then he had returned to Caina’s room and kissed her, and one thing had led to another. 
    If nothing else, that should have worn him out enough to sleep.
    Instead grim thoughts chased themselves through his mind. 
    He looked at Caina. She lay curled on her side next to him, her eyes closed, her breathing slow and steady. The hard edge often in her expression had vanished, and she looked peaceful. He touched her shoulder, and her emotions flickered through his arcane senses. They were quiet and subdued, the random flickers produced by dreams. 
    Kylon leaned against his pillow, staring at the ceiling.
    He wasn’t sure what to make of his own churning emotions. 
    There had been women long before he had ever met Caina. After Marsis, after he became the High Seat of House Kardamnos, he had realized he needed to marry and father an heir, and Thalastre had been a suitable