Free The Borderkind by Christopher Golden Page B

that distance, Oliver felt sure he could hear her laughing. For a moment he envied her, so unafraid to be out there on her own.
    Then she stepped to the edge of the rock and dove in.
    Oliver held his breath in fascination as the waves continued to roll in. He waited for her to come up, and when she did, pushing the damp curtain of her hair away from her eyes, he smiled to himself and started to wade out toward her. There was such abandon in this girl—the girl he’d barely noticed before—that he wanted to be a part of that.
    He’d gotten three steps when the waterlogged Nerf struck him in the back of the head, then plopped into the ocean, bobbing on the waves. Laughter erupted, and Oliver turned and picked up the ball, trying to figure out which of the guys was responsible so that he could unleash watery vengeance.
    He hadn’t spoken to Julianna that day, or any other day that summer.
    But he had never forgotten how she had looked, there on the very tip of the jetty, in the spray of the ocean, or the way he’d held his breath when she’d dived into the waves.
    Even now, he held the memory—that image of the thirteen-year-old Julianna—close in his mind. Somehow, it felt to him like a tether to home—like no matter how far he roamed, as long as he could hold on to moments like that, he could still hope to return to Julianna one day.
    With every day that passed, he regretted even more the hesitation he had felt on the night before they would have been married. When his father was still alive, he would have blamed the old man for making him so discontent with his life that he doubted even what he felt for Julianna. But, as much of a bastard as Max Bascombe had been, Oliver knew the blame lay with himself. He’d never had the courage that Julianna had.
    Crossing the Veil had set him free. He felt different, here: more confident, more
himself,
than ever before.
    But the last time he had spoken to Julianna, her voice had been filled with hurt and doubt and hesitation. His disappearance had given her reason to feel all of those things, and he longed, now, for the opportunity to make it up to her. He had to find Collette first, to get his sister back safely. And he had to convince the monarchs of the Two Kingdoms to grant him a reprieve, to let him prove himself. With every day, he was moving further away from Julianna.
    But he felt closer to her than ever before.
    For the first time in his life, he felt as if he might be worthy of her.

CHAPTER 4
    T he tavern was on the first floor. When they’d arrived, Oliver had had other things to distract him, but as he descended the stairs he was extremely conscious of the fact that the whole building hung suspended above the river. The inn was old—a century at least from the look of it, and probably more—but if it had lasted this long, he told himself, it would survive another night.
    Outside the windows, in the gorge, the shadows were growing long. Evening was not far off. After a bath, and clad in the new clothes Coyote had brought by only ten minutes ago, his exhaustion had subsided to a dull heaviness. He needed sleep, but he could propel himself forward another hour or two, however long it took for this meeting, and a meal.
    The shirt was a rough tan cotton, long-sleeved and open at the collar, and the pants might have been denim, but dyed black. They were a bit long, so that when he put on the new boots Coyote had brought, they dragged underfoot, but Oliver was so impressed with the fit in general that he would not have complained, even if he dared.
    The best thing about his new clothes was the thick, soft cotton socks and the light undershorts, which were woven from a fabric unfamiliar to him. Putting them on was almost as soothing as his bath.
    His hunger, as he entered the tavern, was a ravenous beast, growling in his belly. The smells that wafted along the corridor only made it worse. But once inside, he forgot about food for several moments.
    “Apparently, I’m