The Archer (The Blood Realm Series Book 3) Read Online Free PDF Page A

she moved. Huddled in the safety of its folds, she peered around the trunk of a broad oak that stood just before the strange clearing.
    A man reclined at the base of the rowan, almost hidden by the slant of the fallen willow’s trunk. He was dressed entirely in green, from his tunic to his leggings to the boots that gripped his sculpted calves. Lean muscles bound a frame that, even folded as it was, looked to be taller than her own considerable six foot height. Long white-blond hair hung as straight as wet silk, framing ears that came to a subtle, but distinct point.
    Fey. Marian’s heart pounded a bruising, panicked beat against her chest wall. Stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid. She edged back a step, fighting to think through the sudden panic turning her thoughts to mud. The bravado of before, the urge to take on what scared her, shriveled up and died somewhere deep inside her. She could not get involved with a fey. Not for any reason, not when it might lead… Not when…
    She swallowed hard, feet turning to stone before she could retreat. Four hundred pounds was a great deal of money, more than she could ever spare—especially with the condition it be paid tomorrow. If there was any chance this Robin would help her…
    “He was carrying at least five hundred pounds, Robin.”
    The voice that had spoken last seemed to have no body, at least none that she could see. Biting the inside of her cheek, Marian settled down again, and narrowed her eyes, examining every branch, searching for the owner of the voice.
    There .
    A young man hung from one of the ash’s thick branches, his slender legs curved over the limb to keep him dangling effortlessly with his face a good five feet above Robin. His eyes were slanted, mere slits that held no irises, but were one solid almond shape the color of wet soil. His smile was too wide, splitting his face in a not altogether pleasant manner, and his ears curled out to either side like twisted parchment, long and more pointed than Robin’s. His clothing hung loosely about his body, as if they didn’t belong to him but had been taken from a much larger creature.
    Robin eyed the belt suspended from his upraised hand, poking at it with his finger to jingle the gaudy gold chain threaded around it. The thick leather was finely crafted and looked exquisite all on its own, the gold decoration wholly unnecessary. Based on the way it barely swung as he held it in the air, it must’ve had a decent weight. It could very well hold five hundred pounds.
    “You seemed to find it funny watching him try to run away with his pants falling down.”
    Another voice, this one much deeper, a low, growling base. A hulking figure lumbered out from the shadows of the trees, wide shoulders twice the width of Robin, and at least three times as wide as the skinny boy in the tree. His brown hair was streaked with gold and hung down past his shoulders, merging with a long, full beard that touched the top of his chest. Unlike his dangling companion, this man’s clothes clung to his body with the sort of desperation that suggested a button may launch itself at any moment. Despite his bulk, his solid gait and easy movement suggested a great deal of his considerable girth was muscle. He pressed his back against the trunk of the widest tree in the circle, the leaning wood groaning as he chased an itch.
    “They’re all the same, Little John.” Robin’s expression waxed into boredom as the belt fell into the thick grass of the clearing with hardly a sound, the shift of metal muffled by the tender green blades. “I can’t remember the last man to give us a good fight, the last challenge. Why, when was the last time any of us shed more than a measly ounce of blood, hmm? When was the last time someone nearly died at the blade of a greedy noble, or a disreputable trader?”
    “Not all of us are as pleased with mortal wounds as you are, Robin.” The man hanging from the tree branch shook his head. “Then again, perhaps