Scepters by L. E. Modesitt Read Free Book Online Page A

flowing through the quarasote bushes—toward Alucius and his
flock. Shapes like sanders, but not sanders. lalent-tinged shapes, shadowed in
unseen purple and blue and without lifethreads.
    Alucius
paused just long enough to cast darkness around the remaining cartridges in his
magazine before firing twice more. Each of the dark sanderlike figures he hit
burst into the all-consuming blue flame he had seen only twice before—in
Deforya and when leaving it.
    He
switched rifles and, infusing another set of cartridges with the darkness of
life, quickly emptied the second. There remained only a single dark sander,
which charged toward Alucius.
    The
herder jammed the rifle into the holder right-handed and drew the sabre with
his left. As he leaned forward, he extended Talent around the blade, a darkness
of green and gold, and slashed.
    The
shock of impact was as though he had struck stone, and his entire arm vibrated.
    The
dark sander seemed to shrivel.
    Alucius
urged the gray past the shrinking pillar of darkness, quickly enough that the
blast of heat from the fire that followed only warmed him.
    As
the fires vanished, leaving only an oily residue on the sandy red soil, Alucius
checked the flock over. One ewe—the last straggler—lay dead. So did the young
sandwolf that had been caught by the younger nightram, Alucius wondered if the
younger ram had been one of Lamb’s offspring.
    He
turned his eyes back to the ewe’s body, caught by the sudden stench rising and
drifting toward him. The corpse began to decompose, turning putrid even as he
watched. Then, the body flared into a blue-tinged flame, and soon all that was
left was oily black residue.
    Alucius
turned the gray, heading back toward the front of the flock, and scanned the
quarasote flats with his Talent and his eyes. He could detect nothing. Even the
sandwolves had slithered away—uncharacteristically leaving behind the bodies of
those Alucius and the nightram had slain. He glanced down at the black crystal
of the silver-framed herder’s wristguard, but the wristband was neither warmer
nor colder than usual. He had to wonder if Wendra had felt anything through the
ring she wore that was attuned to his wristguard.
    Thunder
rolled overhead, and the sky darkened even more. Tiny needlelike droplets of
rain began to fall, slashing out of the lowering clouds almost horizontally.
Alucius squinted against the rain, wishing he had foreseen the violence of the
storm.
    The
herder glanced from side to side, squinting through the wind and rain that had
already begun to die away. Above him, the once-dark clouds were thinning
rapidly, revealing a clear silver-green sky.
    Alucius
continued to study the ground, then the bushes stretching to the southeast, with
a side glance at the low wash where the wolves had vanished, and reloaded the
first rifle, then the second.
    In
all his years of herding, he’d never seen anything close to what had just
occurred. Not in herding—only in the battles against the pteridons of Aellyan
Edyss and the Talent-creatures that had attacked his forces in leaving Deforya.
    He
moistened his lips.
    The
attack made no sense whatsoever. If the ifrits were beginning another assault
on Corus, why would they attack him? Why would they alert one of the few
herders with true Talent to their actions? Or was the assault so far along that
they could not control the appearance of the Talent-creatures ?
    Alucius
didn’t want to leave the stead. He didn’t know where he could go to stop such
an attack, and there wasn’t anyone to whom he could turn for help—except his
family—and for them all to leave the stead would likely ruin them all. He and
Wendra might be able to leave… if they knew where to go—and what to do. Except
Wendra was pregnant, and Alucius hated the thought of asking her to go anywhere
into even greater danger.
    Above
him, the sky continued to clear.
    Alucius
looked to the east, to the Aerial Plateau, but he neither saw nor felt the
green