Sands of Aggar: Amazons of Aggar Book 3 by Chris Anne Wolfe Read Free Book Online Page B

thin fog of incense, nearly dissipated out the small nooks and crannies in her wagon, tinted the air with jasmine and cinnamon. Her skin was damp with sweat and tears. She’d been crying in her sleep.
    Memories returned slowly. She’d spent the night trying to meditate, to find answers in the depths of her visions, but nothing had come. The magic must have settled around her while she slept, weaving into her dreams.
    Come.
    The single word echoed in her mind, seeming to fill her room and vibrate out into the night air. She suddenly felt an overwhelming pull, spreading from her stomach to her chest, rooting in her heart and tugging her toward the front door. She crawled out from under her woven quilt, three different silk pillows scattering across the floor with the movement.
    She pulled a silk sari around her waist, tossing the loose end over her shoulder to quickly cover her bare skin. She hesitated before the door, her hand on the latch, vivid memories of the storm haunting her mind.
    Come.
    She turned the latch and stepped out into the night.
    Come… Come… Come…
    The whisper became more urgent, more constant, the sound seeming to ring from her mind up to the stars. Jacquin knew even as she walked that there was something odd, inhuman about the call, but she couldn’t resist it. Was she still dreaming? In a vision? She couldn’t tell anymore.
    Her bare feet seemed to float across the sand as she journeyed beyond the market, past the dance circle to the wall of Oasis. Still the call beckoned, urging her beyond the town’s border.
    She raced toward her sanctuary, to the pile of broken wagons and carts and leapt from axle to wheel to trembling roof until she could jump up and grab the edge of the city wall. Her fingers scrambled, searching for purchase, and finally she pulled herself up to the edge.
    She stared out at the desert, stretching endlessly into the night. Rolling dunes of sand dotted with the occasional cactus and scrub brush. Oasis was named for the natural oasis in the center of the town proper, but just outside the walls any sign of water or shade disappeared. The only inhabitants able to survive in the harsh ocean of sand were vicious reptiles and sand worms.
    Jacquin walked along the wall, traveling along its narrow ledge like a tight-rope walker until she reached a section where a camel-trader’s barn met the wall. She scampered down the edge of the barn, her feet hitting the ground with a heavy thump. The camels in the barn rustled at the noise but quickly settled back down to sleep.
    Jacquin raced out into the night, the pull in her chest warming and growing stronger with each step until it suddenly dissipated. She paused at the sudden loss, coming to her senses as the chill of the night sank into her skin and she realized where she was. She rarely traveled beyond the walls of Oasis, not out of fear, but common sense. All it would take was a misplaced foot and she could be bitten by a poisonous snake or sink into a sand-worm’s tunnel, disappearing forever. And that was without the threat of highwaymen or drunken merchants.
    As she turned to return home, she heard a shift in the sand. She whipped around and froze, her heart stopping in her chest, her breath catching in her throat.
    A small, lithe creature covered head to toe in cat-like fur, her tabby-orange ears folded back against the top of her head approached. The creature sniffed the air, a green-glass curved sword glistening on her belt. A changling. The call had been a trap.
    Jacquin had heard stories of changlings, vicious, primal creatures from the north once thought extinct. The history books were full of wars with the changlings, including the battle believed to have wiped the species from Aggar, but merchants swore they had returned, brought stories of changling tribes traveling south, desecrating villages and attacking travelers unfortunate enough to find themselves in their path. What were they doing in Oasis? Her recent visions