Reap the Wind Read Online Free PDF Page B

basically anything and everything in his path, making his frantic face and waving arms kind of superfluous.
    Yes, I knew he was in trouble.
    But then, so were we.
    Because the makeshift searchlight was now chasing us, flowing along the sides of the canal like bright water. The portal looked like an oval of colored film imposed over the black-and-white landscape around us, some avant-garde cinematography about youth and age. Behind us, skeletal trees became green, snow melted into leaf-strewn streets, people strolled along the shore enjoying a bright spring day.
    And then stopped to stare through the portal at us, including one guy who ran into a tree.
    I stared back as time boiled along a line just behind us, bisecting day and night. And summer and winter. And the bottom of our boat, sending me scrambling frantically into the front and Pritkin cursing and somehow increasing our speed.
    It worked, sort of. We jumped ahead, all but flying now, with a sound like the crack of a mighty whip. Or, I realized a second later, like half a boat splintering and breaking and falling away.
    I stared behind us through my wildly flying hair as what had been the back of our boat was swallowed by that other day, bobbing and listing and then sinking in bright spring sunshine. And realized that we weren’t going to be any better off soon. Half a boat doesn’t float well, and only our crazy speed was keeping us momentarily above water.
    I looked around frantically, trying to spot Rosier, planning to shift us onto his vessel, which at least was still in one piece. But it was dark ahead, even without the glow from behind obscuring my vision. And the sleety half rain, half snow was coming down harder now, making it almost impossible to—
    And then Rosier made it easy by crashing headlong into the back of a barge.
    It sent him hurtling out of his craft and through the air, and I grabbed Pritkin and shifted even before he landed. We ended up right beside him, which would have been impressive—if I’d remembered to leave our broken craft behind. But we were still clinging to the sides, so our boat had come, too, and for a second there, it was skipping along the long, unladen surface of the barge, right beside a falling, cursing, and rolling demon lord. And then Pritkin reached out and grabbed his father. And I shifted us again, about a second before we would have plowed into the back of the captain’s cabin.
    So we plowed into one of the small bridges that spanned the canals instead.
    That actually wouldn’t have been so bad, since our little half craft had managed to land on top. But then we kept right on going. I screamed and grabbed Pritkin, who was clutching Rosier in a death grip but manfully keeping silent. Unlike the elegant demon lord, who was yelling right along with me as our momentum carried us across the narrow span, which was little more than a brick arch sans railings.
    And off the other side.
    And into a patch of bright sunlight and the front of a larger boat being guided along by a still-dripping Pythia.
    “Well, hello,” she said, smiling at me evilly, as I looked up from a pile of demon.
    “Well, good-bye,” I gasped, and kicked her into the canal.
    Our tiny boat shuddered and shook as Pritkin got control of it again. And then abruptly detached itself from the Pythia’s stately barge. And skittered off down the canal, through the early-morning sunlight of that other day that had now engulfed us, with Rosier clinging to the bow, Pritkin holding on to him, and me drowning along behind, my body half in the water as I gripped an oar I’d snared at the last second and hung on for dear life.
    I tried to pull myself up, which would have been easier without all the kicking and scuffling feet in my face. And without being slung back and forth wildly, because no one seemed to be driving this thing. But then I forgot about all that; I forgot about everything.
    Because I’d just looked up.
    And seen a new form of light shining out of