Fable: The Balverine Order (Fable) by Peter David Read Free Book Online Page B

upon the path that supposedly would wend its way up to Windside. What had amazed James was the steady drop in temperature as their relative altitude climbed. It became progressively colder. At first it was barely noticeable, but the farther up they went, the more steadily and dramatically the temperature fell around them. The rocky trail became steeper, and soon every step that James was taking required effort and force of will. He was vaguely annoyed to see that, on the other hand, Thomas wasn’t allowing himself to be the least bit deterred by his surroundings. They could have been strolling along a pleasant path in the forest for all that Thomas was willing to acknowledge the difficulty of their surroundings.
    â€œYou could at least try to make it look like you’re straining,” James had chided him. Thomas had simply grinned back, his smile the only thing visible within the darkness of the hood pulled up over his head.
    Hours crawled one into the next, and the trail was getting narrower. It was becoming readily evident why horses would have been useless in this endeavor. There were points where the boys had to walk sideways in order to squeeze through, and James got himself hung up on his cloak several times, uttering profanities all along the way. “How much farther?” he had said at one point.
    â€œHow should I know?”
    â€œBecause coming up here was your idea!”
    â€œTechnically, it was the coachman’s idea.”
    â€œGreat!” James had shouted, his voice rising. “So we followed some nameless . . .” Suddenly something overhead caught his eye, something falling directly toward Thomas. “Watch it!” he cried out, and, grabbing the confused Thomas, he yanked him back toward himself. A column of ice, as long as a man and sharp as a javelin, crashed to the ground right where Thomas had been and shattered into fragments.
    Gasping, Thomas and James stared at it, and then slowly and softly, Thomas said, “You might want to keep your voice down. Unless you feel like bringing down a ton of snow or ice on our heads. That’s what loud noises do around here.”
    â€œSo ...” He looked around nervously. “You’re saying that if I lose my temper, it could kill us.”
    â€œPretty much.”
    â€œWonderful.”
    That had been all the inspiration James had required to keep his mouth shut as they continued on their way. The path widened out a bit so that they were able to walk more normally after a time, but James was becoming increasingly concerned as the sun made its way across the sky, and no village presented itself. He was not enamored of the prospect of trying to find somewhere to make camp should night fall. For all he knew, Thomas’s snoring would be sufficient to bring a drift down upon them. and they would freeze to death, buried alive beneath tons of snow. But he elected not to say anything of his concerns to Thomas because he had no desire to come across as someone who was constantly complaining. This was a quest, after all, and one did not whine about a quest even though the exact parameters of it were still a bit unclear to him.
    They approached a blind corner of the type that always made James a bit apprehensive since he had no idea what to expect from around the other side. When they turned it, however, Thomas stopped in his tracks, and, as a result, James bumped into him with such force that the two of them almost went to the ground in a tumble of arms and legs.
    â€œI’ll be damned,” said Thomas, and James was beginning to suspect they both would be when, as he dusted snow off his leggings, he saw what it was that Thomas was reacting to.
    â€œWindside?” he said, and Thomas nodded, and replied, “Has to be.”
    There it was, just as the coachman had described. Spread out before them was a small valley that miraculously had taken shape right in the heart of the mountains. Neither of them would