Page 16 (1/2)

When she moved her Queen to protect a Blood male that couldn’t escape capture, his teritted teeth as he took the Bloodyour Queen for a pawn"

The air in the wagon chilled so much he could see his breath

Startled, he looked at her

The gray eyes that had been waro were icy, hard, and reflected a fury that ca at all

Never breaking eye contact, she reached out and deliberately knocked over her Queen "There are no pawns"

Looking away, she began gathering up the captured pieces that were lying beside her on the bench, carefully setting each one into the box

Watching the jerkythe lash

"Thank you for the ga around for the last piece "I’m tired noish to rest"

As she picked up the last piece, a Blood ers closed protectively around it

The cold dis that all the pieces and the dice were back in the box, he slipped it into the cloth bag and left the wagon He returned the game to Blaed with faint thanks and hurried away

No one approached hi look at his face and left hiame to be played with an enemy, because it exposed the heart’s weaknesses

All these long years later, he understood the quarrels between Belarr and Reyna as he never had before Despite their Craft and their courage--or, perhaps, because of it-- Healers didn’t have a strong sense of self-preservation and would drain the point before they’d back away fro Which hy, by Blood Law, every Healer had to be served by at least one Jeweled male unless she had a Jeweled consort or husband ould assu her froinally for too much of themselves?

Since he’d never served in a court before he was Ringed, he’d never been with a Queen he respected let alone wanted to protect, never experienced the fierce loyalty and pride that he’d heard filled ood Queen

For the rest of thefroain Speculation and htened He couldn’t shake the idea that Reyna would like Lady Grizelle, and it troubled hiood Queen troubled him even more, because Belarr would question the honor of a Red-Jeweled Warlord ould abandon a Queen during a difficult journey

Hell’s fire, he was aslaveHe hadn’t agreed to serve her Why shouldn’t he escape if he got the chance? He wanted to go home He wanted to talk to Reyna Wanted,needed to explain

Belarr had never been a slave There was no way he could fully appreciate the emotional difference What would the Sadist do if he were here, wearing the Invisible Ring?

No answers No answers Just a churning uneasiness that ca that he would have to et any worse, it started raining again

"Hell’s fire," Randolf snarled "What’s wrong with Garth now?"

"I don’t know," Jared said as the bigout his arms to help maintain his balance on the muddy road

Garth tended to roam ahead of the rest of theht,would do The fact that the Gray Lady didn’t keep hi about her that baffled the other males Granted, Garth couldn’t ride the Winds by himself, if he had ever been able to, and it wasn’t likely that he could get far enough away on foot to prevent the Gray Lady froh the Ring of Obedience, but that leniency wasn’t typical in a slave owner

Jared shook his head Right now, he wasn’t interested in puzzling over the peculiarities of feht--what little of it there had been that day--aning, and the only thing he was interested in was finding a place tohot to eat So his voice had an edge to it when he said, "What is it, Garth?"

Garth gave no sign of having heard hi toward Jared, he suddenly veered toward Corry and Cathryn, waving his ar to herd small far his ar Garth, but there was nothing a bigger and bigger, or the fear in Corry’s face when he grabbed Cathryn’s hand and ran back to the wagon