The Darkness Comes (The Second Book of the Small Gods Series) Read Online Free PDF Page A

he groaned.
    Bieta jerked her gaze toward her son. “You hear that?”
    Stirk shook his patchy-haired head without lifting his eyes from the lad.
    “He made a sound,” she said, standing. “Groaned.”
    “Didn’t hear nothing.”
    “We can’t leave him.”
    Stirk raised his wide-eyed stare to her. “Well, it don’t look as if he’ll be walking nowhere.”
    “You gotta carry him.”
    Her son raised one brow and lowered the other, fixing her with a disbelieving expression. Bieta crossed her arms and glared at him.
    “Carry him? I’d get his blood on me. And he ain’t going to make it, at any rate.”
    She let her gaze trail down Stirk’s grubby, gray shirt with the rip in the sleeve and the front bulging open over his generous belly where two buttons were missing. One leg of his breeches ended just below the knee in a jungle of dangling thread where it had torn off after the hole in it got too big.
    “You afraid to get your clothes dirty?”
    Stirk shrugged. “Don’t wanna get blood on me, is all.”
    “We’re taking him, so pick him up or you won’t be getting any of this.” Bieta cupped her ample breasts and jiggled them; Stirk sagged like a man beaten.
    “Alright, but you gotta help me.”
    Bieta shook her head. Her son was strong as a horse—and near smart as one—so didn’t need her help, but she obliged to keep him happy. She took up a position at the injured man’s head and grasped him under the armpits, leaning him forward for Stirk to reach under. A moan shuddered in the fellow’s throat when she propped him up, startling her so she nearly let go. She fixed Stirk with a hard gaze.
    “Yeah, yeah. Heard him that time.”
    He bent and hooked one arm around the lad’s back, the other under his knees, and picked him up as though he weighed no more than a sack of grain. Bieta pushed on the injured fellow’s back to make it appear as though she helped; her palms came away smeared with his blood.
    “You got him?”
    “Yeah,” Stirk grunted. “I got him.”
    They started along the dimly lit street, following the same path as Teth and his mates because it was the quickest way home. The next closest bridge would take them too far out of their way and through parts of the city Bieta wouldn’t want to go even when Stirk wasn’t carrying a load.
    “What was he doing here?” she mused. “Don’t everyone know to stay out of Thieves’ Alley?”
    “Don’t think he’s from around here, Ma.”
    “That’s the truth.”
    “And he wouldn’t’ve been here if you hadn’t been screwin’ around with Teth.”
    She glared at Stirk, lips pressed together tight, tongue working hard in the gap between her teeth. He was too busy concentrating on keeping one foot moving in front of the other to notice.
    “Someone’s gotta make money, or how’re we going to eat? You getting a job?”
    “Ain’t no jobs.”
    “That’s right. And you ain’t willing to put some fellow’s cock betwixt your lips for a coin or two, are you?” This time, Stirk didn’t respond. “Didn’t think so.”
    She stopped him short of the corner and Bieta stuck her head out to peer around. The street was empty, so she signaled Stirk to follow as she continued.
    “Hurry.”
    Stirk grunted and increased his pace, the young man hanging limp in his arms, weighing him down with the worst kind of load. Bieta wished there was more she could do to help—by reason of wanting to get home quicker, not due to caring about the strain on her son’s back—but there wasn’t. Being lookout for Teth and his boys would have to be her contribution.
    They stopped to rest halfway along the next block, Stirk leaning against a wall with its daub chipping off the wattle, though he likely didn’t need the pause. He sucked a few heavy breaths to give his mother the impression he’d done some hard work, tilted his head and wiped sweat from his brow off with his shoulder. Bieta rolled her eyes and peeked over her shoulder, surveying the street