The Daylight War. Peter Brett V.

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      She had collected herself when Arlen returned, his glow restored. The dark circles were gone from his eyes, his movements sharp and agile once more. And his blood was up. She could hear it in his breathing and see the magic crackling around him, bringing with it primal urges not easily suppressed.

      She felt much the same. Only the utmost concentration let her keep focus on the wards she was painting onto Promise’s blotched coat. The mare swatted Renna with her tail, but didn’t nip or pull away.

      ‘Feeling stronger?’ she asked.

      Arlen nodded. ‘Still feel off, though. Charged and exhausted at the same time. But it’ll do. We got a long way to ride, and I don’t mean to stop till we reach the Hollow.’

      He pointed. ‘Path up ahead will take us east to the Old Hill Road. Fell out of use ’round ninety years ago when the corelings destroyed Fort Hill. Should give us a straight, clear run to the Hollow. We ride on through tomorrow night and we’ll be there noon the next day.’

      Renna nodded. ‘Who’s Leesha Paper to you?’

      Arlen breathed three times in rhythm, the surest tell he was embracing some feeling or memory, but there was no way to know what that might be. ‘Leesha Paper is Herb Gatherer of Deliverer’s Hollow, but she’s more like Selia Barren from back in the Brook. People hop when she claps. Innkeep in Riverbridge said Jardir snatched her from the Hollow and forced her to his bed. Need to see if that’s so. Pick up the trail, if I can. Find out Jardir laid a finger on her, gonna kill him.’

      Renna smiled. ‘Wouldn’t be the man I love if you didn’t. What he did to you, I’m part fixin’ to kill him myself.’

      ‘Don’t you go tryin’ that, Ren,’ Arlen said. ‘You ent a match for him, no matter what you think you’ve learned. Jardir’s been fighting demons since before either of us was born.’

      Renna shrugged. ‘Still haven’t answered my question. Din’t ask “Who’s Leesha Paper?” Asked “Who’s Leesha Paper, to you?” Hear tell the Krasians been forcing a lot of women to their beds. Why’s this the one that makes you come running?’

      ‘She’s my friend,’ Arlen said.

      ‘You don’t talk about her like a friend,’ Renna said. ‘You go all stiff. Cold. Can’t read you. Makes me think you’re hidin’ somethin’.’

      Arlen looked at her and sighed. ‘What do you want me to say, Ren? You’ve got your Cobie Fishers, and I’ve got mine.’

      ‘Cobie Fisher is one,’ Renna said, feeling her blood pounding in her veins. ‘Da drove off any other boy who came to court more’n once. How many you got?’

      Arlen shrugged. ‘Two or three.’

      ‘Well ent you popular.’ Renna spat. She could feel the monster raging within her, the demon essence, shrieking for violence. She gritted her teeth. It was too big to embrace. It was overwhelming. She tensed, fighting back the urge to leap at him. To kill him, even.

      ‘What?’ Arlen snapped, seeing the fierce look in her eyes and returning it tenfold. ‘Was I supposed to hold true because our das bartered us like cattle? I left Tibbet’s Brook and never meant to come back, Ren.’

      Renna recoiled. Arlen Bales, just the idea of him and the memory of that kiss in the hayloft and her words of promise, had been Renna Tanner’s whole world when she was young. Dreams of Arlen had kept her going through hard times that would have broken other folk. That did break other folk. The thought that she had meant nothing to him back then, that she didn’t even enter into his thoughts, was too harsh to bear.

      Arlen rushed at her, and instinctively she drew her knife. He was quicker, grabbing her wrists and holding them down with the strength of a rock demon. She strained against him uselessly.

      ‘Din’t know the girl you were then,’ Arlen said. ‘Or the woman you’d be. I had, I would have turned right around to take you away with me.’

      Renna stopped struggling and looked at him. ‘You mean that?’

      ‘Honest word,’ Arlen said. ‘You askin’ if I got some past with women? Ay, I do. But past, as in done.’ He reached out, cupping her face and lifting it so their eyes met. ‘My future is Renna Tanner.’

      Renna let her knife drop to the ground, but when he let her go, she still leapt on him.