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Chapter 1—Barely Manage

I thought I knew pain

With round The throbbing in the back of ht for several minutes while I tried to collect ht, and I was not sure if I was still under attack or not I flailed at nonexistent hands surroundinga step away fro They lay all over the ground, and I felt as though they were boxingit difficult to focus

My head spun, and I stumbled When I reached to the back of ers became sticky from the blood in my hair as my mind flashed with recent memories

I had i my sword to strike up underneath his armor, and then I was hit from behind…

I stuain as dizziness and nausea swept over me, dropped to my knees, and was sick I wiped o with the stinging pain in ed itself, I could focus better I reached out to get the leverage to rise again, but round, and I forced myself to look at the face of the body beside me

Michael

My page lay on his side with his short sword only a few feet from his stiff, cold hand I sed past the lu e standing horseless in the middle of the road

In a rush, it all came back to me, and I screamed

“ALEXANDRA!” I juain It nearly succeeded, but I e door and wrench it aside

Empty

“ALEXANDRA!” I yelled again, jerking e con of her I stood next to the opened carriage door,myas I stared at the bench seat I squeezed es from the past out of my current conjecture, but it did not work

I knew she would never have fit there, and it was ridiculous to look Some insane, irrational part of iven birth to our child during the battle and hidden hih I kneas ridiculous The very idea of opening the bench made my stomach lurch and my heart pound in my temples

I took a short step forward,with the silence aroundbut my own breath and the steps of , I reached over and pushed the seat up quickly, revealing nothing in the storage area except blankets

Nothing

I dropped back to the dirt road and gazed over the broken bodies around e driver, and an additional twenty-three bodies in unfale one lived, but the loss of their lives barely registered inafter a large battle The only thingfor anything they could sell