The Assassin and the Desert Read Online Free PDF Page B

bucket. “So this bucket is for your journey back from the oasis—you’ll need it. And this one”—she held up the other—“is just to make the trip hell.”
    â€œWhy?”
    Ansel hooked the buckets into the yoke across her shoulders. “Because if you can run three miles across the dunes of the Red Desert, then three miles back, you can do almost anything.”
    â€œRun?” Celaena’s throat dried up at the thought of it. All around them, assassins—mostly the children, plus a few others a bit older than her—began running for the dunes, their buckets clacking along.
    â€œDon’t tell me the infamous Celaena Sardothien can’t run three miles!”
    â€œIf you’ve been here for so many years, doesn’t the three miles seem like nothing now?”
    Ansel rolled her neck like a cat stretching out in the sun. “Of course it does. But the running keeps me in shape. You think I was just
born
with these legs?” Celaena ground her teeth as Ansel gave her a fiendish grin. She’d never met anyone who smiled and winked so much.
    Ansel began jogging, leaving the shade of the date trees overhead, kicking up a wave of red sand behind her. She glanced over her shoulder. “If you walk, it’ll take all day! And then you’ll certainly never impress anyone!” Ansel pulled her scarf over her nose and mouth and took off at a gallop.
    Taking a deep breath, cursing Arobynn to hell, Celaena hooked the buckets onto the yoke and ran.
    If it had been three flat miles, even three miles up grassy knolls, she might have made it. But the dunes were enormous and unwieldy, and Celaena made it one measly mile before she had to slow to a walk, her lungs near to combusting. It was easy enough to find the way—the dozens of footprints from the people racing ahead of her showed her where she needed to go.
    She ran when she could and walked when she couldn’t, but the sun rose higher and higher, toward that dangerous noontime peak. Up one hill, down the other. One foot in front of the next. Bright flashes flitted across her vision, and her head pounded.
    The red sand shimmered, and she draped her arms over the yoke. Her lips became filmy, cracking in places, and her tongue turned leaden in her mouth.
    Each step made her head throb, and the sun rose higher and higher . . .
    One more dune. Just one more dune
.
    But many more dunes later, she was still trudging along, following the smattering of footprints in the sand. Had she somehow tracked the
wrong
group?
    Even as she thought it, assassins appeared atop the dune before her, already running back to the fortress, their buckets heavy with water.
    She kept her head high as they passed her, and didn’t look any of them in the face. Most of them didn’t bother looking at her, though a few spared her a mortifyingly pitying glance. Their clothes were sodden.
    She crested a dune so steep she had to use one hand to brace herself, and just when she was about to sink to her knees atop it, she heard splashing.
    A small oasis, mostly just trees and a giant pool fed by a shimmering stream, was barely an eighth of a mile away.
    She was Adarlan’s Assassin—at least she’d
made
it here.
    In the shallows of the pool, many disciples splashed or bathed or just sat, cooling themselves. No one spoke—and hardly anyone gestured. Another of the Absolutely Silent places, then. She spotted Ansel with her feet in the water, tossing dates into her mouth. None of the others paid Celaena any heed. And for once, she was glad. Perhaps she should have found a way to defy Arobynn’s order and come here under an alias.
    Ansel saw her and waved her over. If she gave her one look that hinted at her being so slow . . .
    But Ansel merely held up a date, offering it to her.
    Celaena, trying to control her panting, didn’t bother taking the date as she strode into the cool water until she was completely