Free The Path of Flames (Chronicles of the Black Gate Book 1) by Phil Tucker

slopes, leaving the tree line behind as it became a series of waterfalls garlanded in ice. From there it would ascend higher and farther until he reached the holy lake known as the Dragon’s Tear. That was as far as he’d ever climbed. He knew none who had gone farther. For there began the Dragon’s Breath, the great ice road that threaded its way down from the very peaks of the mountains, down from the Valley of the Dead and the home of the gods.
    Tharok took a deep breath, inhaling the painfully cold air, and shook his head to clear his thoughts. His great tribe was shattered. His brothers and uncles had either been murdered alongside his father or were being hunted down like him. Their Women’s Council would have been broken, the women taken away and forced to join other tribes.
    He’d been running for three days now. The time was drawing close for a confrontation. Time for blood, his or theirs, but for that he would need the best ground.
    Through the frigid air came the distant call of a hound. They had picked up his scent again. These were to be his final hours. Well, he would show the Tragon scum who were following him what it meant to hunt a highland kragh in his home.
    He began to run, adopting the long-limbed lope of the wolf, one hand steadying his great horn bow where it was strapped to his back. He moved up the side of the gorge until he gained the trees and then ran parallel to the river, the snow thinner beneath the canopy. There were three hours of daylight left, three hours till the air grew cold enough to shatter trees. He would gain the Dragon’s Tear before nightfall, would run around its shore so as to set foot on the Dragon’s Breath beneath the light of the moon, and if he was lucky, if he was sure of foot and strong, he would gain that ground before they fell upon him. Legend was that one could only safely reach the Dragon’s Breath by the moon’s double-horned light. Never had he thought to test the tale himself, but tonight, tonight he would see.
    He ran, cresting the occasional bank of snow. A flock of stone-gray doves exploded from the trees as he passed beneath, and he cursed, his presence marked by their flight, but perhaps the lowland kragh would fail to understand their import. The river twisted and grew increasing rock-choked and narrow until the throat of the gorge closed at last and Tharok came upon the first waterfall, a plume of white water that cascaded some seventy yards down as it roared its delight to the world.
    He was halfway up the face of the cliff when the first arrow struck to his left. He let out a snarl of rage and looked down over his shoulder to see the lowland kragh arrayed beside the waterfall’s bowl, their dogs leaping and tugging at their leashes, their barks drowned by the roar of the waterfall. They were bending their shortbows and sighting up at him, and he almost let go so as to fall on them and crush them from this great height. Then reason asserted itself and he turned and latched on to the next handhold. If they hit him, they hit him. There was no point in worrying.
    An arrow whistled past him and bounced off an elbow of rock, spinning back out into the void. Another clattered across the rocks below his feet. Tharok forced himself higher. The massive slabs of muscle across his back were on fire now, and his hands were numb, the cold having penetrated even through his thick calluses, but on he climbed. A few more arrows were essayed, but he had passed beyond the reach of the lowlanders’ meager bows.
    The final third of the ascent was easy. Deep fissures in the cliff face presented him with plenty of room to scramble up within them without difficulty. He gained the top and turned to look back down. The Tragon kragh had begun their own ascent, hounds hoisted up on slings, their small, bright green faces staring up at him as he considered tossing down rocks or stringing his bow. But the idea of doing so rankled; that was no way to defeat an opponent. Tharok