Rebel's Cage (Book 4) Read Online Free PDF Page A

side of his mouth into a permanent sneer. Wrinkled and bitter flesh flaked down his throat to thankfully disappear beneath dark cloth. The right arm still hung in useless abandon while the left gripped a walking stick with gnarled fingers.
    So hideously maimed, so badly healed. Hard to believe that inside that rotting shell remained enough power to incinerate this castle, and Kenrick with it.
    And all of it was damage done by the Enemy, by Robert Douglas.
    Nash gave him something close to a smile, a hideous parody on that face. ‘You’re not contemplating something foolish, are you, my King?’
    Kenrick stiffened. Why was it that no matter how hard he tried, his mind still leaked thoughts that this rotting sorcerer could pick up, like dead leaves in an autumn forest? Or was it that Nash knew him better than he would wish?
    Nash leaned on his stick and hobbled his way to the other end of the table, where Taymar poured out wine into jewelledgoblets. ‘I’m sure you could indeed abduct the girl, marry and bed her before Tirone could find you – but would that really get you what you want? Mmn?’
    The tone was half teasing, half contemptuous, making Kenrick grit his teeth. ‘While we dance around Ogiers, Tirone could have his daughter betrothed and married off to someone else. His demands of me are exorbitant – but even if I could meet them, he’d find other excuses and you know it. Hell, if we had those kinds of riches, would we worry with taking Mayenne? And you didn’t see his reaction to my scars! Why, why can’t we do something about them
now?’
    ‘You know why.’
    Kenrick threw up his hands and sat back. ‘You didn’t see Ogiers flinch when he first arrived. I could tell what he was looking at – and so could my entire court! You have no concept of the humiliation I have suffered – and more so with his stories about the perfect Prince and Princess! I’m the King. I insist you take this seriously.’
    A single, baleful glare turned on him then, iciness leaking out of that dark gaze as though there had never been any warmth in the world, ever. Steeling himself, Kenrick refused to move, no matter how much his feet demanded it of him.
    With something that was either a sigh or a hiss, Nash hobbled towards him, pausing close enough for the smell of rotting flesh to fill Kenrick’s world, make his skin crawl with the effort to escape.
    ‘This is little more than vanity,’ Nash spoke, his voice soft and hard, edged with granite. ‘And you have only yourself to blame. I have long warned you against experimenting with the forbidden side of your abilities until I was strong enough to guide and train you. You failed to listen to me and your body now pays the price. This is your mistake, yet you demand I fix it for you?’
    ‘You said you would,’ Kenrick almost winced at the whining tone of his own voice. What was it about Nash that brought this side out in him? ‘You said it would not be a problem …’
    Nash blinked at him. ‘I have told you more times than I canrecall – neither I, nor any sorcerer alive, can heal a wound or mend a scar. To do so is to travel across a line not even I dare cross. I need blood to do as you ask. And powerful blood at that.’
    ‘Then … then give me the means to regenerate, as you do. You promised you would when we became allies. We need Mayenne – and Tirone won’t give me his daughter while I look like this!’
    Nash grunted. ‘You presume too much upon my patience, boy! You would have me give you some precious sorcerer, show you how to use his blood to remove a single scar from your face when I –
I
– require so much more before I can be whole again! The few sources I have been able to find over the last years have only closed up my wounds. And you want a few scars removed?’
    Unable to move under that blistering gaze, Kenrick whispered, ‘So what do we do?’
    One side of Nash’s face twitched, but the voice dropped low. ‘I suppose we do want the same