The Unwilling Aviator (Book 4) by Heidi Willard Read Free Book Online Page B

interesting room," he commented.
    "Only if you're interested in bugs," Pat muttered. Ruth smiled and patted her on the shoulder.
    "Glad you like it!" Hugh chortled. He opened the other two doors and showed that the rooms were much the same as the first. "Did you need anything else?" he asked his customers.
    Pat's eyes swept over the dry tinder that made up the walls. "A match," she mumbled.
    This time Hugh heard her and frowned. "What for?" he growled.
    "For the candles," Ruth spoke up. "The rooms are very dark."
    Hugh's face brightened and he nodded his head. "Those are in the nightstands beside the beds. I'll just let you folks get comfortable, but if you need anything just holler and have your purse ready!" He strolled down the hall, and out of sight and hearing.
    Pat swung around to Ned and her teeth ground together so hard sparks flew out. "What in the world are you thinking having us stay here?" she growled.
    "We need some place to stay," he pointed out.
    Pat slammed her fist into the wall to her right and her fingers sunk several inches into the wood. "But this rotten, disgusting place?"
    "It's all we can afford unless Sins can supply us with money to go to a better place," Percy suggested. The party turned to the assassin, who merely glared back at them.
    "I believe we should accept that as a 'no' and make ourselves comfortable here," Ned insisted.
    "I will keep the bugs away from you," Ruth promised Pat as she led the furious girl into their room beside the first one shown.
    "That's no comfort, Ruth," Pat replied. They shut the door behind them and the five men were left to divvy up the remaining two rooms.
    "As the youngest I suppose Fred and I should take a room," Percy suggested.
    "Apprenticeship supersedes age affiliation, so I will keep Fred with me," Ned replied.
    Canto glanced between Percy and Sins, then looked to Ned with a deep scowl. "Ah'm not sharing a room with them," he argued.
    Sins strode past the group, opened the window at the end of the hall, and slipped out into the darkness. Percy turned to Canto and shrugged. "It seems it will only be the two of us."
    Canto continued to frown, but Percy and he willingly went into their room across the hall from that of the girls. That left Ned and Fred with the first room shown, the one with the fine view of the dank alley one floor below them.

CHAPTER 8
     
    Ned led Fred inside and quietly shut the door behind them. Fred looked at the bed, shuddered and turned to Ned. "I can take the floor-" Ned put his wizened hand over Fred's mouth and pressed a finger to his own lips. Ned's eyes dodged over to the wall that adjoined the one with the girls. Fred's eyes widened when he clearly heard their voices drift through the thin wood.
    Inside the room Ruth sat on the bed while Pat paced the floor, though carefully. A wrong step and she would have practiced walking on air with one foot. Ruth turned her head to and fro watching her agitated friend wear holes in the existing holes. "If I ever get a hold of that castor without his staff I'll-" Pat punctuated her sentence with another punch into a wall. It left a dent.
    "He means well," Ruth argued.
    Pat turned to her with her mouth agape. "Means well? He means to kill us all! That has been his very intention since I first met him at the temple!"
    Ruth covered her mouth to hide her smile. She composed herself, set her hands in her lap, and straightened. "I am sure if he had meant to kill us then we would be dead," she argued.
    "He seeks to do us in in the most painful way possible, and this filth of a place may be it," Pat insisted. In the other room Ned glanced at Fred and quietly chuckled.
    "Our stay here will be short. I promise I will not rest tonight until I find the stone. Then I will try my best to win it in the tournament," Ruth promised.
    Pat stopped her pacing, sighed, and strode over to plop herself on the bed. She grasped Ruth's hands in her own and looked the girl in the eye. "You don't have to go through with