| LEN BOSWELL |
them both to a mysterious gathering that will change their lives forever—or end them on the spot. To survive, they must fight through an unforgiving world of assassins, ancient myth, and forgotten gods to a mythical land where their fates await. As they face danger after danger, Rhynt begins to realize she has more than enough power to deal with whatever comes, including the secrets foretold in The Cave of the Six Arrows. Excerpt The sky rumbled, raven clouds roiling, whipping rain near sideways. He had to tug hard on the reins to keep the horse steady as they crested the rock-strewn hill, everything so gray that, if not for the bright yellow shaft of the arrow, he would certainly have passed by the body of the man in gray, thinking him nothing more than another boulder. Calax Halfhand had seen dead men before, and he
much preferred them to the wide-eyed screaming wounded that he’d had to dispatch over the years, sending them to their peace and their gods and the carrion eaters with his broadsword. He dismounted, tied his steed to a scrub pine, and approached the body, tugging out the strange arrow before turning the body over to see the man’s face. The man’s eyes, gray as his cloak, stared up at Calax blankly, the rain pooling in them, making them seem to twitch with life. But he was dead, all right, a man two score at least, his beard grizzled, his face a lacework of scars, though none recent. He was tall, maybe two hands taller than Calax, and built like an ox, heavy in the chest. He was righthanded certainly, his forearm huge from repeated swings of a broadsword or mace. His hair, black as wood char, was shorn close, with a diamond pattern shaved to the skin above each ear. Green dye of some sort had been applied there to match the sigil on his cloak, one unknown to Calax. He smelled of woodsmoke and sweat, a sign that he’d been traveling for some distance. Days, certainly, perhaps weeks. The man was unarmed save for a small dagger sticking from his scuffed boot. Calax pulled it out and hefted it—light, much lighter than his own. The grip was carved bone, common enough, but the blade had a green cast to it, as if its maker had somehow combined iron with emeralds. Calax slid the dagger into his own boot and turned his attention to the cracked leather pouch hanging around the man’s neck, opening it and emptying its contents on the man’s chest: a few coins from an unknown kingdom, a piece of weir’s root for sour stomach, a flint, some moss from a witch’s oak, and a small scroll tied with gut. Calax opened the scroll and read a single sentence written in the common tongue: You will know him by his hand, or the half of it, and the name Calax Halfhand. You must bring him to me. Calax blinked, hard. What? Issue 60 | July/August 2021 |
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