Beyond the Wall of Time by Russell Kirkpatrick Read Free Book Online Page A

Noetos. What did they represent? Why was one of them so recent? A fanciful
     thought struck him: he imagined they were the blood of those who had died as avatars of the gods. What properties would such
     blood have? Would it leave a mark on the skin? What would it taste like? He wrestled his mind away from the thought.
    “I will speak to her, find out what she needs. Malayu is a large city. Perhaps a physic there can help her.”
    Anomer punched the fist of one hand into the palm of the other. “Will you never listen? She needs assistance now, not later,
     and especially not in Malayu. Unless she receives the help she needs now, there will be no Malayu.”
    “No, son, it is you who refuses to listen. I have cast my net and I am obliged to wait until the time is right to haul it
     in. I will not abandon it now, not when the shark I seek to catch is still swimming in the open sea, savaging anyone who swims
     too close to his jaws. We are going north because I agreed to this with the other leaders. There are larger issues at stake
     than my desire for revenge or Arathé’s health. Arathé has a voice in her head that is somehow linked to all this, and she
     has a power we need. I can’t allow her to abandon this task or hinder others in their execution of it.”
    “Can’t allow her? By Alkuon, Father, what are you going to do? Order her to feel better? Carry her north like you’re carrying
     Dryman’s body? This is not your decision. Either she regains her health and vigour or she and I leave you. We will not follow
     you mindlessly just because you ask it of us. Do we have an understanding?”
    After the boy had taken his leave, Noetos reflected that he’d been wrong in his assessment of his son. Worse luck. Anomer
     was ready to take command. Too ready.
    It was only as they left the blood room that Noetos noticed the corpse’s wounds had begun to bleed anew.

CHAPTER 2
THE CANOPY
    THEY EMERGED FROM THE House of the Gods into a thunderstorm of breathless fury. One after another the travellers left the dry, sandy floor of the
     last room and passed between the two portal trees to be assaulted by slashing rain and continuous flashes and booms. Nothing
     made it clearer that the House of the Gods was truly in another place than passing from blue sky to dark clouds and driving
     rain.
    Noetos blinked as he stood on the waterlogged plateau with the others and waited for the last of their party, Tumar and Kilfor,
     to appear. He was soaked in moments, his hair plastered to his head.
    “Is this natural?” Seren yelled in his ear between cracks of thunder.
    “Don’t know!” Noetos replied, then looked around for Arathé.
That this might be of the gods is something I should have considered
, he chastised himself. He could see no more than ten paces in any direction, so thick was the rain; the air was milky with
     it. That shadow there was likely his daughter—no, it was too tall. It hurried away from the portal, shoulders hunched.
    “Here, have you seen Arathé?” Noetos called to it, and took it by the shoulder. The figure swung its other arm around and
     delivered the fisherman a solid blow on the shoulder, then snarled and shook him off.
    “There’s no call for that!” Noetos cried, and he automatically went for his sword, but remembered he was weaponless; he looked
     up as the figure disappeared into the murk. Noetos hadn’t recognised what he’d seen of the face. One of the porters perhaps.
     He glanced at the hand he’d used to grab the figure’s shoulder. His fingers were smeared with blood. As he stared at it, the
     rain washed it off save the faintest residue.
    What’s the fool doing running off when he’s clearly still injured?
    He stumbled across his daughter a moment later. She was helping rewind one of the porter boy’s bandages, while the other looked
     on. Noetos looked from one to the other, confused.
Neither of the porters then.
    “The storm, Arathé,” he said. “Is it of the