Stonewiser Read Online Free PDF Page A

knowing she was capable of betraying herself easily.
    Sariah slumped down next to him in grudging concession.
    “We're willing to grant atonement,” the executioner said. “One month for each of Meliahs’ nine sisters as is customary. The wiser must find this tale which can unite the Bloods. And she must bring it before us or she forfeits her life as decreed.”
    Too little time for too great a task. Sariah knew a bad deal when she heard one. She had been looking for just such proof for the last year. Yet she saw Kael's wisdom in the proposal. It had to be done. Nothing less would satisfy the executioners, the justice gathering, and ultimately, the Bloods.
    “If she defaults, you forfeit your pledges,” Petrid said. “We take great risk on this venture. Therefore we need further assurances to protect ourselves from default, potential losses and probable death. You are Sons of Ars. No other house is as praised or admired in the Domain. If the wiser defaults, we require Ars's earnings for three years and the Crags.”
    The crowd gasped. Metelaus growled like a wounded beast. Lazar paled, and even Malord, who was not of Ars, looked aggrieved. Sariah loathed the executioner. His smile was as chilling as his monkey's snarl. She understood he had a job to do, but did he really need to unleash his greed blindly on her kin?
    “Fine.” Kael spat the word as if it were poisonous.
    Her life wasn't worth Ars's earnings, let alone the settlement's unique and profitable placement as guardians of the Crags, the best good water source around. It was also one of the few ranges of solid stone that remained unconsumed by the rot in the Domain, populated with valuable herds of goats which made life sustainable for Ars's people.
    “I won't have it,” she said.
    Kael's first look at her was an incinerating glower that could have melted her bones as effectively as the rot. “Pay no heed to her,” he said between clenched teeth. “She has no voice in the Domain. I speak for the woman.”
    The damn fool. But he was right. A Goodlander by birth, she had no rights in the Domain and was a mere spectator in the matter of her own life and death.
    “Kael knows what he's doing,” Metelaus whispered.
    “I won't be the cause of Ars's ruin,” Sariah whispered back.
    “Then listen, so you can meet your obligations and we can all get out of here alive.”
    “The executioners are setting up this deal so that I'll fail. Can't you see? Why would they want me to return with the tale when they stand to make huge profits from my failure?”
    “Don't you think Kael knows that?”
    “It's not right, Metelaus. Give me a few moments of distraction and I'll be gone.”
    “Look around. You'll be dead before you blink. What good will you be then?”
    “Kael is mad putting out Ars like that.”
    “If I were he, and Torana were you, I'd do the same thing.”
    Sariah sunk her face in her hands. She had made her share of bad deals before, but this one promised to be the most costly of all. It was just a fast way for the executioners to enrich themselves, of trumping prosperous Ars and overtaking its prominence. No matter how kind they were, people in Ars were going to be furious with her for putting their livelihoods at risk, for threatening to destroy what they had built since the execration. Sariah couldn't bear the thought of ruining the only kin she had ever known, the very people who had granted her a home.
    “It's done then.” The executioner accepted Kael's pack. “Remember. Nine months to the sunrise. One last thing. A sentence for a sentence. We require an irrevocable condition to the entire agreement in the form of an edict.”
    “An edict. Of course.” Rage burned in Kael's gaze and simmered in Sariah's soul like a twin.
    The executioner smiled in naked triumph. “I hereby decree the wiser banished from the Domain.”
     



Four
     
    P ETRID WIELDED THE banishment bracelet with a snake charmer's deliberate care. At first sight, it seemed