Free Renegade Wizards by Lucien Soulban Page A

didn’t bother turning around to face Par-Salian. “A walk,” she said, heading for the open field. She didn’t want to be around them right then. She was angry. It made it hard to think, and more important, it made her spiteful. In that instant, she despised everyone. She hated Tythonnia and she hated Par-Salian. And Par-Salian’s attempts to mollify her grated on her nerves even more.
    “It’s not safe out there.”
    Ladonna turned around long enough to level Par-Salian with a seething gaze. “I’m sure I can handle any wayward cows,” she said.
    “That’s not what I meant,” Par-Salian replied. “I think we should talk about—”
    “Not now,” Ladonna said as she walked away. “And I suggest you learn to understand women better. I don’t need your help.”
    To Par-Salian’s credit, he didn’t pursue the matter. Ladonna marched into the darkness and continued past the high grass that stroked her hips. In the lonely quiet, her anger bled away and her nerves went still. Ladonna turned to gain her bearings; she could barely make out the clutch of trees against the distant sky, but it would be enough to guide her back eventually.
    Ladonna found an outcropping of rocks that broke the seaof grass and sat upon her granite throne. It was too peaceful out here, too quiet. Absent were the noises she found familiar, the sounds of a city that never truly slept. The noise of humanity. The sleeping breath of other children. She missed that; she missed the sense of family, the close-knit bonds that made survival more bearable. She inhaled deeply, as though winded by the memories.
    What’s bothering me? she wondered. She was usually in better control of her emotions. She angered too easily these days, too quick to the boiling. And too quick after that to the overflowing, rash decisions and actions she would always regret.
    It was a step back, a relapse into someone—something she was before. She grew angry again, her ire slowly flaring. She recognized elements of her old self, the volatile temper and its aftermath. The violence was still there, the child made into beast, a creature of stark instincts. She wasn’t that animal anymore. In fact, she hated that animal. It took years to tame it and break its conditioning. But why was it returning? Why was she relapsing into someone she abandoned years before?
    Palanthas, she realized. Her city, her den. She was returning home, and that meant facing a legion of fears and bad memories. She was going back to face the monsters, a child at the mercy of the merciless. That alone spurred her heart to racing faster.
    Sutler.
    Ladonna shifted uncomfortably on the rock. Palanthas was stripping away her crafted veneer, exposing the frightened little thing beneath.
    Stop this! Ladonna chastised herself. What am I afraid of? That I’ll become that child again? I am a wizard of the black robes, the most feared of practitioners, the strongest of spellcasters.
    She forced herself to dispel the storm of emotions thatwelled within her. She was no longer that defenseless child, that urchin thief. A gulf of fifteen years separated who she was then from herself at that moment. It had been fifteen years of magical preparation and dedication, fifteen years of training to survive and surpass one life-altering test for a lifetime of power and mystical prowess. She commanded fire, ice, shadow, wind, earth, and even death itself. She communed with those things that could not be seen, and how they feared her.
    A smile crept across Ladonna’s lips. Oh how she would have loved to have possessed those powers as a child, to have protected herself and provided for the brothers and sisters she made on the streets of Palanthas. She could think of a few men and women who would have benefited from her more punishing magics. The lessons she could have taught men such as Sutler …
    Sutler.
    Her bones still ached from his touch.
    Ladonna rose from the rocks and slowly made her way back to the others.