The Emerald Dragon (The Lost Ancients Book 3) by Marie Andreas Read Free Book Online Page A

the stories went. Other stories stated that the plains were natural, and the land around them had been flung five hundred feet in the air. However, no one had evidence of any disaster having caused them. Of course no one who tried to go through them ever came back out to say one way or another, so who knew what the truth was.
    Until recently, this area had been off-limits as the cliffs weren’t stable. Last month some dilettante patron had paid to have the whole area magically shored up, then vanished. Leaving a nice big mostly unexplored area for folks like me to wander about.
    The trees here weren’t as big as the gapen trees in the rest of the ruins, and there was little evidence that any big finds were out here. However, it was nice and quiet.
    I’d found a nice area and was just starting to relax and let my annoyance at Alric wander off when Covey burst into my clearing, looking like she’d just done battle with an army.
     
     

 
    Chapter Seven
     
     
    “Do you have any weapons?” She looked around the trees, then tossed me one of her daggers when she realized there weren’t any weapons hanging around. Her eyes were wild and her short hair stuck up in ridiculous clumps. “Come on, we have to stop them!”
    She stopped dancing around long enough for me to grab her arm. The cliffs over the Forgotten Plains were only about ten feet behind us; I didn’t want her to decide to race in that direction. It had only been about an hour since she’d taken off, but her clothes were ragged and streaks of blood ran across her face and arms.
    She’d found something.
    “You found, him ?” I didn’t want to say his name out loud. I wanted Glorinal’s body to be lying dead in the dark depths of that pit in the cavern. Even though that dream was fading, I wasn’t ready to let go of it yet.
    “The sahlins are coming!” She pulled free of my arm and looked around a pair of trees.
    Sahlins? I couldn’t pinpoint where I’d heard the name, but I was sure I had. Maybe ages ago, growing up. However, I couldn’t think of what they were or why their coming would cause someone like Covey to fall apart.
    Covey froze as someone rustled the bushes to the side of us.
    “Hello? What’s all this about then?” Harlan’s voice entered the clearing a second before he did. Just in time to get a knife flung at him.
    The world slowed down as I realized Covey might be impaired, but her aim wasn’t. I immediately reached out with my magic to grab it, then threw both Covey and I to the ground as the knife spun back toward us and thunked into a tree.
    I looked up to see Harlan crouching behind a tree. “I thought you were mad at Alric, not me.”
    Covey shook her head and looked around as if just waking up. “What is going on, and why did you tackle me? I mean it, if there is a chance that bastard is still alive I need to find him.”
    Harlan and I looked at each other as she got to her feet. She looked far more like herself than the hysterical and raving woman she’d been moments before. Except for the fact that she didn’t act as if she knew she’d been gone for an hour.
    Harlan studied her for a few moments, then came out from behind his tree. “You left us an hour ago, looking for the rakasa and Glorinal if he’s still alive.”
    Covey shot Harlan a look that university students everywhere feared—the ‘what lies are you trying to feed me now’, look.
    Harlan was made of far sterner stuff than the average student was and glared right back. “It’s not my fault you forgot what you were doing.”
    “I didn’t forget. I was.…” Covey rocked back on her feet and really looked where she was. “We were in my office. Why are we in the ruins?”
    Harlan scowled. “She doesn’t remember anything after leaving the office.”
    Covey rolled her eyes and looked a little less rattled. “I can speak for myself you know. Moreover, I do remember a bit more, slowly bits are coming back. Leaving the campus and heading toward the