The Soulstoy Inheritance Read Online Free PDF Page B

pushed it aside.
    “Let’s go hunting,” I said to Harbringer. “Grenlow, stay here and make sure nobody takes the place of that last unfortunate soul.”
    The man nodded, though I thought for a moment that he would argue. Was it the assumption that their dinner was one of their own that he thought to counter?
    I pushed that aside too, and waited until Grenlow, Rohan and Cereen had moved to stand in a semi-circle around the pit. Cereen’s mouth was set, but she didn’t look at me as I passed, so I couldn’t tell how angry she was with my actions. I climbed back atop my gelding, and turned it around. If the border was where the residents were being attacked, that was where I would do my hunting.
    Once we were out of the circle of light spreading from the center of town, Harbringer shot me a look.
    “You’ve changed, Harrow.”
    “It’s strange. Hazen told me once that I was lost. I don’t think I’m lost anymore, yet everything that makes me who I am has been torn away.”
    He didn’t reply to that, and as we broke free of the township and spilled back into the neighboring field, we both paused, looking out to the darkness.
    “You should be back at the Academy,” I said finally, “teaching the kids to defend themselves.”
    “I will return—” he slipped from his horse and looped its reigns around a crumbling fence post—“and so will you.”
    I slid from my own saddle, and tied my horse up with his.
    “I don’t actually know how to hunt,” I admitted.
    “It’s easy with Force. Just close your eyes, open the connection, and search for a sizeable energy source.”
    I did as he told me, but while it may have been easy for him, it certainly wasn’t for me. It took me minutes to even locate him, and he was standing right beside me.
    “I’m not very good at this,” I muttered, stepping further out into the field, my eyes screwed closed.
    I felt his fingers slide through mine, and for a moment, my heart thudded painfully, my breath catching on a quiet gasp, but he was only pulling me further into the field.
    “Your heart rate just sped up.”
    I pulled my hand out of his. “No it didn’t.”
    He laughed, and I felt his hand on my jaw. “Open your eyes, Bea.”
    My heart was threatening to jump out of my chest, and when I opened my eyes to find him standing so close to me that we were almost touching, the nervous twisting that seized my stomach increased. He wasn’t laughing anymore, and his eyes flickered with that black heat that I remembered from the last time I had kissed him. He took my hand and placed it across his chest, where his heart seemed to be beating almost as fast as mine.
    “That’s what you’re looking for,” he said. “The rush of blood, the beating of a heart. It’s how you distinguish the plants from the living creatures.”
    I could only stare at him, my hand flattened to the plane of his chest, feeling the steady rise and fall of his breathing. But then his grip moved from my jaw, passing over my eyes, closing them again.
    “Hunt, Siren.”
    I smiled, amused despite myself at the name, and his heartbeat thudded in response. I spread my awareness out as far as I could, using the plants to guide myself, and then I did as he said. I searched for a heartbeat.
    It was only a short time in coming, and maybe that had something to do with the adrenaline already coursing through my system at Harbringer’s simple touch.
    “I think I found something,” I whispered. “Across the field, nine feet deep past the first ridge. Whatever it is, it’s big. It’s also higher up, atop one of the peaks.”
    “Well done. But that’s a wolf. You should probably pick something a little easier for your first time hunting.”
    “I’m going for the wolf, and you’re going to let me go alone.”
    He chuckled. “Nice try. I’m coming, but I’ll let you do all the work, if you insist.”
    I smiled again, and in that moment, I didn’t want to go anywhere. I wanted to stand there in the