The Box Read Online Free PDF Page B

god.
    The Shoanti froze.
    Kostin grinned his most intimidating of grins, conscious of the fact that he was covered in green ichor and spore dust. He pointed at the bodies that littered the rooms, both the horribly mutilated corpses of the Shoanti shaman and his women, and those of the strange fungus people.
    “Thus do those who cross us die: souless and damned for all time. Come to me and join your master in Urgathoa’s belly—or flee the city tonight!” Kostin roared, ranting like a stage villain.
    Behind him Shess murmured, and a ghostly image appeared between Kostin and the Shoanti. It was vaguely man-shaped and glowed with its own inner light.
    “Witness his agonies as I wrack his soul!” Kostin howled, throwing both hands into the air. Before him the image writhed and flickered like a storm-blown candle flame.
    It was a stampede. The Shoanti, all will to fight broken, scrambled for the door. Their howls had turned into those of whipped dogs, and reverberated down the hallway until they were well out of sight.
    Shess giggled, her illusion winking out of existence.
    Taldara moved instantly to Gyrd’s side, the threat from the spores extinguished by the Ulfen’s own potent draught. She searched frantically through her small pack, discarding a slew of items strange and sundry, before snatching up what she had sought. She brought the small phial to the Ulfen’s bearded lips, and tilted it down.
    “That should kill the spores, but he’s still going to hurt like hell. Maybe if we get this mail off, two of us will be able to manage him.” She wiped sweat from her forehead.
    “Let us be away from here first,” Aeventius said. Producing a pinch of coarse, brown hair from his pouch, he intoned the words of a spell. His ring flashed.
    Walking over to the massive warrior, Aeventius bent down and hoisted him onto his shoulder with barely a grunt. “Although,” he said casually, chainmailed form balanced on his shoulder as easily as if it had been a child, “if we run into anything more dangerous than another locked door this evening, I am of no more use.”
    They moved quickly back the way they had come, not daring to explore the complex any further in case some of the Shoanti returned, and everyone aware that Aeventius’s unnatural strength could only last for a few minutes.
    They encountered no one. Retracing their steps to the same alleyway where they had ambushed the first pair of guards, Aeventius set his burden down unceremoniously. Taldara dashed away, intent on hiring a horse or mule from the livery yard on Kindrucker Street. Kostin moved to accompany her, but Aeventius pushed past him with alarming intensity, saying something about not being left behind with “the imp.”
    Kostin sighed and slipped down next to Gyrd’s sleeping form. He straightened his wounded leg, tightening the hasty bandage that was half-soaked through with blood. “Looks like this was a wash. Lucky you got paid up front in Sczarni silver, right little one?”
    Shess shrugged, trying to adjust her overlarge spectacles, which had been bent in the fight. With a pout she plucked them from her button nose and pitched them into the dark.
    “Oh, I don’t know,” she said, a grin sneaking over her face. “It was interesting. Plus we get equal shares of this thing I grabbed off the altar.” From her pouch, Shess produced a sun-bleached goat’s skull. It would have been hideous if it were not for the dozens of fine-cut gemstones clustered around its golden eye sockets.
    Kostin threw his head back and laughed. For the first time in seemingly forever, he really meant it.