Twisted Enchantment (Unbreakable Force Book 5) by Kara Jaynes Read Free Book Online Page B

or is it colder on this side of the mountains?”
    He ignored me. I gritted my teeth, irritated. “So you can’t talk, huh?” I marched over to stand beside him. “Why not?” I asked, before it occurred to me that if he really couldn’t talk, he wouldn’t be able to answer that.
    The man sniffed the air, then turned and stalked over to Fyrsil’s tent and entered. A minute later he reemerged, followed by a bleary eyed and yawning Fyrsil, his hair messy with fly-aways in his face.
    “Time to pack up.” He yawned again, his jaw looking like it would crack, and I found myself stifling one of my own. I went to wake Aaric. He sat up, hair tousled, and blinked. “It’s still night,” he mumbled, trying to burrow back into his blankets.
    I was already rolling up the furs and pushed him off. “Fyrsil says it’s time to go,” I said, tying them into rolls. Aaric started to object, but I silenced him with a glare. “I don’t want to hear it. The sooner we leave, the sooner we can save Dahlia.” I roughly pushed the tent flap open, pulled our belongings out and carried them to the horses.
    Fyrsil was already seated on his steed, eating some bread. Zero was pulling the canvas tent down, tying blanket rolls to saddles and finishing that, pulled more rations out of a saddlebag and passed them to Fyrsil.
    “You’re not going to help take down camp?” I asked, incredulously.
    Fyrsil looked surprised. “Why would I do that?” he asked, confused. “That’s servants work.”
    I rolled my eyes. “You’re not a king anymore.”
    “I have you to thank for that,” he grumbled. He stuffed more bread in his mouth before taking the reins, guiding his horse toward the tracks. Thankfully it hadn’t snowed while we slept.
    Aaric and I finished taking our tent down and with everything ready to go, set off, eating while we rode.
    The sky was inky black, but I could tell by the air and feel that it was nearly dawn. If the Twyli had an early start, well, ours was even earlier. We should catch up within a couple of hours.
    As we rode, Fyrsil took the lead, tracking the prints. It wasn’t until we had been riding for nearly an hour, that I noticed he seemed agitated. His back was stiff, and he kept looking at the tracks behind us. Unable to contain myself, I asked, “What’s wrong?”
    Fyrsil was quiet for a moment before responding, “I don’t think the Twyli slept last night.”
    “What?” I exploded. “We wasted all that time sleeping, while they kept going?”
    “Looks like it.” Fyrsil clicked his tongue and his horse moved from a walk to a trot. It was beginning to lighten, which made it considerably safer for the horses to travel. “Fortunately for your child, we only rested four hours. Unfortunately for her, we may not be able to catch up with them. Four hours is quite a loss. They were moving slowly though. I don’t think they wanted to risk laming their horses either.”
    “We’ll catch up,” I said grimly. “No more stops.”
    Fyrsil’s tone was mild. “The horses may need some time to rest later—”
    “No stops!”
    We urged our horses to move faster. The sun was slowly rising and with it, a sense of growing panic for me. We couldn’t be too late. We couldn’t. The Twyli had to rest some time, didn’t they?
    The hours slipped by, and eventually the trees thinned. We found ourselves facing a long, cold stretch of black, rocky plains. It stretched as far as the eye could see, sloping upward. Snow covered most of it, but the perfect blanket was broken by large, stone formations, and the tracks of our prey, ever before us.
    “From here, we need to move carefully,” Fyrsil cautioned. “The Twyli are no fools; they will have slowed down as well. The land looks flat, but it’s pitted with shallow holes and dips. You risk breaking your neck if you ride too fast. We must ride single file directly over their tracks.”
    We rode out from under the shelter of the woods and onto the endless, rocky