Free Templar's Destiny (9780545415095) by Kat Black

rustle of restless movement. “It could be a coincidence, but this is no’ the time for chances. Far too much is a’ stake.”
    â€œThat is what I assumed you would say. The matter is already being taken care of.”
    I heard the clink of coin exchanged. “Ye will go far in this, lad. Yer service is noted.”
    My throat tightened. Bertrand. I slipped from my place and made my way quickly down the stairs. In the space of a moment, the preceptory had changed. This place of refuge no longer held the safety I had come to rely on. My hopes and dreams were somehow muddied in a wash of uncertainty. Templar Knights, plotting against one of their own. My friend.
    Anger curled within me, and as I passed through the dark and dusty hallways, the power deep below the land seemed to pulse with my every footfall. Without reaching, I felt the essence that was Bertrand. The location echoed impressions that had somehow become stored within my memory, the smell of a cook fire and baking bread. I turned toward the scent. He was near the kitchens.
    That I could sense him there was a comfort. My focus was absolute: Get Bertrand and get out. The road I followed was all but deserted. Swiftly, I passed the granary and the weavers, across a field and along the path between the workers’ huts, careful to avoid being seen.
    Several wagons were being unloaded near the kitchens. Workers were hurrying and hauling. As I passed the side of a cart, I lifted a full sack of turnips. “Be at it, quickly!” a man emerging from the kitchens urged. “There will be little time as it is to prepare the feast,” he said. “His Eminence enjoys a meal that is overflowing.”
    I ducked beyond the wooden lintel and into the kitchen, which was a flurry of activity. Workers were peeling and chopping vegetables, plucking an assortment of fowl, and stoking the fire in a hearth that stretched the width of one entire wall. The smell of baking filled every corner of the room. I dropped the heavy sack beside others of its kind and before anyone could direct me toward another duty, I ducked through a doorway into a small corridor that smelled sharply of drying herbs. As I worked my way through the building, the feel of Bertrand grew stronger. Yet I had to move with caution — there were others near. Voices and the edge of panic wafted toward me on the currents of power stirring in my wake.
    â€œI don’t understand, he was well just a moment ago.” The voice was one of the trainees who had been with Zachariah. “Put something beneath his head. Call a healer.”
    I began to move more quickly, the gift in me responding to someone in need.
    â€œBut he is a healer,” murmured the first.
    â€œWell, he’s obviously not able to tend to himself. Call another.” As I reached the door, a boy brushed past in a sprint. Behind him several men clustered around a body on the floor. “His breath has stopped.” I slipped into the room, the power of the land seeping through the soles of my feet and washing through my body, readying for use.
    The room was in half-light. Through the cluster of people, the pale slackness of Bertrand’s face leapt at me, and my heart seemed to stop. With little care to the consequences, I pushed through the gathered, dropped to his side, and grasped his hand. Beneath my fingers his skin was hot and moist and the power within me surged like the crash of a wave.
    â€œBreathe!” The trainee was leaning over him, feeling along his neck and chest for signs of life. I felt the man drawing from the web haphazardly, but knew that his abilities were weak. He seemed to have no idea what to do. No one would sense my use of the power in the muddle he was making.
    Quickly, I moved into the haze of other sight, opening my mind to the inner workings of Bertrand’s body. His breath and the beat of his heart were slow.
    Help me. I sent the call deep into Bertrand’s mind as