Maeve Read Online Free Page B

the blood to keep the sticky mess off herself, she placed her hands on the cerdd’s back and let the healing power flow.
    After awhile, back aching from the unnatural position, she straightened. Gwynnor’s flesh was whole again, the only sign of the savage wounds a faint pink tracery crossing the thick, grayish fuzz growing on the pale skin of his body.
    He blinked and sat up, looking at her, eyes staring wildly, he quickly focused on the gelatinous blood pooled around him. He tugged at his tattered tunic and glanced briefly at the bloody rags that barely covered her torso.
    Uncomfortable in the silence, Aleytys said abruptly, “I heal.”
    â€œSo I see.” He chuckled, a sudden flash of humor born from his near-brush with death. “The peithwyr?”
    Aleytys jumped up and looked back across the stone. “Still dying.”
    Holding onto her, Gwynnor pulled himself onto his feet and stared at the slowly writhing form of the killer bird. “How?”
    She touched her waist. “Energy gun.”
    â€œCome on.” He scrambled over the corpse of the kaffa and began tearing at the saddle bags.
    â€œWhat’s the hurry?”
    â€œIts mate. We might not be lucky a second time.” He pulled the knots loose and swung the waterskin over his shoulder, the bags over another. Aleytys hurried to follow his example.
    As they moved along a path, clinging to the side of a ravine that opened out a few meters from the battered corpses of the kaffan and the still struggling peithwyr, Aleytys glanced nervously at the sky. “You think the peithwyr won’t see us down here?”
    Gwynnor shrugged, then edged around a curve, pressing his body tight against the side wall. His voice came back to her. “Be careful. The stone is crumbling badly here.”
    After they negotiated the dangerous area, Gwynnor said suddenly, “Their wing spread’s too great. We should be safe as long as this keeps going in the right direction.” Then he added, “I think.”
    She looked back at the sun, still stubbornly high above the western horizon, fully visible even from the depths of the ravine. “How long till sunset?”
    â€œFour, five more hours. Why?”
    â€œI’m about out of push. My home world has a shorter day. And the standard one I’ve got used to since is shorter than that.”
    â€œOh.”
    A shattering scream battered at them. The peithwyr’s mate, wings folded back, plunged at them in a steep suicidal dive.
    â€œSwardheld.” Aleytys surrendered her body, scarcely waiting to be sure he heard. Black eyes blazing, he took her body, snatched the gun from her trouser belt. An eye shot. Then he scrambled back frantically to avoid the plummeting body.
    Breathing hard, Gwynnor and Aleytys stumbled around a bend in the ravine, the screams and papery rattle of the dying bird following them.
    Gwynnor eyed the blunt, ugly gun with a touch of envy. “If we had those instead of …” He flicked contemptuous fingers over the butt of the darter shoved behind his belt.
    Aleytys shuddered, still loathing the feel of the deadly thing. She thrust it away and pulled her tunic down. “The Captain couldn’t sell them to you,” she said quietly, absently. She breathed a swift flash of gratitude to Swardheld, felt his answering grin, then moved away from the wall and continued along the bottom of the ravine. “The Company men would hunt him down without mercy if he did that. You, too, and your companions. So be grateful the situation is as it is.”
    â€œTchah!”
    Behind them, the peithwyr tore at the stone and groaned as it fought death fiercely. The sound lessened and died away as they turned more corners in the torturously winding ravine.
    â€œWill we reach the edge of the plateau anytime soon?”
    â€œNo.” He stumbled, caught himself, then rearranged the straps of the waterskins and the saddlebags. “We have to