Poison Tree by Amelia Atwater-Rhodes Read Free Book Online Page A

only to the high ruler back in the main camps. Thousands of years ago, the tribes had specialized in order to provide for the greater community; some were mostly hunters, some gatherers, some planters, some craftsmen, and so on. In the modern age, that translated into some tribes being splendid examples of democracy and art and spirituality, and some being brutal, ruled by a claw-and-fist autocracy.
    Sarik never spoke about her past, except in bits andpieces—usually when she woke from the nightmares left behind by being regularly beaten within an inch of her life whenever she transgressed.
    “That could create problems while I’m trying to find a home for the cubs,” she said, her voice sounding hollow. “I’m still waiting on responses from the tribes I have contacted.”
    SingleEarth sometimes interacted with other Mistari, but very rarely with royalty, because Mistari royalty generally disapproved of individuals like Sarik who had chosen to leave their home tribes. If a Mistari king saw Sarik and deduced that she was a runaway, he was likely to report her to her father. Jason wasn’t going to let that happen. Ever.
    Lynzi nodded her agreement, though she did add, “Sarik, you know that SingleEarth would never let anyone take you without your consent, right?”
    Sarik nodded, but the look in her eyes was blank. After years of fear, and pain, and shame, it was hard to fully believe anyone’s promise of protection, especially when new violence seemed determined to intrude on the peaceful life they had struggled to build over the last six years.

C HAPTER 7
    A LYSIA WAS IN motion before she knew what had wakened her. She made the first several attacks blind, while still blinking the sands of sleep from her eyes. Her mind registered things like movement, the flash of eyes—and a weapon. By the time she recognized the intruder, she had him pinned to the ground with an arm across his windpipe.
    She slapped Christian upside the head as she pushed herself to her feet. He was lucky she hadn’t been able to get a hand to the knife she had glimpsed at his waist.
    No, not lucky. He knew her style well enough that he would have been careful to keep her from any weapons until they both knew she wasn’t trying to kill him.
    “Jerk,” she said with a smile. “That door was locked for a reason.”
    She offered him a hand up, unsurprised by his sudden appearance in her bedroom. She had given him enough information to track her down if he chose, and had suspected he would follow through as soon as he got over being simultaneously surprised and pissed that she had surprised him.
    As he rose, he said, “Was it really?” He took a moment to straighten out the leather jacket he wore and to check the security of items beneath. He might have left his crossbow at home, but Christian was never unarmed, not even in the heart of SingleEarth.
    Alysia looked at the clock and then turned back to him with a halfhearted glare. “Five in the morning?
Really?
” She sat back down on the bed, finger-combing hair out of her face. There wasn’t even a hint of light outside her windows.
    “I didn’t want to stay up much later,” he replied, “and I wanted a chance to catch you alone.”
    He reached into his jacket to retrieve a slender package; unrolling it, he revealed the three bolts Alysia had given him at Onyx. “Am I right that these are yours?”
    She nodded tiredly. That had been the final joy the day before—discovering that someone had broken into her room. She hadn’t unpacked anything but her laptop before the attack, so she didn’t know exactly when the bolts had been stolen, but the lax security at Haven #4 would have left plenty of predictable opportunities while she was being shown around the campus.
    She fished a key out from between the mattresses and tossed it to Christian.
    Christian knelt down to open the innocent-looking trunk, where two framed photos lay nestled among sweaters—one of Alysia’s mother in Paris,