Weapon of Blood Read Online Free PDF Page A

for you…
    Lad had held to that tenant for five
years.  Not once had he killed in Mya’s service, and tonight he would not break
that vow.
    Dropping to his feet, he released the
blade in a flipping motion.  As the braided sharkskin hilt slapped into his palm,
he assessed his remaining opponents.
    Three more .
    The attacker with the blowgun stepped
back even as the other two advanced.  The nearest held two daggers low and
ready to strike, but she had not anticipated Lad’s theft of the first
assailant’s sword, which gave him a considerable advantage in reach.  He
parried her two thrusts, then swung the weapon in an arc.  The flat of the
blade met with her skull, and she fell like a poleaxed steer.  Her partner
dodged out of reach.
    As the momentum of Lad’s stroke turned
him, he spied movement above and beyond Mya, two more assailants dropping from
the rooftops.  They would reach her before he could finish with these, but she
was already turning to face them, her daggers out.  Lad knew she was not
without skill; he just hoped she survived until he could lend his aid.
    The puff of air from the dart caster’s
second shot sounded like a hammer blow in his mind.  Intuition and training
brought the blade up into the path of the dart, and the envenomed tip shattered
against the flat of the katana.  He leapt, knocked the blowgun aside, and
placed a careful kick into her chest.  The blow broke ribs, and her head cracked
against the brick wall.  She fell in a wheezing heap, but she, too, would live.
    The last assailant stood with two hooked
axes at the ready, but hesitated.  Lad brought the katana around and settled into
a proper stance, ready for the man’s attack.
    It didn’t come.
    The axe wielder’s gaze flicked past Lad,
and then he simply backed away, turned and ran.
    Lad whirled, ready to deal with the other
two assailants, hoping that Mya had managed to stay alive.  Unfortunately, he
was too late.
    Mya stood over two corpses, a bloody blade
in each hand.  One assassin’s throat was slit from ear to ear, while the other
bore a wound to her left eye which undoubtedly penetrated all the way to the
back of her skull.  Unlike Lad, Mya had no compunctions about killing.
    “Did their blades touch you?”  He dropped
the katana and approached her, looking for signs of weakness or pain in her
stance.  “They were poisoned.”
    “No.”  She looked at the daggers in her
hands as if surprised they were there.  Her eyes shone white, wide in the dim
light.  He could see her pulse pounding in her throat.  “No, they didn’t even
scratch me!  HA!”
    “You’re sure?”  He looked her over, but
her clothes weren’t torn or cut.
    “Sure.”  She took a deep breath and
grinned at him.  “They made such a racket coming off of the roof, I was ready,
and surprised them.”  She bent to clean her daggers on one of the fallen
assassins’ cloaks, then stood and indicated the three unconscious foes.  “We
should take one to question.”
    “Please.  No, Mya.”  He gripped her
shoulder.  “We should go.”
    “Let me have a look at them, then.”  She
rolled the swordsman over and snorted in disgust.  “I know this one.  Wu Jah; I
think that’s his name.  Journeyman Blade.  I should cut his head off and send
it to Horice in a box!”
    “Two deaths are enough for one night, and
now you know who sent them.  Come.  Let’s be off.”
    “If I send a message, maybe this bullshit
will stop!”
    “Or Horice will want revenge for the
insult and try again.”  He turned her away from the prostrate forms.  “Come
on.”
    “Fine.”  She sheathed her daggers and
followed him down the alley at an easy trot.
    Four blocks later they slowed to a walk. 
Lad was on high alert, but his attentiveness was so intuitive, he managed to
replay the attack in his mind as they travelled.  Never before had they been
attacked by more than two or three assassins.  Mya had been lucky tonight; a
scratch from a