Page 77 of Reaper's Quest

The existing issue?finding and getting to that someone.

At my back, the footfalls paused, shuffled, then moved toward me. I mumbled a barely audible curse and shivered against the falling temperature.

What would the royal guards do if they caught me? Would they toss me into a dungeon? Tortured or hanged? Simply killed on sight?

I tried to glance over my shoulder, but my footingslipped. My support crumbled. My unwounded shoulder slammed into the wall, and I started to drop. I caught myself mere inches from the ground, and another curse left my lips at little more than a moan.

“Raven?”

I tensed, sending lava-hot pangs ripping through my shoulder. With a whimper, I turned halfway and rested my weight against the wall.

Winter approached.

Seeing no point in trying to run from the inevitable oncoming questions and scrutiny, I chose to rest a moment and allow him to catch me.

“Surprise.” My voice rasped, rough with sarcasm, even as my brain scrambled for a viable story to spin.

Only my creative well had dried, and my delivery sounded…oh, so not right.

“What happened to you?” The tenor of his voice sharpened with concern and something else I couldn’t quite place.

He cupped my shoulder with unexpected gentleness and helped support my weight.

I didn’t meet his gaze but sensed his quick evaluation roaming over me, taking in the damage. He eased my hand away from the wound at my waist.

A muscle in his jaw ticced. “My gods! Who did this to you?”

I sighed, releasing all hope of avoiding the truth. At least, some of the truth, anyway. “A bunch of overzealous soldier boys.”

Boys likely five times my age and who probably hadn’t seen so much action in forever. A century, at least.

I glanced at the hand I had pressed to the wound. Mypalm and the spaces between my fingers were thick with crimson. So much blood. Too much blood. I shifted my gaze from my hand to my waist. The black of my attire was wet, the blood darkening the fabric. The world spun, and bile rose in my throat.

“I don’t feel so good,” I said, my voice small and distant.

“Understandable.” He shrugged out of his jacket and pressed the material to my wound. “You’ve lost a lot of blood. An artery, or something equally serious, may have been hit.”

The pressure had become a thousand knives stabbing at me. I screamed.

“I’m sorry. It had to be done to minimize the bleeding,” he murmured. “I’ve got you, Raven. You’re going to be all right.”

I laughed, but the sound bordered on hysteria.

People always said things would be all right when they desired it to be true but worried it wouldn’t be so. Was Winter afraid I would die? I couldn’t truly die…could I? I was a reaper—the one dealing with the dying, not actuallydoingthe dying. Plus, I didn’t see any Killian standing nearby to take my soul.

Probably couldn’t get into the citadel.

Only…

A flicker of movement in the shadows set in an alcove across the street caught my attention. Someone or somethingwasthere, camouflaged in the darkness, watching.

I shivered, yet felt hot, as if beads of sweat broke out across my brow. Then, in a flash, my teeth chattered, my body chilled to the bone. So cold that ice might as well have encased me.

Had the Killian come for me after all?

“Killian…” I said with the tiniest of whispers.

“What was that?” Winter leaned in and slid his arm around me, scratching the wound on my shoulder.