Tortall by Tamora Pierce Read Free Book Online Page B

could spare another coin to have their garden weeded. Qiom was on his way to wake Fadal when he heard shouts. Two boys ran toward him, one bleeding from a cut eyebrow.
    “We found a woman dressed as a man!” the injured boy told Qiom. “There was a fight; Jubrahal tore her shirt off, that’s how we knew. They’re taking her to the temple for correction.” He scampered down a side street, yelling, “Men of the town, come to the temple!”
    Qiom frowned. A woman dressed as a man—Fadal said it was rare and forbidden. Who had been caught?
    Fadal.
    Qiom raced for the temple. Running, he passed the well. Fadal’s open pack sat there, unattended. Here was proof that their woman was Fadal, if he’d needed it. Fadal would never have left the pack here—it carried their money, their fishing hooks, their food, and their clothes. He stopped for a moment, breathless. The sight of that abandoned pack reminded him of the human dead, hung on dead trees.
    “The temple is closed to ordinary matters!” a priest cried from the temple steps as men raced inside past him. “We must cleanse our town of this demon woman!” He entered the temple, closing the doors firmly.
    Pain roared through Qiom like fire. They would throw stones at Fadal’s human flesh. They would break her kindness,her patience, her stories, and her willingness to work hard.
    Part of him cried: Fadal is no tree. You are no man. Escape! They will chop you down because you walk with her.
    The heat in Qiom’s heart burned that part of him to ashes. He ran up to the closed temple doors and laid his hands on them. They were tall, carved oak. When he tried to open them, he found they were locked.
    Hurry, he must hurry, before they hurt Fadal beyond repair. Qiom set his right hand on one door, his left on the other, and pushed up from his roots. The doors creaked. He pushed again, opening his mouth to let the fire out of his heart in a vast, wordless howl.
    The doors exploded off their hinges, smashing the closest benches, knocking down two fistfuls of men and boys. Qiom strode in, still howling, and seized a bench in each hand.
    Men charged him. He smacked them with his benches until they fell and did not rise. Once he had made sure none of them got up, Qiom looked around the chamber. A huge fire burned at its heart, its roar mingling with the moans of those he had knocked aside. There was no one left on this side of the chamber, no sign of his friend.
    Qiom moved until he could look around the central fire. On its far side, opposite the door, men held on to the shirtless Fadal. Qiom would have to go close to the fire to get her.
    For a moment his courage wavered. The fire would reach out to devour him.
    His mind showed him a picture as Qiom hesitated. Itwas a pear, on a piece of flat rock—a kind offering to a man all other humans had attacked and frightened.
    Qiom stalked forward, circling the fire. Its heat pressed his skin as he walked up to Fadal’s captors. He knocked three of them into the wall, then flung the bench on top of them. He dropped his other bench, grabbed the orange-sashed priest, and tossed him into the wall. One man remained, clutching Fadal as he kept a knife to her throat. Fadal’s face was bruised; her shirt, breast band, and shoes were gone. Even her trousers were ripped.
    “Cut Fadal and I will tear you to pieces.” Qiom hardly recognized the voice that growled from his throat.
    The man was already white and trembling. He threw down his knife, shoved Fadal at Qiom, and ran.
    Qiom slung his friend over his shoulder. It was time to go. He raced through the opening where the temple doors had been, into the square. Ahead lay the gates to the open road. Once away from the town—
    The pack. Qiom swerved to seize Fadal’s pack from the lip of the well. Awkwardly he passed the bundle to Fadal. She tucked it between her chest and his back to cushion her jolting body.
    Now Qiom opened his stride, his eyes on the town gates. A guard was trying to