The Nethergrim by Matthew Jobin Read Free Book Online Page A

scowled, defiant. He reached out to open the door a crack.
    “That’s mine!” Edmund knew better than to simply stand and shout. He stepped quick across the tavern. “Give it back.”
    “I’m a better shot than you!” Geoffrey held Edmund’s unstrung longbow like a sword, and wore Edmund’s quiver of arrows on his back. “You stink at archery—you don’t even practice! Why should you get to have it?”
    “Because you’re a kid.” Edmund advanced to charging range. “You want your own longbow, go buy one when you’re older.”
    Geoffrey shook the whippy shaft in Edmund’s face. “You didn’t buy this! Father gave it to you!”
    “Which means it’s mine, so hand it over.”
    “He gives you everything.” Geoffrey threw the bow and quiver at Edmund’s feet, then flung back the door to stomp outside. Sharp white sunlight cut through the middle of the tavern.
    “Shut that, will you?” Wat Cooper raised a hand to shade his eyes. He sat with Hob Hollows by the fire, their feet up on benches, ales in hand.
    Edmund pulled the door to, muffling the happy chatter and the tramp of feet on the Longsettle road. He bent to gather spilled arrows back into the quiver and laid it on the tavern’s best table. He considered giving the spell one more try, then changed his mind and reached for his best new shoes by the door, the ones he had haggled hard for at market. The last thing he wanted was to keep Katherine waiting.
    “It’s burning low.” Hob waved a hand at the fire. “Fetch us some wood, there’s a lad.”
    Edmund raised the lid of the pot that hung over the hearth. An odor of garlic and onions stung his nose. “Mum!” He aimed his shout at the closed door to the kitchen. “I’m going early!”
    “Edmund, did you do the threshing?” His mother’s voice rose from somewhere out back. “Your father said you have to get the threshing done before you go.”
    “Geoffrey hasn’t done anything, and he already left!” Edmund took up a spare bowl and spooned out a few globs of barley porridge from the pot. The new shoes pinched his toes painfully tight, but he supposed that was the fashion.
    “You can’t just leave it sitting on the stalks, Edmund!” His mother spoke over a swirl of clucks. “You get that threshing done or you’ll catch it from your father when he gets back!”
    “All right, all right.” Edmund ate standing by the pot, scooping down the porridge as fast as he could. He nudged a bit of charred leather with his foot—the binding from one of his books. It had fallen off onto the hearth, preserving with it the torn, burnt corner of a single page.
    Hob Hollows shouldered him aside and reached for the ladle. “So then, Edmund.” He slopped himself a huge helping of porridge. “Going in the archery tourney today?”
    Edmund eyed up at him. “Maybe I am.”
    Hob looked over at Wat. They broke out in peals of drunken laughter.
    Edmund chewed at his gummy porridge. He pointed at Hob with his spoon. “Are you going to pay for that?”
    Hob dug out one last spoonful, put it in his mouth and belched. “I’m good for it, lad, no problems.” He regained his seat by the fire. “I’ll bring a good chicken by tomorrow, settle it all up proper.”
    “That’s what you said last night.”
    “Did I?”
    “Edmund!” His mother sounded louder and closer amidst the clack of bowls being stacked for the wash. “Did you hear me?”
    Edmund thunked down his breakfast and reached for bow and quiver. “Yes, Mum!”
    “The threshing, Edmund, you see that done before your father gets back. If he catches you—”
    “Just going now!” Edmund did not stay to hear the rest. He thrust back the door and leapt into the sunshine. Almost everyone was going south, dressed up in their humble finest, but Edmund turned north up through the square. Short and shaggy Nicky Bird lounged at his ease on the steps of the hall. Martin Upfield leaned against one of the yew trees—Katherine’s cousin on her