Free Awaken the Curse by Alexa Egan Page A

“And if d’Espe succeeds in harnessing that power for himself?”
    “Give me the disk, James. Please.” She reached for the amulet, but he grabbed her wrists to hold her off. “He has my father.”
    “You don’t know that for certain. He could be bluffing.”
    Her eyes narrowed. “You might be willing to take that chance with my father’s life, but I’m not.”
    He released her as if she’d burned him, his face painfully devoid of expression. Before he recovered, she grabbed for the disk at his neck, ducking under his guard to shove him hard against the wall. He stumbled, his skull smashing against the rough stone blocks with a sickening thunk . His knees buckled, and he slid unconscious to the floor.
    Stomach rolling, hands shaking, Katherine yanked the chain free, her fingers closing around the smooth edges of the disk. Anger simmered just below her skin. Did James’s resentment run so deep, he could allow her father to be killed without a second thought? Could this be the real reason he’d come to Wales—not to assist her father, but to punish him? A tightness in her chest and an ache in her throat brought on a fit of quick gasping sobs. Had she completely misjudged James? Had desire blinded her to his bitterness and his selfish cowardice? Had she just made the third biggest mistake of her life?
    Forcing her mind and her gaze from James’s slumped body, Katherine walked out into the snow with head held high and shoulders squared.
    Ten paces away stood two shadowy figures, unmoving but for the flapping of a coat and the flicker of a shuttered lamp in the steady wind.
    “Father?” she called.
    “I’m here, Katherine. It’s all right.”
    “Bring me the disk, mademoiselle.” Malice infused the chevalier’s deep voice, chilling her already frozen body. “Once I have it in my possession, you may have your father. We’ll all gain what we most desire.”
    Do not give it to him.
    A new voice pounded against her skull. Insistent. Angry. A shadow moved at the corners of her eyes. Black on black. She turned her head but saw nothing beyond the trailing mist, the dense trees, and the cliffs rising above.
    The Gylferion are not yours to bestow nor his to accept. They belong to the Imnada.
    There it was again. Pain cramped her neck, burrowed into her shoulders as the voice beat against her brain like a hammer upon an anvil. It became an effort to put one foot in front of the other. From dim shapes, the tall, lanky frame of the chevalier d’Espe and the more rotund form of her father materialized like spirits out of the gloom.
    “Where is Duncallan?” d’Espe barked.
    She clenched her jaw, allowing no hint of her lie to penetrate her expression. “Your magic weakened him. When he tried to stop me, I killed him.”
    If the chevalier’s words grated against her ears, his smile froze her blood. “The little bee has a sting on her. I would not have thought it.”
    “It was an accident. I didn’t mean to do it.” Her heart lodged in her throat, and she felt her father’s questioning stare drill into her. Hating herself, she extended her arm, the disk lying flat upon her palm. “Is this what you wanted?”
    As d’Espe reached for the silver disk, darkness took form, sliding through the trees, gliding like a phantom over the snow. Yellow eyes burning in the night.
    We want what is ours.
    An enormous shape crashed from the trees, jaws gaping on an unearthly snarl.
    The nightwalkers. The Imnada. They were real. They had come.
    *   *   *
    James came to with a groan and a pain in his skull that radiated all the way down his spine. The room above him spun like a top, and the slightest movement churned his guts. “Katherine?” His shout ricocheted against his fried brain until he wanted to retch.
    No answer.
    He fumbled for the amulet, but he knew already the disk would be gone. She had stolen it.
    Bracing himself against the wall, he ignored the pain in his head and the cramping of his bowels and staggered